thegraffik | Design and Illustration

Heinz ketchup packet finally gets a re-design

From Heinz ketchup packet finally gets a re-design

You’ve all seen this sucker before:

The venerable Heinz ketchup packet above has been around since 1968. Forty-two years later, they finally got around to a re-design. The new packet holds three times as much ketchup–perfect for me, since I normally use three of the old packets for the average order of fries–and can be used in “squeeze and pour” or “dipping” mode:

via cs monitor

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Coroflot Launches Job Board with Brand New

From Coroflot Launches Job Board with Brand New

It is with great excitement that we welcome our newest Coroflot job board partner – Brand New – into the fold! Brand New is *the* go-to site for seeing and discussing new corporate and brand identity work. Topical subjects like the most recent Super Bowl identity receive scores and scores of comments from their community of design pros — not surprising given that Brand New is an off-shoot of the legendary online design community Speak Up.

So please extend them a welcome by joining the conversation at Brand New and, if you need some branding help of your own, post a job!

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Keynote: Bruce Sterling on Atemporality

From Keynote: Bruce Sterling on Atemporality

If progress is to go beyond the banal indulgences that give rise to a never-ending array of car shell designs then we need to analyse our present time with regard to its aesthetics and its media.

Watch Bruce Sterling’s keynote on Atemporality at Berlin’s Transmediale.

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Comcast! You’ve got some Xplainin’ to do!

From Comcast! You’ve got some Xplainin’ to do!

Based in Philadelphia, with approximately 100,000 employees worldwide, Comcast is the largest provider of cable, internet and digital phone in the United States with 23.6 million, 15.9 million, and 7.6 million customers respectively. To add to its media influence, this past December, Comcast became the majority owner of NBC Universal with a 51% stake in the company in partnership with GE, who owns the other 49%. Comcast also owns television networks like E! Entertainment, the Golf Channel and Sprouts. With a diversifying range of businesses, the parent company, Comcast Corporation announced last week that it would rebrand its consumer services — cable, internet, and digital phone — to XFINITY. All caps. The three services will now be called XFINITY TV, XFINITY Voice and XFINITY Internet, and will begin to be rolled out this week in eleven markets, with the name and identity appearing in advertising, uniforms, trucks and on the cable user interface.

The modest image adorning the sole page xfinity.com.

Surprisingly, there was no press release with a rationalization for the name or any explanations of how the logo represents cutting edge technology and XFINITY’s commitment to its customers. Or whatever. The new name feels at the same time pompous and clichéd — as if there is no brighter horizon than the infinity of XFINITY but, really, nothing is as depressing as a badly placed “X,” a gesture better reserved for extreme games and products, for bad dot-com era start-ups and for strip-club dancers not named Destiny. It might sound more fun than “Comcast” but at least Comcast sounds like a real company with almost fifty years of experience.

The logo is nearly decent once you accept the name, although it falls prey to a number of clichés as well. First there is the lowercase approach which, if it weren’t for the obligation to write it in text as XFINITY, it wouldn’t be as obnoxious but having that extreme difference will only lead to confusion. Then there is the omission of the tittles, the dots of the “i,” that does create a cleaner wordmark but I believe lowercase “i”s are meant to live in harmony with their dots be it in this lifetime or in infinity. There is a nice gesture when the “f” and “t” join with the “x” and “y” and their crossbars are edged at the same angle as the diagonal characters. But this nice move is offset by too much space between the rest of the letters — “xf” and “ty” become tightly kerned, and the rest is too spacious. When you think about it, this identity could have been more xtremely designed, and it’s surprising that there was so much restraint shown, so let’s appreciate that, because there isn’t much else.

Thanks to Adam Gilson for first tip. Title apologies to Ricky Ricardo.

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Better than the Rasterbator: convert raster images to vector graphics with ONull

From Better than the Rasterbator: convert raster images to vector graphics with ONull

Kim Asendorf, an interactive artist from Kassel, Germany, has just released the first version of ONull, a new tool for vectorizing raster graphics.

The software, written in Java with a Processing core, works by changing pixelized color information into a halftone pattern, much like The Rasterbator. The difference is that ONull’s halftone pattern is highly customizable, allowing you to choose from a wide variety of vector pixels—circles, square, triangles, X-shapes, etc—and adjust opacity, stroke, rotation, and amplification settings until you get the image you want. One can even import a custom vector pixel, resulting in effects like this:

We’re especially excited for the next version of ONull—it will include vector sets and triangle fields, further increasing the transformative, graphic properties of this vectorizing software. For a preview, check out MJ below.

Download the first version here, or click through for more examples.

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Nafi and Anna: Two new interiors from Zmik

From Nafi and Anna: Two new interiors from Zmik

Swiss designers Zmik have a knack for the highly detailed execution of simple concepts. This is demonstrated especially well in their two latest projects: Nafi and Anna.

Nafi, pictured top, is a new interior for an existing hair salon, dividing it into two zones that contrast in their function (waiting room vs. working area) as much as their atmosphere. The first section of the deep rectangular space is seamlessly papered with photocopies of Vogue magazines on brown packing paper, furnished opulently, and lit warmly, creating an intimate space for discussion and rest. This butts abruptly into the second segment, designed for working—it’s brightly lit and bare, with nothing to distract the stylist.

Anna (pictured second) is an interior treatment for Iart Interactive AG’s new office space in an old building. Anamorphosis is used to visually enlarge narrow corridors. From 5 fixed positions, the wireframe drawings reveal imaginary spaces behind the walls, appearing as abstract, graphic lines otherwise.

Many more shots of both after the jump.

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Molson Canadian, Now More Canadian

From Molson Canadian, Now More Canadian

First brewed in 1959 Molson Canadian has never shied away from wearing its Canadian-ness on its sleeve. Whether it be the pseudo rabble-rousing “I am Canadian” ads of the late 1990s, the Molson Mega Keg (an overt play on Canada’s love of oversized monuments along the Trans-Canada Highway), or even the brand name itself. However Canadians have always had a bit of a love hate relationship with brands that speak so directly to the notion of being Canadian. So it’s no surprise that recent examples of Molson Canadian’s overt Canadiana often walk the line between patriotic and palatable by presenting Canadian symbols such as the maple leaf in its logo in a rather caricaturish manner; It’s as if the hyper exaggerated water-and-ice-drenched maple leaf and faux italic typography of Molson Canadian’s previous identity are quite tenuously saying “We’re absolutely, completely, and utterly Canadian (whatever that might mean).”

For this reason, Molson Canadian’s most recent identity refresh, spearheaded by New York-based Spring Design Partners and launched on Boxing Day, is both a return to form, and a rather refreshing step in the right direction. Gone is the cartoonish “leaf-sweat” (I probably found that about as difficult to write as you did to read), and faux italic wordmark; replaced by a bold and realistically rendered maple leafing rising from a gently sloped horizon, shining down on a crisp, clean, condensed Gothic typeface.

There’s a welcome feeling of honesty and authenticity to the identity that was sorely lacking in prior iterations, and yet Molson hasn’t walked away from the pastiche of Canadiana that makes up the core of its brand. While the campaign imagery, featuring Molson Canadian products sitting in super saturated vistas, makes no apologies for a wholly literal representation of the Canadian landscape, the logo treatment and typography in particular take subtle cues from Canadian souvenir decals and postcards of the 40s and 50s.

Short of re-issuing the iconic “Stubby Bottle” format, it’s hard to think of an identity that so thoroughly embraces its Canadian roots without slopping on the kitsch or caricature.

Thanks to Graphicology for the tip.

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Steckbar: A stacking shelf by Ismail Özalbayrak

From Steckbar: A stacking shelf by Ismail Özalbayrak

We know, we know, another stacking, modular furniture set? Still, this one’s pretty nice, nesting closely for storage and expanding into a brightly colored shelf, sideboard or room partition when offset. We suspect that one might also be able to flip a module over to create a recessed coffee table, though its hard to tell from the pictures.

Steckbar, which translates to “snap” in German, was designed by Ismail Özalbayrak, a student at the Hochschule für bildende Künste Hamburg. Our only regret is that the shelf is only a computer model. Get that thing prototyped!

Several more shots after the jump.

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Super Bowl XLIV, Extra Bold

From Super Bowl XLIV, Extra Bold

There is no Sunday like Super Bowl Sunday: The friends, the beer, the chips, the bets, the ads… and, oh yeah, the game. And just in case you were confused by this year’s Pro Bowl being played before the Super Bowl, heed the news, the Super Bowl is this Sunday in Miami, Florida with the New Orleans Saints playing the Indianapolis Colts. But aside from mentioning the obvious, let us turn our attention to the Super Logo, designed this season by Attik.

The development of Super Bowl XLIV’s identity system was an exciting challenge for Attik. First, it’s the most exciting night in professional American sports and second, 2010 was the first year that the NFL had given the logo and visual identity system project to the same agency. And since we had done the visual identity system for XLIII, we felt more than ready to take on both this time.

One mandatory from the NFL was that they wanted the logo to be more representative of the power and boldness of football as opposed to overtly representing the host city, like it had done in the past. Our response was to allow the city’s personality to come through the system’s color palette and support graphics.

The theme of the 2009 regular season was “Own the Moment” and we used that powerful mindset to develop the creative foundation for the identity. This foundation was the idea of a strong competitive duality; the Super Bowl is 2 teams, from 2 conferences fighting for that ultimate victory. The design reflects this by having a bold sense of symmetry and the upright / ball lockup provides a central, relevant focal point.

It was a fantastic process from beginning to end. Being allowed to work with the client on a strong strategy first and then go into design helped yield a great solution. The designs started as a simple and pure mark and then we let it grow and evolve into an extensive and functional system. We can’t wait to see it on Sunday!
— Project insight provided by Attik

All images above provided by Attik.

The XLIV logo certainly feels bold and powerful, more so than any Super Bowl logo I can remember — here are all of the logos for reference — and I like that the logo wasn’t forced to look like Miami, otherwise we might have gotten a more festive interpretation, perhaps too much Miami Vice. Looking through the old Super Bowl logos, it’s interesting that XLIV is only the third logo to use a football and the first to use a goal post. I’m not entirely convinced by the goal post but I think it’s one of those concepts that is so obvious most people simply avoid it and, well, sometimes you shouldn’t avoid the obvious. Since the goal post is secondary to the typography, it works well in this context. Speaking of the typography, man, that is one husky type! It’s really hard to ignore and it has great presence. The one thing that is a little confusing is the shadow under the “SUPER BOWL” text… I can sort of see where it’s coming from, but it’s left a little ambiguous as to where the dimensionality exists. Nonetheless, this is a pretty solid iteration of a very difficult, ongoing brief and at the end of the day, it’s all about the ads. Sorry, I mean it’s all about the game.

Patch and football images from Hlvtca.

Update: I uploaded the wrong logo, which was an older version of the XLIV logo. The new logo has been updated, showing the correct colors and the right drawing of the football. Apologies.

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Fast Company’s Ten ID’ers to Watch

From Fast Company’s Ten ID’ers to Watch

That’s designer Gilles Belley’s Energy Saver power strip, which “glows to show the wasted energy your gadgets eat up when they’re plugged in but not doing anything.” Belley and nine other designers are slideshow’d in William Bostwick’s Fast Company piece “Are These Ten Names the Future of Industrial Design?“

Celebrating the 10th anniversary of Maison & Objet’s product design trade show Now! Design a Vivre, design-world godfather Philippe Starck and Intramuros editor Chantal Hamaide chose 10 rising French stars to usher in a new decade of design. Fear not, Francophobes–these guys actually epitomize all the current trends whizzing around the design world–warts and all–from environmental commentary to DIY grunge to blog-friendly wit. It’s a perfect picture of product design today–but is it a pretty one? Get to know these names and decide for yourself.

Check out the slideshow here.

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