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The leaves are starting to fall from the trees and temperatures are beginning to drop, which means not only is autumn on its way for some of us, but Adobe's annual creativity conference will soon be here. Taking place in the first weekend of November, Adobe MAX 2019 will be a playground for creatives, offering a glimpse into the direction of Adobe's creative tools and new things to play with. The spectacular event, huge in scale and experience – attended last year by just a shade under 15,000 people – is once again at the LA Convention Center for 2019, with main stage sessions and some live events streamed worldwide. The best Adobe deals in 2019 Adobe has teased us throughout 2019 with various sneak peeks and hints at updates and new releases. But what do we really want to see at Adobe MAX 2019? Let's take a closer look at the products we expect to take centre stage... 01. Photoshop You can always bank on Photoshop to have a few surprises. Perhaps unencumbered by many of the complexities that face some of the other products it never disappoints, and there’s bound to be even more Sensei thrown into the mix, for sure. We’re guessing selections will once again feature quite heavily – they are after all the key to many adjustments and essential in compositing; with every recent release featuring more selection magic it seems likely and there are bound to be some jaw-droppers, too. 02. Photoshop on the iPad If memory serves us correctly, last year there was mention of a suggested launch in April this year, but there’s still no sign of it and there’s not a lot of noise coming from Adobe. It’s a huge undertaking – make no mistake, it’s a much bigger product than most users realise – and in a constantly expanding ecosystem, doubtlessly a significant challenge. However, that said, the company last year seemed very confident of a delivery around the end of the first quarter in 2019. Maybe they’re adding some more Adobe magic and aiming for a bigger impact by releasing at MAX. Let's hope so. 03. Illustrator Illustrator has been showing a lot of font-oriented features lately and during the sneaks last year an amazing piece of tech named Fontphoria wowed the audience, creating variations on entire fonts using drag-and-drop with just a single character. Interest in variable fonts is growing, and there have been some videos featuring expanded features within the model that maybe indicate there’s something in the works. Our guess for the 'wow' factor in Adobe’s oldest home-grown product is an overhaul of Puppet Warp along the lines of Project GoodBones that was in the 2018 sneaks. 04. Adobe Dimension Adobe’s 3D tool for designers and visualisers, Dimension has been quietly adding some incredible new features throughout the last few months, including some related to the early 2019 acquisition of Allegorithmic and their Substance material/texturing products. It’s probably a fairly safe bet that there will be big news relating to this product line and how it will mesh (no pun intended) with other Creative Cloud products. 05. Project Aero Augmented reality (AR) is gathering momentum and while there are a number of apps using AR, there doesn’t seem to be much in the way of authoring tools for non-coders that isn’t part of a contained system like Facebook’s Spark AR. Project Aero aims to fill that gap and of course it will almost certainly naturally fit and interop with the other members of the family. Until recently this has been in a closed beta but applications to join the program have been accepted for a little while, now. 06. Adobe Fresco (formerly Project Gemini) Project Gemini, a drawing/painting app that combines and improves on the functionalities of the current mobile creation tools Photoshop Sketch and Illustrator Draw, announced it’s name, Adobe Fresco, just a little while back and it should be well-and-truly out in the wild by MAX (at the time of writing it is available for pre-order on the app store, expected 24th September). Not that it is representative of Fresco particularly, but the image associated with this post was initially created in the app then tweaked in Photoshop, a route that appears fairly common among the users I know from the prerelease and so the prediction here is that more incredible features and interoperations will amplify the recent launch. 07. Adobe XD Adobe XD introduces new features almost every month, and they’ve delivered on everything and more showed at last year’s MAX, including voice prototyping and the auto-animate features that drew so much applause. It’s still the micro-interactions that are craved though, along with support for inline video, so it will be interesting to see if there’s anything on offer that will sate that appetite. 08. Adobe Rush CC A big deal at MAX in 2018, Rush CC, which is now available on iOS, Android, Mac and Windows, has introduced an handful of other features and improvements throughout the year, including interface tweaks, language support, speed controls and Motion Graphics Templates, also know as MOGRT’s (rhymes with the American pronunciation of yoghurts) on Adobe Stock. It’s going to be interesting to see if any new tools have been added for this year's event, especially as the main objective of Rush is to keep it lightweight and flexible – we'll just have to wait and see! Want to keep on top of all the MAX 2019 news? Make sure to bookmark our main Adobe MAX 2019 page, which we'll be updating regularly in the run up and reporting live from the event in November. Read more: Lightroom vs Photoshop: What's the difference? Adobe Fresco art app is finally available to preorder! The ultimate Adobe CC keyboard shortcuts cheat sheet View the full article

American rapper Colson Baker, AKA Machine Gun Kelly, has been inundated with jokes and memes after he asked his Twitter followers to design him a new logo. There are lots of things to consider when it comes to creating a successful brand identity. Our logo design guide even covers what designers should keep in mind. However this doesn't appear to have stopped social media users, who eagerly responded to Baker's open call for a new logo. Taking to Twitter, the rapper and actor decided it was time for a logo redesign because he was at the start of a "new chapter". Promising a sack of cash for the winning entry, Baker provided an email address for submissions to be sent to, then sat back and waited for the ideas to pour in. However, because Twitter can be a cynical place, joke entries quickly flooded his replies. So what did Baker do wrong? Well for starters, he should've given design hopefuls a brief to work with. After all, if designers haven't got some guidelines to follow, how will they know if they're heading in the right direction? How to write the perfect brief By not providing a brief, Baker was also leaving himself wide open to mocking entries. We've got to hand it to the witty responses though. They include references to his feud with Eminem, and some imaginative riffing on the rapper's stage name. There are also some entries that channel the classic design meme 'graphic design is my passion'. Take a look at some of the choicest joke entries below. Would Baker have avoided joke entries if he provided a brief? It's hard to say. Trolls might have worked with the constraints to create prank logos that still played by the rules. It wasn't all joke entries though. Some submissions were genuinely quite impressive. Although we can't help but wonder why the designers didn't just send their work to the email address provided. Don't give your competition ideas, guys! Design contests are controversial beasts even at the best of times. And while Baker is offering an undisclosed sum of money, we can see this stirring up a similar furore as the BBC's recent competition that asked for Peaky Blinders fan art. Only time will tell which logo Baker chooses. But we kind of hope he calls people's bluff by crowning a joke entry the winner. Even if it were only for a limited time, it would be a great way of owning the situation. Related articles: How fan art can get you paid 20 best iPad Pro apps for use with Apple Pencil How to find your art style View the full article

Applying your design skills to the gaming industry is a lucrative option you may have not have previously considered. Job opportunities in the field are growing daily, and more and more qualified applicants are being scouted. This six-course bundle brings you everything you need to kick-start a gaming career. All game designers must first learn the fundamentals of the industry to be successful. Starting from the basics and leading up to more technical skills, The Academy of Game Design Certification Bundle brings you six jam-packed courses to get you up to speed on everything game industry related. From logos and character design to UI and animation, over 100 lessons will help familiarise you with the programs you need to learn to be successful in the industry. 11 best video game character designs Inkscape, an open-source vector graphics editor, is a great software companion in the world of gaming. Courses will teach you the ins and out of Inkscape and show you how to use it to create game logos that not only look stunning, but also generate sales. You'll also learn how to develop parallax-ready game backgrounds, build remarkable 2D characters, design user interfaces for mobile, and so much more. Tutorials in DragonBones, a 2D game animation platform, teach you how to design and animate a variety of characters. Tips and tricks are also included on how to work faster and create better-designed character assets. Plenty of hands-on exercises will provide you with step-by-step instructions that allow you to try out what you learned. And with 24/7 access to the lessons you can keep coming back whenever you need to. While a certification bundle is usually valued at $1,200, it's currently price-dropped to only $25 (that's 97% off). It's certainly a great way to kick-off your game design ambitions and gets you started on the next phase of your professional design career. Related articles: How to design video games cinematics you won't want to skip How to get a job as a video games artist How to create a video game character in ZBrush View the full article

We've all been there. You've cooked a delicious dinner and you can't wait to tuck in, but your ketchup supplies are running low and you can't seem to pour the last drops no matter how hard you try. To help tackle this common frustration, Heinz Canada ketchup bottles have started sporting a clever label which shows you the perfect pouring angle. This brilliant but simple idea is up there with the best packaging designs we've come across. Created by independent creative agency Rethink Canada, the labels on the Pour-Perfect bottles (above) appear to have been rotated to a very unusual angle. But while the bottles look odd on supermarket shelves, when shoppers pick them up they'll quickly figure out that turning the label upright tips the bottle into the ideal ketchup pouring position. Check out the pleasantly surprised reaction of shoppers in the accompanying Heinz advert below. Does it work though, or will we still have to shake the bottle violently or dig around with a butter knife? There's only one way to find out, and that's to pick up a Pour-Perfect bottle and give it a go. Don't hang around though, they're only on sale in Toronto for a limited time. Related articles: Online packaging archive is a design delight 20 packaging concepts we wish were real 6 times brands temporarily changed their packaging View the full article

Bug impacts VMware Workstation 15 running 64-bit versions of Windows 10 as the guest VM. View the full article

The bug was first found in 2016. View the full article

Language learning app Duolingo has amassed a huge user base of 300 million people, thanks in no small part to its playful branding and gamified approach. However its visual elements were starting to lag behind its rapidly expanding reach. Enter Johnson Banks and Fontsmith, who have worked together to create a fun bespoke font for Duolingo called Feather bold. We've already seen how fun fonts can liven up a design, but Feather bold goes one step further as it captures the spirit of the app's owl mascot, Duo. The story behind the typeface was shared on the Johnson Banks site, which reveals how elements of Duo informed the shape of the lettering. Now the Duolingo font is consistent with its mascot "Visually, their owl mascot (Duo), the core colour, and their illustration style were broadly working," the design consultancy explains. "But they lacked clear guidelines on how to use the brand 'away' from the app environment." With the help of independent type foundry Fontsmith, Johnson Banks was able to address this by fine-tuning the logotype and extending the look to the Feather bold typeface as a whole. This includes quirks such as the flick found in the lowercase 'g', and a wing tipped stem junction. "Instead of using neutral typography alongside the symbol (like every other tech company), we redrew the logotype drawing inspiration from Duo's feathery form to reflect the company's quirky personality," it adds. Duo's eyes and wings were design cues for Feather bold As well as creating Feather bold, Johnson Banks also helped to develop a clearer tone of voice and guidelines for the Duolingo brand. At the heart of this identity was the idea that 'everyone can Duolingo'. New logo lock-ups, revised colours, and illustration guides accompany the new typographic styling. All of these elements are now being introduced across digital and physical touchpoints, with future merchandise plans already in place. A clearer set of branding guidelines was also introduced The launch of Feather bold isn't the first Duolingo update to roll out this year. Back in January the app redesigned its green owl mascot in the hope of making the tool more engaging. And having laid the foundations for this typographic update, we'd say they did a buen trabajo (that's Spanish for nice job). Related articles: 50 top typography tutorials The ultimate typography cheat sheet The best new typography books of 2019 View the full article

From Myspace to TikTok, social media has exploded over the last 15 years. A digital space with almost no rules, or a true definition of what it is and where it’s going. It was the unknown, and still is. Fast-forward to 2019, and social media is mammoth, with huge personalities presenting to an even bigger audience, insane data and gurus. With all this change, structure, and specialised careers coming out of the past 15 years, there is one thing you should know – social media will always change, and you’ve got to move with it. Where is social media right now? Right now, as a brand or person of interest entering into social media for the first time, it may be daunting. How are you meant to compete with those giants who seem to have it sussed? Social Media works in mystical ways – okay, not so mystical, but more on the algorithmic, ‘understanding your audience and finding your voice’ side of things. This article will explain those in more detail. Although these giants may have teams of creatives, copywriters and strategist, you will always have your personality. No large team can recreate that. Being authentically you has never been more desirable, and enables your audience to create a more meaningful connection to your brand. You don’t need to bring them into your personal life, but let them see you, hear you, and find out what you stand for through your content and tone of voice. Don’t be scared to push those boundaries. How far you push is up to you. Not every piece of content or story will be a home run, and that’s okay. It will take time to build up a network of people who are genuinely interested in what you have to say. So don’t be discouraged – it may also be that you are just not telling it in the right place or to the right people. Keep looking for your audience. They may be in places you don’t expect. Social media is powerful, but it can be incredibly fickle; don’t let your stats entirely define what to create The question that comes up all the time is ‘how do you measure success?’ This has had people up in arms figuring out what’s important. What do you want to achieve from your content? Was it to grow your audience or create engagement? Let the intention be the measurement of success, and not your engagement rate or like for like. Social media is powerful, but it can be incredibly fickle. Don’t let your stats entirely define what to create. If something doesn’t work, go back and look at why. Review, rework, re-publish and review again. Once you are able to determine what your audience enjoys, where they are and how you would like to show your personality, build on that. Social media is all about escalation. Read on for a closer look at each of the big players, and how to use them to build your brand and grow your audience. Next page: Facebook Click the image to find out more – and enter the competition The largest online platform in the world, with over 2 billion active users, but is Facebook still relevant? Data from taken from the top page categories showed that they have experienced a decline of up to 70 per cent engagement. The worst affected in this case were artists’ pages. However, don’t be put off by the bleak stats. Facebook is in a changing state, so you’ve just got to be willing to move with it. Some say Facebook’s publishing tools are a little bloated, but here are a few that you should consider focusing on. Like Creative Bloq on Facebook 01. Facebook groups By creating a group on Facebook, you’re able to connect one on one with your audience. You are providing them with a space in which they can discuss and share their own opinions based on a topic you’ve set. It becomes less about broadcasting and more about collaborating, and with over 400 million people in meaningful groups, it’s a great time to start. A successful group isn’t easy. You’ve got to give a reason for people to join, and of course, it needs to have some relevance to your brand. Think about what topics you could set. This could be a theme, brand value, collaborative effort — either way, it has to have as much value to your audience as it does to you. If you can create a home for this topic, you will have created a community with a deeper connection to your brand. This advocacy will create word of mouth, and through that, micro influencers who will become a trusted voice. 02. Facebook messenger Facebook reported that 53% of people are more likely to shop with a business they can message directly. The best part is, there isn’t a whole lot you need to do to get this started. Make sure you’ve turned on private messaging for your page. You’re using the messenger call to action on your content, and most importantly, you’re replying. You could explore bots. However, if you are not offering a service that requires an order status, FAQ lookup or some gimmicky interaction, don’t invest in it. Keep it human – apart from the automatic greeting, which is a great way to let people know their message has been received and when to expect a reply. 03. Product catalogue This tool is free, and it carries over to Instagram. If you are selling products through your website or a third party site, consider setting up a product catalogue, which can be found in your Business Manager. This will enable you to tag products in posts, which comes in handy when sometimes the copy doesn’t call for a long explanation of the products featured in that post. 04. Event pages These micro groups have come a long way since being the main source of a birthday party invitation. If you are planning on a series of events over the summer, spend the time to build out an event page for each. Cover what to expect, where to buy tickets, and most importantly, keep those interested updated on the happenings by sharing updates to the timeline. Next page: Instagram Instagram is one of the fastest growing, visually led platforms. So how can grow your audience by using a personality led strategy? It’s a given that your profile should feature some of your work, brand or products that you sell. All these points will help followers to understand what you offer, but how do you really become unique? Here are some top tips for improving your feed. Follow Creative Bloq on Instagram 01. Hone your focus Pick a consistency topic. This could be your products, brand values or concept. Merge this with a specialist topic. This isn’t always on-feature but will enable you to expand outside of your normal publishing realms, building an audience that appreciates not only your work, but also your commentary and creation. For example, if you are an illustrator, your page could feature your work, mixed in with appreciation and/or commentary of other peoples’ illustrative work. By sharing and introducing your passions, you are further injecting your personality and interests. All these traits give a user a reason to follow you, as you are aligning further with their own interests. 02. Focus on individual posts It’s been reported before, but I’m here to tell you that colour coordinated profiles are over. Ditch the block colours, colour themes and colour matching. Instead, focus on the creative – let it sit jarringly next to the post before. There is a need for less conceited profiles, an injection of the raw and experimental. 03. Don't forget stories Instagram Stories are more throwaway, but this doesn’t mean you have to sacrifice your content quality – it just means being more accessible and engaging, and less like a series of adverts. An example would be using a question or poll sticker to support a live draw on stories, documenting each stage with the involvement of your community. Not sure how to use them? Look at our guide to Instagram Stories. 04. Organise your bio If someone is going to take the time to look at your page, you need to make sure you have any info they might want on there. Make sure you include a URL where they can find more about you, and add an email button so they can get in touch. Story highlights help give an idea of your personality. When you've done all that, it's time to explore personalisation options, for example you might want to change the font on your Instagram bio. Click the icon in the top right to enlarge the image 05. Engage! If you are going to ask a question or any include any form of a call to action in a post, either on stories or your timeline, make sure you do something publicly and respond. There is nothing worse than seeing a brand ask a question just for the sake of engagement. You can also share other people's content – just make sure you follow the etiquette rules (take a look at our guide to how to repost on Instagram for this). Next page: Twitter and Pinterest Twiitter is a micro-blogging platform dominated by the media, influencers, journalists, fans and more. What you should be asking yourself is this – do you see your audience or brand on Twitter? There are a couple of ways in which you could approach Twitter, but we are going to look at how you can create awareness. Follow Creative Bloq on Twitter Twitter: How to create awareness The trending page offers the chance for amazing visibility, and being prepared for large public days such as WorldSockDay (only joking.) But it is worth looking at what big days are coming up. These could be from sporting events, TV, national holidays and so on. Preparing assets against these topics ahead is a sure way to get noticed. However, you should always ask yourself before getting involved — can I add anything of worth, will this makes sense to my audience, and will my brand tone of voice come through? More than anything, Twitter is an opinion piece platform, and works predominantly on creative writing and quick reflexes. Look at the trends of Burger King, Vita Coco and Pizza Hut. Clapbacks at the community or at other big brands can be hit or miss. Where it’s good, it can create a buzz, but it can easily turn into you who’s is being dragged. Twitter works predominantly on creative writing and quick reflexes Most actions are done through the app, hashtag or trending timeline view. You will need to get your brand out there. If you can create engaging, relevant, timely and debatable content, then it will throw your brand into the view of any interested parties that tend to frequent the site. Overall, Twitter requires you to shape out your authority in a topic, be a category leader and find your niche. It’s a busy platform driven more by opinions than visual content. You need to be willing to go and look for your audience, take the time to respond, and create engaging situations to carve out your space. Read more: Learn how to change the font in your Twitter bio, or explore the designers you should be following. Next page: Pinterest With 250 million monthly active users, it’s not a platform to ignore. The question is, do you need an account, or can you just be present by introducing better sharing functions on your website? How about both? Users come to Pinterest to find pins for inspiration, aspiration and motivation purposes, which you can work to your advantage by pinning against these points to seed content throughout the platform, creating links back to your website. Here are some tips for making the most of Pinterest. Read more: How to make money on Instagram Follow Creative Bloq on Pinterest 01. Work with what you already have Start small and build up. Work with what you have. For example, If you’re an illustrator and have a bank of work on facial expressions and features, use those files and start. You could organise them and create sections within your board to separate it by categories – eyes, smiles, happy or sad. Show a potential pinner your expertise, and provide them with inspiration. 02. Use keywords As mentioned earlier, Pinterest is an image search tool, so use those general keywords in the description, including relevant hashtags, a title to summarise, and always include your website. The optimisation is important — take the time to fill out the small details, as it will pay off in traffic and awareness. You can also use Pinterest to promote your back catalogue of work for inspiration and awareness. Be sure to work in those keywords when you do, avoiding words like “my work” or “my portfolio.” Instead “Illustrations” with sections such as ‘botanical” or “typography.” Be descriptive. Make your work easier to find by potential clients. 03. Create dedicated Pinterest content If you are willing to invest, spend some time in Pinterest. You could look at creating some templates, inspiration pieces or how-to style guides. These pins are a great way to build up awareness for your expertise, provided motivation for a pinner. Instead of sharing it as a native upload, pin this work directly from your website, ensuring you are getting traffic back to your page. 04. Pay attention to what works There are no real rules on how much you can upload to Pinterest and when the best time to post is. Just think about the quality of your pins, and keep a close eye on your top pins, clicks and audience affiliates to better understand what your audience engages with. Discover further opportunities, and find what drives traffic back to your website and why. New pins may take a while to show any results, but check back on those older pins – they may surprise you and receive more attention. 05. Set up your site as a business page Finally, if you do decide to pin from your website, make sure you’ve set up your account as a business page and claimed your URL by adding a meta tag to your page. In summary, Pinterest is slow and steady, but each pin is an investment in traffic to your website and brand awareness. This article was originally published in creative web design magazine Web Designer. Buy issue 283 or subscribe. View the full article

The reality of web design is that once you've finished a project, you hopefully move straight onto the next one. However, every site you deliver is an essential portfolio piece that demonstrates your skills and abilities, and while you'll usually want to link to your recent work on your site, it pays to do the job properly. Rather than simply grabbing a screenshot of a landing page and a link and adding it to your online portfolio, writing up an engaging case study on your work can be a lot more worthwhile. Case studies don't need to be lengthy essays; they just need to give readers a taste of your process and provide some insight into the challenges you've faced over the course of a web build and how you solved them. They're a great way to let potential clients know how you work, and they can also provide inspiration for other designers and developers; here are five of our favourite recent examples. How to write engaging case studies for your portfolio 01. Museum of Science and Industry of Chicago DogStudio took on a massive job with this site, and delivered For a really inspiring case study, it's hard to beat DogStudio's extensive piece chronicling its work for the Museum of Science and Industry of Chicago. The museum is a vast and highly respected American institution, and you can't help but get the impression that DogStudio was punching well above its weight when it won the commission to rethink and revamp its web platform, but as this case study reveals, it carried the job off with aplomb. Packed with revealing wireframes, imagery and animations, it's a fascinating insight into a massive and challenging build that had to cater for more than five million online visitors wanting to do everything from buy tickets through to figuring out where to park and finding information about individual exhibits. 02. National Geographic: A Bear's-Eye View of Yellowstone A case study doesn't have to be wordy; let the pictures do the talking Sometimes it's better to show rather than tell. For this captivating look at Yellowstone National Park as seen by four bears fitted with camera collars and GPS, Hello Monday had a wealth of footage, data and expert analysis to work with. And rather than go into dry details of how it fitted everything together, it keeps things brief in its case study, providing a short outline of the project and deliverables before moving on to an entirely visual essay that demonstrates just how much work went into creating this digital feature. As well as a good helping of footage and screenshots showcasing what the site's all about, what we really love about this study is a section dedicated to how Hello Monday stamped its own personality on the project, breathing extra life into the feature with animation, watercolour illustrations and pencil-drawn portraits of each bear. 03. Once Upon a Time in… Hollywood If you've come up with an innovative approach to a project, concentrate on that Currently doing big business at the box office, Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in… Hollywood is a love letter to 1960's cinema that recreates its era with Tarantino's typical attention to detail. And to create an online presence that captured the feel of 1969 Hollywood as well as the film, LA agency Watson went the extra mile to create a digital magazine that feels like it could have come off a newsstand 50 years ago. In this case study the Watson team explain not only the thinking behind the magazine and its pitch-perfect adverts, but also how they create a physical print run of the mag that got handed out at the premiere and first-night screenings, creating a whole other social buzz as movie fans posted shots of their magazine to prove that they were there. If you're looking for ideas on how to run a strong social campaign, there's some great material here. 04. British Red Cross Here Kota does a great job of communicating this project's challenges and how it met them Kota's case study on its recent work with the British Red Cross is a clear and concise piece that provides valuable insight on the challenges – and opportunities – of working on a campaign with an institution with clear-cut brand guidelines that need to be adhered to. In the case of the British Red Cross's OneKindThing campaign, Kota had to create a platform that stood out from previous campaigns while staying within the society's pretty epic brand guidelines. With a handful of images and a couple of paragraphs, Kota outlines how it managed just that, and also covers some of the technical hurdles that had to be overcome to deliver the finished site. The end result was well worth the effort, as the British Red Cross testimonial at the end of the case study reveals. 05. Stonewall Forever An in-depth look at an important and technically demanding project To mark the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, an event that helped bring about the Pride movement, Stink Digital partnered with The LGBT Community Center to create Stonewall Forever, an immersive digital experience that features key narratives and previously unheard stories from LGBTQ+ history. Stink Digital's case study explains how it built a living monument to 50 years of Pride, based in Christopher Park, New York, but accessible anywhere through a website or AR app, and goes into some detail of the challenges of creating a WebGL monument that consists of over 10,000 individual shards with post-processing effects, but still runs at 60fps, even on low-end devices. Beyond the technical challenges, though, this is an absorbing and insightful piece on a project that explores life before, during and after the Stonewall Riots. Related articles: The hottest web design trends of 2019 How to refine your design portfolio Get the perfect website layout in 27 steps View the full article

The company has patched a vulnerability that could allow malicious sites unauthorized access to usernames and passwords. View the full article

It's scary to think that we're already three quarters of the way through 2019. And as if you didn't already feel like time was slipping away, these funny new ads from Spotify will really ram home the feeling of existential dread. We've already seen some examples of brilliant billboard advertising, but it looks like we might have to update it with these amazing posters from creative agency Who Wot Why. In the billboards, years are paired up and given humorous captions to highlight how much, or in some cases how little, life has changed. Just take these examples shared on Twitter by copywriter Vikki Ross. The year 1979 is accompanied with the caption 'London Calling', while underneath 2019 reads 'Conference calling'. The contrast between the famous Clash song and corporate life makes for an amusing juxtaposition, particularly if you remember the punk anthem from the first time round. As you'd expect from ads for the music streaming service, songs are the central hook of each joke. So, alternative rock band Smashing Pumpkins are played off against 2019's trend for smashed avocados, and 1983's UB40 becomes 'you be forty'. And while the more things change, the more they stay the same. 1998 was the year of baggy jeans, chokers, and Spice Girls on tour. Fast forward to 2019 and it looks like all three are back in fashion. Having spotted the billboards in the wild, Ross took to social media to find out more. And in response people flooded her replies with examples they'd seen, the best of which she shared with her followers (below). This isn't the first time Spotify has amused passers-by with its funny billboards. Previously Spotify's turned users' bizarre listening habits into 2018 goals, while before that it got personal with its 'Thanks 2016, it's been weird' campaign. Meanwhile, in 2019, Spotify has moved forwards with an app redesign that's centred around its push towards podcasts. And if this has got you reaching for your nearest pair of earbuds, why not give yourself an upgrade with our guide to the best wireless headphones available right now. Related articles: McDonald's is turning its billboards into bee hotels The best print adverts ever These ridiculous ads show sexism is still alive and kicking View the full article

Having a controversial magazine cover is a surefire way for a mag to grab attention, and (hopefully) extra sales. Even as print magazines' circulations and influence wane, sex and politics can still provoke social media meltdown, although just exactly what is considered controversial is an ever-shifting boundary. Some publishers try too hard – going for the print equivalent of click bait. The cast of Glee cavorting in school uniforms for GQ? Cue weary eye roll. At other times, passionate political engagement can lead to terrible consequences, as was the case with the Charlie Hebdo tragedy. And often, of course, it’s difficult to distinguish between shock and satire: was Lady Ga-Ga’s machine gun bra cover for Rolling Stone a sophisticated feminist statement, or just a bad joke? Readers will inevitably consider the merits of each cover against their own moral compass. But whether cynically conceived or not, controversial covers seldom fail to raise title circulations for publishers who dare to take a risk. Here are eight of the most controversial in magazine history. Want to know how to make a mag cover standout, without necessarily offending people? See our guide to creating standout magazine covers. And if you're not quite magazine cover level yet, see our guide to becoming an art director. 01. Esquire: The Passion of Muhammad Ali cover (April, 1968) The impact of the beautiful cover photograph and stark design has not diminished with time If the 1970s hosted some of the worst examples of gory misogyny dressed up as liberalism, it also delivered some of the most politically engaged and memorable magazine covers. With Esquire’s Muhammad Ali interview focusing on the boxer’s dwindling star status and divisive political statements, legendary art director George Lois suggested that the beleaguered sports legend pose as Christian martyr St Sebastian for the cover shoot. Carl Fischer’s resulting photograph of a bloodied Ali pierced by the arrows of his critics simultaneously addressed race, celebrity and contemporary politics with startling force. At the height of the civil rights movement and with anti-Vietnam war protests at their most fierce, it was impossible not to have a strong reaction to Ali’s martyred pose. The Ali cover was doubtless the inspiration for Rolling Stone’s 'Passion of Kanye West' cover forty-eight years later, a non-too-subtle nod from one self-mythologising, ‘misunderstood’ celebrity to another. 02. Rolling Stone: John and Yoko (January 1981) When Annie Liebowitz asked the couple to strip – not unreasonable considering their recent naked album cover, Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins – only Lennon agreed Sometimes a cover becomes controversial for reasons beyond the publisher's control. This iconic photograph of a naked John Lennon curled around a fully clothed Yoko Ono ("That’s it! That’s our relationship", Lennon is quoted as exclaiming) was daring enough in its own right, with its provocative mix of sex, gender politics and the always outspoken ex-Beatle. But Lennon’s assassination, just a few hours after this Annie Leibowitz photo session, transformed a provocative image into a tragic memorial. When Rolling Stone used this as the cover of its tribute issue to the singer, five weeks after his death, it had an entirely different context. Music magazine Q was similarly struck by unforeseen circumstances when its Michael Jackson ‘unmasked’ issue went to press just before the singer’s sudden death. The shocking photograph of Jackson, his face seemingly ravaged by plastic surgery, made for a morbid but entirely coincidental obituary. 03. Time: An American Tragedy (June, 1994) Time’s notorious cover became such a significant part of the OJ trial, that the TV series The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story recreated it with actor Cuba Gooding Jr From their famous, type-only 'Is God Dead?' cover to the (perhaps) less high-brow 'Yep I’m Gay' Ellen DeGeneres “confession”, Time has always proudly courted controversy. Ironically, its O J Simpson American Tragedy cover remains its most (in)famous cover, as it provoked an unprecedented scandal. Both Time and rival news journal, Newsweek, had the same cover image – the police mugshot of the double-homicide suspect. But with the two titles sat side-by-side on the newsstands, it was clear that Time had radically altered the Simpson photo, making his skin appear darker. Time denied any malicious or racist intent behind its retouching, insisting that their art editor had simply editorialised the photo, but the publication was forced to apologise. And in an surreal twist of fate, the cover was subsequently used by Simpson’s defence team as alleged evidence of racism and bias in the media. 04. Rolling Stone: Britney Spears, Hanging on the Telephone (April, 1999) Teenage Spears set the tone for the next decade of hyper sexual, taboo-trouncing celebrity-shock covers, from Janet Jackson in Time to Demi Moore in Vanity Fair The Britney Spears cover for Rolling Stone in April 1999 set the tone for the celebrity sexploitation frenzy of the new millennium. Compared to magazine covers of the following decade, this may looks pretty tame now, but David LaChapelle’s scandalous cover photo let the (sleaze) genie out of the bottle: a seventeen-year-old pop star, stripped to her underwear, lying in bed with a cuddly toy, her expression suggesting it was you who was the voyeur she was talking to on her phone. If accounts differ as to who exploited who for this provocative cover, there’s little doubt that as a template for attention-hungry stars and (allegedly) deviant snappers, this Rolling Stones cover became the holy grail of sleaze. 05. Time: 9/11 (2001) As a token of respect, Time removed its iconic red border for this issue When Lyle Owerko photographed the first of the twin towers in flames, he remembers thinking, "There’s your cover. The one tower that’s smoking and the (other) one that’s stoic and defiant." But then he heard the terrifying sound of a second plane on the horizon. He turned to capture the second collision as it happened. The resulting photograph could not have been more sensational or shocking (read more about the story of this photo on Time's website). As the days, weeks and years passed, magazine coverage of the tragedy adopted a more elegiac tone – Art Spiegelman’s monochromatic design for The New Yorker shows how over the passage of time, editors and designers tried to communicate the horror of 9/11 beyond the documentary eye – but Time magazine was one of the first titles to cover the story, and Owerko’s graphic photo accurately reflected the first responses of the world at large. 06. Paper: Break The Internet Kim Kardashian (2014) No, we still haven’t read an issue of this, either... What to do when your industry (magazine publishing) is being demolished by an unstoppable foe (the internet)? Try and catch a free ride on its coat tails. When hip New York lifestyle magazine Paper hired legendary celebrity snapper Jean–Paul Goude to photograph reality TV queen Kim Kardashian for two covers (dressed and undressed, of course), it made sure to tweet the covers just before the magazine came out for maximum attention. Although the Paper team didn’t quite succeed in their ambition of breaking the internet, they almost broke their own homepage, which jumped from an average of 20,000 daily visits to 395,000 on launch day, and upgraded Paper from being a magazine hardly anyone read or knew about, to a magazine that hardly anyone read. Aware of the important cultural taboos regrading sex, exploitation, race and motherhood that her covers would provoke, Kardashian opened the debate with characteristic thoughtfulness in a tweet that read: “And they say I didn’t have a talent...try balancing a Champagne glass on your ass LOL #BreakTheInternet.” 07. Ladybeard: Beauty issue (May, 2018) Ladybeard’s antagonism towards the mainstream fashion magazine sector could hardly be more explicit Calling your magazine Ladybeard might be considered attention-seeking behavior before you even get to the first cover image (a framed dildo, since you ask) but this kickstarter-founded, indie-feminst title has continued to push the boundaries. For its Beauty themed issue, it showed it was prepared to risk everything – from reader revulsion to stockist withdrawal – in the name of heated debate, with not one but two taboo-busting cover photographs by Anton Gottlob: one an elderly woman’s mouth, the other an extreme close-up of an anus. Co-editor Madeleine Dunnigan admitted to MagCulture that both covers caused “controversy, debate and tears within the team....”, but insisted that by showing (traditionally) unshowable images, important debates could be triggered. ‘It may be impossible to say what is beautiful, or what should be beautiful,” Dunnigan explained, "but we hope that these covers will make the viewer consider the question.” With indies like Ladybeard distributed by mail or independent shops, the risk vs reward metric is lower than your average title stocked in WH Smiths. But Ladybeard's daring is representative of indie publisher's ambition to recapture the bravery of older, iconic magazines, albeit to a dramatically smaller audience. 08. Cosmopolitan: Tess Holliday (October 2018) The ever insightful Cosmopolitan magazine said: “No-one is more aware of their body than a fat person” When makeup-artist turned dental receptionist turned fashion model, plus-size activist, social media sensation, pansexual Tess Holliday (formally known as Tess Munster) revealed to Cosmopolitan that she was experiencing the worst mental health state of her life: “I wish I could just disappear”, so a shame-busting shoot for Cosmo seemed the obvious course of action to steer her back towards emotional well being. Published amidst a flurry of obesity-crisis debates, the Holliday cover was a perfect storm of headline-baiting, everyone-has-an-opinion controversy, and a rare recent example of a print magazine making headlines. Was it taboo-busting, pro self-love balm, or obesity-pedalling, voyeuristic trash? The debate about the reaction to the debate promoted more debate and the issue kept selling… Dignity and feminist credentials still (allegedly) intact, Cosmopolitan proudly reported Holliday’s reaction to all the fuss: “My health is no one’s business. My message isn’t, ‘Let’s all be fat!’. My message is, ‘Let’s love yourself, regardless of how you look in your current body'” to which Cosmo’s Senior Entertainment & Lifestyle writer added her own, carefully nuanced critical support: “Yes. YES YES YES. Literally could not have said it better ourselves." Read more: Port magazine review These incredible posters advertise the movies that never happened 3 trends that changed the design industry forever View the full article

We're not sure what's going on with the colour (depending on who you ask) black at the moment, but it seems, for some reason, everyone is out to create the blackest black. Just a few weeks ago, we reported BMW's new X6 coupé has been spray-painted with a version of Surrey NanoSystems self-described "blackest black in the world", Vantablack, and now MIT are in on the action too. According to a recent blog post, MIT engineers have now created the blackest black ever recorded. The institute's ultrablack material is capable of absorbing at least 99.995 per cent of light, beating the previous pretender to the throne, Vantablack, which only had a 99.965 per cent absorption rate. Man falls into Anish Kapoor's painted hole installation If you've read our guide to colour theory, you'll know that pigments can trick our perceptions. Artist Diemut Strebe has done just that with his new art exhibit, The Redemption of Vanity, which features a 16.78-carat diamond coated in MIT's dark material. Created in partnership with Brian Wardle, professor of aeronautics and astronautics at MIT, and his group, and MIT Center for Art, Science, and Technology, the installation sees the normally brilliant gem disappear against a black background. Take a look at how it seems to vanish in the comparison image above. Our material is 10 times blacker than anything that’s ever been reported Brian Wardle The MIT blog post reveals the new levels of blackness were achieved with the help of vertically aligned carbon nanotubes, or CNTs for short. These CNTs are microscopic filaments of carbon, kind of like a tiny forest of fuzzy trees. By growing them on a surface of chlorine-etched aluminium foil, MIT engineers were able to create what the blog post describes as "the blackest material on record." In the blog post Wardle explains: "our material is 10 times blacker than anything that’s ever been reported, but I think the blackest black is a constantly moving target. Someone will find a blacker material, and eventually we'll understand all the underlying mechanisms, and will be able to properly engineer the ultimate black." While this is a great achievement for MIT, it's sure to frustrate Anish Kapoor. The artist holds exclusive usage rights for the extremely black paint, Vantablack, which prompted artists to create their own alternative on Kickstarter. A seemingly never-ending competition, we wonder who'll be the next to come up with the world's blackest black? Related articles: A short lesson on colour theory 12 colours and the emotions they evoke The essential guide to colour correction View the full article

Independent researchers found 125 different CVEs across 13 different router and NAS models. View the full article

The demand for professional portraits and headshots has taken off in recent years and is quickly becoming a growing industry. If you've been looking to explore this niche but weren't sure how to start, you've come to the right place. Thanks to these comprehensive photography courses, you will be able to add new skill sets to your résumé as you learn how to shoot and edit portraits. What's more, each course is now only $9.99 – so pick up the best camera for creatives and start snapping! Take a look at each course below, and see how they can help you master the art of portrait photography. How to Take the Perfect Headshot with Peter Hurley Take the perfect headshot with a little help from the professionals. Seasoned photographer and former model Peter Hurley teaches you how to capture a person’s personality best. He shows you the techniques he uses to shoot, and how to sell those services, helping you land more clients in the process. The course comes complete with unlimited access so that you can come back for tips anytime you need them. Enroll now for $9.99 (65% off $29). Portrait Retouching Basics with Pratik Naik It's no secret that retouching images can be a daunting and exhausting task. Professional photo editor Pratik Naik teaches you how to make the process simple (and enjoyable) with portrait retouching basics. The 90-minute quick start class touches on developing the best photo editing workflow, as well as how to finish edits faster. Whether you are working with RAW files or JPGs, a Mac or a PC, you'll learn how to create high-end portrait edits. Enroll now for $9.99 (65% off $29). Photography Tips for Everybody with Khara Plicanic A one-woman show, expert photographer Khara Pilanic helps professionals improve their workflow woes with the magic of InDesign. Having been in the industry for 14 years, she's well placed to bring you photography tips that will take your snapshots to the next level. Eleven lectures and 1.5 hours of content will teach you how to make small changes that will help push you beyond typical snapshots. With 24/7 access, you can come back to the materials at any time, no matter what type of camera you own. Enroll now for $9.99 (65% off $29). So what are you waiting for? Start offering headshot photography services and open the door to more business opportunities. Take your skills to the next level with these three courses, now only $10. Related articles: The best camera phones in 2019 The best cameras for beginners in 2019 The best memory cards for your camera View the full article

ReversingLabs identified cybercriminals duping certificate authorities by impersonating legitimate entities and then selling the certificates on the black market. View the full article

The build up to the next Jurassic World movie kicked off recently as a brand-new short film related to the franchise dropped on YouTube. Titled Battle at Big Rock, the short film is packed with special effects that stand alongside the best 3D movies. But it also contains a frankly genius piece of logo redesign. Don't worry, Jurassic Park's iconic T Rex skeleton logo, dubbed Logosaurus by fans, hasn't been replaced. However if you look closely, you'll see that it's found its way into the Universal Pictures logo. We've all seen the Universal Pictures logo so often that it's easy to glaze over and take it for granted. You know the score, the logo sees planet Earth slowly turning through space as the word 'Universal' wraps around it. Lovely. If you look closely though, you'll see that Earth's land masses have been changed to resemble that iconic Jurassic Park skull logo. Take a look at it in action by watching Battle at Big Rock, below. According to Battle at Big Rock's YouTube description description: "The short takes place one year after the events of the last Jurassic World film in Big Rock National Park, where dinosaurs are now living in our world. The story follows a family of four whose encounter with these wild animals becomes a terrifying fight for survival." Director Colin Trevorrow took to Twitter to share his thanks following the enthusiastic reaction from fans. And in his tweet, we get to see a clearer version of the modified Universal Pictures logo with the colours boosted. We can see where one Twitter user was coming from when they pointed out that it would've been more consistent to use landmasses from the Jurassic period, but come on, a planet-sized T Rex skeleton looks much cooler. Also, it literally ties into the name of the film: Jurassic World! As far as extra touches go, this is a brilliant bit of design that helps build the hype for Jurassic World III. The film is due to be released on 11 June 2021. Related articles: Jurassic World VFX uncaged Special effects in movies: 10 stunning examples 13 best animated dinosaurs of all time View the full article

Whatever your creative profession, if you want to stay ahead of the game, you need to keep an eye on the competition. And when it comes to branding in 2019 - where great ideas are as important as brilliant execution - that's never been more true. So the latest issue of Computer Arts, issue 297, a Brand Impact Awards special, is a must-buy for anyone working in the creative industries. Because not only does it list the winners of the prestigious annual competition, it goes into real depth about how these world-class projects were conceived, and why they work so well in practice. Get your copy of the new issue! Elsewhere, we explore the art of image generation software – a super-hot trend right now – via an exclusive interview with its best-known proponent, Zach Lieberman (who also designed this month's cover). We've also got a major feature from Emily Gosling on how to harness photography to make your branding better, a fascinating look behind the scenes of creative studio Baxter & Bailey, a look at how Droga5 created a fluid visual identity for The Tide, a new cultural riverside park on the Greenwich Peninsula, and plenty more besides! Save up to 70% on a subscription now! Have a glance at what's inside below, and then grab your copy today. Computer Arts is the world's best-selling design magazine, bursting at the seams with insight, inspiration, interviews and all the best new design projects. For all this delivered direct to your door each month, subscribe to Computer Arts. Subscribe today, and you can save up to 70 per cent off the cover price! Related articles: Logo design: everything you need to know TikTok app: What is it? And why should you care? 11 ways to bag your first design job View the full article

Social media users have discovered a bizarre and racy design detail in the logo for the American basketball team, the Chicago Bulls. When viewed normally, the logo looks like a bull scowling at you. But if you flip it upside down, it's not a huge stretch of the imagination to see, and there's no two ways of saying this, a robot mounting a crab. Or a robot reading a book, whichever your mind prefers. We've already covered what creators should keep in mind while making a logo design, but there's a valuable lesson to be learnt from this alternative Chicago Bulls logo observation. Namely that designers might want to consider a design from all perspectives. Don't believe us that an intimate relationship between a robot and a crab could find its way into the Chicago Bulls logo? Check out this eye-opening comparison recently shared on Twitter by writer Deniz Camp. We should warn you though, you won't be able to unsee it... While people have pointed out in his replies that Camp wasn't the first person to notice the smutty detail, he managed to capture the attention of Twitter by sharing the regular Chicago Bulls logo next to the upside down one. Considering that the Chicago Bulls logo has been in use since 1966, it's amazing that nobody has spotted this detail before. Although to be fair, the logo that's doing the rounds on social media is a single colour version. Usually the Chicago Bulls logo is white and red, which goes some way to disguising the unintentional X-rated design Easter egg. And while we've had a good laugh at this unfortunate design coincidence, the Chicago Bulls isn't the first organisation to make a logo blunder. Our list of fantastic design fails reveals that anyone can slip up when it comes to creating a brand. So the next time you think you've created the best logo ever, step back and take the time to view it from different angles just to make sure an unfortunate image hasn't snuck its way into the design. You'll thank yourself in the long run. Related articles: 6 logo Easter eggs you might have missed Can you spot the hidden symbol in this airline logo? McDonald's McFails with accidentally smutty cups View the full article

What's minimalist website design all about? When it comes to user interface design, the term 'minimalism' still causes a lot of confusion. What is it? How should we use it (if at all) and where does it fall on the spectrum alongside flat design, flat 2.0, material design and other modern-day design systems and visual aesthetics? First, let's take a look at minimalism. Is minimalism flat or flat-ish? It can be. Is minimalism white? It can be. Does minimalism mean less clutter? It can do. Minimalism can look like a lot of things but we often forget about what it aims to achieve – why do we actually need it? Fundamentally, minimalist design advocates clarity mixed with intention; in other words 'no more than what's needed' to shift user focus to the most valuable aspects of the experience, while removing focus on the aspects that may distract users. By that logic, all design should be minimal but only if we're using minimalism correctly. 17 websites that use minimalism beautifully Sure, minimalist design may look nice but it should never be at the expense of clarity – i.e. where a design displays notable minimalist qualities but without conscious thought, displaying beautiful form that lacks any intuitive function or usability. Let's walk through how you can achieve minimalism, step-by-step. 01. Limit choices Limiting choice is one way to reduce cognitive overload, in turn helping the user make decisions more efficiently. However, for usability's sake, we'll need to include a couple of things: Relevant choices Alternative choices Relevant choices Deciding what's relevant to users depends on the context. For example, if we were showing a list of new blog articles, deciding on a few to showcase might depend on whether or not the user is logged in. With the former, we could use artificial intelligence to decipher the user's reading tastes. With the latter, we wouldn't be able to tailor content to a specific user but that doesn't mean that we don't have data at our disposal. We can still list results based on traffic data. However, that's content. When it comes to UI, tracking tools such as Google Analytics help us learn more about our user's behaviour. A/B testing tools like Crazy Egg and Google Optimize can test alternative versions of our layout. Heatmaps can also indicate what users do and don't care about. Or, if you're creating an app or website from scratch, designing information architecture through usability testing would be a better tactic in the absence of data – open and closed card sorting or functional salience testing springs to mind here. So as you can see, there are numerous ways to obtain qualitative and quantitative data and combine them to make informed decisions. Alternative choices Blinkist displays a few items and then a 'see all' button If we're designing our information architecture well, we'll be offering simple ways to access alternative options. For content this could be a 'see all' button but for navigation it could be a hamburger menu (yep, the hamburger menu isn't so bad!). Even though less is more when it comes to minimalism, that doesn't mean we need to limit our overall offering, only our upfront offering. Minimal clutter = maximum impact! Interesting fact: when it came to product presentations (i.e. content), Steve Jobs famously swore by the rule of three. Generate CSS (26 Sept) is a London conference dedicated to all things CSS – ! Use the code WEBDESIGNER2 for 10% off tickets 02. Strip visual clutter This flat tap target is so stripped it completely lacks clarity Speaking of clutter, visual clutter refers to cosmetic styles that only add emotional value – i.e. they look cool but they don't offer much else. Now I do love things that look nice (don't all designers?) and emotional design is extremely important, especially in consumer-based industries, but there's a reason why it's called the surface layer – it's applied last. It's so easy to run with the wind when it comes to the surface layer – some call it over-designing. If something just doesn't feel right to you, Coco Chanel once said: “When accessorising, always take off the last thing you put on”. But if you really want to take a more sensible data-driven approach, there's a really neat trick I like to use that involves screen sharing. While sharing your screen, acquire a few users and have them decide which styles to toggle on and off. Carry on until the user is satisfied with both the visual appeal and usability. In terms of tap targets specifically (buttons, links, input fields and so on), visual affordance testing can reveal which elements appear to be clickable and which don't. You may find that the former technique is more useful though because it will also reveal solutions (i.e. which styles to remove in order to reduce visual clutter). 03. Optimise visual hierarchy Here the user learns what to do without reading the long text So we've minimised our upfront offering and optimised it visually in order to reduce cognitive overload but could we take this a step further? Absolutely but we also need to remember that users are lazy – before users read, they scan. This means where users are briefly scanning our UI and content holistically, even the tiniest visual distraction can draw users away from what's really important, making minimisation ever more important when it comes to scannability. But that aside, the elements that are left after minimisation should complement each other well. Less is only more if we make it speak volumes. Content and headings Since users precap content by scanning its headings, these headings should be extremely informative, not only hinting at what its accompanying paragraphs will elaborate on but be good enough that if users only read the headings, they would still walk away satisfied – this is still true even if it costs us in terms of SEO value. After all, what use is acquisition if we can't offer a decent reading experience once the user has arrived? Headings should also benefit from a clear typographical hierarchy, aiding users in their effort to understand how individual snippets of content form a body of information. UI and colour A similar concept applies to UI and colour. Colour can not only help with contrasting but also help to infer meaning, so when users come across these tap targets, they automatically understand what it is they do or where it is they will lead to. Getting the headings and colours right might not have anything to do with minimalism directly but it ensures that the elements we aren't willing to minimise are as effective as they can possibly be. Otherwise, we run the risk of over-designing in order to compensate. 04. Make more mean less 'Put everything on one screen. It's simpler, right?' In theory this sounds like a top-notch idea but it's not a solution that works in every case. Some designs are more complex than others and, besides, simple for who? You need to be mindful of confusing simpler implementation (making things easier for developers) and simpler UX (making things easier for the users). Consider breaking down UI-heavy components into smaller user flows. While technically this does result in more, it creates the illusion of less. Typically this means breaking up long forms into logical steps but it could also mean breaking up lengthy articles with images. Overall, minimalism is a tricky subject. Sometimes we mean it as a visual aesthetic (flat UIs, white backgrounds, etc.), other times we consider it merely a concept or even a lifestyle. In terms of user interface design, the best way to think of it is to consider the impact on cognitive load that each element has. When designing to reduce cognitive load, ask yourself these questions for every style, user flow, interaction, and feature: Is it needed? Is it over-shadowing elements that are more important? Is it being over-shadowed by elements that are not more important? It comes down to visual hierarchy – eliminating clutter and using design to indicate importance. Sometimes that means moving things out of sight if it helps the user focus on what's really important. This article was originally published in issue 321 of net, the world's best-selling magazine for web designers and developers. Buy issue 321 here or subscribe here. Related articles: 8 minimal UI designs and why they work Build a Material Design app with Angular 2 14 easy ways to make your website more accessible View the full article

If you're in the market for a versatile laptop with plenty of power, but can't wait until Black Friday 2019, then we have news of a hot deal from Dell that ought to do the trick. From Monday 16 September through to 18 September, Dell is having a 72-hour sale on its high-end ultrabook, the new XPS 13 2-in-1 laptop, which will save you a cool £500 on the usual price, making it one of the best Dell XPS deals we've seen of late. The model in question is a must-have for designers keen on having the freedom to work wherever they like. It's equipped with a 10th Generation Intel Core i7-1065G7 processor, 16GB of memory and a 512GB SSD, so you can be sure it can come with most design tasks you care to throw at it. This Dell XPS 2-in-1 is a powerful and versatile beast It also features a 13.4-inch 4K HDR touch display for the ultimate in clarity, and it weighs in at just 1.33kg – not much more than the latest MacBook Air – so it's ready to go with you anywhere. We're already big fans of the Dell XPS range for their unbeatable combination of powerful specifications, beautiful displays and rock-solid build, and this model's no exception. Normally it would set you back £1,899, but for 72 hours only you can get one for just £1,399. Getting your hands on this sweet deal couldn't be easier; simply follow this link (it goes live at 00.01am on Monday 16 September), and use the code MEGA500 at the checkout to see £500 knocked off the price. Don't hang around, though, this is a limited-time deal that'll end at midnight on Wednesday. Related articles: The best Dell laptops in 2019 The best 2-in-1 laptops for designers in 2019 The best laptop deals in 2019 View the full article

We're giving away five pairs of tickets to Generate CSS, a brand new CSS-focused event for web designers and developers, brought to you by Creative Bloq, net magazine and Web Designer. The lucky winners will be chosen at random and announced on Thursday 19th September. To be in with a chance of winning a pair of tickets simply fill out this entry form. The deadline for entries is 5pm BST on Wednesday 19 September 2019. Good luck! About Generate CSS Venue: Rich Mix, Shoreditch, London Date: Thursday 26 September 2019 Generate CSS is brought to you by leading design magazines net and Web Designer, and Creative Bloq. Our new conference takes place at Rich Mix in Shoreditch, London. You’ll be able to catch great sessions on everything CSS, whether that’s soon-to-be-released specs, cutting-edge techniques for crafting revolutionary layouts or ways to create smooth UI animations. Not only that, but you’ll also get to hang out with fellow web designers and developers, hobnob with CSS experts, check out the latest tech and get stuck into some light-hearted breakout activities. And even once the conference is over, there’s still plenty of fun on offer: you’re all invited to join us for a drink at the Generate after party. So whether you’re an experienced dev looking to sharpen your skills or a fresh-faced designer eager to learn how to start styling up sites, there's plenty to master. Here are some of our excellent speakers, from Google, Clearleft and more! If you would like to book tickets to Generate CSS, head to the Generate website, and for a 10% discount use offer code: WEBDESIGNER2. Read more: 10 best CSS frameworks Cool CSS animations for recreate 22 best UI design tools View the full article

monday.com is a multi-functional planning platform dedicated to streamlining workflows and improving productivity within companies. Since it first launched in 2014 (under a different name), the platform has gone from strength to strength, and there's more exciting news recently announced. The company's latest round of equity funding raised $150 million and saw the company valued at $1.9 billion – nearly four times what it was judged to be worth at its previous round of funding a year ago. It's a clear testament to monday.com's success so far, and an exciting sign of what's still to come. With plenty of long-term plans for the platform, and now the cash to channel into making them a reality, the future is looking bright for Monday.com. Find out more, or try monday.com for yourself The platform can be adapted to any business structure or workflow [click the icon in the top right to enlarge the image] What makes monday.com stand out from competitors is its dedication to flexibility – this is a tool that aims to adapt to the needs of any user, business or workflow. Its website presents enthusiastic case studies from everyone from financial leads to creative project managers. And with major companies including Wix, Philips and Carlsberg already amongst its fans, it's certainly doing something right. This latest round of funding is going to be channeled into making the platform's team communication and management tools even better. monday.com feature focus Whether you're a studio manager or simply interested in how this tool might help boost efficiency within your immediate team, monday.com is worth exploring. Let's take a look at how the platform works. The tool centres around flexible and customisable project boards. The owner kicks off a project by building a design board that includes all the specific columns they need. When the project kicks off, the board is populated with design requests, and team members create their personal backlog to work through. Stay on top of progress by dragging-and-dropping different tasks to the appropriate group, assigning requests to different team members, and using the different views to keep track of what's going on. Flexible boards ensure everyone can track a project's progress [click the icon in the top right to enlarge the image] The ability to add automations is just one of the handy features to make things even more efficient. For example, you might want to automatically notify the colleague who requested a task when you've completed it. monday.com knows different teams have different needs, so you don't need to worry about shoehorning your process into a specific format. Project boards are highly flexible to suit the needs of the project. Individual team members can customise their own workflow by creating specific groups tailor-made for their process. If you are struggling with anything within the tool, you can rest assured – there's 24/7 email and phone support, with a 10-minute response time (much better than industry standard). Want to find out more, or try it for yourself? Visit the monday.com website now. View the full article

Anyone who’s kept an eye on logo design in 2019 knows the score. When it comes to redesigning a major brand’s logo, the standard route is to take the existing design and simplify it in as many ways as you can. If it features multiple colours, reduce that to just one. If it has ornate, expressive or cartoony typography, change that to a more streamlined font. If it has graphic elements, remove them, or at least make them look more geometric and app icon-like. If there are serifs, swap them out for sans-serifs. You get the idea. In short, if you end up with something that looks like all the other logos around right now, then you’re going in the right direction. This most pervasive of all the logo trends of 2019 can be seen in the redesigns of Volkswagen, Android, Sydney Film Festival, Toyota, Scotiabank, City of Vienna, Bristol CIty FC, Staples, Airarabia, All4, and many more. But it has not been entirely dominant. Some brands have decided to buck the groupthink, and dare to go in a different direction. Here we bring you 10 new logos from 2019 that stood out from the crowd, in a number of striking ways. 01. Western Sydney Airport The work of Australian design agency Traffic, the new logo for Western Sydney Airport is a world away from the clean but unexciting wordmark of its predecessor (click the right arrow above to see the previous design). Stacking the text and adding a bold new graphic element, crafted from a disjointed combination of triangles and an eye-catching gradient, this new logo has certainly divided opinion. You can learn more about the thinking behind it here. 02. Wind Mobility WInd (full name: Wind Mobility) is a Berlin-based startup that offers dockless e-scooter and electric bicycle rentals, and its latest logo was designed by London studio Ragged Edge. The new design is a bold approach that calls to mind superhero comic typography. And overall there's a clear sense of dynamism and speed to it, particularly seen in the off-key serifs on the 'W' and 'N', which befits the brand nicely. Check out the full identity and learn more about the thinking behind it here. 03. Sheffield Theatres Here's another logo design that takes inspiration from headline-style typography. Sheffield Theatres is a group of three theatres in Sheffield, England, namely The Crucible, The Lyceum and the Studio. And its new logo, created by local agency Cafeteria, is brimming with confidence and assertiveness. With its bold typography, vivid colour, and inspired use of an exclamation mark (which nicely flips on itself in the animated version), this logo design may be clean and simple, but it's certainly not bland. 04. Access Based in Teesside, UK, since 1976, Access is a leading company manufacturing startlifts for home use worldwide. It's not an industrial sector you'd normally connect with a sense of youthful dynamism. But this new identity, designed by Middlesbrough studio Better, takes an unusual approach that manages to tick a lot of boxes. Stacking the letters vertically is an obvious reference to the product in question, while the custom lettering, created in-house, reflects the innovative nature of the company's engineering. The negative space down the middle, meanwhile, recalls the crisp stencil-like silhouettes of industrial manufacturing. See the full identity and learn more about the thinking behind it here. 05. Teach First Teach First is a social enterprise registered as a charity, which aims to address educational disadvantage in England and Wales. Its previous wordmark was pretty standard, but London studio Johnson Banks recently gave it a dramatic makeover. Centre-stage is the attention-grabbing T/F monogram, with its clever use of triangles and negative space, while the wordmark is now stacked, and cast in a spiky new serif. See the full identity and learn more about its creation here. 06. Desigual Desigual is a global clothing brand, headquartered in Ibiza, Spain, that's known for its use of graffiti art, asymmetry and flamboyant splashes of colour. This June it excitedly announced that it was "becoming the first brand in the world to permanently reverse its logo". What was the point of that, you might ask? According to a press release, this in-house redesign was "a tribute to the rebellious, disruptive and fresh spirit that inspired filmmaker Isabel Coixet to give us the name Desigual in 1984 because we were 'not doing the same' thing as everyone else." You can read more about the controversy surrounding this redesign in our article, Is Desigual’s new backwards logo a step forwards? . 07. M Capital M Capital is a private equity firm in France; the kind of enterprise you'd expect would favour a staid, formal and strictly corporate logo. So it raised a few eyebrows when they released this new design, crafted by Parisian studio Brand Brothers. These jagged, angular and disjointed letterforms are a world away from those in the previous logo, which evoked precisely zero personality. You can learn more about the new identity and how it was created here. 08. OBV Formed in 2014 from the merger of Flanders' opera house and main ballet company, Opera Ballet Vlaanderen (OBV) is the largest cultural institution in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium. This new logo, designed by London-based Pentagram partner Marina Willer, uses distorted type to turn the institution's capital letters into an instantly recognisable icon. Like it or loathe it, it certainly conveys the contemporary feel the client was aiming for, and avoids any hint of cliche. Check out the full identity here. 09. Zoo de Granby Zoo de Granby is a Quebec institution: a non-profit zoo that's also home to an amusement park and a water park. In a world of boring, samey logos, its bright new wordmark is a real breath of fresh air. Designed by Montreal studio lg2, there's a real sense of fun to its playful typography, well befitting a space devoted to amusing children and families. Learn more about the thinking behind it here. 10. Vrbo Our final example of a bland and uninspired logo being transformed into something more enticing comes from Vrbo, the most popular vacation rental site in the US. With every website logo looking very similar these days, this redesign by Texas studio FODA goes in a very different direction. It's inspired, apparently, by stripes; namely those in "the clothing we wear on vacation, from board shorts to ski clothes to the classic French breton" and "in the destinations we visit, from umbrellas on the beach to log cabins in the mountains". Visually the result is spectacular and eye-catching, although we wonder how well it reduces down on small screens. You can learn more about the redesign here. 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Sites that use the Gutenberg (found in WordPress 5.0 to 5.2.2) are open to complete takeover. View the full article