"The actual tragedies of life bear no relation to one's preconceived ideas. In the event, one is always bewildered by their simplicity, their grandeur of design, and by that element of the bizzare which seems inherent in them" ... Jean Cocteau
Digital reality
So I saw the moon earlier, probably between the second and third period of the hockey game, as it has been raining since Thor’sday and is supposed to continue until Tuesday, I thought I would comment on a rather new phenomena. The totally un-natural look of the web, what with the long awaited and too late to really make people care about it, Vista’s Aero glass look or the Mac OS X AQUA look, designers seem to want this, I don’t know exactly what to call it, maybe the ‘Glossy Sparkling Clean’ look, defiantly not the ‘black shiny FBI shoes’ look. I was standing out on my back porch looking at all the 150 year old maple trees and my slate patio and was wondering where are the real colours & textures in computer generated design?
I have been visiting a lot of sites lately trying to learn how to use TextPattern and finally it got to me, I love their work, but I don’t know…the look is so foreign to me. Maybe it is because I choose to live here on the Bay of Fundy and not in some big city (which if I remember correctly are all pretty dirty), but squeaky clean and glossy and sort of…well, for lack of a better word, fake. Just one example that really put me over the edge is Bryan Veloso’s site Avalon Star. From a HTML – CSS point-of-view, it is amazing, but am I going to see anything like this in the real world? Then my brain takes over from my instinct and tells me, “it is just design – fashion” making me think that all those things are made to try to take us out of our mundane existence. Even designers trying to make colour correct, while everyone looks at something on different monitors and under different lighting conditions and it is all in the mind or eye of the beholder. It all seems so subjective. Is that the reason black and greys are so popular these days, they are easy to understand and people have a hard time with real colour?
So to end this rant off, go get some colourful clothing and get out of the drab grey world.
Why do you want to paint your house in nice beautiful colours, then always dress and look at web sites in grey? Remember it took about 70 years to get movies in colour and the kids nowadays have a hard time to watch black & white movies, but they want the web and fashion to be in millions of shades of grey.
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Written by Jeff Nelson 12 June 2006, 00:01 #
I like the ‘oranje’ for your site today as Netherlands won their match in the World Cup . . .
A colour story for you:
My friend Mario returned home to Quebec for Christmas with the family last year and on Christmas eve he settled in with his nephew aged three to watch the black and white version of ‘A Christmas Carol’ starring Alistair Sim.
Not too far along, his nephew asked, ‘Uncle Mario, how come there’s no colour in the movie?’ and Mario responded, ‘Because, that’s the way it was back then.’ A little bit along the nephew shared his thoughts, ‘It must’ve been strange – the whole world in black and white with no colour . . .’
When it comes to graphics and communication design I like to zig if everyone else is zagging. So I choose Dutch Fall Maple Orange and Bay of Fundy Slate as my colours for the day. I’ve always wanted the job of naming the colours for the paint companies . . . nice work if you can get it.
Written by Robin 12 June 2006, 11:05 #
hi Randy, read this yesterday morning. I took you’re advice & went to change out of my grey-black clothes, was rushing getting ready for work. Then I noticed it. That all my colourful clothes were summery, tank tops and light skirts – my pink & orange bikini. But it was cold outside.. and I was working down by the lake where it is even colder, even though it would seem working in the Beach that it would be warm, beaches often are.. and then it hit me that really maybe Canada is not meant to be such a colourful place, at least in the cold weather. Ideally yes, but in reality it just isn’t – to me at least, not when its dark & grey outside. Bright, colourful clothes to me represent warmth & heat, cool colors go with the cold. I tried yesterday but the best I could do was blue, dark green & purple. I did try though. On an aside I do notice that with my diet change to raw I have gotten slightly more colourful.. maybe theres something to that also.
I like your ideas though & the thought of being more colourful. Thanks for the inspiration.
Have a colourful day!
Written by Jeff Nelson 17 June 2006, 01:23 #
Operis Progressus Magnopere Naturae Placet . . . The Progress of the Work Pleases Nature Greatly . . . If it wasn’t for the negative charge, I wouldn’t know what the positive charge was. So, thanks but no thanks Descartes for your ‘I think, therefore I am.’ One man, one phrase, and boy, what a shift. (One of the pages I’m designing for my site shifted and I had to go into the code to find out where the bug was. Turns out it was one dot, one place, and boy, what a shift). For me, it’s when being becomes thinking that the ‘thought prison’ shows up. Rodin showed us the other way. ‘The Thinker’ makes the stress clear to see, the burden of living in the head becomes exposed for all to see. One man, one sculpture, but boy, no shift. How come? I feel it’s because the habit of living in the head instead of the heart becomes addictive to not just the individual but also to the race – offering up a distraction. Lacking the courage to be my natural self, I should jump at any opportunity to steer clear of living life on life’s terms. But why would one lack the courage to try to be true to one’s nature? Negative charge can be responsible for that. A thinking society generates default ideas, emotions and attitudes. Add water and stir. Yabba Dabba Doo. Regular patterns. Resentments. ‘There must be more to life’ gets notioned at the end of the day instead of at dawn. Time is man-made. All animals live in the now, in the heart. Peace of mind requires an awareness of the timeless stillness underneath it all. I feel and silently witness myself feeling. No judgement on the feeling. No auto-thinking about the feeling. Just feeling and watching myself feel. This is my soul trying, discovering an unlimited capacity for love and joy and unimaginable bounty. I am the life form as are you as I am.
You started it Randy!