Last month Adobe released beta versions of Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Soundbooth CS4. Registered CS3 users could try this software without any time limit. I downloaded Dreamweaver CS4 in the first week it was available but because computer security is so tight at Ogilvy I’ve been unable to install it. That hasn’t stopped me from exploring the new user interface changes through articles and videos written and taken by others, as well as Adobe’s designers.

One of the key changes causing a lot of debate at the moment is Adobe’s decision to offer an option in the OSX version of CS4 to put the document and UI in to one big window, with a solid grey background, and allow the window to be resized from any side rather than just the bottom right corner. This would be optional and it has yet to be decided what the default would be.

The Microsoft Window’s versions of Adobe’s suite has always had this design, as all Windows applications do. Traditionally Mac OS has kept the UI separate to the open document — so you could see the desktop behind the application.

The first reaction to this decision by Mac users has therefor been that they are making it look and behave like a Windows application, rather than following the design rules set in OSX. While I agree that it’s important to make applications look and behave consistently with the OS (and why I also use Safari instead of Firefox because it feels more like an OSX application), it’s interesting to note that Apple has been transitioning their software to use this design without anyone seeming to notice, or at least without causing as much debate as Adobe seems to be. Perhaps it’s because it’s been Apple software and so Mac users don’t make the connection to Windows and rather assume it’s just an evolution.

John Nack from Adobe has put a gallery together that shows some of the pro applications Apple makes that use the ‘Windows’ design. Apple are always preaching that Windows just copies Mac OS but perhaps this is one case where OSX has copied Windows?

I think it’s important that this new design remains an option, regardless of whether it’s an improvement or not, simply because many users are used to working the current way. It will be interesting to see how many people make use of the new UI and what the UI in CS5 ends up with though.

My name is Anthony and I like to collect typographic tshirts, I own about six and I’m always hovering over that little ‘add to cart’ button to add to my collection. I think it started when I bought a tshirt from a designer I met in Melbourne who devotes his professional life to protesting the use of Helvetica. Now I just like the nod of acknowledgment I get as I walk down the street and someone ‘gets’ what my tshirt is about. So I’m going to help you get in to this secret society by revealing some of my sources and featuring images of my favourite tshirts (many of which I own).

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Typotheque

Grandbüro

Fuck Helvetica

Super Superficial

ISO50

Neubau Berlin

Turn Nocturnal

2K by Gingham

Experimental Jetset spoke at the D&AD lecture I attended last night to a sold out theatre. They chose to present work they had done for French clients, simply as a theme for their talk. At first they seemed nervous speaking to such a large audience in a foreign language but it didn’t take long before they became more comfortable and enguaged the audience with their charisma and humour. It was interesting to listen to their process, they explained that they try to make design physical in their work, in that it references the real world through tearing or breaking an element, or the medium itself. I was particularly interested in their choice of sans-serif typefaces in 99% of their work, specifically what was their reason for it. Luckily this question was asked in the Q&A session at the end. Their response was that it wasn’t intentional, they’ve just always found a sans-serif better suited their projects. They thought serif faces were always associated with old fashioned typography, where you would chisel the forms in to stone or marble, while sans-serif was more current and reflective of the work they do.

My favourite piece of work they showed was the work pictured above, an invitation they did for a Wim Crouwel exhibition — a famous Dutch designer and typographer. They made reference to a calendar he had designed where the type was cut and on different layers of paper. They printed the letters of his name on to long sheets of paper at different sizes and hung the sheet from sliders on the ceiling of their studio. The letters increased in size so they could be placed behind one another but appear like they were the same size when viewed front-on. Then they got Crouwel to walk through the sheets of paper and had a photographer take photos —- a good example of referencing the real world through the design. They showed some other pieces of interesting work too like the branding for 104 - Cent Quatre and RMN, quite inspirational projects.