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Get Inspired By Your Desktop Using GeekTool & CandyBar

Ari Krzyzek — Mon, 17 May 2010 23:32:33 +0000

Inspiration comes from anywhere. With the technology we have today, it is only a matter of quality to feed your brain with selective inspirations to keep you going with new ideas. From browsing for inspiration on Google to reading people’s tweet of new inspiration post online. And if you notice, your desktop could also become one of the sources for it. How is it not? Many designers spent their time working on a wallpaper design with hope it will give them inspiration when they need it.

Your desktop is the closest inspiration source for you. Ever get bored with the ordinary look of your current desktop? Did you try using the most awesome wallpaper you could find to cheer up your desktop? Did it work? Well, for me it didn’t. For the past few years I changed my desktop wallpaper every once or twice in a month. But recently I changed it once or twice in a week. I just couldn’t figure out what I really want to be on my desktop that could also inspired me, until I saw one desktop screenshot from deviantArt. It was not the greatest desktop screenshot, but what he put on his desktop that interest me the most.

Ever heard GeekTool and CandyBar?

GeekTool

GeekTool is a PrefPane (System Preferences module) for Mac OS 10.5. It let you display on your desktop different kind of informations, provided 3 default plugins :

File plugin to monitor MacOS X activity with /var/log/system.log, or any file that you want to follow.Shell mode to launch custom scripts or commands like “df” to check space left on filesystems, “uptime” to monitor load of your machine… Finally, Image mode helps you monitor bandwith usage, CPU loads, memory availability of your server, via tools like MRTG or RRD.

Click here to download GeekTool.

I personally like this plugin. It allows me to put anything on my desktop, well not any anything, but most of things that I wanted. Say a board with some of my favorite pictures. Time, calendar, weather info, even add IP info or my Mac info on my desktop. How to do all that? Well, the image is simple, all you have to do is set the path or the image URL, then place it anywhere on your desktop. But others like calendar or weather info, those need some line of command. Below I have the links you can check for the command info.

http://www.mactricksandtips.com/2008/10/small-list-of-geektool-commands.html
http://www.keynote2keynote.com/2007/04/10/ultimate-geektool-setup-pimp-your-desktop-part-2/
http://www.macheist.com/forums/viewtopic.php?id=12999
http://maketecheasier.com/geektool-turn-macs-desktop-into-information-center/2010/03/09
http://www.maclife.com/article/howtos/customize_your_desktop_geektool

Though, I still don’t know why I couldn’t get the weather image to show up on my desktop. I spent several hours working on this but I didn’t succeed. If you have this problem as well, then you know you’re not the only one :p

CandyBar

CandyBar allows you to change the system icons in Mac OS X that you normally can’t, including including the trash can, volumes, default folder, and more!
CandyBar 3 also now includes a full-featured icon organizer (formerly called Pixadex) that acts like an iPhoto for your icons: collect and store your icons in the same application you use to change them!

Click here to download CandyBar

Now that you have CandyBar installed on your Mac, you should begin your search for icons or icon sets that you like. Here are few links where you could get great quality icons.

http://weloveicons.com/
http://iconfactory.com/freeware/icon
http://frespiration.com/icon-index/

If you prefer to use your artwork, pictures or your own icon but kinda disappointed that it wasn’t the right type of file, go to iConverticons to convert your files to Mac or Windows icons.

Still need more inspiration for your desktop? Check out some of these beautiful screenshots using GeekTool and CandyBar.

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Bacio 3rd Anniversary

Ari Krzyzek — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 18:43:53 +0000

Client: Bacio Club Bali
Project Type: Under Contract Project
Media: Print Media (Artpaper)
Category: Print Design – Invitation + CD Package
Website: http://bacioclub.com

Details…
Artwork for Bacio 3rd Anniversary. This includes Invitation and CD pack. The theme was obvious: Circus.

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Frespiration! #1. Coming Up Soon!

Ari Krzyzek — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 22:59:01 +0000

With the fresh New Year ’10 spirit, we are proud to announce the upcoming inspirations all over the globe. We call it, Frespiration! We want these collections to be share to other creative people and inspire them from art point of view. Everyone who wants to join us is welcome, all of the artwork collections are under the category of Graphic Design, i.e. illustration, typography, print design, stationary set, advertising, web design, etc. We are also still debating whether we should include Photography inside the collection. If you are interested to join on our very 1st edition, please click here for more info. Comments, critiques, and advise are welcome to make this design collection the best one around.

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Design Concepts: Review and Get Reviewed!

Ari Krzyzek — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 00:00:14 +0000

Every designers are taught to think about the concept first before creating any designs. Although some designers get inspired for the concept along when creating the design itself. The point is, you always need a concept to support your design and build it at the same time. As a designer, I try my best to apply a strong concept behind my designs, either for my clients, contests, or even for my personal artwork. But to judge or review my own artwork, I would say they’re great. This is why I wish I could share my concept and get some feedback about them from other designers.

ConceptFeedback helped me review my designs for free. Of course they want you to also return the favor for other posted concepts. But it’s worth it. So far this become the place where I shared my artwork/project’s concepts and listen to what other people think about them. Sometimes they come with solution that you can try. Be open, not all of them will praised your work, but hey, that’s the point. You need more critique or advise to build better concept for next projects.

The concept you post could be anything; it could be websites, logos, advertisements, videos, and more. So, go ahead and post your concept and be surprised on the reviewed.

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Begin to Make Website for Designer

Ari Krzyzek — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 18:38:22 +0000

For most Print Graphic Designer, design and create a website would be a challenging task to do. As much as we enjoy ourselves working on the artwork and layout for it, those principles on print designs won’t aesthetically pleasing as it is for the print designs. As a print graphic designer, it was quite confusing for me when I was being critiqued by my client for the web page I did for his company. I found that even though he isn’t a designer, he knows the real function of the web page and the customer’s vision flow when they are browsing the web. I searched more resources about them. And yes, even though it’s basically part of graphic design, web design has its own rules. From the illustration, color scheme, and typography, it’s all what we’ve been familiar with in print design, but in web design, pay more attention to the effects (ie. gradients or shadows) as well.

Below are some great links to articles that have helped me understanding more about website design. Hopefully they could be useful for you to :)

Part of the TutPlus website series from Envato to help providing designers about internet and websites.

A step to step tutorial to guide you designing and coding your first website.

Great blog and resources for web designer.

This article has 9 important things you should never underestimate when designing a blog web page, really useful and such a great reminder for designer ;)

And this last one is an article to prepare yourself to be ready in polishing your next web project professionally.

Good luck and have fun ;)

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Selling logo on IstockPhoto

Ari Krzyzek — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 22:15:02 +0000

Various stock photos and illustration are sold on the net, everything you need for your project and saving more budgets for most freelancers. After releasing the audio stocks at the beginning of this year, now Istockphoto announcing the Istock Logos. This new product will come in few months ahead, while IstockPhoto is still preparing for the Logo Training Manual for the Istock logo designers. Even though it’s a stock logo, there are few differences use for the Istock logos; Isstock Logos will be exclusive file, high price, and only for one time use. Read more about it on the “Logos come to iStock” forum to find the details, and start thinking for some new ideas for your new logo for sell.

http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=119471

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Be Awesome at Work?

Ari Krzyzek — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 18:02:20 +0000

Most designers nowadays are split into two categories; one prefer to go freelancing, and other prefer to work for a company. Despite those two categories, we all want to be great on our work. We learn tutorials and news from many sources on the net to upgrade our skill, thousands of design blogs also become our inspiration to improve our design knowledge in term of handling clients, time or project management, or others.

One famous site on this, is Envato. In case you’re not too familiar with this name, you may have heard psdtuts+, vectortuts+ and other tuts+ series, freelance switch (a very useful website for freelancers). Now they publish their new website for people who prefer to work for company and want to be awesome at their work. From how to make an effective to-do list, to how to gain respect in your workplace. You can find them and other resources about it here:
http://workawesome.com/

So, who says that the employee can’t be awesome at work? ;)

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$29.95 Book from SitePoint now FREE for ONLY 10 days!!

Ari Krzyzek — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 15:35:24 +0000

Yup, I’m not joking. What you read is F-R-E-E.
SitePoint is one successful Web portal business. This Australian web development service company also publishes top-selling educational books. Over 50,000 books are sold across 135 countries. Those books are used by web developers and designers; many of them are also endorsed by universities and educational institutions around the world.

This month, only until 14th September 2009, SitePoint is giving “The Principles of Successful Freelancing” book for free. This book is all about what you need to think, prepare and to do as a beginner in freelancing. It’s a handy guide to be your own boss and starting to grown your own business as internet freelancer. No matter what type of profession you are, this book will guide you to be a better prepared freelancer. So if you started to think to work away from the office or you just wanna learn more and getting advices before deciding to go freelancing, grab the book while it’s free just for 10 more days.

Go to this link to find more about the free book:
http://twitaway.sitepoint.com/

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