"Rock" by Junebug
site reviews
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prior listings
Search results for: laun
prior listings
Please note: Our format changed as of 10/18/07 – see the front page and full archives for more recent listings. Thanks.
Search results for: laun
- Elaine 10/7/07
Description: pictures of everyday surroundings
Comments: "Photography has always been attractive to me but I am really starting from scratch as I hadn't touched anything else than a small compact digital camera since 1982..." Living in Paris, Elaine has been out to capture the everyday in pictures since launching the photoblog at the beginning of the year. Look – another spiral to add to the collection, not to mention great shots of a one-man band and a beautiful blur...;~))
- Art on the Net 12/29/05
Description: a virtual space where artists join together in sharing their art with others on the Internet
Comments: "Enjoy visiting artists studios and roaming the gallery rooms." Over 11 years ago, the site launched as a result of a barter between Lile, an artist, and a friend who was interested in one of her oil paintings. She got a free internet connection for a year out of the deal and soon launched art.net. Today, it houses the works of over 400 artists, presenting their works in a non-commercial setting (see the Manifesto). The design is somewhat old fashioned but the site's navigation is pretty good – more important, the content is remarkable (and vast). Here's a fun starting point...
- Forget Magazine 8/5/05
Description: poetry, fiction, reporting and essays not found in mainstream media
Comments: "What we are really after: what we are really after in this publication is the publishing of material that is ignored in the mainstream press and the even the independent news. Anything that has reason and passion." In 2002, it was said that "every writer under 40 is aware of this site." Young writers. Canadian culture. Submissions "that pertain to the interaction, in Canada, between people will be considered the highest rate of priority (before first, if that is possible)." Launched back in February, 2001, there's almost 500 works in the archives (mostly words, some including interesting visual touches) – and don't miss the various About documents for entertaining insight into what makes this litzine tick... [wood s lot]
- Dan Holdsworth 3/12/05
Description: gallery of photographic projects (Flash)
Comments: One of Dan's photographic series, at the edge of space, includes an amazing rocket launch shot and six other untitled images, all taken in 1999. I also like the 3 motorway vistas. But it's the 11 shots in the no echo series that simply blew me away...;~))
- Thunder Chunky 3/9/05
Description: design, music and film magazine featuring interviews and reviews from around the globe
Comments: From Liverpool, today's pick is an online magazine full of interesting music reviews, insightful interviews and other goodies revolving around design, music and film . Launched just last May and looking good...;~))
- Web Gallery of Art 12/5/04
Description: A virtual museum and searchable database of European painting and sculpture of the Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque periods (1100-1800)...
Comments: There's over 12,000 reproductions of art in its catalogue, covering European art of the 12th-18th centuries. Search the database, browse by artist, or take one of the site's many guided tours. Launched in 1996, initially covering a more limited period, the site also offers a free postcard service. Works like a charm...;~)) [RadioGladio < Design Radar]
- Planewalk 3/18/04
Description: a harbour for my visual creations
Comments: Eleni a/k/a curly-haired monster, a 21-year-old artist, launched the site last September after several prior attempts and I'm glad she made it. A harbour for her art, the site's simple ink-splattered design is appealing. The works, going back as far as 1998, include traditional paintings, pen & wash, and pencil sketches plus digital portraits, paintings, scribbles, and collabs. Cool style – I love the untitled pencil drawing of a tree done in August, 2001. Eleni says "explore, enjoy, and perhaps be inspired." 3 for 3... [raster]
- Gathering the Jewels 11/01/03
Description: the website for Welsh cultural history
Comments: It's "a unique coming together of libraries, museums and archives from all over Wales" and houses thousands of "images of Welsh life through the ages." Launched just over a year ago, today's pick is part of a digitisation project meant for people to "learn from and enjoy" while preserving the jewels of Wales' cultural history for future generations. Nicely organized and comprehensive in scope...
- randomWalks 10/10/03
Description: a group weblog
Comments: Though "a group weblog" is a simple, accurate description, I like Adam's more creative way of describing the site. "A creature with a thousand arms and eyes, making love with itself and reaching back as far as creation and forward to the very end of time." He launched the site back in late 1999, not only "to become famous" (don't we all?), but also to "rope his friends into finding new things for him to look at every day." There's 12 other "editors" besides Adam, providing content in literally dozens of different categories.So far this month, there's been posts to love, living, politics, kerouac, media, poetry, music, books, apple, macfilter, war, drugs, (anti)capitalism, cartoons, cinema, fluffy, l.a., porn, public space, punk, quotes, sex, the arts, wisdom, words. and race, to give you an idea as to the variety. "We dislike war, racism, prisons, privilege and ignorance," says Adam, speaking for the group. I wouldn't like the blog nearly as much if it was too heavy in a single category, like politics or technology. I like the variety and the group pulls it off well – a nice mix. There's also assorted quick links ("Flux") and "Headlines" on the sidebar.As far as the site's design goes, I like the random images above each day's posts. A subtle, tiled background pattern and the randomized graphics add flavor to the page and the color scheme and layout are also visually appealing. The site renders slightly better in Mozilla than in IE6 (which has known bugs in handling background colors, thank you) but looks nice in both browsers. Browse by date, category, or title and enjoy... [discovered while playing BlogShares]
- We Come In Peace 8/19/02
Description: some strange tales with some strange creatures (Flash)
Comments: Drag the "little monster" towards one of the "stoneballs" and he'll eat it to launch a funny episode. The monster has an existence similar to the coyote in the old Road Runner cartoons – I think that's why I find it all so funny. There's 5 episodes and every one of them is a real gas – today's pick is serving up real entertainment – some of best Flash-based cartoons I've encountered. So – take yer browser to today's pick for a few minutes, drag and eat, and enjoy (and don't worry, if your boss catches you watching, he/she will probably laugh their ass off, too)...
- Ftrain.com 7/22/02
Description: I have much to learn.
Comments: Today's pick is one of those sites I've been aware of for a long time – visited now and then, always enjoyed it, but never picked it. Why? I dunno. It's a great website and belongs with the best of the cool – it's about time! The site launched back in October, 1997 (coincidently, the same month that coolstop was born). The tongue-in-cheek copyright date (8/11/74) is actually the birthday of Paul Ford, the site's creator. Paul's a writer (a very good one, in my opinion, though "I have much to learn" as well), which is no surprise considering he was raised by creative parents who both wrote poetry. "You know how that goes." Sense of humor? If you really wanna know Paul, "My Busy Day" should do the trick – it'll give you an idea as to how he thinks – most amusing. It's not only funny amusement, though – there's excellent literary content here – stories and narrative from "Career Development: An Artist" to "The Naked Woman Across the Street" to "The Subway Diary" to "The Insurance Agent", Paul's writing is sometimes humorous, sometimes making serious points, always thought-provoking. There's also creative content contributed by others, either written by them or submitted in response to such calls as "Please Send Me Your Favorite Poem." What we have here is what I think of as a well-designed, organized literary repository. There's a number of different ways to get to the content – in my book, this site exemplifies good usability. There's a bonus, too – links – oodles of links with commentary. Though "cool" is an ambiguous word, calling today's pick a great website is right on the mark...
- Flying Puppet 3/25/02
Description: interactive and poetic net art (Flash/Shockwave)
Comments: A painter from Paris, Nicolas Clauss, decided to stop painting the "traditional" way. Today's pick was launched last April with Nicolas' decision "to use internet as a canvas." With the collaboration of several talented friends, Nicolas presents his art via Flash and Shockwave – "It's a place of experimentations offering several pieces where interactivity and play dimension are essential." There is a section showcasing 8 of his static works, paintings which I'm guessing were done before the site was launched – they are superb. Then, there's the interactive art – wow! – 30 pieces of multimedia magic! As far as textual (informational) content goes, most of it is currently available in French only, but Nicolas is working on that. The site design is excellent, though I'm not sure which member(s) of the team are responsible for it. One thing I am sure of is that Nicolas, Jean-Jacque, Francois, and Frédéric have a special chemistry between them...
- where were you 3/13/02
Description: site exists to gather the thoughts and emotions of everyday people to the events on and after September 11, 2001
Comments: When JFK was shot in the early 60s, I remember people talking about where they were and what they were doing when the horrific event occurred. I can't remember now what I was doing when it happened – I was just 13-years-old and it all seemed so surreal to me. But, the media images of the event and seeing how people around me were affected are all still clearly etched in my memory. The point is that major events impact our thoughts and emotions. Moving to the present where the word "horrific" has taken on a whole new meaning compared to the 60s, we're all still dealing with our feelings, to some degree, over what happened 6 months ago. How could we not be? Yes! I vividly remember where I was and what I was doing on the morning of September 11, 2001. I doubt that I'll ever forget this time. Today's pick was launched on September 15, 2001.– An 18-year-old named Marie Pelkey came up with the concept – 19-year-old Lane Collins designed the site – 19-year-old geoffrey Hicks was responsible for the "technology." These three students obviously weren't around back in the early 60s to recall how people talked about where they were when JFK was shot as a way to cope with the terrible event – but they sure responded quickly to 911, having the insight to see that people will need, or at least want to share their own thoughts and emotions about it. Almost 1,000 people from all over the world have already weighed in – perhap, you'll want to as well. File this one under "the power of the web."
- the xanthic eye 2/7/02
Description: online gallery containing free wallpapers, icons, skins, and paint shop pro and photoshop tutorials
Comments: As designers, one of the things we try to avoid is the appearance of horizontal scrollbars... sometimes. In the case of today's pick, horizontal scrolling is intentional and the sleek interface, inspired by the look of the iMac ("this one is shiiiiiiny oooOooOo") is quite wide on some of the pages – personally, I think it's worth having to scroll left to right – it's such a cool interface! Today's pick has been listed in the portal cool zone since May, 2000, but after seeing the current version (V6), it was clear to me that it belongs with the best of the cool. V6 was launched last September. There's a wealth of great graphics in the "Gallery" as well as in the "Wallpapers" section. Add some skins and icons for download plus some tutorials – as far as graphics-type sites go, this one has a lot of good, original content. Raymond's been on the web since 1999 and – get this – he's only 16-years-old...
- funkybean 1/10/02
Description: what the internet should be all about, – comedy, fun, spirit, stunning design and interactivity (mature content)
Comments: "And yes, we also know we're the laziest gypos on the world wide web." They admit they'd rather "shag a lot" instead of "writing bullocks" but they still managed to launch "The League of Ladies" – "LOL" seems awfully intentional here and some of the stuff will indeed leave you in that condition. Another project you'll find at today's pick called "Pish take" is just as bizarre on the humor front – "rummage around and you'll find an eclectic mix of unadulterated crap from the past and present. For all you lovers of kitsch design and garish branding." Kitsch? Yep, and they said it, I didn't, thank God – very retro, to say the least. Now, go have a little fun...
- Becoming Human 11/30/01
Description: Journey through the story of human evolution in a broadband documentary experience.
Comments: The long list of site credits tells you this was no small production. Funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and presented by the Institute of Human Origins, today's pick is a wonderful example of new media presentation. They suggest a broadband connection and at least 64k of RAM to view the main attraction, a documentary done in Flash that takes you on a "journey through four million years of human evolution." There's 43 photographers, 9 illustrators, plus the resources of six major museums on the image end of things and 31 content contributors, aside from the team of 22 behind the production of the site. To be honest, I only watched a small part of the documentary – it's humongous – but I saw enough to realize this is great web work – I'll be back there soon to learn more about "Becoming Human." The "News & Views" section also covers some interesting topics and the "Learning Center" is scheduled to launch in mid-December. Excellent!
- Visual-Pollution 11/25/01
Description: Most of the works are private and underground. Many works, paint work, digitalwork, etc, are exhibited in the view. (Flash)
Comments: A 24-year-old Visual Design student at Chosun University in Korea who calls himself "Artwave" is the guy behind today's pick. He's already anticipating the coming new year with the launch of "Artwave2002 Vol4" – the main page loads with a unique combination of sound and motion – very inviting. It's the "gallery" that grabbed me – start at the bottom with his "fine art" and work your way up through his "cover designs" to the "motion graphics." The still drawings and paintings are really good and help you appreciate his interfaces and other multimedia work – I really like the little piece called "dream." Artwave is quite talented...
- terrorpilot|dot|com 7/16/01
Description: v 2.0 – "kill all web designers" – experimental flash portfolio. pain in the neck for the new economy. (mature content)
Comments: The Italian designer who calls himself "swampthing" is one strange dude. I'd seen the previous version of his site and wasn't sure what to make of it. This new version, launched earlier this month, has made it all much clearer to me – this kickass designer is one strange dude (not necessarily a bad thing). When one pulls out all the stops and lets it all out like this guy is doing, you've got to take notice and I'm sure that's what he's been thinking all along. With a Flash intro that's a cross between Hitchcock, Scream, and Troma (definitely not for the faint-hearted) and a stated mission to "kill all web designers", swampthing is apparently going for the throat here and whether you like or not, you have got to take notice. The "collective" weblog is an excellent addition to the site, balancing out the madness a bit, and the "covers" are good stuff. What this site provides is a radical experience – a work of web art that's one of a kind. What remains to be seen, I guess, is how people will respond to it...
- Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries Presents 6/15/01
Description: collection of words + music via Flash (mature content)
Comments: It's easy to come up empty in this site picking "business." I can look at just so many designer portfolio/CV sites before I start longing for content that's broader than a job search and intended for more than just those within the design community. I guess it's a sign of the times. So, it's easy to come up empty unless, of course, one keeps an assortment of extraordinary sites in their back pocket so when new site submissions aren't exactly what one is looking for, one has a "plan B" that's even better than "plan A." Today's pick is coming from the back pocket. "Why would you hold off on it, then?" is a reasonable question you could ask. My answer is I'm only aware of the site because another "site picker" (a truly great one, in this case) made me aware of it and I'm not the kinda guy to steal someone else's thunder – call me silly. The credit for today's pick should go to Glenn Davis, who posted it at the now defunct Astounding Websites way back when he launched the site. That's how I learned about it and when I first visited today's pick, I was really amazed. Now that AW is gone, I feel it's a positive thing to pick this one today because if you haven't seen it, you've been missing out on a collection of some the most intelligent and engaging Flash pieces you will ever encounter – that's why they called it astounding, silly...
- Subdisc 4/10/01
Description: experimental design from sweden (flash)
Comments: Though you'll find a wealth of sites in the Portal Cool Zone that have been around a long time and are just as good as they've always been, one of my key missions here is to make you aware of brand new sites worthy of your time. Today's pick launched just yesterday. If you're set at 800x600 resolution, I suggest you either go into fullscreen mode or set your taskbar on "auto hide" if you're in Windows – that way, you won't miss part of the text at the bottom. What I really like about today's pick is the cool Flash interface and clean, colorful look acheived by Swedish designer Marcus Ericsson. There's some good content already with the promise of more in the works. Even though it's hosted by the design firm he works for (which always comes off as being a little commercially promotional in my mind when the link to the "host" is so prominent), Marcus defines this as his own personal playground and that's exactly what it really appears to be. It's got a fun look and feel and Marcus' creativity definitely goes in more than one direction. The "merchandise" section even has a shopping cart feature, but it's non-commercial and where you'll find freely downloadable wallpapers and screensavers – only one of each at the moment, but I'm sure that's only temporary. Then, there's the "jukebox" with several songs written by Marcus – they're not solo performances, though – he's got other musicians playin' with him and it's pretty good stuff. Had to wait a bit for loading, but I'm on a low bandwith connection at home, so I really didn't mind. I'm looking forward to seeing how the "exhibition" section grows – Marcus promises it will. So – I'm pleased to share this 2-day-old site with ya – enjoy...
- Adrenalab 10/20/00
Description: a freelance design project
Comments: Today's pick seems to be a blueprint that follows the producer's development as a designer. Luca launched the site in August, 1999 as "a way to live my design experience" and describes it as "a simple project with many dreams and a lot of energy." It seems to be an experimental place to try out new layouts and ideas, and the upcoming November issue plans to turn this from a one-man-show into a collaboration of several other designers along with Luca. I really like the 3d look of the interface – the design is clean and crisp and the colors are earthy and quite visually appealing. The graphics are superb throughout, and though it is very much a work in progress, the portfolio of sites and covers is enough to carry it at the moment. That blueprint sort of look (at least that's the impression I get) throughout the site gives me the impression that it will become rich in content before not too long. Laura, one of the other designers, already has a section up and if all those choices on the menu eventually become active links, we may be in for quite a show. There's a lot to explore here and even more to look forward to – I'm inspired by the design and if you read a little in Luca's "unit," you might be inspired, too – it's his love for design that's driving this puppy.
- g-e-l-u-n-d 9/27/00
Description: Personal home page.
Comments: It's funny... when you talk about years on the Internet, "since 1995" is considered a veteran. Hell! That's only five years ago, but in Internet time, it seems like so much longer than it really is. Anyway, Gary's been dabbling in HTML since 1995, and today's pick is his "launching pad to various web projects" he's developed since then. The content is diverse and there's a lot of it. Three little "+" signs on the cover take you 3 simple motion graphics pieces – sorta like old fashioned cinema with pixels exposed. Gary uses a lot of popup windows, but, in most cases, they seem appropriate. Among his various projects, there's some interesting texts, more visuals, and an "audio diner" – in general, it's pretty entertaining stuff. Pages load very fast and the design is clean and appealing. This is a personal website of someone who obviously enjoys the medium and has been doin' it longer than most – 5 years, that is...
- cubadust 9/5/00
Description: very cool design featuring wallpapers, fonts, and an arcade
Comments: The fullscreen interface launched from the splash page of today's winner is impressive – the deep blues and black and fine lines and yummy images combine together just right. It's got a certain richness that I find quite pleasing. Though I think the information in the "latest updates" popup (which appears a little funky in NS as compared to IE) might be better presented by incorporating it into the interface itself, that's just a preference – I just don't like the way it immediately blocks a portion of the beautiful artwork behind it. Featuring unique wallpapers and fonts, all excellent, I have a feeling that the site will be adding things with time. This is an advanced design with superb graphics and I would love to see an actual gallery of the producer's artwork – I'd be willing to bet that something along those lines is being planned. And my tip of the day is don't ever ignore that ambiguous "misc" link, folks. Click it on today's pick and you get a mini-arcade... there's several challenging Java games that load pretty quickly. I'm glad this site was submitted – though the number of submissions is constantly growing, only a few are as cool as today's pick. "Very cool design" he said – I'll have to agree...
- urbanize.org 6/16/00
Description: reclaiming the city (mature content)
Comments: There's people who insist that digital art is not art at all - that it's silly and superficial, blah blah blah... and street art a/k/a graffiti gets the same kinda bum rap. Well, kiddies, the web has changed all that - the stuffed shirts who wanna dictate what art is simply have to step aside sometimes 'cause the web makes it clear that art is what artists decide it is. When you move about your environment with an open mind, you might get the feeling that everything around you is art - sights, sounds, words, and people - commercial, non-commercial, old media, new media - it's all part of culture - it's all art. Today's winning site presents several simple collages of street art, some of it "culture-jamming", though most of it appears to be graffiti with attitude, but not necessarily "anti-commercial." I like the design - the collages are presented in a window that scrolls horizontally which works well here. I'm not sure about the navigation, though - it is easy to get around, but once you enter the site, you need to launch a little popup each time you want to change sections - I'm convinced that many users don't like that sort of thing, but like I said, keeping an open mind may be in order. The art on display is interesting to me - I like it and really don't care who wins the argument as to whether it's art or not - if some people find it thought-provoking and interesting (as I did), then it's creative and meaningful to some degree. (mature content)
- halfbakery 3/4/00
Description: whatever you can think of - a communal database of ideas and inventions, edited by everybody who wants to
Comments: A think tank for everyone. One guy has this idea about cable in a can - just spray it into the outlet and spray a path to the device input and presto! - no ugly cable (just an ugly pile of "cable goo"). Then, there's "laundry balls", a time-release capsule of fabric softener - hey! - didn't some company already invent that? Today's winning site is where you wanna go if you have an idea for something that'll change the world (or not). Calling itself a communal database of ideas and inventions, it's fun to see some of the ideas that people come up with - clean design and easy to get around.
