© ForthMedia

This is a re-design of the fm "ContactMe" icon. Above is the eye-candy, full color version.

(No. You can’t use this icon. But you can look at it. Right here.)

It’s supposed to be a guy, talking on the phone, using a wireless headset. We had a problem with the first (1.0) version, because people could not recognize what it was supposed to be, when shrunk down to a tiny, doodad size, like you would use on a Web page.

As a neo-cubist piece, I think it’s pretty animated. The best one yet? At this point, I probably put in more time creating neo-cubist icons than most people put in doodling with pencil and paper.

Cut up icon

As told by Martin Lindstrom in Buyology: Truth and Lies About Why We Buy
a smashable brand is one that you can still recognize, "even if it shattered into a hundred pieces." Like a Coke bottle. Or an iPod. So, I thought it would be interesting to see if you could still recognize the icon, even if I cut it up with a pair of scissors. Do you still recognize the brand?

Icon wallpaper

This is what the icon looks like as wallpaper on a hand-held device. Pictured is a first generation iPod Touch, but it gives you an idea of what it might look like on an iPhone 3G. You’ll get that postponed iPhone delivery on Friday, after its available retail.

Note: These icons are copyright ForthMedia, and used here by permission.

Las Vegas. The Forum Shops at Caesars Palace. Cell phone camera.

The Prints of Andy Warhol Exhibit

Now through the end of May 2009 you can see The Prints of Andy Warhol at the San Jose Museum of Art. It’s worth going.

In addition to lithographs and screen prints from the Andy Warhol Museum (Pittsburgh) there are 10 pieces from a private collector in the Bay Area. These are an Ad Portfolio Warhol created, from Apple Computer, to Life Savers, to Blackglama (Judy Garland.)

Tech Connect Event at San Jose Museum of Art

Hurry, and you can still see Frida Kahlo: Portraits of an Icon upstairs. Its a collection of Frida photos taken by well-known photographers around the world.

More…

Archive ~ Warhol Sunglasses

Steel and fiberglass model of Leonardo da Vinci statue. September 2008.

A cell phone photo of da Vinci horse, in front of San Jose’s High Tech Museum. The artist never saw this full-scale design realized in his own day. Protracted design time, and later, a lack of war time bronze resources, scuttled the project.

A “mythical” Apple I computer

Before the iPhone and the iPod, Apple made this computer. Like a lesser known painting by a famous artist, this Apple I is tucked away in a Silicon Valley wine cellar, one of perhaps 50 still known to exist.

“Sexy” close-up

The motherboard originally sold without a keyboard, monitor or power supply. That big white microprocessor chip on the bottom row wasn’t made by either Motorola or Intel, it’s a MOS 6502.

Blogs ~ Microsoft’s Real Problem: The Second Coming of Apple
Blogs ~ Why iPhone Games Will Rule
Blogs ~ Why you should never say never

Three Musicians (1921). Version residing at the Philadelphia Museum of Art.

When I was a kid, I had a small art book with a picture of Picasso’s Three Musicians on the cover. The image was about the size you see on your computer screen. Maybe smaller.

When I unexpectedly came face to face with the real thing in a museum, I was stunned by its size and true colors. To read that the painting is so many tens of inches by so many hundreds of centimeters, doesn’t explain it. Look at your wall. It’s about that big.

Four books, four Olgas

Since I can seemingly never have enough books about Picasso, I can show you an example of how hard it is to figure out what artwork looks like, without actually standing in front of it.

This is a painting of Picasso’s wife, Olga. Just looking at my version (from four different books) I think I’ve made my point. You can’t tell what art looks like from books, or on the Internet.

Knowing the artist had the color ochre in his palette, you might decide one of the middle slices are right. But the blues are different. Knowing the artist was imitating the smooth-skinned, idealized beauties painted by Ingres, you might choose another.

Olga Picasso poses for her portrait

Working from this photograph, Picasso embraced technology. Early film cameras were becoming the must-have gadgets of the day.

Warhol-Sunglasses
What I like about Andy Warhol is that he knew how to "photoshop" before there was Photoshop.

Simply Liz by Andy Warhol

Warhol’s portrait of Elizabeth Taylor disappointed art investors this week when it sold for less than hoped for. Auctioned for $23.6 million, it seems to me that the painting is holding its value.

Small wonder that former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan mentioned artwork in the same breath as real estate and investment portfolios when he wrote, "Stock and bond prices, homes, commercial real estate, paintings, and most everything else joined in the boom." Actor Hugh Grant, who sold the painting, realized a 665% increase over the six years he held on to his investment.

For those of you who are interested in art for art’s sake, Simply Liz’s sister painting Red Liz lives at the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco. To my own disappointment, she wasn’t actually on display the last time I went up there, so you may want to call ahead.

Warhol-Sunglasses 2×2

These are the concept designs for a Flash at ForthMedia. The way I do it is to create individual scenes that tell the story in pictures. After that, I imagine how to "transition" from scene to scene. For me, it’s important to add a human element. Don’t you agree it should be "People Using Technology," not the other way around?

You can see the Flash for the Generation 2.5 iTours (which have been consuming most of my time) here.

Know Your Business

Get on the Web

Help Them Find You

Escher exhibit at San Jose Museum of Art

The recent Escher exhibit in Silicon Valley afforded a rare opportunity to see not only famous prints, but also sketches and intermediate pressings that revealed how the Dutch master created his illusions. Escher’s multi-dimensional Relativity was on display.

Study for Relativity

This sketch was not one of those on view, it is from a rare book. (The museum confiscated my camera at the door.)

There are three vanishing points and three different ground planes in this environment. The floor of one world is a wall or ceiling in another, a door or window becomes a trap-door.

Although it looks strange, people who enjoy 3D computer modeling can re-create it. In fact, somebody made one out of Lego.

Vanilla Transhuman

The idea for this image came from the movie Vanilla Sky. The main character is in love with two women, and at one point he can no longer tell them apart in his mind. I morphed the two actresses together to see what they might look like as one.

Can you imagine a near future in which human cloning is possible, with celebrity fans who want to DNA-splice their children with somebody famous? You can actually copyright your DNA but I don’t think its clear what would happen if someone was cloned against their will.

This work dates back to Summer 2003.