3rd year Graphic Design student Matt Whiteley has updated his already brilliant portfolio. I’d best step my game up if I’ve got to compete with the likes of this chap in 5 months time!

I just came across this video for a Lexus concept car. I’m not really a car nut, and don’t even like this car. Although I do like a lot of classic and top end models, particularly the ones I’ve no chance of ever owning. But it’s the design process that really fascinates me, it’s the same for anything, cars, buildings, gadgets etc. Seeing how it begins with the early ideas/sketches/modeling, it always gets me excited. Especially when they are brought to life with some great motion graphics.

Nick had one of those ideas that everyone wishes they had had themselves - and boy has he run with it. Some elegant sculpture here that makes me - not inherently an ‘OMG-I-JUST-GOTTA-BUY-THIS-LAMP’ kind of person - want to buy ten of them, have them all face into a white wall (that I currently don’t own) and pretend my room is like the one in Roald Dahl’s ‘The Twits’ (those pesky monkeys!).

The only thing more impressive is the list of blogs he’s been featured on, a list that doesn’t include us. So I apologise if everyone’s seen this stuff a million times on fffffffound and other ‘user-curated-image-bookmarking-sites‘ [said in a robot voice] but sod it, it’s pretty and we like.

Having listened to/watched this for the eighth time today, I felt the desire to share.

Please if at all possible watch in HD full screen with your PC speakers turned to 11 and enjoy my nomination for track of 2009.

My god that drop.

Are you guys as nerdy as I am when it comes to a nice bit of typography? Do you have another person in your life who would just love a type-led compliment this Valentines day? Head over to the newly opened HmBM shop and pick yourself up a card, or four, for that special person, part of the Just My Type range. Also keep your eyes peeled for more splendid graphic ephemera in the coming months!

Spotted on visual culture publisher: Gestalten, this video features the illustrator Niemann, who has done illustration blog work for the New York Times and a number of nice covers for the New Yorker.  I just like listening to his accent as he chats sincerely and articulately about data visualisation.

Cracking mixed media portraits using old floppys from Nick Gentry. His official blurb is that his focus has been to explore how technological advancement is affecting society. Each floppy disk used in the paintings has a history and story of its own. It represents the increasing pace of the modern life cycle, where objects are created, used and disposed of quicker than ever. To challenge this notion, as these personal artefacts of life are cast aside, the obsolete are now given new life and a renewed purpose by using them as a medium for art.

In between sorting out crap for you guys to do (cue shameless plug for our BIG EVENT) and picking our noses, us here at ShellsuitZombie occasionally venture into the chasm of BS that is Twitter. It’s the tool you love and hate, like that potato-peeler with an uncomfortable grip that cuts so damn good*. And sometimes while sneaking around trying to tweet unnoticed we stumble upon a talented designer/illustrator like Shane.

This guy graduated only this year but his work shows a maturity beyond his years. With influences from Build to Non-Format, the Horndog** clearly knows his design, and we look forward to encountering him further in the future.

*note to self, never attempt another analogy. Ever.
** This name is Unapproved by Shane, but we like it.

Some amazing illustrative work from Tahgasa Bertram, a.k.a Sweaty Eskimo.

If you weren’t lucky enough to see the Design Museum exhibition of the late great Alan Fletcher a couple of years ago, you are in luck. The Cube gallery in Manchester is holding a ‘major retrospective’ of 50 years of his work. The show was opened last week by a fashionably late Peter Saville, who worked with him briefly at Pentagram, and there’s a curatorial talk by Emily King at the University of Salford on March 5th.

If you’re a student get yourself (and your class) there, especially to the talk. If you aren’t, the exhibition is open on a Saturday, so get a weekend trip to Manchester planned in.

Alan Fletcher: Fifty Years of Graphic Work and Play
22 January—03 April 2010
Cube Gallery, Portland Street, Manchester, M1 6DW

Nanami Cowdroy is an Australian artist, with Japanese and European roots.  She has created these beautifully detailed and expressive drawings in mixed media, and is now exhibiting around the world.  For me, the inky style adds depth and movement to her subjects, and many of her creations provide a fresh take on traditional Japanese imagery.

50 students and graduates. 50 professionals. Two bands. Two DJs. Some beers. And unfortunately we will be there too.

Come one come all to witness a gladitorial battle - observe a series of physically and mentally gruelling tasks designed specifically to test us all. Grip your beer white-knuckled as your agility and nerves are put to the test. Or just help us unite the current and future leaders of the design and advertising industries at utilising a mixture of beer, chat and music.

MUSIC
Musical entertainment will be provided by two bands who have been picking up lots of radio airtime and have both recently released debut singles -

First up we have Keston Cobblers Club, a South London folk four-piece.

And second up it’s Harrison Hope, a North London outfit known for
melodic soulful rock.

As well as these two awesome live acts we also have a mega treat in the form of ‘The Liberal Democrats’ - a duo of DJ’s who have recently worked with Ali Love and Erol Alkan (including designing this Tee) and are currently working the London circuit. David Rudnick was responsible for the Annie Mac mini mix last week - believe us these boys will blow your socks off.
Download a free 80 minute taste of David Rudnick right Here courtesy of us.

If this sounds like your cup of tea, click on the poster up top to go straight to our shop, where you can pay the paltry price of £2.50 for your ticket (It will be £3 on the door, that’s if there’s even space!). What’s more, with the cost you will recieve a free badge and a poster on the day so you NEVER FORGET US.

7pm, Tuesday 16th of Feb, The Old Blue Last, Shoreditch. Drop it like it’s hot motherfucker.

Diesel have a way with catchy, controversial taglines.  Global Warming Ready back in 2007 sticks in the mind.  This latest campaign: Be Stupid by London agency Anomaly overlays the familiar bold text comments on photos of beautiful people engaged in inadvisable situations.  The photos are less glossy and airbrushed than in the past, with a bit of a Vice magazine or Lastnightsparty (website seems to be down at the mo) hipster vibe.  The images are like a psychological Rorschach test (those inkblots that look like angry clowns killing puppies), they provoke an emotional response to each situation: are you a free-living funmeister or a disapproving consequence-driven square…?

There haven’t been enough genitals on SSZ lately.  Anti AIDS spot by TBWA Paris - lads!

The Designers Society in Plymouth is a project organised by the students who (among other things) have invited design luminaries to talk at their university. They have bagged some huge names including Harry Pearce, a partner at Pentagram, who is speaking this Tuesday 19th of January at a dirt cheap £5 a head.

In addition their inaugural exhibition based on a brief based on the theme of Plymouth kicks off on the 20th. If you’re local to Plymouth go along, if not just look at what a determined and driven bunch of students can do. Let’s hope this kind of thing carries on and other design courses take up the mantle.