1. Hackintosh

    April 28, 2009 by J.P.

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    When I started freelancing I need to make a new beastly computer that could handle tons of storage and be the central base for all of my projects. The two most important things I was concerned with my system were speed and budget. I had been following the osx86 project on and off over the last couple of years and after seeing successfully running production machines running I was to tempting to build one of my own.

    As a part time homebrew/mod hacker I felt making a Hackintosh would be a great exercise, very educational, and also enrich my geek cred.

    Total Budget of Project: $700

    Parts list for machine

    • DFI Blood Iron MotherBoard
    • XFX9800GT Graphics Card
    • Gskull ram 2 dimms 4gigs total
    • Coolmaster Power Supply
    • Antec 900 Case
    • SATA DVD Drive
    • RETAIL DVD of OSX10.5

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    First you will need to create a boot cd that will allow the bios to read the OSX  dvd.

    Once the system has been booted it will run threw the normal installation.

    After the machine tries to restart you will have to boot to the boot312 cd in the dvd drive. Once that is loaded target the the correct drive to boot. Most systems its 80.

    After selecting boot drive I recommend loading the os in verbose mode by typing “-v” or  “-v -f” before starting the boot. This will allow you to see all the loading process under the hood this will help nail down what hardware device might be causing issues due to kext conflicts.

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    Once system has successfully booted install the following:

    • Chameleon – This will now replace the boot 312
    • Drivers… recommend looking at the OSX86 project for these downloads.
    • Depending on what version of install disc you have install combo update to take system to the latest version of the os.

    Once you have the system up and running its more of less a full Mac, I highly recommend adding a sectioned drive that you can clone and restore with if you plan on messing around with different kext and or osx updates. Personally I use CarbonCopyCloner and it has already saved me a couple times.

    I have been running the machine with virtual no issues for almost 5 months now. The 2 main issues that I have and sleeping and restarting the machine.

    Category: hardwareComments (4)

  2. How to Improve Newsletter Design

    April 27, 2009 by J.P.

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    Last week I completed a email campaign that I was only brought into only to code. I felt that the process followed was generally flawed that the team took. I started with a finalized approved design which I was suppose to code into a mailer. From the beginning I started noticing flaws in the designs and how the design would be translated into many of the the popular web clients of today like Gmail for example.

    Often I think people and small teams rush the designs of the mailers and don’t fully understand what it takes to develop and what will be rendered by each client. Most web based email applications won’t properly read divs, background images, or even external style sheets. With these short comings and designers unaware of these limitations or bad and unexpected things can happen.

    When creating a mailer its important to first and foremost take your audience into consideration. Are they main using web based clients like gmail, yahoo, etc.? Are the checking there mail on the mobile devices? Or they simple just using a desktop client like Mail (OSX), ThunderBird, or Outlook? All of these and a combination should it most cases be assumed.

    Rules of thumb to help achieve the audiences viewing of the mailer

    At the of the top of the design provide a link for the subscribers to see a web version. Most mailers these days are filter and end up in junk mail boxes or the software is smart enough to hide the images. Leaving your pain stacking work looking like a blob of random text bits. Having this link at the top will give the user and easy way to view the mailer as it was ment to be presented.

    Keep it simple. Since most clients ignore CSS  including background images your going to have to get old school with some tables. By keeping the design simple you will be able to get you message across to the widest audience. I good example of this is UrbanDaddy.com’s mailer(seen below).

    Allow the users to easily forward and print the mailer.

    urbandaddy

    Category: coding, designComments (0)

  3. Don't Forget Wire Frame Everything

    April 23, 2009 by J.P.

    Since reemerging in to freelancing I have noticed that not many people use wire frames that should be. I guess a lot of people think its an extra step that’s not needed or will add unnecessary time/cost to the project.  When this approach is taken things start to veer off the path as the project goes from one phase to the next. The designer, coder, and client are all expecting different things to happen at different parts of the site. By creating even simple wire frames you can show the flow of the site and how the content will be presented. Even if it is just a quick pass(though not recommended) it can prevent major headaches down the line.

    Here are a few good resources I found for wire framing.

    List of wire framing applications:

    A few good reads on wireframes including examples:

    When all is said and done wireframing things out helps better communicate the goals of the project and will give everyone a roadmap to follow.

    Category: coding tool, designComments (1)

  4. SVN Resources

    April 12, 2009 by J.P.

    Here are a few good links for getting down with SVN. Including one to a free online book that will get you up and running in no time at all.

    Category: codingComments (0)

  5. How Important Your Business Card Is

    April 10, 2009 by J.P.

    This guy really knows what the deal is…. love the quote “Strathmore stock. 60lb. Holds a crease”. Special thanks to k8iedid for shooting that one my way.

    Category: applications, insperationalComments (0)

  6. FLEX & MXML The next logical step for XHTML coders?

    April 7, 2009 by J.P.

    I’ll be perfectly honest.. I didn’t know much about Adobe Flex. I knew that it was more or less an all coding method for Flash developers and the early adopters using JS/AJAX really enjoyed working with it. Flex based sites had always impressed me but the idea on how to make them seemed to complex. Since Flash MX had been released I had little experience writing any sort of AS other then animating banners or updating AS for already running sites.

    Over the past couple of days I have been messing around with it and am truly having fun writing the code. My main focus for the last few years now has been XHTML/CSS as well as design and with basic understandings of Flash. Moving forward to improve my skill set Flex seems to be a fun tool to learn and a good next step for someone with a similar skill set.

    If your interested in playing around with Flex here is a link that really helped me get started Setting up a AS3 Project in Textmate.

    Category: coding, css/xhtml, flexComments (0)

  7. Vintage Atari Box Art

    April 4, 2009 by J.P.

    Basic beauty of the Atari 2600’s approach to package design is something missing from games of today. Below are a few amazing painted covers.

    game-10game-1game-2game-3game-4game-5game-6game-7game-8game-9

    Category: insperational, vintageComments (0)

  8. Twisted Films of PES

    April 3, 2009 by J.P.

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    The stop motion shorts done by PES are nothing short of totally twisted. More eating less writing go now www.eatpes.com

    Category: design, motion, videoComments (0)

  9. IMC Productions

    April 2, 2009 by J.P.

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    Had the pleasure of hanging out with two of the members of IMC productions over the weekend. Check out some of the spec spots they have created for Nike, Apple, among other big boys.

    Rumored new project in the works with IMC and well known B&W classis photo poster the Impossible Cool maybe hitting the streets soon.

    Category: motion, videoComments (0)

  10. Lawrence Weiner shot by Hillmancurtis

    April 1, 2009 by J.P.

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    There is a great artist series posted on hillmancurtis.com. All very inspirational and shot beautifully. I recommend checking out the Lawrence Weiner short.

    Category: insperational, videoComments (0)


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