Stupid title, but good article over on Smashing Magazine about valuable keyboard shortcuts in Photoshop. I use a lot of these and highly recommend incorporating them into your workflow as they will absolutely speed up your work.

Gorgeous logos for Beckenridge Brewery by advertising and design agency Cultivator. These would definitely make it into my shopping cart as they fit nicely with my analogy of well designed labels. Any of you tried some of these?

For the most part the posts of my blog are related to design, music, photography…basically creative subjects. But every now and then I have the desire to write about everyday things and so I’m going to start incorporating those into the blog. So to kick things off, why not write about things that have bugged me today?

1. I admit that I watch a lot of HGTV, especially the shows dealing with finding a new house. For the most part I can cope with the varying personalities of the home shoppers, but it drives me nuts when the guys are mostly concerned with finding a house with a “man-cave” and when the women are constantly concerned about having granite countertops as if that has to be a built-in feature and you’d be crazy to buy a house without them. Shudder!

2. The commercial being run now by Discover that starts off with the line “We’re a nation of consumers…and there’s nothing wrong with that.”  I find it ironic how credit card companies are promoting themselves as the solution to the national debt problem.

3. The fact that Bernie Mac died today.

Shot live at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City on Icelandic Independence Day. With this Sigur Rós seal their number two position on my list favorite bands and are chompin’ at the heels of Radiohead.

Very nice site devoted to design ideas and creative solutions for interior spaces. Really love the idea of a tunnel between two kids rooms in this post.

Unbelievable images by Dutch photographer/designer Jaap Vliegenthart. Not all of his work samples are surreal like the ones above, but these stood out to me in particular because of their surreal qualities. I could totally get into doing work like this because I love to do composite work in Photoshop. Obviously no where near as easy as it looks, but I’d really enjoy the challenge.

Can someone tell me why our present day doesn’t look anything like these old depictions of “the future”? I mean, what happened? How could we have such amazing visions for how the future could look with the sleek vehicles and homes and end up with the Ford Explorer and David Weekly?  In all seriousness, how cool are these illustrations? Aside from their visual awesomeness, they are all so beautifully done. Reminds me of the work of artist Ralph McQuarrie.