Mr. Doobs latest project ‘Harmony - Procedural Drawing’ is a fun little online application that lets you draw whatever you want in black and white with a couple of brushes and shapes to choose from. Definitely a good way to kill some time if you are sitting around with nothing to do. 

A quick summary of this story is basically that a freelancer working out in LA agreed to do some work for a studio and after both sides agreed on a deal memo the agency decided not to honor the contract and to throw a wrench into the situation by trying to stiff the freelancer out of the total agreed upon amount.

I first came across this article on Motionographer and later decided to read further into it on the freelancers blog post here.  What makes this story interesting is not the fact that a freelancer gets jipped out of pay because I’m sure this happens alot, but because of the way the freelancer deals with the situation and how he stands up against the sometimes intimidating agency and fights the company in court. 

As a freelancer myself, luckily I have not had to deal with this situation to this severity but I can totally see how this can be a huge issue. 

1. Giant chicken and waffles (BK). 2. Crazy faced cupcake? 3. Jimmy’s Dinner 4. View from Kips Bay

I recently worked on a new site for ESPN’s Wide World of Sports with the good people over at The Concept Farm. The sports complex which use to be known as Disney’s WWOS was recently overhauled and completely re-branded into ESPN WWOS.  Along with the new re-branding they needed an updated web presence to match the brand and style. The conclusion was a clean and slick website with a bit of an edge.  The site that allows users to register / view upcoming events, explore the complex and browse through an extensive collection of videos and photos. 

Everyone’s favorite online award website, The FWA, has recently relaunched with a completely new look. The site reminds me a little bit of the new agency websites that every company has been hauling out in the past couple of months but none the less it’s a refreshing look.  A couple new features have been thrown into the mix as well including the Dock, which allows you to sign in and save some of your favorite sites.  Public Vote has also been added and as the name sounds it allows people to vote on recent submissions.  Of course, there is the social networking aspect as well that allows you to tweet and facebook the winning sites. 

1. Dumpling Man (East Village). 2. Snow Day #1 3. Snow Day #2 4. Sonya in the subway

I finally got a chance to test out my 5D Mark II last weekend and so far so good.  The quality and speed of the camera is a huge improvement from my old 10D.  I took this photo of a homeless man outside of an abandon building that I’ve seen plenty of times around Lower East Side.  I always thought it was just an abandoned building covered in graffiti but come to find out this building is pretty popular and has quite a history and is better known as 190 Bowery. Click here to read more about the building and also see photos of the interior which are amazing. Also I have a larger photo of the image above on my Flickr that’s not cropped. 

Yeasayer - Madder Red

Yeasayer - Ambling Alp

Brooklyn based band Yeasayer is back with their second studio album titled “Odd Blood”.  This one of course follows their debut album All Hours Cymbals.  I have a pretty mixed review about their new release, some tracks I really like and other I don’t care for as much.  Either way I’ll leave it up to yourself to judge the outcome.  In contradiction however, I do have to say the more I listen to Odd Blood the more I like the over all album or perhaps I’m just getting use to it.

Cool Hunting
Cool Hunting has recently designed their website with a very grid based look.  The majority of the site still resembles the previous version but definitely a nice new touch to the site.

Stargate Studios Back Lot Reel
While we all know many things are green screened in Hollywood I never realized that almost everything is green screened, especially in TV shows. Star Gate Studios released their back lot reel which shows scenes from various tv shows as seen on tv and behind the scenes.  Watching this clip skewed my views on TV shows.

1. Red Hook Station. 2. Dessert at Apairy 3. Canal & Baxter 4. Train to Ikea

Mouse Path is a cool little applet developed by Anatoly Zenkov from Moscow.  The program is available as a free download for both Mac and PC.  The simple application keeps track of your mouse movement during the time on your computer and allows you to save a image on the mouse paths whenever you want.  The end result is a cool abstract work of art or chaotic scribble of lines and circles. 

What a crazy, busy New Year it has been so far. I just finished moving this past weekend and I’m glad to finally get that out of the way.  Work as been going well and again sorry for the lack of update on my projects, I have been waiting for projects to get completely finished and therefore haven’t been able to upload any work but there are definitely things in the pipeline. 

Also, I finally purchased a new camera after having my Canon 10D for over 6 years. I have been eyeballing the 5D Mark II like like a kid in a candy store for the past year and a half and I’m glad I decided to finally get one.  I haven’t had a chance to really test it yet but hopefully sometime this week I can make time to do that. I also picked up the 16-35 L lens for this camera which I have seen some awesome photos produced by it. 

Chiquita Banana
DJ Neff recently redesigned everyone’s favorite bananas, Chiquita.  The new design is a play off the old one but in a more fun and quirky way.  Neff created over 25 of the recognizable Chiquita stickers that will randomly be placed on each banana. Each sticker features a fun illustrated character that can easily be something that you would want to collect.

Overcoming Creative Block
As designers we all get creative block at some point.  Some of us are able to overcome this better than others and we all have our own ways of doing so.  Here is a great list of 25 designers that explain what they do when they get into a slump. 

i Phone Doctor
Anyone with a cracked screen on the iPhone that has been looking for a cheap repair look no more.  Dr. Brendan is based in NY and will meet you at near by location to fix your screen on the spot for around $70.  I hear he does a great job and works quite fast. 

1. Columbus Park. 2. Bayard Street 3. 6th Ave 4. Conveyor Belt Sushi (Big East) 5. Columbus Park

Contraption
A pretty intresting video of some contraption created by a couple of people that goes through an entire house.  I’m not sure if I believe its all real with no effects done to them but you can judge that for yourself.

Minimal Workstations
Some reason I always like looking at other peoples work stations and set ups.  Web Designer Depot has put together a pretty good showcase of minimalist work stations, some a little dull but others quite nice.

Aisle One
Antonio Carusone recently relaunched his site with a yet another very nice clean and sleek look.  The main focus continues to be on great typography and minimalism. 

New York Public Library’s Photostream
A really interesting collection of photos on Flickr from the New York Public Library. 
Via Swiss Miss