We worked closely with our long-time client, the Population Council to design & develop the online version of their 2010 Annual Report. The site includes an interactive map of that showcases the Population Council's work and achievements throughout the world. See the site here.
We are excited to announce the launch of View Zine, an independent, tightly-curated photography magazine. The iPad app is available today as a free download from Apple's iTunes app store.
Inside you will find: “Views”, a portfolio review of mostly unsung, talented photographers (many of whom I found on the web) whose simple passion for looking is exciting; “Projects”, which highlights some long-term assignments or personal passions; “Quotes”, our sincere attempt to introduce text on the subject by some great writers; “While You Were Away” which explores a different place of conflict in the world - starting with Palestine - through the unique perspective of people on the ground in whatever capacity they find themselves in; and our “Overview” section, which includes an information-graphics map displaying stats about this issue’s contributors, our short manifesto and ways to connect with us online.
View was created using the Adobe Digital Publishing Suite (prerelease version) which works quite seamlessly with Adobe's CS5 software, InDesign in particular. This is the same solution used by Wired, The New Yorker and other publications to create their magzines. We wanted to explore this exciting new way of communicating and View is the result of that work. We will write more about our experience and process of collaborating with far-flung photographers as well as using this new software option very soon.
image/words is a poetic discovery tool for photographers and writers Just choose a photo from your album (or from one of our publicly hosted images), add freeform text and you’re done! Experiment with your text, thoughts or poems. Or just make custom LOLcats. The text can be large, small, transparent or opaque and in two great colors: black or white—but with a variety of fonts.
When you’re done and happy with your creation, make an iPad™ slideshow of all your hard work (and LOLcats). If your friends are too far away to hand your iPad over to them, you can email them or share on Facebook straight from the app. And if you just want to take your images and go home, save them to your library—the high resolution images you sync via iTunes will retain their size.
When you’re not feeling creative or when your cats aren’t doing anything particularly funny, image/words connects you to our library of images with texts to get you started. We plan future updates that will provide additional and more refined typographical controls and a universal version that will work on an iPhone.
Features:
At the end of last year we were fortunate to be able to work closely with the esteemed non-profit organization Population Council on their new website. We are happy to announce they just launched and have been receiving great feedback.
In November of last year, we were contacted by Marianne, head of studies in the department of Communications Networks and Services at the University Institute of Technology of Marne-la-vallée near Paris. She explained that her students are planning a trip to New York and that they hope to interview some companies in related fields. In subsequent emails Marianne explained that the students researched such companies on the internet and selected FusionLab for the range of its activities, the design of our site and our achievements. We agreed to host them and answer any questions they may have.
This Tuesday a group of ten students as well as Marianne and a fellow teacher knocked on our door. We had a lovely time discussing how we work, went over our latest portfolio and showed them previews of projects that are about to launch but not yet live. We also discussed design philosophy and reviewed a selection of books I thought they should see (some about grid design, as well as books by Josef Müller-Brockmann, Edward Tufte information design books and more).
The students listened intently to everything my partner and I had to say with a sense of seriousness (visiting a foreign country and office) as well as play (one student taped the whole thing, another wrote every url I showed them). In short, it was a lovely, and lively visit. I hope we can see their impression of the visit online soon and we wish them all the best. Au revoir!
