Sven Assmann

Arthur 2 — teaser website

SA — 2009-09-05T17:06:39+02:00

Teaser website for Arthur 2 und die Minnimoys with Bill Kaulitz from Tokio Hotel. Full website coming soon.

Tobis Film — website relaunch

SA — 2009-09-05T16:56:20+02:00

Website relaunch for Tobis Film. Webdesign, web development, community features, video player and upload, social sharing, banner animations.

yogaservice — website

SA — 2009-09-05T16:52:40+02:00

Website for yogaservice. Web development, consulting and sponsoring, design, programming, community features, yoga studio finder, events and blog.

Vincentino e.V. — logo design

SA — 2009-09-05T16:49:06+02:00

Logo adaption / design from Vincent TV for Vincentino e.V.

soniq perfming arts — website

SA — 2009-09-05T16:44:44+02:00

Web development and design adaption for soniq performig arts.

Sibilla Calzolari — website

SA — 2009-09-05T16:40:45+02:00

Webdesign and development for Sibilla Calzolari photography.

project drive — website

SA — 2009-09-05T16:35:25+02:00

Relaunch and redesign for project drive. Wordpress development and theme customizing.

The Post Republic — website

SA — 2009-09-05T16:28:33+02:00

Redesign and relaunch for The Post Republic, Berlin. This was created in collaboration with the highly talented designer Julia Guther.

Institute of Rock Music — website

SA — 2009-09-05T16:25:10+02:00

Website for Institute of Rock Music. Theme adaption and design, Wordpress development.

Institute of Rock Music — corporate design

SA — 2009-09-05T16:22:06+02:00

Logo design and stationary for Institute of Rock Music, Germany.

S3 Graphics — visual concept and storyboard

SA — 2009-09-05T16:05:39+02:00

Visual concept, storyboard, design and 3d animation for S3 Graphics, USA. Four movies that will explain the product features of S3 graphic chips.

Stevens Pass — Youth Poster

SA — 2009-09-05T16:00:58+02:00

Layout and Design concept for Stevens Pass, Washington, USA. Photo: chasejarvis.com

Stevens Pass — Bird Banner

SA — 2009-09-05T15:54:15+02:00

Design and illustration for Stevens Pass, Washington, USA.

Sharedband — corporate web movies

SA — 2009-09-05T15:42:10+02:00

Relaunch of website for Sharedband UK and US. Visual concept and idea, storyboard, 3d animation, Flash animation and programming. Four intro movies that explain the features of Sharedband products. Website development: Giraffedesign, Seattle, USA.

checkitmobile — logo design

SA — 2009-09-05T15:34:19+02:00

Logo design for checkitmobile.de.

Burn After Reading — website

SA — 2008-10-02T20:44:08+02:00

Last night was the Germany premiere of Burn After Reading — the new movie by the Coen Brothers with George Clooney, Franves McDormand, John Malkovich, Tilda Swinton and Brad Pitt! It’s a really funny movie, so I can highly recommend it! I did the concept, design and programming for the official German website. Many thanks to Petra, Andy and Magnus at Tobis! Check out the website here and have fun (there’s a hidden easter egg, too): www.burnafterreading-derfilm.de.

Steven Pass — RFID icon design

SA — 2008-10-02T20:43:53+02:00

Stevens Pass, WA, USA use a technology with their ski passes. They now have RFID integrated, so the passes can be used several times and reloaded. That again is more friendly to the environment. They needed an icon which showed the RFID technology and the environment aspects. So I combined the signal with the famous Cowboy Ridge and gave it an overall modern look. This icon is one of a series of icons I designed for Stevens Pass. It’s always fun.

Audioberlin — media player

SA — 2008-06-06T18:14:04+02:00

Audioberlin — The Audiotainment Company has a new media player on their website! I integrated this slick and fast text, photo and video player. It’s really easy to use and very flexible if you want to present your videos on your own corporate website.

Happy-Go-Lucky — movie website

SA — 2008-06-05T13:45:24+02:00

I'm proud to present the website for the upcoming movie Happy-Go-Lucky by Mike Leigh, starring Sally Hawkins (winner of Silber Bear). There are a couple of gimmicks integrated like flip books and paint splashes. But play around with it yourself and have fun: www.happy-go-lucky-derfilm.de

rucksack.com — travel community

SA — 2008-04-16T18:41:57+02:00

We’re working on a new community for rucksack travellers on the internet: rucksack.com! Expect lots of cool trip planning features very soon! We just setup a teaser page until the beta starts.

Game based eVideo — kickoff meeting

SA — 2008-04-15T10:45:14+02:00

I attend a new project at the FHTW (University of Applied Sciences) Game based eVideo. It’s all about Web 2.0, eLearning and video, of course. We try to research ways to set up environments that use the tools of games, web 2.0 and videos. It’s a team of about 30 people from very different fields. I’m really excited about this! I might end up stop using this blog (or only very rarely) as I will mainly discuss and work on different community sites. We’ll see.

re:publica 08 — bloggers conference

SA — 2008-04-15T10:45:11+02:00

I went to the re:publica 08 conference in Berlin. Unfortunately I hadn’t much time, so I could only attend a couple of talks and workshops. It was really good! Check out the website with video streams and lots of more information.

I’m Not There — ecard

SA — 2008-02-25T22:20:05+01:00

You got to check this out! We created this cool ecard that shows your message on paper cards held by the actors of the movie I’m Not There. Credits go to Samuel and his team who did the programming! And now go to www.imnotthere-derfilm.de and send a message to your friends!

I’m Not There — website

SA — 2008-01-31T18:13:22+01:00

This is the first teaser page I created for the upcoming website for I’m Not There — starring Cate Blanchett, Christian Bale, Richard Gere, Heath Ledger, Ben Whishaw and Marcus C. Franklin as Bob Dylan. Particularly Cate Blanchett is amazing as Dylan! More coming soon on the official myspace movie page I will edit in the next couple of days.

Into The Wild — website

SA — 2008-01-28T19:17:36+01:00

This week the new movie Into The Wild by Sean Penn will start in Germany. I created the website for the German release. It’s a really great movie! Check out the website for more info!

Into The Wild — myspace

SA — 2008-01-28T19:17:07+01:00

Along with the release of the official movie site for Into The Wild, we created a special myspace page. There is also a cool VW bus tour around Germany. Check out the myspace page for more info.

“Maischberger” Christmas card

SA — 2008-01-28T19:17:00+01:00

I’m proud to announce the design of this year’s Christmas cards for Menschen bei Maischberger. It is based on the 2006 christmas card which you can find here, but this year the outlines of the stars are the words “menschen bei maischberger”.

Triumph der Liebe at Deutsches Theater

SA — 2007-12-21T22:49:46+01:00

I went to see the play Triumph der Liebe at the Deutsches Theater tonight. It was a rococo comedy by Pierre Carlet de Marivaux. The production was directed by Barbara Frey. It was a real pleasure to see it and the stage design was wonderful! After all the pre-christmas stress this was a perfect release, although the play also had its tragic sides.

Supervising final practical exam

SA — 2007-12-19T21:54:59+01:00

This week the design class at the L4 Academy started with their final practical exam. They will have to design a logo and a magazine insert or an interactive CD-ROM application for a spa hotel on the island Sylt. I’m supervising them taking care everything is according to plan. They have 10 working days to write a concept and prepare themselves for the practical test. Today they only had about 6 hours to do their whole work for the insert, create PDFs for offset printing and presenting a mockup of the final product.

P.S. Ich liebe Dich — Website

SA — 2007-12-18T20:49:47+01:00

Today I launched the website for the upcoming movie P.S. Ich liebe Dich (P.S. I Love You) which is distributed by Tobis in Germany. The movie stars Hilary Swank and Gerard Butler, but check out the website for more infos and exclusive photos.

“Open Season” Rail Jam

SA — 2007-12-04T13:36:58+01:00

Stevens Pass, WA, USA opens the new season with a rail jam competition. And here’s the poster I designed for the event. Nate Escalona, Marketing Supervisor, Stevens Pass Winter Resort: “… the best event poster I’ve ever seen!”

Der Klang des Herzens — movie website

SA — 2007-11-24T13:39:30+01:00

This is a new website for the upcoming movie Der Klang des Herzens (August Rush) starring Jonathan Rhys Meyers and Robin Williams. I launched it last Friday. It’s based on the website for the US but the German artwork is different, so I had to redesign it. Thanks to Petra and Magnus at Tobis!

Promo website for romantic movies

SA — 2007-11-22T19:39:34+01:00

Today I launched a promo website for three upcoming movies by Tobis. Starting on December you can win great prizes every week, so check it out: www.dieschoenstenfilme.de.

London visit

SA — 2007-11-22T10:03:04+01:00

Last weekend I spent in London with some friends. The weather was nasty, but it’s always great to visit London. I was lucky to see the new St Pancras Station. It was re-opend after 12 years. The architecture and especially the famous St Pancras Clock are very impressive! I can also recommend checking out The Big Chill House for your music pleasure, Leon for healthy, organic and delicious fast food and the Shoreditch House for hanging around or swim in the pool on the roof top (members only).

workXL AG — relaunch

SA — 2007-11-08T11:16:20+01:00

I’m proud to announce the relaunch of the new workXL AG website! It presents the new corporate design we started with earlier this year. Now we also redesigned the website and set up a content management system (Typo3). Thanks a lot to Lars and Höddi at workXL and everyone who participated in the working process!

JazzFest Berlin ’07

SA — 2007-11-08T11:16:17+01:00

On Saturday we went to see the Trio Riessler-Levy-Matinier and the Trio Madeira Brasil with special guests. A friend recommended this concert at the Berliner Festspiele as part of the JazzFest Berlin ’07. We had setas in the second row so we could literally here every single breath and note they played. Both bands were just amazing and Yamandú Costa — a young guitar gaúcho — just blew our minds!

Webcuts.07

SA — 2007-10-12T11:43:10+02:00

Webcuts.07 — The Internet Film Fest in Berlin was a cool event this year, again! First we had a panel for our VIP guests with Karin Wehn (University of Leipzig), Marc Schleiss (winner of Webcuts.06), Eckhard Jäger (founder of Webcuts), Tillmann Allmer (interfilm berlin) and Jennifer Hoffmann (HFF Potsdam). The screening of the nominees and the award show were both fun and continued at the After-Show party. The image above shows me with the winners for Best Animation Matthieu Landour und Edouard Jouet from Paris at the ceremony. We also had a show simultaneously on an island in Second Life with our exclusive movie theatre. So, to get an idea of what you missed, check out www.webcuts.org. You can find a video coverage of the evening here at freshmilk, an interview with Eckhard Jäger and me and more photos here.

Webcuts everywhere!

SA — 2007-10-10T21:49:06+02:00

Berlin Mitte, Prenzlauerberg, Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg is tagged with Webcuts posters and stickers.

radio1 — interview

SA — 2007-10-03T17:00:25+02:00

radioeins in Berlin did an interview with some people from the mstreet. It was live, quite nice and really, really short.

Environmental responsibility

SA — 2007-10-02T22:53:20+02:00

This next year, Stevens Pass (WA, USA) will offset the entire propane and power consumption of the resort. They’ll be the first and only “Green” resort in Washington.
In order to adequately promote this, we created a logo that would work on any printed material and also as a sticker.
The green power they are subsudizing comes from wind energy wholesale so we integrated a windmill into the design along with the mountain silhouette of the famous Cowboy Ridge. So, here’s what the new badge looks like.

Webcuts.07 — jury meeting

SA — 2007-09-29T21:00:15+02:00

The winners of this year’s Webcuts.07 were chosen by the jury last night. It took many hours until we finally decided on the best clip in each category. Yet, it’s still top secret who the winners are, as we will announce them next Thursday, October 11th at the Webcuts.07 Awards. Many thanks to the members of the jury (from left to right): Ludwig von Reiche / mental images, Prof. Susanne Mayer / HDM Stuttgart, Prof. Ulrich Weinberg / HFF Potsdam, Sven Assmann / interface!berlin, Katrin Holetzeck / Eastside Film and Andy Polaine (both absent).

Webcuts.07 — Nominees

SA — 2007-09-28T09:22:19+02:00

The nominees for this year’s Webcuts Awards are set — but still a secret! The best 22 movie clips from around the world will be presented on October, 11 at the CineStar Original Berlin. Tonight the jury will meet to decide on who will be the winners for best design, best animation, best story and best film.

iPod touch arrived

SA — 2007-09-25T15:14:11+02:00

Today my new iPod touch arrived! I couldn’t wait until the iPhone was available in Germany, so I pre-ordered the iPod touch a couple of weeks ago. It doesn’t have all the features of the iPhone (no phone obviously), but I mainly wanted the great touchable user interface. You have to check for your-self, if you haven’t tried an iPhone or iPod touch yet! Connecting to my Wifi internet was as easy as expected. YouTube videos work great! Oh, happy day!

Fantoche 07 Film Festival

SA — 2007-09-18T17:02:57+02:00

The team of Fantoche 07 — International Animation Film Festival in Baden/Switzerland invited me to visit the festival. I was the curator for a small section Flash & Co which enables visitors to explore the diverse world of digital animation. The selected movies are from past Webcuts screenings — the Internet Film Fest in Berlin I help organizing. Thanks a lot to Duscha Kistler and Nicole Göbel for inviting me and letting me participate! The festival was a great inspiration and I met a lot of very talented and interesting filmmakers and sound designers like Max Bauer. He is one of around 20 Foley artists (sound makers) in German-speaking countries. He works as a Foley artist for film and television productions and he creates live sound effects for theatre productions. Together, we plan a special event in Berlin, but the details are still secret. I shot a couple of pictures and movies with my mobile which you can find here.

Nabaztag is alive!

SA — 2007-08-28T11:53:02+02:00

Finally after some trouble connecting to my new Nabaztag with my iBook, I used my Playstation Portable to built up a connection. The Nabaztag doesn’t have an Ethernet port, so you have to set it up for the first time with and Ad-hoc wireless network. Once connected to your WLAN the Nabaztag can connect to all sorts of services like weather forecast, news, email accounts and many more. It has built-in speakers and a microphone, so it can read text and news (e.g. BBC News) in English, French and German. I’ve just started finding out all of the features but it’s fun! If you want to learn more about it got to the official Nabaztag website.

Visit to Marburg

SA — 2007-08-27T12:26:15+02:00

Last week-end I went to a birthday party in Frohnhausen near Marburg. The party was on the country-side but on Sunday a did a quick visit to Marburg. It’s gorgeous! Watch the pictures in my small gallery here and you will see how beautiful all the renovated small houses look like!

Webcuts.07 – call for submissions

SA — 2007-08-20T15:11:26+02:00

Webcuts.07 is near! Tell everybody! We call for submissions! And there are great prizes again this year — worth a couple of thousand euros! Just go to www.webcuts.org and submit your movie! deadline for entries is September 15th, 2007.

Die letzte Legion — flash banners

SA — 2007-08-20T15:06:27+02:00

The Last Legion will start on August, 30 in Germany. I designed a couple of flash ad banners for Tobis and the banners will start today on German websites like moviemaze.

Open Air Gallery

SA — 2007-08-06T15:47:25+02:00

On Sunday I crushed into the annual Open Art Gallery at the Oberbaumbrücke. There were a couple of very good artists and a wallpaper in the middle of the entire bridge where you were invited to paint. I bought five very cool art prints by Dutch artist Johan Potma and Mateo from California.

English on-site Mac support

SA — 2007-08-02T14:07:52+02:00

I just woke up with this idea this morning and I couldn’t help myself. I built this website in one go today. I provide on-site Apple support for several companies in Berlin. I noticed that there are no Mac support services for English people I knew of, but there are a lot of people who live in Berlin who don’t understand German at all. So, check out the website and if one of your english friends needs help, send for the Mac Doctor!

tb vent — website launched

SA — 2007-07-30T15:38:04+02:00

Today, we launched the website for tb vent — a company for television, broadcasting and events like Simpsons – The Movie, Pixar’s Ratatouille or Deutschland ein Sommermärchen. The concept, design and development were a collaboration with Peter Ruschel.

workXL AG — product leaflets

SA — 2007-07-30T12:38:05+02:00

Along with the new company profile brochure of workXL, we designed four new product information leaflets. They all come on semi-glossy heavy paper and customized 3D graphics.
You can have a look at the PDFs here:
Deutscher Auftragsdienst – DTAD
European Tender Information – ETIS
Tender Information Module – TIM
Public Procurement Market Research

Open doors at University of the Arts Berlin

SA — 2007-07-23T15:28:10+02:00

From 20 to 22 July the different houses of the University of the Arts Berlin were accessible to the public. Sonya and Tarik presented some of their work. The above image is from Tarik’s installation autofokus. You can find more about the installation on his website and you can watch a video here.

Club with rooftop terrace

SA — 2007-07-18T15:40:17+02:00

If you’re in Berlin you might know the weekend club. This Tuesday was just the perfect weather for a cool beer after work on top of Berlin.

workXL — company profile brochure

SA — 2007-07-17T19:04:45+02:00

This is the new image brochure Peter and I designed for the workXL AG. We redesigned their corporate image and added new 3D graphics that explain the benefits of their business. Have a look at the web optimized PDF here. More products coming up. Many thanks to Lars and Höddi at workXL!

Intro for Sat.1 “Uschis Hobbyzoo”

SA — 2007-07-16T14:00:29+02:00

This was really a fun job! Christian Maier produces episodes of Uschis Hobbyzoo for Sat.1. He asked me if I could do a short animated title intro that looked like handwritten. You can watch the movies here at Sat.1.

Award for “Best Overall Marketing Program”

SA — 2007-07-16T13:40:18+02:00

Giraffe Design is proud to announce that our client Stevens Pass has won the award for Best Overall Marketing Program by the National Ski Areas Association (NSAA). We are happy to continue last year’s award for Best Program to Increase Trial By New Participants. We would like to thank the NSAA and everyone at Stevens Pass!

Most common mistakes all Germans make

SA — 2007-07-11T18:58:54+02:00

Last night interface!berlin presented an English language workshop by Susanne Killian. Susanne Killian is an experienced interpreter at conferences like the recent G8 summit in Germany. She explained the difference between the German and English language in matters of courtesy and business conversations. Although the Germans don’t mean to be impolite they often make the same mistakes which sound a bit to uncourtly for native English-men. So, the participants learned a couple of tips how to avoid situations like this.

Website optimized for iPhone

SA — 2007-07-02T11:29:38+02:00

I resisted the iPhone hype so far and I didn’t post any news about it, although I followed the media since its announcement months ago. It is a great device! So, if there is anyone out there with an iPhone you should be able to read my blog within the screen width. No zooming in or out necessarily. This blog is optimized for iPhones (and for Playstation Portables as well).

Update 2007-07-11:
Last night I had the chance to actually hold the iPhone in my hands. The guys at the HSD/Gravis store let me test it. It’s really amazing! It’s better than I expected. The finger gesture interface is so intuitive and great fun! And in fact, I checked if my web site worked on an iPhone — well, it did!

Fashion and art collection opening

SA — 2007-06-29T17:32:23+02:00

Last night I just crushed into an opening at La Robe — a designer’s store next to a party of a friend of mine. Have a look at the current collection here.

Anina live mobile video streaming

SA — 2007-06-29T17:06:39+02:00

Now, check this out: Anina recorded the speeches at the NMI with her mobile phone. She directly streamed the video to her website where you could watch the conference live! I recorded the process with my phone sitting next to Prof. Rebensburg who showed that you could watch the video stream on the internet.

Anina at NMI 2007

SA — 2007-06-29T16:18:26+02:00

I joined Anina for her keynote at the NMI 2007 on Thursday. She gave a brilliant and passionate speech which impressed the audience. Anina just came from Shanghai to Berlin for this conference and already left again today to fly back to China, unfortunately. There were a lot of very interesting speeches at the NMI: Prof. Sauter (IRT, Munich) talked about HDTV standards which opened everyone's eyes about some of the myths of HDTV, Dr. Richarts (Vodafone R&D) talked about their mobile arts projects, Dr. Schisler from L4 (where I teach) talked about Life4-U — the first TV magazine in Second Life — and many more. After the speeches Julean A. Simon played a so-called midi-wind-controller solo (sort of midi saxophone) on the roofs of the BBAW (Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften). Find more at the Anina’s blog and watch a small clip here.

70 years Stevens Pass seal

SA — 2007-06-28T16:32:01+02:00

Stevens Pass celebrate their 70th anniversary this year. So, they came up with the idea to have a 70 years seal to promote their special offers. The seal combines a fresh, glossy and modern look with a traditional North-Western style. The typography is both authentic and contemporary.

LimeLight PR website online

SA — 2007-06-25T16:18:12+02:00

Last weekend Peter and I launched the website for LimeLight PR — a public relations agency in Berlin. The backend is based on Wordpress whereas the design is completely customized, of course.

Saxon Switzerland

SA — 2007-06-13T14:53:54+02:00

Once again I spent a couple of days in the Saxon Switzerland — always worth a trip for the beautiful mountains and the country side.

Met in Berlin

SA — 2007-06-09T13:17:56+02:00

Today, I went to the Nationalgalerie in Berlin to see the current exhibition of the most beautiful 19th-century French masterpieces from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. I had so-called VIP tickets which basically meant they were more expensive, we had a group guide and I didn’t have to wait in the line. I’m pretty sure the regular audio guides are very good, too and as far as I know the line isn’t too long. Furthermore they had “Live!Speakers”, i.e. art history students you can ask about each individual picture. That was really great, as you could virtually discuss and interpret the pictures with the knowledge of the Live!Speakers.

Osaka label night

SA — 2007-05-26T13:53:32+02:00

Buss Kondukteur — the music project of a friend of mine — played at the Zentrale Randlage in Berlin. The show was part of the osaka label night with Hannu (Helsinki) and Hulk (Dublin). Those of you who know Apple computers recognize that Roy’s Macbook covered with stickers that let the Apple logo appear like a cross. And it’s a small world. Roy’s brother used to play in Gemma Hayes’ band of whom I am a huge fan (as you can see here).

Virtual Venture Competition launched

SA — 2007-05-22T13:19:39+02:00

Virtual Venture Competion — a global business-building contest initiated by McKinsey & Company — launched today. This is a really huge worldwide Second Life project. I know who worked on it, but with respect to strict policies I am not allowed to tell you. But I know that most of the day in the last two months the designer shot pictures, designed the website, built 3D avatars and created icons and buttons. It must have been a really challenging job but a lot of fun at the same time. As far as I know, the responsible team at McKinsey was really great and very professional. I heard the designer giving special thanks to Dirk, Arne, Martin and Jan at McKinsey & Company. Now, go check the website and register for the competition. The deeper you get the more features of the website will be revealed… Spiegel Online is the exclusive media partner, so you will find updates there as well.

Elke Brauweiler live

SA — 2007-05-16T16:41:10+02:00

Longtime friend Elke Brauweiler of the music project PAULA played at the Roter Salon in Berlin. She presented songs from her current french pop cover songs album “Twist A Saint Tropez”. I really liked the songs from the album and I was impressed how fresh and cool they sounded played live. If you want to listen to her songs which are perfect for summer time, go check her Website and her myspace page. There’s also a very interesting feature on arte TV which you can find here.

Gilbert & George at Tate Modern

SA — 2007-05-07T12:02:47+02:00

I spent a couple of days in London last week and I had the chance to see the Gilbert & George exhibition at the Tate Modern. Bringing together a selection of pictures that spans their entire 40-year career, it is fitting that it is the largest retrospective of any artist to be held at Tate Modern.
‘Large’ also in aspects of their artworks. Most of them are huge mega-sized images with bright powerful colors. One thing I noticed is that when they started using computers in 2003, I didn’t like their art as much as their work in the 80s and 90s.

Vacation on Sardinia

SA — 2007-04-26T21:03:39+02:00

This was my first time on Sardinia and I really fell in love with the island — beautiful never-ending sand beaches, mountains right at the sea side, beautiful little villages and barely any tourists in spring-time.

Art exhibition opening

SA — 2007-04-16T12:02:21+02:00

Sonya, a very good friend of mine opened a new exhibition “Hope and Glory” together with three other artists. It’s a very interesting mixture of styles and concepts. You can find the gallery here in Berlin.

New deli opening

SA — 2007-03-25T16:32:16+02:00

A very good friend of mine, Ortrud, opened a new deli in my neighbourhood. Go check it out! It’s really great, you can get all sort of delicatessen. You can find it next to the popular cafe “Sowohl als auch” in Prenzlauerberg. Here’s a short movie clip.

Berlin street art

SA — 2007-03-25T16:28:00+02:00

I just bumped into this impressive piece of street art down the street where I live. Check out the full resolution image for the details! If you are in Berlin you can find it here.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles — Website

SA — 2007-03-17T15:49:35+01:00

Today I launched the German website for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. It’s a fullscreen flash presentation with trailers, downloads and info about the movie. There will be updates in the various sections soon, so expect new downloads, character designs and more…

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles — pizza box

SA — 2007-03-17T15:27:05+01:00

The press folders for the upcoming movie Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles will be shipped in customized pizza boxes. My business partner Peter and I presented the concept to Tobis and shipping has started last week!

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles — press folder

SA — 2007-03-16T16:49:48+01:00

In collaboration with my business partner Peter, we designed the press folder for the upcoming movie Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I enjoyed watching the TV series in the early nineties and now the Turtles will be on the big screen as CGI characters — really cool character artwork! The folder has almost the size of an LP (25 cm x 25 cm) and will be shipped in a customized pizza box to the press media. So, if you’re lucky, you will have one in your hands soon!

Wiserner & Partner — business cards

SA — 2007-02-26T20:23:39+01:00

Currently, I’m working on the corporate design for Wiserner & Partner Real Estate, Berlin. Starting up, here is the business card with the logo — a fresh spring green combined with the sophisticated font FF Meta by Berlin typographer Erik Spiekermann. Stationary and web site are in progress.

Preparing for final exam

SA — 2007-02-19T19:15:49+01:00

The students of this year’s graduating class for media design at L4 will have their final exams this spring. Starting today until May, I help them preparing for the tests in design, technology and media production.

David Lloyd book-signing

SA — 2007-02-17T21:57:23+01:00

David Lloyd — co-creator of V for Vendetta gave a book-signing in Berlin. He was so kind to sketch in my copy of V for Vendetta.

PAULA in concert

SA — 2007-02-16T19:09:03+01:00

I know the band PAULA for more than 7 years now (since I designed their website), and I can’t remember how often I saw them playing. It was always fun but tonight was very special at the Magnet. For the first time I saw Elke Brauweiler and Arne Gosh play all the songs by themselves which sounded very cool and for the first time ever Elke’s twin sister Anke joined them on stage singing the background vocals on “Schlaflied”. What a great Valentine’s Day concert!

interface!berlin at Reichstag

SA — 2007-02-15T23:09:17+01:00

Today we had an exclusive guided tour through the Reichstag and we could see the works of art on the different stories of the building. I came up with the idea a couple of months ago when I had the chance to visit the Jakob-Kaiser-Haus which is connected to the Reichstag on the underground. But it was Simone who organized the tour and the invitations to our members of interface!berlin and she made it all happen.

Anina in Berlin

SA — 2007-02-05T10:07:24+01:00

Anina spent some time in Berlin and we checked out the local fashion stores for her upcoming project. Make sure you read her blog, because she’s always coming up with reports from fashion shows around the world, new ideas and cool new features.

transmediale.07 — Designing your Second Life

SA — 2007-02-02T21:30:34+01:00

There was a interesting panel discussion at the transmediale.07 about Designing your Second Life. I think Joachim Stein explained some very interesting aspects about certain copyright issues in Second Life.

Shooting for fatboy

SA — 2007-02-01T21:08:13+01:00

Mike — a good friend of mine — needed me for a shooting for his final diploma in graphics design. He’s working on a campaign for fatboy — a dutch manufacturer for sacks filled with little balls on which you can sit or just relax. And that’s what Mike actually wanted me to do in front of the camera.

Anina at HFF

SA — 2007-01-31T20:06:50+01:00

Anina of 360° Fashion and anina.net gave a speech for the film students at The Film & Television Academy (HFF) “Konrad Wolf” in Potsdam. It was a very interesting, brilliant and inspiring speech about her life as a fashion model, mobile technology and the success of her popular blog. Have a look at the pictures by Prof. Weinberg who came up with the idea to invite Anina when he met her at the Webcuts.06 show last year and who is a very visionary person in matters of new media, too.

Arthur — Germany premiere

SA — 2007-01-20T19:26:28+01:00

Today was the Germany premiere of Arthur und die Minimoys (Arthur and the Invisibles). Luc Besson and Bill Kaulitz of Tokio Hotel came to the Potsdamer Platz to promote the movie. I think it was a very entertaining movie and really good fun! Go and watch it with your friends! You can find pictures and trailers on the official website (which I designed). Thanks to everyone at Tobis for the invitation to the premiere!

L4 — 10th anniversary

SA — 2007-01-18T22:23:52+01:00

Right after the meeting at audioberlin I went to the 10th anniversary of L4 – academy for digital communications. I was pleasently surprised when I met Prof. Eku Wand giving a honoric speech for L4. He was a founding member of interface!berlin and Pixelpark and we’re proud to say he is on the Webcuts jury, as well.

interface!brunch at audioberlin

SA — 2007-01-18T22:23:43+01:00

audioberlin invited the members and friends of interface!berlin for a tour at their studios. The sound studio is at the Meistersaal which is part of the Hansa Studios – a living legend as bands like U2, Depeche Mode and David Bowie recorded their albums there.

Business cards for audioberlin

SA — 2007-01-18T22:23:27+01:00

Business cards for audioberlin – The Audiotainment Company in Berlin.

Flyer for audioberlin

SA — 2007-01-16T12:05:36+01:00

This work for audioberlin is both a flyer and a business greeting card (sort of). You can find the PDF here.

Limelight business cards

SA — 2007-01-16T12:05:16+01:00

Peter designed these business cards for LimeLight PR — a PR agency for movie productions in Berlin. I only helped Peter with the first approach and the concept of the design. Check out the spot UV varnishing that makes some areas glossy. The new website for LimeLight PR is currently in progress.

“The secret life of words” — DVD

SA — 2007-01-07T19:25:52+01:00

I almost missed the German DVD release of Das geheime Leben der Worte (The secret life of words) – an Isabel Coixet movie with Sarah Polley and Tim Robbins. I designed the press kit with Peter Ruschel for Tobis — one of the finest film distributors in Germany earlier this year.

Meeting Ellie Kurttz

SA — 2006-12-28T19:22:58+01:00

Ellie Kurttz — a good friend from London — came over to spent Christmas and New Year’s Eve with us. She’s a professional photographer who mainly works for the Royal Shakespeare Company. She had an exhibition at the Embassy of Brazil in London. Check out her brilliant work here (currently updating).

Merry Christmas

SA — 2006-12-23T07:02:39+01:00

I wish everone a Merry Christmas and all the best for the next year — and remember: be careful what you wish for, you might get it.

“Maischberger” Christmas card

SA — 2006-12-23T06:20:49+01:00

I’m very happy to announce the design of this year’s Christmas cards for Menschen bei Maischberger. If you found this in your mail, take a closer look at the snowflakes. They are formed of the three words in “Menschen bei Maischberger” and the numbers in “2007”. In each snowflake the word is highlighted with a silver spot color.

Los Berlin Beamboys installation

SA — 2006-12-17T17:30:02+01:00

Los Berlin Beamboys show an video installation at the St. Elisabeth church in Berlin-Mitte — two huge balls in the middle of the church and combined with a surround sound concept. The entrance is free, but I think it’s much better to see it when it’s darker. You can watch a video clip here.

3x33 — Christmas market

SA — 2006-12-17T06:35:13+01:00

Every year the team at 3x33 arranges a special designers Christmas market — a nice spot to find unique presents, have a good coffee and listen to some live jazz music.

audioberlin relaunch

SA — 2006-12-16T13:48:23+01:00

The website of audioberlin – The Audiotainment Company has been relaunched. I did a whole new design for the website. It’s not finished completely yet, as the head of each page will have different interactive animations with sounds — a playground for things to discover. The basics of the back-end (originally programmed by the masterminds at area42) were transferred but I had to change the source code for the relaunch, though. Many thanks to Matthias and Jan at audioberlin!

PicooZ

SA — 2006-12-13T20:07:39+01:00

A friend of mine told me about this funny tittle toy. The PicooZ is a light-weight helicopter that can be easily controlled even in your living-room. I’ve just unpacked it and as you can see in this clip I still need some practice…

Supervising final practical exam

SA — 2006-12-13T15:29:43+01:00

This week the design class at L4 started with their final practical exam. They will have to design a logo and a sales folder with several sheets or a website for a catering company. I’m supervising them taking care everything is according to plan. They have 10 working days to write a concept and prepare themselves for the practical test. But next Thursday they will only have about 6 hours to do their whole work for the sales folder, create a PDF for offset printing and presenting a mockup of the final product. They have already come up with a couple of good concepts today.

Tempo — 20th anniversary

SA — 2006-12-08T20:35:23+01:00

For the first time after 10 years, one of my favorite magazines of all time — Tempo — published a special issue today. It’s a nonrecurring 380-pages edition and probably already sold out. The cover of Kate Moss doesn’t impress me very much, but I’ve got a copy and I remember the days when I read the Tempo in my “youth” and the shock when I heard that they knocked off the magazine. It was one of the freshest and most unique magazines with great articles during that time. They were one of the first in Germany who started the so-called New Journalism.

20th media.net summit

SA — 2006-12-08T20:21:39+01:00

The media.net Berlin Brandenburg had their 20th media summit and 5th anniversary on Wednesday. It was hosted by Tita von Hardenberg interviewing the mayor of Berlin, Klaus Wowerei. As always it was a very nice event and we had a great time at the after-party. You can find more pictures here.

“Wie in der Hölle” — DVD

SA — 2006-12-04T19:24:46+01:00

Today was the release of the German DVD Wie in der Hölle (L’enfer) — a French movie by director Danis Tanovic (No Man’s Land) with Emmanuelle Béart, Karin Viard, Marie Gillain, Carole Bouquet and the legendary Jean Rochefort.
In collaboration with Peter Ruschel I designed the poster, lobby sets and press folder for TOBIS Film earlier this year.

Opera at the Bode Museum

SA — 2006-12-03T15:41:13+01:00

On Saturday night I was on a very special event: Apollo und Hyacinth at the Bode Museum. The Bode Museum was just re-opened in October and now they present Mozart’s first opera in the halls of the museum on the Museum Island. The Chamber Orchester of the Berliner Philharmoniker directed by Christoph Hagel played. Brilliant vocalists and an excellent dance ensemble choreographed by Ismael Ivo completed the superb musical performance. If you have the chance — go and see it!

Meeting my business partner from Seattle

SA — 2006-11-25T18:40:49+01:00

Forrest Corbett — friend and business partner from Seattle came to Berlin for a short visit. He spent about two weeks with his wife Rebecca here in Berlin and a couple of days in Stockholm. We had a great time and we scheduled our jobs for the upcoming year. For more information about his company go to Giraffedesign.com.

Webcuts on Motor TV

SA — 2006-11-21T18:24:28+01:00

Extracts of the official selection of Webcuts.06 are currently presented by Motor TV — Berlin-based nationwide music TV channel. The clips are broadcasted throughout the entire broadcast, so you will see the Webcuts movies every now and then. You can watch Motor TV here online or if you live in Berlin and Brandenburg you can watch it on TV via DVB-T.

“Arthur und die Minimoys” launched

SA — 2006-11-20T21:26:27+01:00

I’m proud to announce the launch of the website for Arthur und die Minimoys — the new animation movie by Luc Besson. I designed the website for Tobis, the German distributor and it will feature more stuff until the start of the movie in January 2007. Many thanks to Petra and Magnus at Tobis!

Hiddensee

SA — 2006-11-13T22:30:56+01:00

Last weekend I was on the island Hiddensee — a beautiful, small island in the Baltic Sea where cars are not allowed. It’s the perfect place to relax and to get away from all the stress in a city like Berlin. I took some photos with my mobile phone SE K800i and I put them online here together with some small video clips which you can find here.

Logo for Taco Stop

SA — 2006-11-04T18:45:52+01:00

Steven Pass in Washington, USA opened a new taco restaurant at their winter ressort. They needed a logo which I designed in collaboration with Forrest at GiraffeDesign, Seattle. It was really a fun job!

The Dears

SA — 2006-11-04T10:13:44+01:00

The Dears played at the Mudd Club in Berlin last friday. They were a bit theatric but did a great show.

Maier-TV launched

SA — 2006-10-31T11:51:27+01:00

Today I launched the website for Christian Maier. He’s a journalist and has produced several reportages and documentations for TV stations like ARD, RTL, Sat1, Spiegel and many more. Go check his portfolio of movie clips online at www.maier-tv.de.

Coverage at freshmilk

SA — 2006-10-25T22:54:13+02:00

Freshmilk exclusively reported on Webcuts.06 online. You can watch their coverage at freshmilk.de. I think they did an amazing job. Don't miss the interviews with Prof. Weinberg and this year's winners!

Die Welt shows Webcuts.06

SA — 2006-10-21T22:48:55+02:00

I thought I could have a rest after Webcuts.06, but in fact, the press and the media are very interested in presenting Webcuts.06. We’re proud to announce that Die Welt features our festival on the homepage. Check it our here.

Speech by Andy Murdock at HFF Potsdam

SA — 2006-10-14T21:00:42+02:00

Andy Murdock (San Francisco) — maker of Lots of Robots and winner of Webcuts 04+05 had a speech about his 3D animated feature movie project. He explained the technical methods and creative processes behind the creation of this solo project. It was a very interesting and inspiring afternoon at the HFF Potsdam. Many thanks to mental images, our main sponsor and Prof. Weinberg, who made this possible for Webcuts.06. You can find some pictures by Peter here.

And the winners are…

SA — 2006-10-13T22:08:32+02:00

So, here are the winners of Webcuts.06.

Best Film + Audience Award: Video3000, Germany

Best Animation: Tyger, Brasil

Best Design: Trusted Computing, Germany

Special Award: Elephants Dream, Netherlands

Webcuts.06 — Success!

SA — 2006-10-13T17:19:05+02:00

Webcuts.06 was crowned with success. The show was sold out, there were brilliant films and we had a party far into the night! Anina — founder of 360°Fashion presented the winner for the special award. She’s really a blogging-pro. Read the whole coverage at her blog here!

Interview for RTL II News

SA — 2006-10-11T18:04:46+02:00

RTL II News interviewed me about Webcuts.06 this afternoon and they showed it on their prime time news tonight. You can watch the news as a podcast here (interview starts at 7:00).

Meeting Anina

SA — 2006-10-11T18:04:27+02:00

Lovely blogging fashion model Anina from 360Fashion arrived from Paris tonight and I brought her to the hotel. She will award one of the prizes for Webcuts.06 tomorrow. And Andy Murdock, the winner of last year arrived from San Francisco! Things are getting exciting, now!

Interview for Freshmilk

SA — 2006-10-10T11:33:24+02:00

The interview for Freshmilk is online. You can watch Eckhard Jäger and me explaining Webcuts.06. Click here.

Webcuts — jury meeting

SA — 2006-09-30T18:13:54+02:00

The winners of this year’s Webcuts.06 are determined by the jury. It was a 5-hours-process and we had a hard to time to find the best clips in the categories. Yet, it’s still top secret who the winners are, as we will announce them next Thursday, October 12th. Many thanks to the members of the jury (from left to right): Ludwig von Reiche / mental images, Prof. Eku Wand / HBK Braunschweig, Prof. Susanne Mayer / HDM Stuttgart, Sven Assmann / interface!berlin, Prof. Ulrich Weinberg / HFF Potsdam, Gerrit Wahle / UFA and Ilona Koglin / Page (absent).

Theater tusdoch — trailer

SA — 2006-09-27T22:47:23+02:00

Theater tusdoch — an independent Theater in Berlin needed some quick help for their website. They wanted to publish their trailer video of the current play online, so I gave them a helping hand, converted the clips and put them on their website.

interface!berlin meets Wirtschaftskreis Mitte

SA — 2006-09-27T13:07:24+02:00

On Tuesday evening we invited the members of the Wirtschaftskreis Mitte to present them our organisation interface!berlin. Dirk Lambrecht, business councilman in Berlin-Mitte was so kind to give us the opportunity to speak about broadband internet and its new possibiities. We had several speakers: Lutz Treutler, CBXNET (Broadband Internet); Eckhard M. Jäger, area42 (Typo3); Alexander Krause, berlin-bits (Web Accessibility) and Hr. Nielsen, SWYX (CBXNET Phone — Digital and Analog Nets).
Together with M. Scheuer of audioberlin I explained the audience what Podcasting is, showed them some of the Podcasts we produced and how it can be used for your company.
You can find photos from the event here.

Film shooting for Cornelsen Verlag

SA — 2006-09-16T15:05:38+02:00

Teaming up with Matthias from audioberlin and Peter we were shooting a couple of scenes today for the Cornelsen Verlag — one of the leading publishers for educational media in Germany. We shot in a classroom at the Peter-Ustinov-Schule with Julius, a 6 year old, smart boy who did a great job. The films will be used as introduction movies for education software that will help children learn how to use dictionaries and find words more easily. Many thanks to Elisabeth Wagner at Cornelsen for her help in directing the films.

Launch of Podcast by CDU/CSU faction

SA — 2006-09-12T18:35:08+02:00

In collaboration with audioberlin, we released the first Podcast of the CDU/CSU Fraktion. The Podcast will be produced every week and you can listen to it here or at iTunes.

The table of free voices

SA — 2006-09-09T21:16:35+02:00

Today 112 internationally renowned thinkers and activists took their place around the biggest table ever constructed and answered 100 of the most pressing questions facing humanity. I went to the Bebelplatz square — located along one of Berlin’s central avenues, Unter den Linden to see the public event. You could hear the questions asked by Willem Dafoe and Hafsat Abiola, but unfortunately you couldn’t hear the answers of the participants as they all replied at the same time. However, they recorded the answers with video cameras individually installed in front of each speaker — imagine a round table with 112 microphones and cameras!
The project which was broadcasted live on the internet as well, was initiated by dropping knowledge — a German NGO which acts globally. It’s interesting how I heard of it. First, I read a news at the website of Pearl Jam who are known for their environmentally consciousness. Then I found out that the German foreign minister Dr. Steinmeier is the patron of the table of free voices. Last Monday I read an article at macnews.de — one of my daily RSS feeds — which described that they installed more than 112 Macs for this open source project and finally I found it this morning at Tagesspiegel Online. You can watch a small clip I recorded this afternoon here.
www.droppingknowledge.org

Webcuts — print ad

SA — 2006-09-06T23:36:32+02:00

This year’s Webcuts.06 is getting closer. So, here’s the first ad I designed which will be published in videofilmen, a magazine for video film makers.

Website for physiotherapy clinic launched

SA — 2006-09-06T23:14:57+02:00

A very good clinic for physiotherapy and other body therapies is Physiotherapie Pia Weber in Berlin-Mitte. I’m occasionally working on the redesign of the logo and the website for Pia Weber. Today, I’m happy to announce the launch of the first website for the clinic. It’s supposed to look both professional in terms of therapy, emotive and friendly. Check the website at www.physio-mitte.de.

L4 — design basics

SA — 2006-09-06T23:12:36+02:00

On Monday two new classes for media designers (video + sound) started at L4. And as always the students will learn the basics in design and communications. However, each class is different and I’m looking forward to see the results of their works.

Portfolio for actress Johanna Geißler

SA — 2006-09-01T23:20:03+02:00

I’m proud to announce that I designed the new print portfolio for Johanna Geißler — a very talented young actress from Berlin. She was awarded “Best Actress” in “Die Besucher” (The visitors) at the Winnipeg Film Festival and at the International Fimfestival in Sandpoint, Idaho! Check out her website www.johanna-geissler.de (in progress).

Webcuts — Podcast #1

SA — 2006-09-01T22:49:33+02:00

I totally forgot to post this news on my own blog: The first Webcuts podcast is online for you to watch and download. You can find the “Podcuts” at blog.webcuts.org.

interface!brunch at CBXNET

SA — 2006-09-01T17:07:29+02:00

Today we had one of our interface!brunches, again. This time an association member CBXNET arranged a speech by Michael Treutler (Dr. rer. pol.) about the basic principles of the media-economic person. Quite an abstract and academic topic which Michael Treutler describes in his book “Die Ordnung der Sinne” (The order of the senses). However, we had a lively discussion about the US market compared to the European market during the brunch. Did you know that audible uses a rather bad audio quality in the US for their files and that German clients don’t accept that low quality because they’re used to higher CD quality audiobooks?

L4 — intermediate exam for media designers

SA — 2006-08-29T21:20:30+02:00

One of the classes for media design at L4 had an intermediate examination last friday. In about 4 hours the students should retouch a photo with cherries and design a flyer or a small website for a fruit farmer — not too easy if you want to make it properly in only 4 hours! Anyway, I had to grade their concepts, ideas and designs and I had to check the technical requirements of their works. After all, a good testing for their final exam next year.

Website relaunch for Kirsch

SA — 2006-08-14T13:28:16+02:00

In collaboration with mikemo design, I relaunched the website for Kirsch – one of the leading manufacturers for power generators in Europe. Kirsch builds small portable aggregates, large emergency power systems for hospitals or stadiums and generating sets for special applications. It was a very challenging project in terms of a user-friendly, yet modern design and in ways of delivering a content management system that was both powerful and easy to handle for editors. Credits go to area42 who helped us with the initial installation of TYPO3 and gave us technical support. Special thanks to Olaf Hirschmann at Kirsch, who was in charge as a project manager and system administrator, and to the entire management team.
www.kirsch-energie.de

Design basics for event managers

SA — 2006-08-14T13:04:09+02:00

This morning, I started a new class at L4. The students will learn the basics in Adobe Photoshop, Indesign and FreeHand over the next three weeks. There is not enough time to make them experts but as event managers they get an insight of the applications and the process of designing communication media.

Paparazzi photos for “tip”

SA — 2006-08-10T14:26:45+02:00

An acquaintance of mine Christian Lesemann did a shooting for the cover story of the current issue of tip – one of the leading city magazines in Berlin. He shot the mayor of Berlin Klaus Wowereit in a paparazzi style. If you’re in Berlin, go and get a copy.

WEB2DNA art project

SA — 2006-08-03T14:57:25+02:00

Similar to the Webpage Visualizer the WEB2DNA project analyzes a webpage and “crunches it to little bits and spits it out as a graphic representation of a human DNA”. The brighter your DNA appears the semantically richer is your page.

Website launched for the band Fotos

SA — 2006-07-28T00:00:29+02:00

Today I launched the website for the band Fotos. They’re getting pretty popular right now, so their site had to be built very fast. However, I designed a rather classy and unpretentious style. Have a look: www.fotosmusik.de.

Volver — premiere with Penélope Cruz

SA — 2006-07-27T19:25:30+02:00

Charlotte of Tobis and Peter were so kind to invite me to the Germany premiere of Pedro Almodóvar’s new movie Volver starring Penélope Cruz. The screening was at the Kino Kulturbrauerei just around the corner where I live. And the aftershow party in the yard was so much fun! Here’s a clip of Penélope Cruz (unfortunately way too small).

Berlin University of the Arts — open doors

SA — 2006-07-25T10:26:07+02:00

This weekend I visited the Berlin University of the Arts (UdK) to see some of the students’ and a friend’s work — some really interesting and inspiring ideas. Unfortunately I didn’t have much time to talk to the students, but I recorded a couple of movies which you can see here. Sascha at we-make-money-not-art wrote a good article about the digital class of Prof. Sauter.

Berlin Cathedral

SA — 2006-07-21T14:01:30+02:00

Escaping the hot weather of 100° F, I went to see the Berlin Cathedral with my parents who are here on holiday. It’s always an impressive visit to see the grandiosity of the architecture and the sculptures. Video here.

Jakob-Kaiser-Haus

SA — 2006-07-11T15:41:21+02:00

I had a meeting at the Jakob-Kaiser-Haus in the Parliament Quarter in Berlin. The building has an amazing number of paintings and installations. One is a set of hundreds of boxes on which the names of all members of the parliament are labeled. See a video here.

Webcuts.06 Teaser

SA — 2006-07-10T17:57:54+02:00

Promoting Webcuts.06 – the Internet Film Fest I released this year’s teaser trailer for the event. Meanwhile, I'm working on a new main trailer.

1 million fans in Berlin

SA — 2006-07-10T15:22:47+02:00

On Sunday I was at Germany’s largest fan mile. Approximately 1 million fans were celebrating the German World Cup team in Berlin. It was a very emotional event and the German team wanted to thank the fans for their amazing support — making the World Cup the best of all time.
I must say it was a great feeling to support the German team in last 5 weeks and seeing them on stage at the Brandburg Gate and the whole euphoria I will never forget (small clip here).

Pixar’s Cars — interview walls

SA — 2006-07-07T21:40:09+02:00

Yesterday, I produced a couple of walls for the current Pixar animation movie Cars which will be used for a press junket. The walls will be behind the actors who give interviews for TV stations. The previews were designed by my old friend and colleague Peter.

Webcuts.06 blog online

SA — 2006-07-06T23:37:02+02:00

Today our blog for Webcuts.06 – the Internet Film Fest has been launched. We will keep you in touch with all the latest in the progress of the festival. And we soon will have a video podcast which will feature the best artists and movies of previous Webcuts festivals. Unfortunately our new member of the organization team Mara is missing on the current photo (we’re going to fix that).

World Cup — day off at lake

SA — 2006-07-03T23:48:05+02:00

After the glorious victory of the German World Cup team I took a day off at the Schlachtensee. You can see the crystal clear water of the lake in this video.

German flag — analyzed

SA — 2006-07-01T15:30:47+02:00

Inspired by the great artwork by Brazilian designer Icaro Doria for the magazine Grande Reportagem in Lisbon, Portugal, I designed a German flag really quick this afternoon. I found the flags at anina.net. With all my respect for the original idea by Icaro Doria, I don’t mean to harm any copyrights, I just couldn’t help myself.

dmmk — the German multimedia congress

SA — 2006-06-27T23:13:51+02:00

Today I was at the dmmk — the German multimedia congress. Nikesh Arora (Vice President European Operations von Google Inc.) and Charles Fränkl (Head of Management AOL Germany) had a keynote about social networking and Web 2.0 — no news really. The panels later this afternoon were more interesting, especially the speech by Sören Stamer of CoreMedia about the explosive character of the web was actually very improvised but very inspiring, too.

Free climbing in Saxon Switzerland

SA — 2006-06-26T15:59:11+02:00

Last weekend, I spent some time in the Saxon Switzerland at the Berghof Lichtenhain. They needed new pictures for their website, so Peter took photos of the hotel and the beautiful mountain landscape. You can find some pictures of the 2-day shooting here. We did some free climbing in the Czech Republic, too, which was very exhausting in the hot sun but still a lot of fun. By the way, free climbing started in the Saxon Switzerland at the beginning of the 20th century and was brought to the USA by Fritz Wiessner who emigrated from Germany in the 1930s.
Update 2006-06-29: I’ve just found a tiny video clip of Peter shooting the landscape.

Photoshop prep for final exam

SA — 2006-06-23T15:43:43+02:00

On Wednesday I started a new Photoshop course at L4. The students will refresh and advance their skills in Photoshop and other applications and they will be prepared for their final exam at the German chamber of commerce and industry (DIHK).

Artwork at agency in 1996

SA — 2006-06-14T17:13:08+02:00

This is something funny from my first internship at an advertising agency. The city of Trier wanted caution labels for their car parks to be aware of thieves. So, my job was to think about a slogan. It all ended up with this sign “Diebe nehmen sich so manches heraus” which is a play on words (Pickpockets unbag quite a lot). The signs must be from 1996 and they’re still there. Mike found it and sent me the picture.

Mondo Fumatore gig

SA — 2006-06-11T17:43:20+02:00

On Sunday afternoon Marc played with his band Mondo Fumatore in Kreuzberg. It was a really quick ‘unplugged’ gig in the sun. I hate to say that there are no current show dates. But go and check the MP3s!

Gonzales in concert

SA — 2006-06-07T10:30:20+02:00

Gonzales played two gigs in a row at the Babylon in Berlin on Tuesday. The first show was sold out within a few hours, but I was lucky to get a ticket from a friend. Gonzales is a great piano player and his current show “From Major To Minor” is very entertaining. If you get the chance to see him — go and get a ticket quickly. You can find some videos of his shows on the label’s website.

iPod DIY repair — the bold way

SA — 2006-06-05T13:59:39+02:00

A good friend of mine stayed with us a few days. With her she brought her broken iPod as rumor had it that I was a Mac healer. It appeared to be a severe case. The iPod displayed a broken folder icon when starting up and it didn’t mount on the desktop. Even after checking with Disk Utility and DiskWarrior which had helped me with severe hard disk problems in the past, I wasn’t able to fix it. I checked some forums and the Apple discussions groups and I figured out that it was a pretty common problem that arose after some years of using the iPod. So, the only solution was to get a new hard disk.
But I wasn’t willing to give up — not yet. So, I listened to the noise of the hard drive and I could hear how the disk’s head was kind of stuck when trying to mount. As my friend told me that she was already about to toss it away, I wanted to give it one last chance. I firmly hit the iPod several times against a wooden chair — et voilà — the head of the drive moved on and the iPod started up perfectly. I checked the disk with DiskWarrior and replaced the directory but there weren’t any severe problems and the iPod played music happily ever after…

Webpage visualizer

SA — 2006-05-29T13:17:18+02:00

I found this at anina.net and spreeblick.com. It’s an html parser that visualizes the html tags as a graphic. It’s both revealing and making fun. This is what my current blog looks like but you can enter any web address here to create a graph of your own web site.

Shore leave

SA — 2006-05-29T10:56:59+02:00

Last weekend I spent two days at the Kulturgut Wrechen — a beautifully restored estate in the wildlife park Feldberger Seenlandschaft which is about 130 km north from Berlin (GoogleEarth Placemark). The pension has some really nice rooms and is situated at the shore of a lake where you can relax or enjoy a walk along the many lakes in the national park. You can find more of my pictures here and a short video clip here.

New central station — opening celebration

SA — 2006-05-27T01:06:06+02:00

Tonight was the grand opening celebration of the new central station in Berlin — the most modern station in the world (costs: € 700 million). There was a huge light show with fireworks and live music and it was the first time that the public had the opportunity to enter the whole station and check its architecture — impressive! You can find some pictures here and a short video clip here.

Diploma presentation

SA — 2006-05-26T10:35:29+02:00

On Wednesday Jenny Pilz had her final diploma presentation in textile / surface design. She designed wallpapers and reliefs for a bar in Berlin near the popular Helmholtzplatz in Prenzlauer Berg (which is my borough). She succeeded in conserving the original old walls of the place and she used silk wall papers with bird patterns to fill the whole room with life. Depending on how the light shines on the surfaces there are really nice reflexions. The bar’s ‘official’ opening is this Friday and you can find it here.

Designmai

SA — 2006-05-21T16:42:44+02:00

Just around the corner where I live was the showroom of this year’s Designmai – an international designfestival. You can find tons of photos at flickr. I only had the chance to see a glimpse of what was presented but there was some really cool stuff!

interface!brunch

SA — 2006-05-18T19:12:27+02:00

I was happy to announce a new interface!brunch which the members of our association interface!berlin organise occasionally. This time area42 presented their latest project for the S-Bahn Berlin. They created an interactive flash map for the train lines with information about delays, constructions sites and schedules. It was extremely fast and it had a good usabilty. You can find the tool online here (only German) and some pictures from the brunch here.

Wie in der Hölle — Lobby Sets

SA — 2006-05-17T19:04:30+02:00

Finished work on the lobby cards for Wie in der Hölle: eight photos from the movie on high glossy photo paper for the movie theatres in germany.

Wie in der Hölle — Poster

SA — 2006-05-16T18:28:16+02:00

The official german movie poster for Wie in der Hölle has been released today. I designed it together with Peter Ruschel and the final Photoshop composition is about 800 MB large and has more than 60 layers (not counting the text layers which were set in InDesign). It was challenging but fun! Thanks to Magnus at Tobis!

Jintanino — MySpace Music Account

SA — 2006-05-11T22:21:19+02:00

Although I’ve been using MySpace for quite a while (and I hate to say it’s getting more annoying every week), I edited the first band account on MySpace for the hip hop / rap artist Jintanino (Tote Fliegen Records, Berlin). It’s just the first simple approach to using CSS with MySpace to change the look of the artist’s page — and it still doesn’t look good. I think MySpace has to improve its usability and its spam issues or I think the users will switch to other similar, better systems.

Die Besucher (The Visitors) — Premiere

SA — 2006-05-08T00:09:26+02:00

Tonight was the premiere of the short film Die Besucher (The Visitors) by Ulrike Molsen at the Eiszeit cinema in Berlin. The premiere party was great and I enjoyed meeting new interesting people. And it was the first time that I could basically hold the final DVD — for which I had done the authoring (see recent post) — in my own hands.

Press folder for “Wie in der Hölle”

SA — 2006-05-03T18:55:04+02:00

In collaboration with Peter Ruschel our latest work for TOBIS Film has been released today: a new press folder for the upcoming French movie Wie in der Hölle (L’enfer) by director Danis Tanovic (No Man’s Land) with Emmanuelle Béart, Karin Viard, Marie Gillain, Carole Bouquet and the legendary Jean Rochefort. Again, we really enjoyed working on this project for TOBIS – designing a very classy and glossy brochure.
The movie will start in Germany on June, 29.
You can download the 40-pages press folder here (PDF – 1.6 MB).

Bertolt Brecht house in Buckow

SA — 2006-04-16T12:04:23+02:00

On Holy Saturday I spent a wonderful sunny day with my girl and a friend in Buckow (Google Earth Placemark) which is about 50 km east of Berlin. Located at two beautiful lakes, Buckow was the summer residence of Bertolt Brecht and his wife Helene Weigel. We had the opportunity to visit the small exhibition which was installed in the house near the lake. If you’re around that area it’s also worth a walk around the lake.

EnviroShield — new web design

SA — 2006-04-14T12:04:32+02:00

Today I designed a new web interface for EnviroShield, Washington, USA. Giraffe Design gave me the first approach and I designed the final version — clearly laid out and with some rougher brush strokes to freshen the overall impression. So, EnviroShield are very happy with their new web design.

1st Škoda Talent Design Award

SA — 2006-04-07T12:23:51+02:00

My good friend and business partner, Michael Schmidt, won the 1st Škoda Talent Design Award. He designed a catalog for a fictitious art exhibition. The new Škoda car models are interpreted by the style of famous contemporary artists. You can read more here (German) and you can download the full catalog here (PDF – 2.6 MB).

The Knife

SA — 2006-04-07T12:23:29+02:00

The Knife played their only Germany gig at the Maria in Berlin last night. It was one of the most crowded shows I’ve seen at the Maria in years. And it was one of the most boring ones, as well. The songs were great, but I think 90 percent of the music and vocals were playback and the songs sounded exactly like on the album. My friends — and I think most of the audience — agreed with me. The only interesting thing was the light show and the videos that were projected onto a semi-transparent black curtain in front The Knife.

Art Of Fighting

SA — 2006-03-28T13:39:53+02:00

I watched Art of Fighting last night at the Bastard. It was a nice concert and I enjoyed one or two songs a lot. Altough there were only a few people in the audience, the atmosphere wasn’t very intimate.

DVD authoring for short film

SA — 2006-03-27T15:38:57+02:00

I finished the DVD menu design and authoring for a new short film “Die Besucher” (The Visitors) by Ulrike Molsen, today. The interesting part is that the main dvd menu is not only a motion background but a short prequel to the actual film. The premiere of this critically acclaimed short film will be at the end of April. (Package and cover design by Steffen Zimmermann.)

18th media.net summit

SA — 2006-03-17T13:40:06+01:00

The media.net Berlin Brandenburg had their 18th media summit at the Café Moskau last night. It was hosted by Jörg Thadeusz who discussed the question “In Love with Berlin?” with the artist Brigitte Maria Mayer ( “Echolot” ), comedian Thomas Hermanns, photographer Jim Rakete, director Tom Tykwer ( “Lola Runs”, “Das Parfüm” ), actress Katharina Wackernagel ( “Die Boxerin” ) and director Hans Weingärtner (“Die fetten Jahre sind vorbei” ). It was very entertaining but not very mattering. However, “networking” at the after show party was fun and it was nice to meet people and friends.
You can watch a small movie clip here.

Bauhaus exhibition at the Tate, London

SA — 2006-03-11T13:16:37+01:00

Never miss the Tate if you’re in London! I didn’t have much time, so I only visited the Tate Modern section and the exhibition Albers and Moholy-Nagy: From the Bauhaus to the New World which was brilliant. I wished some of my students could see it, as part of the design basics I teach are still originated in the Bauhaus approach and I thought it was very inspiring, as well.

Juliana Hatfield at Bush Hall, London

SA — 2006-03-10T23:08:35+01:00

After eight years of being a fan of Juliana Hatfield I finally had the chance to see her live! She did a solo show and played a repertoire of her songs (only a few from her current album ‘China’ ). It was very intense and she’s an amazing singer.

Update 2006-03-29:
I met a guy at the Gemma Hayes in-store gig who went to the Juliana Hatfield gig, as well, and here are his pictures.

Gemma Hayes — In-Store gig

SA — 2006-03-10T16:45:37+01:00

I went to Camden Town where Gemma Hayes had an in-store gig at FOPP Records. There were only a few people there which made the performance very intimate. I had the chance to have a little chat with Gemma and asked her if there were any plans to tour in Germany. She said she’d love to, but nothing planned yet. She was pretty impressed when she heard that I came all the way from Berlin and signed me her current Single ‘Undercover’ with a special note. (I’m not a geek, just a huge fan… ) I asked her how she feels when so many people in the audience took pictures like during the concert last night and she said it was a bit uncomfortable, but she couldn’t stop people from doing it.

Update 2006-03-29:
Here are some pictures by a guy I met at the in-store gig.

Design Museum London

SA — 2006-03-10T14:04:22+01:00

Just some impressions on the Design Museum, London.

Gemma Hayes at the Scala, London

SA — 2006-03-09T23:30:00+01:00

So, here I am, finally, at the Scala in London, looking forward to see Gemma Hayes playing live. It was a brilliant show and her voice was really amazing, though I have to say, that the current band — compared to her last band during the debut tour in the US (saw her in Seattle, 2003) — wasn’t that exciting. I didn’t have the feeling that they worked as a band at all. The whole focus was on Gemma, which was alright, but I really enjoy it when I see a band having fun on stage. That wasn't the case here.
And I have to complain about all the people with their cameras in the audience! They were so annoying holding their cams up in the air in front of my eyes. They were shooting all the time. People, listen to the music! It's all about music, please!
But again, apart from that — I was enjoying a great performance by Gemma Hayes.

Update 2006-04-18: I’ve found two short movie clips from the concert online. Watch clip 1 and clip 2 (QuickTime).

London’s Calling

SA — 2006-03-08T11:30:36+01:00

So, I’ve just arrived in London for the Gemma Hayes concert tonight expecting some nice days here. I'm meeting Claudia, a friend of mine at frieze — a magazine for contemporary art and culture.

Andreas Sauer Exhibition

SA — 2006-03-06T21:00:43+01:00

Yesterday, I happened to hit on an exhibition by Andreas Sauer at Schiele & Schön Publishing. I was very fascinated by the colorful style and impression of his work, so I took some pictures with my cell phone (not literally) which you can find in my gallery.
Go and check more of Andreas Sauer’s great work on his website.

Annamateur and her Guitarits

SA — 2006-03-06T21:00:14+01:00

Sunday night I saw Annamateur and her Guitarists performing in the Café Zapata in Berlin-Mitte. She originally comes from Dresden where she’s pretty popular. A friend of hers — Ines Rosenholm — highly recommended Annamateur as a fantastic singer / entertainer with a slightly foul-mouthed and vulgar attitude — and yes, Ines was right!

Video editing for dance project

SA — 2006-03-02T21:59:10+01:00

Maya Lipsker — a choreographer, producer, teacher and dancer at the dance studio / theater DOCK 11 — will premiere her new production Face to Face on March 16th here in Berlin. For the first time she will use video projections on stage. I edited some video clips and applied a slow motion effect. You can see the performance on March 16–19 and 23–26 at the DOCK 11.

Stevens Pass — College Pass Sale Poster

SA — 2006-02-28T20:37:35+01:00

I’m pretty busy designing for Stevens Pass, and I really enjoy it! So here’s a new poster for the Stevens College Pass sale.

Stevens Pass — Slopestyle Event Poster

SA — 2006-02-27T19:39:48+01:00

Yet another poster that I’ve designed for Stevens Pass. This time it’s for the Slopestyle Event in March and again, it was a real fun job thanks to Forrest at Giraffe Design and Matt at Stevens Pass.

Design Basics at L4

SA — 2006-02-27T16:15:08+01:00

Today, I started teaching a new design basics course at L4. All 11 days are spread over 4 weeks and the students will learn the basics of scribbling, design, layout, typography, corporate design and many more.

DE:BUG 100

SA — 2006-02-23T17:27:33+01:00

This Friday the 100th issue of DE:BUG will be released as a special 100-pages issue with a dictionary about the “electronic aspects of life” as they call it. It’s definitely worth its money and it comes with a free music compilation with exclusive tracks by To Rococo Rot, Lawrence, Mouse On Mars and many more.

“V for Vendetta” graphic novel

SA — 2006-02-23T16:50:30+01:00

Yesterday, I’ve finished reading the comic novel V for Vendetta by Alan Moore. I saw the movie at the world premiere, so I ordered the book the other day at Amazon. I was pretty surprised when I figured out that the story was first published in 1983 and the style of the graphics had this rough 70s / 80s look. It’s an intelligent, yet frightening story about a totalitarian world in 1997. Though, I must confess that I enjoyed the modern style of the movie more than the book and particularly Hugo Weaving as “V” and Natalie Portman as “Evey” were more likable than the comic characters.

LED throwies

SA — 2006-02-20T19:45:20+01:00

Inspired by Friday’s Rocketboom videocast, I made my own LED throwies. They were easy to assemble: a 10 mm LED, a 3 V battery and a magnet — all tied together with duck tape. So people, if you find these somewhere attached at magnetic objects in Berlin — it was probably me… Hope to make some pictures in action very soon.

Einstein Tower

SA — 2006-02-19T12:28:09+01:00

Yesterday, I was at the Einstein Tower in Potsdam. The “Einsteinturm” was planned and built in the years 1919 to 1924 by the famous architect Erich Mendelsohn. The Einstein Tower is a functional building, a solar observatory and until the second World War the most prominent research institution of that kind in Europe. A substantial overhaul of the Einstein Tower started in November 1997 and it was re-opened in 1999. I think it was pretty crowded by tourists there during the Einstein Year 2005, so, yesterday was my first time at the site which gave me the opportunity to record a little wobbling video.

Sehnsucht (Longing) — Screening

SA — 2006-02-15T20:31:58+01:00

This afternoon I watched Sehnsucht (Longing), a movie by Valeska Grisebach. Told in a realistic style that sometimes has the feel of a documentary, the story is situated in a village not far from Berlin. I think it would be a very good short film rather than a — sometimes very slow — feature film.

Short Film Award Ceremony

SA — 2006-02-15T00:03:34+01:00

Tonight I was at the award ceremony for the Berlinale short film selection. The Golden Bear went to Jonas Odell who some of you might know by the music videos he did for Franz Ferdinand. The film ALDRIG SOM FÖRSTA GÅNGEN (Never Like The First Time!) about people’s “first time” is just brilliant! I couldn’t find any clips of the movie, only at MTV.

“Tough Enough” Screening

SA — 2006-02-14T23:47:24+01:00

This afternoon I went to see Knallhart (Tough Enough) by Detlev Buck. The movie tells of a drastic change in the life of young Michael Polischka. He moves from the bourgeois Berlin district of Zehlendorf to the social realities of Neukölln, a district marked by unemployment. A good movie with fresh and creditable acting, only the soundtrack was terrible: white New York rock music à la The Kills (don’t get me wrong — I love them) doesn’t fit to a German / Turkish / Arabian district like Berlin-Neukölln.

V for Vendetta — World Premiere

SA — 2006-02-14T01:55:49+01:00

Yesterday, I was at the world premiere of V for Vendetta — directed by James McTeigue, produced by Joel Silver, The Wachoski Brothers and Grant Hill based upon the comics by VERTIGO. Part of the movie was filmed in studios in Berlin.
Of course, Natalie Portman and Hugo Weaving were there, too and I was pretty excited to see them live. I was sitting in the theater looking forward to the screening when suddenly the side door opened and Natalie Portman and Hugo Weaving appeared next to me heading to their seats!
As always, Natalie Portman was enchanting and Hugo Weaving did some nice dubbing (his face is always hidden behind a mask) — I just love to hear him speaking. So, people, don’t go and watch the German version — you must see the original one!

Stevens Pass — Superpipe Event e-mail flyer

SA — 2006-02-13T20:17:17+01:00

Matching the Superpipe Event Poster for Stevens Pass, I designed this e-mail flyer for their newsletter.

56th Berlinale

SA — 2006-02-13T09:32:56+01:00

Finally, after my dental surgery, I can go to the Berlinale and take advantage of my accreditation. It already started last Thursday, but today is my first opportunity to watch one of the hundreds of films. More later this evening…

Stevens Pass — Superpipe Event Poster

SA — 2006-02-12T11:33:53+01:00

For Stevens Pass – a great ski and snowboarding resort in Washington, USA — I designed this poster for their new Superpipe Event later this February. Matt at Stevens Pass allowed me free play, so I was very happy to make the design a bit “louder” than usual…

Sunny winter day

SA — 2006-02-04T19:36:00+01:00

This afternoon Sybille and I spent some time in Motzen (Google Earth) at the Motzener Lake south of Berlin. It took us about an hour to get there by car but it was a beautiful sunny winter day and we enjoyed walking on the frozen lake.

Meeting with pictoplasma

SA — 2006-02-03T20:29:59+01:00

This afternoon I had a meeting with the Peter and Lars of Pictoplasma who organise conferences and events on contemporary character design. They maintain an extensive web-archive and publish books and resource books on the topic.
Together with Jenny and Ecki of Webcuts — the Internet Film Fest and Mara from media.net bb we agreed on teaming up and organizing something together as we’ll both have our events later this summer — nothing confirmed yet, but it’s gonna be thrilling!

Press folder released for new Isabel Coixet film

SA — 2006-02-03T12:11:28+01:00

Together with friend and business partner Peter Ruschel, we released the German press folder for Das geheime Leben der Worte — a new film by Isabel Coixet with Sarah Polley, Tim Robbins and Javier Cámara. The original title is La vida secreta de las palabras (The Secret Life Of Words). We designed this folder for Tobis — the German film distributor which was a challenging as well as a satisfactory job — and Charlotte at Tobis was just great! The movie will be released in Germany on 6th of April. We had the chance to see it last year and I have to say it’s a very good story and the actors are brilliant! You can download the press folder here (PDF — 2.5 MB).

Anina told to quit doing “tech stuff”

SA — 2006-01-30T11:08:50+01:00

Anina, the fashion model that blogs about her “digital life” has been given an ultimatum by her agency: either quit doing the technology stuff, or leave the agency. They said that fashion and technology did not go together.
I think that’s pretty stupid — it’s like telling you to stop talking to people on the phone or stop being interested in music. Read her article at Anina.net and leave her a comment.

iLife ’06

SA — 2006-01-27T11:19:11+01:00

I've just installed the new Apple iLife ’06!
I ordered it right after Steve Jobs had announced it at the MacWorld Expo – I just had to have it! And it’s arrived even earlier than expected!
I’ve just rushed through the iApps and checked out the new features – I really love it! Here are just a few things that I like:

iPhoto 6 now has a full screen mode just like Aperture (dark background – no menu bar) and some nice new image effects which improve your photos. Don’t get me wrong – you can’t compare it with the adjustments you have in Adobe Photoshop, but, hey, I don’t want to import all my snapshots in Photoshop and then re-import them in iPhoto… And in full screen mode Apple has added the “compare” feature of Aperture, which is very nice. With the image adjustment panel and the new features I don’t need Aperture anymore.

iDVD 6 has some really nice new themes – I love “Road Trip” and ”Reflections” which has the look of the Apple TV ads. I’m trying to put some samples here very soon. Do you know the “Magic Movie” button in iMovie? They now have integrated a “Magic DVD“ button in iDVD which fills all drop zones automatically.

GarageBand 3: integrated Podcasting and iSight recording – all you need to create your own Podcasts and export them!
iMovie HD: widescreen HD support and themes from iDVD 6.
iWeb: well, that’ll be an extra post on this blog, soon.

Photoshop Training

SA — 2006-01-16T19:10:07+01:00

Today, I started a new Photoshop refresh workshop at L4 – Institute for Digital Communication. The students will refresh their knowledge about image composing, color correction and layouting and many more in this 6-day-course.

DIY iSync Configuration

SA — 2006-01-16T18:04:13+01:00

Steffen – a friend of mine – has found a way to configure the Apple iSync software in such a way as to sync your Address Book and iCal with phones that are not yet supported by Apple, e.g. the Nokia N70, N90 or the Sony Ericsson W550(i). You‘ll need some basic understanding of scripting but all the rest is pretty easy and the instructions are explained step-by-step on his website: www.isync-hilfe.de (only German so far).

Stevens Pass Web Cam Widget

SA — 2006-01-15T11:59:42+01:00

I have created an Apple Dashboard Widget for Stevens Pass. It shows the current web cam image of the ski resort. You can adjust the time interval from 5 to 30 minutes on the back side of the widget if you flip it. Mac users can download the widget here.
Sorry, Windows users – you can only watch how it works in this movie here (QuickTime 7 required).

There goes 2005

SA — 2006-01-01T17:57:38+01:00

Happy New Year everybody! I spent christmas with my parents and after that I travelled to the hotel of Sybille’s parents – the Berghof in the Saxon Swiss, which is not in Switzerland but in East Germany. This snap shot by Sybille gives an impression of the winter idyll (and no it’s not Caspar David Friedrich, it’s just me…). I wish everybody a wonderful 2006 and all the best!

Stevens Pass – Tube City Rack Card

SA — 2005-12-21T08:43:44+01:00

Together with my friend and business partner Giraffe Design, Seattle a new print media is in production for Stevens Pass – one of the largest ski resorts in Washington, USA. This time I designed a rack card which shows all the information you need about the ski resort’s fun park called Tube City where you can ride down the hills on tubes – this really looks like fun! Hope to check it out soon myself…
The photos are shot by Seattle-based Chase Jarvis. He’s been creating stunning photography for mega-brands like Nike, Volvo, Subaru, T-Mobile, Microsoft, as well nearly every ski company, snowboard manufacturer, sports eyewear brand, and niche active lifestyle company on the planet.

Website launched for Ines Rosenholm

SA — 2005-12-19T23:13:46+01:00

Today, I published a new website for the Berlin actress Ines Rosenholm. She played at several theaters in Germany and Belgium such as the Theater Wechselbad in Dresden or the Morgenstern Theater in Berlin. She's a very talented and fascinating person. Check out her website at www.inesrosenholm.de.

Christmas at the pool

SA — 2005-12-18T23:37:48+01:00

On Sunday afternoon I was at a pretty nice christmas market here in Berlin-Prenzlauerberg. It was in the old Stadtbad Oderbergerstraße which used to be a swimming-pool. But now it's a venue for all kinds of events such as art exhibitions, concerts and parties. And this Sunday the guys from 3&33 organized their annual designers christmas market at that wonderful place. It was very crowded but you could still listen to some good music, nice visuals and buy some very cool and unique christmas presents and have a chat with the designers. Watch a small clip here and don't miss it next year!

iBook do-it-yourself hard drive replacement

SA — 2005-12-15T15:42:23+01:00

After my iMac G5 crashed last week (power supply out of order), my iBook’s hard drive crashed last Saturday, too. It did a good job for almost 3 years, but now really wasn't a good time to let me down… So I had to buy a new hard drive and replace it by myself (no more warranty). Man, it was a challenging job, but the Fixit Guide at pbfixit.com helped me a lot. Took me about an hour to open the iBook and replace the hard drive – if I hadn’t forgotten the little power connector in the end, which made me go through the whole process again… Finally, my iBook’s working fine again, now with the new drive even significantly quieter.

Design Basics at L4

SA — 2005-12-07T10:57:24+01:00

From Monday 6th to Friday 16th of December I'm teaching a 10-days workshop at L4 – Institute for Digital Communications. The students learn the very basics of design, layout, typography and corporate design. Here's a sneak insight of the students' work on their second day…

PAULA live in Berlin

SA — 2005-12-01T14:56:18+01:00

Yesterday I went to a PAULA show. They played at the Maria in Berlin – the final gig of their fall 2006 tour. I’ve known these guys since 2000 and create the website for them. It was a pretty good rock show with front singer Elke Brauweiler who really enjoyed the evening with the band and the fans. The venue was pretty crowded and the fans liked the new interpretations of their hits like Jimmy and Als es passierte as well as their new songs from the current album Ruhig Blut. I only had my cell phone with me, so the video and sound quality is very poor, but watch this if you like to get an idea of the show.
I met Berend who was formerly the so-called mastermind behind PAULA (together with Elke), too. He’s just finished a small Germany tour with his band and is back in Berlin producing the album for guther (morr music) - a project he’s doing together with his steady Julia Guther. Wonderful music! I had the chance to listen to a few songs last night and I’m really looking forward to the release of the new album. You can listen to the last album I Know You Know here.

SPOTS Installation – City Gaze

SA — 2005-11-28T12:50:04+01:00

‘City Gaze’ (Die Stadt hat Augen) is an exhibition that pursues a unique concept. An office building on Potsdamer Platz is being transformed into a seeing object. From 24 November to 28 February 2006, SPOTS, a light and media installation that has been integrated into the building’s facade, will be presenting new works by internationally renowned artists that have been created especially for this location and this medium. The show will launch with a work from Berlin-based artists and architects realities:united – who also have overall responsibility for the development of the light and media facade – in collaboration with the artist John deKron.
A friend of mine – Steffen Zimmermann – shot a movie at the opening. You can find the movie here (QT required).
This installation is just amazing and go see it if you're around Berlin!

iBook with transparent display

SA — 2005-11-22T13:44:57+01:00

Today I replaced my original iBook display with a transparent one. It’s a bit hard to see because of my iSight camera, but I think you get the idea. It's got a light grey shine which makes it easier to see the icons on the desktop.
Watch the movie here or click on the image (QuickTime required).

Glasses track eye movement, ad exposure

SA — 2005-11-22T11:14:02+01:00

Here’s a pretty interesting article about a pair of spectacles some guys from The Guardian used to film everything they see during a typical day. The result: 130 different advertising “elements” showing more than 80 brands. But the test person could only remember about 1 % of all ads.

DE:BUG 12-05 – Web 2.0 Special

SA — 2005-11-21T15:56:42+01:00

In der aktuellen Ausgabe der de:bug ist ein 10-seitiges Special über das Phänomen „Web 2.0“. Endlich wieder eine Ausgabe des Magazins wie ich sie auf früheren Tagen kannte – für Geeks und Dummys gleichermaßen interessant.

„Web 2.0 ist keine Technologie, sondern ein Konzept. Das wird of verwechselt. Es gibt zwar Core-Technologien und gemeinsame Nenner, aber letztendlich ist Web 2.0 so etwas wie eine große Koalition, erkennbar vor allem daran, dass jeder plötzlich mit jedem kann.“ [debug #98]

Die Inhalte:
- Web 2.0 Grundlagen // Was alles und wieso
- 2.0 für Dummies // Ich und das Web 2.0
- Office 20. // Runter von der Festplatte
- Design 2.0 // Alles so schön pastell hier
- Flock // Der Browser wird social
- Flock Interview // Warum Silicon Valley?
- Folksonomy // Rings um Tag
- Web 2.0 Linkliste // Zu viele neue Seiten
- …
Erhältlich demnächst am Kiosk.

Krieg der Sterne

SA — 2005-11-19T22:25:42+01:00

Ha! I’ve just found an old comic book of Star Wars Episode IV. It still has the orginal title in german that says “Krieg der Sterne”. The imprint says it’s from 1978! It’s just book 1 of a series and ends when Luke, Han and Chewy rescue Leia from the Death Star. The last phrase of the comic book: “DREIPEO! WO BIST DU?” (3PO! Where are you?).

Frakatale Exhibition

SA — 2005-11-19T17:29:48+01:00

I’ve been to the “Frakatale IV Exhibition” at the “Palast der Republik”. It’s titled “death” but it’s definitely worth a visit! And everyone who hasn’t had the chance to see the “Palace” from the inside yet – tomorrow is the last chance, because the building will be knocked down in about 40 days!
That’s why there was a demonstration in front of the building todoay – hard to say, but I think there were a couple hundred people demonstrating.

More info you can find here www.fraktale-berlin.de and here www.volkspalast.com/_vp/aktuell.htm

Website’s Up

SA — 2005-11-19T00:31:59+01:00

Hello everybody! My Website is up – at last!
I’ve been working on so many different ideas for my website during the last year, but I’ve never had the time to finally realize them…
So, now here’s a very reduced version of the web site. Still, I hope to post some interesting stuff for you and maybe you'll find my web site mutating in the next couple weeks or months.