Dave DeVries' Children's Drawings

This collection of art works, from illustrator David DeVries' The Monster Engine Project, are based on drawings by children, all aged around 6-years-old. I'd love to see these turned into a cartoon series.

This Is Yours

Hackney's The London Fields have employed the talents of designer Phil Bold to help design, package and promote their debut album, This is Yours. Recruiting the help of friends and family the band cut and painted 250 cereal boxes to size, forming the CD's packaging. These were then attached to the railings at London Field's park. The tag on each read "If you are reading this then you have probably found this album. After you have had a listen please sign the card and leave it in a place for someone else to find. Kind regards." Download the album for free here.

Live London Underground Map

Drawn in from the TfL API, Matthew Somerville created this live map of the London Underground showing all the trains currently running on the network in real-time. The red pins are trains, the yellow pins are stations.

Struck

This is Struck, a short film by Screenwriter Milena Ferreira, and her husband, Producer Nathan Lorch. Directed by Taron Lexto Struck tells the tale of Joel (Bodhi Elfman), who gets impaled through the chest by a three-foot arrow. But it doesn’t harm him. And it won’t come out. Joel has to learn to deal with both his newfound protrusion, and his own painful loneliness. It's a lovely watch.

Three Sided Football

Played on a hexagonal pitch Three Sided Football is a game invented by Danish Situationist Asger Jorn. He presents it in the book The Application of the Triolectical Method in General Situology; his refinement on the Marxian concept of dialectics, which states that "every historically developed social form is in fluid movement, and therefore takes into account its transient nature". Yeah, whatever.

The Work Of Mike Lemanski

Very rarely do I simply post links to a designer's portfolio, yet the work of Mike Lemanski is just too beautiful not to share. Some lovely illustrations; some gorgeous typography, and most surprisingly of all, some truly inspiring concepts, which I often find lacking in many design portfolios. Very nice indeed.

Post-It: Don't Forget Your Friends

A really interesting facebook game from the king of venerable office adhesive reminders, Post-It. Don't forget your friends is a trivia app that rewards users for recalling facts about people in their Facebook networks, with Post-It brand products available as prize. The post-rationalized agency shpeel goes like this: "Don't Forget Your Friends is meant to help remind us that while it’s easy to accumulate digital friends, we should not forget why we have chosen to bring them into our circles". Nice try. It does nothing of the sort; it's just a really sweet little game that I think a lot of people will be interested in using. We don't need the adspeak to justify it.

Death To The Death Penalty

An absolutely stunning film for Amnesty International by TBWA\Paris and digital arts collective Pleix. Waxwork figurines melt in the light of the charity's candle of hope.

Adidas Match Tracker

Adidas' Match Tracker demonstrates the incredibly detailed dataset generated during international football games. Every meaningful event is tracked and recorded for the full 90 minutes, providing sports statistic enthusiasts and data addicts alike the power to explore and analyze a match from a completely different perspective.

Waze

Developed by software engineer Ehud Shabtai, Waze is a user-generated traffic updater using the GPS in it's community's smartphones. It's currently in it's infancy here in the UK and as such has a limited user base. Though I predict this to change rapidly as crowds begin to realise it's potential and begin creating the much needed road maps that it's going to rely on.

Nabaztag

Nabaztag is a Wi-Fi enabled ambient electronic rabbit invented by Rafi Haladjian and Olivier Mével. Once connected to the web Nabaztag can be customized to read news articles, emails and weather reports relevant to the owner.

Ant Protest

Now I can't imagine the stunt itself having any real impact per se. Yet, thanks to the wonder that is the internet, this ant protest for insecticide brand Baygon, will, I'm sure, get the recognition that such a wonderful idea merits.

Cry of the Dolphins

Interesting use of YouTube for an anti-cyber bullying campaign from Saatchi & Saatchi on behalf of the National Crime Prevention Council.

Star Wars Cantina 2010

David Beckham, Daft Punk, Snoop Dogg, Franz Beckenbauer, Noel Gallagher, Ian Brown, Ciara, Jay Baruchel and DJ Neil Armstrong all feature in this nice little number from Adidas, currently doing the rounds. It's essentially a creative re-edit of one of the most famous Star Wars movie scene, the Mos Eisley Cantina. To seamlessly integrate the new shots into the original Star Wars footage, the adidas team created a replica of the original dimensions of the Cantina bar. It launches onto UK tv screens on June 12th.

Project Natal

Microsoft's Project Natal ditches game pads and wiimotes in favour of full body gestures. These gestures and audio are captured and turned into actions on the screen. The concept's awesome, not to mention some of the acting in this trailer.

The Ambient Umbrella

The Ambient Umbrella lets you know when rain or snow is in the forecast by illuminating its handle. Light patterns intuitively indicate rain, drizzle, snow, or thunderstorms while it automatically receives local weather data from accuweather.com. Super cool.

The Playreport

I'm not entirely sure what IKEA are planning on doing with this just yet, but it looks interesting nonetheless. With the goal of making "the world play more", Playreport is a global research project on children, families and play. IKEA have conducted 11,000 interviews in 25 countries, speaking to 8,000 parents and 3,000 children aged 7-12. The results are illustrated through this lovely animation. I wonder what they'll do with all this data.

Blues Maker

The Blues Maker lets you record your own blues track...sort of. It's beautifully designed and has a really simple interface that's a pleasure to toy around with. From Brazil-based Fischer + Fala and the D3 Digital Production Company.

Out Of The Box

I like these phone manual books from Vitamins Design. When the user places their new phone inside, they can navigate through its feature in a simple and more digestible way. Each page reveals the elements of the phone in the right order, helping the user to set up the Sim card, the battery and even slide the case onto the phone. Arrows point to the exact locations the user should press, avoiding confusion and eliminating the feeling of being lost in a menu.

Stickybits

Now this seems quite tasty. Stickybits is an app that allows people to attach digital content to real world objects using barcodes. Unlike QR codes however, Using Stickybits means that other users to scan that same barcode, see what you and everyone else has attached to it, and in turn add their own content. Contagious are currently preparing there next printed installment to include a Stickybit on its cover, which will give their readers the opportunity to use it as a potential media channel.

Mark Your Marathon

Nice conceptual project from designer Michael Robinson in the form of Nike+ 26 shoes. Robinson has identified that while we can now collect all sorts of data while running, thanks to pedometers and heart-rate monitors, we don't usually make that data public. His Nike + 26 prototype use marathon spikes with 26 lights in them. For every mile you run, a light turns on, creating an info-graphic of the wearer's progress in a marathon. Nike have approached a slew of designers and asked them to re-purpose a pair of Nikes for an exhibition to be shown later in the year.