Vegan Nacho Chips

You know those annoying kids in high-school who takes million photos of themselves posing with each shot varying by a 5 degree angle? Well I'm being one of those now except with my food. So forgive me for my indecisiveness. I know (in terms of design) that it is better to be extremely selective and only choose what is necessary instead of putting every single possible angle and idea but call this blog an experiment, an unfinished draft.

Back in my younger days when my family friend used to come over to play, her dad would always buy us some form of fast food over whether it be maccas or hungry jacks, mostly maccas, but one time he brought over some Taco Bell - probably the first and last time I ever had it in my life. For me it was something different to what I was usually used to and perhaps that experience left an imprint in my memory. I don't think I liked it very much during the time but now that my tastebuds have matured and 'exoticised' my memories re-reads it as being quite delicious. We basically had these fries that was topped with tomatoes, mince, sour cream and probably some coriander (memory gets hazy here). It's probably the tomatoes and coriander that put off my younger self. I never really knew what was on the Tacobell menu to confirm what it was called. Nevertheless it has inspired me to make this. While I originally intended it to be fries as opposed to chips - I accidentally bought the wrong bag so I decided to make-do as my craving for tex-mex couldn't wait for the next shopping trip.

Pretty basic idea. Fry yo chips and add the usual nachos toppings. I made a vegan mince thing using textured soy protein, some fresh salsa (diced tomatoes, onions, coriander, salt, lemon juice) and fresh guacamole (avocado, garlic, lemon juice, green onion). I also had some vegan sour cream (Tofutti brand). Garnished with more sliced green onions and coriander. If I had some vegan cheese I'd probably have added it to get truly get that American tex-mex hit.

Dinner 20.7.12

Sometimes I wonder why I was not born Korean I could live off this food everyday. Even my dad calls me Korean. But anyways:

1. Seasoned Spinach
2. Tteokboki
3. Janchi Guksu

Strawberry Snow

This winter I've happily eaten four pints of vegan ice cream; today I had the last spoonfuls. Now that there is no longer any tubs left in the fridge my sweet-tooth craving was left hanging leaving me to feel really edgy for something cold and sweet. We recently had some strawberries that were not so very sweet so I told my dad to freeze them so I could blend them into a drink - all inspired by the fact that the strawberry container was marketed as a "smoothie pack" which sparked up some good memories back at Fuji Japanese Restaurant in Thailand where I ordered this delicious strawberry blended ice drink. And thus my experiment began:

I didn't have very many strawberries... I think it was like 3 small and 1 large one. In their frozen state I popped them into the blender and man these babies are viscious - had I not placed my hand on the blender top I swear one of the strawberries would have flown out like a shooting rock. Still, I was excited my icy delight was beginning to form. I then added some Preshafruit apple juice (I had the apple + passionfruit kind on hand) and some sugar. Blended away. I still had some strawberry ice rocks  in the blended juice but it was still delicious :) and of course garnished with some mint (makes it pretty + gives an extra hit of freshness). 

I absolutely love how the colours turned out! So bright and pink/red. For next time having more strawberries inside would mean less crazy shooting rocks lol and I'd make the sugar into syrup first so that it's all melted. I think I might try some agave syrup next time to make it a raw treat.

I wasn't really sure what to call this. At first I called it Strawberry Ice but after designing this photo and adding the dots for the wintery feel - I thought hey! It's like snow! So there you have it Strawberry Snow.

Lists

Winter School is over and I have spent the last 2 days indulging in vegan ice-cream, sleeping in, and simultaneously tumblring while watching a kdrama. Now that I've treated myself with a good dose of lazing around it's time to get back on track and make the most of the next two weeks before crazy 4-subject spring semester begins. I honestly don't know if its even possible to tick off the following before August begins given how fast the past two days have been :(


Paperwork

• Lodge youth allowance form 
• Apply for election job
• Write draft CV in German
• Write draft letter of motivation in German

Design

• Complete menu design
• Design flyer for friend's family business 
• Design letterform for typography exhibition

Personal

• Clean room
• Clothes Shopping
• Photograph more / Buy 40mm/2.8 macro lens
• Sell stuff on ebay
• Design Portfolio
• Send delayed presents
• Write Letters

Catch-up / Hangouts

• Helen + Zennings (26)
• I've been everywhere man 
• BOS18
• The Shins Zazu and Airu (25/19)
• Zine / Food Typography / Make stuff /workshop  mit Viscom Scouts

Personal Projects

• Motivation Poster
• Food art/design project
• Square meals
• Ethnic/Indigenous patterned bento boxes
• Eat your colours
• mini food photog
• Illustration
• Mum's sweaters
• Apple stickers
• Icecream
• Instant
• Revisit viscom
• Zines
• Paper Dolls
• Doodles Archiving
• Triangles
• Tangents

Yeah forget about completing that last section - I'll work on those throughout the years ahead.

Words of Web

"Being adaptable to new approaches, to question and revise your approach is as much a part of web design as creating layouts in Photoshop or HTML."

http://designingfortheweb.co.uk/book/part1/part1_chapter3.php

This is definitely something to consider during the process of design (and not just for web). It's easy to get caught up in doing the same old routine and being attached to familiar. I realise when it comes to the world of web, things are constantly happening and changing fast - I think this is where adaptability comes in handy. While its important to keep up to date with the technology, something I need to work on and think is just as important, is actually going out there (away from the screen) to find inspiration and new ways of exploring how web media can be used.

Day One

Something I learnt that I didn't know before about the process of coding (in terms of html vs. css):

• Html is used to give the functional structure (probably not the best words) i.e. paragraphs, lists, headings, links, italics etc. 
• Once html is completely done, validate to ensure it's clear of all errors (e.g. unclosed tags)
• Then css can be used to apply the stylistic and compositional features of the page.
  

                

Now that I think about it, it's somewhat like typesetting a page. Where you paste your content, sort out the paragraphs and headings then apply the paragraph/character styles.

I like this methodical rhythm to the process.

Choosing a Magazine

Being an indecisive nut, choosing a magazine (for my assignment) was so difficult! This is why sometimes complete freedom can be a pain however I won't take that for granted because I'm sure I'll miss the freedom when I really start working.

    

For a while I was tossing between Elephant magazine and Apartamento. I was actually surprised to find that Elephant magazine didn't really have its own website despite having quite a solid identity - it was basically a segment of their publisher's website outlining past issues and previews of current issue. I've never actually had a proper read of the magazine but always loved the designs shown in lectures and searches on the internet. It's a disappointment though whenever I get my hands on it - the glossy cover and glossy pages just doesn't do it for me! Especially with the lovely binding and thickness of it, you'd think they'd want the magazine to feel more like a book. Quite honestly that disappointment repelled me from choosing it even though the visual features of Elephant magazine would've been nice to work with.

Elephant Magazine Issue #5 Contents page: Always loved the design of their contents pages

Elephant Magazine Issue #3 Contents Page: Even though the designs changes with every issue there's alway something distinctly Elephant about them.

But I ended up choosing Apartamento as I thought that it would be nice to work with the interiors, people and lifestyle spectrum of magazines. I was actually reluctant to choose this magazine in the first place because it seemed like apartamento prides itself for having such a strong presence as print (I hear magnation complained of having too many readers nagging them for it) that I felt I shouldn't impose on making their online identity such a big thing as the value of apartamento lies in the fact that people are eager to get it into their hands; it's the personal relationship readers have beyond the screen that makes this magazine magical in the first place. However that said, I also noticed that Apartamento runs a fair bit of events and projects (again strong offline appeal), and sure it's featured on their website and updated on their Facebook, but considering there's this nice sense of community happening I felt that their online presence could significantly enhance this. 

Currently this is their website. When I first saw it I felt quite disappointed. I found that it felt rather empty and 'dead' (no hints of liveliness). It does its job by providing information on the maga with elements of promotion here and there but nothing more than that. Also I didn't really understand the whole centre-alignment and why the colour blue (and the red) was used; it felt so harsh for the natural aura I got from the magazine. Perhaps it was their intention for the website to feel as "homemade" as possible? 

As part of the research process I ended up taking a trip down to Newtown's Magnation to buy the magazine. This gave me a good insight to where the magazine is placed next to (competitors) and also gave me a good excuse to add more magazines to my collection (haha just kidding). I think it was crucial to understand the tactile nature and its identity as print before plunging into designing their website - obviously because you need to understand and experience the magazine in order to know what needs to be communicated. But other important questions I asked myself were: "What can I add to the readers experience of the magazine?" and "how can web extend the magazine's relationship to readers". Establishing a good sense of community and relationship with its readers by extending interactions beyond the contents of their magazine was something I felt the more successful websites did and this is from looking at my own encounters of being a reader - they were the sites I kept going back to (therefore keeping my attachment to the magazine).

Apartamento Magazine - a niche in the interiors range of magazine focusing on the natural everyday interiors of people in its rawest form - no styling no design dictate.

Some features of Apartamento I noted:

• Unique small format fits perfectly in hand
• Same sort of feel as Dumbo Feather magazine on its focus on people, 'mook' format (half magazine half book) and subdued colours.
• Use of the Clearface font for folios, footers, headings and masthead.
• Futura used for body copy and contents (centred aligned)(now I understand why such feature was so prominent in the navigation of their website)
• Underlined titles in red (this also explains the links on the website)
• Images in full-bleed and if cropped would have a border. Image captions in red.
• Font colours sometimes went crazy. 
• Also features illustrations (some in mono-colour).
• Pages were usually colour in a subdue pastel
• A black and white pattern featured on the spine