Tokyo Game show just started and Microsoft revealed a bit more about the Xbox Avatars. Kotaku posted a new video today. That’s really sweet and I am really proud of the work that we are doing here.

The Single speed/track/fixed gear bike craze was supposedly triggered by the Mash video:

I haven’t seen the Mash video yet but I have seen the trailer and clips from the new San Fransisco based video, Macaframa, directed by Colby Elrick and Colin Arlen. Have a look at the trailer and their Vimeo page. The footage is beautifully edited, cinematographed and color graded. Sweeeet

MACAFRAMA Trailer from MACAFRAMA on Vimeo.

man I wish I never discovered http://www.theaestheticpoetic.com

This week I bought a beautifull red Felt F90 racing bike from my coworker Matt. It has aerodynamic spokes and the kind of gears you find on sports cars. Really fancy. It is obviously ultra light and I am intending to use it to go to work. I have been told by my coworkers that it would take me from 30 minutes to 1 hour depending on my level of fitness. I am fit so it will take me 30 minutes….. well we will see 😉 it is a really long distance, 10 miles (16 kms) according to googlemaps.

I am a bit tired of car pooling, I don’t want to buy a car, the fancy Vespa I always wanted to buy since I moved to UK wouldn’t last 2 days outside my house so this looks like the only option. Also it was a good price … for that kind of bike 😉 and Matt did very well at numerous competitions riding this bike.

Now this bring me to my second point. Single speed bikes.

If you live outside a big city you have probably not heard about the craze about single speed bikes. They are sleek, sexy, ultralight and really low maintenance since they don’t require high tech components like racing bikes. I saw some guys playing Bike Polo few years ago in Bethnal Green and thought that was really cool. I have never tried one but if it weren’t for the vandal that bend your wheels when you leave your bike unattended I would have probably bought one myself in my London days. The reason why I wanted to mention them today is that I found some videos of guys doing tricks on their single-speed bikes. Riding them in town is rad but riding them in town while doing tricks is even radder.

I created a Youtube Playlist with some really cool videos related to single speed bikes and messengers
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=9463403E4136AC6F. PUMA commissionned a great documentary on messengers called “NYC Messengers” but I can’t find it anymore.

The most useless ad analysis ever on TheStreet.com by Gary Krakow and his sidekick. Come on Gary, just stick with your “Iphone killers” videos instead. At least I can easily filter what is junk and what is gold on TheStreet.

What were you expecting? A copycat of the Apple campaign? A technical demonstration of why Microsoft is so great? This has been done in the past and didn’t work. Remember the previous Wow campaign?

Please TheStreet, more Altrucher, less Krakow

Ah those were the days. Spike Lee and Michael Jordan in the early 90’s Nike commercials. Gosh I am old!

I haven’t been following much the olympic games those days but the few footage of TKD I found on the net were pretty boring especially since most official website only show the last round of each match so the opponent are usually really tired from the previous rounds.

I am currently practicing Thai Boxing but I still love Taekwondo very much and just to show that TKD can really be brutal sometimes, here is a video of the fastest KO I just found on Youtube. To me, since hands and fist are hardly ever used, TKD is more an acrobatic sport than a martial art, but sometimes the ending of a match can be really quick and lethal.

You can find a guide to TKD, here, on the BBC website http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/olympics/taekwondo/7301041.stm

Here are 2 great tutorial blogs and other graphic design links I just found.

Psdtuts.com
Abduzeedo.com/

some textures Designreviver.com

some fonts

I also used to visit the following websites back in the days I was into graphic design. I haven’t checked them for a while, I am not sure if they are still being updated.
Kaliber10000
designiskinky.com
surfstation.lu

If you know some interesting photoshop or graphic design related websites, please add them in the comments

For the past few years, I have noticed a shift in my interests. In the past, I used to spend a lot of time reading technical books or browsing websites dealing with the technics behind digital art but for the past few years I have shifted my interest from CG to the real stuff.

“Lines and colors” is one of those websites I discovered lately. As the author puts it: “lines and colors is a blog about drawing, sketching, painting, comics, (…) and anything else I find visually interesting. If it has lines and/or colors, it’s fair game.”

What I like about this blog is that you can easily select your favourite mediums in the category section on the right and browse hundreds of post about pastel, ink, watercolours…

Happy reading!