App of the Week: THINK

The app.

This week's app is one just for inspiration and information: THINK by IBM. It's a world of information, infographics and cool ideas -- I am using some of the mapping info in some new pieces of work. Most of all, THINK is an example of the new kinds of publications that web-based content makes possible: visual, nonlinear, beautifully designed.

Here's how IBM describes it on the page about the exhibit and the app.

(Some readers reported issues with the link -- still works for me, but here's the link to the itunes app page as well. )

An exploration into making the world work better

Consider the advances of the past century. The way science has improved our daily lives. The possibilities unleashed by technology. The things we can do today that earlier generations could not even imagine.

Yes, this is about better information, tools, algorithms—but that's not all. It's about the deeply human quest to make the world more livable, safer, more efficient, more sustainable. Our enduring drive for progress has given us the capacity to see the world with greater clarity... to map what we see... to understand its dynamics. All of which builds shared belief... in a better future, and in the way each of us can act to make it so.

Lesson plans that go with the app and exhibit.This is part of IBM's commerical and cultural DNA -- it draws on the same tradition that saw Ray and Charles Eames designing interesting and novel exhibits in NYC for the company.

See what you think and tell me one idea you have for using what you see in your own work in the comment section, and I'll enter your name in a giveaway for a copy of THE MISSING ALPHABET, The Parents Guide to Developing Creative Thinking in Kids. 

P.S. I hope you'll sign up for my newsletter and stay in touch as I launch a round of great iPad workshops online. Either use the form on the sidebar or go to this link: http://mad.ly/signups/69874/join

Art App of the Week: Drawing Pad

How to choose? How to choose?

(And how to remember -- if you checked in earlier, I had the name of the software wrong, and the wrong list! Drawing Pad -- not free, but it is only $1.99 with some optional in-app pruchases, like coloring books, available.)

As I work towards getting my iPad on-line courses up and running, you'll find a weekly APP reccommendation here on the blog on Fridays, each with a few examples of drawings, photos, journal pages and more. 

I admit to an ongoing addiction for new apps -- OK,  consider it a line item in my art supply budget! Consequentlyly, after sampling free and paid versions of several hundred, I've found some really great ones and some real dogs. Some are simple "one-trick ponies," others are perhaps too expansive and overwhelming that unless you devote a LOT of time, you'll find them a bit overwhelming.

The iPad is such a powerful, intuitive creative tool, and the mobile software designers out there are certainly running though the paces. When my online course launches (next month, I hope), the format will include step-by-step tutorials, specific projects with step-outs, adaptations for use as fiber art tools -- both as part of your process and your works of art. If this sounds interesting, I hope you'll sign up for my newsletter HERE, in order not to miss the launch of the online series of workshops -- they'll start with an "iPad for Art Basics" and proceed through Photo Editing and Manipulation, Drawing and Sketching Tools, Keeping Track, Art Journaling, Photo Filters, Collage Tools and -- who knows!

This week's app is Drawing Pad. The interface is bold, easy to understand (the tools are in drawers, so explore them carefully! Some of the drawers give you the option to scroll right and reveal a whole other set of tools, colors and options. You can import a photo from your own camera roll and use it as a guide to trace or alter or paint, or you can start with a blank "sheet" of paper. If you wish, you can import a photo, sketch over it, then go back and change the paper to white or another color and have only your sketch! It's a very SIMPLE layering process, with only two layers. Of course I have other tricks for this -- to make it a multilayer tool. but you'll have to wait for the workshop for that!

Save the images to your email or camera roll or FB, Twitter, or an album inside the app -- think of this as a kid-friendly (for the kid in each of us) sketching and painting tool. I

These tools in the main drawer are options for saving, erasing, coloring book, colors of paper, stickers and, scrolling right, different tools.

 Sketching on top of a photo of San Fernando Cathedral, then replacing the photo with plain paper.

Sketching on the road. 

iPad Workshop at the Studio

Just a few pics!

Here are a few photos from the digital manipulations we made on the iPads. (I hope to have more from the participants to come later, these were my demos!)

All of the above were my quick demos using a variety (and combinations of) different apps for the iPad, using original photos (in most cases) for source materials. 

Here's another by artist/participant Zet Baer:

Snapguide How-To

From a message on Quilting Arts list from Jane Davila:

"Has anyone heard of Snapguide? I'm a recent devotee and have just posted my second guide there. It's a website and app that hosts tutorials, or guides as they call them, on a wide variety of topics. The audience is growing exponentially (over a million in less than a year), and unlike Pinterest, the guides can only be posted by the creators not brought from other sources (eliminating pesky copyright quandaries). But like many social networks you can favorite, share, follow, and comment. The interface to create a guide is elegant and very simple. You can add videos and photos along with text for your guides.

So my thinking is the stronger and more interesting the guides are there, the bigger the audience will become, attracting more high quality guides, attracting more readers, and so on. It was started by some big names in tech and has financial backing from some very savvy tech investors. It is viewable on the web and as an app on the iPhone or the iPad....I wrote a blog post about it and included the links to the 2 guides I wrote. One guide is to make matchbook art notepads and the other is how to transfer images using Citrasolv natural solvent.

I too have made a little snapguide on using some iPad apps to make snowflake designs (great for thermofax designs, too).

I really like the site and understand their financial need to make it work as a social platform (Hey, I don't listen to Seth Godin for nothing -- his STARTUP SCHOOL podcast is amazing if you think about your art business as a start-up). I admit, I would find it great to be able to use Snapguide for private guides as an option, so I coul duse it as an online course!

The interface is really fun, fast, painless and idiot-proof (I am said idiot), and the format makes it easy to use just the right amount of text with your images. Take a look! Add your own ideas, too. I do think they will make it to scale with this idea because the interface is so easy, so nice to look at and, by now, there are a crazy wild assortment of guides being posted!

Here's the link to my Snapguide -- http://snapguide.com/guides/design-an-ipad-snowflake/