I know I’m fanboying a bit too much at this point, but damn it, editing photos in this app is so fun (@aphera@mastodon.social)
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Lars
@zhcet@mastodon.design
mastodon 4.7.3i make things
student; developer at @glyphsapp@typo.social
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127 Followers
182 Following
42 Posts
Joined September 05, 2023
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superposition:
This will never happen, but here’s my take on a retro/skeuomorphic Mastodon client
Was too impatient for the flowers to take this photo, but still turned out kind of interesting… let’s see how it looks with the flowers open.
Didn’t notice that the level in the Measure app got updated with Liquid Glass. It’s quite cool actually, and also very skeuomorphic (this is one of the very few cases where the real object uses liquid too)
Here’s a fun tech thing: for some reason the manufacturer of this air conditioner didn’t want to redo the settings interface for their all-screen touch-based controllers. So instead they just made an emulator of the old controller, including a virtual bluely-light monochrome lcd, virtual buttons, and a whole lot of fiddlyness. I don’t know why, but this is really funny to me… emulating two decade old hardware just to control an AC
Love this (presumably hand-) painted map of the train network in an old Spanish train station
I started using RSS again a few months ago and adding a feed to my own website has been on my todo list ever since. Because the website is a portfolio/wiki and doesn’t fit the usual blog template, it was a bit difficult to figure out how to do it properly, but I think I finally worked it out now. So if you’re also into RSS, this is the feed:
The new Liquid Glass icons look… worse somehow!? While I do appreciate the increased contrast/sharpness, they are really, really flat. It’s literally just glyphs on round rects now. There’s no shading left (look at the Messages one for example). Also, why aren’t these properly anti-aliased? I expect some of this to be improved, but the direction is pretty clear: icons will continue to get ever more flat
If I do ever get around to shipping Charcoal 2.0, it will at least have some better icons for the tools…
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Sequoia for reference. So much more consistent and harmonic…
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Also re interface design: Design tools should always have the option to make the interface completely monochrome (looking at you, Sketch on Tahoe)
Just asked my HomePod “How cold will it be tonight?” and – I’m not joking – the reply was “Tonight it will be sunny at 2°C”
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@jonmsterling @tuomas_h Yes I think I’m probably not a good person to talk about this since I never used <10 versions. The ones I did use never felt sluggish, but I might have forgotten because of how bad performance got when the added the Apple Music stuff
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Crossing my fingers that everything goes right now in the final step. Feels good to finally be able to ship another (long overdue) update to Charcoal though!
In an (as usual) very funny move, Apple Photos’ “this day x years ago” randomly presented me with an old picture of a WWDC lunch box today
Solid reminder that for many queer (and right now especially trans) people, freedom is to a large degree about material circumstances. Some of us are lucky to have been born in regions with more progressive policies regarding queer rights, but for those who weren’t, being able to move or flee is only possible with access to financial resources. Many people’s human rights depend on their ability to pay
Finally got a scanner for my sketches!
I don’t think I’ll get around to Charcoal 2.0 anytime soon, so I think I’ll try to add some liquid glass to the current interface instead. Perfect excuse to redo the icon though 😉
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@mrudokas@mastodon.social I don’t have a single answer but yes dilution, but also more senior designers ending in some middle management position, some having moved away from interface design, and many in that niche having found their place working on existing products/at established companies. More specifically with Affinity though, I’m quite sure though the last place you’ll find people with this expertise is Canva…
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@marcedwards@mastodon.social I have no idea about making music, but I just want to say it looks so pretty! Incredible craftsmanship as always
So Devil Wears Prada 2… I didn’t expect to like the sequel this much, it’s pretty well done imo. If the first film’s thesis was that Miranda was a toxic boss but that was (partially) because she really cares, this one’s is that she is one of the last ones left who cares. The film meets the current moment well I’d say, not just in how it presents the media industry, but also how creative labor more generally is threatened by AI slop and indifference
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@tuomas_h Oh no I damn it hadn’t seen that before… I should look at as little of this OS as possible. Every time I open something new, I find something unpleasant 🙈🫠
@marioguzman@mastodon.social “you and i forever in republica moldova” or something like that 😂
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@tuomas_h@mastodon.social omg what an icon! i think packaging it as an app would be really great too. we use a dead unnotarized software package in an exercise class i teach at uni and at this point i have to personally install it on each persons computer. something like this would really help
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@mrudokas@mastodon.social I’m not a huge fan of the Cavalry design either but I’d say everything except the coat of paint on top is way better. My theory on all the bad pro app interfaces is that most designers today had the majority of their training making mobile apps which don’t lend themselves to density. Most good high-density desktop apps are either older, or designed by programmers (who design in-context not on an abstract canvas)
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@tuomas_h I wonder if “iTunes is too bloated” was just a narrative that took on its own life at some point. Using it today, I feel like even iTunes 12 was pretty well thought out. At the same time, the Music app is basically as particular in many ways and definitely just as heavy, however it is rarely described as bloated (but deservedly for its long list of other issues). Also even with all the problems, iTunes/Music get way too much crap compared to Mac Podcasts/TV imo
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@mrudokas@mastodon.social Yeah that’s probably also fair. My suspicion is that the design process went something like this: “How do we make this seem more accessible to Canva users? Oh I know let’s make the buttons bigger” and then they realized that this didn’t make any sense for most of the interface and stopped after the left sidebar and toolbar
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Also sure you could make an argument for more font sizes for clearer visual hierarchies, but even then the hierarchy is wrong here: “Empty” is really important in that window
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@marceloexc@im-in.space Oh yeah that is another maddening thing… that toolbar grows with every release and you can either tolerate that or you’re screwed. They had an option to use it without Application Frame in the v1 apps, which was great, but they removed it in v2. Adobe deserves a lot of crap (for just about everything), but in my opinion the core interface of Photoshop/Illustrator/InDesign is still unbeaten
One year ago… #eurovision
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@jordan@notclickable.social doing my best to make them happen, but unfortunately time is a limited resource…
“PixelMator PRO”… nooooo what happened to the style guide?
PINCH TO ZOOM IN THE SIMULATOR 🎉
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@marioguzman@mastodon.social Jesus christ, this is pathetic. It is very sad how many doors are now closed for (new) independent developers which were open even just a few years ago. App Store features have been heavily demoted and seemingly no longer get updated, app media coverage is all but non-existent, and you’re competing against vibe coded stuff. Raising the price of the dev membership or their percentage would just br yet another barrier
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@marceloexc@im-in.space true yeah i hope so, because unless the have-time-to-make-weird-things pendulum swings back for me, it won’t be by me 😂