For a long time I have noticed well designed pullquotes that only had the beginning quote. The alternative was a standard text quote that was more bland but had both beginning and ending quotes. Here are some examples I found on SmileyCat.com to better illustrate what I am talking about.
The last example is a nice compromise but I prefer pullquotes with a little bit more style. It really bugs me how there is no easy, pure-CSS way of including the ending quotes. That is until now.
WebMasterWall.com has a tutorial featuring a simple method to create “double quotes” (as they call them) using CSS. The trick is to attach the ending quote background image to the
tag and use the pseudo-element :first-letter for the beginning quote graphic. The reason we can get away using this trick without any JavaScript is because IE 5.5+ actually recognizes :first-letter when applied to any block element. Huzzah, this is my second favorite pseudo-element after :hover.
The only gotcha to this is according to W3C specs “Unless you’re using a transitional doctype, text should not be placed directly inside a blockquote element without block-level tags surrounding it.” In other words the text within a
should be wrapped in
tags which would break the blockquote:first-letter styling. This could easily be corrected by using blockquote p as a selector and assuming you don’t have multi paragraph pullquotes. I think that is a reasonable compromise.
I stumbled on two sites today that really struck me with their design.
WeDudes.com
WeDudes is a site dedicated to creating little versions of yourself or avatars. I’m really attracted to the fun cartoon style of the page. Not much else to say about this simple site as it is in a closed beta, though I would like to see more of it.
DesignFloat.com
This site is another Digg.com inspired social news site but with a focus on all things design. From all of the other Digg clones running on Pligg on the web, this one takes the cake for the best creative stylings. The idea of floating a story up to the top is a clever paradigm and the bright colors give it a fun, light feeling. I’ve added their NetVibes widget to my everyday reading list in case a good story rises.
Open web services allow people to play with a set of data in their own way encouraging experimentation and new ideas. This is what allows amaztype to be what it is, providing Amazon book search in a whole new way. When you enter in a search term, the site will query Amazon for pictures of the book cover which it then arranges to form the words you were searching for. Check out what the search for “blog” brings up…
Clicking on a part of the search term allows you to zoom in to see the cover a bit better as well as more information which is dynamically brought to you from Amazon including the authors, price, and even the 5 star ratings. While not very useful if you are looking for a specific book, this data visualization presents a familiar set of information in a new way.
I have been trying to eat more small meals throughout the day rather than three larger ones. For example, I eat breakfast before my commute, a granola snack around 11:30am, lunch anywhere from 12:30pm – 2pm, a small snack before dinner and finally a healthy choice microwaveable dinner.
Things seem to be going well as you can see by my graph. The dip below 205 was because of the weekend where I sleep in late and eat much less than during a weekday.
Oh those wacky Japanesse, coming up with the weirdest things. This USB keyboard bra actually might be a good idea to get computer nerds to spend more time with their not-so-techie significant others. Kitty costume not included.
We bloggers always seem to be in a hurry. I always try to include a photo in all of my posts and when I am in a rush, waiting for the slow and bloated Photoshop to open is a real drag. That is why I rely on ImageWell whenever I am posting from my PowerBook. ImageWell features…
Resize, Rotate, Crop and Flip
Layering and Transparency controls for images and draw objects
Web Preview and Quality/Size adjustment tool before uploading to the web
Screen Grab feature grabs full screen, a selection on your screen, or window grab and automatically imports it into the well for instant editing and sending
I mostly use it to resize and compress larger image to fit on my blog but it provides other features that I may use in the future. The best thing of all is ImageWell is completely free! So if you constantly find yourself waiting for Photoshop to boot up just to make a minor change, consider using ImageWell and get back to your web work.
Insects make for an interesting photographic subject, not because they are rare, but because of their abundance. Finding bugs is not a hard challenge but releasing your shutter in the nick of time before they buzz off can be like herding cats. PopPhoto.com has some good tips to take into consideration while you are out on a critter chase. Some of my favorite include:
There is not just one bee or fly out there. Remember, you are surrounded by millions of insects every day and if the first one you see gets away, there’ll be another soon enough.
Most insects are very sensitive to carbon dioxide, and will run or fly away if you breathe directly on them; however, certain beetles will freeze when breathed on — experiment!
These tips would have come in handy back when I was shooting the spider in my bathroom. Well, a macro lens would have helped too.
