Amazing Cool Barcode

What’s in a barcode? More than you might imagine, when idealized through the eyes of some very creative Japanese artists.

You will be amazed at what can be done with a few straight lines and a push to think outside of a very ordinary box.

UPC symbols are ubiquitous and constant reminders that we are a civilization of consumers. Up until now, there was no distinguishing one from the other.

That’s all changed since a Japanese company named D-Barcode came up with some very creative and innovative ideas on how to make these uninteresting lines actually enjoyable to look upon.

It is said that barcodes are the bane of the modern graphic designer. Many distribution people compound the headache by insisting on conspicuous white rectangles, which may or may not fit the context involved. The changes are little and subtle, and yet at the same time, enormous.

Now picking up a bottle or box at the supermarket may bring a smile to your face, not because of a price reduction but rather form a funny unexpected face or form smiling back at you from the label on the back of the package.
This enhancement of the consumer experience is brilliant on many levels. But why keep talking? Check out these cool barcodes and judge for yourself!

Wrist Headset Bluetooth

Every once in a while, some new concept comes out that is actually a good idea. We have been seeing a lot of wrist watches that can act as mobile phones lately, but I think we are just creating those to fulfill some vintage Dick Tracy fantasy. This is one concept wrist phone device that won’t require you to talk to your wrist.

The On Time Headset System is a bracelet that comes with a pop-out wireless headset. I suppose that is a better place to put your Bluetooth headset than your pocket.

The bracelet has a secondary display, so if your headset rings, you can just look down and see who is calling. I would imagine that the bracelet display can show the time, making it a very fancy wristwatch.

By the way, did I mention that the displays are both touchscreens? Well, they are, and they would hopefully not require tiny fingertips in order to use.

My source referred to the OnTime Headset System as the “future of bling”, and I can’t help but feel that it is about time that tech and bling combined to create something like this. Well, as I mentioned before, this is only a concept, but I already want it on my wrist.

Lighting Tea Bag

Surely you caffeine addicts will agree, coffee truly is the sexually oriented drink - It picks you up! It illuminates your world, if I may say so. Designer / Bookmark Maker Wonsik Chae takes this concept to an elegant level by making the drop-in tea bag light up your environment chemically. For those whose eyes are sensitive to brightness in the mornings, I recommend a different cup. For those who love lamp(s), drop it!

As the tea bag empties its taste into a tea cup, so does the “Lighting Bag” empty its light into any fluid-holding container. What Wonsik hopes to accomplish with this project is to tear down the idea that creating forms from which light can be projected must be a difficult task - he wants light forms to flow easily.

Having a manifesto for your industrial design project can be a dangerous rope to walk - what do you make of Wonsik’s liquid light concept?

Brooch - Soundboard

This speaker concept called Brooch has no built-in soundboard. You have to bring that to the party. With its specially design suction cup, attach it to any smooth, flat surface. Different surfaces have different tones to them. The idea is to experiment. All music controls are projected onto that same surface for simulated touchscreen goodness. What do you guys think? Win?

Designer: KyungRyul Lim & Miyeon Kim

Have an Expresso

An espresso machine is a challenging object to design, on the one hand you have to innovate and appeal to the eye, and on the other hand it has to be pragmatic and intuitive to use as is the original design of an espresso machine.This design is about reconstructing the parts that make an espresso machine, while innovating in its curvature, without loosing its simplicity of use. All you need to do now is pick a cup out of its branch and make yourself a morning espresso.

Designer: Adam Zerbib

Tile - Hexagonal Modular Lighting System

Tile is a clean, unique, playful, contemporary, and multifunctional LED lighting device. Because of its modular nature with the unique joints that allow the lighting units to rotate in both X axis and Z axis, it functions as a work lamp, a floor lamp, and a wall lamp. It can also reconfigure into a decorative lighting device that provoke the mood of the environments.

In the wall lamp mode, the lamp suspends from ceiling with electric core connected on two sides. The lamp lights up from the back and shine through against the wall creating interesting lighting effects.

Designer: Gary Chang

Crystal Telephone

It seems in regard to electronic design, touchscreens are in and anything tactile is out. Tao Ma sees it the other way around. The Quartz Tele concept uses large quartz crystals for each numeric number on a dial pad. Below each crystal is an embedded LED. Pressing each crystal illuminates it like a transformer’s energon cube. They all sit on a base with a sharp LED screen that displays pertinent information like incoming calls, dates, and contacts.

Designer: Tao Ma

Vertical Ice

You love the cold water. For when you want ice in a nice place, there is the “Iced Carafe.” Design team “Officeoriginair” brings you what’s basically a simple contraption, made simply for having wonderful time! Molded plastic with a rubber stopper, made in such a fashion that if you freeze an amount of water in the bottle while it’s on it’s side, the ice will stay put!

Full on cold your entire drink experience.

The ice. It sticks to the inside of the bottle, on the side. It makes the whole drink cold. The whole time you drink it. And if you just sit there and wait to see if the ice will fall off into your drink, you’ll notice that once it does, it’s still a giant hunk of ice, a vertical piece of ice, which is still keeping your drink cold.

I think the design of the bottle is good enough. The idea is ok, and the implementation is not that special as the concept is very simple. One you use the ice for a few minutes, all the ices will be melted and blend in with the liquid, then there is no more interesting stuff to see.

Anyway, Viva vertical ice!

Handy Toaster

As far as innovative toasters go, I’ll stick with the VHS Toaster over this butter-knife type deal. At least with that one I wont accidentally toast my hand in the morning.

It’s a design concept by Kim Been that looks like a knife but is really a handheld toaster. All you need to do is run it across the bread until it’s toasted to your liking. An animated graphic shows you how you are doing, which your you should be able to see with your own eyes.

How are you going to get toasting power in this knife-thing? It would likely take awhile to toast your bread. Therefore this may be more of a dieting tool as you will surely go hungry.

How Tall Are You Mirror

Are you mini like Kylie? Or a mountain like Hulk Hogan? Measuring your height with numbers is so last decade, we all gauge our heights by celebrity now darling. This tongue-in-cheek mirror lists 120 celebrities by height and guarantees to have people loitering in front of it trying to make themselves more James Dean instead of Ben Stiller.

WIPER MIRROR

The text on the picture:
If you've ever been the victim of unsightly watermarks or abusive messages written in the condensation of your bathroom mirror, then here is the answer. Fitted with a car windscreen wiper you can vamoose that pesky condensation with one fail swoop. No more ugly wet hand marks or toilet paper fluff left on your looking glass and also doesn't it just look pretty slick? Quirky and practical, you'll always be able to see your lovely mug in this mirror.

My additional idea is: to have the mirror shape design patterned by the wiper way, sort of curved and put a holder under the mirror to take the dripping water from the wiping and collect all the water in one place in the bottom of the mirror.

I wonder if they have an automatic wiping or not. But manual wiping with the wiper is still cool (no cable or wiring).

Chromed Steel Dart Coat Hooks

Chromed Steel Dart Coat Hooks with a Screw-in wall fixing.
Good quality design especially if you have a masculine room design.
I think it will be good if they also provide the target practice to put on the wall.

Anyway, they look so cool you may not want to cover them up by hanging your coats on them!

170mm long - Pack of 3.
Original design by Anthony Chrisp.

Hidden Bathroom in your Closet

Not a day passes by when I don’t wish I could fold away my bathroom and hide it so that my room is made up only of comfortable fluffy pillows and rows and rows of shelves filled with books. But they don’t make it that way, or so I thought.

Cirrus MVR is a modular bathroom, designed by Michael Trudgeon, that can be relocated any place you wish. Cirrus MVR is equipped with all the basic necessities with built-in bath, shower, toilet and hand basin. All these utilities can be folded and pushed back into the main body of Cirrus MVR, even the man-length bath tub. The Cirrus MVR also contributes in its own way to keeping the planet going by reducing your water consumption.

Designed to help solve the climate and space saving problems, Cirrus MVR is equipped with a central water recycling and purifying unit which explains how it reduces the water consumption.

500XL Earbud, The BIGGER The Better!

Awesome good looking design, great creative idea to bring this one up. If I see it, I will definitely buy it as it really looks like an earbud/earphone for iPod but hey...watch closely. It is claimed 500 times bigger than the original earbud size.

These so-called earbuds are compatible with your PC, PMP, CD and MP3 player. Since it comes with a 3.5 mm audio input cable, a USB DC power cable and a built-in amp, the speaker system can be used with a variety of gadgets. By the way, it can be powered either by the included USB cable or three AAA batteries. We guess you can also plug it into the wall to a generic power supply.

About the sound quality, hmmm...still don't know yet. Try to put it inside your ears. =)

Momenta Necklace Captures Life’s Exciting Moments

The Momenta PC is a finalist in Microsoft’s Next-Gen PC Design Competition that you strap to your neck. Momenta necklace isn’t a whole lot more refined, but at least it’s a touch less noticeable. It’s got a camera that’s constantly recording what’s in front of you, but it also measures your pulse rate. When you get excited about something, it automatically saves the previous five minutes’ footage for you to review later.

Interesting Rubber Remote Control from Panasonic

This may be the strangest remote control we’ve ever seen. With the push of a button, this remote becomes rigid and ready for use.
When it’s not in use, this concept remote just sort of lays there limp, pulsating with light. But when you touch it, the remote gets excited and becomes rigid.

Constructed of a soft, flesh-like gel, the remote appears cold when off. Once turned on, however, it seems to come to life. A soft light emanates somewhere from within as the center of the device begins to slowly rise and fall, mimicking the tranquil motions of breath. Left undisturbed, the remote will slumber peacefully. Buth should a human hand approach, sensors inside alert it to the imminent touch. It stops breathing, grows rigid – the light from within is extinguished.

Apple Dish

You know when you eat an apple you don’t know when to put the apple core and as it often happens there’s no bin nearby or you can’t throw the core that far. Some people eat the whole apple seeds and everything. For those who don’t there is a cool, funny dish for apples and apple cores made by d-vision. I’d rather get up and walk to a bin and throw the core out then put in on a dish and then walk to a bin, throw it out and then wash the dish. If you want, the apple should also comes in a changing colour from white to brown as it rotten. hehehe... Enjoy!

Marbelous Table

Netherlands-based designer Tineke Beunders has created a table that combines the world of adults and children. Whenever you’re feeling like a child and want to do something fun or just need to relax simply get the marbles into the grooves on the table. The grooves run through the whole table and the marbles will roll down the legs to the feet of the table where they will in a small box so you won’t have to chase the marbles all over the room (despite what the photos show). Cool Isn't it? Makes me want to make one!

From: ontwerpduo.nl/en/werk_marbelous.html

360 Paper Bottle

The 360 Paper Bottle is a container that is versatile in its range of consumer applications. It is made from food-safe and fully recyclable materials. It strategically decreases energy consumed throughout the product life cycle without sacrificing functionality, and enhances everyday consumer usage by offering an environmentally friendly experience.

The crazy idea of selling billions of gallons of water in everlasting plastic bottles to people who already have access to clean water sources is turning our planet into a gigantic garbage heap. Finally, somebody is doing something about that. Brandimage created the 360 Bottle made of paper, which is 100% renewable.

Nice. It's apparently an impossible task to convince a sizable portion of our population that there's no need to clutch a bottle of water like a baby with a pacifier all day long. So, might as well limit the amount of harm done. These paper bottles are good for just about any liquid, too — not just water.

If this idea can even make a dent in the 60 million plastic bottles tossed each day in the U.S., Brandimage deserves an award. Wait. The company received an IDEA (International Design Excellence Award) for this design. Bravo. Now if they could just get those silver-tongued water hucksters and bottle-sucking sheep to buy into it.

Source:

http://www.idsa.org/IDEA_Awards/gallery/2008/award_details.asp?ID=35918167

http://dvice.com/archives/2008/11/paper_water_bot.php