Real Designers

As I've been whippin' this website in shape, I've had to deal with labels. What do I call myself? How do I organize my posts? What is it that I do? "New Media Designer" seemed like a good label. It's been around for a while, and it rolls off the tongue easier than "dij-it-tahl mee-dee-uh".

On the other hand, I take labels pretty seriously. New Media doesn't seem to entirely capture what it is that I do. Or rather, what I ultimately want to do (whatever that is). Confounding this further are people like Hillman Curtis, who is (are?) so good that I'm embarassed to put myself in the same semantic namespace. I was just looking at their site, and was struck by the moment of having video on the home page using very minimal motion. Brilliant. Not only does it add an eerie immediacy, but because it's relatively still it also compresses really well. The result: a fast loading, high quality experience. It's even immune to slow loads, because the subtle motions of the video stream can kick in later. As jaded users, we have no expectation of movement, so we are surprised and delighted when it happens.

I wish I'd thought of it. I had better start thinking harder if I want to keep swimming in the New Media pond.