And i don’t mean only mentally, it’s physically and spiritually exhausting.

Also, getting all the essentials down for day to day life without the parents there to constantly re-fill the fridge/freezer, damn, even the toilet paper – it’s tough.

I am however almost settled in the beautiful, yet small, town of Hatfield. The people here seem to be lovely and I can’t wait to mingle!

Will hopefully be back with random notes on important design-y stuff soon!

Fold-out Shelving system

The general consensus is a positive one for this innovative piece of storage, after all the basics are quite positive. Who doesn’t want a big modern art piece that conveniently folds into a shelving system?

But i see one possible flaw, and that is the visual impact once some shelves are used. Don’t you think that once you have your trinkets on the wall, as colorful as they may be, they may visually clash with the rest of the photograph?
Also convenience, if you need a shelve human nature dictates that you will need said shelving for a long time and i am pretty sure it will be very inconvenient to put down all your trinkets to show off your new toy.

Now this on the other hand – by designer Yoon-Zee Kim , is a much more stylish and multifunctional design. But maybe I am biased for i love everything multifunctional or modular.

Wall Wave

Overall I like the concept, but it’s evident it was more for art’s rather than design’s sake, so i wouldn’t get me one after weighting all the pros and cons, how about you?

After alot of tinkering, thinking, swimming in code, i decided that simple is better. The result might not be visually stunning but it works for me… for now.

If you are like me then there were times when you had to do something small, simple, and yet time consuming, and you wished there was something out there that could do it for you. Now now, don’t be shy, laziness is human nature, repetative = boring and time has become too valuable nowadays.

Below are some tools that I have found useful in the past along with what i think are essential to a successfull begginer’s design workflow.

1. Pen and Paper – Thats right, start the old fashioned way, write/draw/doodle it down! Flowchart it, circle it, crumple it and throw it in the trash and start again!

2. Plan, plan, plan! Knowing what you want will get you where you want to be, will give you a foundation of what help you’ll need, what plug-ins and tools might help you get the result you need. It’s painful looking at the countless websites out there that have no idea what they want to be and instead spew worthless widgets and Flash at our face hoping it will WOW us into coming back…

3. Think color : monochrome or migraine-inducingly-saturated with color? Browse the thousands of palettes over at ColourLovers and get inspired!

4. Shrink-O-Matic – Need to convert a large amount of photos to a smaller size? This tool can be amazingly useful, It wins over opening every picture in PS and shrinking.

5. WhatTheFont – I was introduced to this website by my boss who came up to me with a small sheet of white paper with an unidentified font on it, something the previous designer had introduced into the publication, and wanted me to find out what it was and use it again. WhatTheFont can come in handy when you just need to know the elusive name of that piece of type you love so much. Simply scan and analyze, the forums can be very helpful too!

6. Lorem Ipsum Generator – Yes, when you need your dummy text you can find it here… I know I know “But -Insert name of design software here- has an auto generate feature!-  Well, believe me when I say it will come in useful at some point in your design career!

7. W3Schools – If you are an information black hole and love to learn all the nitty gritty behind web design in terms of code this is the place for you. A perfect place for beginners with tutorials on all the major Web languages, Css, HTML, Javascript, PHP you name it!

8. CssLeak – Stuck? Get inspired! A daily updated gallery of the most beautiful Web Design on…well…the web!

9. Tuts+ – Learn! Yes, there is no shame in admitting you know nothing and looking for help. I find the Tuts+ network the most beginner friendly collection out there, each tutorial is detailed and explains the most important part, namely not how to get the pretty picture…but “W.H.Y”.

That’s it so far, I’ve found all of the above useful at some point in my quest for knowledge and experimentation so give them a go. Web design can be daunting but i think we can manage

Like for example, I was sitting in our kitchen yesterday, staring blankly at the TV while having my cuppa and I noticed this very strange bottle. The only reason I noticed it was because i Knew the bottle!I have a fascination with packaging so when the design community on this small island of mine (Malta) which are known for less then mediocre design, come up with something, I collect it.

The design in question was a full bottle wrap for the Maltese signature drink “Kinnie Zest”. Now i remember all aspects of the original bottle and that’s why i was rather shocked when i saw that the bottle had shrunk, but not in a deformed obvious way, but in a perfectly appealing i-totally-meant-for-it-to-look-this-way way.

Original bottle on the right, mum's version on the left

At first i thought my memory was simply playing up again, but this morning i found the culprit behind my confusion. Mum had poured hot coffee in the bottle causing it to shrink in both height and circumference! Now thank god i have an original, but i have to say I love mum’s version more

The new bottle has shrunk all around

After doing my fair amount of looking around for the latest word on future careers this is a short summary of the top 10 design jobs with the best prospects:

1. Game Designer – Let’s face it … people love games, our daily lives push us to strive for alienation from the constant flow of meaningless information and the stress of our daily take-out-the-trash-and-don’t-forget-to-pick-up-come-milk lives.

2. Animator – I am not biased or anything, but i do believe that this career has the potential of being a dream job for someone who loves breathing life into their imagination.Like game design, we need to give people somewhere to escape to.

3. Interior Designer – Habitats, being in control of your environment is a pretty powerful thing, people love to personalise and the rewards of hiring the right designer (never mind being the one) can be great!

4. Architect – Something i think will forever be in demand, someone who can maximise the potential of the space around us, no?

5. Graphic Designer – Communicating Visual information can help a business, good design sells and people are slowly realising that fact. Of course one needs to learn to distinguish a good designer from the average-shmo that has an illegal Photoshop copy and likes to play around with the shiny tools

6. Mobile Designer – A shiny new phone makes people happy… we do live in a material world after all… more shiny new phones, more happy people… right?

7. Web Designer – The beast is constantly growing, so logically we need more and more people to feed it.

8.Art Director – Direction, management,success is all about organisation and vision. Some might agree with me when I say we need more vision and less bureaucracy!

9. Product Designer – It’s all about design, design makes people happy, i have great respect for this career path and when done well it can inspire beauty!

10. Fashion Designer – Clothes make people happy… see “Mobile Designer”

Thoughts? Drop me a line with why you think these sectors are growing.

I believe a lot can be learned from the nature of Opera, beauty in the drama of life. A lot of inspiration can be found within the stories woven by these great artists.

I greatly enjoyed the evening, Donizetti, Verdi and Mozart just to name a few of the composers whose pieces were performed.

God sometimes i feel so old for my age

I have been offline for a few years now, some of you might know me from my livejournal – shippy4life.livejournal.com.

For those of you who don’t here is a short bio:

My name is Kaya Jabar,

I am 19 years old,

I love all things design,

I dream of becoming a professional computer animator – starting my BA in 3d animation on the 28th September 2009 at the University of Hertsfordshire,

I love – a simple statement that can describe me…fun loving but with a rather short fuse ( I am working on it);

I created this blog to give you a glimpse into the life of a dreamer, a girl from a simple upbringing, ok…poor upringing that loves to work hard to achieve what she wants!

This is my life… a dreamer’s honest opinion on …  stay tuned!

Official Website - www.kayajabar.com (forever under construction)