With 57 of his paintings and drawings lining the walls at the American Art Museum here in D.C., quite an exhibition of Rockwell's idealized view of America. Evoking "love of country, small town values, children growing up, unlikely heroes, acts of imagination and life’s ironies," this master storyteller proves that a picture is worth far more than 1,000 words. Need proof?  Take a second or even third look at the picture I posted with today's entry.

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Boy on High Dive | The Saturday Evening Post, August 16, 1947

If you're in D.C. for the holidays, check out Telling Stories: Norman Rockwell from the Collections of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg at the Smithsonian's American Art Museum.  A free exhibit, the curtain comes down on January 2, 2011.

It isn't every day that someone walks into my office + totally blows me away with a design-inspired conversation. Thanks to my colleague Ivan Djordjevic (@ivandj) for steering me to firstborn, a ridiculously awesome multi-media agency that has me falling out of my seat.  Just browsing through their "evolution of flash" inspired portfolio of projects leaves me feeling like the food critic in the closing scenes of Disney/Pixar's Ratatouille.  That is, nothing short of amazed.

Upon launching firstborn's Lincoln Financial site, Ivan encouraged me to Google "Favorite Website Awards" - a site that recognizes the latest and best cutting edge creativity.  He warned me it will blow my mind... and than left with these parting words hanging in the air "there is so much creativity here, its out of this world."  Um... Ivan, how do you expect me to focus the rest of today?

I had the pleasure of meeting a number of wonderful people on the Big Island last week.  With views like this (a great local surf spot outside of Hilo), you can see why so many awesome people love calling this Hawaiian island home.

I posted the above picture as an attention grabber; my real intention?  To ask for some help as I storyboard a new website for the elementary school -- Kalaniana'ole Elementary & Intermediate School -- where my mother-in-law taught.  I'm putting together their first website, Facebook page, etc. and thought to ask for suggestions/directions towards any sites you like that might be appropriate for this exceptional elementary school:

I'm leaning towards WordPress as the platform upon which I'll build the site.  As I think about the amount of information that needs to be shared with teachers + students, it seems a logical choice.  Perhaps there are other ways/tools/services I might consider?  The "solution" doesn't need to be free (Aimee + I will cover the costs... but let's keep it within reason, ok?), and the driver behind the decision is a clean and simple user experience + intuitive administrative features that allow for easy use + posting.  Thoughts?  Ideas?  Suggestions?  All are welcome!

Mahalo!!

In the five years I've been at Computech, we've totally refashioned the way we market + position the firm.  For example, when I joined the company from New York City in July of 2005, we had a rudimentary site that essentially offered a phone number and a few project descriptions.  Don't believe me?  Check out the Way Back Machine.

Since than, we've established a pretty healthy pace for refreshing content -- while amping up our online aesthetic.  If you've been on the site recently, you'll find a beta version of our most recent creation.  While more content-rich than our previous sites, I'm excited to share that our new homepage design goes live later this week.  Here's a sneak peak at what it will look like:

In case you're interested in our online evolution, here's something of a story board of the previous three designs.  The top left version went live in late '05, the "paper tree" in '07 and the panoramic in the fall of '08.

While just one piece of our overall marketing program, computechinc.com is our most visible + widely available way that we engage with customers, employees, prospective clients and future staff.  Take a look at what we're working on; I'd certainly appreciate feedback on what works for you -- and what might be improved.

As a follow-on to my earlier post, a few additional clicks from Sunday morning.  Some subtle; others, like the one below, a bit more preening.

For my last post, I shared a few pictures that I took in New York over the weekend.  What follows are a handful of logos/slogans/brands that captured my eye and imagination.