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Work is Play: The personal blog of Nick Craske, Interactive Creative Director. Killerpoke is the independent blog of Nick Craske, Interactive Creative Director living and working in London. Nick Craske has worked at LBi, FramFab, Landor, AKQA, HarrimanSteel, & Siebert Head
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Who in the blazes?

Killerpoke is the independent blog of Nick Craske, creative director, living and working in London. Killerpoke is a method of inducing irreversible hardware damage on a machine. As a little-scamp the most rewarding play was always disassembling objects, turning them upside down, inside out and making something more useful, unexpected or playful - and sometimes just to enjoy pulling them apart. I'm even more curious now, and increasingly fascinated with technology and narrative to communicate and entertain in the digital world. Work is play.

Blogs I enjoy & frequent

  • A directory of wonderful things, BoingBoing
  • Stalking the suave and spectacular, Cool Hunting
  • His Wisdom, wonder and wit, Stephen Fry
  • He's as dissapointed as we are, Mr Davies
  • Big Dumb Agencies on his radar, Mr Parker
  • Grandaddy of Interaction Design, Mr Cooper
  • History, Philosophy & Science = SoulPhysics
  • Supporting Freedom of Information, WikiLeaks
  • As suave as they are optimistic, Optimism
  • Nothing decomposing here, The Face of Fecal
  • In contrast, here is a simple, Juxtopoz
  • Interactive Marketing Periscope, Adverblog
  • The World is full of Ads, most of them are here
  • Human Behavioural Research, is fascinating
  • ActionScript obsession, is very healthy here
  • Google, masters of Webbi'verse? eyes peeled
  • Disposable, collectible & rideable, bits of wood
  • Backstage at the beeb, is more exciting than tv
  • Genius ActionScript magician, Mr Michelle
  • Boostworthy and skiled to the hilt, Mr Taylor
  • Pitch, Yaw and Roll with, Papervision love
  • Nurbs, Extrusions and Lathes? Papervision play
  • Asthetics in computation requries, Processing
  • Relentless progression in code, Mr Watz
  • Browser magic and evolution, Mozilla Labs
Barrett. The definitive visual companion to the creative work of Roger 'Syd' Barrett. Click here to register now.

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MyLibrary, randomly selected

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Web wonders & delights

  • Technology, Entertainment, Design, TED
  • Ready, Steady, Book, .COM
  • Delightful literary moments in time, On this day
  • Yeh, yeh, really, really, good, good, far far
  • Love digital and adore books, Blog + Books
  • Exploration of computation, levitate here
  • Cannes' archives are overflowing, good'ness
  • Elegant, Prose-like 3D code engine, Papervision

Books in my hands & head

Just finished

Currently reading

Categories

  • Advertising
  • Animation
  • art
  • Augmented Reality
  • Blogging
  • Books
  • Brand planning
  • Computing
  • Copy writing
  • Copyright
  • CSS
  • Design
  • Digital Marketing
  • Drawing
  • Emergency
  • Fashion
  • Film
  • Flash
  • Games
  • Hardware
  • Illustration
  • Installation
  • Integrated
  • Interaction design
  • Internet
  • Journalism
  • Killerpoke
  • Maps
  • Maths
  • Media Buying
  • Mobile
  • Music
  • Nature
  • Nearfield
  • Philosophy
  • Programming
  • Puzzles
  • Science
  • Social Networks
  • Software
  • Technology
  • Theory
  • Typography
  • Uncategorized
  • Writing

Archives

  • August 2010
  • July 2010
  • June 2010
  • May 2010
  • April 2010
  • March 2010
  • February 2010
  • January 2010
  • November 2009
  • October 2009
  • September 2009
  • August 2009
  • July 2009
  • June 2009
  • May 2009
  • April 2009
  • March 2009
  • February 2009
  • January 2009
  • December 2008
  • November 2008
  • October 2008
  • September 2008
  • August 2008
  • July 2008
  • June 2008
  • April 2007

Amigos, chums & compadres

  • Film-animation-director-sorcerer, Mr Hopewell
  • Film-photo-director-magician, Klaus-bang-bang
  • Very slightly gifted guitar boy, Graham
  • A gushing fountain of musical talent, Michael
  • The Sepia Band HQ, Sepia music
  • Signing the most amazing new bands, Jamie
  • Effervescent rocksters from, Sparkadia
  • A Geek & shamelessly proud of it, Casablanca
  • Suave partners in design-crime, HarrimanSteel
  • A brain the size of a house, Snowbadger
  • Hard-grafting happy-chappy, Mr Harris
  • Fierce fanatical film fab'ness, Mr Hartshorn
  • Complex architectural algorithms in Flash? Liam
  • Two design-brains wired to be thoughtomatic
  • Wearing design and code hats, Hoppermagic
  • Motion graphics and animation skills, Mr Blanke
  • An 'odd mix' of good stuff, Mr Jed Hallam
  • Brand planning Bluurb extraordinaire, Nick Gill

August 8th, 2010

Every games console ever made

The Insane Console History Video 2.0 from Elder-Geek on Vimeo.

July 15th, 2010

UNIQLO Lucky switch is marvelous

UNIQLO LUCKY SWITCH from HN on Vimeo.

July 11th, 2010

Apple prepares to implement Nearfield technology

Apple have been developing NFC-based technologies for quite some time and it appears they will be implementing these in a new patent application for an app called “Products”.


Apple was first reported to be testing RFID iPhones last year.

July 8th, 2010

Google Voice

July 6th, 2010

Matel and Qualcomm partner Augmented Reality

It’s just a tablecloth and a piece of paper, until you pull out a Nexus One, at which point it magically becomes an arena where toy robots fire off punches.Augmented reality isn’t anything new, of course, but Qualcomm seems determined to bring it to cell phones in a big way — launching an AR game studio, sponsoring a $200,000 developer challenge, and announcing a free software development kit (which will see open beta this fall) all on the same day. The company partnered with Mattel to build the Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots proof-of-concept you see above using that very SDK, and you’ll find a hilarious video of grown men pretending to have the time of their lives with it right after the break.

However, augmented reality is only half of Qualcomm’s mobile gaming plan — a rep told Pocket-lintgames like Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots are only financially viable if they can work across platforms. To that end, the company also demonstrated a simple three-player peer-to-peer title, but with — get this — a Nexus One (over Bluetooth), a Nokia N900 (over WiFi) and a Dell Latitude laptop all playing the same synchronous game. To commemorate this mishmash of awesome, the company funded another video; listen to an individual with a ludicrously bad accent give you the play-by-play after the break. Oh, and find some press releases, too.

June 29th, 2010

Wonderful exhibition in London: Digital Hinterlands

Digital Hinterlands features a diverse range of work by some of the best recent architecture graduates from London’s Architectural Association, Bartlett , Royal College of Art, and University of Westminster. Curated by Ruairi Glynn in consultation with Arup, this exhibition revealed how the latest computational design and rapid manufacturing processes are providing new ways of understanding and designing space. From built models, 1:1 fragments, material experiments and installations, to interactive devices, virtual worlds and robotics, the exhibition presented the ideas of a wave of young designers, operating on the speculative hinterlands of architectural design.

June 29th, 2010

Simplifying c++ with the openframework

Openframeworks is a c++ library designed to assist the creative process by providing a simple and intuitive framework for experimentation.

The library is designed to work as a general purpose glue, and wraps together several commonly used libraries under a tidy interface: openGL for graphics, rtAudio for audio input and output, freeType for fonts, freeImage for image input and output, quicktime for video playing and sequence grabbing.

The code is written to be both cross platform (PC, Mac, Linux, iPhone) and cross compiler. The API is designed to be minimal and easy to grasp. There are very few classes, and inside of those classes, there are very few functions. The code has been implemented so that within the classes there are minimal cross-referening, making it quite easy to rip out and reuse and/or extend.

made with openFrameworks from openFrameworks on Vimeo.

June 28th, 2010

At-At Dog Day Afternoon

June 28th, 2010

The internet is rewiring our thought patterns

Wired magazine’s Nicholas Carr has written a fascinating article detailing how the internet is rewiring our brains and altering our brain activity.

‘The penalty is amplified by what brain scientists call switching costs. Every time we shift our attention, the brain has to reorient itself, further taxing our mental resources. Many studies have shown that switching between just two tasks can add substantially to our cognitive load, impeding our thinking and increasing the likelihood that we’ll overlook or misinterpret important information. On the Internet, where we generally juggle several tasks, the switching costs pile ever higher.’

June 26th, 2010

Augmented reality and LEGO magic. Perfect use of the technology

June 26th, 2010

3D character using Flash Papervision augmented reality

Papervision – Augmented Reality (extended) from Boffswana on Vimeo.

June 26th, 2010

The Social Network – David Fincher’s film about Mark Zuckerberg

June 26th, 2010

Stunning degrees of motion in iPhone 4’s gyroscope

Users will appreciate the iPhone 4’s gyroscopes new sense of control because it’s the closest thing you get to augmented reality without the extra hardware involved. What makes this so special is the nearly 1:1 motion control displayed by the software.

The game demonstrated here in itself isn’t all that complicated –aim and shoot targets accurately – but the limitless possibilities this gyroscope-developer symbiosis presents are mind boggling. Soon we could see apps like Layar, GPS aided information or car and flight simulators in a whole new way, literally.

June 20th, 2010

Ikea’s AR application really has meat-and-balls to it

As with all emerging technologies there is a staggering amount of eye-candy-only implementations of augmented reality being developed by brands as part of their digital marketing campaigns. Ikea’s application compliments, and integrates well, with the existing Ikea experience. Love-or-loathe it their linear in store experience – a passage through the entire collection to the final warehouse stage – is an integral part of their success and high volumes of sales. While this AR application is for use in a person’s home – and therefore after a person has left the store – it does have the potential of being used in store; to enable comparisons and combinations. Potentially a person could also photograph or film their interior-space prior to visiting the store using their mobile device, and then while in store map furniture into a composite in their mobile device.

June 16th, 2010

Escape From Oil City – my first album artwork commission in 1992

Dr. Feelgood have often been called ‘the greatest local band’. Canvey Island is peculiar and strange little island at the end of the Thames Estuary. I’ve always been embarrassed by my ‘hometown’ but have always been proud of Dr. Feelgood. Lee Brilleaux – the Feelgood’s frontman – and my father were great friends and I used to recieve The Big Figure’s –the Feelgood’s drummer – spare drum sticks and drum skins. I ‘escaped‘ from ‘The Island’, moving to London to work in a design agency, when I was 18. Appropriately my very first ever piece of commercial design was for the Dr. Feelgood sister band The Canvey Island Allstars and their album Escape From Oil City. I too escaped. The CIA’s single, Werewolves of London, was the soundtrack to Paul Newman’s Hustler sequel, The Color of Money.

June 16th, 2010

Oil City Confidential: Dr. Feelgood’s feelgood film wins Mojo Award

Oil City Confidential is the brilliant film documenting Canvey Island’s legendary local band Dr. Feelgood. Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian described it as “ ..a vivid study of period, music and place”. The film was broadcast on BBC Four in April 2010. It has recently one a Mojo award.

June 16th, 2010

The Art of spectacular music video’s with a miniscule budget – new OK GO music video

June 14th, 2010

WordPress 3.0 official release: the magic of open source and the developer community

June 13th, 2010

Feast your eyes upon the Avatar of 1956: Forbidden Planet

I am feeling the pull of mind-bendingly-fascinating sc-fi this weekend. Forbidden Planet really needs to be seen again to appreciate how beautifully is was art directed and produced. Truly ahead of it’s time. Wonderful audio and sound design. Astonishing even now.

June 13th, 2010

Entertaining typographic VW print ad on London Underground

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