We (2Krogh) received the first copies today - oh what a joy! To those who don’t have a clue what I am talking about, read my earlier posts here and here.

And keep an eye on Twitter, here and here, for information on how to win one of the books!

Thomas Silkjær, 9. July, 2009

This weekend I had the honor of taking the photos of the newlywed couple, Laura & Jacob, good friends of ours. It was really fun trying, and I am quite happy about most of the photos! I have selected a few here, but please take a look at the whole set at flickr.

Thomas Silkjær, 8. July, 2009

I think it is on time to write a short update about what’s going on in my life.

Thilde

Thilde is almost 10 months old now, talks a lot (ba ba ba ba) and is almost walking around the apartment. I promise to upload some new photos and videos soon - I have really been neglecting Flickr and Vimeo lately.

MacBook Pro

Yesterday I received my new MacBook Pro - I ordered the 15″ 2.8GHz model with a downgraded harddisk from 500GB 5400RPM to a 320GB 7200RPM. Speed is more important to me than disk space. It is really great, but haven’t had that much time to play around with it yet.

InDesigning.net

The InDesigning.net blog is running quite well, with a range of posts apparently attracting a lot of visitors. I have also begun writing all scripts in JavaScript instead of AppleScript, enabling Windows users to use them as well. Check out these posts:

• Free InDesign style template
• Better typography: Using the baseline grid
• Better typography: Optical alignment
• Better typography: Creating and organising styles

Twitter

I recently hit 300 followers on Twitter - incredible so many people shows interest in what I am saying. Morten Fangel and I also just launched the new site hatsoftwitter.com - so if you need to find out which hats are trendy, just check the site to see what fellow twitterers are wearing.

theundersigned.net

My personal web site were recently featured on a list of 88 Single Page Website Designs For Design Inspiration, which I am quite happy about.

Design and production bible

The earlier referenced design and production bible project is nearing an end. We are currently laying the last hands on the text and are almost ready for print. We also launched our Bible design website at 2krogh.com.

Thomas Silkjær, 16. June, 2009

As I mentioned in my last post, I have launched the InDesigning.net blog.

Now it has been running for a little while, and I actually think it is going alright - already done 2 screencasts! I still think my english sucks though, but check them out:

• 5 simple but useful tips
• Subheadings the right way

Be sure to give your comments, and if you know any InDesigners, please share the site. Thanks.

Thomas Silkjær, 28. March, 2009

Are you an InDesign user? I have launched a new InDesign blog: InDesigning.net.

The main target group is current InDesign users, who knows their way around the application - with guides, tips and tricks and screencasts to make you better, and thoughts and ideas on how I think Adobe could proceed with improving and adding new features.

I have never recorded a screencast before, and my english is rather rusty, so this should be exciting. But I am really excited about it! So I am currently in a process of writing down ideas on both blog posts and screencasts for the site.

Thomas Silkjær, 15. March, 2009

I have launched a little project site for my book project, check it out at http://theundersigned.net/book/.

Please, if you are interested in the book sign up with your e-mail on the page. The more interested people, the more I am motivated to write faster.

Current status is about 12.000 words and some illustration work done - still a far way to go.

Thomas Silkjær, 18. February, 2009

Some months ago I started juggling around with ideas about writing a book. I have been coding HTML/CSS for several years now, and I feel it has almost become native languages for me. Trying to learn from me to people who ask for help, I sometimes wonder if things I find obvious in fact can be a little hard to understand if you almost never use the languages.

I started planning, writing and designing a HTML and CSS introduction book - not with the real goal of ever accomplishing writing a full book, but mainly as an exercise to explain myself about the things I feel I know quite well. I wrote a lot but eventually stop, finding it a bit to big task.

A little week ago, I took up writing on it again, going through the plans on chapters etc., and this time I feel a bit more excited about it. I still don’t know if it will ever become a book, but if it is not, I might just publish some of it as articles here. I have asked some people to read my current process and have asked for their honest opinions - so if they like it and can see any potential in it, I think I will be more motivated and obviously continue writing.

I will post updates on the project here, of course.

Small changes to the site

I have added an extra section to the site, the microblog. The posted items here will not be published to the feed, since they are mainly published somewhere else. Currently it is aggregating my tweets and delicious bookmarks, and more will be added if I join more services like that.

Regarding tweets, I am active on my twitter alias “Silkjaer”, so if you ever want to get a hold of me, you can always find me there!

I have also made the sliders for the sections more visible by adding a background color to them. Some people had issues figuring out how to navigate, I hope this helps. If you still can’t figure out the navigation, please just think of the website as art or something … ;)

Thomas Silkjær, 4. February, 2009

I have been fooling around with even more JS lately, and I have created a CSS gallery website, webdesignbook.net.

I know there exists hundreds of these sites, but I just had to try to create one (again), giving users who is looking for new design inspiration, a new form of finding what they look for.

Downsizing

The more sites submitted to the gallery, the better. The first view on the website shows the newest sites submitted and you can go back and forth in time to see more websites - as usual websites.

But you can also hover a website and click “downsize” which will filter away some websites, websites that has the least in common with the site you chose to “downsize” from.

The technology

Downsizing is done by matching different criteria, since all submitted sites are tagged with common tag names, but the system also automatically grabs a screenshot of your website, and analyze the picture to see e.g. what colors are used - which also is used to help downsizing from your clicks.

The site is WordPress and MooTools powered, and all submitted sites are manually reviewed before published. The current design and feature set might change as time goes, but for now the site is functional and open for website submissions.

So if you have made a webdesign you would like to share, please head over to webdesignbook.net to submit it!

Thomas Silkjær, 29. January, 2009

Today we received the first thin print samples of the Design and production bible, and as I promised, here are some photos:

When I have more news about the book, I will be sure to post it here!

Thomas Silkjær, 28. January, 2009