Monthly Archives: May 2011

Semester 2 Assessment Display

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Last week I had my second assessment at DJCAD where all of my project work from semester two was examined by my tutors. Unlike the semester one assessment, where we just displayed our work on our desks, we had to set up our displays in one of the first year studios. This is because our studio is being used (and redecorated – yippee!) for the degree show, which I cannot wait to see.

Here are some shot’s of my display (complete with last years silly USB stick box)







Change the iTunes 10 Window Buttons

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The new ‘traffic light’ style window buttons on iTunes 10 are completely out of context to all my other applications. After having success changing the icon I decided to find out if it was possible to change the buttons. Much to my delight – it is! Unfortunately the site I found out how to do it on is “under temporary maintenance” so I don’t have a link but I can tell you how to do it:

  • Close down iTunes if you have it open
  • Open up ‘Terminal’
  • Type or paste the following text on the Terminal screen:
defaults write com.apple.iTunes full-window -boolean YES
  • Click return and quit Terminal
  • Launch iTunes

You should now have lovely aesthetically pleasing horizontal buttons. The buttons will remain horizontal even when you update your iTunes software. If you do decide however that you want the vertical buttons back then type the following text into terminal:

defaults write com.apple.iTunes full-window -boolean NO

Also, I had never heard of Terminal this before I did this but just search for it on your mac and don’t be scared of it. The icon looks like a blackboard.


Replacing your iTunes 10 Icons

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My initial dislike for the new iTunes icon led me to discovering this tutorial from OSXDaily. It allows you t to have the new iTunes 10 BUT with the old iTunes 9 icon on your desktop. Just follow these steps:

  • Click into your Applications folder and select iTunes
  • Right click on the icon and select ‘Show Package Contents’
  • Open the ‘Contents’ folder, then open the ‘Resources’ folder
  • Find file called ‘iTunes.icns’ and make a copy of it on your desktop for backup purpose
  • Replace it with the  old iTunes.icns file
  • Start or restart iTunes
You can delete the back up image file once your finished and everything is working alright. Unfortunately you will need to do this every you update your iTunes software. This was the reason I eventually forced myself to accept the new impostor!

Little Snapper

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I just downloaded Little Snapper, a mac application which lets you capture screenshots of entire webpages. Goodbye “Command key iconShift icon4″ dragbox screenshots, hello pixel perfect, full screen “websnap” shots!

LittleSnapper was built to help designers and other creative-minded Mac users build up a design scrapbook. Whether it’s proofs of client work, live sites that interest you, or screenshots of your favourite Mac applications, LittleSnapper allows you to capture, organise, annotate and share them all – from one beautiful OS X application.

Little Snapper automatically categorizes all your snaps for you as well as storing the web address. It then allows you to edit these details, add tags or categorize them further with things like star ratings to create ‘Smart Collections’. It also lets you edit the websnaps, so you can crop areas, add shapes and even text!

As a graphic designer the uses for this app are endless. For example; I am currently designing a website for a client and this app will allow me to show the website design to him in a much more sophisticated way. The editing tools will allow me to communicate with him directly on the image – rather than having notes and questions in a separate email. The library will also allow me to store and refer back to images of the site being built.

I have started doing this already because the intuitive nature of it’s design meant I knew how to work it in about five minutes. (This video is helpful though) The interface is delightfully simple making the entire app a joy to use. It is quite possibly the most elegant, useful application I have ever downloaded.

I seriously recommend it.