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Lifestyle / Daddy Issues

A sudden fondness for Radio National.

When dads get old

by jo walker

Its been a couple of years now since dad got his special government-issue seniors public transport together he makes a point of gloating about how much less hes paying for the experience than I am. In return I enjoy making faces and talking loudly about how old and decrepit he is. Those jokes are funny for now: Hes still got all his original working parts and (gallingly) is the fittest person in the family. At some point I suppose theyll stop being such a cack, when the real decline begins. Even then, I bet hell still be tickled by the discount bus rides. Hes that kind of guy. If my father is anything to go by, the first signs of Dad Ageing are fairly cosmetic. Rogue ear and nose hair. A sudden fondness for Radio National. Spectacles multiply special types for each occasion, including those creepy ones that turn from sunglasses to regular lenses when you walk indoors. (Despite numerous pleas that they make him

look like a child molester, Dad refuses to stop wearing them.) Theres obsessive Sudoku solving and the insistence that mobile phones belong clipped on your belt. And, of course, the urge to tuck shirts into any kind of pants boardshorts included and hoik the waistband up around the nipple height. Actually that last one Im convinced is a silent rebellion against my mum, who regulates Dads wardrobe and pretty much chooses what hell wear each day. Maybe high pants are his only way of regaining control: You can make me wear a clean shirt, woman, but you can take my unusually high waistband from my cold, dead hands!

Clothes are just one of the things Mum is in charge of these days. She seems to be convinced that Dad is incapable of doing anything for himself. Shes older than him, by six months (this is another of his favourite gloats), but she plans his social activities and tells him when to wipe his nose and how to stack the dishwasher. If he wants to speak to me, she dials the number, waits for me to pick up and says, Dad wants to talk. Until quite recently my dad was a pilot with a license to fly large planes around the world. Now he is not allowed to choose his own socks. Dad has declared himself to be in an extended middle age not old like his

own father was at the same point in life. And maybe hes right. My granddads were WWII veterans who wore cardigans and hearing aids, drank rum with milk and smelt of pipe smoke and strong mints. They has walking sticks and got cantankerous when the cricket was on. My dad yells at the rugby, but hes been doing that for a while now. And he drinks his rum with Diet Coke. Got to keep the waistline slim so you can pull your pants over it. My brother has kids, so my dad is a grandfather now, too. But not in the way his pas generation was. Hes taught my nieces to surf and gives them horsey rides on his back and sits with them for

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Music / David Bowie

Im just an individual who doesnt feel that I need to have somebody qualify my work in any particular way. Im working for me.
- David Bowie
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Music / David Bowie

He just said, I feel like writing again.

T
ony Visconti has been producing David Bowies albums since Space Oddity in 1969. Theyve worked together on many of bowies greatest triumphs, including Heroes, Young Americans, and Scary Monsters. After a long break, they joined forces again in the early 2000s for Heathen and Reality. Two years ago, he started working with bowie on his long-awaited new ablum, The Next Day. Rolling Stone spoke to Visconti about the pairs secret sessions, how medieval Englosh history inspired some of the soings and why its unlikely that Bowie will tour - though a single show remains possible.

Was there ever a point over the past few years where you thought that Bowie would never record again?

By Rob Sheffield

I was a little scared after he had his heart condition. He had a little scare himself. I didnt speak to him for a year after that, He was recovering and just not talking to anybody. But I was one of the first people he e-mailed afterwards and we were steadily in contact since then. But he never really brought up music until two years ago. So he never said to me he retired, and every time I saw him in person, he looked in really good health... All these rumours started going around about his health. Every time I had lunch with him, or coffee with him, Im looking at him and my dear old friend was looking really good. But music didnt interest him until two years ago, thats when he made the call. He said, How would you like to make some demos? And I was a little shocked, quite honestly, it was just so casual.

Hear the story from Tony, who has been good friends with Bowie for 45 years.

How did the process begin?

I was working on another project in London, and he didnt know that. He said, Well, when are you going to get back? I said, In a few days. The next morning after i returned, I was in the studio with him playing bass. We had Sterling Campbell on drums, Gerry Leonard on guitar and David on keyboards. We were in this little studio down in the East Village doing demos for a week. I was pinching myself. I couldnt believe it was really happening.

Did he have eshed-out songs at this point?

Yes, he wrote them at home. He had an eight- or 16-track digital recorder. They were quite fleshed out. He had nice bass line ideas and drum patterns. We quickly took down the names of the chords and we scribbled it out on paper. Gerry Leonard and I read from the chord sheet. The room was about eightby-eight, which included a drum kit. We were on top of each other, grasping for air after an hour or two.

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TYPOGRAPHY
IS A SYSTEM RID
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SIMPLY

They say, Rules are meant to be broken. Find out more tips on how to break rules wisely and create disorder that is still considered a balanced chaos. These will definitely wow your audiences.

Web / Typography Grid

overwhelmingly, columns dominate Web design grids. Once youve mastered the grid as a tool then its time to get creative with it. Work on establishing a visual rhythm in your design. Then you can step in and break the visual flow for effect. The techniques discussed in the next section present effective ways of getting creative with your columns in grid-based Web design.

Like skyscrapers in city centers,

Six

Creative Column Techniques

Layouts that have strong horizontal areas are being seen more often, especially on home pages. Horizontal Web design areas feel more creative because vertical designs are so common on the Web. Try using more rows in your designs. Or join areas of a column together to create a display space in your design. Rows can be used to break up the visual flow of a page. Each row you create gives a new opportunity for establishing new column areas with different sizes, numbers, and variety. Its possible to create pages on your site, or areas of your pages, that are heavily horizontal. Or join columns to form rows that add interesting areas to your layouts. Consider varying the number of columns in the rows you create. The gray horizontal row below is heavily emphasized. The use of repeating horizontal backgrounds helps to make predominately vertical layouts feel wide. Adding these spaces to your layouts will allow them to stand out. Horizontal areas in sites will slow the users progression through the page and create emphasis.

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One of the techniques in line with embracing some disorder is to break out of the boundaries youve established in your grid. Once youve established your order find ways for elements to move outside of it. Cross over the lines youve set up and break out of the visual flow of the page. In the article Thinking Outside the Grid Molly E. Holzschlag discusses concepts of creating compelling visual design that breaks the mold of the grid. Some of her examples show boundaries being escaped. This is an inspiring conceptual article that also discusses the complexities involved in coding designs that are less rigid. Pull-quotes are an example of a design element that presents an opportunity to break out of your established visual flow. The older version of Andy Rutledges Design View used interesting pull-quotes that broke the visual flow of the column. Doing this places greater emphasis on the pull-quotes than if they were kept within the content of the column. An abrupt change in the flow of the page will cause users to pause and notice the change in rhythm. This is true whether the pull-quote is kept within the column or moved outside the boundaries of its borders. Consider this the next time you use pull-quotes or if youre embedding an image within your column. As an image presents the same design opportunity.

EMBRACING DISHARMONY

Disharmony is, of course, the opposite of harmony. A grid is a harmonious instrument. Its goal is to achieve balance, symmetry, and order. So why would you want to bring imbalance to this order? Why break up this carefully constructed data structure? The answer is to add interest. Chaos is more interesting than order. A good murder mystery is infinitely more enjoyable than a story about taking a walk in the park. A partly broken grid is more interesting than a perfectly ordered grid. Besides who doesnt want to break the rules? Embrace some randomness, chaos, or discord and create a space for them to thrive within your designs.

UTILIZING ANGLES

JOINING FOR VARIETY

Its possible to set an entire grid on an angle. In the article Rule Four: Spacing Is Your Friend an angled grid design is reviewed. The example used in this article is for print design though. The use of an angled grid is unusual on the Web. Thats because the layout of text on the Web is horizontal, not slanted. You would likely use images to accomplish an angled piece of text. Flash would be another option. In both cases youre loosing the semantic goodness and ease of use of Cascading Style Sheets. The use of angles to occasionally break your grid will add visual interest. If you restrict the use of angles to images you wont lose any semantic or SEO benefits of the default horizontal text used in the Web.

ESCAPING BOUNDARIES

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Web / Typography Grid

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Illustrations and the use of design elements allow for overlapping and breaking out of the structure youve created in your grid. They can be used to add some areas of creative disorder to counterbalance the rigidity of the grid.

ILLUSTRATING AREAS

Illustration can break the grid by overlapping gridlines and flowing into different content areas. The movement of the design elements within the illustration creates a different visual rhythm that acts in opposition to the order of the grid. There is balance in the design of these opposing forces. Illustrations design add stimulating areas of interest to an otherwise boxy layout.

There are some basic design principles to consider when looking to energize space within your grid. Concepts such as asymmetrical balance, proximity, and repetition are discussed in the article The Principles of Beautiful Web Design by Jason Beaird. Jason Beaird has this to say about asymmetrical balance,Rather than having mirror images on either side of the layout, asymmetrical balance involves objects of differing size, shape, tone, or placement. These objects are arranged so that, despite their differences, they equalize the weight of the page. Paragraphs and images can be of different sizes. Try breaking columns and overlapping them horizontally. Abandon Mathematical precision, and it will be a grid based on an artists intuition and eye for design. To achieve balance, it is not based on rigid structure alone, but rather is achieved through the equalizing weight of asymmetrical balance.

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Conclusion
There are multiple techniques to add interest to your grid. Certainly you should first understand how to use the grid effectively. Then work on escaping some of this rigid structure and create some free flowing spaces within your design. Or break the established flow and focus attention on a particular element. Utilize concepts such as disharmony, asymmetrical balance, and ordered chaos to bring areas of your sites grid designs to life.

ENERGIZING SPACES

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IMPULSE would like to make special thanks to Class DV2004 Typography II and tutor Ms Angeline Yam. & All our readers.