Spectrumblog Works

  Sculpted in 2022,   HOW MANY BUBBLES IN A BAR OF SOAP? by Kevin Cole is part of a series of mixed media called The Ballot Box series. It is located at Hearne Fine Art in Little Rock in an exhibit dedicated to Kevin’s work named Where Do We Go From Here? II: Exploring Gerrymandering and Voting. It is painted with tar paper and carved with wood and metal. It uses a color palette of blue and white, in which the former takes up the most space while the latter is throughout the sculpture. The overall design of the sculpture is inspired by the old letterbox design of the 1800s. The most notable aspect of  HOW MANY BUBBLES IN A BAR OF SOAP?  is the pattern of bubbles seen all around, which fits the name of the sculpture to great effect. A second aspect of this sculpture’s design is the hole in the front, which also works well within the context of its design. Another aspect is the hole of the sculpture, in which objects such as coins or papers are inserted, although s...

Remember: Don't confuse this with the Dark Knight.   Created in 1998 by Lino Tagliapietra, this glass artwork takes heavy inspiration from Australian tools such as the Boomerang. The design of the glass artwork bears a striking resemblance to Batman’s Batarang weapon due to its shape, although the infamous DC comic book character of the same name has no relation to this glass. Batman uses a simple yet effective color palette of red and blue, in which the former color makes up a quarter of the paint used, while the latter is utilized in the middle of the glass. The glass texture on Batman features a wrinkle-like appearance, and the U shape of the glass conveys a sense of emotion. The design choices for  Batman  are clever and effective. Lino strategically uses only two colors, red and blue, which are usually associated with joy and freedom. As a result,  Batman  perfectly captures the feeling of positive energy. The design of  Batman  is very organi...

Painted by American artist Edward Hopper in 1942,  Nighthawks  is an iconic oil painting taking s place in a bar at night. Edward’s choice of setting for the oil painting is clever in that the dark color palettes used by the oil painter convey a sense of loneliness. For example, look at where the man in the middle is positioned compared to the three people on the right, who are all next to each other. Despite this, the four people in  Nighthawks  lack any sense of happiness in their emotions despite the bar itself being rather colorful, albeit with a limited palette. Additionally,  Nighthawks  also convey a sense of isolation, and this occurs in real life, especially during adulthood. The somewhat depressed faces of the four characters in  Nighthawks  further increase the isolation that emerges from the oil painting. Furthermore, since the four characters in  Nighthawks  are on the rightmost side of the oil painting, the background and f...

Developed by Google in 2011, Google+ was an attempt from Google to make a social media platform akin to Facebook or Twitter.  I will explain the issues with Google+ using five of the Ten Usability Heuristics for User Interface Design.   Google+ was an example of poor Consistency and standards. An example below is the messy layout as there's no clear indication of what a user should place their eyes on first. Violation Score: 4 Google+'s User control and freedom were flawed. The data breach that occurred in 2018 effectivity caused the platform to lose many users since that year. Violation Score: 4     Google+'s  Flexibility and efficiency of use were poor. A big example of this was the Circles feature. On paper, this sounds like a great way to group things, but the problem arises when the user realizes that the info on the circle itself is vague.  Violation Score: 4 The Recognition rather than recall of Google+ was problematic. An ex...

 This website was launched in 2010 and is a website that houses numerous pictures and videos.  I will explain the issues with Pinterest using five of the Ten Usability Heuristics for User Interface Design.  Pinterest's Flexibility and Efficiency of Use could be better. Just from the front page alone, there's a bonanza of images without context about the ideas, such as "How to make this?" Violation Score: 4 The Consistency and Standards of Pinterest could be more consistent. If a user wants to scroll toward something they're looking for, some images appear in the result and have no relation to the topic type. For example, I typed in Pumpkin and was expecting this - 🎃 rather than the image below. Violation Score: 4 In the case of a Match between the system and the real world, Pinterest needs improvement in this area. A major problem I have with Pinterest is the lack of curation and its habit of reposting content without mentioning its original source. Here's an...