The Most Beautiful Border in the World

Parana River divides three countries - Argentina, Paraguay and Brazil and it seems to be the most beautiful natural border on Earth.

Cover Up Tattoos

A tattoo of someone's name is such a bad idea for so many reasons, but just because you made a mistake that doesn't mean you have to get stuck with it forever, or pay a big bill for laser surgery. Cover up tattoos are a great way to hide your mistakes if you can't erase them, and a nice but bigger picture goes a long way.

10 Very Useful Google Services You Should Know

In only a few years Google has become the king of the Web. It went from a college research project to the most popular search engine that rakes in billions of dollars every year. They've expanded to mobile, OSs and, in the past few days, promising the fastest broadband Internet to thousands of homes in the States.


We use the Google search engine on a daily basis, but Google has lots of other great services out there.  Recently, we talked about 5 Great and Unknown Google Products.  I want to dive back into that topic and share a few more services that Google has going that you should know about.

The List

1. Aardvark

Aardvark is a social search service that finds people who can answer all of your questions. When you submit your inquiry, Aardvark searches your circle of friends and finds someone who can answer your question. The answer is sent to your IM, or you can check it on your Aardvark profile. The service was bought on February 11th, so just a few days ago.

2. Sets

Google Sets is a simple service that creates sets of items from a few examples you give. Simple indeed, but extremely fun. Let's say you want a list of popular TV shows. All you have to do is insert two or three shows you know and Google will predict the rest. Voila, you have at least 15 other TV shows listed.

3. Audio Indexing

Let's say you really want to know in what videos your favorite topic is mentioned. Google Audio Indexing is a technology that scrutinizes all the audio in YouTube videos. While it is only for politics now, the service will probably get expanded in the future.

4. News Timeline

How does news change through time? See it on the Google News Timeline.  Results are shown in a timeline, with articles, videos and photos.

5. Living Stories

While major newspapers are not available in News Timeline, Google got together with The NY Times and The Washington Post in order to bring us Google Living Stories. This service shows news that is designed for the online environment. Stories are covered completely with all development gathered in one place.

6. City Tours

If you're planning to visit a big city and don't know where to go sightseeing, go to Google City Tours and enter your starting address. The search engine will generate the best itinerary, telling you the time you will spend and draw you a route to follow for every day of your vacation.

7. Image Swirl

After Bing announced Visual Search, Google decided to strike back with Image Swirl. Images are organized in groups (swirls) based on their similarity (whether visual or semantic). For instance, if you are looking for a jaguar, Google will organize the results in swirls: the car, the cat, logo. Additionally, images are organized by their angle, colors and so on.

8. Dictionary

Sure, you can find dictionaries all over the web, but Google Dictionary provides you with a little extra.  When you search for a word, it gives you a definition, a phonetic transcription, synonyms, related phrases, related languages (if the word appears in other languages as well) and web definitions. Oh, and if possible, they give you a photo.

9. Squared

Squared is one of the niftiest services on Google, regardless of how simple it might seem. Let's say you're looking for landmarks in London. Squared creates a table with names, images, descriptions, locations and telephone numbers, but it doesn't stop here. You can add your own columns: opening times, height, when they were constructed.  The possibilities are almost unlimited. In case the list does not exist, you can help them and add it.

10. Fast Flip

If you love news and you like to get it online, but don't have enough time to check all the news websites, use Fast Flip.

Conclusion

I immersed myself in Google alternatives a few months ago, because I wanted to see what Google has to offer. I was very surprised at what I found. Google is really more than just a search engine.  They are constantly trying to make your online experiences better.  Many of the services mentioned are in beta, but they are all worth checking out.
In case you know other interesting and useful services by Google, feel free to mention them in comments.


(By) Alex is a blogger from Slovenia who loves internet novelties and runs the Renton Blog.

Interview with Glenn Jones

With his fifteen years of experience, intelligent and humorous style, graphic designer and illustrator Glenn Jones from New Zealand, answered our questions on building a career, discovering his talent, finding inspiration, and the process of creating his pop t-shirt illustrations. Let's have a chat with Glenn.

1. Welcome to Vectortuts+ Glenn. Can you please introduce yourself?

Hello, I'm Glenn Jones from Auckland, New Zealand. I'm a freelance designer and illustrator, and a partner of Glennz Tees.

2. How did you get started in your design and illustration career?

I got a job as a junior designer and illustrator at a newspaper company in the early 90's. I started hand drawing images and scanning them in, and then in my spare time taught myself how to use Adobe Illustrator 3, which was much different than the version we have today. I loved the clean result of vector art and I've tried to evolve my style ever since.

3. Did you get an education? How did you discovered this talent?

Yes, I did a design course but there were no computers, it was all old school markers. Practice I guess, would get into work early, and stay late and over time. I just tried to get better at how I drew stuff

4. Do you draw on paper first and then transfer them to computer or use only tablet?

I draw everything on screen – I draw a quick rough first, then convert that drawing to guides before drawing my final illustration over the top.
I do have a tablet, but I draw most of my designs just with a mouse. I learned to draw in Illustrator with a mouse, and then started using a tablet few years later, so I don't mind either way

5. Can you describe the design process? How do you start and end?

It's fairly simple really – I get an idea when I'm doing something else, and then I usually forget it. Then if I ever remember it again, I just sit down and draw it. I'm fairly impatient so I like to try to finish it ASAP, then I'll leave it for a day or two, and revisit it. Then I'll do any refining and if it's for my tees it usually goes straight here: site.glennz

6. Which software are your favorites? Which software and which tool do you like most?

I love Illustrator! and pretty much just use the Pen Tool. I like the refinement you can get with the bezier curves.

7. What are your future plans? For example, will we see toy versions of your illustrations? Can you share some of these plans with us?

I really have no idea – its a constant evolution and I'm lucky to be teamed up with some guys that are always keen to try something new.
So yes, hopefully there will be all sorts of product additions in the future.

8. Your illustrations have a different iconic style. Most of your works have humorous and rational aspects. What is the reason for this kind of drawing?

I think alot of that style was influenced by the jobs I had to do when I first started using Illustrator. Part of my job was to create editorial graphics and graphs. I really like the clean simplicity of info graphics and I think that has followed through into my style today. I often draw something and then when I see it a couple of days later I'll remove stuff to simplify as much as possible – try to make it clear and easy to get.

9. All your works are illustrations. Do you have other type of works too, for instance web design, info graphics, etc? Or do you prefer working only on illustrations? What kind of works would you do, if illustration did not exist?

Yes I'm a packaging and corporate identity designer, but I enjoy the illustration side of things more. If there wasn't illustration, I'd like to be an industrial designer – create products or furniture, something like that.

10. Which artists inspired you? Why? What did you see in them? Which websites do you visit for inspiration? Which movies affected you most?

I don't really have any favorite artists, there are so many talented people around, even just on a site like Threadless – there is some mind blowing talent and diverse work on there. Websites I look at often would be: notcot, Behance, ffffound, Core77. I'm not sure if any movies have effected me too much, but I do like to call upon well known pop culture to put my spin on it.

11. Thank you for answering these questions Glenn. Do you want to tell something to our illustrator and designer friends?

Thanks for the interview, and to people who've contacted me directly thanks for the kind words and feedback I get! If anyone ever has questions I try to help when I can.

Glenn on the Web

• Glennz.com
• Glennz Behance

Capturing Motions