July 4, 2011

I Redesigned This Blawg...

When I first started this blog, less than a year and a half ago, I had about as much web design experience as this chinchilla:


"I made a GeoCities site about UFOs. It was totally rad!"

My original, dark blue design conformed entirely to an existing blogger template. But for some reason, I did not like it. Perhaps it was too dark. Perhaps it was too compartmentalized.


...in any case, it looked like shit.

I soon decided that I would design a more unique and captivating blog. So, with a basic knowledge of HTML and no understanding of CSS, I set out on a journey of discovery that would consume many, many hours of my boring, insane life.

First I made some simple structural adjustments:



Miraculously, even with limited knowledge of code, I managed to keep the blog functionally intact. With this small victory, I charged forth with reckless abandon, making a plethora of changes to the appearance and structure of the blog— most of which were unnecessary.

Over the course of so many edits, I began to screw up the code, and a lot of issues began to arise. I was also becoming increasingly aware of just how shitty the whole thing looked.

It was time for a complete reset.

As luck would have it, I had recently completed a "Principles of Web Design" course at Cal Poly SLO, so I finally had a solid grasp of both the technical and the conceptual aspects of web design.

Armed with knowledge and determination, I went back to the drawing board and created a brand new look for the Bored and Insane blog— it's now cleaner, brighter, and better!

May 22, 2011

May 20, 2011

From the Fires of Hell (Infographic)

See the abridged version on CRACKED.com

From the Fires of Hell: The World's Hottest Peppers Christopher Columbus named peppers ‹peppers › Only badasses eat peppers Peppers get their hotness from capsaicinoids Why do animals willingly eat peppers? Spiciness is just a highly efficient way to tell mammals to back the fuck off. Presumably, before the Scoville test, pepper heat was measured through more subjective methods Scoville heat scale: increasing pain. The Cracked.com Pepper Scale: bell pepper, jalapeño The Cracked.com Pepper Scale: habanero, red savina habanero, and naga jolokia The Cracked.com Pepper Scale: naga viper, trinidad scorpion butch t Ring of fire, fiery seed dispersal

See the abridged version on CRACKED.com

UPDATE [FEB 2012]: The Trinidad Moruga Scorpion is now the world's hottest pepper; it has a hotness of 2 million Scoville units.

Just typing this update caused my clothes to spontaneously combust.

May 3, 2011

Redesigning a Terrible Site

Here is my proposal for Cal Poly San Luis Obispo's website. As some of you may know, the current website is designed like a horrendous piece of crap.
[UPDATE 8-11-2012: Cal Poly website no longer a horrendous piece of crap.]

I made some major organizational and aesthetic changes:

Cal Poly Home page
Cal Poly Events page Cal Poly Admissions page

Want to see the handy, dandy UX guide? Check it out here!

April 25, 2011

Robert Burton Music

My friend, Robert Burton, makes awesome music. He just launched a shiny new website, which you should definitely check out:

http://robertburtonmusic.com Robert Burton Music

Give his stuff a listen! (...and check out the gradients. I put all those gradients in there.)

April 15, 2011

The Killer Whale: Biggest Badass in the Animal Kingdom (revised edition)

the killer whale size comparison the great white shark kill those whales! sea lions are cute that's right! OH MY GOD!

When I first posted this infographic on my blog, I made some embarrassing factual mistakes. Fortunately, since very few people actually view these blog posts, I was able to avoid spreading incorrect information all over the internet.

A few months later, when the infographic ran on Cracked.com, I had not amended my mistakes and hundreds of thousands of internet users were exposed to false information! In an effort to make up for the negative effects of my terrible, shoddy research, I created this definitive, factual (probably) edition of The Killer Whale: Biggest Badass in the Animal Kingdom. Enjoy.