Posts by Chanpory

About Chanpory

Chanpory helms this lovely little blog, LifeClever. During the day, he's an interaction designer for Dubberly Design Office in San Francisco.

He's also pushed pixels for MetaDesign, Move Design, Youth Radio, and McShane Adigard Design (MAD). When not feeling modest, he likes to brag about his interaction and branding work for Macworld, PC World, Symantec, Adobe, Yahoo!, and Four Seasons Hotel.

Chanpory is a graduate of the California College of the Arts and Oakland Technical High School.

May 20, 2008

10 Free Web-based Alternatives to Photoshop

I’m fed up with Photoshop and its one billion rarely-used features. How about a simple photo-editor that’s quick, easy, and doesn’t cost a thousand dollars. Fortunately, there’re tons of web-based photos editors popping up. Most are crap, but some are promising. Check out these free web-based Photoshop alternatives: 1. Picnik Arguably, Picnik is the most [...]

May 16, 2008

Whatever’s Clever: Do You Have Typomania?

From Erik

May 15, 2008

Why You Should Never Forget Wolfgang Wienerschnitzelhaus

When designing anything to accomodate names”such as a business card, an address book, or a project management app”don’t forget about Wolfgang Wienerschnitzelhaus. Why? Because he’s a got really really long name. And he won’t be the only one. So while everyone else cozies up to the boring John Does of this world, make sure you’re [...]

May 13, 2008

10 Reasons Why Your Online Portfolio Sucks

Kyle Meyer of Astheria has an excellent post on why online portfolios just plain suck. He must be reading my mind, because I was just about to write about my intense hatred for online portfolios. Thankfully, Kyle’s saved me the trouble. He’s combed 200 online portfolios to find these 7 common mistakes: Bad navigation Zoomed [...]

May 9, 2008

Whatever’s Clever: How to Sleep Like a Baby

I’ve been up to the wee hours designing, coding, and writing. The result? Two weeks of terrible, awful sleep. So if you’re in the same boat, this week’s roundup for you. Here’s 10 tips to help you sleep like a baby:

May 7, 2008

Learn 35+ Languages for Free in iTunes

I was just browsing iTunes for poignant Morrissey covers when I discovered nearly a thousand free language courses on iTunes. 926 courses to be exact. Holy Moleskine, Batman! The extensive library of courses span over 35 languages, from Arabic to Yiddish. Each course comes as a convenient podcast which you can subscribe and put on [...]

May 5, 2008

Maker Faire is the Magic Kingdom for Geeks

For everyone who’s been picked last for kickball and first for lab, your time has come. I just went to my first Maker Faire in San Mateo last Saturday and was totally blown away. I’m declaring it the most exciting event for geeks in the world. The vast array of geekerie included everything from laser [...]

May 2, 2008

Whatever’s Clever: How to Take Screenshots Like a Pro

This week’s roundup is about screenshots, screenshots, and screenshots: 6 Screenshot Utilities You Should Know About “I use different screen capture utilities depending on the type of screen I’m trying to grab. Some are great for a quick and dirty capture of a page I want to send someone. Others are good for annotating an [...]

May 1, 2008

Why Boring Desktops are Good

Some of us in the office are fed up with beautiful, distracting desktop backgrounds. So we’ve changed them to a medium grey: The solid grey reduces distractions and creates a nice neutral backdrop for design work. But it’s boring. So boring, it makes you want to spend less time mesmerized in front of the computer. [...]

Apr 30, 2008

LifeClever Joins 9rules

Hey everyone, just a quick note: 9rules has invited me to join their community of blogs. So as of today, LifeClever is now an official member of the 9rules network. I’m honored to be in the company of fantabulous blogs including ones I’ve been following regularly: Glenn Wolsey 5ThirtyOne Smashing Magazine LifeDev Dumb Little Man [...]

Apr 29, 2008

The Missing iPhone Ringtone

I love the ringtone at the end of every iPhone television ad. It’s simple, sweet, and unassuming. But strangely, it’s doesn’t come installed on the iPhone. You can’t even buy it from the iTunes Music Store. Fortunately, you can download it here for free: Download iPhone TV Commercial Ringtone To install, just download it. Then, [...]

Apr 28, 2008

Portfolio 101: Pick a Least Favorite

When I review a designer’s portfolio, I love to ask: “Which project is your least favorite?” The answer I loathe to hear is: “Oh, they’re all my favorites and I love them all!” That’s when my eyes roll. The answer’s polite. It’s inoffensive. It’s safe. But it’s also the lamest response you can give. I [...]

Apr 25, 2008

Whatever’s Clever: Terminal Geekerie, Family People, and a Very Clever Witch

Helpful hacks for becoming a Terminal guru Ben shows you how to get your Mac geek on with Visor, the other app from Blacktree–the folks that make Quicksilver. Why I love working with family people “The stereotypical startup dream hire is a 20-something with as little life as possible outside of computers…I should know. I [...]

Apr 22, 2008

Get a Crash Course in Graphic Design

If you’re aching to learn design skills but don’t have the time–or the confidence–then check out Robin William’s The Non-Designer’s Design Book. The approachable, unassuming, and humorous book explains basic design principles in a way that anyone can grasp–from grandmas in Scranton to art directors in New York City. So what are these basic design [...]

Apr 15, 2008

Two Gmail Hacks for Fighting Spam

Mark Roudebush at Method recently sent me two ultra-clever Gmail tricks for tracing and preventing spam. Here’s what he wrote: 1. The Plus Hack You can create alias emails for things like shopping sites, places you know will spam you, or anything you want to track to see who they are sharing your email with. [...]

Apr 14, 2008

LifeClever Gets a Face Lift

Voila! A brand new design for LifeClever is now up. I’ve been toiling on this for the past few months, so I’m very excited to share it with you. Why just a face lift? I had hoped to do more by migrating to Drupal and adding some cool new features. For example, forums. Unfortunately, Drupal’s [...]

LifeClever is Chanpory Rith's website on how to live and work better as a designer. You can check out the archives, grab the RSS feed, or send me a love letter. ;-)