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.

Apr 3, 2008

Supercool typographic posters of supercool cities

Ork Design has some very clever typographic posters of famous US cities. Each poster shows the neighborhoods of a city arranged as a typographic map. Cities include Boston, Brooklyn, Chicago, Manhattan, and best of all, San Francisco. It’s sweet candy to the distintiguished designer’s eye. Cost is $20 for posters that are offset printed. If [...]

Apr 1, 2008

5 useful Quick Look plugins for designers

Quick Look in Leopard is super handy for instantly previewing files such as Word docs, Quicktime Movies, PDFs, and HTML files. But what about previewing file types that designers care about? You know, like Illustrator, InDesign, Freehand, Quark, and Flash documents? Unfortunately, Quick Look doesn’t natively support them. Thankfully, a few plugin developers have come [...]

Mar 28, 2008

Adobe launches Photoshop for the web

As if there aren’t enough permutations of Photoshop, Adobe’s just launched Photoshop Express. This web-based version of Photoshop enables you to quickly crop, touch-up, distort, and apply effects to any of the billions of images you’ve taken with your cam. I haven’t delved in too deeply yet, but I’m fairly impressed with how well it [...]

Mar 25, 2008

Portfolio Day might make you cry, but it’s worth it

If you’re looking for a design job right out of school, then AIGA Portfolio Day is your best chance to schmooze with local designers who might be hiring. Even if you’re not looking for a job, it’s the best way to get useful feedback on your portfolio–even if the reviewers make you cry. Just remember, [...]

Mar 24, 2008

What Happened to the LifeClever Magic?

Long time reader Jason Sanders recently sent me an email: I have to say: I loved your site. It was a great combination of design tips and productivity. I even learned how to properly format my resume from your article “Give your resume a face lift” which helped me get a job. Thank you. But [...]

Mar 10, 2008

Get all the latest lifehacks with Alltop

Can’t get enough lifehacks? Head on over Alltop, a new site by Guy Kawasaki and friends. The Popurls-inspired site brings you the latest stories from popular lifehacks sites such as 43 Folders, Lifehacker, and Zen Habits. Oh, and LifeClever too ;-) You’ll also find pages for a wide range of other topics including design, mac, [...]

Feb 25, 2008

Work + School + Life = Impossible?

Okay, the Discrete Math class I’m taking is kicking my ass. I did pretty well during the first half of the course, but now the amount of work is intensifying. I’m learning lots, but is it really possible to work full time, take classes, blog, and still have a fabulous designer life? I’m beginning to [...]

Feb 14, 2008

Where to Find Greeting Cards that Don’t Suck

Being a designer is a curse. Why? Because everything around you looks like crap. That includes menus, signs, websites, business cards, and worst of all, greeting cards. Go down the greeting card aisle in any drugstore, and you’ll soon be overloaded with banal cartoons, flowers, and kittens. And don’t even get me started on the [...]

Feb 13, 2008

What I’ve Been Up To

I’ve been a little quiet lately and just wanted to let you know I haven’t fell off the face of the earth. Although I hate talking about myself, here’s what I’ve been up to and why I haven’t posted very much recently: I’ve decided to continue my edumacation and am taking a course at Stanford, [...]

Jan 29, 2008

What Michelangelo Can Teach You About Good Design

After marveling at Michelangelo’s statue of Goliath-vanquishing [David,][1] the Pope asked the sculptor, “How do you know what to cut away?” Michelangelo’s reply? “It’s simple. I just remove everything that doesn’t look like David.” While I’m not totally sure of its accuracy, the conversation still offers three very sage design lessons:

Jan 9, 2008

Can’t Miss: Macworld Expo 2008, Baby!

It’s that happy-joy-joy time of the year again. Yes, Macworld Expo kicks off next week in San Francisco on January 15th. Steve will be delivering the keynote, and is expected to entice Apple fans with a new mouthwatering product. The rumor mills are abuzz with whispers of an overhaul to Apple’s notebook line and the [...]

Jan 3, 2008

1Password to Rule Them All

It’s tough keepin’ up with the gluttony of “insanely great” Mac utilities. Everyday, VersionTracker lists scores of new apps ready to tweak, optimize, and organize all the crap on your computer. For the most part, I ignore them. Usually, they’re so buggy and poorly designed, I just send them straight to trash after trying them [...]

Dec 21, 2007

Happy Holidays from LifeClever

We are closing shop for the holidays from now until January 2nd, 2008. We wish everyone a safe, restful, and clever holiday. Thank you for sticking with us, and see you in new year!

Dec 18, 2007

Unstuck Your Writing With an Email

Dear Reader, I have friends who write effortlessly like superheroes. Crank 500 words in 2 seconds? No problem. Others sweat uncontrollably, hyperventilate, and tremble at the mere thought of writing. If writing stirs a panic attack in you, try this: start with an email. Instead of launching an imposing behemoth like Microsoft Word, call up [...]

Dec 12, 2007

What’s Your Morning Ritual?

In the movies, people wake up to happy birds chirping and the sweet smells of coffee brewing. In fantasyland, everyone is a perky morning person. I’m not. Far from the picturesque cereal commercial, my mornings are a blur. Get up, feed the kitties, bathroom, shower, dress, get to the bus. All in 30 minutes. No [...]

Dec 5, 2007

Why Rejection is Good for You (and Me)

For the past year, I’ve been anxiously anticipating the relaunch of Macworld’s website. I had completed the design in 2006, but after a year, the site curiously had not changed… Until this week. On Monday, Macworld launched a beta version of their spanking new site. For readers, it was an early holiday present. For me, [...]

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. ;-)