The 2008 Team Jersey designs are percolating out. There is a trend and as Michael Jackson says “It don’t matter if your black or white” since every jersey for 2008 seems to be either black or white.
Team CSC have gone from a very cool kit design that was somewhat consitent and evolutionary to a completely different look that is strong on white. The 2008 design is different since the team switched clothing sponsors from Descente to Craft. No, not the processed cheese company with a K, but the Scandonavian company with a C known for some classy clothes.
The new design is based on a concept about teamwork. Team CSC is known for it’s teamwork and cohesion. What better way than to show something of each rider in the design itself. This idea came to the kit designer and the idea basically flowed out.
”The Team CSC 2008 uniform is a tribute to the team itself. A uniform, which represents each rider and at the same time also representing them all as one unit. The idea comes across in the new “signature pattern.” A pattern created from each individual rider’s signature in a graduation from black to white. Where black is a pattern created from all the signatures and white is an open light pattern, which enables you to see the individual signatures. In this way each rider “signs himself on” to the team and at the same time signs his commitment to Team CSC’s beliefs and values,” says Inger Tanderup Klixbull, who has also designed the team’s previous uniforms.
If you look closely below the signatures show up in the detail. Nice touch for a kit to have intricate detail on close view. From TV and far away you see the overall design, but in pictures and closeup view you get some fine details.
I am not expert designer, but I did design Maxpowercycling.com’s team kit last year and I am sending out the 2008 design. As a designer you have to take a step back and do the squint test. See what type of impression the design gives. The signatures with the black lines and random curls give off a hairy look. If you do not notice the signatures up close the design looks like clumps of pink and black hair.
The overall look is like a hairshirt that is neatly cropped.
Maybe the design needs a few more iterations to cut down the hairiness aspect and emphasize the signatures.Until then all I am thinking is that I need to get my back waxed and my legs shaved before spring.
Having a large computer mounted to your handlebars is not quite so odd anymore. With powermeters and GPS devices it is not unusual to see maybe more than one gadget. Check out a pic from my recent ride.
(Things are starting to get crowded)
The Cerevellum would like to be the next cool gadget to mount on your handlebars. The gadget is still in the concept stages with a few prototypes already developed. The core feature is a video display from a rear -facing camera mounted on your handlebar ends. The rearview screen is an evolution of the large SUV mounted cameras that allow you to see what is behind without craning your neck. This was a necessary feature for gigantic SUVs and it seems like a natural extension to cycling.
The concept of having a video display showing the view from behind you is nice for many reasons. First off you can throw out those helmet mounted mirrors. They look dorky. Next you have the safety of seeing what is coming up behind you which is very important especially in high-traffic areas. For racing you can look behind to see if you have a gap when attacking or see if the person behind you is suffering so you can go on an attack.
The advantages are great, but compare a $300+ video display that requires you to look down vs. an ever-present $20 helmet mirror, the idea of looking dorky and having a couple of bucks in your pocket is not bad.
The initial prototype took a Nintendo handheld unit with a camera mounted in the ends of the handlebars. The battery life was enough for a two hour ride. The full production concept looks to go beyond the simple functionality of the rearview camera called Hindsight. After all, the Hindsight camera features does take up a portion of real estate on you handlebars, so to make it more viable they feel the need to incorporate more functionality. The functionality will not be built by Cerevellum, but they will create a new standard use of “modules” where functionality can be added or removed by plugging little devices into the bottom of the device. The plan is to allow other companies to build modules that would add functionality to the main unit such as GPS, Powermeter and anything else.
The marriage of the various components looks to be ambitious since you have to ask major industry players to build a new product that would plug into the hindsight base unit. The concept is great, but how do you get Garmin, Polar and others to build these units?
http://www.cerevellum.com/
CNet: Crave Post
