Category Archives: Art

Looking for SWLing Post gear? We’ve got you covered!

Over the years, readers have often encouraged me to create SWLing Post shortwave radio-themed products, which is to say, t-shirts, coffee mugs, and the like. But for some reason, I’ve never gotten around to it.

That is, until now…

SWLingPost-DXFiend-Vintage-Front

What finally motivated me to create these items is a friendship: I’m fortunate to number among my friends the amazingly talented Jeff Murray (K1NSS) of Dashtoons. It occurred to me that I might commission Jeff to design some shortwave radio-themed graphics that represent the broad spectrum of radio enthusiasts here on the SWLing Post. Jeff, ever enthusiastic where radio is concerned, was the perfect artist for the job–particularly since he and I see eye-to-eye on the beauty of both radio innovations and radio nostalgia. And with Jeff’s quirky sense of humor to enliven his sharp, dapper graphics, the great results you see here were simply inevitable.

Of course, his pictures speak louder than my words. As I’ve said, Jeff’s clearly a graphic artist par excellence, and it certainly doesn’t hurt that he really knows radio–inside and out.

SWLingPost-DXFiend-Vintage-Back

While he was at it, Jeff created an SWLing Post logo that will soon accompany a refreshed Post design I’ve had in the works…stay tuned for that as the new year approaches.

In the meantime, I thought I’d share a link to a simple CafePress webstore I’ve put together for our newly-minted swag.

Click here to view great SWLing Post gear.

So far we only have a few select items on offer, but I’ll soon be adding more. But we do have two great t-shirt and coffee mug designs available now: the Radio Waterfall design features the SWLing Post logo superimposed over a blue SDR waterfall, with the words “DX FIEND” emblazoned beneath; the Radio Nostalgia design features the above vintage-style radio image, with”DX FIEND” beneath, and the “SECRET WORLD” image on the back. Take it from me, they look great.

Let me know if there’s something in the CafePress catalog you’d like to own featuring Jeff Murray’s terrific radio art, and I may be able to put it out there for you.

Oh, and by the way–a small percentage of your purchase (typically between $2.00-4.00US) goes towards keeping the SWLing Post online. The rest of the cost goes to CafePress’ product base price. True, I doubt we’ll ever sell enough to break even this way, but who cares…! After all, I do all this for fun, not profit.

Plus I confess to a little personal motivation: I really wanted a Jeff Murray-designed mug for my own cuppa joe!

The great thing about CafePress–although slightly pricey for some items–is that they offer great products, great customer service, and a no-questions-asked return policy. I like that.

large_mug_sdr_waterfall_mugs So, if you take a leap of faith and purchase one of our items, please comment and let me know how you like it!

Side note: If you ever need amazing custom artwork for your QSL cards, your company, or your shack, I highly recommend Jeff Murray. He worked with me over the course of a week to nail down these incredible designs, and wowed me with his powerful creativity every step of the way. It was worth every single penny and more, and an honor to work with him, which is why I hope to have him create even more artwork next year! Thanks, Jeff!

And thanks to our Post readers for your purchase! Go ahead–join me in a hot cuppa!

Wired: Inside Bang & Olufsen

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Beolit 39 from 1938, B&O’s first Radio in Bakelite (Source: Wikipedia, image by Theredmonkey)

On the topic of beautiful radio design, I just read this Wired Magazine article which features photographer, Alastair Philip Wiper.

Wiper has been researching the Danish consumer electronics company Bang & Olufsen for his upcoming book, The Art of Impossible: The Bang & Olufsen Story. He was granted unprecedented behind-the-scenes access to B&O, where he learned about the company’s design philosophy, process and history. Here’s a short excerpt from the article:

“In the mid-1950s, design greats like Arne Jacobsen began experimenting with new materials and colors, galvanizing a wave of mid-century modern Danish furniture makers. Everything was sleek, teak, and handsome—it still is—but exhibits showing off the new pieces had a curatorial problem: no one was making modern radio cabinets, forcing curators to display decidedly outdated designs alongside the stylish new furniture. The technology definitely needed a major overhaul.

Bang & Olufsen joined a handful of radio manufacturers in rising to the challenge. The two men spent a few years doing research and working with architects and designers to design devices as beautiful as they were functional—an approach widely taken for granted today but novel at the time[..]”

I encourage you to read the full article at Wired.com and view some of the photographs in their online gallery. If you’re not familiar with B&O design, do a simple image search online.

The Architecture of Radio iOS and (soon) Android App

A map of languages

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(Source: IFLScience)

This beautifully illustrated infographic (above), designed by South China Morning Post’s graphics director Alberto Lucas Lopéz, shows the most spoken known languages in the world and where they’re spoken by the 6.3 billion people included in the study.

Based on records collated from the database Ethnologue, the infographic illustrates the wide-ranging facts and figures of the world’s living languages catalogued since 1951.

“There are at least 7,102 known languages alive in the world today. Twenty-three of these languages are a mother tongue for more than 50 million people. The 23 languages make up the native tongue of 4.1 billion people,” says Lopez on his infographic.

“We represent each language within black borders and then provide the numbers of native speakers (in millions) by country. The colour of these countries shows how languages have taken root in many different regions,” added Lopez.

You can see the full pie chart in all its technicolor glory here.

Guy shares his nostalgia radio wallpaper for download

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SWLing Post contributor, Guy Atkins, writes:

I’m writing to let you know of a “nostalgia radio” Windows wallpaper graphic I’ve made available to radio hobbyists. This design is called Hertzian Vision, and I created it three years ago for a few SDR enthusiasts/software authors in Finland. I’d like to offer it to your readers too.

My design was inspired by the SPARK Museum of Electrical Invention in Bellingham, Washington, which opened initially as a showcase for antique radios.

Here is a link to a folder with two sizes of the wallpaper:

https://app.box.com/s/33qzg7ouo3sztzzbnd36ylytt1cp7u3y\

The two high resolution wallpaper files are 1920 x 1200 and 2560 x 1440 pixels.

This is a fantastic graphic you’ve created, Guy–many thanks for sharing it with us!

On a side note, Guy also informed me that the SPARK Museum of Electrical Invention also operates a low power FM station, (KMRE) that features old time and classic radio shows. You can listen to KMRE online via TuneIn Radio or several other sources.

All morning, I’ve been listening to KMRE via my SStran AM transmitter though my BC-348-Q. Great fun!

[Update: if you have difficulty downloading the wallpaper via the link above, you can download them directly from the SWLing Post server by clicking here and here.]