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Blanka and Candy have invited 50 leading designers and graphic artists to produce 50 images for an exhibition to celebrate this year’s 50th anniversary of Helvetica.

The exhibition launches in London at the Design Museum and also will appear at the Image Now Gallery in November for Design Week in Ireland. The event is also currently set to visit Edinburgh, Leicester, Newcastle, Paris and New York, ith Sydney, Berlin and Copenhagen [TBC].

Each artist has produced a 50cm x 50 cm print in an edition of 50, available online from blanka.co.uk for £50 each.

Looking for business card design inspiration? You could do worse than visit the Business Cards Flickr pool.

Blade Runner - one of my favorite movies is 25 years old this year.

It was one of the most critically underrated movies at the time of release but has proven to be one of the most influential science fiction films.

My favorite scene from the movie is the famous “tears in rain” soliloquy from leader of the renegade replicants, Roy Batty (pictured) played by Rutger Hauer - you can hear it by clicking the audio player above. Apparently the words “like tears in rain” were not written into the script and were a spur of the moment adlib from Hauer.

A great article written by special effects wizard Adam Savage can be found here - Blade Runner at 25: Why the Sci-Fi F/X Are Still Unsurpassed.

UPDATE: 01.11.07 - Wired Magazine interview with Ridley Scott.

Cool - quite literally…!

More here.

A monograph of the work of product designer Naoto Fukasawa has just been published by Phaidon.

Formerly working at IDEO and currently design director at ±0, this Japanese designer is notable for his signature of clean and simple product design for clients such as Muji and Issey Miyaki.

Adopting a radii of 2.5mm to the edges and corners of many of his products - apparently this has been observed as the natural radii that evolve at the edges of planed pieces of wood as they wear away through use over time - Fukasawa has this to say about his typically zen-like approach to product design.

“Design means observing objectively. It means being aware of our living nature, a simple element in the larger environment. I like it when a project doesn’t sell my name or my characteristic, when it is just an object that happens to be there… no, not anonymous, just natural.”

+ Naoto Fukasawa - available here
+ Naoto Fukasawa on Metropolismag
+ Naoto Fukasawa Q&A in Wallpaper

Laughing all the way to the bank… to the tune of an estimated £55 million.

It turns out that Hirst had little to do with the actual crafting of the skull - the work was carried out by jewelery makers Bentley & Skinner in London. You can read about the making of Damien Hirst’s diamond skull on Supertouch.

It is quite beautiful… but is it art..?

Shockingly bad so it is.

So if, like me, you don’t like the new branding for the London 2012 Olympics, get it changed here.