Category Archives: Feature Home

Elaine Heinzman

Content Strategist and Information Architect

3 Last-Minute Holiday Tech Gifts

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We acknowledge that it’s late in the gift-buying game, so if you procrastinated on your shopping for Christmas, Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and/or Three Kings Day, Matrix Group has got you covered with three options for the gadget geek in your life.

Nixplay Iris digital picture frame

The Nixplay Iris is a sleek, high-resolution digital picture frame that you can update from your smartphone. It connects to Dropbox as well as the major social-media and photo-gallery platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Picasa, Flickr).

If your parents love to see the most current photos of their grandkids, you can use the Nixplay Mobile app to update the images they see on their Iris. Bonus: Click the Nixplay link above for a voucher code to get free delivery in time for the holidays.

 

Nonda ZUS phone charger and car locator

The Nonda ZUS looks more like something out of the new Star Wars film than a phone charger, but it has another, even better superpower: It automatically saves your car’s location whenever you park.

Are you the kind of person who can’t remember where you left your car? Use the ZUS app to find your vehicle, and connect your phone to the ZUS so your phone can recharge. 

Rocketbook WaveThe Rocketbook Wave is a traditional spiral-bound notebook with some pretty unconventional twists. It comes with a Pilot FriXion pen, which you use like a regular pen to take notes (and which you can buy in office-supply stores everywhere). The Rocketbook app lets you scan those notes and upload them to whichever cloud service you use (Google Drive, Dropbox, iCloud, Evernote).

The coolest part: When the Rocketbook Wave is filled up, you microwave it to clear out all the pages and use the notebook over and over.

Alex Pineda

Creative Director

Top 5 Design Trends for 2015

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With 2014 coming to an end, what can you expect to see in 2015?  Mobile device usage will continue to grow and expand into wearable tech and appliances. We’re already seeing it with TVs. What’s next?  red letter a

Here are some trends to keep your eyes out for:

  • Responsive typography:  You’ve heard a lot about responsive design, but the next thing will be typography. Rather than having fixed type sizes, or relying on users to increase the font size manually, responsive typography will adjust itself to the resolution that’s detected.
  • Responsive design will expand to devices beyond tablets and smartphones. With the explosion of more platforms and devices, responsive design will evolve even further.  Whereas before, responsive design meant taking into account smartphones, tablets and desktops, now it’ll have to include smart watches, TVs and appliances, and more!
  • Parallax, animation and scrolling effects: More and more sites, including Google and Apple, are using parallax techniques, animations, and scrolling effects to feature new products and services. We expect to see more of this in the next year!
  • Bigger Images and videos: With larger resolutions for desktops and tablets, images and even video are scaling up as well.  Airbnb and Flipboard are two examples of sites that use full-width video to great effect. Check them out!
  • Flat Design evolves into Material Design.  Many of you may be familiar with flat design, a design philosophy that removes stylistic elements from websites, giving them cleaner, simpler looks.  Google recently unveiled “Material Design,” a new direction for mobile (and design in general) that uses very subtle gradients, layering, and animation, to keep a sense of the tangible world (physical space and objects) while still achieving all the advantages of flat design.

These are some of the trends we believe that we will see in the coming year. Do you agree? What do you believe we’ll see. Share your thoughts.