Around the world in design challenges

Several design initiatives are taking advantage of the “global village” via the Web, and here’s a look at some of them. Perspectives that are completely different from your own—thousands of miles different—are just one way for you to grow as a designer, so take down some notes and get your passport stamped:

How would you illustrate your city?

CitID invites designers to honor their respective cities creating logos for them. Submission is by email and it’s a great way to get acquainted with design sensibilities from every corner of the world.

How would you create a charity site in 24 hours?

FullCodePress pits Australia, New Zealand, and the US against one another in a 24-hour race to build websites for charitable organizations. Last year’s teams designed for RainbowYouth (New Zealand) and NSW Disability Discrimination Legal Centre (Australia), with NZ coming out on top.

This year: Team USA members are already locked in, with no less than Jason Santa Maria at the helm, but applications for the Aussie and NZ teams are still open until May 5th. The showdown happens from June 19 to 20.

How would you build on an existing design?

The Exhibition Season of this year’s Layer Tennis is done, but if you missed all the live action this compilation video provides a great wrap-up. There were some interesting new matches this time, covering typography, motion graphics, photography, video editing, and the return of the 10-city tournament.

How does this color make you feel?

To wrap up this little excursion we’ve been on, here’s a golden resource for all the global designers out there: David McCandless and AlwaysWithHonor.com designed an infographic on What Colors Mean Across 10 Cultures.

Layer Tennis is back!

After the wildly successful first run, I’m delighted that Coudal is gearing up for another season of Layer Tennis, which are live creative matches using Creative Suite software. Heard of Photoshop tennis? It’s a more riveting version of that, since matches will use more than just PSD layers and will play with motion and sound!

The rules: two players—renowned designers like Shaun, Veerle, Jason—must build on each other’s “volley” for no more than 15 minutes. A coin toss by the referee to determine who goes first, which serves as the creative teaser for the weekly matches. And while waiting in between plays, we’ve got witty commentary from the likes of Gruber and Kottke. After 10 rounds, a winner is decided upon by voting in the forums.

Truly a star-studded yet downright geeky spectacle. Every single aspect of Layer Tennis is hilarious, and the attention to detail is just admirable. The icing on the cake? They actually have Adobe as sponsor, again. And why not, since you’d expect them to use PS and Flash anyhow.

Do you have your season pass yet? Don’t forget to subscribe, follow, and fan.