founding team @opacityhq · founded https://xitter.cf/t.co/ng85Rubu9M (acquired) · founder @forum_tokyo · designer / builder in japan
fukuoka, japan 福岡
Joined May 2010
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it's OFFICIAL, @forum_tokyo is back after selling out last year. 🇯🇵
mark the date:
February 17th-19th back in Trunk hotel in Shibuya, Tokyo. this time a slightly bigger venue to fit more attendees.
if you came last year, there's a surprise for you...
...you're a founding member.
and founding members today can secure their tickets before it opens to the public.
clink the link below 👇
tokyodesignforum.com
had a call with a designer in sf last week who asked for advice. two things i told him:
1. show up
put your work somewhere it can be found. tweet, communicate, inject yourself into the conversation.
then breach that digital wall.
go to the meetups and conferences and meet people in person. that's how you build a network in this industry, and there are more meetups now than ever.
2. give it your all
when i was young and freelancing, i had this defensive mindset. protect the contract. "that's line 2A, outside scope."
then it switched. they hired me to do this project, so i was going to do the best version of it. the extra mile, the attention to detail.
most people do the bare minimum, that alone puts you ahead.
brian benitez retweeted
A few of you have asked about buying passes for a group, or sponsoring a pass for a designer who couldn't make it otherwise.
You can do both now! Email (hello@tokyodesignforum) or DM us and we'll send you the details 🙏
brian benitez retweeted
Keepsweeper winning 2nd place in Best Game at @RevenueCat’s Shipaton: $10,000.
Sharing it with my 12-year-old son and co-designer: priceless.
i've been copying other people's work since second grade.
freehanding the nike swoosh in my spiral notebook, italic letters and all.
then every tutorial on psdtuts.
then dribbble. i'd see something sick, put the original on top as a hidden layer and try to match it pixel for pixel. reverse engineering layers from a flat image. "ok, this blur isn't the same as that blur, so it's a different effect."
same reason an engineer takes apart an alarm clock. how did they get from a blank canvas to this?
take killer work and redo it yourself. just don't post it as your own.
"brand engineer" is going around right now.
i use it for lack of a better term, but the label matters less to me than what the role actually turns into.
to me it describes a brand designer who can build tools or products with taste and vision at its core.
for example, recent motion stuff i've been doing for zoah (@OpacityHQ) came from a video/motion graphics tool i built. before everything lived in prompting, so i built a canvas where me and the agent can collaborate.
i even pointed it to zoah's code repos and it created a video (with sound design) of what we'd shipped.
what the role takes now:
- translating your taste and vision to agents
- building your own tools that are usable, shareable and fit the product
- creating systems, workflows for tasteful output without human intervention
- staying on top of the models, because each has its strengths and weaknesses.
that's what the term means to me. building stuff with taste at a scale one person couldn't before.
i'm building @forum_tokyo website entirely with opus 5.5.
i fed it the brand system, last year's website, feedback from sponsors and attendees and my @granola transcripts.
basically gave it a lot of different data inputs, plus my intention around taste and the level of polish i wanted.
it built the venue in 3D, lanyards with real physics you can grab (it was built following a blog by @vercel), a speaker list where every photo prints in halftone and more.
to get to a higher level of output with ai, you have to understand the craft and the steps in order to get a successful outcome.
but also, it is a lot of trial and error, which you just have to accept.
how could you not love ai?
in the last few weeks/months, i built:
- a native mac app that runs my whole home studio: lights, camera and mic
- an animation tool for @OpacityHQ to create marketing assets
- the new @forum_tokyo lp, internal dashboard, without ai this event would be hard to pull off alone
and plenty of other things that i can't probably remember.
being a designer now feels creatively unbound, i can just build stuff, and it's only a matter of energy and time.
it is such a powerful time to be a designer.
illustrations for @nytimes in collaboration with @TBrandStudio
these were drawn by hand with an illustrator at my studio.
been posting a lot of AI-generated stuff lately, so this one is a bit refreshing.
the canvas is the codebase ✨
The Tesla demo was incredible! but, if you make software, this @OpacityHQ demo is JUST as crazy!
YOUR codebase, connected to the canvas IN REALTIME!
Edit from the canvas, and your codebase is INSTANTLY updated! Works in local, dev, or (dare I say) prod!
No waiting for AI to code out your components, no dev mode, no copy/paste. Real code components, in real-time.
WHO'S READY!? 🙌
Doors are open, and everyone's invited 🎟️
A welcome night, then two days of talks in Shibuya, Feb 17-19, 2027.
We saved you a seat!
tokyodesignforum.com
brian benitez retweeted
Introducing new vector tools coming to Zoah:
Sculpt, drag, and paint with brushes that animate as they reshape the path.
Every stroke stays a real, editable vector, rendered live.
Doors for Tokyo Design Forum 2027 are open to everyone 🗼
Back in the earlier days, the design community was super tight-knit. As the industry grew, we lost a lot of that.
@forum_tokyo is my contribution to help bring it back: one room in Tokyo where anyone who cares about this craft can show up, meet each other and leave with friends.
The first 72 hours went to the people who came to year one. That was a thank you for taking a chance on something brand new.
If you've been waiting, thank you for your patience. You're in. Can't wait to hang in Tokyo!
See you in Shibuya, Feb 17-19 🙏
tokyodesignforum.com
