Podcast Tech

Nerdy Details: The Apple iPhone 16’s Camera Control Button

Apple’s Johnnie Manzari and Rich Dinh share insights on the new control and how it helps people capture more photo/video opportunities in this special episode of Design Tangents

Josh Rubin, Evan Orensten

20 September 2024

We love getting into the nerdy details of design innovations and the iPhone 16‘s new Camera Control button presented a perfect opportunity to dig in. For this first podcast of our new Design Tangents series aptly named Nerdy Details we sit down with Johnnie Manzari from the Apple Human Interface team and Rich Dinh, Senior Director of Product Design, to talk about cameras and photography through the lens of the new control on “the world’s most popular camera.” Camera Control represents years of collaboration between Apple‘s design and engineering teams and the unassuming feature packs a punch, elevating the iPhone’s photography capabilities through a combination of hardware and software innovations.

According to Dinh, who leads the iPhone design team and has worked on all 16 generations of the iPhone, the control’s design was meticulously considered down to the smallest detail. “The amazing thing when you look at the button is it is flush, and so for day-to-day use we’re hoping that the phone feels very much like your phone today in terms of how you grip it and handle it, but we’ve added a little chamfer in there to give that really lovely half press and full press experience with the button flush.” This attention to tactile feedback is complemented by the use of premium materials like sapphire and stainless steel, ensuring both durability and a premium feel.

The control’s capabilities extend far beyond a simple click. As a human interface designer, Manzari explains how utilizing a force sensor and a capacitive sensor enables a range of adjustments, from composition to exposure. “By lightly pressing on the button, you signal to the phone that you are intending to take a photo. That led to all sorts of interesting new experiences that we started to design.” This level of control and customization elevates the iPhone’s camera to new heights, empowering users of all skill levels to capture their vision. Tune in to Design Tangents to learn more about all the nerdy details of Apple’s new Camera Control.

Subscribe to Design Tangents on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify, so that when each episode comes out it’ll be ready and waiting in your player of choice.

Design Tangents is produced and edited by SANDOW Design Group. Special thanks to the podcast production team: Rob Schulte, Hannah Viti and Rachel Senatore and to Amber Lin for creating our show art.

Podcast Culture

Katie Longmyer: Design Tangents Episode Sixteen

We sit down with the misfit-magnet and cultural pioneer to discuss community, human connection and more

Josh Rubin, Evan Orensten

17 April 2024

With a high-energy presence that pulls in everyone around her, Katie Longmyer is a self-proclaimed misfit, as well as a misfit-magnet who has built cultural experiences that so many others cherish. Her array of professional accolades—from chief of staff to one of the founders of WeWork to managing director of acclaimed creative agency Mother’s New York office to co-founder and CEO of the footwear startup Proto, which she just left—are rivaled only by her creation of one of NYC’s most successful parties at The Standard High Line’s rooftop, Le Bain, and the founding of the Brooklyn Electronic Music Festival. For this episode of Design Tangents, we spoke with Longmyer about her career arc, the peaceful power of Shibari, collaboration, connection, AI and more.

For Longmyer, community began in nightclubs. “I often say that nightclubs saved my life,” Longmyer shares. “In New York, I found clubs and people and I was surrounded by creatives. We were always just sitting in a club and someone would have an idea and we’d all pile onto it. A week or two later, a project would emerge. That manifested into so many things.” Simultaneously, she began to work in the music industry by day, and paired this corporate path with the people she met and skills she acquired through nightlife. This led to the creation of Good Peoples, an organization that launched careers (and marriages) and encouraged a mission to foster a collective, creative community.

One of the threads of Longmyer’s path is about connection. “My creativity expression is people. I am painting with the people,” she says, acknowledging that she thinks about community every day. It’s also about addressing communities in flux. “A lot of people talk about culture from the nascent communities that it comes out of and wanting to keep it small and, you know, ‘don’t sell out.’ What is better than everyone consuming what you made? I want people to feel it and be impacted by it. The way you do that is execution.”

Nightclubs continue to inform the way she problem solves and engages with others. “I will forever be a club kid. I am always looking for my community there,” she adds. “It’s something I will never put down.” Longmyer is not only seeking out community, she is forging it to develop safe spaces for other misfits. Tune in to Design Tangents to learn more about the development of Proto, the importance of her Gel-X stiletto nails, social media as a tool for connection and more.

Subscribe to Design Tangents on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify, so that when each episode comes out it’ll be ready and waiting in your player of choice.

Design Tangents is presented by Genesis and produced and edited by SANDOW Design Group. Special thanks to the podcast production team: Rob Schulte and Rachel Senatore and to Amber Lin for creating our show art.

Podcast Tech

meriko borogove: Design Tangents Episode Fifteen

Nerding out with the ever-insightful designer, engineer, director and photographer

Josh Rubin, Evan Orensten

4 April 2024

It’s challenging to reduce the immensely influential, future-defining contributions of meriko borogove—a designer, engineer, director and photographer, as well as a close friend to COOL HUNTING—into a smattering of introductory words. For instance, though you may not know her name, if you’ve used an Apple device with a camera, you’re familiar with her work. borogove led the team behind the creation and development of the company’s cameras for years, starting with the iPhone. A warm, insightful human being who uses her grasp of technology and passion for creativity to forge togetherness, borogove experiments in the worlds of VR and AR. As a part-time contributor to ScanLAB Projects, a London-based art and technology studio that believes 3D is the future of photography and cinematography, borogove questions the future of audiences, devices and performance. In this latest episode of Design Tangents, borogove enlightens us with tales from her early days at Apple, shares the origin story of the iPhone’s camera, offers up thoughts on Vision Pro, and even the essence of connection with spatial computing.

borogove took a temp job at Apple on the QuickTime team in 1995—years before joining the team that would imagine the iPhone. “We didn’t sleep for a year and a half when we were launching the phone,” she says. “I remember knowing it was going to be important, that it was going to be big, but none of us really understood” what they were creating.

“We were such a small team on the first iPhone. We all did a lot of things,” she continues. “I was responsible for power and performance. I was responsible for the QA team. We built all the demos that Steve launched with. I was also really embedded and responsible for the media stack— graphic, audio and sound” components. borogove also worked on the company’s Camera RAW and Aperture software before Apple made the first phone. It gave her insight into computational imaging and a vision for what an iPhone camera could do. “I believed we should not be competing with camera phones, which all sucked,” then, she says, “but I knew that we could be competing with point and shoots and DSLRs.”

Her world after Apple has demonstrated a commitment to exploring the convergence of technology, artistry and community. It’s led her to a co-director role of a production with the Berliner Ensemble to a professor position at Royal Holloway, University of London. Whether it’s through her iPhone camera, or the LIDAR technology employed by ScanLAB, borogove maintains her passion for photography, as well.

Ultimately, she’s hopeful for our technological future. “I believe that there is a generation that is going to be dreaming past us and building past us and I believe it is going to be multidisciplinary,” she says. She also wholeheartedly believes that the next generation of creators understand that we must all start from a place of respect. To hear more of borogove’s insights—like never swipe through other people’s camera rolls, or pay attention to the future of volumetric capture—tune in to Design Tangents now.

Subscribe to Design Tangents on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify, so that when each episode comes out it’ll be ready and waiting in your player of choice.

Design Tangents is presented by Genesis and produced and edited by SANDOW Design Group. Special thanks to the podcast production team: Rob Schulte and Rachel Senatore and to Amber Lin for creating our show art.

Podcast Design

Willie Williams: Design Tangents Episode Fourteen

The visual experience director on shape-shifting breakthroughs at The Sphere and designing quirks into his spectacular work

Josh Rubin, Evan Orensten

20 March 2024

Though Willie Williams, or Treatment Studio, the London-based experiential design firm he co-founded, might not be household names, the creative alchemist has helmed visual projects for some of the biggest names in music history—from David Bowie and George Michael to Lady Gaga. Working behind the scenes, Williams has translated his famous clients’ desires into indelible, inspirational memories for their fans. Not only has the visual director worked with U2 for 40 years, he masterminded the shape-shifting breakthroughs behind their residency at The Sphere. It was in Las Vegas that we sat down with Williams for the latest episode of Design Tangents, to discuss the future of live entertainment, his lifetime of journaling and the value of only working with people that you like.

Over his decades in the industry, Williams has been behind a series of technological firsts in live entertainment, from the use of 360-degree screens to augmented reality—all on a quest to match spectacle and simplicity. “My goal really is always to show people something they haven’t seen before or help them imagine something they haven’t imagined,” he tells us. It begins as a visual process. “There are moments. There are scenes. We ask, ‘What if we can create something that looks like this? ‘You get milestones and the task of the show then becomes how you move between these extraordinary moments.”

“We are not the main attraction here,” he adds. “It’s what we do for these performers.” Williams and his team turn their visions into realities by figuring out the technologies that can make them real. “You never start with the equipment,” he says, “but at the same time I instinctively know if something should be possible in a year’s time or not.”

One of our favorite attributes to work by Treatment Studios is the inclusion of Easter eggs, which were abundant in The Sphere’s U2 residency. “It’s partly a need for self-entertainment,” Williams says. “It’s also to do with morale because keeping a team buoyant is really important when they’re working long hours and away from their family. It gives people an opportunity to play.” Williams equips concertgoers and event attendees with the opportunity to play. To learn more about why he believes community will be at the core of the future of live entertainment experiences, and why fun will always be a necessity, tune in to Design Tangents now.

Subscribe to Design Tangents on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify, so that when each episode comes out it’ll be ready and waiting in your player of choice.

Design Tangents is presented by Genesis and produced and edited by SANDOW Design Group. Special thanks to the podcast production team: Rob Schulte and Rachel Senatore and to Amber Lin for creating our show art. Discover more design podcasts from SURROUND at surroundpodcasts.com.

Podcast Design

Jonathan Adler: Design Tangents Episode Thirteen

Insights (and vocab lessons) from the beloved potter, interior decorator and author

Josh Rubin, Evan Orensten

6 March 2024

Decades ago, we first met potter, interior decorator and author Jonathan Adler when he worked at a film talent agency by day and threw clay during nights and weekends. In 1993, Adler—an irreverent, fantastical designer with a mighty vocabulary—launched his first collection of ceramics at Barneys. It was an opportunity that would begin to shift his future from design outsider to industry leader. From the opening his first boutique in SoHo to an eponymous design company with retail locations worldwide, Adler’s maintained his integrity and authenticity. In the latest episode of Design Tangents, we speak with the multi-hyphenate about the essence of utopian design versus dystopian build, adopting a signature flourish and more.

Adler, who spent nearly a decade as a full-time production potter, is always imagining something new. “So much of my work does start in my pottery studio but I see it as a means to an end rather than a meditative pursuit,” he says. “Today, I have a very insular craft-based design practice which started in clay and moved into a squillion different materials, voices and categories.”

Authenticity, an innate desire to express himself through creation, and a willingness to learn, experiment and explore all informs Adler’s success. “I say yes to everything,” he tells us, “and I recognize that many of my yeses will probably lead to unexpected opportunities.” He notes that it was never his intention to forge a design empire. In fact, he didn’t even think of himself as a brand. He just made things—and continues to make things—because he enjoys it.

To learn more about Adler’s future, as well as the influence of AI, new technologies and the virtual world on his design process, tune in to Design Tangents now.

Subscribe to Design Tangents on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify, so that when each episode comes out it’ll be ready and waiting in your player of choice.

Design Tangents is presented by Genesis and produced and edited by SANDOW Design Group. Special thanks to the podcast production team: Rob Schulte and Rachel Senatore and to Amber Lin for creating our show art. Discover more design podcasts from SURROUND at surroundpodcasts.com.

Podcast Design

Paola Antonelli: Design Tangents Episode Twelve

From the welcoming nature of Milan Design Week to the themes of MoMA’s research and development salons, insight from one of the most influential voices in design

Josh Rubin, Evan Orensten

21 February 2024

One of the most influential voices in design, the architect, author, editor and Design Emergency podcast co-host Paola Antonelli is the Senior Curator in the Department of Architecture and Design at NYC’s Museum of Modern Art, as well as the museum’s founding Director of Research and Development. Antonelli has been with MoMA since 1994—and she’s been a friend of COOL HUNTING for nearly two decades. Eloquent and always straight forward, she continues to set a standard for design curation. In our latest episode of Design Tangents, she touches upon her expansive work, the welcoming nature of Milan Design Week, the conflict of design for good versus design for violence, and so much more.

More than wax poetic, Antonelli’s musings are anchored in an understanding of the power of design. “Culture, creativity, design, architecture: they are not just luxuries or necessary, functional things,” she tells us. “They really are a way to deal with living together in a world that is more and more complex and hard to inhabit.”

“Design is a real force to be reckoned with,” she adds. “It’s an enzyme that helps with progress. Without design, great revolutions could not come to life.” Part of Antonelli’s mission is explaining that to public audiences, while preventing them from feeling like design is an elite term that’s out of touch. In fact, it all began with her MoMA exhibition Humble Masterpieces, wherein she explained to visitors that everyone has a museum-worthy design collection in their desk drawer.

In 2008, as the world was engulfed in a financial crisis, Antonelli grew tired of observing that, “whenever there is a crisis, culture is the first to be considered superfluous.” She felt that MoMA had an opportunity to show that culture could provide the nourishment that society needed—that it could be a testing ground for the way we will live in the future. “We can show that museums and other cultural institutions can be the R&D of society,” she says of the initial idea.

A few years later, MoMA began a research and development focus dedicated to this concept, with Antonelli at its helm. As a result, critically acclaimed MoMA R&D salons continue to tackle future-forward topics, from the tactile to abstract. Attendees are provided a reading list in advance and high-level dialogue commences. “We are showing the world that museums are life,” she adds.

To learn more about the salon series, Antonelli’s thoughts on her own podcasts, as well as insight on the current MoMA exhibition Life Cycles: The Materials of Contemporary Design, tune in to Design Tangents now.

Subscribe to Design Tangents on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify, so that when each episode comes out it’ll be ready and waiting in your player of choice.

Design Tangents is presented by Genesis and produced and edited by SANDOW Design Group. Special thanks to the podcast production team: Rob Schulte and Rachel Senatore and to Amber Lin for creating our show art. Discover more design podcasts from SURROUND at surroundpodcasts.com.

Podcast Design

Maximilian Büsser: Design Tangents Episode Eleven

The punk rock provocateur of Swiss watchmaking on creating to fulfill your own desires

Josh Rubin, Evan Orensten

7 February 2024

Our latest Design Tangents podcast guest, Maximilian Büsser (who we have known for more than 15 years) is nothing less than a renegade in the very traditional Swiss watch world. As the founder of MB&F he’s continued to surprise and delight watch and clock collectors globally with his visionary pieces—and draw attention to historic partners. In 2014, Büsser was the subject of a COOL HUNTING Video, and one year later we collaborated with the pioneering provocateur on a COOL HUNTING Edition Starfleet Machine. His work manages to be both futuristic and nostalgic—bound by a sense of wonder. Celebrating Swiss watchmaking, human craftsmanship, and mechanical art, MB&F’s creations are much more than time-telling machines (though they do that too).

Büsser began in the traditional watch industry. As a child, he thought he’d be a car designer and studied engineering. However, he ended up at the prestigious maison Jaeger-LeCoultre, back when it was a small brand and at a time when the world did not know what to do with mechanical watches. After seven years at Jaeger-LeCoultre, several as its CEO, he moved to luxury powerhouse Harry Winston, where he began to amass considerable success. “Watchmaking saved me,” he tells us. “It gave me a family. It gave me a life. It gave me a purpose,” he says.

However, there was a disconnect between his success at Harry Winston, his relationship to his own father, and his desire to do what he believes in and be proud of it. He started to imagine a small, disruptive company of his own. In 2005, he stepped away from the mainstream and began to redefine what watches could be. “MB&F is a life decision,” he tells us. “It is not a business decision.”

Büsser is full of advice. “Stop creating to please people. Try to create for yourself,” the entrepreneur says. “That’s not something you’re brought up on. I want to create something that I love.” Büsser adds that, at first, he didn’t know what he loved and part of the process with MB&F has been uncovering it. To learn more about what’s inspired him, how he has upended the industry and what he hopes for the future of the brand, listen in to Design Tangents now.

Subscribe to Design Tangents on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify, so that when each episode comes out it’ll be ready and waiting in your player of choice.

Design Tangents is presented by Genesis and produced and edited by SANDOW Design Group. Special thanks to the podcast production team: Rob Schulte and Rachel Senatore and to Amber Lin for creating our show art. Discover more design podcasts from SURROUND at surroundpodcasts.com.

Podcast Design

Suchi Reddy: Design Tangents Episode Ten

Diving into the dance between emotion and logic in the design process with the acclaimed architect, artist, teacher and neuroaesthetics practitioner

Josh Rubin, Evan Orensten

24 January 2024

Our latest Design Tangents podcast guest, Suchi Reddy has inspired COOL HUNTING writers, editors and readers for years now. The founder of the architecture, art and design firm Reddymade, Reddy is an architect, artist, teacher and a practitioner of the mantra “form follows feeling.” Her roster of perspective-shifting works includes the mesmeric large-scale installation “Look Here” inside Washington DC’s National Building Museum, the immersive “me + you” sculpture for the FUTURES exhibition at the Smithsonian Arts and Industries Building, the beloved “X” pavilion for Times Square Arts and a range of residential and commercial architectural projects including Google’s first retail store. Reddy, a passionate thought leader in creating spaces that make us feel, was the ideal guest to discuss the dance between emotion and logic in the design process; her insights inform and inspire.

The breadth and depth of Reddy’s work is unified by her values and distinct perspective. “I do not look at people’s work and say that’s interesting to me because of a style,” she tells us. “It’s interesting to me because of its substance—because of the idea that’s being explored. People ask if I’m a modernist? Yes, I am. But mostly, however, I’m a serenist. I will make whatever you want—but serene. If you’re a maximalist, or a developer that wants a beautifully energizing space, that’s what I’ll do, because I want to try to understand the feeling of the space or project that I need to communicate.” Reddy wants to direct design conversations around style to that of “the democratic space of the body. I want people to be able to understand spaces through their senses, through their feelings.”

For Reddy’s practice, art and architecture work in tandem. Her contributions to the public art space also allow her clients access into her brain. “My practice is quite unusual in that it covers architecture, interior design, public art installations and artistic works. We’re also interested in the research that underpins the workings of neuroaesthetics, a study that looks at how spaces and experiences impact our brains and bodies.” Through neuroaesthetics, Reddy designs an agenda of equity, equality, agency and empathy for all that she creates.

“21 years into doing this, what keeps me going is the fact that I feel this incredible satisfaction when something is made,” she says. Whether her work manifests as a private residence, or a collaboration unveiling at Milan Design Week, it is predicated on an understanding that we build our worlds outward from our bodies—and feelings will always influence our intepretation of everything that we see. Listen to the latest episode to learn more about the ways that form follows feeling.

Subscribe to Design Tangents on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify, so that when each episode comes out it’ll be ready and waiting in your player of choice.

Design Tangents is presented by Genesis and produced and edited by SANDOW Design Group. Special thanks to the podcast production team: Rob Schulte and Rachel Senatore and to Amber Lin for creating our show art. Discover more design podcasts from SURROUND at surroundpodcasts.com.

Podcast Culture

Zane Lowe: Design Tangents Episode Nine

We kick off of our second season with Apple Music’s head of artist relations, podcast host and lead anchor for Apple Music 1 Radio on diligence, instinct and what makes for a great interview

Josh Rubin, Evan Orensten

10 January 2024

To kick off the second season of Design Tangents, COOL HUNTING’s podcast exploring the creative processes and inspirations that drive change-makers, we needed to lead with a voice anchored in passion and wisdom. That was what brought us to Zane Lowe’s studio at Apple Music in LA, where we sat down with the influential host. Lowe, once referred to as “Pop’s Unofficial Therapist” by the New York Times, is Apple Music’s head of artist relations and the lead anchor for Apple Music 1 Radio, and hosts the The Zane Lowe Interview Series and The Zane Lowe Show podcasts. Lowe’s roles are owed to his intuitive skills at interviewing and his passion for music—born from a need to find a place where he felt understood. In our insightful conversation, Lowe shares his thoughts on diligence, instinct and what makes for a great interview. He also relishes us with a tale of an interview that changed his life and taught him there was space for him to be both a fan and do his job.

In 2015, Lowe spearheaded the efforts behind the launch of Apple’s Beats 1 Radio, which transformed into the renowned Apple Music 1 Radio, helping usher in a new era of music broadcasting. Throughout his tenure, Lowe has learned about the importance of structure and balance, and the power of listening. “I was terrible at being present when I was younger, only up until very recently have I felt like I’ve been in practice on that,” he shared with us. “It’s a practice for sure and it will be forever. That’s where self-awareness comes in handy.”

Lowe is known for presenting his questions and interpretations to his guests in the most thoughtful way. He notes that it’s about reading the energy of the room—and being as informed as possible in advance. “I cannot talk to you unless I’ve heard your music,” he says. “That, to me, is research 101. The number one thing I have to do, and I’ve said this before, is that I have to feel the music. I have to know the intention, from my perspective, of the music.”

“Music doesn’t get put in the same descriptive categories as some of the other arts,” he adds. “It’s been so successfully commodified and commercialized and distributed as a packaged product that people often forget that it’s not the intention most of the time.” Lowe seeks to uncover why each track has been made—and his listeners benefit from his curiosity. Tune in to learn more about Lowe’s process, what moves him and a recent experience that set a new standard for sound experiences.

Subscribe to Design Tangents on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify, so that when each episode comes out it’ll be ready and waiting in your player of choice.

Design Tangents is presented by Genesis and produced and edited by SANDOW Design Group. Special thanks to the podcast production team: Rob Schulte and Rachel Senatore and to Amber Lin for creating our show art. Discover more design podcasts from SURROUND at surroundpodcasts.com.

Podcast Design

Matty Benedetto: Design Tangents Episode Eight

Our inspiring conversation with the self-described “evil genius” inventor and content creator

Josh Rubin, Evan Orensten

21 June 2023

Behind more than 400 inventions over the last four years, serial creator Matty Benedetto—the founder of Unnecessary Inventions—is as prolific as he is entertaining and inspiring. A self-described “evil genius,” Benedetto works from a studio in Burlington, Vermont, solving problems, assembling unexpected creations and sharing content to millions of loyal fans on Instagram and TikTok. Benedetto makes for a thrilling guest on our latest episode of Design Tangents, where he provides insight on social media success, being authentic first and foremost and operating as a one-man company surrounded by nothing but ideas and his machines.

Benedetto’s entrepreneurialism began when he crochet ski hats—at age 13—for his friends. By the time he went to school for business and marketing, he already had his own company. Our paths first crossed in 2012, when we became obsessed with his cloth iPhone cables. “I am just jumping from one idea to the next at all times,” he tells COOL HUNTING. “Every few years I need to reinvent what I am doing.”

I see the final image of the invention in my head before I start making it. I work backward

After his first invention when viral on Reddit, Benedetto volleyed his online success into a series of (often silly) problem-solving pieces. “All of my inventions I create, I see the final image of the invention in my head before I start making it. I work backward,” he explains. These have ranged from the Burrito Bumper (which funnels spillage into a taco) to a Tic Tac organizer (which stifles the jangling sound inside a case), as well as Airsticks (AirPods paired with chopsticks) and Gator Grip “Croc” gloves (which led to a cease and desist letter). None of these have ever been for sale. That’s not the point. “With the internet these days, you have to do something that’s unexpected to be noticed,” he adds. “Everything’s been done a million different ways, a million different times.”

Benedetto often makes the astounding possible—and encourages others to do suspend disbelief and do the same. “A lot of people give themselves false roadbloacks to bringing something to life that they want to see. I think I ignore all that,” he says. With a new board game on the market (after a year and a half in development), Benedetto also has a product people can take home. Learn about it all at this episode of Design Tangents now.

Subscribe to Design Tangents on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Spotify. When each episode comes out it will be ready and waiting in your player of choice.

Design Tangents is presented by Genesis and produced and edited by SANDOW Design Group. Special thanks to the podcast production team: Rob Schulte, Hannah Viti, Wize Grazette and Samantha Sager and to Amber Lin for creating our show art. Discover more design podcasts from SURROUND at surroundpodcasts.com.