Ross Hori

writer | designer | photographer

#Design

Design is a central part of the work I do. These posts cover a variety of topics, from how-tos and techniques, to pieces I’ve created.

Experimenting with Bing Image Creator: is there a time limit for saved creations?

Work: writing, research and design
Thursday, June 8th, 2023

After a week and a half away having fun, I opened Bing's image creator to see what "I" could come up with. What I found was some of my early creations had vanished.

It looks as if it keeps about 2 weeks worth of images, although I can't be certain. I will take a look back in a few days and [keep reading...]

Keyword stuffing has no place in modern content marketing

Work: writing, research and design
Thursday, May 18th, 2023

I tried to read an article on the decline of Japan's department stores and failed miserably. 

What should have been solid analysis on the challenges facing an important sector in the local retail landscape was ruined by keyword stuffing. Content that should have informed and educated, instead frustrated with over long sentences, unnecessary repetition [keep reading...]

Photograph of the front of the old Tokyu Hands store in Sannomiya, Kobe, after it closed. The remains of the

How to use scenarios to improve your business plan

Work: writing, research and design
Thursday, May 11th, 2023

The global InsureTech market is expected [keep reading...]

Graphic showing the potential size of the Insuretech market across three different reports

Should you add a watermark to your graphics?

Work: writing, research and design
Thursday, May 4th, 2023

There's an eternal debate amongst creatives: should you include a watermark? These are the small graphics often overlaid on a photo or illustration that identify who the creator was.

Although this discussion is usually held amongst photographers, I think it applies equally to other creatives. For example, if you're creating charts or diagrams for your blog posts, is some sort [keep reading...]

Graphic showing a junk sailing in a sunset amongst mountains on an inland sea

Smart funnel management doesn’t involve blocking “free” email services

Notes
Saturday, April 29th, 2023

An amusing 30 seconds started with: "Download our [keep reading...]

Photograph of a no-entry sign with a figure stenciled on it as if kneeling in stocks

An isometric office, two color variations and a floor plan added to my portfolio

Updates: the latest news from Ross Hori
Thursday, April 27th, 2023

A busy few days experimenting with different techniques for various projects.

The image above is a red/green toned photo edit using a couple of shots from my old archive. My aim was to create a repeatable color change I could apply to a small number of images in a presentation. Although I've been using Affinity Photo for years, this was [keep reading...]

Two overlaid photographs of the same woman. One is red with the woman frowning, the other green with her smiling

Snapshot from my design workflow

Notes
Tuesday, April 25th, 2023

Most of my work starts as a sketch somewhere on my iPad. They'll find their way to Affinity Designer, get resketched and then I fill in the blanks.

I usually do a side-by-side, so have my sketch artboard to refer to, then duplicate it and "trace over the top." By the [keep reading...]

Screenshot showing how I design an infographic from rough sketch in Affinity Designer to completed product

Brutalism in Nagisa, Kobe

Play: photography, road trips, art etc
Monday, April 24th, 2023

The catchily titled "Hyogo Prefectural Museum of Art" is a monument to Brutalism. Designed by renown architect Tadao Ando, it rises from reclaimed land in Nagisa and rightly draws crowds fascinated by its displays of contemporary art.

While the museum takes the attention, the park next door is also worthy of mention. It continues the brutalist theme with rising columns of concrete, an arena that's perfect for outdoor performances and promenades along the sheltered marina. Even the toilet block joins in, [keep reading...]

Photograph of the promenade at Nagisa in Kobe, showing a series of concrete columns rising from steps used as seats by famililes

How to add a footer to your Apple Keynote slide deck

Work: writing, research and design
Thursday, April 20th, 2023

As much as I love using Apple Keynote, there is one area where it falls down: footers.

Tailoring the footer can be a labor intensive process of copy/paste between slides and hoping you don't miss one. Wouldn't it be great if you could just set up a standard footer and change the presentation name, [keep reading...]

Graphic showing various Apple Keynote slides with footer information in different places

YouTube: what I watch and how I watch it

Work: writing, research and design
Monday, April 17th, 2023

According to my history, I watch about two hours of YouTube a day, most of it on my Sony Smart TV. My Lenovo tablet is used more for comedy over lunch and how-to style videos on technology and software I use. I rarely use YouTube on either my Mac or iPad.

How I consume YouTube is more interesting. You might think spending 2 hours is an awful waste of time, which is what the pure data suggests. However, my observational data from a daily journal shows I rarely just watch videos. I'm [keep reading...]

Infographic showing what I watch on YouTube and what device I use.

Japan’s non-regular workers

Work: writing, research and design
Tuesday, April 11th, 2023

Infographic exploring the non-regular workforce in Japan. These are people in part-time or zero-hour work. Usually they're women in middle age, although the numbers of men over retirement age (65) has been increasingly steadily.

I sourced the data from the e-stat data portal, the official Japanese Government stats database. The data was crunched in Apple Numbers, [keep reading...]

An infographic showing the dynamics of Japan's part-time and zero hour contract workers.

How to create social media images with Affinity Publisher

Work: writing, research and design
Thursday, April 6th, 2023

During the spring I shared a quintet of posts on LinkedIn reflecting on different aspects of business. Each had an image that teased the post's theme based around a common style.

These posts were made for a couple of reasons. On the one hand I wanted to test a style of post to see if it increased engagement (spoiler: yes, but it was marginal). On the other, I tested using Affinity Publisher as [keep reading...]

Screenshot of Affinity Publisher showing two, different designs of the same image side-by-side

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