For an upcoming show at the Barbican Art Gallery, French artist Céleste Boursier-Mougenot has set up an environment for finches to be musicians. By setting up electric guitars to be the only perches for the birds to stand and play on, they are left with little choice but to make music. What's astonishing is that the little birds seem to enjoy it and try to enhance the sound more by using sticks. This is a fascinating exploration into the relationship of music to all living things in the world. I would love to see this but unfortunately I don't think I will be in London anytime in the near future.
If there's one thing that REALLY annoys me it's wires! Yeah, it seems silly since we think that we need them. In my mind, even as a kid, I thought there must be a way to transmit electricity with out wires or at least figure out a better way to power our appliances and gadgets. Well, as luck/fate would have it, Marin Soljacic at MIT has finally got the technology at a point where it will be widely available in the next few years!! I first heard about this a couple years ago on MIT's Technology Review website (it's one of my favorite sites! yeah, so what I'm a nerd.) but at the time it was big and impractical. In addition to just making sense and being more convenient, this could have major impact from an environmental perspective. Of course, companies will not stop putting wires on products anytime soon but in the future we will hopefully see a dramatic decrease in the use of PVC & copper for wires. Wires actually account for a major percentage of PVC consumption. There's also the environmental perspective of just how an area looks. whether in your house or on the street, wires are an unsightly eyesore. Think about how much better Tokyo will look without the wires everywhere!
I could go on and on about this but read about it more on his company's website- WiTricity
Just a couple of months ago I posted THESE amazing flat speakers coming out of Taiwan. And now I see these that were actually published even earlier. I think the ones from Taiwan will actually sound better though but still these are amazing!
A groundbreaking new loudspeaker, less than 0.25mm thick, has been developed by University of Warwick engineers, it's flat, flexible, could be hung on a wall like a picture, and its particular method of sound generation could make public announcements in places like passenger terminals clearer, crisper, and easier to hear.
Lightweight and inexpensive to manufacture, the speakers are slim and flexible: they could be concealed inside ceiling tiles or car interiors, or printed with a design and hung on the wall like a picture.
This is the first time I've really seen this phenomenon on video. Too bad it's such low quality but still beautiful to watch. There's a photographer, I think Italian, who does some great black & white photos of this sort of thing too. Sorry, couldn't find the name in the few minutes I had to post this...was in Seed Magazine about 6 issues ago.
If you're slightly crazy like me, you've thought about the possibility of flat, flexible speakers and if you're even partially out there you've considered paper speakers. Well, our dreams our becoming a reality. Scientists in Taiwan have developed a flexible paper speaker by sandwiching paper and CNTs together.
”Aside from use in family, stereo, or automobile hi-fi equipment, it can also be used in earphones or for industrial antinoise purposes,” says Johnsee Lee, president of Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI), where the technology has been under development since 2006.
The device, named fleXpeaker, is basically a sandwich of paper and metal filled with an electroactive polymer that contracts and expands with an audio signal’s electric field.
”It’s soft [and can] easily fit in different curves,” says Ming-Daw Chen, division director of ITRI’s Electronics and Optoelectronics Research Laboratories. ”Therefore, the product customization can be done in diverse fields, such as art for public facilities, interior design,...costume accessories, and others.”
I doubt these will ever fully replace traditional cone speakers but for many applications these will hopefully become the standard. Read more about it >HERE<
I'm sure many of us have thought about the possibility of adding to our body's natural architecture. Well Australian artist known as Stelarc (Stelios Arcadious) actually does! Seen here is one of my personal favorites called simply Ear On Arm. The artist went through a series of surgeries to have a prosthetic ear implanted into his arm with a microphone that would send audio to the web. Yeah, really intense and just in the name of art. Think about the possibilities. Here's a brief explanation in the artists' own words.
I have always been intrigued about engineering a soft prosthesis using my own skin, as a permanent modification of the body architecture. The assumption being that if the body was altered it might mean adjusting its awareness. Engineering an alternate anatomical architecture, one that also performs telematically. Certainly what becomes important now is not merely the body's identity, but its connectivity- not its mobility or location, but its interface. In these projects and performances, a prosthesis is not seen as a sign of lack but rather as a symptom of excess. As technology proliferates and microminiaturizes it becomes biocompatible in both scale and substance and is incorporated as a component of the body. These prosthetic attachments and implants are not simply replacements for a part of the body that has been traumatized or has been amputated. These are prosthetic objects that augment the body's architecture, engineering extended operational systems of bodies and bits of bodies, spatially separated but electronically connected.
Definitely go to his site and learn about his other crazy projects such as 1/4 Scale Ear and Ping Body. Click > HERE <
I hope I never need hearing aids but now at least there are options to make my hearing as good or possibly better than before. Plus, I can have music right in my ears via external source- MP3 player, radio, etc... These are attched to your bone behind your ear via small titanium screws that sense vibrations. So, it's basically like dolphins' ears (which have some of the best sense of hearing in all of the animal kingdom by the way). Read more and get your nerd on > HERE<.
Ok, back from a little hiatus....I'll be posting a lot over the next couple weeks though to make up for it. I've seen and heard a ton of great things to share but let's start with something that will only happen once in our lifetime. If I had the money I would have flown over there just to witness that.
On July 22 was the longest solar eclipse the earth will witness this century. Unless you were in the right part of Asia you would not be able to see it though. You can find out more about the event from NASA. Speaking of NASA, this eclipse also comes at the same time of the 40th anniversary of NASA pulling off the greatest hoax in history. (the alleged moon landing...ugh, don't get me started on that!!)
In case you didn't know, today is a very important holiday that is often forgotten- Pi Day. Yes, as in the mathematical constant, π. To learn More go to the official site of Pi Day
Scientists seem to be confused about these 'mysterious' columns of light appearing in the night sky of Sigulda, Latvia. I have carefully examined the pictures online and can say that aliens are definitely here. Those are obviously beams of light from alien spacecrafts. Trust me, I'm an expert. The real question is why they decided to reign down on Latvia? Click HERE to see more evidence and read the article.
For over a century people have been trying to find inventive ways of electricuting themselves at home. Well, finally a group of socially conscious designers have developed an adapter specifically for sticking your fingers in the socket. No longer will you need to worry about fiddling around with forks or wire. You can find out more about this at the designer's site- ArtLebedev.com
This one is actually a 'real' woman and not android although she may as well be. She is extremely brilliant and beautiful. Her name is Neri Oxman and if you're geek or just into material science, architecture, design or art you already know the name or at least her work. I forget name pretty easily unless I'm reminded again. In this case, when I was reminded it was one of those, "Duh! Of course I know her work!" kind of things. Amazingly, she's still working on a pHD in Design & Computation from MIT. Her body of work is very extensive and her list of awards and achievements is probably as long as she is tall. She's studied all over the world, been showcased in Seed Magazine and featured in nearly any architecture or design magazine around the world, been in shows at museums around the world, spoke at several lectures and somehow stays very grounded. Perhaps it's her medical background and growing up in Israel? In any event, she is destined to become one of the major players in architecture, design and material science in the 21st century. So what does she do?
" M A T E R I A L E C O L O G Y was formed in 2006 by Neri Oxman as an interdisciplinary research initiative that undertakes design research in the intersection between architecture, engineering, computation, biology and ecology. As such, this initiative is concerned with material organization and performance across all scales of design thought and practice. Material is interpreted merely as any physical entity which corresponds and reacts with its environment. As such, it seeks to promote and define a design research agenda which is ecological in nature, in ideology and in material practice; it aims at embracing the evolving elements of change in both (and indeed related) social constructs and environmental descriptions of the ever changing built environment."
For a proper explanation of what she does, just go to her site- MaterialEcology
To see her most current award or project go to her Blog
Sure I post a lot of crazy things that all have merit but truth be told, I'm not really into most high-end design other than eye-candy. Furniture design mostly bores the shit out of me..'product design' is usually pointless or wasteful..automotive design is relatively stagnant..and overall, most so-called industrial design is only concerned with commercialization and catering to only about %15 of the total world population. Sure, people need jobs but there is plenty of money and opportunity to be made by doing good and charitable things as well. (hint* governments, charities, philanthropists...) The stuff that really matters to me is the stuff that actually does something good and positive for people that need it most. The industrial design profession a whole lacks actual visionaries with the drive and passion to do something good for anyone besides themselves and their own careers all for the sake of money. Which is probably why some of the best actual industrial design comes from scientists and engineers who are sincere about doing good and are empathetic to people's needs. Prime example is the Life Straw that is helping millions of people to have cleaner drinking water and thus be healthier (those scientists are PAID!!). The OLPC program is also worthy of mentioning as well as the Play Pump program in Africa.
Anyway, what you're looking at is an amazing invention that is enabling thousands of people with bad eyesight to see clearly again. A scientist at Oxford developed a way to make an easily modifiable lens with two thin membranes that shape according to the amount of water in-between them. The patient can do it themselves and adjust each lens to what's best for them by pushing or pulling a water-filled syringe. Once adjusted, they just take the syringe off and tighten the screw. The over all costs are immensely cheaper since they only have to produce one lens and this also saves huge amounts of money and time with distribution. The intent is to distribute 1 billion pairs over the next 11 years with a target cost of only $1. Oh, and he's just doing this to do it and takes no money from this project. Surely, these form of these glasses could be refined but all things considered, this is great design. Read the article..
Thank you science! Finally I can have a pet just long enough to love it and be sad when it dies in just 1-3yrs time. Scientists have cloned sheep, grown teeth in petri dishes and teleported metal. So, some of these mad scientists got together and thought this would be a great idea. You get the best of both worlds: you get a pet programmed to your needs AND you get to question humans' involvement in nature, life and death. This reminds me of that lesson that's taught to kids...you know, the one where the parents buy the kid a pet chicken, let the kid start to love it, then chop it up and eat it for dinner. Wait...you weren't taught that lesson?! Well, it was a good lesson and a delicious meal. This has me thinking..what do GenPets taste like?
I love this kinds of installations that are funtional, fun and question human behavior and consciousness. One such project opens tomorrow in Dale, Norway. People from anywhere in the world will be able to call a phone number and broadcast their message over the fjord for the people in Dale to be annoyed with. Telemegaphone is the pre-project for something larger (and probably more annoying) called Parafunctional Payphones by Unsworn Industries. My guess is that they are going to hate the artist for erecting such a thing. I'm going to get extra drunk just to talk to myself and broadcast it to the people there to let them know I AM their messiah! muwahhahhahahahahahaha... Or maybe I'll just say a bunch of jibberish in a Swedish Chef accent. Yeah, I know they're not in Sweden but does anyone know what a Nordic accent sounds like?! Ya?
Some of you have probably seen this already on the interweb but for those that haven't, it's called Golden Shellback and it is amazing!!! It was developed for the marine industry but somebody there had an epiphany- we all have electronics and get near water. Except for me, I avoid water unless it's mixed with fermented hops & barley. I haven't showered in years either...that's what deodorant is for.
Global warming exists. Nobody will deny that. The problem is that we have being led to believe that it is all due to humans. This is not the case. I'm one of these people that likes to know 'why?' so I've done some researching into this matter quite a bit over the last year. People really thought I'm crazy when I said that there is no way global warming could only be due to humans. I remembered learning about the earth having several shift in climate in various regions long before humans and certainly millions of years before this new industrial era. What really amazes me though is that a lot of people that would deny that humans are not solely at fault are also people that denounce the way in which advertising has infected our society. Well folks, the human-caused global warming campaign is one of the biggest advertising scams ever!
I will say, however, that the intent is for the right reasons and I do not believe the people behind that train of though are seeking to steer people in a wrong direction. The threat of us as humans causing the earth to fail is large enough to make people more conscious about the way they consume and discard objects. Because of this higher sense of awareness it has forced companies to, once again, be more responsible both socially and environmentally. It is great to see the changes being made because of this threat and I advocate these efforts to promote more recycling, upcycling, sustainability and so on. Yes, we have done A LOT of damage to the earth and we do need to acknowledge this and change our ways. There is no denying that humans do contribute a percentage to global warming but guess what- so did the dinosaurs. Pollution and global warming are both separate and intertwined topics facing our modern societies.
My point is that I just wish that the public were told both sides of this story. People should also take a few moments to do some of their own research and balance out what they learn. I'd like to hear what some of you think about this.
Here's a clip from the movie "What The Bleep Do We Know? (Down The Rabbit Hole)". More specifically it's from the 'quantum edition' which allows the viewer to watch the movie in potentially infinite ways by jumping in and out of 'rabbit holes' of information. By information I mean rants by people who don't know much but are really, really good at wondering and observing. By not knowing much I mean that they only know about 100 times what most of us morons do but still, I think they're on drugs. Yes, drugs of information that they vomit back at us morons who don't know what the bleep they're talking about.
Oddly enough, this really is one of my favorite movies and I do actually understand what they're talking about. I love all this nerdy shit though. It doesn't make my brain hurt either because I've been smart enough to fill my brain mostly with beer and junk food.
I highly recommend watching the other clips or just do yourself a favor and rent or buy the movie. Make sure you get the second edition and rent it for at least a week or so to assure you have time to get through even half of the bonus features.
Like most planets, earth too can be a terrifyingly beautiful place. One can't help but to look in awe at the intense beauty and forces that our planet constantly shows us. These pictures taken by Carlos Gutierrez of the Chilean volcano, Chaitin, eruption in May was one for the record books. It spewed ash 12miles (about 19k into the air) and released ash and thick lava for about a week. The most astonishing visuals were seen during a 'dirty thunderstorm' surrounding the volcano.
Read and see more pictures from this event: here here and here
Gizmodo got an exclusive tour of the Lego manufacturing facility. I've seen quite a bit of these types of videos and have seen some things first hand but this process blew me away. To mass produce small objects like this on such a massive scale and to do it with such precision and quality is truly magical. Their automated sorting and storage 'cathedral' system is brilliant. Thanks Gizmodo for taking the time to present this to the world. Maybe Lego will someday make their products from recycled plastic and promote recycling their products?
National Geographic is more than just a magazine used a source for 'boobies' for pre-pubescent boys. The take pictures of lots of other naked stuff in the world too. Their photography is always top-notch and never gets old. I haven't checked this site in about 6 months but it's not like they add a new gallery that often either. Highly recommended!
In the picture is part of the Toxic nudibranchs series. You can see the rest of that gallery here.
Be sure to browse around National Geographic .com too! But beware, you will be trapped into looking and reading for hours!
A good way for your music to NEVER be heard (but also never bootlegged)
So some scholar of the highest order of nerd-dom thought of a genius way of distributing and selling music without all the hassles of worrying about how many people would bootleg it or even buy it. Seriously, unless you have an old NES gaming system you will not be able to listen to this. Well, maybe you could visualize what it sounds like but somehow a grey case with a sticker on it does not scream 'awesome synesthetic experience' to me. I guess i'm not a total nerd yet. I am enough of a nerd to know that NES rom's have a very limited capacity and probably cannot even handle music that's actually worth listening to. So, thanks ( whoever made this ) for making crap music that nobody can listen to. There is a download option for people that don't just happen to have an NES.
I did hear this shit is all the rage in Azerbejan.
I'm a sucker for manufacturing process videos. Especially when it's about my favorite drug. They're leaving out a lot of info but these are still very informative. I would recommend digging deeper though. Let me know some more about this process, history or materials. I'm always trying to know more about anything dealing with vinyl, phonographs and DJing. (make sure to watch part 2)
Heather Ackroyd & Dan Harveyhave been doing some amazing art with grass since the late '90s. The most notable being their explorations in photographic photosynthesis. After realizing that the color of grass can vary greatly depending on the amount of light it gets they developed a process to make negatives to allow for this process. Read more about them and their process here
I've owned a copy of this book for quite some time now but I just discovered this video. It's crazy, funny, weird and interesting. It's an interesting idea but probably not something I can fully subscribe to.
Here's a few new explorations into graffiti worth checking out:
PaintThatShitGold allows you to bomb any other site on the web. It's part of the promotion for Atmosphere's recent album (I don't know if it's the most recent one)
Graffiti Playdo allows you to do graff with other people over the web.
Green Works' Reverse Graffiti is a really cool project. So simple but thought provoking in different ways. Thanks to one of my professors, Tony G from Grow Design, for letting me know about this. You can see a lot more pictures of these pieces on Flikr
Tagged In Motion is insane!!! I love the blend between the primitiveness (yes, it's a new word now) of graffiti with the cutting edge computer/tech/geek/vr stuff. This still blows me away when I watch it. I first saw this about 6 months ago and it's stayed in my mind since then so it's pretty damn impressive.
Hektor is another project I've known about for a while (although I was late...it's a few years old). It's essentially just a couple of motors and a string that moves the can of spray paint around. It makes the images from basic vector art and then figures out the path that it must go in to produce the art, similar to a CNC machine.
Seriously, you may never use these materials for any projects but knowing what's out there is super important. Sure, this doesn't have everything that's in the book but you can find more information elsewhere. This is still very good starting point. I would highly recommend buying a copy of the book (for me! I'll let you borrow it though)
Get your minds out the gutters ladies..this isn't about me! (wink)
This is about a building tuned mass damper in the worlds' tallest building- Taipei 101. Read more about it here> It was put to the test recently during the massive earthquakes that rocked China and it worked as expected. Watch the video below.
Good to know: I'm not the only person with this theory
I'm not a scientist by any means although I love learning about scientific things. I am however into thinking about logical or practical theories to explain things. Such as, aliens really coming from the center of the earth and not the center of the universe...you know hard core logic based on fact and empirical evidence. We don't even know where the center of the universe is. Sorry ladies, you are not the center of the universe. That would defy logic and based on the evidence it would appear that the earth remains completely still and everything is moving around us...so, there you go, the center of the earth is where aliens come from.
Ok, back to serious reality land is the pangea theory and plate-tectonics. Even as a kid i thought it made more sense that the earth was at one point much denser and the surface was all land. Seriously, how else would all the land mass go back together unless the earth was smaller but contained the same mass. Plus, the earth is heating up and as things heat up they expand. Therefore, it would make sense that the earth is in-fact expanding. I stopped sharing this with people since it is an unpopular theory and was tired of it being called crazy, weird or dumb. I'm not surprised to learn that other people have thought this but am pleased to see that some lunatic made a video. It's ok that I call him that because he is...c'mon, he's a comic book author! Those people are scare me more than animals that look like plants.
This is a piece I first learned about a few months ago from an issue of Tokion I was reading. I'm a sucker for real heady art & sound installations and experiments. But I'm especially intrigued by projects that cross into understanding and interaction from the general public. Recently two prize winners of Absolute Vodka's "Absolut Visionaries" initiative built a remarkable instrument. The first part of Absolut Visionaries is Absolut Machines with a multi-layered question "In an Absolut world, would machines be creative?"
Dan Paluska & Jeff Lieberman have built an instrument called Absolut Quartet that receives data that you input from your computer from any where in the world via internet, then teaches itself a new composition no matter how seemingly random your keystrokes seem to be. This part of the project is amazing in itself and would be impressive if it were just generating computer based music but these guys are nuts and took it much further. They liked the sound of a marimba but just having mallets strike the keys was too simple for them. No, they have balls that are launched and strike the notes at just the right time then bounce off. There is also an organ and drum sounds but they are really just in the background.
This is an amazing feat of engineering, design and programming. Figuring out the delay needed must have been a challenge, but then to program each motor to propel the ball at different arcs and speeds with regards to the size & weight of the balls is an entirely different challenge. And, of course, the balls can only hit one note or else it will mess up the sound. Oh yeah, and part of this quartet is wine glasses w/ water or oil in them that turn underneath some apparatus that makes them produce sound. In case, you're wondering, yes, each part of the 'quartet' plays their own part the same as people would. This is like the Telematic Drum Circle on drugs although, that is an interesting piece as well. (you can find that on youtube as well) I'm pretty upset that I didn't get a chance to make a composition on it. Oh well.. Hopefully, I will get chances to work on future projects such as this one.
Here's a couple videos involving magnets. The first one is one of many videos I've seen with FerroFluid (an oily fluid with magnetic particles suspended in it). This was developed by Japanese artist, Sachiko Kodama.
The second video is from some company called NASA. They're not too good at making movies although the technology the used is amazing. They might be better suited for space science and aeronautics.
(I love this picture by Rajesh Kumar Singh)
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