Panoramas, Stephen Wiltshire, visits Sydney

Stephen Wiltshire is an architectural autistic savant artist and is known for his ability to draw a landscape after seeing it just once. He studied Fine Art at City & Guilds Art College. His work is popular all over the world, and is held in a number of important collections. Stephen is currently in Sydney, Australia.

He simply absorbs any architectural and or street-scape he visually inspects. You'd also have to wonder if he stores in his memory every drawing he ever made or whether he wipes the hard drive every now and again ?


Peter Murphy has captured a panorama of Stephen at work, recreating his view of the city at Customs House, Circular Quay. Check out Stephen's blog here, or view a panorama of his awesome 10 meter long drawing of Tokyo here.

Perhaps you'd appreciate a live web-cam feed of Stephen performing his unreal photographic memory in action. Hey and there's heaps of video in place when his not in the field of vision - until May 1.

The concept train that never stops at a station

I have to say that I have from time to time in my life pondered such a dynamic possibility and low and behold some Chinese engineers seem to have brought this about, that is, on the drawing board.

The train, is a split level Transrapid, essentially two types of carriages one above the other. The lower half is the always moving carriage, or the actual high speed train and the top of the roof has a key  groove running the entire length. This groove accommodates the upper level carriage which transverses the length of the lower carriage as it pulls into and out of stations. The animation video is a little disconcerting with a superfluous promotion banner and in Mandarin. Be that as it may, the sliding traversal concept is pretty cool.

This proposed design is one whole new mega industrial infrastructure project, except perhaps for the already existing transrapid components in current use. The train running at around 500 kmh simply off loads and up loads commuters as it passes through stations, via the slower moving carriages on top.



I was so taken by the initial engineering sketches of the Transrapid when the whole idea of a linear motor powered locomotive emerged from German and Japanese engineering teams, that I penned a poem, (which I've been known to do from times ago) celebrating the arrival of a high speed train running on a cushion of air in the local newspapers. Some time after this there was a consortium of company's in Western Australia led by Janet Holmes A'Court proposing a national Transrapid infrastructure project.  The naive or perhaps, somewhat simplistic poem is entitled Safety First

Planes fall out of the sky
Cars slide into fly
Trains skid off the track
Whereas Transrapid
Will always bring me back

The Real Group : A cappella in Acapulco

The Real Group are a internationally popular Swedish A cappella Choir and I really like  the underlying meaning in this swinging entertaining song.

The lyrics of this particular song are a play on a common expression in music. The double meaning of the song is to be yourself and that people have a lot in common despite different exterior appearances.

Man as Industrial Palace: Retro Physiological Animation

In this video, Henning Lederer has animated a historical poster by Fritz Kahn entitled Man as Industrial Palace (1926), who is considered by many to be the founder of conceptual medical illustration.

"Kahn produced a series of books during the 1920s on the inner workings of the human body using metaphors of modern industrial life. His modernist visualization was fitting since he was writing during a time of great industrial and technological change, especially in Germany." (Source)

Although we now know more about the human physiology than Fritz Kahn did, Henning Lederer in this preview clip has merely kept the illustration relevant to the 1920's interpretation. The sound design by David Indge similarly depicts the action in the animation with vintage industrial sound samples.

Puss in Boots accompanied by cat guitarist

 playing Bolero, and in the background, ceiling cat is peering down into the scene. Some people may think this fake, but everyone knows that cats can both wield sabers and play guitars !

Otherwise, this hilarious video was produced with Adobe After Effects and the coolest part of this video is the cape gliding in the wind from the window he's looking out, but the little guitar playing Mariachi cat is really the cute one, huh ?

In case your interested; "Puss in Boots", is a French literary fairy tale about a cat who uses trickery and deceit to gain power, wealth, and the hand of a princess in marriage for his penniless and low-born master. The tale was written at the close of the seventeenth century by Charles Perrault.

Amazing Trompe-L'oeil Fire cube Illusion!

Here, we see an anamorphic cubic illusion or Trompe-L'oeil with just a flat row of 400 lit candles, which increased the heat of the room by 10 degrees.

A Trompe-L'oeil or anamorphic Illusion is a type of optical Illusion where an image can only be viewed from a certain angle or perspective. From other angles the Illusion seems to nothing much in particular, but will only seem complete when viewed from the correct vantage point.

In case your wondering the music piece is "Shazzam", by Frederic Chopin.

Here, is a Trompe-L'oeil drawing of a disappearing car that I posted a while back.

TheRaven

is a recently released cleverly produced low budget sci-fi pilot trailer, using 3D effects and 3D modeling and animation.

"Chris Black possesses a power that could lead to the destruction of the current regime, and they will stop at nothing to destroy him. The chase is on as Chris runs for his life in this sci-fi thriller set in an alternate and futuristic Los Angeles."

Credits
Director : Ricardo de Montreuil
Producers: Ricardo de Montreuil & Eliz Eskeranli
Writers: RIcardo de Montreuil & Antonio Perez
Cinematographer: Andres Sanchez
Composer: Angelo Milli
Special Effects Supervisor: Aaron Burns
3D Modeling and Animation: Juan Somarriba and Francisco Concha
Visual Effects and Compositing: Ricardo de Montreuil
Editing: Ricardo de Montreuil
Color Correction: Santiago Padilla
Budget: $5k
Format: RED 1920×1080

You can find concept drawings and production sketches of TheRaven here.

E-Ink Newspaper display concept

is a cool semi-transparent E-Ink newspaper conceptual display. The virtual art video was likely made in a sophisticated video editing application, possibly Final Cut Pro. It was created by MFA student Scott Liao in collaboration with Manny Darden and Jay Yeop Kim.

The real E Ink according to the Wikipedia "is a specific proprietary type of electronic paper manufactured by E Ink Corporation, founded in 1997 based on research started a the MIT Media Lab. Currently available commercially in gray-scale only and commonly used in mobile devices such as e-Readers and to a lesser extent mobile phones and watches. The material is processed into a film for integration into electronic displays" particularly for e-Readers such as the Sony Reader and the Amazon Kindle among others.

Flexible/fold-able displays aren't anything new. Nor are interactive content or E-Ink. It's bringing these concepts together in a workable package that might take some time.

TechRestore disassembles re-assembles iPad

The first thing that strikes you about this video is the uniquely creative sound effects of this stop-motion animation tear-down treatment. It's pretty fun to watch. Apparently it only took 4 minutes of real time to pull it apart and re-build it !

Critically speaking there seems to be more than enough space within the enclosure to have a camera, an SD Card reader or a simple USB port in it, surely ?

But hey, isn't this all part and parcel of an Apple product ? Or are there production issues to be considered when building a completely new product ?

I tend to think that apple build the simplest which becomes the cheaper option available for the market, then listens to its critics and responds in the next generative model. I'd certainly be interested in reading your opinions in the comments section of this post.

Octopus Camera Operator

A free diver finds himself in an octopuses garden down at Wahine Memorial, Wellington, New Zealand, and ends up with an entertaining documentary of an octopuses desire for some fun.

"While trying to get video of a wild octopus, it suddenly dashed towards me and rips my shiny new camera from out of my hands, then swims off, all while the camera is recording! he swam away very quickly like a naughty shoplifter. after a 5 minute chase, I placed my spear-gun underneath him and he quickly and curiously grabbed hold of the gun as well, giving me enough time to reach in and grab the camera from out of his mouth. I didn't feel threatened at all during the whole ordeal. he seemed to be fixated on the shiny metallic blue digital camera. the only confusing behavior was how he dashed off with it like a thief haha. cheeky octopus."

Music by: Vincent Gillioz, Car Chase and Dalmatian Rex and the Eigentones with, Octopus I Love You.

The video was filmed with: a Panasonic Lumix DMC-FT2 (also called the DMC-TS2) in 720P movie mode. Filmed and edited by: Victor Huang.

A man builds world's biggest beer coaster house

Sven Goebel from Germany has fulfilled his dream of building the biggest house made of beer coasters in the world and has sealed his Guinness World Record, by pulling it down.

He used over 300,000 coasters to create walls and furniture for the house. But to claim the record title, he had to prove no adhesives had been used to hold his structure together.

Goebel delivered the final proof that nothing but statics has been holding the coasters in place and with one little pull on a string, and a few taps of his foot, Goebel sent thousands of coasters and hundreds of working hours crashing down, to demonstrate that no glue or other substance joined the little cardboard mats.

Source

Tri-dimensional mapping: Illuminated Apparel 2010

Creativity comes together with fashion, music, and video projection.  Between dance, happening, and design, this event,  by collaborative team Lumina Motion,  has, perhaps, created a new art form !

The video projection technique is using tri-dimensional mapping on the models and surrounding walls.
Credits:
Make up: Minata Mus make-up studio
Models: Francisca Benavides / Macarena Cox

Apparel design by Loreto Correa

Production & Art Direction: Germán Gana / José M. Ramos

Music: Sixteen by Le Tigre

The Axolotl is the luckiest animal in all of Mexico

now they have two songs about them. One from the gifted singer Yma Sumac who had an impressive 5 octave vocal range and exotic persona that made her an international sensation in the 1950s, (link).  Nevertheless, Axolotl's are cute but critically endangered Mexican mole salamanders. They're also adorable since they smile a lot.

One thing you probably didn't know about the Axolotl, though, is that they're neotenic, meaning that they basically look the same when they're old as when they were young.

The unique thing about the axolotl is that, under the right circumstances, they actually will metamorphose into what you and I think of as a typical, semi-aquatic salamander.

The axolotl can be induced to metamorphose by drinking salamander goo, and here's an almost surreal entertaining song about it by Rather Good's Joel Vietch.

A Fun Animation: Big Catch Movie

A fisherman sets himself upon the end of a long pier but unbeknownst to him lurks an unexpected possible tragic end. This delightfully entertaining animation was written, composed and directed by Moles Merlo.

He used Maya and composited it in Shake and Rachel Chapiteau provided the shark's voice

The sound design was created by Baptiste Thiry, be sure to check out his cool audio interactive website.

Asteroid – WIP

Johannes Timpernagel in this animation is playing with different settings of an opens ource software VVVV-patch using an unsharp-vignette with a radial b&w-gradient-map.

Music track is Gogol by Gonzales.

Hydrofoam: One heck of a RC boat !

Oh what fun the Radio Remote Control 3-in-1 Hydrofoam looks in this video.

Wouldn't at all be surprised if you could  use  an iPhone or iPad or similar wifi gadget with it. I was surprised though that I couldn't seem to find any on-board video views ?

The 3 in 1 hydro flying remote control plane boat is built with model plastic and foam construction, super tough lightweight airframe, uses a brush-less motor and is sold with a 4 channel transmitter receiver.

See a close up image of the Hydrofoam here or go get yourself one here.

Pixels: New York under attack by old-school video game

This fun animation is by Patric Jean and shows New York under attack from a slew of classic 8-bit characters being destroyed bit by bit, thanks to some truly stunning special effects. I assume using something like Maya for modeling and effects. Maybe After Effects or Maya again for compositing and match moving.

Might be worth pointing out there's no such thing as an 8-bit pixel. Technically speaking those are voxels.

My favorite part is when the Tetris blocks level buildings one row at a time.

Tidy Laundry Robot

We live in hope that in the near future or perhaps one day real soon now, many of the mundane chores that many of us given to have to complete in any one day will be done by robots.

Take for instance ironing and folding ones clothing and garments as an example that many of us need to complete on a regular basis, how many of us would dearly love to pass this chore over to a programmed mechanical rattler. Well we may be in luck, researchers at UC Berkeley recently used Willow Garage's PR2  two-armed mobile robotic platform to fold towels. The video here shows a robot successfully folding and sorting towels into separate groups and moving between one table to another.

I do like how the robot takes its time when meticulously examining each towel, except one has to keep in mind that the video is shown at 50X speed. It’s elegant in its simplicity, complex in its visual recognition, and fun to watch !

The open source project was led by UC Berkeley Ph.D. student Jeremy Maitin-Shepard working with Professor Pieter Abbeel.

Timeless by Poornima Balasubramanian

Here is a delightfully refreshing and entertaining sung poem about the video animator's personal experience of Time.

"Timeless" tells the tale of how I developed an understanding of my mortality. Using my voice as the vehicle to tell the story, the motion-graphic piece illustrates the story through abstract imagery. From string-like motion to melting clocks, the experimental music video is filled with subtle metaphors."

Like many other video's I post here on nevertheless, once through is not enough for me. I think its the finesse of Poornima's weave between concept and delivery that particularly moves me.

I often wonder whether video portals like Vimeo and or YouTube may one day get around to including a loop button option in their video transport windows ?

“Doubtful Comforts” First wiggle stereoscopy music video

creates a 3D effect that does not require special glasses to view. Instead of using special glasses to provide two perspectives, wiggle stereoscopy alternates quickly between two perspectives in the image or video itself.

Fabian Röttger part of the duo A Nice Idea Every Day made this 3D camera shift music video for the song “Doubtful Comforts” by Blue Roses.

Ironically the video is not particularly comfortable to watch. except it maybe easier to appreciate if you relax your vision and look at the spaces where there is least shaking rather then the details.

Lautlos or Without a Sound

This media art project by Feedmee Design is one of 120 videos of a lavishly produced DVD-Box including a booklet & 20 postcards of the second annual collection of 20/120, published by IdN.

"Staying true to the ideals of creativity and innovation, with a theme of “Truth vs. Deception”, 20 directors came together to create a ground-breaking collection of short films that use live-action, effects, animation, comedy, action and verité. Twenty 120 remains dedicated to the definition of creative – an original product of human invention or artistic imagination – by celebrating the work of artists around the world." (IdN)

The film got honored within the category „Audiovisuelle Medien: Design“ at the Art Directors Club Competition 2009.

Graffiti Stop Motion by Broken Fingaz

Out in the airspace above their apartment somewhere in Israel two young graffiti artists (Tant & Unga of the "broken fingaz crew") cook up a floaty entertaining stop-motion animation.

Whilst I'm not necessarily a big fan of rap music, the track by Boreta and edIT of The Glitch Mob in the video seems to good to be true.