20 most recent innovations in leisure

Reflective Camera Bag Improves Photography on the Go

Thu, 06 Oct 2016 00:00:00 Z

Many photographers carry their gear in a camera bag, and often bring along a reflector to help better illuminate their subjects. Now they can carry just one item that serves both purposes. Betabrand’s Flash Bag makes things easier. It is a messenger-style camera bag with built-in reflective panels for adding indirect light to your photos.

The bag has a large area of reflective foil under its flap. Just unhook the buckles and lift the flap for some extra light. It will bounce and concentrate light from the Sun, your flash, and any other lighting source.

Mountain Meets The Sea In New Diving Fin Design

Thu, 22 Sep 2016 00:00:00 Z

Inspired by modern click-in/click-out ski binding systems, Italian entrepreneur Paolo Piumatti figured that scuba divers could benefit from something just as convenient. The resulting Finclip system lets divers get their fins on with no awkward bending over or sitting down.

Because wearing fins makes it difficult to walk around, they typically go on last when suiting up for a dive. This means that the diver is already wearing their heavy tanks and weight belt, so bending down and balancing on one foot to pull on the fins can be difficult – even potentially treacherous.

Finclip is designed to address this problem. It replaces the heel strap of any open-heel type fin with a shoe horn-like device, that stays attached full-time. Users just push their booted foot in, step down, and the integrated strap lever will snap up against their heel.

Getting out still does require the user to reach down, although they just need to flip the lever back over when doing so.

3D Cinema Without Glasses

Tue, 26 Jul 2016 00:00:00 Z

3D cinema might bring dinosaur jaws right up to your nose, but it's a wonder the great beasts don't just laugh when they see the oddball glasses on your head that makes the effect possible. A new advancement from MIT takes a well-known trick known as the parallax barrier and leverages it in a way particular to how we move our heads in movie theaters. A small prototype using 50 mirrors and lenses has been developed and, if researchers can advance upon the idea, glassless 3D viewing might just become the future of cinema.

Parallax barriers are the way in which some current 3D devices – like the Nintendo 3DS – deliver a multi-dimensional viewing experience direct to our eyes without the need for glasses. It basically works by arranging barriers on the screen (crystals in the case of the 3DS) that allow each of our eyes to only see certain images that are slightly different from each other. When the brain puts those images together, the main picture seems to have a three-dimensional depth. In a way, it's no different than those old-fashioned stereoscopic images that used to be sold on boardwalks everywhere.

The parallax barrier approach works on the 3DS because gamers can basically hold the screen at exactly the right position to line up the barriers with each eye and make the 3D effect work (although, it should be noted that the new 3DS XL uses face-tracking technology to make keep the barriers in line for a more seamless 3D experience.)

So it works fine with small screens, but for larger screens, the issue gets more complex. Even with a television, it's difficult to pull off parallax-barrier-enhanced viewing because people sit at different heights in the room and view the TV from different angles. The problem is compounded in the large scale of a movie theater.

To overcome the issue, the MIT researchers realized that people don't really move around much in a movie-theater seat. Their heads have a limited range of motion constrained by the seat in which any individual is sitting. So, the scientists decided that if they could beam individual parallax-barrier-enhanced images to each seat, every person could get a 3D experience without having to wear glasses.

A prototype followed that is only a little bigger than a pad of paper. Using 50 sets of mirrors and lenses, the system, which the researchers are calling Cinema 3D, beams a different set of images through parallax barriers customized to each seat in the theater.

"It remains to be seen whether the approach is financially feasible enough to scale up to a full-blown theater," says MIT professor Wojciech Matusik, one of the co-authors on a related paper. "But we are optimistic that this is an important next step in developing glasses-free 3D for large spaces like movie theaters and auditoriums."

Sunblock Spray Booth

Mon, 18 Jul 2016 00:00:00 Z

Sure, you can apply sunblock to yourself, without any help, but you may miss some spots. And asking someone else to rub it onto your body might be awkward. So why not have a machine do it for you? We have machines for everything else after all. SnappyScreen is just such a device. It sprays sunblock over your entire body in less than 10 seconds.

Just stand on the platform, put on the protective eye shield, and it sprays you all over. It couldn’t be easier. You just select the SPF level that you want and tell the machine if you’re under or over 5 feet tall. Step inside and the rotating platform ensures even coverage across your whole body.

Suspension On Snowboards

Thu, 14 Apr 2016 00:00:00 Z

While we've all seen footage of snowboarders swooshing through fresh powder, the fact is that they're more often banging their way down icy or rutted ski slopes. That being the case, why don't they have suspension like mountain bikes? Russia's Sergey Yarosh & Co Design thinks they should, which is why the company has developed the SANKIboard system.

SANKIboard is designed to be mounted on existing boards, with conventional third-party bindings in turn being mounted on it.

Using carbon fiber-reinforced fiberglass front and rear leaf-style shock absorbers, it reportedly soaks up both ongoing vibrations and big hits upon landings. According to the designers, this should allow for more control, less discomfort, and less muscle fatigue. Additionally, the increased height should keep riders' boots from contacting the slope during aggressive carving.

Plus, if riders sit on it between runs, their butt won't freeze.

Swing While Standing Up

Mon, 04 Apr 2016 00:00:00 Z

A new, locally made toy is flying to new heights across the country. 'The Swurfer' combines the motion of swinging through the air with the sensation of surfing in the ocean. "A lot of inventions happen by accident and this one isn't really any different," said Swurfer inventor, Rob Bertschy.Rob's mother suggested turning one of his old surfboard prototypes into a swing because of its curved board. But Rob wasn't satisfied with an ordinary swing. "I didn't really want a boring swing. So I had to figure out a way to stand up on it and move around. I tried lots and lots of different ideas and I finally landed on this one" he said.

The Swurfer has two adjustable handles, yards of rope that hang from a tree and a curved board."The first prototype shipped in August to Wonder Works Toy Stores," said Bertschy. "Since then it's really taken off. We now ship to states all over the country."The Swurfer has been listed as one of the top 25 toys of the year and they're all being made from Robs garage on James Island."I didn't think it would be where it is today," he said. "My ultimate goal is to have a whole line of unique swings. We just signed a national agreement with a group of national independent toy stores. I'm starting to get a lot of interest from surf and skate type shops. Sometimes I lay awake at night ,wondering if extreme Swurfing can be the next X-game.

"Rob is planning to travel across the U.S. with The Swurfer promoting it, hoping it takes off in all 50 states. You can buy a Swurfer at any Wonder Works Toy Store or online at www.swurfer.com

Expandable Canopy On Wheels

Thu, 04 Feb 2016 00:00:00 Z

Designed by Beijing-based people’s architecture office, the ‘people’s canopy’ is thought as architecture for events and architecture as an event in itself. The two-story high expandable roof structure is set on bicycle wheels so that it can be cycled by citizens, paraded around the city, and stretched to the length of entire streets, linking disconnected public spaces. The canopy can collapse to the size of a double-decker bus so that it can be pedaled from one location to another. When parked, it can be opened like an accordion to 12-meters in length at a span of ten meters, thus turning unused areas into ones for pedestrians and events.

The design was first commissioned by the city of preston in the UK and In Certain Places, an art program for urban intervention and events. The aim of the program is to re-energize the city’s grand but declining historic center. Urban sprawl and air conditioned shopping malls have driven residents away from the open streets and publics spaces of the rainy city. The design references expandable canopies popular in southern china typically used by small businesses like restaurants and bars to temporarily expand their spaces into parking lots and public sidewalks.

Following their debut in preston, the ‘people’s canopies’ were features in the 2015 bi-city biennale of urbanism/architecture in Hong Kong. Installed in Kowloon park, they were continually relocated, expanded and contracted to support various public activities. Events were planned for the canopies but the public was also encouraged to engage in unexpected ways.

Book With Removable Pages

Wed, 09 Dec 2015 00:00:00 Z

The Rekonect is a novel new notebook with magnetic pages you can remove and reattach. It’s much like a binder, but in sleek notebook form.

It might be the best notebook idea since the notebook.

How’s that?

First, the Rekonect is the answer to every perfectionists dilemma: paralysis about what to fill it with. With pages you can remove and rearrange, the book guarantees each page turn is filled with the very best stuff in the right order.

Second, since you can pull pages out of the book, you can draw or write on a nice flat surface without working around the book binding. That feature will make any lefties smile too.

The faux leather cover and elastic strap hide the secret magnetic spine that holds each page inside. Books come in 60 or 120 page versions, with additional packs of 120 or 240 sheets that featuring lines, dots, plain or graph paper.

Books Function As Subway Tickets

Thu, 26 Nov 2015 00:00:00 Z

People only read an average of about two books a year in Brazil. To promote reading, Brazil’s biggest pocket book publisher L&PM Editores created a collection of small paperbacks that also work as subway tickets.

L&PM worked with Agência Africa to create the Ticket Books, a collection of ten books with RFID cards built inside the book covers. The hidden RFID cards made the pocket books readable by the turnstile scanners at the subway. Agency Africa also worked with Via Quatro, the company that manages the subways, so that the Ticket Books can be made available at the turnstiles at the subway stations.

To celebrate World Book Day last April 23rd, L&PM gave away 10,000 books for free at subway stations across Sao Paulo. Each book came with ten free trips. When all ten trips have been used up, users can recharge them via the Ticket Books website and use them again or gift them to a friend to encourage even more people to read. The project was so successful that L&PM expanded the project to other cities in Brazil.

The Ticket Books collection included ten titles: Peanuts: Friendship. That’s What Friends Are For by Charles M. Schulz, Garfield: Sorry by Jim Davis, Hundred Love Sonnets by Pablo Neruda, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Art of War by Sun Tzu, Sherlock Holmes: The Hound of Baskerville by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Hamlet by William Shakespeare, Murder Alley by Agatha Christie, Chives In Trouble! by Mauricio de Sousa, and Quintana Pocket by Mario Quintana. The books also featured cover art inspired by subway maps.

Self-Rolling Dice

Wed, 14 Oct 2015 00:00:00 Z

If you’re having a hard time getting your tablet-addicted kids to gather around the table for a nice family game of Monopoly, a new Kickstarter for a pair of motorized dice that magically roll themselves might help tear them away from their touchscreens.

Boogie Dice, invented by Nimrod Back, are only slightly larger than the dice you usually roll across a game board. But packed inside each cube are a plethora of tiny electronic bits including a vibration motor, colored LEDs, a battery, and even a microphone. When they’re all working together a simple snap of your fingers, or a clap of your hands, brings the dice to life sending them flipping and tumbling across a table all by themselves.

Self-Rolling Yoga Mat

Thu, 24 Sep 2015 00:00:00 Z

Does the frustration involved with rolling up a mat keep you from avoiding a daily yoga routine? That’s my excuse, which is now rendered moot with a yoga mat that rolls up tightly all by itself thanks to some fashion technology that was popular in the 1990s.

The YoYo Mat, which is attempting to raise $50,000 via Kickstarter to fund a large production run, looks and feels like your typical foam yoga mat. So you’re not making any compromises when it comes to weight or comfort. But it’s been upgraded with a pair of flat metal strips embedded along each edge of the mat that become rigid when unfurled ensuring the YoYo Mat always lies flat on the floor.

When your workout is over, simply picking up the YoYo Mat causes those metal strips to ‘snap’ and the whole thing to roll up on itself. It’s not exactly a solution to the planet’s most pressing issues, but the days of wrangling a six-feet long foam mat into a tight roll will soon be ancient history for yoga enthusiasts.

Access Your Backpack Without Taking It Off

Mon, 17 Aug 2015 00:00:00 Z

To get at the stuff you're carrying in your backpack, you have to take off your backpack. This is one of those unavoidable facts of life. Unless you're Stretch Armstrong. Or you're wearing a Paxis.

The brainchild of Paul Vierthaler, Paxis is a backpack that look like any other, but with two compartments for storing things. The top one stays in place. The bottom one, however, is mounted to an articulated arm. Pull a tab on the pack's front side and that compartment swings around to the front of your waist, providing easy access to its contents.

Modular Tent

Thu, 13 Aug 2015 00:00:00 Z

If you have ever wished for a more communal camping experience, you might want to check out these awesome POD tents from M2C Innovation. POD Tents can be built into multi-room units for festivals or big family events, with accessories that give each user control over the design. Completely weatherproof, these tents offer a cozy home outdoors, regardless of the weather.

POD Tents are rather palatial, with the Maxi design sleeping a maximum of eight people and the Mini up to four. Not only can connectors bring together multiple PODs, but internal sleeping cells can be purchased, creating miniature rooms for couples or kids. In a way, these tents can function as tiny homes out in the wilderness. The Maxi size POD is about 52 pounds and completely weatherproof, making for a comfortable excursion.

Free Sunscreen Dispensaries

Thu, 06 Aug 2015 00:00:00 Z

Sunscreen dispensaries might become as ubiquitous as water fountains if the city officials of Boston and Miami Beach have anything to do about it. Both cities have been trialling free dispensaries of SPF 30 sunscreen as a measure to get more people to protect their skin.

In Miami, 50 dispensaries are dotted throughout the city, while this July 30 dispensaries were placed in popular parks around Boston including Boston Common. Neither program is currently coming at any cost to the taxpayers. The Boston sunscreen dispensaries were funded by skin-cancer organizations the Melanoma Foundation of New England and Make Big Change, while the Miami Beach dispensaries were gifted to the city for its centennial celebration in March 2015, a move sponsored by Mount Sinai Medical Center.

“Skin cancer and melanoma are among the most prevalent cancers and they’re also among the most preventable,” Matt O’Malley, the Boston city councilor who proposed the sunscreen initiative told local news station WBUR. “So, what we are doing in Boston is, we’re offering a service, we’re promoting public health and we’re reminding folks of the importance of sunscreen—at no cost to the taxpayer.”

Self-Sealing Water Balloons

Mon, 02 Mar 2015 00:00:00 Z

A water balloon fight is no fun when kids have to keep running back to their parents to tie the balloons for them. Using tiny elastics the Bunch O Balloons came up with a slightly better way to automatically tie 37 water balloons at once, but these Zorbz appear to have the best solution yet, automatically sealing themselves with just a quick tug on the neck.

How the self-sealing technology works exactly is presumably a trade secret, but the Zorbz website makes mention of a special valve hidden inside the neck of each balloon that's activated and sealed with nothing more than a simple tug. There's one caveat, though: a special long and thin filler nozzle has to be attached to a faucet in order to fill the balloons, but that's included with every package and is very easy to install.

The Perfect Beer Head

Mon, 19 Jan 2015 00:00:00 Z

The perfect beer head! Many a bar has seen endless discussions about the subject. From now on, these discussions are history. With the FndF automatic beer skimmer, you will always get the right beer head. Ideal for events, where you have to tap a lot of beers in a relatively short time.

The FndF beer glass has a slightly widening edge. This ensures that you don't have to skim the beer, while it still acquires a nicely firm beer head automatically. Your beer looks perfect every time. That way, you keep enjoying high quality beers.

This glass is ideal for big parties or festivals. You can't always have advanced draught equipment or experienced barkeepers. Moreover, big crowds with thirsty throats need a lot of beers, and fast! With the FndF-glass, you will easily achieve this. In just 3 simple steps –rinse, pour, serve- your perfect beer will be ready.

Surfboard Propelled By Striding Motion

Fri, 19 Dec 2014 00:00:00 Z

The world’s first split paddleboard, ‘peleboard‘ made from a carbon fiber construction and stainless steel bearing, represents the evolution of the stand-up watersport. The fitness-oriented craft looks similar to traditional boards, but is divided lengthwise into two halves and separated by a sliding rail. this enables the rider to continue to use a paddle whilst also propelling themselves forward by moving their legs in a striding motion.

‘It delivers a full workout,’ Blake Knutson, cofounder of peleboards, said. ‘There is a lot of balance and power involved, and your whole body has to participate. But the peleboard is really about people getting into fitness they can love. If you don’t love what you’re doing, you’re never going to get the full benefits of exercise. Pele is the hawaii an volcano goddess — known for passion and power. We hope the board helps people find theirs.’

The ‘peleboard’ utilizes flap pivots underneath to grip the water and push itself forward with every stride. As well, it can also function as a regular board by simply flipping a small lever that lock its two halves together.

Magnetic Field Reduces Beer Foam

Thu, 18 Dec 2014 00:00:00 Z

It’s every beer drinker’s worst nightmare: You set your bottle down on a table and open it, only for the drink to foam up and come shooting out, drenching the table and most likely you as well. But that nightmare might soon become a thing of the past thanks to an unlikely source: magnets.

Belgian researchers have used magnets to make beer less foamy. Applying a magnetic field made antifoaming agents more effective. The field is applied when hops extract is added to beer's malt base. This prevents it from attracting too much CO2 - which causes foam.

The method was so effective that much lower amounts of hops extract were needed, reducing the cost of brewing the beer in the first place. The method takes just one minute and could make beer cheaper - as less hops extract is needed to prevent the formation of foam

Spillproof Wine Glass

Wed, 03 Dec 2014 00:00:00 Z

To avoid spillages at the dinner table, San Francisco duo Superduperstudio has shaped these wine glasses so they rest at an angle when knocked over.

Saturn Wine Glasses by Superduperstudio don't have a traditional stem and base, but instead are indented around the bottom of the bowl. The glasses rest upright on a flat surface beneath the bowl and stack within one another for compact storage. When knocked from upright, the vessels tip to rest on the wide curved edge above the base instead of falling horizontal and spilling the contents.

When knocked from upright, the vessels tip to rest on the wide curved edge above the base instead of falling horizontal and spilling the contents.

Two sizes for red and white wine hold about the same amount of liquid as average glasses – 150-175 millimetres for red and 120-150 millilitres for white – while remaining "spillproof".

Wine glasses are usually designed with stems to prevent the transfer of heat from the hand to the liquid.

"One small downside for not having a traditional stem seems to be how the temperature of your hand affects the temperature of the wine, but isn't as big of a problem in the red as the white," Yamane told Dezeen.

The vessels are hand-shaped then blown in a mould in Oakland, California. Each piece is then annealed overnight – a process that involves slowly cooling the glass to strengthen it – before being returned to the kiln for just long enough to soften and finish the edges in a process known as fire-polishing.

While prototyping the designs, Superduperstudio developed a technique of creating wooden moulds so they could quickly and cheaply make multiple versions each day.

The different glass iterations they created were tested and adapted to find perfect the shape.

Magnetic Wall-Mounted Bottle Opener

Thu, 27 Nov 2014 00:00:00 Z

Wall-mounted bottle openers are great in and of themselves. It's the 21st century—we shouldn't be using both of our hands like some kind of animal. But Dropcatch cleverly takes this modern convenience one step further with bottle cap catching magnets.

No more inconsiderate house guests littering your floor with small, jagged pieces of metal. Because soon as you pop the bottle open, the cap patiently waits on the mount to be removed at your leisure. There are even two versions—a Junior size that holds up to 15 caps or a Senior size that catches up to 52, making it great for parties and extra lonely nights alike.