The Kid Should See This

Go along for the ride with this MK12 short film, Beauty In...

rion — Mon, 17 Jun 2013 06:40:20 -0700

Go along for the ride with this MK12 short film, Beauty In Danger, a collaboration with artist Brian Alfred and musician Ian Williams.

Related visual journeys: Optical Poem, Gumbasia, and Boogie Doodle.

This is a mimosa pudica, also known as the sensitive plant or a...

rion — Mon, 17 Jun 2013 06:20:15 -0700

This is a mimosa pudica, also known as the sensitive plant or a touch-me-not. It is known for its rapid plant movement, moving quickly into a closed, sleep position when touched, shaken, blown at, etc, only to open a few minutes later. Watch this happen in a larger groups of plants:

Some of our favorite videos are made by someone giving us a personal video tour, such as the tour of the International Space Station, this tour of a seaweed collection, this red-tailed vanzosaur video, and this video about a nine-banded baby armadillo.

Travel back to Southampton University, England...

rion — Sat, 15 Jun 2013 10:14:13 -0700

Travel back to Southampton University, England in 1962 as students compete with the Flying Bicycle Airplane vehicle that they spent months building. Bonus: old-timey narration.

Watch more videos about flying in the archives.

From British Pathé.

YouTuber westh2o was diving underwater with friends in Moorea,...

rion — Fri, 14 Jun 2013 12:30:31 -0700

YouTuber westh2o was diving underwater with friends in Moorea, French Polynesia when they began to hear the whale song of a humpback whale. Westh2o writes:

The recording does not do justice to the actual sound. Seriously some of those sounds vibrated my chest. I didn’t realize whales had such a wide frequency of sound. Some were mid to hi frequency and some were very low.

As they swam into the depths, straining their eyes to find the sound’s source in the cloudiness of the water, the vocalizations became louder, and then something huge began to emerge. Here’s a glimpse:

Watch the video to get a reeeally good look. And then watch more whale encounters here, here, and here.

via PetaPixel.

This is the Three Wattled Bell Bird, recorded in Costa Rica,...

rion — Fri, 14 Jun 2013 07:50:29 -0700

This is the Three Wattled Bell Bird, recorded in Costa Rica, Central America.

Because of the secretive behavior of this bird, it is often only detected by the distinctive bell-like call given by the males. At close range, the vocalization of many in Costa Rica is heard as a complex three-part song, the “bonk” giving the bird its name. This hollow, wooden “bonk” is thought to be among the loudest bird calls on Earth, audible to humans from over 0.5 mi (0.80 km) away.

Watch a phenomenal amount of videos with birds, including more that either look or sound quite unusual: the common potoo, the red-capped manakin, the not-to-be-missed birds of paradise, and the kookaburra.

Via PopSci, Let This Rube Goldberg Machine Show You How Cows Eat...

rion — Fri, 14 Jun 2013 06:20:00 -0700

Via PopSci, Let This Rube Goldberg Machine Show You How Cows Eat And Poop. This is Cow by Nova Jiang.

Watch more Rube Goldberg machines, kinetic sculptures, and chain reactions.

I suddenly have the urge to go blow across the top of a bottle....

rion — Thu, 13 Jun 2013 10:31:21 -0700

I suddenly have the urge to go blow across the top of a bottle. This is Aeolus, an Acoustic Wind Pavilion, and I have no doubt that we would stand within it for quite a while… great sound. It reminded me immediately of England’s Singing Ringing Tree, as well as the sound of Tibetan Singing Bowls.

jtotheizzoe:

This amazing art project goes along with my latest YouTube episode about gusty science: What Is Wind?…

Luke Jerram is a colorblind artist based in the UK. Aeolus is a sonic creation that blends acoustic physics, inspirations from classical civilizations, and visual adventure. The arch is a large Aeolian harp, an ancient instrument that uses the wind’s vibration on strings to send a frequency down a long metal tube.

A listener in the center of the arch experiences sounds transmitted from a field of taut strings and naturally harmonic open tubes. In addition, the angle of light transmitted through the polished pipes creates an altered listening environment. The experience can change by the minute or hour depending on wind conditions.

The tightened strings vibrate due to something called the von Karman vortex street effect, where the vortex created behind a string causes it to vibrate. It’s similar to what happens when a car antenna begins to sing in the wind.

You can see a photo gallery here, and listen to interviews and sound samples here.

A true feat of beauty and science.

(via Luke Jerram)

A Tibetan Singing Bowl: Singing bowls… are a type...

rion — Thu, 13 Jun 2013 10:23:00 -0700

A Tibetan Singing Bowl:

Singing bowls… are a type of bell, specifically classified as a standing bell. Rather than hanging inverted or attached to a handle, singing bowls sit with the bottom surface resting. The sides and rim of singing bowls vibrate to produce sound characterized by a fundamental frequency (first harmonic) and usually two audible harmonic overtones (second and third harmonic).

You can also watch this Tibetan Bowl Master both strike and rub the outsides of the bowls for different sounds.

There are more bells ringing in the archives. Related watching and listening: Glass Harps.

Northern Arizona University’s Con Slobodchikoff, Ph.D.,...

rion — Thu, 13 Jun 2013 09:17:00 -0700

Northern Arizona University’s Con Slobodchikoff, Ph.D., and his student-teams have been studying the alarm calls of Gunnison’s prairie dogs for over 30 years. The result: the prairie dog language has been somewhat decoded. Yes, we know what they’re saying when they yip and squeak!

From The Atlantic:

The animals have word-like phonemes, combining those into sentence-like calls. They have social chatter. They can distinguish between types of predators that are nearby — dogs, coyotes, humans — and seem to have developed warnings that specify the predators’ species and size and color.

This video is a win-win because you get to watch prairie dogs (and their predators), all while learning about how we observe, analyze, and test to find out more about their sophisticated animal language. Be sure to read the interview with Slobodchikoff for more information…

Human-powered helicopters, thought-controlled helicopters, and...

rion — Thu, 13 Jun 2013 08:39:21 -0700

Human-powered helicopters, thought-controlled helicopters, and now helicopter-bicycles! From PopSci:

The helicopter-bike is a prototype developed by a team of three Czech companies, which just took it for a five-minute test flight inside a Prague exhibition hall. That’s actually a lightweight dummy in the driver’s seat, since those massive propellers make this thing weigh over 200 pounds, meaning it’s not yet flyable with the weight of a human on board.

What kind of helicopter do you want to invent?

From open.edu, learn about six key movements in design history:...

rion — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 15:15:00 -0700

From open.edu, learn about six key movements in design history: Gothic Revival, Arts and Crafts (below), Bauhaus, Modernism (above), American Industrial Design and Postmodernism.

You can watch them all here.

via Open Culture.

Above, A Basic Demonstration of Optical Cloaking. Cloaking is a...

rion — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 09:52:59 -0700

Above, A Basic Demonstration of Optical Cloaking. Cloaking is a term for hiding an object from view at specific frequencies, but evidently one can cloak things DIY-style with four mirrors and their precise placement.

So before reading further, how is the illusion above happening? Any guesses?

Professor of Physics at the University of Rochester John Howell and his 14 year-old son Benjamin built three uni-directional optical cloaking devices with everyday materials. For around $150, they put together “one made of Plexiglass and water, another of inexpensive lenses, and a third constructed using ordinary mirrors.” The video demonstration above shows one of the devices and two of his sons… sometimes.

What might this small feat of optical engineering be used for? Since it’s uni-directional it has limitations, but in theory, it could hide satellites orbiting Earth. You can read more about how Professor Howell’s devices work in the videos notes, here on arXiv.org, or on MIT Technology Review.

There are also a few more videos with mirrors in the archives.

Thanks, @AmebaCuriosa.

This Japanese-flavored animation was created for the unveiling...

rion — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 06:58:22 -0700

This Japanese-flavored animation was created for the unveiling of two Toyota Camatte electric car concepts. Showcased at the 2012 Tokyo Toy Show, these vehicles were designed to get kids involved with building cars and learning how to drive them. Yes, it’s a full-sized toy car for kids.

At the 2013 Tokyo Toy Show, the new Camatte57 concept convertible demonstrated how its 57 lightweight, detachable panels could make for some sporty, DIY personalization that kids can help put together. Watch its shell get assembled:

Alas, these large toy electric cars are only concepts, so don’t expect to find them disassembled all over the living room floor anytime soon.

Watch another commercial out of Japan: TOUCHWOOD SH-08C.

Thanks, twwhlspls.com.

Here’s an excellent discussion starter… what is...

rion — Wed, 12 Jun 2013 06:10:31 -0700

Here’s an excellent discussion starter… what is happening to the liquid in this video?

This is Supermajor, a project by teacher and artist Matt Kenyon that was inspired by the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill. From the project:

In the gallery a wire rack of (vintage) oil cans sits. One oilcan has a visible fissure out of which oil slowly flows cascading onto the pedestal and gallery floor… The only thing is, the oil isn’t exactly flowing out of the can. Instead, oil appears to slow slowly drop by drop back into the can. At times the drops of oil hover unsupported in midair. Other times the drops are in the process of a slow motion splash onto the pedestal.

I don’t know exactly how this demonstration is being executed, but I might suggest watching some of these videos next… and definitely watch this one…

There’s also an interview with Kenyon over at Cool Hunting and FastCo Design, and more projects at Swamp.nu.

Thanks, @AmebaCuriosa.

Pop-up orchestra performance on a delayed plane!...

rion — Tue, 11 Jun 2013 18:28:53 -0700

Pop-up orchestra performance on a delayed plane! Violinist Juliette Kang, violinist Daniel Han, violaist Che-Hung Chen, and cellist Yumi Kendall of The Philadelphia Orchestra were traveling from Beijing to Macao on tour.

When their flight was delayed on the tarmac for three hours, they decided to play some uplifting music to pass the time: Antonin Dvorak’s “American” String Quartet No. 12 Finale.

You can read more about the quartet’s 2013 Residency & Fortieth Anniversary Tour of China at PhilOrch.org.

On a technology side note: How many phones and cameras can you count in the audience?

h/t ITN.

Puffins on Parade at the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

rion — Tue, 11 Jun 2013 17:48:00 -0700

Puffins on Parade at the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

Via kqedscience, this is a tour of two of our closest...

rion — Tue, 11 Jun 2013 08:48:30 -0700

Via kqedscience, this is a tour of two of our closest galaxies: the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds. They are between 163,000 and 200,000 light-years away and hold a few hundred million stars like our sun. HD full screen.

These images are from astronomers at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and Pennsylvania State University, who used NASA’s Swift Ultraviolet/Optical satellite telescope to create the highest resolution, wide field surveys in ultraviolet light.

Read more information in the video’s About section, or watch The Beauty of Space Photography, or watch more videos about stars and galaxies.

From the Periodic Table of Videos team, hot charcoal...

rion — Tue, 11 Jun 2013 08:21:08 -0700

From the Periodic Table of Videos team, hot charcoal meets Liquid Oxygen (slow motion).

via Doobybrain.

Sir David Attenborough and chameleons in Madagascar, then and...

rion — Mon, 10 Jun 2013 08:54:00 -0700

Sir David Attenborough and chameleons in Madagascar, then and now, a brilliant video that mixes flashbacks from a 1960 television show called Zoo Quest with 2008 color footage shot for the BBC TV series Life in Cold Blood. He has spent six decades presenting programs for the BBC thus far.

There are more wonderful BBC clips, many with Sir Attenborough, in the archives.

In this absolutely incredible footage from EarthTouchTV, watch...

rion — Sat, 08 Jun 2013 14:22:53 -0700

In this absolutely incredible footage from EarthTouchTV, watch hundreds of thousands of sardines off the coast of South Africa swarm at the center of an animal feeding frenzy. With Earth-Touch divers right in the middle of the action, large, hungry predators — sharks, dolphins, diving gannets, and a 20 to 30 ton Bryde’s whale — all take part in this intense and fascinating sardine run.

There are hours of nature and underwater videos in the archives.