ClipsToNote

Amazing Northern Lights Show

2012-01-26T21:20:00.001+01:00

Lights Over Lapland photographer Chad Blakley captured this amazing view of the aurora borealis in Sweden on January 24th, 2012. The January 23rd solar flare and ensuing coronal mass ejection are the 'lighting engineers' of this incredible display. Credit: Chad Blakley http://www.lightsoverlapland.com

Via: Powerful Solar Storm Sets Off Amazing Northern Lights Show - YouTube

Still Life

2012-01-24T22:54:00.001+01:00

Still Life is an interactive gallery piece that takes traditional still life painting into the fourth dimension with a motion-sensitive frame on a rotating mount.
[...]
On the hardware side is a custom-framed television connected to a rotating mount from Ergomart. Attached to the back of the television is a spatial sensor from Phidgets, makers of fine USB sensors. On the software side is a simple C application to communicate with the sensor and feed the data to a Unity 3D scene. The scene itself consists of a camera tied to the sensor data with all lights and objects parented to it so they rotate in unison.

Via: Still Life | Scott Garner

Your Google Brain

2012-01-24T21:32:00.000+01:00

Are our brains being boggled by Google? Study says humans now use the internet as our main 'memory' - instead of our heads

People remember where to look up information - not the info itself
People actively forget information if they think they can look it up later
Tests on how people remembered items they would normally Google

Via: Google boggling our brains? Study says humans use internet as their main 'memory' | Mail Online

Lytro's light field camera technology could supercharge future iPhones

2012-01-24T20:34:00.000+01:00

arstechnica.com →

Lytro’s light field camera technology could supercharge future iPhones According to Walter Issacson’s authorized biography about former Apple CEO Steve Jobs, one of the things Jobs wanted to “revolutionize” was photography. Jobs believed the iPhone was a vehicle for doing so, but current imaging technologies limit the photographic abilities of smartphones. As detailed in a new book by Fortune’s Adam Lashinsky, Inside Apple, Jobs may have found the solution he was looking for in a radical imaging technology from Lytro. To that end, Jobs apparently met with Lytro CEO Ren Ng in June 2011 to discuss how Apple might integrate Lytro’s light field technology into its products. (via Lytro’s light field camera technology could supercharge future iPhones)

[...]

We recently had a chance to use Lytro's upcoming standalone camera first-hand. If a future iPhone includes a similar light field capture sensor, we believe it could potentially revolutionize the way many people take and experience photos while on-the-go.

Source: Ars Technica

30 Beautiful Sunsets From Around The World

2012-01-23T11:27:00.001+01:00

via buzzfeed.com

Trevi Aerating Wine Glass

2012-01-22T22:09:00.001+01:00

This wine accessory features an innovative inner wine aerating platform that eliminates the need for on-bottle aerators and decanters, unlocking the true flavors and aromas of your favorite vintage simply by pouring into the inner cup.

via 7gadgets.com

Video: Friendly dog meeting curious cows makes internet hit - Telegraph

2012-01-22T21:24:00.001+01:00

A cute close encounter between Lucy the boxer dog and a herd of cows has become an overnight internet sensation. After being shown on an American TV show, the clip has been viewed more than half a million times on the web more than a year after it was first posted.

via telegraph.co.uk

Star Trek's Tricorder Medical Scanner May Become Reality, Thanks To Nanotechnology Breakthrough

2012-01-22T17:54:00.001+01:00

Trekkies, take heart. A scientific breakthrough involving a form of infrared radiation known as terahertz (THz) waves could lead to handheld medical scanners reminiscent of the "tricorder" featured on the original Star Trek television series.

What's the breakthrough? Using nanotechnology, physicists in London and Singapore found a way to make a beam of the"T-rays"--which are now used in full-body airport security scanners--stronger and more directional. The advance, which was described in a recent issue of the journal Nature Photonics, could lead to T-ray scanning devices that are smaller and more portable than existing devices.

via huffingtonpost.com

Female Orgasm Video -- A womans brain during orgasm

2011-12-04T14:52:00.001+01:00

Female Orgasm Video: This Is Your Brain On The Big 'O' With Fireworks - Katy Perry - YouTube

Source: Female Orgasm Video: This Is Your Brain On The Big 'O' With Fireworks - Katy Perry - YouTube

You may know what it feels like to have an orgasm -- but do you know what it looks like? Now, thanks to a team of researchers at Rutgers University, you can see the big "O" in all its colorful glory.

Nan Wise, a 54-year-old PhD student, sex therapist and associate on the research project, agreed to be the guinea pig. She was hooked up to a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner and stimulated herself while the machine took "snapshots" of her brain every two seconds, across 80 different regions, The Guardian reported. Professor Barry Komisaruk and his team then spliced these snapshots together into an animated film. The movie is the first of its kind.

[...]

Komisaruk recently presented his research at the Society for Neuroscience in Washington, DC, although it hasn't been published in a peer-reviewed journal. He hopes that his work will not only allow scientists to understand why some men and women have trouble achieving orgasm, but also understand our body's reaction to pleasure as a whole.

Source: Female Orgasm Video: This Is Your Brain On The Big 'O'

I had an orgasm in an MRI scanner | Kayt Sukel | Science | guardian.co.uk

Kayt Sukel went to extraordinary lengths to help researchers learn more about the neuroscience of the female orgasm

Kayt Sukel before entering the MRI scanner. On the right is orgasm researcher Barry Komisaruk. On the left is PhD student Nan Wise. Photograph: Kayt Sukel

Source: I had an orgasm in an MRI scanner | Kayt Sukel | Science | guardian.co.uk

Top Gear Caravan Train

2011-11-27T14:25:00.001+01:00

Presenters Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May attempted to make train travel cheaper, faster and more interesting on the UK's only double track, main line heritage railway.

They replaced the conventional carriages and locomotive with caravans attached to a specially modified car.

[...]

The scenes for the show were shot at all four of the GCR stations, Loughborough, Rothley, Quorn and Leicester North, as well as various line-side locations over four days.

Operations manager Peter Haylock, who was in the "sport caravan train", said the eight-mile track from Loughborough to Leicester North and the stations were closed when the crew were filming.

"It was hilarious," he said. "The buffet car caught fire and there's a spectacular crash at the end.

Source: BBC News - Top Gear films challenge at Great Central Railway

Trains part 1 - Top Gear - BBC - YouTube

Source: Trains part 1 - Top Gear - BBC - YouTube

Trains part 2 - Top Gear - BBC - YouTube

Source: Trains part 2 - Top Gear - BBC - YouTube

The Kilobots Are Coming

2011-11-22T11:03:00.000+01:00

(PhysOrg.com) -- The Kilobots are coming. Computer scientists and engineers at Harvard University have developed and licensed technology that will make it easy to test collective algorithms on hundreds, or even thousands, of tiny robots.

Source: Kilobots - tiny, collaborative robots - are leaving the nest (w/ video)

Kilobots are leaving the nest — Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences

Called Kilobots, the quarter-sized bug-like devices scuttle around on three toothpick-like legs, interacting and coordinating their own behavior as a team. A June 2011 Harvard Technical Report demonstrated a collective of 25 machines implementing swarming behaviors such as foraging, formation control, and synchronization.

Once up and running, the machines are fully autonomous, meaning there is no need for a human to control their actions.

Source: Kilobots are leaving the nest — Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences

Wyss Institute Signs Licensing Agreement with K-Team Corporation : Wyss Institute at Harvard

The Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University announced today that it has signed an agreement to license its Kilobot robotic technology to K-Team Corporation, a Swiss manufacturer of high-quality mobile robots for use in advanced education and research. K-Team robotics solutions are used in more than 600 universities and industrial research centers internationally.

The Institute's Kilobot is a low-cost, easy-to-use robotic system for advancing development of "swarms" of robots that can be programmed to perform useful functions by coordinating interactions among the many individuals. These swarms are inspired by social insects, such as ant colonies, that can efficiently search for and find food sources in large complex environments, collectively transport large objects, and coordinate the building of nests and bridges in such environments.

Source: Wyss Institute Signs Licensing Agreement with K-Team Corporation : Wyss Institute at Harvard

Introduction to Kilobot - YouTube

Source: Introduction to Kilobot - YouTube

Demonstrations of Kilobot collective behaivors on up to 29 robots - YouTube

Source: Demonstrations of Kilobot collective behaivors on up to 29 robots - YouTube

Weta the Dinosaur of the Insect World

2011-11-19T14:23:00.001+01:00

Male Wellington tree weta

Source: Weta - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Weta

Quick Facts
• The weta is only found in New Zealand and is so old it has outlived the dinosaurs.

• Weta are large by insect standards. Some of the giant weta are enormous and are amongst the heaviest insects in the world

• The weta is sometimes called the dinosaur of the insect world

• The weta is more primitive than the tuatara. The weta has changed very little in the past 100 million years.

• Weta have their ears on their front knees and can feel the vibrations of noises around them.

• You can tell a male and female weta apart because females have a long ovipositor, which looks a bit like a stinger, which they use to lay eggs.

Source: Weta

Source: New Zealand Tree Weta - Massey University - YouTube

For male weta, big is better - Massey University

For a male tree weta, size really is everything. In six of the seven species in New Zealand the males all sport a distinctly large head, and the bigger the head, the better the chance of mating.

Massey University post-doctoral researcher Dr Cilla Wehi has been studying whether there is a downside to this evolutionary feature.

But she found that, despite their size, males are at no greater risk of being spotted and attacked by predators than females.

“Having the big head is a plus in terms of getting and guarding females,” she says. “The big head means a male has a larger mandible that helps win the battles with other males for control of females,” she says. “But it also means that adult males are conspicuous, as they come out at night to feed and fight.”

Source: For male weta, big is better - Massey University

Coins Stacking World Record

2011-11-15T19:58:00.001+01:00

That¿s one way of using your spare change! Man stacks 3,118 coins on a single dime | Mail Online

If there was an award for the world’s most patient man, he would definitely win it.

Instead, Tai Star has settled for the record holder of the most coins stacked on a single dime.

Star, from Tucson, Arizona, spent seven hours building a tower of 3,118 coins on a dime.

The impressive structure consisted of 600 quarters, 501 dimes, 313 nickels, 1699 pennies and five foreign coins.

He starts with the single dime and places it near the edge of a table.

Source: That¿s one way of using your spare change! Man stacks 3,118 coins on a single dime | Mail Online

Expert stacker, Tai Star, performed the feat last month and uploaded the record to the website, Recordsetter.com. Star completed the task with a total number of stacked coins reaching 3,108.

The meticulous project took Star 7 hours to complete and included several different coins including pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters and even a Canadian quarter.

Star has been a member of RecordSetting.com for only a couple of months and already has multiple records posted on the website.

Source: Arizona man breaks coin stacking world record (VIDEO) | Outlandishnews.com

Balancing Rules - URDB Wiki

- no adhesives or glue permitted
- balanced object may not touch other objects, ground or body parts for support
- object must remain balanced in place for duration of the attempt; record setter must have control over the object at all times
- wherever possible, attempts to break balancing records should use objects of the same size and material as the original record

Source: Balancing Rules - URDB Wiki

World Record: Most Coins Stacked On A Dime - YouTube

Source: World Record: Most Coins Stacked On A Dime - YouTube

I'm The First Real Smartwatch

2011-11-14T14:25:00.001+01:00

Android-based watch mimics the smartphone | Springwise

Blue Sky’s i’m Watch can access calls, text messages, email, music, photos, videos and the Internet.

Between mobile phones and tablets, smart devices have become an integral part of many consumers’ lives. Now we’ve discovered i’m Watch, a device that’s billed as “the first real smartwatch” and goes well beyond simply telling time.

Source: Android-based watch mimics the smartphone | Springwise

i'm Watch

Slick, thin and ergonomic, i'm Watch is made to be part of you. And it’s always with you by all means: phone, web, music, radio, organizer, photo, video, and whatever App you may come up with. Born for multi-tasking exploit, i'm Watch is so fast and simple to use that everything else will be left behind, likely on your car backseat.

Source: i'm Watch

Source: i'm watch - the first real smartwatch in the world - YouTube

Among the specifications of the clock, “I’m Watch” has the screen of 1.54 inches with 240 x 240 pixel resolution, 4 GB of internal storage, 64 MB RAM, Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR and Li-Po of 450 mAh, whose length ranges from about three hours with the speakerphone function on until two days on standby.

I’m Watch include also Others interesting functions ,resources to make calls, check your calendar, check the weather forecast, listen to music, watch movies and pictures, view e-mail notifications, SMS and social networks.

Source: Blogger: ClipsToNote - Create post

imWatch First REAL Smartwatch Unveiling Today For Android?! iPod Nano Clock Response! - YouTube

Source: imWatch First REAL Smartwatch Unveiling Today For Android?! iPod Nano Clock Response! - YouTube

Scientists prove hypnotic state exists | ZME Science

2011-11-03T20:54:00.001+01:00

via zmescience.com

Hypnosis has been considered for the past 250 years by the scientific community as being nothing more than a cute trick, with little consideration put in for in-depth research into this highly controversial state. Some psychologists believe that a hypnotized person is unconscious, resembling a sleep walker, while modern research suggests that the case is actually the opposite, the subject being fully awake, albeit with little peripheral awareness. Nevertheless, it’s a poorly exploited field, a fact which Scandinavian researchers hope to change after a recently published paper which claims it has proof that the hypnotic state actually exists.

The study, conducted by researchers from Aalto University in Finland and the universities of Skövde and Turku in Sweden, followed the curious case of a woman who could enter a state of deep hypnosis instantly just at the utterance of a word (her name and afferent hypnotic keyword has not been disclosed for reasons self-explanatory). When enduced, the woman’s eyes became glazed, a sign of hypnotic state advocated by psychologists for decades.

Throwable Panoramic Ball Camera

2011-10-14T21:16:00.000+02:00

MAKE | Throwable Panoramic Ball Camera

We present the Throwable Panoramic Ball Camera which captures a full spherical panorama when thrown into the air. At the peak of its flight, which is determined using an accelerometer, a full panoramic image is captured by 36 mobile phone camera modules.

Source:MAKE | Throwable Panoramic Ball Camera

Source:Throwable Panoramic Ball Camera - YouTube

Web browsers of the early 1990s

2011-10-12T21:19:00.001+02:00

Amplify’d from arstechnica.com

Before Netscape: the forgotten Web browsers of the early 1990s

Mosaic was soon spun into Netscape, but it was not the first browser. A map assembled by the Museum offers a sense of the global scope of the early project. What's striking about these early applications is that they had already worked out many of the features we associate with later browsers. Here is a tour of World Wide Web viewing applications, before they became famous.

The CERN browsers

Erwise

ViolaWWW

Midas and Samba

A guy from Japan

See more at arstechnica.com

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a1egaj

World's Largest Violin

2011-10-11T20:03:00.000+02:00

Check out this Guinness World Records exclusive to not only see the scale of the world's largest violin, but also hear what it sounds like...

Collected from:World's Largest Violin -- Exclusive Shoot - YouTube

How the world's engineers built Wi-Fi

2011-10-10T10:33:00.001+02:00

Amplify’d from arstechnica.com

Cutting the cord: how the world's engineers built Wi-Fi

In the 1980s, even before connectivity to the Internet became commonplace, people realized that connecting a group of computers together in a local area network (LAN) made those computers much more useful. Any user could then print to shared printers, store files on file servers, send electronic mail, and more. A decade later, the Internet revolution swept the world and LANs became the on-ramp to the information superhighway. The LAN technology of choice was almost universally Ethernet, which is terrific apart from one big downside: those pesky wires.
Read more at arstechnica.com

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a1ede8

Shelf House

2011-10-10T10:08:00.001+02:00

Amplify’d from www.inewidea.com

Shelf House for bookworms is located in Osaka, Japan. Once stepping into the house, you’ll see big and small shelves here and there, such as on the walls, on the stairs, or even integrated with the window. So do you have enough books to fill all these shelves? I don’t, honestly.

See more at www.inewidea.com

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a1eddt

Amateur Rocket Flight

2011-10-10T09:27:00.001+02:00

Amplify’d from blog.makezine.com

On September 30, Derek Deville’s Qu8k (pronounced “Quake”) rocket blasted off from the Black Rock Desert in Nevada, screaming to an altitude of 121,000 feet. It was returned safely to earth and fully recovered (three miles from the launch site). The video above is the longer 17-minute version of the launch, but there’s a lot of awesome stuff, including some assembly and set-up pics, launch footage, and footage from two on-board cameras. The 7-minute free-fall might be a bit dizzying and dull but you can skip that part. The shorter version is here.
Read more at blog.makezine.com

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a1edci

RemoteTouch -- Remote Control with Touch-Screen-Like Interaction

2011-05-20T21:24:00.000+02:00

Remote Follows Your Thumb's Shadow

A remote control prototype called RemoteTouch puts your thumb's shadow on the TV screen.
The remote allows touch screen-like interaction, and can sense a thumb hovering above it.

Researchers in South Korea recently unveiled a prototype remote that can put your thumb in two places at once.

"After trying different options our final conclusion was we have to build our own touchpad that can track fingers even when they are not in touch with the surface -- and that's fast enough to produce effective visual feedback on the TV screen," said Geehyuk Lee, an associate professor in the Human Computer Interaction Lab at the Korean Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) who worked on the prototype.

[...]

The resulting device produces a shadow of the user's thumb on the screen. Touch the remote or even hover a thumb slightly above it, and the shadow on the screen responds accordingly.

[...]

The researchers felt that existing tech involved too much work. The viewer has to move a whole arm, move the device around, or put the remote on a flat surface so it works. To limit the needed motion, the team decided to use one-to-one mapping between the touchpad and the TV screen.

Collected from: Remote Follows Your Thumb's Shadow : Discovery News

Human Computer Interaction Lab. @ KAIST

Collected from: Human Computer Interaction Lab. @ KAIST

RemoteTouch: touch-screen-like interaction in the tv viewing environment

Sangwon Choi, Jaehyun Han, Geehyuk Lee, Narae Lee, Woohun Lee

CHI '11 Proceedings of the 2011 annual conference on Human factors in computing systems

Abstract

We explored the possibility of touch-screen-like interaction with a remote control in the TV-viewing environment. A shadow representing the user's thumb touches the screen, presses a button, flicks a cover-flow list, and draws a simple stroke, while the thumb stays and moves on and above the touchpad. In order to implement the concept we developed an optical touchpad for tracking the thumb hovering over its surface, and designed a TV application to demonstrate possible new interaction styles. Throughout two iterations of prototyping, we corrected some of our false expectations, and also verified its potential as a viable option for a TV remote control. This paper presents technical issues and requirements for the hover-tracking touchpad and a complete report of our user studies to explore touch-screen-like interaction for the TV.

Collected from: RemoteTouch

The Langkawi Sky Bridge

2011-05-04T11:25:00.000+02:00

Collected from: Langkawi Sky Bridge | Flickr - Photo Sharing!

The Malaysia Sky Bridge | Wacky Archives

It’s not a bridge to the sky, but it’s not far from the idea! The Langkawi sky-bridge in Malaysia is suspended at 700 metres above sea level and spans 125 across the mountains, offering magnificent views of the Andaman Sea and Thailand™s Tarutao Island. It’s set apart from other bridges by its curves that provide different perspectives of the landscapes.

Collected from: The Malaysia Sky Bridge | Wacky Archives

Langkawi Sky Bridge - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Langkawi Sky Bridge is a 125 metres (410 ft) curved pedestrian cable-stayed bridge Malaysia. It is located 700 metres (2,300 ft) above sea level at the peak of Gunung Mat Chinchang on Pulau Langkawi, an island in the Langkawi archipelago in Kedah. The last scene of Indian movie Don: The Chase Begins Again was filmed here.^[1]^[2]^[3] The Langkawi Sky Bridge is accessible by the Langkawi Cable Car.

Collected from: Langkawi Sky Bridge - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Malaysia, Langkawi Sky Bridge

Malaysia, Langkawi Sky Bridge in Malaysia

Collected from: Malaysia, Langkawi Sky Bridge

YouTube - Skybridge, Malaysia

Collected from: YouTube - Skybridge, Malaysia

Jelly in Slow Motion

2011-04-30T20:44:00.000+02:00

Drawingmachine by Eske Rex

2011-04-09T14:21:00.000+02:00

DRAWINGMACHINE

Collected from: eskerex

www.danishcrafts.org

Drawingmachine by Eske Rex

The movement of the pendulums affects the entire room. It is easy to become entranced while watching the drawing emerge, line by line.

Drawingmachine is a construction involving two pendulums, each suspended from a tower construction and connected through "drawing arms" and moveable joints. A ballpoint pen resting on a drawing surface covered with paper is mounted at the point where the pendulums come together. The pendulums are set in motion by hand, and their movements are represented on the paper. The movements of the pendulums affect the entire room, and the experience engages the beholder's body. While the rhythmic repetitions cause the beholder to pause, the drawing emerges on the paper.
The technique of using weights and pendulums was invented in the Renaissance and applied in the so-called Harmonograph.
Eske Rex is interested in the machine as a sculpture in space, a constantly changing mobile. In addition, the universe in the drawings is interesting by virtue of their spatial, textural, temporal qualities - a never-ending experiment where it is impossible to produce two identical drawings.

Collected from: www.danishcrafts.org

Collected from: Drawingmachine by Eske Rex on Vimeo

Collected from: eskerex » Blog Archive » DRAWINGMACHINE

Related

ClipsToNote

Amazing Northern Lights Show

Still Life

Related articles

Your Google Brain

Are our brains being boggled by Google? Study says humans now use the internet as our main 'memory' - instead of our heads

Lytro's light field camera technology could supercharge future iPhones

30 Beautiful Sunsets From Around The World

Trevi Aerating Wine Glass

Video: Friendly dog meeting curious cows makes internet hit - Telegraph

Star Trek's Tricorder Medical Scanner May Become Reality, Thanks To Nanotechnology Breakthrough

Female Orgasm Video -- A womans brain during orgasm

Top Gear Caravan Train

The Kilobots Are Coming

Weta the Dinosaur of the Insect World

Quick Facts

Coins Stacking World Record

I'm The First Real Smartwatch

Blue Sky’s i’m Watch can access calls, text messages, email, music, photos, videos and the Internet.

Scientists prove hypnotic state exists | ZME Science

Throwable Panoramic Ball Camera

Web browsers of the early 1990s

Before Netscape: the forgotten Web browsers of the early 1990s

The CERN browsers

Erwise

ViolaWWW

Midas and Samba

A guy from Japan

World's Largest Violin

How the world's engineers built Wi-Fi

Cutting the cord: how the world's engineers built Wi-Fi

Shelf House

Amateur Rocket Flight

RemoteTouch -- Remote Control with Touch-Screen-Like Interaction

Remote Follows Your Thumb's Shadow

The Langkawi Sky Bridge

Jelly in Slow Motion

Drawingmachine by Eske Rex

Drawingmachine by Eske Rex