Interesting piece of work highlighting the plight of Himalayas due to global warming by Off-Road Studios. It will be great to watch full length documentary.

Off-Road Studios is an integrated communications agency taking care of 360 media requirements of its clients while fulfilling its social and environmental responsibilities at the same time.

For several years, evidence has been mounting that the global climate is steadily getting warmer. As a result the melting glaciers are constantly undressing the majestic snow covered peaks of Himalayas. Last Look at the Himalayas is an environmental conservation documentary by Off-Road Studios, aiming to capture what’s left and promote the struggle against global warming.

Los Angeles based photographer David Hill puts together a video showing all the layers that went into 11 Adventure Series images. The Photoshop files are deconstructed in After Effects showing even minute details … quite close to 3D photo composites.

Image by Daniel Espírito Santo, Camera Assistant João Botas and Editing by Pedro Sousa.

Some very interesting long exposure shots by Celine Ramoni taken from the New Transit Yurikamome (an automated guideway train that connects Shimbashi to Toyosu, passing through the artificial island of Odaiba in Tokyo, Japan) passing through the Rainbow Bridge.

Japan was the “trigger” of my interest in photography (I lived there for 4 years). During my travels, I discovered so many unique and magnificent landscapes that I felt the need to capture and retain these exceptional moments that I was living. I was astonished by the high number of people that were carrying professional photo gear compared to those in my own country. This apparently large popularity of photography further raised my curiosity.

I bought my first SLR one year after my arrival in Japan. The first few months seemed difficult and my pictures disappointing. But by learning a few basic concepts, I gained a tremendous freedom in the variety of pictures I could take.

I have rather simple gear such as Nikon D7000, Nikon 35mm f/1.8 DX and Nikon 18-105mm VR. I mostly shoot landscape and cityscapes. I usually use the aperture mode because I like to emphasis on the DOF of my photos. For the long exposure shots though I usually use the manual mode. I don’t do lots of post processing and most of my photos are almost straight out of the camera.

Time lapse sequences of photographs taken by the crew of expeditions 28 & 29 onboard the International Space Station from August to October, 2011 at an altitude of around 350km.

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This short time lapse film was shot during the Icelandic Midnight Sun in June of 2011 by Los Angeles, California based photographer Joe Capra.

For 17 days I travelled solo around the entire island shooting almost 24 hours, sleeping in the car, and eating whenever I had the time. During my days shooting this film I shot 38,000 images, travelled some 2900 miles, and saw some of the most amazing, beautiful, and indescribable landscapes on the planet. Iceland is absolutely one of the most beautiful and unusual places you could ever imagine. Especially during the Midnight Sun when the quality of light hitting the landscape is very unusual, and very spectacular.

Iceland during the Midnight Sun is in sort of a permanent state of sunset. The sun never full sets and travels horizontally across the horizon throughout the night, as can be seen in the opening shot and at the :51 second mark in the video.

During the Arctic summer, sunset was at midnight and sunrise was at 3am. The Arctic summer sun provided 24 hours a day of light, with as much as 6 hours daily of “Golden light”. Once the sun had set it wouldn’t even get dark enough for the stars to come out, and they don’t start to reappear until August.

Alexandra Bonomo was born in 1983 on the island of Manhattan. Despite a keen interest in Graphic Design, her watercolours speak for themselves. She completed her Graphic Design course at Parsons School of Design, New York, and currently working on some personal art projects.

Andrew Byrom, a graphic and type designer, talks about the typography he sees in everyday objects. Andrew is on Faculty at Cal State Long Beach and teaches a design class at UCLA Extension.

To learn the physics behind this demonstration visit here.

Murat Germen, based in Istanbul, Turkey, uses photography as an expression and research tool. He works as a professor of art, photography and new media at the Sabanci University in Istanbul. His work has been featured all over the world and can be found at institutions such as Istanbul Modern, Young & Rubicam, McCann Erickson, The Designory, Norman Foster & Partners, DDB, Rafineri, Swissôtel and Boyner to name a few.

Photography is an opportunity for me to find things people ignore and bring them forward to make people reconsider their ideas. I am not interested in extraordinary things since they are always covered and receive more attention due to mankind’s unending interest in celebrities, fame, sensation… I try to concentrate more on ordinary things and catch possible latent extraordinariness in regularity. It is easy to take ordinary photos of extraordinary things but more challenging to take extraordinary photos of ordinary things. It is possible to say I tend to concentrate on extracting beauty out of ordinary. I attempt to defamiliarize ordinariness, render it ambiguous by alienating it from its familiar context and finally make people to ‘see it afresh.’

Murat has an MArch degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he went as a Fulbright scholar and received AIA Henry Adams Gold Medal for academic excellence.

Photography records the surface information, where one can only depict the exterior features of objects (color, texture, shape, etc.) and the resulting visual representation cannot incorporate the internal condition / content / soul.

The combination of digital means and artistic practice is of prime importance. The computational dimension is indispensable and allows me to visualize anything that I perceive / conceive. The technological advances in imaging and its post-processing changed the way I observe, imagine, create and share my artworks.

Renowned for album covers, posters and his recent book of life lessons, designer Stefan Sagmeister invariably has a slightly different way of looking at things.

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Ray Caesar was born in 1958 in London. At an early age, his family moved to Toronto, Canada, where he currently resides. From 1977—80 he attended Ontario College of Art, followed by 17 years from 1980—96 working in the art & photography department of the Hospital For Sick Children in Toronto, documenting disturbing cases of child abuse, surgical reconstruction, psychology, and animal research. Coupled with inspiration from surrealists Kahlo and Dali, Caesar’s experiences at the hospital continue to influence his artwork.

It can be said that there are defining moments in a dogs life that can only be described as pivotal. Mine came when I received a gift of a flesh toned 12 inch plastic movable human doll attired in cheaply made military fatigues called “GI Joseph”. I however named him “Stanley Mulver” and immediately resigned his commission from the light infantry. My Mother helped in this by sewing small business suits and leisure wear out of leftover Christmas fabric embroidered with holly and snowmen, tinfoil shoes and one tasteful Safari suit made of tight fitting powder blue rayon that proudly shone cobalt in the summer sunlight. It wasn’t long before I had begun making enlarged wigs out of gray plasticine. These wigs soon became huge pompadours for Stanley and looked even more grand when I meticulously imbedded small hairs from my daily body and face shavings. This hirsute practice along with walking upright allowed me to fit in with other children even though my father considered it a waste of time. In short, Stanley had become a visage of the Man I could never be, of that elusive self one sometimes glimpses down the tunnel of infinite reflected mirrors. Although ridiculed by my peers, I proudly wore Stanley around my neck at all times as if to say “SEE! This is the man I will be, a good man, a kind man”.

His haunting imagery is created digitally using 3D modeling software called Maya, mastered while working in digital animation for television and film industries from 1998—2001. In 1999, Caesar received a Primetime Emmy Nomination for Outstanding Special Effects in a series.

I have worked in many fields over the years, attended obedience classes and art colleges, jobs designing horrible buildings in architectural studios, medical art facilities, digital service bureaus, suspicious casino computer game companies, eventually working at computer modeling, digital animation and visual effects for television and film. Some award nominations have been attained and I have been driven in long black liquor filled limousines and walked on hind legs down red carpets in Pasadena while wearing strange smelling rented tuxedos.

Caesar works in Maya (a 3D modeling software used for digital animation effects in film and game industries), using it to create his figures as well as the virtual realms in which they exist. Through the program, he builds digital models with invisible skeletons and anatomical joints that can be bent and manipulated to assume any pose. He wraps the models in rich textures, adding hair, skin, eyelashes and fingernails. Then places them in digitally lit, impeccably detailed 3D environments built with architectural layers, windows, wallpapers, curtains and furnishings. Caesar’s meticulous process incorporates elements of drawing, painting, collage and sculpture, working countless hours to achieve every remarkably intricate tableau. Further emphasizing his sculptural technique, Caesar compares his process of 2D printmaking with imagery created in 3D as being similar to the practice of capturing stills from video and film.

With full control over dressing, posing and lighting his figures as well as every element of their surroundings, Caesar’s craft is an advanced extension of a childhood obsession—playing with dolls. Fantasy, escapism, human cruelty and disguise are reoccurring themes explored within his dramatic narratives. Betraying the seemingly child-like innocence of the figures is their piercing, knowing gaze—exposing inner strength in contrast with their fragile physical appearance. Dark details manifest from deep within the artist’s vast imagination to define simulated realities, transporting the viewer into sanctuaries created for his lost ghost-children who emerge from shadows into safe refuge, carrying macabre secrets and hidden truths.

All images by Gallery House/Ray Caesar.

A beautiful video postcard from Bali, Indonesia. Filmed and edited by Andrew Melikov.