Archive for November 8th, 2009
Name That Movie
Illustrator Paul Rogers puts together six drawings of iconic images for each classic movie. Your challenge is to name the movies from the drawings. You don’t get a clue as to the plot, the dialog, or the actors. I could name most of them; I suspect that the others are movies I haven’t seen. Link -via reddit
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Turning Rainwater Into a Playground
Image: De Urbanisten and Studio Marco Vermeulen
Two Dutch architects want to alter the storm drainage system of the city of Rotterdam to redirect water into playgrounds. The water will be used to fill fanciful ponds and moats for children to play in/around:
In Florian Boer and Marco Vermeulen’s proposal, rainwater runoff isn’t funneled into a complex system of underground pipes, a system that is rather expensive to build and maintain, but is managed instead through a network of surface reservoirs, the Waterpleinen, or Watersquares. These storage spaces will be dry for most of the year, but during storm events, they will collect water from the surrounding neighborhood. If one reaches capacity, excess water will overflow into another basin. After the rain, the collected water will slowly recede into nearby bodies of water or seep into the soil.
So instead of being buried in concrete, excised from the daily life of the city and only experienced by municipal workers, urban hydrology is visibly, even prominently, incorporated into the surface fabric of the city. Programmed with recreational opportunities when its dry and even while inundated, its infrastructure provides active public spaces for the local area, not dark playgrounds for a handful of urban explorers. It even becomes an event, its frolicking rivulets and interior lakes staged for the young and old.
Link via Fast Company
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Bread Shoes
Photo: Dalia Birske
Martynas Birskys of the Vilnius-based design studio DaDaDa sells slippers made out of bread. For your comfort, you can select from various sizes and grains. It’s hard to argue with his sales pitch “eatable…dries itself… made from bread…first in fashion…needs no pressing…feels good in dry climate …won’t sag.”
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8-Bit Wedding Invitation
Image: GeekStir
Luis Diaz Santis and Magaly Guerrero Ramierz sent out invitations to their wedding depicting themselves as 8-bit characters in a two-player combat video game. Chris Jacob of Gizmodo suggests that this is a subtle social commentary on modern marriage. Either way, it’s cool, and you can view a picture of the groom proposing in binary at the link.
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Inflatable Seat Belt
(YouTube Link)
Ford is developing a seat belt that inflates when the car detects a crash. In The Wall Street Journal, Matthew Dolan writes:
Its inflatable rear seat belts spread crash forces over five times more area of the body than conventional seat belts, said Sue Cischke, Ford group vice president of sustainability, environmental and safety engineering
Each belt’s tubular air bag inflates with cold compressed gas, which flows through a specially designed buckle from a cylinder housed below the seat. The inflatable belt’s accordion-folded bag breaks through the belt fabric as it fills with gas, expanding sideways across the occupant’s body. It looks something like a water wing children wear in the pool before they know how to swim.
Link via Popular Science
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Harp Cover Songs
(YouTube Link)
Ben Miller of Urlesque has compiled several pop, rock, and metal songs performed by harpists, such as CKania13’s rendition of Led Zepplin’s “Stairway to Heaven.” The other videos are selections from Journey, Iron Maiden, Metallica, and Lenny Kravitz.
Link | Previously on Neatorama: Harptallica
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Longcat Fleece Scarf
Longcat is long, and warm, too because he’s a scarf made of fleece, felt, and polyfil. Also available in Tacgnol style (black). This internet meme is brought to you by artist Heather Dugger. Link -via The Daily What
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The Tin Horse Highway
The Outback town of Kulin, Australia, welcomes many tourists for the annual Kulin Bush Races in October. In the days leading up to the races, locals construct fanciful horses out of all kinds of materials to entertain those who travel the highway leading to the Jilakin Racetrack. This has become known as the Tin Horse Highway. See more tin horses placed in funny situations at Holtie’s House. Link
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Teeny Tiny Books
This is sort of like the library necklace, but with real books. From the Publishing House of Miniature Books in Russia come these tiny masterpieces measuring less than half an inch tall. I used Google Language Tools to try and translate some of the titles, and found one title translated as “And Bunin. A. Antonovsky apples”.
An Amazon search brought me to Ivan Bunin’s Collected Stories. The first story is called “The Scent of Apples,” and I learn on the first page that antonovka means autumn apple:
“I remember a fresh and quiet morning…The big garden, its dry and thinned out leaves turning golden in the early light. I remember the avenue of maples, the delicate smell of the fallen leaves, and the scent of autumn apples — antonovkas –that mix of honey and fall freshness. The air’s so clear it seems there is no air at all…”
There is a long history of miniature books in Russia, and you can read more about it here.
Via Nag On The Lake.
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Astronomical Clocks – Literally and Metaphorically
Astronomical clocks – amazing works of engineering that are sometimes six hundred years old – can be found throughout the world. Europe, however, has the lion’s share. Here are some of the more remarkable examples of the form.
To say that this clock is astronomical is, perhaps, stating the obvious. Another word that might describe the Prague Orloj is exquisite. The first and perhaps most astonishing fact about this astronomical clock is that it was finished and in place in 1410, over eighty years before Columbus made his voyage of discovery to the Americas. The first thing that draws the eye is the dial at the center of the clock which shows the positions of the moon and the sun. What makes the Orloj a magnet for visitors to the Czech city is the clockwork show of the figures of the apostles, which on the hour parade themselves. There are other moving sculptures too – plus a dial which pitted with medallions which represent the months of the years.
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Virtual Cow Butt
Veterinarians have no choice when they need to check a cow for pregnancy or infection. The standard procedure is to stick your arm up the cow’s rectum. The technique is difficult to teach to veterinary students because, well, it’s dark in there.
That’s why veterinarian and computer scientist Sarah Baillie has created the “Haptic Cow,” a virtual, touch-feedback device that mimics the feeling of real bovine anatomy, placed inside a fiberglass model of a cow’s rear end.
“With this technology, students can feel something that feels like the inside of a real cow, but I or another instructor can be following their movements on a monitor,” said Baillie, who teaches at the Royal Veterinary College in London. “This means we can say, ‘Come back a bit or go left a bit.’ It actually means you can direct them.”
Not only can professors follow a student’s exact movements and critique the technique, but they can also keep track of how much force is being applied. If a fledgling vet gets too rough and exceeds the number of Newtons considered safe by experienced vets, virtual Bessie will belt out a cautionary “Moo-oo!”
(image credit: Sarah Baillie/Royal Veterinary College)
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