Blade Runner 2049 may not have lived up to the hype at the box office, but it definitely delivered the goods in the visual department thanks in part to the amazing models made by the artists at the Weta Workshop.

These incredible buildings could have been created using 3D software or matte paintings, but director Denis Villenueve insisted on using practical effects as much as possible to pay homage to the original film, in which many amazing models were used.

Behind-the-scenes of our miniatures work on @bladerunnermovie. Zac stands in the middle of our LA cityscape, carefully piecing together one of the towering mega-skyscrapers that dominate Denis Villeneuve’s vision of the future. #photooftheday #bladerunner2049 #BladeRunner #miniatures #movies #wetaworkshop #amazing #handmade

A post shared by Weta Workshop (@wetaworkshop) on Oct 25, 2017 at 1:27pm PDT

Weta Workshop created this stunning behind-the-scenes video showcasing the amazing models and miniatures they created for Blade Runner 2049, breaking down how many of the amazing shots in the movie were made using practical effects.

(YouTube Link)

-Via Laughing Squid

I've been obsessed with toys since I was a little kid, but as I grew older I found myself less interested in the action figures and kids' toys I once thought were the greatest things on Earth.

And many artists out there agree with me, so they started creating art toys and modifying existing figures for adult collectors who see toys as an artistic medium that captures the imagination and looks really cool sitting on the shelf.

And Y. Nakajima is one of the greatest toy artists working today, because his characters tell a whole story while just sitting there waiting for action.

His post-apocalyptic versions of Donald Duck, Mickey Mouse and Winnie The Pooh are seriously badass, with tons of tiny details that add to their backstory, but if the s#%t hits the fan I'm hanging out with Thomas the War Engine.

-Via Geeks Are Sexy

The bad definitely overshadowed the good in 2017, and all the bad news and dark facts about the future of our planet brought some people down in a major way and made others stop reading the news entirely.

So, sick of reading all the negative stories, Jacob Atkins made it his mission to share all the positive stories he could find in 2017, and his positive view of the world definitely made me smile.

It's good to know there's hope for the snow leopard, the coral reefs and the people who have been devastated by the AIDS epidemic in Africa.

But the best news of all involves the poor honey bees who have been dying off in record numbers, due in part to pesticides used to protect crops.

It appears bee populations were on the rise in 2017, although research seems to indicate their colonies have increased 3 percent while the number of deaths due to colony collapse disorder fell 27 percent, so Jacob's info on this one may be a bit off. Yay for bees!

See Man Tired Of All Negative News From 2017 Posts The Most Positive Things That Happened here

Funeral traditions seem like the kind of thing that would change very little over time, and many people are under the impression that the funeral traditions of today date back centuries.

But funerary customs are constantly being updated due to changes in social attitudes and simply out of necessity, since people die every day but there's limited space left in the cemeteries.

So what's going to change in the next 10 years?

Well, due to limited grave space we're going to see more cremations, including "flameless" cremations that dissolve the body in water, and at-home funerals are about to become far more common.

We'll also start seeing self-driving hearses on the road, digital time capsule service offered online to store photos, videos and other remnants of the deceased's life, and the fully customizable digital tombstones sci-fi stories have been promising us for decades.

Read 12 Ways Funerals Will Change In The Next 10 Years here

Medical science has progressed so much in the last 100 years that knowledge once believed to be tried and true about the treatment and prevention of illness has proven to be pure nonsense.

People used to believe in the healing power of products like castor oil, morphine and mercury only to discover they did more harm than good, and now we're finding out that vitamins don't really help cure illness either.

But some people still believe that taking vitamin c or zinc will help prevent or cure a cold, a claim backed by products like EmergenC and Airborne, but as you'll see in this episode of SciShow these vitamins don't help cure a cold, or anything else for that matter.

(YouTube Link)

-Via Geeks Are Sexy

80s and 90s kids were obsessed with discovering where in the world Carmen Sandiego was hiding, and because the games taught kids about geography you could even play them on the computers at school.

And even though we were able to discover where Carmen Sandiego was hiding time and time again there was one question that never received an answer- who was Carmen Sandiego?

We're not talking about the in-game character here but rather the actor who portrayed the shadowy Carmen in the 90s TV show Where In Time Is Carmen Sandiego?, the person who came to represent Carmen in real life.

HuffPost reporter Todd Van Luling was able to track down Janine LaManna and discover why she was never given the credit she deserved for personifying Carmen Sandiego IRL:

LaManna, whose name was listed in the credits as part of the ensemble cast, was essentially hiding in plain sight. She played a rotating series of good guy/helper characters, like Betsy Ross and Elizabeth Cady Stanton, which threw off suspicion about her other, more important role on the show. Or perhaps it was an illustration of how heroes and villains aren’t as easy to tell apart as we think?

Life did end up imitating art—sort of. After taking a break from performing, LaManna went off the grid. She doesn’t have a Facebook or Twitter account, and she married an army officer whose work, like Carmen’s, takes them all over the world. They’re probably not stealing the Great Wall of China while traveling, though.

Read more at Mental Floss

(Image Link)

Sharks can be scary as hell when encountered while swimming around in the ocean, so imagine how terrifying it would be to come across them inside an active volcano!

It may sound like the plot of a cheesy sci-fi movie like Sharknado but it's true- back in 2015 scientists discovered living sharks inside Kavachi, an active underwater volcano in the Solomon Islands.

(Image Link)

Researchers sent down a robotic camera that captured the stunning footage of a Pacific sleeper shark, hammerhead sharks and silky sharks swimming around inside the acidic and super-heated environment like it's no big deal:

“Divers who have gotten close to the outer edge of the volcano have had to back away because of how hot it is or because they were getting mild skin burns from the acid water,” Phillips said. “These large animals are living in what you have to assume is much hotter and much more acidic water, and they’re just hanging out. It makes you question what type of extreme environment these animals are adapted to. What sort of changes have they undergone? Are there only certain animals that can withstand it?

(YouTube Link)

-Via Did You Know?

Dragonflies are absolutely gorgeous insects, with vibrantly-colored bodies and magically iridescent wings that shimmer in the light, but did you know they start out as ugly little bugs called nymphs before they become beautiful?

Just kidding, dragonflies even look cool in their nymph stage, and as cool as it is to see a dragonfly up close it's even cooler to watch one transform from a plain-colored nymph to a colorful adult in this video from Beauty of Science:

This short film documented the magical transformation (metamorphosis) of a dragonfly from its nymph to an adult. All footages were captured with an iPhone 6s from May 25th 11pm to May 26th 7am. This transformation is a wonder of nature.

The Metamorphosis of a Dragonfly from Beauty of Science on Vimeo.

-Via Laughing Squid

Every parent has their own way of dealing with a child who doesn't want to play by the rules of the house, their punishment more or less severe depending on how bratty and disobedient the kid is being.

But when you're dealing with an entitled teenager you have to approach punishment differently and hit them where it really hurts- in their wallets.

Heidi Johnson had issues with her 13-year-old son Aaron's attitude after he started lying to her about finishing his homework.

He claimed he didn't have time to do it because he had a job making videos on YouTube, so she wrote him this letter to inform him he'd now be treated as a roommate rather than a kid:

It's ridiculous how many kids think they're going to be a YouTube star just because a few of their videos get some views, don't they know the real money is in eSports?

-Via Shareably

Friendship is Bold by Shin Gallon

The Caped Crusader has teamed up with some strange characters over the years, but his adventures in Equestria take the cake in terms of strangeness! But weirdness always follows in the Joker's wake, so when he discovered a device that allowed him to cross over from Gotham to Equestria he brought with him a sea of madness that rocked the land with clowny color. Luckily, this dimensional ripple also let the Caped Crusader cross over with the Joker, and even though he was shocked to see they'd arrived in a world full of sentient horses Bruce was glad to see he wouldn't have to walk!

Show the world the strange side of being a superhero with this Friendship Is Bold t-shirt by Shin Gallon, it's MLP meets DC in a mashup that's sure to make your fellow fans cheer with delight!

Visit Shin Gallon's official website, then head on over to his NeatoShop for more geek-tastic designs:

View more designs by Shin Gallon | More Cartoon T-shirts | New T-Shirts

Are you a professional illustrator or T-shirt designer? Let's chat! Sell your designs on the NeatoShop and get featured in front of tons of potential new fans on Neatorama!

Types of Stars by Andropov

When you stare at all those points of light in the night sky do you ever wonder what you're seeing out there? Maybe you're seeing a poor failed star who couldn't grow big enough to shine brightly like their brothers and sisters the main sequence stars? Those failures are even jealous of their baby cousins the protostars because they can't get their internal pressure or temperature up high enough to outshine a young stars, which makes them feel really small. But every star feels small when compared to the red supergiant, even George Clooney!

Show the world how bright you are with this Types Of Stars t-shirt by Andropov, it's a fun way to share your passion for astronomy and a great way to get people talking about your cool new shirt!

Visit Andropov's Twitter, then head on over to his NeatoShop for more bright-minded designs:

View more designs by Andropov | More Science T-shirts | New T-Shirts

Are you a professional illustrator or T-shirt designer? Let's chat! Sell your designs on the NeatoShop and get featured in front of tons of potential new fans on Neatorama!

The Distracted Boyfriend Meme had a big year in 2017, and his wandering eye was used to represent everything from The Youth to Homer Simpson to the ubiquitous Me, but it turns out the pic chosen for the meme is only part of the story.

Because, as is often the case in the world of stock photography, there are many more photos in the series that walk us through their phony yet doomed relationship, photos that were forgotten when the initlal image went viral.

Twitter user Andrew J. Abernathy discovered the saga of the Distracted Boyfriend when he spotted the jerk's stock photo girlfriend in another photo, so he started sharing the pics via tweets.

The couple had a kid together, bought a house together the old fashioned way, and did some other totally not fake and totally not staged things together like a totally not fake couple.

But in the end his wandering eye would cause the fake couple that shouldn't have been together in the first place to break up, but in a shocking twist the Distracted Boyfriend was the one who did the dumping!

See Famous Jerk Boyfriend Meme Has Fascinating Stock Photo Backstory here

When Jurassic Park came out back in 1993 the thought of dinosaurs roaming the Earth again made us all shake in our Reeboks, but now that we've lived through 2017 we know there are much scarier creatures out there.

They're called humans, and while dinosaurs can devour your body and beat you with nunchuks humans can tear your world apart from the inside out with their bigotry and hatred, and even worse they can teach your kids to hate.

So let's make those ideological dinosaurs spreading messages of religious bigotry go extinct once and for all- by breeding dinosaurs with a taste for the blood of bigots! (Comic by Pie Comic)

-Via Geeks Are Sexy

At the core of every good story is a conflict, a situation that pits the main character against someone or something standing between the main character and their goal.

The classic conflicts found in literature such as man vs. man and man vs. himself have been broken down and analyzed a thousand times over, so rather than presenting the same old literary analysis here's a chart starring Daffy Duck.

It's based on a chart created by Grant Snider from Incidental Comics, only this one is way wackier than the original and anything but boring!

-Via Geeks Are Sexy

Taking a road trip with friends and loved ones can be fun as long as they carry their fair share of the financial load, do their fair share of the driving, and help you stay awake while you're driving.

But some people can't ride in a car more than ten minutes without falling asleep, which makes them terrible copilots, and yet when that person is your wife you have no choice but to take them along and hope they don't snore.

Redditor MrMagoo21 shared all the "fun" road trip pics he has taken while his wife slumbers away, and despite the fact that she sleeps while he drives during every road trip MrMagoo21 says he has no hard feelings:

“I’ve always attributed it to more of a Pavlov’s dogs situation,” he said about her passion for naps. “She got car sick really easily as a kid and her mom would give her some motion sickness medicine that would usually knock her out on long trips. Just figured she has been subliminally trained at this point to fall asleep at the sound of an engine running.”

-Via Bored Panda