Archaeologist Benedicto Perez Goicochea and colleagues discovered something fantastic in a remote mountainside in the Amazonian jungle: the village of the mystical "Cloud Forest People."
The buildings found on the Pachallama peak are in remarkably good condition, estimated to be over 1,000 years old and comprised of the traditional round stone houses built by the Chachapoya, the 'Cloud Forest People'. [...]
Archaeologist Benedicto Pérez Goicochea said: "The citadel is perched on the edge of an abyss.
"We suspect that the ancient inhabitants used this as a lookout point from where they could spot potential enemies."
It turns out that Mother Nature invented the Super Mario Star. Behold the Marginaster sea star, newly discovered off the coast of Tasmania:
Photo: CSIRO
A recently discovered species of Marginaster sea star was found living around seamounts in the southern waters off the coast of Tasmania, scientists reported in October 2008.
The seamounts, or underwater mountains, can sprawl 15.6 miles (25 kilometers) wide and rise thousands of feet from the seabed.
In the deep sea, where the ocean bottom is nothing more than muddy sediment, rocky seamounts offer a stable habitat that provides shelter and food for sea life.
National Geographic News has the fascinating photo gallery: Link
Florida congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen was convinced that the phone call she got was from a Barack Obama sound-alike, so she hung up on him. Twice.
Turns out, it was the real Obama:
According to a statement released by her office, the Republican congresswoman cut off the caller, telling him she thought “this is a joke from one of the South Florida radio stations known for these pranks.” She then hung up.
Finally, an aide told Ros-Lehtinen she had an urgent call from Chairman Howard Berman, chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee. Still suspicious, Ros-Lehtinen urged the California Democrat to recount a story only both of them would know.
Berman passed the test — and told her she had, in fact, hung up on President-elect Obama.
Remember the squid hat that Jill and Miss C posted? Well, I found a dress to match: behold the octodress by VECONA, as displayed in their Cabaret Gothique fashion show in Bruges last month. Via jwz.
Psst! Wondering what you should get for your geek for Chistmas? Take a look at this article that our very own Jill Harness wrote for Inventor Spot.
This one to the left is the Inka, the alien coffee press, by designer Guido Venturini (if that isn't an alien's name, I don't know what is) for Italian design studio Alessi.
You see these opening logos every time you go to the movies, but have you ever wondered who is the boy on the moon in the DreamWorks logo? Or which mountain inspired the Paramount logo? Or who was the Columbia Torch Lady? Let's find out:
1. DreamWorks SKG: Boy on the Moon
In 1994, director Steven Spielberg, Disney studio chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg, and record producer David Geffen (yes, they make the initial SKG on the bottom of the logo) got together to found a new studio called DreamWorks.
Spielberg wanted the logo for DreamWorks to be reminiscent of Hollywood's golden age. The logo was to be a computer generated image of a man on the moon, fishing, but Visual Effects Supervisor Dennis Muren of Industrial Light and Magic, who has worked on many of Spielberg's films, suggested that a hand-painted logo might look better. Muren asked his friend, artist Robert Hunt to paint it.
Hunt also sent along an alternative version of the logo, which included a young boy on a crescent moon, fishing. Spielberg liked this version better, and the rest is history. Oh, and that boy? It was Hunt's son, William.
The DreamWorks logo that you see in the movies was made at ILM from paintings by Robert Hunt, in collaboration with Kaleidoscope Films (designers of the original storyboards), Dave Carson (director), and Clint Goldman (producer) at ILM.
Photo courtesy of Robert Hunt - Thanks for the neat story, Robert!
2. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM): Leo The Lion
In 1924, studio publicist Howard Dietz designed the "Leo The Lion" logo for Samuel Goldwyn's Goldwyn Picture Corporation. He based it on the athletic team of his alma mater Columbia University, the Lions. When Goldwyn Pictures merged with Metro Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer Pictures, the newly formed MGM retained the logo.
Since then, there have been five lions playing the role of "Leo The Lion". The first was Slats, who graced the openings of MGM's silent films from 1924 to 1928. The next lion, Jackie, was the first MGM lion whose roar was heard by the audience. Though the movies were silent, Jackie's famous growl-roar-growl sequence was played over the phonograph as the logo appeared on screen. He was also the first lion to appear in Technicolor in 1932.
The third lion and probably most famous was Tanner (though at the time Jackie was still used concurrently for MGM's black and white films). After a brief use of an unnamed (and very mane-y) fourth lion, MGM settled on Leo, which the studio has used since 1957.
The company motto "Ars Gratia Artis" means "Art for Art's Sake."
Sources: MGM Media Center | Wikipedia entry on "Leo The Lion"
3. 20th Century Fox: The Searchlight Logo
In 1935, Twentieth Century Pictures and Fox Film Company (back then mainly a theater-chain company) merged to create Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation (they later dropped the hyphen).
The original Twentieth Century Pictures logo was created in 1933 by famed landscape artist Emil Kosa, Jr. After the merger, Kosa simply replaced "Pictures, Inc." with "Fox" to make the current logo. Besides this logo, Kosa was also famous for his matte painting of the Statue of Liberty ruin at the end of the Planet of the Apes (1968) movie, and others.
Perhaps just as famous as the logo is the "20th Century Fanfare", composed by Alfred Newman, then musical director for United Artists.
4. Paramount: The Majestic Mountain
Paramount Pictures Corporation was founded in 1912 as Famous Players Film Company by Adolph Zukor, and the theater moguls the Frohman brothers, Daniel and Charles.
The Paramount "Majestic Mountain" logo was first drawn as a doodle by W.W. Hodkinson during a meeting with Zukor, based on the Ben Lomond Mountain from his childhood in Utah (the live action logo made later is probably Peru's Artesonraju). It is the oldest surviving Hollywood film logo.
The original logo has 24 stars, which symbolized Paramount's then 24 contracted movie stars (it's now 22 stars, though no one could tell me why they reduced the number of stars). The original matte painting has also been replaced with a computer generated mountain and stars.
Paramount logo history, for more details, see: CLG Wiki
5. Warner Bros.: The WB Shield
Warner Bros. (yes, that's legally "Bros." not "Brothers") was founded by four Jewish brothers who emigrated from Poland: Harry, Albert, Sam, and Jack Warner. Actually, those aren't the names that they were born with. Harry was born "Hirsz," Albert was "Aaron," Sam was "Szmul," and Jack was "Itzhak." Their original surname is also unknown - some people said that it is "Wonsal," "Wonskolaser" or even Eichelbaum, before it was changed to "Warner." (Sources: Doug Sinclair | Tody Nudo's Hollywood Legends)
In the beginning, Warner Bros. had trouble attracting top talents. In 1925, at the urging of Sam, Warner Bros. made the first feature-length "talking pictures" (When he heard of Sam's idea, Harry famously said "Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?"). That got the ball rolling for the studio and made Warner Bros. famous.
The Warner Bros. logo, the WB Shield, has actually gone many revisions. Jason Jones and Matt Williams of CLG Wiki have the details:
Warner Bros. Logo History - see the full details at CLG Wiki
If you're interested in WB cartoons, you can't go wrong with Dave Mackey's Field guide: Link
6. Columbia Pictures: The Torch Lady
Columbia Pictures was founded in 1919 by the brothers Harry and Jack Cohn, and Joe Brandt as Cohn-Brandt-Cohn Film Sales. Many of the studio's early productions were low-budget affairs, so it got nicknamed "Corned Beef and Cabbage." In 1924, the brothers Cohn bought out Brandt and renamed their studio Columbia Pictures Corporation in effort to improve its image.
Vintage Columbia Pictures Logo (Source: Reel Classics)
The studio's logo is Columbia, the female personification of America. It was designed in 1924 and the identity of the "Torch Lady" model was never conclusively determined (though more than a dozen women had claimed to be "it.")
In her 1962 autobiography, Bette Davis claimed that Claudia Dell was the model, whereas in 1987 People Magazine named model and Columbia bit-actress Amelia Batchler as the girl. In 2001, the Chicago Sun-Times named a local woman who worked as an extra at Columbia named Jane Bartholomew as the model. Given how the logo has changed over the years, it may just be that all three were right! (Source)
The current Torch Lady logo was designed in 1993 by Michael J. Deas, who was commissioned by Sony Pictures Entertainment to return the lady to her "classic" look.
Though people thought that actress Annette Bening was the model, it was actually a Louisiana homemaker and muralist named Jenny Joseph that modeled the Torch Lady for Deas. Rather than use her face, however, Deas drew a composite face made from several computer-generated features (Source: Roger Ebert, Photo: Kathy Anderson)
Obviously, we're missing the stories of the logos of many other film studios. We'd love to hear from you if you know any! Please tell us in the comment section.
If you like this article, please check out Neatorama's articles on logos:
Most kids will find puppets funny, but not this kid. He's got a severe form of pupaphobia (the irrational fear of puppets). I don't think he's making this up, and I sure hope that he outgrows it.
I know people who have misophobia (irrational fear of dirt and germs), chemophobia (chemicals), and flutter-phobia, so I don't find the kid's reaction as funny though I'm sure many people would. But it sure is interesting: Hit play or go to Link [YouTube] - Thanks Juergen!
Do you have an irrational fear of something? What is it?
Previously on Neatorama: Coulrophobia: Fear of Clown (not a good link for you if you're afraid of clowns)
Hooray! It's time for Neatorama and Hobotopia's Caption Monkey game. But first, the story: that's Sara the Walrus who is trained to play the saxophone!
Under the direction of her trainer, Sara the Walrus grips the brass instrument between her flippers and blasts out a note.
Russian trainer Sergiy has also taught her to strike a nonchalant pose, leaning on a worktop with one flipper under her chin and looking bored.
Sara's skills at mimicking humans extend to dressing up as a railway platform conductor and blowing a whistle. (Source)
Now, onto the game: funniest caption will win an original Laugh-Out-Loud Cat comic by Adam Koford. Place your caption in the comment section. One caption per comment, please, but you can enter as many as you like.
Don't forget to check out Adam's blog for inspiration! Good luck!
Photo Credit: (above) Iron Man (below) Jeremy Keith of Adactio
Did you know that the movie Iron Man used a Creative Commons-licensed photo from Flickr? Here's the story of how Jeremy Keith's photo of his buddy Andy Budd in NASA's Vehicle Assembly Building in Cape Canaveral ended up in the movie:
“Wait a minute”, I said. “What is this for?”
“It’s for a movie that’s currently in production called Iron Man, starring Robert Downey Jnr.”
Holy crap! One of my photos was going to be in Iron Man? That certainly put a new spin on things.
“So I guess you want to use the picture because it’s inside NASA’s Vehicle Assembly Building?” I asked.
“No. We just thought it was a picture of some warehouse or something.”
Mars Rover was rovin' along the Red Planet where it snapped a picture of what looks like ... a log of wood? The photo immediately a conspiracy theory rush in the blogosphere:
The unusual image was featured in a NASA press release in 2004, although the space agency made no mention of the timber-like object captured on the spacecraft's 115th day on Mars.
But one website insists it is a leaked image that 'could get someone killed.' A writer from TheCrit.com said NASA's claims Mars was a desert world were 'lies' and that 'there are vast forests on Mars, ones that are kept from the public.'
They go on to speculate the 'wood' was brought to its present position by a flood of water that must have happened within 40 years 'because the wood is intact.'
Randy Goodman of Sedalia, Missouri, thought that he had killed a deer with a well-placed shot to the neck. As he marvelled over his lucky catch, the deer came to life and exacted a little revenge:
As the nine-point, 240-pound buck lay lifeless the unexpected happened. The buck stood up and knocked Goodman on his butt, attacking him with his antlers.
“It was 15 seconds of hell,” Goodman said. Goodman thought the deer was trying to go through him as he fought it off the best he could. A few seconds later, the deer was off and running. “I felt his front legs go over my face,” Goodman said.
The buck ran 30 yards and fell down again and Goodman was worried the deer wasn’t done yet. “If he was going to come back I would be in trouble because I was in too much pain,” Goodman said.
Archaeologists digging at Zaraysk, Russia, unearthed a trove of Stone Age figurines and carvings, including something puzzling: a cone-shaped object whose function remains a mystery:
Also among the finds was an object carved from mammoth ivory, shaped like a cone with its top removed. The cone is densely ornamented and has a hole running through its centre.
The authors note that the object is unique among Palaeolithic artefacts. "The function of this decorated object remains a puzzle," they say.
Since you guys are experts at guessing in our weekly What is it? game, let's try this one for size: what do you think the mystery object is for?
Yay! It's time for our weekly collaboration with the What is it? Blog. This week brings us this strange object to the left - can you guess what it is for?
The first person who guessed right (or the funniest guess, if nobody got it right) wins a Free Neatorama T-Shirt! Contest rules are simple: place your guess in the comment section. One guess per comment, please, but you can enter as many times as you wish. Post no URLs, let others play.
Psst - you've got a secret admirer. Well, actually not yet ... but you will, if Jake Bronstein of Zoomdoggle has his ways. The always-fun Jake (who came up with ideas-so-wacky-they're-brilliant like the Fun-O-Meter and randomly thanking customer service reps posted previously on Neatorama) wants to write you a love letter.
All you have to do is give him an address (name optional) and he'll take care of the rest:
When was the last time you got a love letter? Get ready to reset the counter, cause Zoomdoggle & Co. wants to send you one. Really. Hand written, and one of kind too. Just send an address, name optional, to loveletters at zoomdoggle dot com, or post it in the comments section, then keep an eye on the mailbox. It’s coming. And, if you’re anything like us, you’d be surprised how good it’s going to feel. Even coming from a stranger.
