Soon to be a full-length feature, TimeScapes by photographer Tom Lowe is a breathtakingly beautiful video.
This is production footage from my forthcoming debut film, "TimeScapes," a portrait of the American Southwest. This video was filmed and edited at 4K (4069x2304) resolution, four times greater than regular 1080p HD. A 4K DCP file is available upon request. Shot on Red Epic and Canon RAW still cameras.
I can't decide which part I like best: the landscapes, the rolling stars, the music, or the dancing VLA dishes. You’ll want to watch the trailer twice; the second time in full screen. -via Geekosystem
British sailors aboard the amphibious assault ship HMS Ocean lip-sync to Mariah Carey's Christmas recording while on their way home from what was originally supposed to be a seven-week deployment -but then they were diverted to Libya, and seven weeks turned into seven months. After a 225-day mission (176 at sea), they are stoked to get back to the UK by this Friday, in time for the holidays! Link
Dr. Phil Plait selects his favorite space pictures every year, but this year he had a lot to sift through. The top 16 pictures taken from the viewpoint of space include volcanoes, hurricanes, earth formations, the moon, eclipses, and spacecraft, including the final space shuttle missions. Astronaut Ron Garan took this photograph of the moon from the International Space Station. See the rest at Bad Astronomy Blog. Link
From the remark about the hostages in Iran, I suspect this is from 1979 or 1980. The younger son grew up to host a website dedicated to photobombs. -Thanks, Comedy Wizard!
We read about the adventures of Dave Prager and his wife Jenny on their blog Our Delhi Struggle, which we've linked to several times here at Neatorama. Now Prager's book, Delirious Delhi, is available for purchase, and he's launched a blog about the book, in which you can follow his adventures in publicity and read some excerpts as well. Link
It is summer now in Antarctica, and the giant salmon are running -as you can see. Sandwichgirl recently took a few photographs of the fish, which are curated in a Flickr set. Link -via Laughing Squid
Grocery stores always manage to have a table full of bananas just the perfect shade of yellow to attract customers, that will last a couple more days while the family eats them. They are shipped in by the boatload from Central America, so how do they manage this feat? You can get the lowdown from a banana distributor who explains the precisely controlled process that produces the produce we buy. Link -via Jason Kottke
This Korean report follows a hand that has all the moves. I don't understand Korean, but the comments at YouTube indicate the puppeteer is a high school girl. Watch this little fighter try to split a board! -via Buzzfeed
Redditor JiveMonkey snapped a picture of this house in Rocklin, California, that is famous for its homemade Christmas lawn decorations. See the full size image to decipher what Calvin's snowmen are protesting. Link
Anthony Miranda was arrested in Chicago for an attempted mugging. The 24-year-old approached a man in a car and demanded money at gunpoint on Friday night. After some money was turned over, Miranda made the driver get out of the car.
At some point, Miranda’s attention was diverted and the victim was able to grab control of the gun and the two wrestled.
During the fight, Miranda accidentally discharged his gun, shooting himself in the ankle, Mirabelli said.
The victim -- who told police he’s a martial arts expert and ultimate fighting champion -- was able to pin Miranda down until police arrived. Police arrived to find Miranda with a face full of lacerations and two black eyes. He was taken to Holy Cross Hospital for treatment, police said.
Ralph ‘Whistler’ Giese performed "Georgia on My Mind" on the Detroit talk show Kelly & Company in the early '80s. The audience reaction is priceless. See more of Giese's video at Dailiy Picks and Flicks. Link -via Metafilter
Dawn Wells, who played Mary Ann on the long-running '60s TV series Gilligan's Island, begins a run in a new play in Chicago tomorrow. And she still gets recognized wherever she goes.
“I can’t go anywhere,” she says. “I can’t go to Beijing, I climbed with the gorillas in Rwanda. It’s ‘Mary Ann! Mary Ann!’ ”
Although Wells runs a film festival in Idaho, is working on a book (a conversation between Mary Ann and Dawn) and has two reality shows “in development,” she’ll take a short break from those projects to appear (starting Tuesday) in the Chicago run of “Love, Loss, and What I Wore.” The play centers on how items of clothing mark emotional moments in women’s lives.
While Wells, 73, has for years held on to a lucky green blouse, the most precious threads she owns are Mary Ann’s almost-belly shirt and leg-lengthening bun-huggers.
Custom-made and immediately recognizable, they’ve long been valuable collector’s items. Wells has been offered as much as $35,000 to sell the ensemble, but “I’m not ready yet.”
Read more in the the Chicago Sun-Times. Link -via reddit
I had to laugh when I first saw this Twaggie posted at the Neatorama Facebook page. See, my old microwave doesn't have recipes on the buttons (yeah, I finally got rid of my dial microwave), but my mother's does, which confused me at first. Matt Lassen illustrated this one from at Tweet by @perlanation. Link
Man, that looks like a lot of fun! I would ride this playground slide, which is somewhere in Japan, but only once unless I could drive back up the hill. -via College Humor
Once upon a time, fairy tales were dark fables designed to scare children into good behavior. This is the story of one American author who thought kids deserved better.
In December 1900, L. Frank Baum was a struggling, 44-year-old writer living in Chicago with his wife and four children. Christmas was only days away, and Baum was desperately searching for a way to buy presents for his family.
On a whim, Baum went downtown to ask his publisher for a royalties’ advance for the five books he’d written that year. He walked out with a check for one of the books, and promptly stuck it in his pocket. He didn’t bother to take a look at it.
When Baum arrived home, his wife, Maud, was ironing a shirt. He reluctantly handed her the check, and at the same moment, they both discovered that it was for $1,423.98—roughly $40,000 today. Paralyzed with disbelief, Maud burned a hole through the shirt.
That book, of course, was The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN
Lyman Frank Baum was born in 1856 in Chittenango, New York. As a child, his weak heart limited his capacity for rough-and-tumble play. So, despite being the seventh of nine kids, he spent most of his childhood alone, indoors, and dreaming.
As a young man, Baum leapt like a flea from career to career. By his early 30s, he’d been a journalist, a printer, a postage-stamp dealer, and a champion poultry breeder, which led him into publishing, with his trade journal The Poultry Record. He also ran his own theater company, where he wrote, directed, and acted in his own plays.
Then, in 1881, Baum met his leading lady—Maud Gage, a sophomore at Cornell. But Maud’s mother, Matilda, disapproved of the union. Matilda Gage was a feminist who marched alongside Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony in the women’s suffrage movement. She saw Baum as a flake who’d never amount to anything, and she told her daughter she’d be a “darned fool” to marry the itinerant actor. Yet, Baum’s charm, sincerity, and uncanny ability to tell fantastic stories were no match for Matilda, and he soon won her over. He also became a feminist.
Frank married Maud in 1882, but troubles were around the corner. Baum’s theater company went belly-up, and without local prospects, he looked west for opportunity. In 1888, he moved his family to the Dakota Territory, where he opened a store in the town of Aberdeen. (Years later, when Baum wrote descriptions of the Kansas prairie in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, he was actually describing South Dakota.) His shop, Baum’s Bazaar, sold Chinese paper lanterns, Bohemian glass, gourmet chocolates, and other exotic items. But Baum overestimated the frontier’s demands for novelty shopping. In a few short years, he’d gone bust yet again.
At this point, L. Frank Baum was 35 with no career. He headed east for Chicago, where he received guidance from an unexpected source: his mother-in-law. Matilda Gage convinced Baum to pursue his one true talent, telling stories. In Aberdeen, children had stalked Baum, demanding story hour from the raconteur. Kids loved his tales because they weren’t thinly disguised morality lessons. Instead, Baum’s stories were fantasies filled with candy, toys, magic, and adventure. Heeding Matilda’s advice, Baum decided to give writing a try.
