MeituPic
Chinese iOS and Android camera app has a unique ‘defog’ feature to improve shots taken in poor air conditions.
*** New “Defog” feature magically turns smoggy sky into clear blue one.
***The most popular photo editor loved by over 300 million users worldwide!
Hong King's visual culture museum M+ has a fantastic site devoted to the city's ubiquitous neon signs, a glowing landscape of pop advertising that was one of the inspirations behind Ridley Scott's vision for Blade Runner. (via Laughing Squid)
Tim Delger not only reveals the secrets of hipster logo design, he'll also sell you the necessary fonts
*This guy’s got good slides. Also, that’s a good speech about the nature of the contemporary Internet after a generation’s worth of development.
*The tracks of the “Curiosity” rover on Mars, as seen from orbit by yet another machine observing Mars.
Buzz Rickson’s Black MA-1 Bomber Jacket
Cayce Pollard, brand-phobic coolhunter at the center of Pattern Recognition, adores her Japanese-made replica of a standard issue U.S. Air Force flying jacket.
The Rickson’s is a fanatical museum-grade replica of a U.S. MA-1 flying jacket, as purely functional and iconic a garment as the previous century produced…Cayce’s MA-1 trumps any attempt at minimalism, the Rickson’s having been created by Japanese obsessives driven by passions having nothing at all to do with anything remotely like fashion…It is an imitation more real somehow than that which it emulates.
The Rickson’s is a quite real jacket, emblematic for Gibson of the almost religious craftsmanship of Japanese garment makers. Buzz Rickson’s is, in fact, a Japanese clothing company founded in 1993 that specializes in replica vintage flight jackets, one of which is the MA-1. According to their site:
We carefully research and analyze existing vintage flight jackets. We then make every effort to duplicate the material paying close attention to the woven fabric techniques. Firstly, we clarify the exact time the material was made by examining the structure of the fiber, weaving method and spinning technology. For instance, in the case of nylon, we examine the existing nylons to confirm the melting point and conduct an infrared ray spectrum analysis to determine the change in infrared rays and temperature…
And so on. You can find out more about their process, including microscopic photos of nylon threads at their website. The MA-1 was one of the first nylon bomber jackets, designed in the 1950s to replace its bulkier predecessors and keep up with the advance of smaller jets traveling at higher altitudes. You can get MA-1 replicas from various sellers, of varying qualities, but it’s hard to imagine anything topping the Rickson’s. They recreate the colors and the fading of the fabric down to the molecular level.
Cayce wears a black MA-1 jacket, in keeping with her all-black minimal style that accommodates her unique condition. In a marketing twist worthy of a Gibson story, the black MA-1 did not actually exist (the USAF only issued green MA-1s), until Pattern Recognition prompted Buzz Rickson’s to create one as part of its “William Gibson Collection.” This would make the black Rickson’s a perfect replica of a fictional garment, modeled after the real-life perfect replica of an actual vintage item. They are, of course, out of stock from Rickson’s and difficult to find.
History Preservation Associates
Designed by Jackson Willits | Country: United States
“Matt’s Brew is just that—beer brewed by Matt Flores, a fellow Seattle-based designer. When he mentioned needing packaging for a CDA this winter, we started ideating and decided the beer should be a play on the notorious rain and darkness we experience here in the Pacific Northwest. From there, I chose to create a design and illustration that’s somewhere between the classic WPA national parks posters and a New Yorker cartoon. This jaded snowman is dedicated to all the folks who spend their short daylight hours in grey and soggy concrete jungles.”
Via: lovelypackage.com
The post Matt’s Brew appeared first on Create Laboratory Limited.
seoul KOREA
Design and Construction Process
DDP is the first public project in Korea to utilize the 3-Dimensional Building Information Modelling (BIM) and other digital tools in construction.
Photos: Virgile Simon BERTRAND.
Throughout the design process, every building requirement was considered as a set of inter-related spatial relationships which will define the social interactions and behavioural structure in/around the project. These relationships became the framework of the design, defining how different aspects of the project, such as spatial organization, programmatic requirements, and engineering come together.
With parametric building information modelling software and design computation, we were able to continually test and adapt the design to the ever-evolving client’s brief as well as integrate engineering and construction requirements. These technologies helped to maintain the original design aspiration throughout the project’s construction. It also streamlined the architectural design process and coordination with consultants. The parametric modelling process not only improved the efficiency of workflow, but also helped to make the most informed design decisions within a very compressed project period; ensuring DDP’s success throughout life-span.
In construction, the benefits of using the parametric modelling techniques are apparent. The digital design model could be refined at any time throughout the design and construction to accommodate additional onsite conditions, local regulations, engineering requirements and cost controls. The team were able to have greater control of the design and details, with much greater precision than a conventional construction process; giving the client and the contractors a much better understanding and control of the project.
The DDP façade cladding system is an exemplary result of such a process. Construction the exterior envelope of DDP was a challenge as the cladding system consists of over 45,000 panels in various sizes and degrees of curvature. This was made possible by the use of parametric modelling with an advanced metal-forming and fabrication process to develop a mass-customization system. Parametric modelling enabled the cladding system to be designed and engineered with much greater cost and quality control. Throughout the construction process, the cladding model was adjusted to incorporate various engineering, fabrication, and cost controls while maintaining the integrity of the original design.
The completed façade incorporates a field of pixilation and perforation patterns, which creates dynamic visual effect depending on the lighting conditions and seasonal changes. It will take on different characters as the external condition changes. Sometimes, it will look as a singular entity; sometimes, it blends with the surrounding landscape as part of the complete ensemble of Dongdaemun. At night, the building will reflect all the LED lights and neon signs of the surrounding buildings. With the interplay of the built-in façade lighting, the building’s appearance will be animated and take on the characteristics of its unique urban settings.
The client’s vision must be congratulated. The DDP design shows a commitment to preserve the site’s history and integrate the newly discovered history in an architectural landscape that revolves around the ancient city wall and historical artefacts – which form the central element of the composition. This external landscape transforms Seoul into a greener city, while voids and folds in its surface offers glimpses into innovative world of design below; making DDP an important link between the city’s contemporary culture, historic artefacts and emerging nature.
DDP continues Korea’s architectural and engineering traditions at the forefront of technology. DDP is a built demonstration and celebration of the skills and passion of the team who helped to bring this fantastic building to life.
Additional credits and links:
ARCHITECT: Zaha Hadid Architects (ZHA)
DESIGN: Zaha Hadid with Patrik Schumacher
ZHA PROJECT LEADER: Eddie Can Chiu-Fai
ZHA PROJECT MANAGERS: Craig Kiner and Charles Walker
ZHA PROJECT TEAM: Kaloyan Erevinov, Hooman Talebi, Matthew Wong, Martin Self, Carlos S. Martinez, Camiel Weijenberg, Florian Goscheff, Maaike Hawinkels, Aditya Chandra, Andy Chang, Arianna Russo, Ayat Fadaifard, Josias Hamid, Shuojiong Zhang, Natalie Koerner, Jae Yoon Lee, Federico Rossi, John Klein, Chikara Inamura, & Alan Lu.
ZHA COMPETITION TEAM: Kaloyan Erevinov, Paloma Gormley, Hee Seung Lee, Kelly Lee, Andres Madrid, Deniz Manisali, Kevin McClellan, Claus Voigtmann, & Maurits Fennis.
LOCAL ARCHITECT: Samoo Architects & Engineers (Seoul, Korea)
LOCAL CONSULTANTS
STRUCUTRE: Postech
MECHANICAL: Samoo Mechanical Consulting (SMC)
ELECTICAL AND TELCOM: Samoo TEC
FAÇADE: Mac M&C
CIVIL: Saegil Engineering & Consulting
LANDSCAPE: Dong Sim Won
FIRE: Korean Fire Protection Engineering
LIGHTING: Huel Lighting Design
QUANTITY SURVEY: Kyoung Won
CULTURAL ASSET: Josun
ACOUSTIC: OSD
NOISE / VIBRATION: RMS Technology
ENERGY ANALYTICS: Daeil ENC
MAINTENANCE: Doall CMC
ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT: Soosung Engineering
PLANNING PERMISSION: Sewon P&D
INTERNATIONAL CONSULTANTS:
STRUCTURE/M.E.P.F. Services/LIGHTING/ACOUSTIC: ARUP Engineers (London, U.K.)
LANDSCAPE: Gross Max (Edinburgh, U.K.)
FAÇADE: Group 5F (Basel,Switzerland)
GEOMETRY: Evolute (Vennia, Austria)
QUANTITY SURVEY: Davis Langdon & Everest (London, U.K.)
london UNITED KINGDOM
Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL
tutor: Daniel WIDRIG.
suckerPUNCH: Describe your project.
Stefan BASSING: Deep Texture continues to explore in depth the concepts of structural transition and multi-materiality.
The title—”Deep Texture”—implies a relation between logics of material behavior, geometric logics of transition, and changes in resolution of one system to be revealed as texture on the surface of the final structure—as, for example, those found in nature. Architecture is no longer to be understood as a collision of different material systems, but rather as one continuous entity where structure morphs into volume, into skin, and back into structure. Seamless material shifts and geometric transitions from horizontal into vertical conditions within one system become possible.
After the imtense study of geometrical tiling systems, three archetypes of structural cells were developed. These cells manifest the transition from shell/skin into structure and consist of four rhombic tiles, referred to as the “architectural granulate.” The architectural granulate implies the possibility to design one’s own material consisting of material “cells” of different material behaviors, all belonging to the same material class of thermoplasts. Fused through heat into one composite, the material system allows for changes in shape and structrual performance. Thus within one structure the gradual transformation from an edgy, structural, and rigid strand into a soft membrane is possible, while the underlying logic of aggregation remains present and recognizable. The texture of the final structure reveals the inherent logics of the tiling system as well as material distribution logics within the system. On a macro scale, the project initiates a rethinking of architectural tectonics in reference to nature and the human body, where bone structure, muscle, vein, and nerve and skin tissue—multiple systems of varying performance and material properties—become one functioning entity of dependencies
sP: What or who influenced this project?
SB: Neri Oxman, Tom Wiscombe, and Achim Menges.
sP: What were you reading/listening to/watching while developing this project?
SB: Reading: Computational Design Thinking (AD reader); several short essays by Tom Wiscombe; and much more.
sP: Whose work is currently on your radar?
SB: Alisa Andrasek, Daniel Widrig, Isaie Bloch, Gilles Retsin, Ruairi Glynn, and Philippe Morel.
Additional credits and links:
Thanks to the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) whose scholarship made it possible for me to pursue the research undertaken at the Bartlett GAD.
Thanks as well to Daniel for his guidance throughout the year.
[cargocollective.com/stefanbassing]
In 1898, the British, who had conquered Hong Kong island some sixty years earlier, signed a 99-year lease with the Chinese that gave them control over the New Territories, an additional strip of land on the mainland. The lease excluded a small military fort called the Kowloon Walled City, a walled military outpost with a small surrounding village. On the terms of the lease, the Chinese were allowed to continue manning the fort, although only so long as their doing so didn’t interfere with the British control over Hong Kong. The Chinese wanted the fort to check the influence of the British Empire, while the British hoped the arrangement would only be short-term, and that they would gain control over the Walled City in the long term. They did so sooner than expected: the year after, in 1899, citing local resistance to the handover of the New Territories, the British captured the fort by force, finding it to be mostly empty, only a small garrison of troops left. One might expect that they’d assert their influence once they’d captured the place — a legal document from April, 1899 declared the Chinese administration of the Walled city to be “inconsistent with the military requirements for defending Hong Kong” and therefore in violation of the lease — but instead, the British took a curiously hands-off approach to the area which would later serve to make the place a kind of legal limbo, outside of effective jurisdiction from both the British and the Chinese sides.
Kowloon Walled City in 1865. The boundary of the British colony at the time ran just beyond the rice fields outside the city walls.
After the occupation in 1899, the Walled City became a small rural village with a population of a few hundred. Buildings fell into disuse and disrepair. In the surrounding hills, squatters ran little farms, and some of them moved into the city. By 1933, the Hong Kong authorities decided to remove this dirt spot from the map once and for all, and evacuated the inhabitants. Then the Japanese rolled in during WWII, occupying Hong Kong and tearing down the Walled City’s wall to extend the nearby Kai Tak airport. After the war, China again showed interest in asserting their rights to the City, and thousands of refugees poured into the no-longer-Walled city, banking on China to keep the British authorities from throwing them out. The British tried to forcibly evacuate the city in 1948, but this time, the inhabitants fought back, and the British decided to back off. Up until the 1960s, the city grew steadily, but the buildings remained three stories or less, even as the Chinese crime syndicates, the Triads, moved in to take advantage of the relatively lawless area.
Children playing on the roof.
Then, in the 1960s and 70s, there was a building boom, and Kowloon Walled City turned into the sprawling, cyberpunk arcology that continues to inspire and awe people, even now, seventeen years after its destruction. As buildings grew taller, the street grid became more and more obscured, and as the ever-taller constructions leaned on each other as they raced to the sky, daylight was obstructed, and the city earned its nickname, the City of Darkness. At its peak in the late eighties, the area, which spanned little more than 0.03 square kilometers (0.01 sq mile), was home to 35,000 people. Bridges and stairs affixed to houses allowed you to traverse the city from one end to another without once stepping on the ground. Manufacturers and stores thrived in cramped spaces in dark alleys, often without electric light and with natural light mostly occluded by the superstructure itself, the organically constructed mega-building that filled a volume from the ground upwards to a cap of fifteen stories — one of the few official bans on construction: so as not to disturb the airport, buildings may not exceed that limit — almost completely. Textiles, sweets and toys were among the things manufactured in the Walled City in its heyday. By the time of its destruction, however, some factories had downscaled or closed down because it was cheaper to produce their goods in China. That’s right, Hong Kong a victim of outsourcing to China.
Aerial view of the city in 1989, at its densest and most highly populated. Originally outside the city and close to the sea, reclamation work and urban expansion had swallowed it, so that by the time it was torn down, it was in the middle of Hong Kong.
The unique political circumstances surrounding the Walled City created a state of effective lawlessness. Although the city was never completely without incursions by the authorities, it was for many years effectively self-governed. Despite the squalid living conditions, with cramped spaces, dirty water, bad or lacking access to electricity, and a significant presence of the Triads, the City saw a steady influx of people who were looking for cheap rent and nonexistent taxes. Doctors and dentists could practice without getting licenses like they would in Hong Kong proper; manufacturers could likewise set up shop as they pleased. The triads ran drug dens, brothels and gambling houses, and visitors could also enjoy dog meat, which was illegal in Hong Kong. In the early days, there were open sewers, and the sanitation workers tasked with the sorry job of removing the soils of the night would occasionally have to fish out dead addicts floating in the sewage.
The Walled City is interesting as an example of anarchy, or something close to it, in practice. Opponents of anarchism like to point to the 1969 police strike in Montreal, where an entire city descended into rampant crime and chaos with the police gone. See, they might say, human nature is so vile and terrible that even a single day without police is enough for us to revert to our basest level and steal and murder with abandon. The Kowloon Walled City, however, was not a short-term situation. It survived outside the law for many years, and it was growing almost right up until the end. As such, it’s a better example of how an anarchist society might work.
A grocery store inside the Walled City.
Itty-bitty needles for all your little needle needs.
In the images above you can see the microneedle patches. When applied, these patches feel like a cat’s tongue or Velcro as they pierce the skin without causing pain or bleeding. Once attached, the patches swell, turning into a jelly-like material that keeps the holes in the skin open and allows continuous delivery of medicines or vaccines. They can also extract fluid from the skin for patient monitoring purposes.
This technology, as well as being a treat for anyone with a needle phobia, could make a real difference to premature babies who are not well suited to repeated use of needles. And for the millions of patients who require all sorts of treatments using conventional needles, microneedle patches, that only need to be applied twice a week without having to visit a healthcare centre or professional, would greatly improve their treatment options.
Watch those pats on the back. As always.
An amazing gallery of images from a dust storm in Sydney.
The one above is my favorite. I like the contrast. Not just the colors but the domestic banality with the hellscape.
A team of roboticists has developed a drone that 3D-prints a sticky substance to help remove or patch up harmful objects in emergency situations.
The team at Imperial College's Aerial Robotics Laboratory builds biologically-inspired robots because, as director Mirko Kovac explains in a video, "biology and animals are very good at moving in outside terrains -- birds or insects can move everywhere and they can overcome obstacles that are very large compared to their own size". Kovac and his lab have worked on multiple designs, including an aerial-aquatic robot inspired by diving birds and flying fish. Their latest offering -- to be revealed at the Imperial Festival (9-10 May) -- was inspired by swiflets, birds that create their nests entirely from their own saliva. The mechanical version is a quadcopter that administers a polyurethane foam in the field, so that another drone (a hexacopter) can come along, stick itself to the object, and fly it to a safe distance.
By: Liat Clark,
Continue reading...
Image Credit: idownloadblog.com
On April 15th and 16th, Google held its first Ara Modular Smart Phone developer conference at the Computer History Museum in Mountainview, California. Ara is a project that is being spearheaded by Google ATAP, their “Advanced Technology and Projects” group, which is a stay-over from Motorola that Google kept after the Motorola sale. The Ara Project is their concept for a modular cell phone. They were forced to push the announcement of the project forward with the sudden popularity of PhoneBloks, a modular phone concept conceived by Dave Hakkens that went viral recently. The ATAP team had been working on the Ara modular phone for a while at that point, and decided to announce the phone as an answer to the popularity of the PhoneBloks idea.
Since the project’s announcement, the reception has been mixed. The reactions seem to fall into two camps: the “I want that gimme that right now” camp, and the “That will never work don’t even try and here’s why” camp. That reaction notwithstanding, the DevCon this weekend was full of about 400 people who had formed an “Okay, let’s see if we can make this work” camp.
Google’s message for the developers at the convention was clear; they need manufacturers and the developers-that-be to start building modules. They want to reach what they call a “demonstration at convincing scale,” i.e. have enough developers and companies on board and time-invested by 2015 that the project has enough outside investment to demonstrate value. They’ve released a v0.10 Development Kit complete with reference designs, a high-level description of the platform, and an industrial design language to insure that developers build modules to their form-factor specifications. The conference highlighted all of the major systems and components of the phone, and gave developers a good starting point for module design. What follows is what I took from the conference, from the hacker/maker perspective.
The base platform, or “Endo” as the developers refer to it. is what Google plans to manufacture and sell. They have a vision of users purchasing a bare-bones endo from stores that includes only the screen and wifi module. That’s it. All the other modules will be purchased from their module store or other retailers. This way they can sell platforms, and not phone plans. Users will be responsible for purchasing a separate module from a cellular provider if cellular service is desired. This may be a frustrating step for consumers looking for a new phone, but for electronics geeks it’s great news; Ara will be an off-the-shelf expandable hardware platform with a touch screen and wifi module that runs Android out-of-the-box. To me that’s more exciting than the Ara’s viability as a mass-market cell phone.
The Endo will house all the electronics that run Android and connect to the modules. The central controller will be the Texas Instruments OMAP4460, the chip on the PandaBoard. The central controller will connect to the modules via the MIPI Unipro network protocol. The MIPI protocol was developed by a consortium of cell phone developers to create a fast, universal protocol for connecting peripheral hardware in cellular designs. Modules will connect to this protocol using a special chip that the Android will recognize. The chips require a special driver in Android, that is currently being compiled into the kernel.
Right now, the only method the Ara group has offered to connect a user-designed module to the backbone is an FPGA with an instantiation that talks to MIPI. This FPGA then tunnels protocols like I2C and GPIO to the module. The problem with this FPGA solution is that it is expensive, high-power, and large. For the future development, Toshiba has promised to manufacture a specific ASIC that will solve these problems and connect the module to MIPI natively. Google will provide a driver that will automatically recognize this ASIC, making module hardware development much more streamlined.
Another interesting feature of the Ara phone is the way the modules are held in the Endo. Mechanically, the modules slide into the slots on the back of the phone and are held in the x-direction by dovetails. In the y-direction, however, they are held by electro-permanent magnets, or EPMs. Magnets that can be magnetized or demagnetized with a burst of electrical current. They draw no power unless they are changing state. The idea is that the user inserts the module, and the EPMs automatically magnetize to hold the unit in place.
Before the conference, I couldn’t find these magnets for sale anywhere. I cornered one of the Ara team members at the conference and asked where I might purchase hundreds of these, and I was told “No one is actually building them yet. The EPMs we have we had to build by hand.” Frustrating.
Google spent a good deal of time at the conference discussing the Ara’s industrial design. They’ve developed a very specific set of rules for module developers. The modules can only be so big, so hot, and so high-power. The also talked at length for their plans for manufacturing the coverings for the Endo. Stated simply, they plan to 3D print everything. Consumers will be directed to a site where they can design a fully custom enclosure for their phone that will be 3D printed on a special printer that is being designed by 3D Systems. It’s certainly exciting to see a company planning to manufacture a mass-produced product on technology as young (and open) as 3D printers. Be sure to check out the MDK for a full run-down of their industrial design language.
Along with hardware guidelines for developers, Google has contracted MetaMorph Software to build an interesting design tool for module developers. The tool is called CyPhyML. It is built upon the open-source CyPhy software developed by DARPA for rapid prototyping and virtual environment testing.
CyPhyML is not a CAD program, but rather an “umbrella” program that integrates several CAD programs and facilitates the design process by translating a CAD model designed in one program (like a layout in Eagle) to a model in another program (like a 3D model in Creo). CyPhyML takes the design from the part-level to the module level, and facilitates tests like Spice models and heat dissipation. The designers tried to keep the “utility programs” as open and available as possible. The tool is a bit too comprehensive to describe here, but check out metamorphsoftware.com for a basic run-down. The software has yet to be released, but the tool has a lot of potential for wide use in the prototyper market.
To sell the modules and make them available and understandable, Google has plans for a “Play Store for Hardware.” In other words, the modules that they approve will be sold through a special repository, like the Play Store for applications, where users can search through tested-and-proven hardware modules to build a custom phone. There was not a lot of talk about the fees and processes associated with this “approval process”, but there wasn’t anything to suggest that a developer couldn’t develop and sell a “non-approved” module without going through an official Google approval process. How Google is going to deal with these renegade modules remains to be seen, but the promised availability of the Toshiba ASIC and openness of the CyPhyML software is a good sign.
As I stated before, the most exciting part of the Ara project is that Google plans to mass-produce cheap Android platforms that include a touch screen and wifi module in stores. That in itself should get a geek’s blood flowing. As far as hackability, there is nothing to suggest that the Ara won’t be super-hackable. The ASIC that Toshiba has promised and the EPMs (that no one has promised, yet) seem to be the only pieces of specialized hardware that designers will require to build modules. The seeming “openness” of the CyPhyML software is promising, and may turn out to be a useful tool for hobbyists even if the Ara platform doesn’t succeed as a mass-market cell phone. To keep an eye on the project, bookmark the Ara Developers Google Group for the latest.
