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Valve's engineers may spend much of their time building practical hardware like gamepads and VR headsets, but they still have room to work on some intriguing side projects. Just ask the company's Ben Krasnow, who recently created prototype game controllers that use the player's butt and tongue for input. The backside-based system centers on a modified bathroom scale that translates posture shifts to software commands; players just have to lean or spin to move their character. The tongue controller, meanwhile, stuffs a mouse's optical system into a custom retainer. As you'll see in the demo videos after the break, neither device is especially practical -- you'd need extra equipment to have any chance of competing with fellow gamers. Still, the experiments show just how daring Krasnow can be when exploring alternative control schemes.

Filed under: Gaming, Peripherals, Alt

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Via: Eurogamer, The Verge

Source: Ben Krasnow (YouTube 1), (2)

Palette co-founder Calvin Chu has a problem with how people work. "Creative professionals spend so much of their time on the computer, and at the moment, they still use a very generic one-size-fits-all keyboard and mouse interface." It doesn't make sense, he says -- photographers, gamers, film editors, musicians and accountants all using the same interface? Surely there is a better way. "It should be specialized and made for your needs, and that's where we came up for the idea for Palette." Palette is Chu's answer to a world that's discarded tactile dials and switches for keyboards, mice and touch screens. It's a modular collection of buttons, sliders and potentiometers that can be programmed to do almost anything on your PC. We took a look at an early prototype of the customizable controller to reacquaint ourselves with the tactile world.

Building control layouts with Palette is dead easy -- within seconds of touching the assorted modules, we were able to snap together a nifty control board with multiple buttons, dials and even a slider or two. The components connect using up to two ports located at their base, daisy chaining their way to a power module that connects to a laptop. Firing up a copy of Photoshop Lightroom, Chu puts our creation to use, tweaking a image's lighting with the twist of a wrist or adjusting digital brush sizes on the fly. The demo didn't use Palette's buttons, but we couldn't help mashing them anyway: they respond with the delightful pop of a classic arcade controller.

Although the system can work with only one or two units linked together, we found it worked best in larger groups. The weight of a larger controller helps keep the setup grounded, and while we enjoyed the light resistance the slide-controller offers, the unit sometimes slid across the table if it wasn't anchored to other modules. For now, the entire setup connects to the computer via USB, but Chu says that might change in the future. "We're playing with the idea of a wireless version, connecting over Bluetooth or even wifi." Luckily, upgrading is easy. "All you'd have to do is switch out one little power module." Chu says that after the Kickstarter orders are filled, Palette hopes to sell individual modules and upgrades through an online store, which should make it easier for builders to get the components they want to build their dream interface.

Palette has only been on Kickstarter for about a week, but it's already collected $78,000 of it's $100k goal. At this rate, it'll probably make the cut by the end of the year, but if you want to help it along anyway, check out its product page at the source link below.

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Source: Kickstarter

When Google introduced the in-depth article search results section, the company gave voracious readers a great way to look for weekend reading spree fodder. Today, Mountain View is making it even easier to scour the internet by adding a "More in-depth articles" link at the bottom, which reveals up to 10 more lengthy pieces you can sink your teeth into. If that's not enough, you can find even more things to read by clicking the new links below each result that lets you explore relevant topics. These two features will soon pop up (if they haven't yet) for English users, but there's no word on whether they'll also roll out for other languages.

[Image credit: Anthony Ryan / Flickr]

Filed under: Google

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Source: Google

The market for keyboard-equipped phones may be on the wane, but don't tell that to Ryan Seacrest -- the American Idol host is convinced that messaging mavens need real buttons. To that end, he's jumping into hardware and launching the Typo Keyboard for the iPhone 5 and 5s. The Bluetooth case turns an Apple handset into a makeshift BlackBerry Q10, complete with backlit, sculpted keys that cover up the iPhone's home button (there's a small substitute key); we hope you don't need multitasking, folks. The Typo Keyboard will make its formal debut at CES in early January, and it should ship that month for $99. Thankfully, that means we'll escape a sales pitch during New Year's Rockin' Eve.

Filed under: Cellphones, Peripherals, Mobile

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Via: AllThingsD

Source: Typo Products

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Hundreds of flights were delayed or cancelled on Friday in China's commercial hub of Shanghai as record levels of air pollution shrouded the city in smog, prompting authorities to issue the highest level of health warning.

The incident is especially embarrassing at a time when China seeks to build Shanghai into a global business hub on par with the likes of London, New York and Hong Kong by 2020.

On Friday afternoon, the Shanghai government issued its severest health warning as the city's pollution index ranged between 23 times and 31 times the levels recommended by international health officials.

In the first such advice since a new health warning system was launched in April, authorities urged residents to stay indoors and asked factories to either cut or halt production.

"I don't think it's fit for people to live in this kind of environment," said Shanghai resident Fan Jianjun, 34, who wore a face mask as he walked through the opaque air in the Lujiazui financial district.

"But I have no choice. I still need to work. I can only take preventive measures but I have no idea whether they work."

Air quality in cities is of increasing concern to China's stability-obsessed leaders, anxious to douse potential unrest as more affluent citizens turn against a growth-at-all-costs economic model that has polluted much of the country's air, water and soil.

The government has announced many plans to fight pollution over the years but has made little apparent progress.

Most of the flights leaving Shanghai's Pudong International Airport have been delayed, according to the airport's website. Pudong was the world's third busiest cargo airport in 2011, data from the Airports Council International shows.

Hazardous air pollution forced schools to shut or suspend outdoor activities in at least two cities in eastern Chinaon Thursday. Some schools in Shanghai cancelled outdoor activities on Friday, as well.

The unusually noxious haze was caused by several factors, including industrial pollution and auto emissions trapped by cold, windless weather, said Xu Bin, an associate professor at Shanghai's Tongji University.

By 0700 GMT, the level of PM2.5 particulate matter, or tiny particles in the air that are the most hazardous to health, reached a "severely polluted" 466, according to the Shanghai government's monitoring website, http://www.semc.gov.cn/aqi/home/English.aspx.

A similar measure by the U.S. consulate in Shanghai showed a reading of 503, a level described as being beyond the index on its website http://www.stateair.net/web/post/1/4.html.

Levels above 300 are considered hazardous, while the World Health Organization recommends a daily level of no more than 20.

(Reporting by Shanghai newsroom; and Kazunori Takada; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)

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В октябре на наши экраны вышла картина Федора Бондарчука “Сталинград”, о которой говорили два долгих года, и зрители наконец смогли оценить работу команды кинематографистов: не только режиссера и актеров, но и потрясающую работу оператора Максима Осадчего,  невероятный труд художника-постановщика Сергея Иванова и, конечно, монументальные усилия VFX художников.   

This isn't the first we've seen of Saturn's six-sided jet stream, but NASA's calling the GIF after the break "the first hexagon movie of its kind." The "movie" is made from a compilation of images taken by the Cassini spacecraft, and depicts a hurricane-like storm at the center of the "hexagon" that has populated the planet's north pole for decades, if not centuries. For more check out the press release at the source link below.

Filed under: Science, Alt

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Source: NASA

Many car shoppers use Google for research well before they set foot into a dealership. It only makes sense, then, that the company has just rolled vehicle stats into its Knowledge Graph. Look for a new ride and you'll get basic specifications, pricing and alternatives based on search results. The savvier car shopping is only available in the US today; for now, those in other countries will have to visit dedicated sites.

Filed under: Internet, Google

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Via: Android Police

Source: Google (Google+)