Danbusha

Hitchcock’s “The Peeps”

Digital painter and concept artist Piotr Jabłoński creates brutally detailed paintings for videogames and comic books which often veer into the realm of horror, but in his spare time dabbles in somewhat tamer sketches and other random ideas that he shares with fans on Facebook. A few months ago he stumbled onto the idea of two small brothers in futuristic space helmets who explore the world with a feline pal, a giant cat mural that follows them everywhere, provided there’s a wall. The response online has been incredible, with fans demanding an art book or even an entire comic book series. While nothing is concrete yet you can see more on Behance, and a few of the panels are available now as prints.

Suntory Whisky – 3D on the Rocks (VIDEO):

3D on the Rocks by Suntory is an innovative way to enjoy whisky.

Savor your whisky with a beautiful ice creation in your favorite shape, forged with the latest 3D technology. Whisky produced with the finest craftsmanship together with ice made with fresh spring water. 

Come, delight yourself in the art of Japanese Whisky.

Read More.

China Caves 2012 / Hong Meigui Expedition to explore giant caves in Wulong County.

China Caves 2012 / Hong Meigui Expedition to explore giant caves in Wulong County.

The giant caves of Mulu National Park, Sarawak, Borneo, Malaysia.

Exploring The Gouffre Berger (cave) in the Vercors region of France. At just over 1000m deep, The Gouffre Berger is recognised as one of the best sport trips in the world.

A cave explorer climbing out of a Maelstrom on the fixed rope in Boxhead Pot, Yorkshire Dales.

The giant caves of Mulu National Park, Sarawak, Borneo, Malaysia

China Caves 2012 / Hong Meigui Expedition to explore giant caves in Wulong County.

Robbie Shone is a British adventure, cave and travel photographer based out of Austria. His adventures have led him to the remotest areas of China, Papua New Guinea, Borneo, the Alps and Crete where he has photographed the deepest, largest, and longest cave systems ever discovered. These feats involve dangling on a thin rope 650 ft. (200m) above the floor in the world’s deepest natural shaft, exploring the far ends of a 117 mile long cave system, and spending nearly four days continuously underground on shoots.

Collected here are some of his most jaw-dropping shots, many from a 2012 excursion into cave systems in Wulong County, China. You can explore more of his cave photography over on his website. All imagery courtesy the photographer. (via This Isn’t Happiness)

Against Wind and Tide: Photos by Nicolas Evariste

Beautiful long-exposures of Normandy, located in the northwest of France.

Photography is my means of expression and escapement. Through my pictures, I don't necessarily try to show things as they are, but to share a personal and artistic vision of what surrounds us. The nature theme is recurrent in most of my series, but I like to explore new horizons.

Snails: Photos by Vyacheslav Mischenko
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Beautiful photos of snails in captivating poses taken by amateur photographer Vyacheslav Mischenko in a forest near his home city of Berdychiv, Ukraine.

I spent a lot of my childhood out and about in forests as my family are big wildlife lovers so I'm always on the lookout for unusual animal shots which I can capture. I don't like taking just simple macro shots as you can find them everywhere so I always try to create pictures which I hope people will love.

Asher Svidensky's photographs from Mongolia of apprentice eagle hunters are fantastic. (FYI, they hunt with eagles, not for them.) Among Svidensky's subjects is a 13-year-old girl, Ashol Pan:

At the end of the photographing session, I sat down with her father and the translator to say my goodbyes, and I asked him this:

"How did it feel watching your daughter dressed in Kazakh uniform, on a mountain top, sending the eagle off and calling it back again?"

"Very good"

"And honestly... would you have considered truly training her? Would she become Mongolia's first ever female eagle huntress?"

I expected a straightforward "No" or a joking "Maybe", but after a short pause he replied:

"Up until two years ago my eldest son was the successor of the eagle hunting tradition in our family. Alas, two years ago he was drafted to the army, and he's now an officer, so he probably won't be back with the tradition. It's been a while since I started thinking about training her instead of him, but I wouldn't dare do it unless she asks me to do it, and if she will? Next year you will come to the eagle festival and see her riding with the eagle in my place."

From the father's answer I realized that the idea of women's participation in keeping the tradition is a possible future, but just like many other aspect of Mongolian life, it's an option which women will need to take on by themselves.

(via @rebeccablood)

Tags: Asher Svidensky   Ashol Pan   hunting   Mongolia   photography

My Paris Pad

Jomsom Radio Station, Nepal

A matter of life, Jeffrey Brown

Evolution of the Bicycle from Visual Artwork on Vimeo.

A Visual History Of The Bicycle via DAN NOSOWITZ

We’re inching toward spring, so our thoughts naturally turn to all the things we haven’t been able to do for the past few months. Like: biking! Oh man, biking is so great. And so is this little animated history of the bicycle’s design, created by Danish firm Visual Artwork.

The bicycle has changed a lot from its beginnings in Germany as a pedal-free “dandy horse,” which is basically just a plank of wood with two wheels (you move by running along like a Flintstones car). The animation shows the two-wheeled vehicle’s design from the dandy horse as it gains pedals and gears, as the wheels change sizes (with a brief stop at the penny-farthing, the ultimate in absurd modes of transport), and finally to our modern road bike.

And who knows! Maybe we’re due for another step in the evolution of life on two wheels.

Read more

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Each Saturday Morning here at Adafruit is Saturday Morning Cartoons! Be sure to check our cartoon and animated posts both nostalgic and new that inspire makers of all ages! You’ll find how-tos for young makers, approaches to learning about science and engineering, and all sorts of comic strip and animated Saturday Morning fun! Be sure to check out our Adafruit products featuring comic book art while you’re at it!

Weekend Plans

Smithsonian Magazine’s 2013 Photo Contest, in focus

Design Crush

More from The Portlandia Activity Book

Striped socks

The Design Deck

Have you tried worrying about it?

“I actually have this theory that I’ve never written up: that teenage girls and middle-aged...

Cool performance by Imogen Heap, Q&A on the glove controller below:

Via The Public Domain Review.

An eighteenth-century pattern book consisting of 36 ink drawings showing precise iconometric guidelines for depicting the Buddha and Bodhisattva figures. Written in Newari script with Tibetan numerals, the book was apparently produced in Nepal for use in Tibet. The concept of the ‘ideal image’ of the Buddha emerged during the Golden Age of Gupta rule, from the 4th to 6th century. As well as the proportions, other aspects of the depiction – such as number of teeth, colour of eyes, direction of hairs – became very important. The V&A have produced a good guide to the iconography of the Buddha, including the 32 Lakshanas or special bodily features.

Read more.

Megan Lee Studio Rock Star Scientist series @ etsy.

Megan Lee Studio: Blending art & education into one geeky eye-pleasing mix (and home of the Rock Star Scientist posters!). I offer art prints, t-shirts, hoodies, magnets, tote bags, phone covers, postcards & stickers!

Rock Star Scientist series:

• James Clerk Maxwell
• Grace Hopper
• Richard Feynman
• Alan Turing
• Gregor Johann Mendel
• Sir Isaac Newton
• Michael Faraday
• Marie Curie
• Thomas Alva Edison
• Nikola Tesla
• print dedicated to John Bardeen
• Albert Einstein
• Niels Boh
• J. Robert Oppenheimer
• Rosalind Franklin
• Ada Lovelace
• Linus Pauling
• Benoit Mandelbrot
• Alexander Graham Bell
• Charles Darwin

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If you want to resemble the coolest fiber optic lamp ever, you are going to have to get in line behind Natalie Walsh. She has created a mesmerizing flow of fiber optics. The balloon style underskirt encourages movement of the hanging fibers, which seem to shift color like melted sherbert. You can check out all the details (and challenges) in her Instructables. Fiber optics pose an interesting issue because they rely on a central light source, which means you have to allow room for this in the outfit. Natalie did a great job with her design.

I designed the back to include a pouch for the handle, and the straps of the dress to bring the fiber optics from the center back to the front, and back around the body to an even distribution at the hips.

In an odd way, working with fiber optics is a lot like dealing with a thick head of hair. You have to group all of the strands from one area, like a ponytail,  and allow them to spread out in another.  You can even trim them, much like you would for doing a layered haircut, to add interest. Natalie has some special suggestions for handling the light.

Aside from just cutting the filaments, there are lots of options for making your fiber optics shine. As the light will escape wherever there is a cut or nick in the filament, distressing them with sandpaper, scissors, or simply natural wear and tear creates very cool effects. For this project I wanted to keep the light focused at the bottom, however depending on the look you are going for, it’s something fun to keep in mind!

This is really an impressive dress, but it does take some time. Feeling inspired, but only have a few hours?  We’ve got a great Tron Hoodie tutorial waiting for you using El Wire. You can still look plugged in.

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Every Wednesday is Wearable Wednesday here at Adafruit! We’re bringing you the blinkiest, most fashionable, innovative, and useful wearables from around the web and in our own original projects featuring our wearable Arduino-compatible platform, FLORA. Be sure to post up your wearables projects in the forums or send us a link and you might be featured here on Wearable Wednesday!

cartechboy (2660665) writes "When we were kids, we were promised flying cars in the future, like The Jetsons. Well, now it's the future, and we don't have any flying cars. But Land Rover just unveiled some crazy new technology called the Transparent Hood system. It's brilliant in its simplicity, and yet quite complex in its implementation. Using a web of camera images and projectors, the Transparent Hood system projects the area just in front of and underneath the nose of the vehicle onto a head-up display along the lower portion of the windshield. Not only is this obviously breathtaking, but when it comes to off-roading—or parking in tight urban spaces—this could change the game. It will allow drivers to see precisely what's below them and immediately in front of them allowing precise placement of the vehicle's front wheels. The system also displays key vehicle data including speed, incline, roll angle, steering position, and drive mode. People, this is the future, and the future is now."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Smithsonian

“We have a government that says it’s okay to eat Twinkies and Cocoa Puffs and Mountain Dew,...

Hugh Pickens DOT Com (2995471) writes "Michael S. Rosenwald reports in the Washington Post that, according to cognitive neuroscientists, humans seem to be developing digital brains with new circuits for skimming through the torrent of information online at the expense of traditional deep reading circuitry... Maryanne Wolf, one of the world's foremost experts on the study of reading, was startled last year to discover her brain was apparently adapting, too. After a day of scrolling through the Web and hundreds of e-mails, she sat down one evening to read Hermann Hesse's challenging novel The Glass Bead Game. 'I'm not kidding: I couldn't do it,' says Wolf. 'It was torture getting through the first page. I couldn't force myself to slow down so that I wasn't skimming, picking out key words, organizing my eye movements to generate the most information at the highest speed. I was so disgusted with myself.' The brain was not designed for reading and there are no genes for reading like there are for language or vision. ... Before the Internet, the brain read mostly in linear ways — one page led to the next page, and so on. The Internet is different. With so much information, hyperlinked text, videos alongside words and interactivity everywhere, our brains form shortcuts to deal with it all — scanning, searching for key words, scrolling up and down quickly. This is nonlinear reading, and it has been documented in academic studies. ... Some researchers believe that for many people, this style of reading is beginning to invade our ability to deal with other mediums. 'We're spending so much time touching, pushing, linking, scrolling and jumping through text that when we sit down with a novel, your daily habits of jumping, clicking, linking is just ingrained in you,' says Andrew Dillon."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Calvin and Hobbes

Vo Anh Kiet (Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam). Finalist: Travel. Terraced fields during harvest season. Mu Cang Chay, Vietnam, September 2012.

Carol Lynne Fowler (Seeley Lake, Montana). Finalist: Americana. A champion bronco bucks a champion rider at the Helmville Rodeo. Helmville, Montana, September 2013.

Sergio Carbajo Rodriguez (La Garriga, Spain). Finalist: Travel. Portrait of a young Suri boy going with his father to take care of the cattle. Ethiopia, August 2013.

Graham McGeorge (Jacksonville, Florida). Finalist: Natural World. McGeorge spent a quiet 6 hours trying to get the perfect image of this eastern screech owl out of its nest. Okefenokee Swamp, Georgia, April 2013.

Christopher Doherty (North Palm Beach, Florida). Finalist: Natural World. Breath at sunset, captures a sea turtle at a dive site called Black Rock. Kāʻanapali, Hawaiʻi, August 2013.

Karen Lunney (Brisbane, Australia). Finalist: Natural World. During their annual migration, wildebeests are forced to find new river crossings in the Serengeti-Mara region. “The animals were being taken by the unfamiliar currents of deep water and had to struggle to get close to the far bank. There were few rocks on which to land and the initial orderly progression soon became a desperate struggle of clambering,” says Lunney. Mara River, Masai Mara National Reserve, Kenya, September 2013.

Nidal Adnan Kibria (Dhaka, Bangladesh). Finalist: Travel. Action Hero. As part of a show called “Well of Death,” a biker performs a stunt at a village fair to celebrate Rath Jatra, a Hindu festival. Dhamrai, Bangladesh, June 2012.

Vincent Cheng (Burnaby, Canada). Finalist: Travel. A group of locals playing billiards by Namtso Lake. Tibet, China, June 2013.

Dina Bova (Petach Tikva, Israel). Finalist: Altered Images. “Babylon—Made in Italy is inspired by the story of the Babylon tower, the painting by Pieter Bruegel and by a trip to the beautiful Cinque Terre in Italy,” says Bova. Cinque Terre, Italy, October 2013.

Aspen Wang (Hong Kong, Hong Kong). Finalist: Natural World. Penguins on Ice. “Although my photo hardly does justice to describing the tenuous balance in Antarctica’s ecosystem, it has served to crystallize in my memory one of the last stretches of untamed and inarticulate lands on earth,” says Wang. Antarctica, December 29, 2010.

Smithsonian Magazine just announced the finalists of their 11th Annual Photo Contest. This year’s competition saw a whopping 50,000 submissions, from which 60 finalists were selected in 6 categories including: Natural, Travel, People, Americana, Altered, and Mobile. The contest is now open for a Readers’ Choice vote which runs from today through May 6, 2014. Vote here. All photos courtesy Smithsonian Magazine and the respetive photographers.

Self-taught photographer Darren Moore creates ethereal black and white landscapes using a method called daytime long exposure, where a special filters are attached to a camera lens to reduce the amount of light. These neutral density filters allow for the shutter to open for extended periods of time in broad daylight, from 30 seconds to upward of 15 minutes for a single exposure. Moore shoots mostly in locations around England, where he frequently visits causeways, breakwaters, shipwrecks, and other features along the shore.

You can see more of Moore’s photography over on Flickr and in his online gallery. He’ll also have work later this April in a group show at the Patchings Art Centre.