KWBaker

The year in musuc fir 2016 is best defined by the classic Dickensian line from “A Tale of Two Cities,” “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.”

Mortaility cut a wide swath across some of the greatest and influential musicians of the twentieth century. Roots and country artists like Merle Haggard, Guy Clark, Ralph Stanley, Leon Russell, Jean Shepard, Glenn Frey, Red Simpson, Joey Feek and Steve Young among other greats like Prince, Sharon Jones, David Bowie and Leonard Cohen seemed harshly unrelenting. This level of loss will be felt in our cultural fabric in ways we’ve yet to understand.

To quote the late, great George Jones “Who’s gonna fill their shoes?”

Let’s hope that those passed legends shine as a beacon to the next generations to create great work that ties us together in song, music and common humanity. From what I know about 2017 I do see greatness coming.

But there was a silver lining. The influence of roots music in mainstream and, in a cultural equivalent of time folding in on itself, mainstream country music. This trend of influence occurs without Americana surrendering its identity of innovation and authenticity. To some artists the genre was found too constricting and they lit out for other terrain better suited to their art.

And here’s to a more equitable arrangement between tech companies and the musicians that provide the bedrock to build their empires. Much to be done here…

As others sacrifice to create, let’s us, the audience, push ourselves to discover, share, attend live shows and financially reward the creators. Most which are hauling thier own gear and traveling to shows in cars or vans not tour buses.

Without them, this life is much less joyful.

Criteria – Calendar year 2016. No EPs, live, covers or re-release albums no matter how awesome.
Don’t see your favorite represented? Leave it in the comments, and here’s to a new year of Twang.

Matt Woods – ‘How to Survive’ – (iTunes | Amazon) – Tennessee troubadour Matt Wood’s third studio album ‘How to Survive’ offers taut songwriting that cuts to the emotional quick. Not an overtly political album but something more effective in sowing understanding – a topical album.

Paul Cauthen – ‘My Gospel’ – (iTunes | Amazon)
Paul Cauthen’s ‘My Gospel’ takes a page from the book of Paycheck and Waylon, a mix of juke box secular and pulpit gospel songs both personal and ethereal confessionals. These testimonials through Cauthen’s big baritone that suits these sonic vignettes of contemporary southern soul.

Brent Cobb – ‘Shine On Rainy Day’ – (iTunes | Amazon) Like Chris Stapleton and Kacey Musgraves Brent Cobb worked the Music Row ear worm mines for years before moving front and center with his own wares. Those dues paid off. His debut is both breezy and heavy like the great music of the country crossovers from the 70s but fresh with life and rich with authenticity and tradition.

Darling West – ‘Vinyl and Heartache’ – (iTunes | Amazon) The Norwegian trio Darling West takes their smooth pop chamber folk aesthetic to a new high on their sophomore release ‘Vinyl and Heartache.’ Mari Sandvær Kreken’s voice transcends each original cut, and a superb cover of Fleetwod Mac’s ‘The Chain,” to take the extraordinary musicianship even higher.

Karen Jonas – ‘Country Songs’ – (iTunes | Amazon) All you need to know about Fredericksburg, Virginia-based Karen Jonas’ is right there in the title. ‘Country Songs’ picks up where Jonas’ 2014 debut ‘Oklahoma Lottery’ left us – somewhere between heartache and hangover. Her voice lies between sass and sultry as Jonas’ accounts a woman longing for more and being fed up. All the while fitting perfectly with classic barroom weepers without resorting to threadbare nostalgia.

The Buffalo Ruckus – ‘Peace & Cornbread’ – (iTunes | Amazon) The Buffalo Ruckus’ sophomore album ‘Peace & Cornbread’ still embodies the soul of all those barrooms the band has torched with their fiery live shows but brings the more feral elements to heel that pays off with cohesion and great songwriting. Here divinity mixes with road tar to create a great Southern soul album

Dori Freeman – ‘Dori Freeman’ – (iTunes | Amazon) One of the surprises of 2016, Freeman’s debut exudes the confidence of a veteran performer and songwriter influenced equally by her native Appalachia as she is classic pop, bar room country and uptown jazz and moves deftly across it all to deliver an astounding cohesive treasure.

Kelsey Waldon – ‘I’ve Got a Way’ – (iTunes | Amazon) Kelsey Waldon’s sophomore release has vulnerable resolve and classic country running through it like the coal veins in her home state of Kentucky. And just as bracing and satisfying as it’s bourbon. Her plaintive voice and keen eye for human nature makes for these sterling tales of hard roads and tender hearts.

Austin Lucas – ‘Between the Moon & the Midwest’ – (iTunes | Amazon) Austin Lucas’ latest release is a moody, pedal steel laden arc traveling among broken hearts and bitter tears. His signature croon sits between jubilant and forlorn and bears the marks of a man that’s been through trouble but comes out the other side stronger and with better stories.

Whiskey Myers – ‘Mud’ – (iTunes | Amazon)
Few musical genres are as maligned as Southern Rock. But then a band comes all with an album that makes you believe again. Whiskey Myers’ ‘Mud’ is that album. The band worked with Americana Auber-producer Dave Cobb to create an album that pushes lyrical and music boundaries established by their 2014 breakout release ‘Early Morning Shakes.’ The pride of Palestine, Texas mixes country, rock and blue-eyed soul to achieve one of their strongest efforts yet.

Robert Ellis – ‘Robert Ellis’ – (iTunes | Amazon) On Robert Ellis’ fourth solo album, the Texas songwriter further moves from the school of George Jones country crooning even further into the adult pop of James Taylor and Paul Simon, and tackles adult themes of despair, restlessness and loss of love. A disciple of music styleS and texture, as well as songcraft and extraordinary fret work, Ellis delves into Chet Atkin’s jazz-flavored country (Drivin), bossa nova (Amanda Jane) and even a neo-classical dirge (The High Road) and ties. It shouldn’t work but damned if Ellis doesn’t pull it off.

Hayes Carll – ‘Lovers and Leavers’ – (iTunes | Amazon) Carll’s latest suggests his 5-year recording hiatus has been a rough if introspective stretch. ‘Lovers and Leavers’ is Carll’s solemn of his career without tipping into being a dour bumfest. These days there’s more on Carll’s mind than drinking, hootin’ and ahollerin’. This is an authentically more personal, emotional and confessional work that moves Carll into the realm of Guy Clarkian genius.

Margo Price – ‘Midwest Farmer’s Daughter’ – (iTunes | Amazon) An overnight success 13 years in the making, Jack White saw something in Margo Price that Music Row didn’t when he signed her as the first country artist on his Third Man Records label. Life’s harsh beauty pours from each song and common resolve is there with grace. Stuff too real for Music Row confections. Price sits well within a current musical groundswell proving that soulful roots music has an audience hungry for something real and is here to stay.

Lori McKenna – ‘The Bird & The Rifle’ – (iTunes | Amazon)
‘The Bird & The Rifle’ – When she’s not penning mega hits for the likes of Tim McGraw and Little Big Town, Lori McKenna puts her considerable songwriting skills to weightier faire like her latest, ‘The Bird & The Rifle.’ Intimate stories of small town hopes hitting the hard choices and their unforeseen consequences. We see ourselves in gems like “Halfway Home” and “We Were Cool” and brings more dimension to McKenna’s own “Humble and Kind” which was a hit for McGraw. These songs create a web that ties our experiences together in common humanity.

Sarah Jarosz -“Undercurrent” – (iTunes | Amazon) Jarosz’s 4th full-length studio album surprised many fans who’ve been listening since 2009’s debut ‘Song Up in Her Head.’ The then teen wunderkind has built on her time in the bluegrass genre and arrived an accomplished arranger, songwriter, singer and musician. Traditional forms are reworked as contemporary personal reflections of maturity and sophistication. experimental pop fuse with classic songwriters like Paul Simon, Joni Mitchell and Carol King.

B.J. Barham – ‘Rockingham’ – (iTunes | Amazon) Inverting the country contemporary music trope of quaint small town nostalgia American Aquarium vocalist B.J. Barham focuses his deft songwriting eye on the gutting of the small town American dream. The album title, Rockingham, is the North Carolina, a town of a few thousand where Barham was raised, is the starkly real and metaphor for many forgotten towns. Steely-eyed truth sketches each hardscrabble scenario where desperation lingers thick in the air like the funk from the local tobacco company.

Robbie Fulks – ‘Upland Stories’ – iTunes | Amazon) Fulks is the unheralded hardcore alt-country troubadour. Though not as well known as Steve Earle or Chis Knight for decades Fulks is the guy the Earle and Knight would listen to closely for economy of songcraft and rich imagery. his newest offering is grammy nominated and might rightly put him at the top of Americana legends lists. Appalachian break downs and honky-tonk weepers driven by his voice that echos the ages makes this a glorious addition to the roots music canon.

Miranda Lambert – “The Weight of These Wings” – (iTunes | Amazon) Break-up albums are a mixed bag. When done well, as with Beck’s ‘Sea Change’ and Willie Nelson’s ‘Phases and Stages,’ the work can become an iconic confessional moment in a profession that trades on personal reflection. Miranda Lambert’s double album ‘The Weight Of These Wings,’ split into two sides — The Nerve and The Heart, written in the wake of her tabloid fodder divorce from Blake Shelton shows Lambert taking a step back and licking her wounds with songcraft instead of chasing chart toppers. This is a 24-song thesis on survival, healing and returning back to Texas roots.

John Paul White – ‘Beulah’ – Out of the ashes of one of the most celebrated pop-folk duets of modern times rises a forlorn beautifully crafted from folk, classic country and adult pop. An album that is both rich lyrically and melodically. John Paul’s post Civil Wars is a moody beauty with keen songwriting sharper and more cohesive than his CW days. Sparse arrangements- B3 organ, cello, drums, bass and the ever present acoustic guitar – build a fitting texture to frame the songs. Harmony is not forgotten with the Secret Sisters lending a subdued vocal hand on songs like the country weeper “I’ve Been Over This Before.” This gets better with each spin

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What’s the ‘recipe’ for a great photograph? As we embark on this new 365-day journey called “2017,” our friends at COOPH teamed up with photographer Craig Semetko to answer this question; and he believes it all comes down to 4 key elements: Design, Information, Emotion, and Timing.

Semetko has dubbed this the photographer’s DIET, so you never forget one of the four elements when you’re composing a photograph. Check out the video up top to hear all about it, or scroll down for a summary of each of the 4 points.

Design

This is all about geometry and composition—whether that’s geometric shapes within the photo, or geometric relationships between the elements in your image. You don’t have to subscribe to any particular “rule” or composition, but don’t forget to make instead of simply take your photographs.

Information

A great photographs provides context to the viewer; the beginnings of a story. Some photos tell more of the story than others, but any great photograph must contain at least the kernel of a story, which the viewer can then expand on in his or her mind.

Not enough information, and your viewer might feel nothing; too much information, and they won’t be able to make heads or tails of your image.

Emotion

This element is repeated over and over again, but it cannot be overstated: a great photograph makes the viewer feel something. When you’re dealing with a human subject, that feeling might be joy, sadness, or amusement. For landscape photographs, that feeling might be calmness, or serenity.

Timing

Capture the perfect moment—when the elements of a scene, the light on a scene, or the subjects of a scene align just so—and photographic magic happens. This point is best summed up in the video by Semetko himself when he says:

A great photograph should give the impression that it could not have been taken a second before, or after.

To dive deeper into each of these “rules” and see more example images, check out the video up top. And the next time you’re out taking photos, ask yourself: does this image incorporate every aspect of the photographer’s DIET?

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Image credits: All photographs by Craig Semetko, used courtesy of COOPH.

There are nearly limitless ways to make money in your spare time. If you want to get a better job, though, make sure that your side hustle is helping you get there.

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If you’re just getting started with photography and don’t want to spend too much on gear, there are a few DIY tricks that can save you some money, and one of these is making your own flash diffuser. A flash diffuser can be used with your camera’s flash or an external flash, and it serves to soften the light of the flash. This can be particularly useful in low-light situations where you want the results to look more natural and less harsh. In the videos below, you’ll see the difference between taking a photo using the camera’s pop-up flash or using a...

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Tom Scott take us to an amazing place: Lake Constance. Where is Lake Constance? It's in Europe. It's in Germany, Switzerland, and/or Austria.

(YouTube link)

Whether there are actually international borders running through the lake depends on what country you are from. One nation claims there are lines. Another says the lake belongs to all three countries. And the third doesn't really care! -via reddit 

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There is a noticeable difference between the average superhero comics from the 80s and beyond and issues starring the same characters from the 1950s and 60s, and that difference is all thanks to the Comics Code Authority.

The Comics Code kept writers and publishers from printing anything that could be considered immoral or remotely offensive, and their assault on comic books began with the release of Dr. Fredric Wertham's book Seduction Of The Innocent.

Susana Polo of Polygon's Issue At Hand discusses the silly effect the Comics Code had on comic storylines, touching on how writers fought back with the power of morally neutral absurdity and how Nixon and Stan Lee helped cut out the Code.

(YouTube Link)

-Via Polygon

During the second World War, at a mental hospital outside of Lund, Sweden, researchers forced a group of patients to ingest 24 pieces of a sticky, light brown substance in a single day. These severely disabled patients were involuntary participants in a long-term study commissioned by the state medical board in cooperation with big industry, and this coerced feeding would continue for three years. The four to six doses that they consumed four times a day over that time were in some ways sweeter than their typical medicines—but also more troubling. No benefit to the patient was ever expected. Rather, the goal was to measure the damage inflicted by the substance over time and determine a dosage safe for public consumption.

The ruinous “treatment” in question was a caramel candy. The corporate underwriters were sugar, chocolate, and candy companies. And the effects of the so-called Vipeholm experiments still reverberate today. In fact, one direct result has become a lasting—even beloved—part of Swedish culture.

In Sweden, Saturday is for sweets. The Swedish custom of lördagsgodis, or Saturday candy, was spurred by the outcomes at Vipeholm, which definitively proved that sugar, particularly between meals, causes tooth decay. The idea behind lördagsgodis is moderation—to limit candy consumption to a weekly, rather than a daily, occurrence.

Once a week, Swedes are given a free pass to indulge in all the gummies, chocolates, and salty liquorice their Nordic hearts desire. (Non-Nordic hearts will most likely take a pass on the salty liquorice.) However, few Swedes standing in line at the supermarket to collect pick-and-mix candy on Saturday morning know that their weekly indulgence has its origins in the sustained mistreatment of 660 psychiatric patients.

Before the Vipeholm experiments, the cause of tooth decay had been a topic of much speculation. People blamed their dental woes on everything from wine and hot foods to masturbation and vitamin deficiency, writes Samira Kawash in her book, Candy: A Century of Panic and Pleasure. By 1938, leading scientists around the world were pointing to either too many carbohydrates or a lack of various vitamins as the source of dental cavities. But there was no definitive proof.

What was evident, however, was that the Swedes were in serious need of a dental intervention.  A study carried out in the 1930s showed that three-year-olds there had cavities in a whopping 83 percent of their teeth, notes Bo Krasse in a paper in the Journal of Dental Research. New laws mandated that municipalities provide dental care to citizens, but there were not enough dentists to meet demand. So a decision was made to shift over to a prevention-focused model, a better use of resources than long waiting lists at doctors’ offices. Problem was, no one knew how to prevent tooth decay yet.

In search of clarity, Sweden's national medical board decided to undertake a long-term nutritional study to determine the root cause of dental cavities once and for all. The most desirable, accurate study, it was determined, would test human subjects. In an ideal test, one would have human subjects whose vital signs could be monitored daily, who would follow a drug or dietary regime without fail, and whose environment could be totally controlled by the researchers.

But where would one find such subjects? For the medical board, the answer was obvious. They had jurisdiction over the state mental institutions.

Of the four state mental institutions in operation at the time, Vipeholm was perhaps the bleakest. It housed the cases deemed fully “uneducable.” Many patients could not dress themselves. Many were tied to their beds. The doors of the hospital were locked at all times and the only private bedroom was an isolation chamber without any furniture, where patients in solitary slept on a bed bolted to the middle of the floor. At mealtimes, there were no knives or forks, only spoons.

After an initial study focused on vitamins, the infamous Carbohydrate Study began in 1946. The 660 Vipeholm patients were chosen to undergo variations on extreme sugar consumption. One group consumed sugar in a solution, one group consumed sugary bread at meals, and the last group consumed special toffees between meals. The caramels had been specially formulated for stickiness, so that they would cling to teeth and gums. When the study ended, 50 of the research subjects had completely ruined teeth.

The Vipeholm study was a success insofar as it positively identified a link between sugar consumption and tooth decay. It was also reprehensible. It was the relative helplessness and immobility of the patients that made them attractive test subjects. In the dogged pursuit of a healthier society, the powers that be sacrificed the health of society’s most vulnerable members.

The Swedes were hardly alone in pursuing highly questionable controlled human experiments at this time. For example, the United States injected radioactive substances into otherwise healthy living subjects as part of the Manhattan Project. And, of course, concurrent to the Vipeholm experiments in Sweden, experimentation on human subjects was reaching its odious zenith in the Third Reich, with prisoners in Nazi concentration camps subjected to some tests so innately depraved that they qualify mostly as blood sport.

In 1947, following the revelations of these practices in the camps, the Counsel for War Crimes adopted the Nuremberg Code, which laid out a comprehensive set of medical and scientific ethics, including the principles of informed consent and nonmaleficence (or “do no harm”). These principles would later be incorporated into the Declaration of Helsinki, the current defining, international document on modern research ethics.

The lasting legacy of Vipeholm, however, turned out to be something a bit sweeter—Saturday candy. In 1957, following publication of the Vipeholm study’s results, a coordinated public health campaign kicked into gear. Radio PSAs, home-delivered pamphlets, and posters in waiting rooms encouraged young Swedes to brush their teeth and eat less sweets. The new message around candy was not prohibition, but moderation. The mantra was “All the sweets you like, but only once a week!”

Even today, you would be hard-pressed to find a Swedish child whose face doesn’t light up at the news that Saturday has arrived. Indeed, data implies that Swedish adults are equally excited. Swedes, it turns out, love candy. They consume more candy per capita than almost anyone else. And annoyingly, they do so while maintaining one of of the highest levels of dental health in the world.

Generations of good teeth and a twee tradition of Saturday sweets are surely the coziest possible outcome of the dark days at Vipeholm. But looking back, it’s hard to sweeten the pill.

For the last few years, graphene has been something of a buzzword: a new material with remarkable properties promising to revolutionize everything about our lives. But is it all empty hype? What exactly is graphene and what can we really expect from it? Graphene is an unusual form of one of the most common elements on the planet (carbon) and was discovered and synthesized in the University of Manchester way back in 2004. It consists of many sheets of carbon, each sheet just a single atom thick, all arranged in a hexagonal lattice. Image Credit: nobeastsofierce via Shutterstock And because...

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No. 13 Duke edged No. 8 Louisville 58-55, but the Cardinals ran the cleverest play of the night. To start the second half, Louisville fooled the Blue Devils into defending the backcourt, leading to the easiest layup Briahanna Jackson’s ever had.

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This week’s milestones in the history of technology include the birth of VisiCalc, the world’s first handheld-sized scientific calculator, and Daguerreotype photography.

A bit of planning can save you a ton of money when it comes to buying throughout the year. Here’s your comprehensive, always up-to-date guide on the best times to buy everything this year.

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(Courtesy gmaso/myBudgetTravel)

Using billions of data points, a new report from Expedia offers pro tips on how to get prime deals on flights year-round, as well as a preview of 2017 top destinations.

As we shift into the new year, there’s a lot of looking back on the travel industry to see what worked and what didn’t, what succeeded and what failed, and, of course, where, how, when and why people traveled. We look back so that we can have a clearer vision and understanding of what’s ahead. While technology allows us to do nearly everything aside from decisively predict the future, piles upon piles of data lets us to come pretty close. The more data we can pull from, of course, the clearer the vision.

In a recently released study by Expedia, the company partnered with Airlines Reporting Corporation (ARC), a trade organization, to crunch the numbers between January 1, 2016 and October 24, 2016 and figure out worldwide air travel trends. The report, “New Heights for Air Travel,” looked at data from Expedia—which encompasses the 335 million itineraries it created in its 20 years of operation. Those itineraries cover 1,820 cities within 203 countries. ARC, meantime, offers information on more than 12.5 billion passenger flights. (That's a whole lotta packs of tomato juice and packs of pretzels!)

The main takeaways of the study forecasts a huge win for travelers. First, according to the International Air Transport Association and ARC, air capacity is up about 5% globally, which means airlines are flying more planes to more destinations. Global growth typically clocks in around 3%, even in boom times. So in other words, 2016 saw a tremendous amount of growth. More seats in airplanes means more competition for passengers, so this past year also saw a tumble in average ticket prices. Those two factors—more space and lower cost—are a formula for creating more travel opportunities at lower prices in 2017. 

How much of a tumble in those ticket prices, you ask? In the nearly 10 months examined, average ticket prices in North America fell about 6% for economy one-ways and about 5% for economy round-trips. That means, for instance, a round-trip ticket that cost $472 in 2015 cost $450 in 2016.

With billions of data points at their fingertips, Expedia and its partners were able to examine buying patterns and assess ticket pricing trends and quirks. By and large, the results pretty much validate a lot of urban myths. First and foremost, some times are better than others for purchasing airline tickets. Weekends are the best time to book flights. Fridays are the worst, primarily because that’s when business travelers make their bookings. The study also notes that for domestic travel in the US, you can save as much as 11% by purchasing tickets on a Sunday vs. Friday. You can save even more on tickets to Europe—as much as 16%, in fact—by making your ticket purchase on a Sunday.

And now for the good news for the early birds among us. We all know that it pays to plan, but this study tells us just how much. According to ARC, 21 days in advance is the tipping point. When it comes to traveling within the United States, within Europe and even between the US and Europe, booking three weeks ahead of takeoff can score you as much as 30% over waiting until the last minute.  

When you’re planning a trip, don’t underestimate the impact of a weekend stay. Expedia’s study determined that you can get the best deals when you include a Saturday night overnight stay on your itinerary. That can mean savings of up to 57%, as the researches found to be the case in Southern Europe.

That does it for the “how.” Now, about the “where.” Based on its data, the study looked at 500 top destinations. Not surprisingly, the airport with the most significant leap was Jose Marti International Airport in Havana, Cuba, which surged in capacity by 53% from 2015 to 2016. Coming in a very close second was the airport in Da Nang, Vietnam. Among other destinations that spiked in popularity were Zhuhai, China (41 percent); Cusco, Peru (39 percent); and Santiago, Chile (38 percent). Cities in Uruguay, Iceland, Panama, and Russia were other mentions.

There are plenty more general findings. Perhaps you can chalk it up to the coast-to-coast growth of tequila and the taco truck boom, but overall growth of Mexico City as a destination was a significant 11%. Industry watchdogs are already deeming it a 2017 hotspot. Largely because its economy is pulsing, airlines are ramping up flights to India as we speak. Same goes for Dubai as well as China, which saw nearly 10% growth in airline capacity over the past year. Notably, in addition to more airlines instituting new routes to China, new airports have opened or expanded throughout the country.

Experts predict that most of the destinations that have seen growth in 2016 will continue to thrive. It’s up to you to prove them right. Or chart your own path and prove them wrong. 

See More From Budget Travel:
These are the destinations and travel trends everybody was searching on Google this year
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5 BIG Ways Google Can Help You Travel Smarter

Followable:
The curiously named blog “Spoon & Tamago” is the best way to keep up with the latest art, design, fads, and lifestyle innovations from Japan. They also offer a nice feature: curated “guides” to Tokyo via interesting long-term residents. Well crafted well-designed site, as might be expected. Add ‘em to your RSS feed. — KK

Stuff:
Since I’ve started using this wallet case, it’s so easy to just slide it into my coat pocket, grab my keys and go. I rarely carry my purse around now. The kickstand feature makes it ultra practical. — CD

Web trick:
I have a massive “swipe file” of illustrations from online portfolios. I use them for inspiration when I design or draw something. Owidig is a website that can suck every image file from a website and save it to your computer. It’s easy to use once you get the hang of it, but here’s a good video to get your familiar with it. — MF

Listenable:
A really great podcast episode well worth listening to is “17 Great Questions That Can Change Your Life,” by Tim Ferriss. This is an audible extract from his new book Tools of Titans. In this session he lists the 17 questions that he asks himself on a regular basis in order to get the most from his life. They are very effective probes. And this podcast is a good introduction to his book, which is also very useful. — KK

Sound effects:
Get free, high-quality sound effects of almost anything you can think of for your podcasts, apps, or movies at Freesound. — MF

Social Network:
When you sign up for Nextdoor it’s like instantly joining your neighborhood watch group. Plus you get local business recommendations from neighbors, classifieds and events. — CD

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-- Kevin Kelly, Mark Frauenfelder, Claudia Dawson

VideoLast year's top show slips a notch, but AMC's Better Call Saul remained one of the best things on television. 2. Better Call Saul (AMC): Showrunners Peter Gould and Vince Gilligan have been faced with one of the more delicate challenges in television: building a series on the idea of working [...]

(YouTube link) 

Bricklayers in Teralba, New South Wales, Australia, capped a wall with perfectly-laid bricks, using a domino fall. I understand the first fall, although I couldn't understand why they did it. Then the second fall comes back around, and whoa! How did they do that? On Twitter, @neconocc gave us a graphic that helps to make it clear.

@joebloggs8040 I made a physics simulation. It works but the condition is very severe. Is there any hidden gimmick? pic.twitter.com/qJ7IktrYX3

— ふぁい (@neconocc) December 25, 2016

It's pretty darn cool to watch, but I don't see any advantage over laying bricks the old-fashioned way. Still, if the purpose was to make a viral video, they did well. -via Metafilter

You know it's cold outside when Yellowstone National Park's Old Faithful geyser starts erupting snow instead of super heated water and steam.

British photojournalist and war photographer Don McCullin was knighted this week for his “services to photography.”

The news was published today as an official public record in the The London Gazette, which reads:

“THE QUEEN has been graciously pleased to signify her intention of conferring the honour of Knighthood upon the undermentioned: Donald McCULLIN, C.B.E., Photojournalist. For services to Photography.”

The 81-year-old McCullin first began his photography career nearly 60 years ago, in 1959. Much of his word in that time has focused on war and the needy in society.

In 1964, McCullin won the World Press Photo of the Year award for his images showing the war in Cyprus.

“I’ve made this huge journey from the beginning of my life where it was very poor and impoverished,” McCullin tells BBC News. “I’ve managed to get away from that and I’ve managed to educate myself by travelling with great journalists.”

The photographer also tells BBC News that he’s retiring from conflict photography after making a trip to Iraq last month to document the Battle of Mosul. He does, however, plan to continue shooting other kinds of photos for as long as he’s able.

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Image credits: Header photo by TV Brasil – EBC and licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Another year has come to a close. As we wrap up 2016, here’s a look back at the 10 most popular posts published on PetaPixel over the past 365 days.

#10: Brides Magazine: Don’t Feed Your Photographers

Brides magazine angered a lot of wedding photographers by telling brides they shouldn’t feed their photographers.

#9: Phil Collins Reshot All His Original Album Covers for the 2016 Reissues

Musician Phil Collins reshot his old album cover photos in the exact same style.

#8: Nikon Awards Prize to Badly ‘Shopped Photo, Hilarity Ensues

Nikon Singapore drew scoffs and jeers after awarding a photo prize to an obviously Photoshopped photo.

#7: This Photo of a Potato Sold for Over $1,000,000

Photographer Kevin Abosch made headlines after his photo titled “Potato #345 (2010)” purportedly sold for over $1 million.

#6: This Photo Was Shot Over the Course of 26 Hours at an African Watering Hole

Photographer Stephen Wilkes camped out at a watering hole for 26 hours and turned his photos into an amazing composite image that shows night turning into day.

#5: This is Canon’s Crazy DSLR Stockpile at the Rio Olympics

An eye-opening look at Canon’s DSLR gear stockpile at the Rio Olympic Games.

#4: GoPro Strapped to a Hot Wheels Car Captures Every Little Kid’s Dream Drive

A GoPro HERO5 Session strapped to a Hot Wheels car hurtling down a track creates an incredible (and incredibly viral) video.

#3: Chicago Tribune and Sun-Times Covers After the World Series

Comparing the front page cover photos of the Chicago Tribune (which employs staff photojournalists) and the Chicago Sun-Times (which laid off its photographers in 2013) after the World Series finale.

#2: This Animation Was Created Using Old Photos from the Early 1900s

A beautiful short film created by printing photos from the early 1900s to life.

#1: Nat Geo Launched a Free Website for Printing Detailed Topographical Maps

National Geographic published every US Geological Survey (USGS) topographical map from across the United States onto one site for people to view and print out.

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Bitcoin has left stocks, bonds, and gold in the dust in 2016. The digital currency has more than tripled in value, while the S&P 500 and SPDR Gold shares rose in upper single digits; and all three investments outperformed the iShares 20+ Year Treasury Bond, which declined in value. Fund YTD Performance SPDR Gold [...]

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