No, that's not the Eye of Sauron — it's a planetary system being born. It's one of the first images captured by SPHERE, a new planet-finder installed in Chile last month. The image shows the protoplanetary disc surrounding star HR4796A — just one of many astounding discoveries SPHERE is sure to make.
The animated short film Last Breath plays like a fever dream—or really, more like a nightmare. In a city run by a corporate mascot, one man realizes that he has become a social outcast because he's one of the few humans who still breathes.
Several new cities in China will be geoengineering experiments, where developers are leveling hundreds of mountains, filling valleys, and building on top of the newly-flattened land. Now, Chinese scientists and engineers are saying these projects are based on shoddy research, and must be stopped.
Bunker.jordanThis is awesome. I want seven.
When most people think about FDM 3D printers, they picture these machines printing in PLA or ABS plastic. Recently, more and more people have begun using other materials like nylon. However, a company called Akemake, with the help of a new 3D printing material from Fillamentum, is trying to change this.
Akemake has recently used a 100% natural wood filament called Timberfill to print out a working desktop speaker.
This 3D printed model is the first speaker in the world printed from Timberfill material made by Fillamentum,” Machal Kandler of Akemake tells 3DPrint.com. “Yes, it is 100% wood!
Download STLs and Assembly Instructions on Akemake
Every Thursday is #3dthursday here at Adafruit! The DIY 3D printing community has passion and dedication for making solid objects from digital models. Recently, we have noticed electronics projects integrated with 3D printed enclosures, brackets, and sculptures, so each Thursday we celebrate and highlight these bold pioneers!
Have you considered building a 3D project around an Arduino or other microcontroller? How about printing a bracket to mount your Raspberry Pi to the back of your HD monitor? And don’t forget the countless LED projects that are possible when you are modeling your projects in 3D!
The Adafruit Learning System has dozens of great tools to get you well on your way to creating incredible works of engineering, interactive art, and design with your 3D printer! If you’ve made a cool project that combines 3D printing and electronics, be sure to let us know, and we’ll feature it here!
Bunker.jordanvia Rosalind via firehose
THIS VIDEO
WATCH THIS VIDEO
WORDS CANNOT EXPRESS HOW WELL DONE THIS VIDEO WAS DONE TO SPREAD AWARENESS.
Everyone watch this
I WANT TO BREAK MY MOUSE WITH REBLOG
SERIOUSLY, EVERYONE REBLOG THIS.
Cymon shared a great 3DxMusic project on YouMagine.com.
The recorder is one of the oldest woodwind instruments. In the hands of an experienced player it creates a sound synonymous with Renaissance music. Often used in elementary music classes because of it’s ease of operation. With 3D printing everyone can have one of their own to make beautiful music on… or wailing screeches if they never got past “hot crossed buns”.
This instrument was created with the help of the 3D printing community who helped me iterate designs until this version became a reality.
Download available on YouMagine.com.
Every Thursday is #3dthursday here at Adafruit! The DIY 3D printing community has passion and dedication for making solid objects from digital models. Recently, we have noticed electronics projects integrated with 3D printed enclosures, brackets, and sculptures, so each Thursday we celebrate and highlight these bold pioneers!
Have you considered building a 3D project around an Arduino or other microcontroller? How about printing a bracket to mount your Raspberry Pi to the back of your HD monitor? And don’t forget the countless LED projects that are possible when you are modeling your projects in 3D!
The Adafruit Learning System has dozens of great tools to get you well on your way to creating incredible works of engineering, interactive art, and design with your 3D printer! If you’ve made a cool project that combines 3D printing and electronics, be sure to let us know, and we’ll feature it here!
Just like many of the aliens on Doctor Who, the Silurians have changed since their first appearance on the series in 1970. The humanoids have a reptilian appearance. One of them – Madame Vastra – has become a popular recurring character in recent seasons. Cosplayers and makers Bryan Little and Mette Hedin created a costume based on the modern design of the aliens, and I’m impressed by how detailed the mask looks. They told Dvice a little about crafting the ensemble:
According to costume creators Bryan and Mette, the head was sculpted from a clay mold taken of the costume wearer’s head. After giving it some texture, both silicone and fiberglass were brushed on, followed by the final colors. The rest of the costume was constructed from a modified shirt pattern, using both fabric and fishing net. The armor, including the arm bands and gauntlets, as well as the gun, was hand sculpted out of foam. A dremel tool was used for the engravings.
You can watch and learn from an interview with Bryan and Mette about their award winning costumes (they show up around 4:10 as Vashta Nerada):
via Dvice, photo by Richard Man
Bunker.jordanhmm... yeah, i'd watch it
It's well worth checking out this five-minute short film, Mech: Human Trials. Not only has it been picked up to become a full-length movie (something there's plenty of scope for), but it's also packing enough excitement and cool ideas into five minutes to keep you rewatching and rewinding.
After far too long, Lego is finally acknowledging that lady scientists exist. We don't yet know which figures will be produced, but it looks like the solitary woman in science minifig will be getting some coworkers!
Premodern 3D design
It may be hard to believe, but this illustration is over 400 years old. It’s from the age of the Renaissance, when folks loved perfect shapes and measurements. They enjoyed experimenting with geometry, but also with perception - and deception, for that matter. And so illustrations like this were produced: perfect three-dimensional designs in a two-dimensional space (the page). This one is part of a book with 97 drawings made by Lorenz Stör, a late-16th-century designer with a love for geometrical designs that resemble the style of Escher. I love how Stör gives us the impression that we can just grab these objects from the page and toss them around.
Pic: Cambridge, Harvard, Houghton Library, MS Type 108 (more here). Here are more designs by Stör.
Back when open-air tests of nuclear weapons were common, scientists noticed that clouds would suddenly burst into existence around the explosion. Soon afterwards, the clouds disappeared. What caused these clouds to flicker in and out of existence? Find out!
A severe heat wave has swept over Japan, with temperatures in parts of the country hitting a 90-year high. As people look for creative ways to keep cool, the most popular item is not for humans, but for their fur-covered companions.
Bunker.jordan#paggro
Bunker.jordanYESYESYESPLEASE
Sunny Meadow Fun Park. Edition of 50, 590 x 590mm.
Skhayascraper. Edition of 20, 590 x 840mm.
Langa Longer Shopping Mall. Edition of 50, 590 x 630mm.
Bridge Below Starry Skies. Editions of 50, 590 x 490mm.
Gugulethu Gables. Edition of 50, 590 x 590mm.
Glory to Gold. Edition of 10, 940 x 770mm.
Diepsloot dignity tower. Edition of 50, 590 x 590mm.
Con/struct is the latest body of work from Cape Town-based artist, designer, and photographer Justin Plunkett who uses his own original photography to digitally construct fictional landscapes and structures. He shares via an artist statement:
Con/Struct is an exploration into the themes of empowerment and imagination. Plunkett, using his own photography, has created new juxtaposed environments that encourage questioning and exploration: inviting the debate around how marketing- induced aspiration and perceived value can empower but can also corrupt, how it can be both perverse and create beauty. At the same time, at the core of his work, he honours and applauds ingenuity and the creative spirit.
The new works were recently on view at the Cabinet, and you can see more on his website. (via Designboom)
Mini moto racing… a little girl sporting a Rossi ‘46’ AGV helmet, full leathers, getting her knee down! How amazing is that?
“Geraldine Portica — This is not a girl, but a boy, who was reared by his mother as a girl and has always dressed as a girl and went to school as a girl and has never associated with any one else but girls and was employed as a chamber maid on 6th St. when arrested, he is a native of Mexico and speaks several languages, his English with the Spanish accent, he is now waiting to be deported to Mexico by the U.S. Gov. Dec. 27th, 1917.”
From the files of the San Francisco Police Department
The Genesis of the Oculus Rift @ WIRED -
Before Oculus Rift, the virtual reality headset was starting to collect dust in the museum of pie in the sky products. Beside it sat a hover board and across the room was a menagerie filled with commuters riding jetpacks. But there were a few individuals who would not abandon VR to this fate, and set out to revive (and vastly improve) the technology. Wired ran a piece that recounts the early days of the Rift and how the founders made it what it is today.
This is a rundown of the hardware that their vision and iteration produced:
The Brain — The biggest challenge in creating realistic VR is getting the image to change with your head movements, precisely and without any perceptible lag. The Rift fuses readings from a gyroscope, accelerometer, and magnetometer to evaluate head motion. Even better, it takes 1,000 readings a second, allowing it to predict motion and pre-render images, shaving away precious milliseconds of latency.
The Display — Even the best LCD can take 15 milliseconds for all its pixels to change color. The Rift uses AMOLED screens, which can switch color in less than a millisecond. Oculus also figured out how to deactivate those pixels rapidly so the image doesn’t smear or shake when you whip your head around.
The Optics — You want an image that fills your entire field of vision without distortion. Typically that requires heavy, expensive lenses. The Rift uses a pair of cheap magnifying lenses, and Oculus developers distort their games so they look right when viewed through the optics.
Positional Tracking — Previous VR headsets let you look around but not move around. The Rift’s small external camera monitors 40 infrared LEDs on the headset, tracking motion and letting you crouch, lean, or approach an in-game object.
Astronomers have discovered two new super-Earths orbiting an ancient 11.5 billion year-old star a "mere" 13 light-years from here. One planet is in the habitable zone, prompting a researcher to wonder what kind of life could have evolved over such a long period.
