Man and Machine

Man and Machine NASA

NASA http://goo.gl/HvifW

What Web Designers Can Learn From Video Games | Smashing Magazine

smashingmagazine.com

"Games are becoming more Web-like, and the Web is becoming more game-like. If you need proof of this, you have only to look at Yahoo Answers. Random questions are posed, the top answer is chosen, and credibility points are given to the winner. It’s a ranking system that accumulates and unlocks more and more features within the system. It works because of the psychology of achievement and game mechanics and thus encourages interaction. This raises the question, what can a Web designer learn from games, or — more specifically — video games?"

In The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, you start out in prison and must escape through an underground cave, fighting rats and the occasional small goblin along the way to learn the basic controls of the game.

Unbelievable accuracy Kennis & Kennis

Dutch artists: Alfons and Adrie Kennis

"This reconstruction is made on casts of the original bones from the Feldhover neanderthal. 

Missing bones were added from other skeletons, Spy neanderthal, Kebara neanderthal and Monte Circeo neanderthal. First (if necessary) we reconstruct the missing and deformed parts. 

After that we drill holes in the cast, we fit pegs in them, which length corresponds with the measurements of skinthickness of today's people (Helmer and Lebedinskaya) or apes. 

After that we apply the muscles. Layers of plastic clay cover the muscles until the pegs are submerged in it. 

The pegs can of course not be absolute guides because they are based on measurements of modern people and apes. 

In this stage we already get a rough impression of the volume and contour of the face and body which can be quite a surprise. The forming of the nostrils, eyelids, lips and ears is educated guesswork. These parts of the face are very important to make a character and a portrait. 

We want real characters so we give them more lively, expressive faces." Alfons and Adrie Kennis

kenniskennis.com

Robot Quadrotors Perform James Bond Theme

Flying robot quadrotors perform the James Bond Theme by playing various instruments including the keyboard, drums and maracas, a cymbal, and the debut of an adapted guitar built from a couch frame. The quadrotors play this "couch guitar" by flying over guitar strings stretched across a couch frame; plucking the strings with a stiff wire attached to the base of the quadrotor. A special microphone attached to the frame records the notes made by the "couch guitar".

Quadrotors Come to TED
Video by Kurtis Sensenig
Text by Evan Lerner upenn.edu