Archive for January, 2008
Amazing Body Paint Art
Comments(0)
There are body paints (the stuff we douse on ourselves on Halloweens or on particularly patriotic occasions), and then there are body paints - the stunning pieces of art that artist Kim Joon creates. The human body is sometimes even lost within the picture, as the eyes are drawn by simultaneously intricate and engaging patterns on the skin. He has a lot more work on his site - check it out!
Whale Blimp
With all the talk about reviving the airship in the recent years - it seems like this peaceful and spacious mode of travel (as compared to the airlines which are still desperately trying to trim half-inches of leg rooms) could be back for a rebirth after that much-documented Hindenberg disaster. If they do come back, I’d wish for it to be in the form of this ‘Manned Cloud’, a concept airship developed together by Jean-Marie Massaud and the French national aerospace research body ONERA.
Airships are certainly no match for traditional airplanes in speed or efficiency - but it’s certainly much more relevant in leisure purposes like an ‘air cruise’. Capable of hovering at much lower altitudes (typically 500-1000 meters above ground), it brings being-in-the-air as an experience in travel itself, rather than simply a means-to-an-end. As described by Massaud:
Living in the sky, watching the Earth from above. Rediscovering the marvel of traveling, experiencing contemplation. Exploring the world without trace
Manned Cloud is an alternative project around leisure and travelling in all its form, economic and experimental, still with the idea of lightness, human experience and life scenarios as the guiding principles. The spiral of Archimedes is the driving force of this airship in the form of a whale that glides through the air.
I thought the form had the peace, grace and elegance associated with this mode of air travel. It sort of brings us close to nature again in appreciation.
Wallpaper Design Awards
Wallpaper, the art/design magazine that I’m sure many of us are familiar with, have just published the Wallpaper Awards 08, giving kudos and recognition to great designs in a wide field, including best city, public housing, fashion and even specifically grooming product.
As a product designer I am of course partial to the ‘domestic appliance’ category. With a jury mix that is more eclectic and varied than many typical design awards - including Donatella Versace, Tadao Ando and Wong Kar-Wai - the products selected all seem to ooze personality and soul. The winner is the Katamari 01 Speakers by Gizanze:
Other finalists include:
Alpha TV by Brionvega
Heater by Plusminuszero
L10 Washbasin by Boffi
Gorenje Kitchen Appliances by Ora Ito
What’s also really interesting is how they honor their winners. Instead of solely plastering the glamor shot of the product, they’ve also made a 15-second animation for each winner - check it out (total of 10 categories) !
Weiner Circle
This is a pretty interesting video about a hot-dog stand in Chicago that made its business by featuring abusive customer service. Yes you’ve read that right - abusive. Their staff would hurl vulgarities at the customers, and (most of?) the customers actually enjoy the one-of-a-kind experience, or come for it.
Pretty interesting, eh? [Warning, coarse language NSFW]
Industrial Rings
If you are the geek technician/engineer type (and your wife-to-be is to), why not propose with this set of unique rings? :) Designed by Kiley Granberg, it’s made of brass coated with 24k gold plating and a white zircon gem. Which made me ponder - so which is the man’s ring and which is the woman’s?
Top 100 Most Viewed on World Architecture
Modern technology and visionary architecture certainly brings about much man-made wonders. Have you seen them all? World Architecture has a very comprehensive Top 100 of the most viewed architectures - check it out to see if you can get inspired!
Permutations for Obama’s Logo
A while ago in my post ‘Visual Branding - More than a Mark’, I mused about the changing nature of a (company’s) branding identity. While the traditional notion of branding is a strong, iconic but static symbol, we are starting to see much more versatile branding identities that leave room for permutation and re-interpretation. An extract from that post:
They are often just as strong and iconic (if not more), but they have an added dimensionality and freeplay that allows for creative interpretations of the symbol, rather than just a static stoic symbol.
…
It’s great though to see brands getting more alive and versatile. With the new mediums of expression (cellphones? Google Earth views?) and the Web2.0 culture of hacking and mashing, a versatile logo allows the audience not only to receive but also to actively reciprocate and reinterpret what these brands mean to them …
Shown above are Barack Obama’s campaign logos. While the top one is the official icon, there’s also a whole range of other icons that were tweaked to cater to the various niches while retaining the strong and very recognizable primary branding. The free-exchange nature of the Internet has definitely encouraged ‘mashing’ of different elements for customization. As a nod to the web culture, these logos are even available for download on his website, and at 96×96 pixels they seemed to be precisely targeted at web-uses such as online avatars for forums and instant messaging services.
If your company’s logo isn’t versatile enough to accommodate re-interpretation and transformation (hey, even politicians have done it), you might want to consider some change as well!
NIKE Ads - ‘Defy’ and ‘Endure’
I came across and was very much inspired by the two ads above from Nike, titled ‘Defy’ and ‘Endure’ respectively. They were really wonderful in many senses. For both videos, a series of really expressive scenes extracted from sports played in slow-motion, coaxing and allowing the emotions from the sportsmen/women to really flow out to the viewer (with matching background music too).
‘Defy’ paints a picture of hope and of celebration of the human body - how great athletes seem to defy gravity and common notions of what is possible - aptly ending with the tagline ‘A little less gravity’. On the other hand, ‘Endure’ takes a straight look at the less glorious part of sports - the agony in endurance, defeat and disappointment, with the tagline ‘A little less hurt’. Juxtaposed together, they show poetically the humanness and the emotions in sports - and that they are very much simply two sides of the same coin.
If you have been inspired and motivated by the strength of human spirit in sports and endurance, be sure to also check out this story which has been floating on the Net recently, chronicling the superhuman feat of a 61-year old farmer who beat professional athletes in a grueling 875-km race, simply because he didn’t know he was supposed to stop and rest.
MIT RoboScooter
The RoboScooter is a lightweight, folding, electric motor scooter. It is designed to provide convenient, inexpensive mobility in urban areas while radically reducing the negative effects of extensive vehicle use – road congestion, excessive consumption of space for parking, traffic noise, air pollution, carbon emissions that exacerbate global warming, and energy use. It is clean, green, silent, and compact.
“We looked at existing folding bicycles and we looked at origami,” Mr. Mitchell, professor of architecture and media arts and sciences, said of the design. He said the students liked to call the vehicle “the cuter scooter.” The final show-quality prototype was presented at the Milan Motor show on November 6-9th, 2007.
Scooters are often the best form of transportation in some urban areas, be it the bustling but narrow alleys in developing Asia, or along roads in historic cities like Paris and Rome that have been constrained from accommodating to our modern forms of transport. Quick, agile and economical, they are perfect for zipping from point A to B - at the same time reducing some hassles associated with driving, such as parking space.
The RoboScooter from the MIT lab was the outcome of the collaboration between MIT’s Smart Cities group, San Yang Motors and Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Research Institute. Taking the versatility and portability factor even higher - this scooter features a foldable body unit, allowing it to be stowed neatly in crowded urban spaces and apartments. This was achieved with the use of electrical motors that are placed within the wheels, which eliminated the need for a drive-chain. The electric engine also create less air pollution - just what we need in the cities.
Overall I think the design is pretty well-done, especially considering the fact that it has only 85 parts (as oppose to approximately 250 parts in a typical gasoline scooter). Personally, there is a bit of lost-in-translation between the top render and the actual prototype - it seemed to have dropped some elegance/neatness along the way. Could it be the exposed wires and joints? Or maybe even the color schemes. But I think I’m asking too much… (Yeah, I also know one that side-view tends to conceal much more than the more unforgiving perspective…). So, well done MIT et al. - hopefully we’d see some of these on the streets soon.
[via Daily Galaxy]
Userful Computer - Split your PCs
I came across this free software called Desktop Multiplier by a company called Userful. It lets you leverage the power of one physical CPU for up to 10 virtually separate users. As we know, CPUs and processors are getting ever more powerful, while much of what we do (email, browsing, etc) doesn’t really require the full strength. With this software, you can have only one physical computer for your home/office - everyone still works independently, running programs, opening files on their own display and inputs. This is especially valuable in commercial/public sector works where the computer is used to run small and simple programs - like a inquiry terminal in a library, or an Internet kiosk in an airport, for example.
This could dramatically reduce the costs needed, be it hardware or software. On the environmental note, this would certainly also consume less resources (be it electricity or in production of hardware) than having the full configuration. There seems to be some issues with software licensing though - can you only buy 1 copy of the software, or do you still need to buy by the number of people using? Perhaps that’s why it seems on their website they only have it for Linux so far.
Personally I’d hope it’d come onto the mainstream Windows too - and the bonus would be to develop wireless connections between the CPU box and the input/output (monitors, keyboard, mouse). One central wireless home server/computer for everyone’s needs. Perfect!
