MacAskill’s Imaginate

This has been doing the rounds on the blogosphere this morning, so I’m already a few hours late to the table by posting this now, but it’s worth it.  I promise.

Climb inside the mind of street trials rider Danny MacAskill who, with the help of Red Bull and Imaginate, has released a new riding film.  Seven minutes of tricks, stunts and unbelievable balance as Danny spins, hops, and pedals his way through a childhood fantasy.

Enter Danny’s mind and enjoy

UPDATE! VIDEO LINK CORRECTED – Should work fine now.

Surrounded by oversized versions of kids toys, the stunt rider ‘makes do’ and builds himself a course and terrain worthy of any five year-old’s bedroom floor.

I love the attention to detail in using ‘plasticine’ to secure the extra large colouring pencils-cum-telegraph poles, and the army men that spring to life.

Absolutely stunning stuff.  Jealous doesn’t even cover it.

Designed By Apple – Intention

Design intent is something that I say almost everyday, trying to defend or convey an idea or concept to colleagues, other consultants, and even the client.  Moving the vision from something in your mind to something tangible.  Something real.

In the wake of Apple’s announcement of iOS 7 there has been huge volumes of criticism.  With barely a breath taken, Twitter and the blogosphere were a wash with negative comments.  Let’s not deny there are some fantastic ideas and functionality in the latest version (some even love the new look too!), but the main issues people seem to be having are with the aesthetics and (lack of) consistency.

In reading lots of opinions and tweets I think that Frank Chimero and Joshua Topolsky have probably made the most sense to me.  Frank’s Generosity of Perspective and Joshua’s on The Verge seem to make the most valid and well-considered points, based less on a knee-jerk reaction than some others all to eager to Twitter-bash on Apple.

Circling back to my original point on design intent, it seems that however well (or not) iOS7 has been received Apple’s heart was always in the right place.

A beautiful little animation.  Enjoy.

Lego Champions League 2013

We’ve seen some great football recreations over recent years, from the beautiful efforts of Richard Swarbrick to Lego stop motion captures.

Following on nicely from the Champions League Final between Dortmund and Bayern last weekend The Guardian have provided the match highlights wonderfully recreated in Lego.

The champions of Germany, the champions of Europe again

They have got the instant replays spot on, and when paired with the style of pre-match television coverage overlaid with the original commentary the whole thing is impressively accurate!

Wakeboarding and Lights

Using light as a medium for art is something that we are increasingly seeing.  Light can be expressive and emotive in a single fleeting instance, which makes it such a powerful tool to work with.

Combining this with slow motion video capture or long exposure photography we have seen before with the likes of the LED Surfer, but Red Bull have taken it to the next level by incorporating a similar idea into wakeboarding.

Three Red Bull wakeboarders (Mike Dowdy, Adam Errington, Dallas Friday), one photography studio (Snap!) and one light artist (Patrick Rochon) came together in an entirely experimental collaboration.

The plan was to “fuse sport, art, and technology” to capture the excitement and creativity of wakeboarding, by using the movement of light and the riders across the water.

Focus on art, creativity and beauty

Even Patrick himself was impressed with the outcome.  The planning and capture was tough, but his motivation was simple.  Trusting the boarders to rise to the occasion and achieving final shots that “are so fluid in the water … it is precisely what we are trying to do.“

See part 2 of the Red Bull enterprise where they take to the skies with a paramotorist!

A Boy And His Atom

I thought that Guinness had a World Record for just about anything, but World’s Smallest Stop-Motion Film is a new one for me!  Introducing A Boy And His Atom by IBM.

Capturing, positioning and shaping atoms to create an original motion picture on the atomic-level is a precise science and entirely novel
Andreas Heinrich, IBM Research

The stop motion was made by a team of IBM’s nanophysicists not only having a bit of fun, but gaining amazing insight into how to move individual (yes, individual!) atoms.

Crucial in the field of atomic memory and data storage, a scanning tunnelling microscope uses a super-sharp needle to carefully select and move molecules of carbon monoxide along a copper surface to extremely precise locations.  Then, in a similar fashion to more traditional stop-motion style capture, the 100-million times magnified image is recorded and then the atoms are moved again to create the next frame.

With the potential to create devices containing unprecedented levels of storage, this is a very exciting step towards the future of computing and “the new frontiers of math and science”.

More information on the science behind IBM’s big data storage here, and you can see how they made the actual tiny film here.

Hyperlapse Road Trip

This is brilliant to watch.  Hit full screen, put your feet up and cruise to some very cleverly manipulated images woven together from Google Street View by the brilliantly creative folks at digital agency Teehan+Lax.

You can even make your very own hyperlapse (good fun!) using their very clever JavaScript here.

Via Good.

Dove Real Beauty

It is commonly known that Photoshop is widely used to touch up and edit cover models.  Everything from minor blemishes to the “slimming” of limbs and full blown transformations.

This aspect of the industry has been mocked before with the likes of Fotoshop By Adobé, but now Dove are actively trying to do something about it with their campaign promoting and celebrating Real Beauty.

By planting a disguised “Beautify” skin glow effect to directly impact those who retouch the photos, such as art directors and graphic designers, the  Photoshop Action actually reverts the image back to the original unedited state.

Whilst this is no doubt a cunning and creative way to impact the retouching of photos, the scheme has come under some criticism that it isn’t targetting the right people.  Ultimately graphic designers and such are the ones who are doing the editing, but more often than not they are simply doing a job.  Their client is the one calling the shots and paying for the contract or project.

The underlying message from Dove is one of being happy with true beauty and making the point that Real Beauty isn’t retouched, but perhaps aiming their creativity at the real culprits would be more worthwhile.

Via Design Taxi.

100th Tour de France

100 is a significant milestone in anything, let alone something as celebrated and monumental as cycling’s “le Tour“, the Tour de France.

This summer from 29 June to 21 July represents the 100th edition of the race.  As if that wasn’t exciting enough, the race organisers recently released this trailer for the event.  Epic stuff.

Enter the legend

An extremely inspiring montage to encourage you out on your bike!

More great moments in history from the Tour here.

Slow Motion Cheetahs

Super slow motion capture of the fastest animal on planet Earth.

Utterly mesmerising to watch, and I can only imagine the setup and patience the crew must have endured to catch it all.  Part of the crew was cinematographer Gregory Wilson who uploaded this beautiful Director’s Cut of the captured footage.

Using a Phantom camera filming at 1200 frames per second while zooming beside a sprinting cheetah, the team captured every nuance of the cat’s movement as it reached top speeds of 60+ miles per hour.

Items of particular note that astonished me were the steadiness of the cheetahs’ heads, the stealth and focus in their eyes and the amount of time their back legs seem to almost float above the ground, extending their gait and maximising their speed!  Stunning stuff.

More on the setup of the shoot here.

Chicken Or The Egg?

The age old question: Which came first the chicken or the egg?

Mitchell Moffit and Gregory Brown from AsapSCIENCE take a look at the perplexing conundrum that has “baffled humanity from as early as the Ancient Greeks”.

So, chicken or proto-chicken?  Egg or proto-egg?  It seems the real answer has more to do with semantics and our naming system than anything else!

What do you think?