The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology celebrates their 150th Anniversary with creating the world’s largest Lite Brite. Just kidding. NOVA is its name and color is its game. This light monster is consisted of 25,000 suspended lightballs and it has the ability to display 16 million colors per second. Go have a look at it in person. It will be on display at Switzerland’s Zurich train station, in the main hall, until September 2009, but I wouldn’t stand directly below it, just in case!
In an increasingly crowded marketplace product customization has become the catch phrase of the day. If Gwen Stefani and J-Lo can “design” their own clothing lines why shouldn’t we be able to pick a few color swatches and make our own products? Now you can take your bling to a whole new level by designing your own tailor made Ferrari through the company’s Ferrari Atelier program.
In an increasingly crowded marketplace product customization has become the catch phrase of the day. If Gwen Stefani and J-Lo can “design” their own clothing lines why shouldn’t we be able to pick a few color swatches and make our own products? Now you can take your bling to a whole new level by designing your own tailor made Ferrari through the company’s Ferrari Atelier program.
Getting paid to jet set? JetBlue has come up with a totally new jet ownership program called JetSuite. Now you can enjoy the luxury, convenience, and satisfaction of owning a private jet minus the liability, regulatory risks, and operational hassles. If you sign up, you will receive a brand new BMW designed Embraer Phenom 100 Jet. You can fly in style with a number of set hours to use each year and additional hours are always available for purchase.
We could get used to this kind of transportation, a jet that is always on call, well maintained, with hangar, & pilot included? Sounds like our kind of life. When your not using your private plane, JetSuite will keep it garaged and polished for you. The cost is offset by JetSuite charting your plane out while your not using it, and its even possible to generate positive cash flow this way. Best of all, you will be eligible for the full tax advantage of accelerated depreciation on the plane itself.
Already have a jet, but want to join? No problem, placing your aircraft into the JetSuite fleet is hassle free and at no additional cost to you. The program sounds pretty tempting. We might just have to pick ourselves up a new jet.
As a member of the Japan Design Innovation exhibit at Milan Design week 2008, Fujitsu Design Corp. has introduced their Cedar encased PC Notebook. In deviating from traditional petrol based materials Fujitsu has adopted what they are calling “Human Centered Design.” Design that is not only easy to use but easy on the earth as well, and technology that can be utilized comfortably in an IT rich society.
The most highly anticipated video game of the year is finally in stores worldwide today. That’s right, Rock Star Games has released the latest and greatest in the saga of criminal gaming behavior – Grand Theft Auto IV. It’s available for both the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360, and is now a Multiplayer game (up to 16 players - 15 game modes). The game is still rated M (Mature) and has reached a visual level of realism that you have never seen before in a video game. It runs on Rock Star’s game engine, R.A.G.E., which has many unprecedented characteristics such as real reflections in glass, cars, or water, more detailed road and building textures, and it uses Euphoria – an animation package created by Natural Motion, which uses Dynamic Motion Synthesis (DMS) technology. This is the most awesome breakthrough for GTA IV gamers – characters in the game are now animated in a way you have never seen in a video game before. They can hang off the back of vehicles or helicopters, step off and up onto curbs, and even react realistically when hit by gunfire – like if a character is shot in the leg, he will limp. The way a character walks even changes when the terrain does.
The success of GTA has always been attributed to the fact that this is an “open world” game – meaning the location is vast and can be explored in depth by the player. The location this time is Liberty City, and the main character, Niko Bellic, is an eastern European immigrant who has come to America in search of a better life…only to find out that Liberty City is not the place to pursue the American dream. GTA IV takes a stronger turn towards storytelling also, although the storyline is a lot less linear than before. It is possible to do more than one mission at a time, and some missions take place over several days – which brings up the cellphone. Yes, Niko uses his cell to receive calls and make calls to help set up his missions. He could be waiting for days for phone calls to move forward on a mission, and in the meantime, he can go on dates…or frequent strip clubs. So, if you love cappin’ fools, stealin’ rides, and hangin’ with ho’s…today is your lucky day.
If we thought TED was cool before, now we are convinced we MUST find some way to get in. We’re still stunned by this video from the most recent TED conference of Johnny Lee making a digital drawing board from a WII remote and a dry erase marker. We know that sounds a little MacGyverish, but the result is mind blowing. Using the inexpensive motion sensing technology in the WII remote, he’s built a pen that can have it’s motion tracked. The result is you can open photoshop, project it on a wall, and draw or paint with the pen like you would with traditional art mediums. Well, kind of like traditional mediums, minus all the buying brushes, charcoal, paint, thinner, rags, canvases, etc, and our favorite, no clean up.
We can imagine doing some pretty amazing performance pieces already. It’s safe to say that if guys like David Ellis can make amazing art from old paint cans they can go to town with recycled technology like this.
Lee also mentions another WII hack we posted on last year referring to 3-D motion sensing technology for video games that is also quite impressive (the earlier post gives a little bit better explanation of how this technology works and how simple it is). Could these two things be combined to create 3-D environments users could interact with? Is this the beginning of holographic video games? We’re guessing someone is working on this right now, and if any of you have any info this please post it in the comments section.
If you are familiar with the work of Paris’ Ora-Ito the concept of a flashy yet well designed gold hard drive is no surprise. This design resides among a long list of creative remixes of everyday products. Having dreamed up designs for Louis Vuitton, Apple, Addidas, among many others Ora-Ito is definitely one studio I’ll be keeping my eye on. You can pick up this Gold Hard Drive at A+R
With the temptation to keep up with all of the new technology, comes the fear of mismanaging the madness. The guys over at Greener Grass have come up with a clever solution to your multi-deviceness (I don’t think that’s a word). Tame is an instant customized away message system that will update to many of the devices that we use each day. You update your away messages to Tame through a web interface and simply flip to cub to reflect the message of choice. This is the perfect solution for those of us trying to text message and send e-mails while driving. We all know we try.
I’m sure the last time you rolled through Silver Lake you hit Intelligentsia for some espresso while you were shopping for kicks…but if you are shopping for a moped there is a far better espresso waiting for you at Choke. I’m privy to the Cappuccino myself. Serious.
Choke is a straight vintage motorcycle shop where bikes are fixed in the back, mopeds are sold out the front, and espresso is served from the counter. Adorned with an old soda pop machine, a community pack of Lucky Strikes, and a signed Evil Knievel poster, this mom and pop joint is the spot for the moped packs on the Eastside. No Mom & Pop tho – Jeff & Nick opened the place about a year and a half back and cater to the serious moped enthusiast. Their bike of choice is a TOMOS, which originated with the Puch 250 SGSS, a racing bike manufactured in Slovenia back in the early 1950’s. TOMOS evolved rapidly and developed several trophy-winning racing bikes in the 60’s and 70’s in the up to 50 cm3 class. These racing mopeds transformed into two-wheelers for the average biker and hit big in the US in the late 70’s when gas prices soared and people desired an alternative ride to their high gas consuming four-wheel vehicles…anyone hear an echo?
Choke stocks an assortment of bikes – a Sprint or two usually, and on some days there may be a Streetmate R to see. TOMOS are quality machines that have a long history of reaching and exceeding EPA standards and sport a modern look while not compromising comfort. They do have off-road lines, and a few years back even made a deal with BMW to have them produce some component parts for some of the bikes. Visit Choke for an awesome portal to these European classics and a great ol’ school neighborhood vibe.
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