unique and interesting: January 2012

Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Animated History Of Aviation

A brief history of aviation in 3D animation. While there are many contributions to aviation that could not be included, this video shows many of the substantial advancements that propelled aviation to what it has become today.

YouTube link

(thanks Cora)

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Did you find Heath Ledger as The Joker scary? Then perhaps you suffer from coulrophobia, the abnormal fear of clowns. Why do so many people find clowns scary? Only a few years ago the Bestival Festival on the Isle of Wight in the UK had to rethink its plans. Each year there is a theme and they thought they would follow up their successful cowboy theme with one based around clowns.

They had so many phone calls from adult ticket holders complaining that they would no longer be able to come because of their fear of clowns that the organizers had to rethink the theme. If you are afraid of clowns, don't read this article.

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At the beginning of the twentieth century, 40 percent of American men belonged to a fraternal lodge, and they were hazing their newbies with squirting goats, spanking machines, electric chairs and carpets, and the like. Nearly all their prank devices came via catalogs published by the makers, the DeMoulin Brothers Company, from 1896-1930.

Embodiments of fraternal mischief, the prank machines were inventions of three sons of a French immigrant carriage builder in Western Illinois. The DeMoulins were among America's high-tech geeks and makers at the peak of the 'Golden Age of Invention.'

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The Borgund Stave Church is a church located in Borgund, Lærdal, Norway. It is classified as a triple nave stave church of the so-called Sogn-type. The church was built sometime between 1180 and 1250 CE with later additions and restorations. Its walls are formed by vertical wooden boards, or staves, hence the name.

The floor plan of this church resembles that of a central plan, double-shelled Greek cross with an apse attached to one end in place of the fourth arm. The entries to the church are in the three arms of the almost-cross. Rapid City in South Dakota, USA has an exact reproduction of the famous church.

Flying People In New York City

Three human shaped RC planes were flown around New York City to create the illusion of people flying. It's a marketing stunt to promote the February 3 release of the movie Chronicle.

YouTube link

(thanks Miss Rare)

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Ever heard of a text neck, a Blackberry thumb, a Wii wrist, or a iPad shoulder? Our shiny new gadgets are proving once again that human beings are really easily breakable.

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The popularity of Formula One racing has grown to a point where it's now attracting a global television audience in excess of 520 million. The race meetings are attended by thousands of people who are all keen and willing to show their support for their favorite driver or team and pay a great deal of money for the privilege.

The amazing cars that you see today can reach flat out speeds of close to 220 mph (360kmh). Running a team for a year, taking in all of the races on all of the continents visited, can cost hundreds of millions of dollars. It hasn't always been this way, however, as in the early years of the 20th century when this type of racing began, there were no set classes and not a massive amount of in-depth rules. A look back through the premier class of racing.

(via Dark Roasted Blend)

At the Igloo Village in Zermatt, Switzerland, guests can sleep at an altitude of 2,727 meters (8.946 ft) at the Gornergrat, right next to Switzerland's most famous mountain, the mighty Matterhorn. The Igloo village typically opens up in December with accommodations for up to 40 overnight guests. The coolest feature is surely the two outdoor jacuzzis set directly in the snow covered landscape.

(thanks Cora)

Rémi Gaillard - Radar

Rémi Gaillard is a French humorist who runs pranks on the public. This time he dressed up like a radar station to track vehicles speeds. And not just cars but also planes, trains, and even a tractor. All goes well, until the cops show up.

YouTube link

(thanks Cora)

Tyrannosaurus rex was a very large ferocious carnivorous dinosaur of the Upper Cretaceous period. The animal had a very large head, its weight was more than six tons and it could have been more than 40 ft long. Unfortunately, it had very small forelimbs. Meaning that it failed at the most basic tasks. Like playing the guitar.

T-Rex Trying... is a tumblr blog showing the unfortunate trials of the Tyrant Lizard King.

A visualization from YouTube, demonstrating the sheer volume of video that's uploaded to the site every second/minute/hour/etc. Click on the little video guy to get started.

(thanks Cora)

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We all have an inner animal. Find out what your animal name is.
Mine is Fantasia, the Beautiful Dodo Bird.

Lego Man In Space

Two teens from Toronto, Canada, successfully launched a Lego figure into near space. Mathew Ho and Asad Muhammad, 17-year-old classmates at Agincourt Collegiate Institute, took four months and $400 to carry a Lego figurine and four cameras 78,000 feet above the earth on a homemade weather balloon.

YouTube link

Be careful about using it.

(via Miss Cellania)

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Even today, with advanced foods, and radios, and insulated clothing, a journey on foot across Antarctica is one of the harshest tests a human being can be asked to endure. A hundred years ago, it was worse. Australian explorer Douglas Mawson's journey has gone down in the annals of polar exploration as probably the most terrible ever undertaken in Antarctica.

Above is the last photo of Mawson's party, taken when they left the Australasian Antarctic base camp on November 10, 1912. By January 10, 1913, two of the three men would be dead, and expedition leader Douglas Mawson would find himself exhausted, ill and still more than 160 miles from the nearest human being.

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Do you know what the only royal palace used by a monarch in the U.S. is? Do you know there are European territories on the African continent? Or that the Canary Islands were named after dogs?

16 Weird Facts From Around The Globe.

(thanks Bosko)

The Dutch Side Saddle Hop

Getting your bike in motion while someone is sitting on the rear rack is difficult because of the extra weight. You have to start moving your bike forward and then your passenger has to hop on the rear rack. The Dutch Side Saddle Hop - a three-step move to elegantly hop on the rear rack of a bike - makes it easy once you know how to do it.

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Could this be the creepiest picture you've ever seen?
It scared the heck out of me!

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At the age most of us were playing with food and discovering our toes, child prodigies around the globe are learning complex languages and studying fields we've never heard of. Many of these children went on to do great things. Others were crippled by emotional instability. Some have great potential and are just getting started.

(via Reality Carnival)

Great Ball Boy Catch At Australian Open

One of the ball boys makes an amazing catch during the Federer - Nadal semifinal match at the Australian Open. Speaking after the match, 14-year old Dylan Colaci said he reacted instinctively when Federer casually disposed of a ball after a fault on his first serve. He said: I didn't have much time to think about it. I just stuck my hand out and the ball just stayed there. I couldn't believe it myself but then I just had to get straight on with the match.

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You'd think the distinction of a 'National Animal' would bring with it some sort of benefit - protection from extinction, for instance. Not so. Take the Bald Eagle, symbol of the United States, which has been on and off the endangered species list for over 40 years.

Sadly, this sort of thing is far from unusual. Here are six of the coolest, strangest, and most endangered animals repping countries today.

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We normally associate shipwrecks with the bottom of the sea but with the recent tragedy of the Costa Concordia our perceptions have changed. Many ships end up on or near beaches. Here are just a few of the ships around the world which did not sink but were shipwrecked nonetheless.

How To Remove Ads From Videos

Are you annoyed by the ads on YouTube videos? Here's how to remove them!

YouTube link

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The gentle magnificence of elephants has long held a special place in Indian society. It's hardly surprising that elephants became symbols of royalty in Indian culture and that the animal is associated with a number of different festivals. The Elephant Festival is a festival celebrated in Jaipur city in Rajasthan state in India.

The Elephant Festival begins with a beautiful procession of bedecked elephants. The owners proudly embellish their elephants with vibrant colors and heavy jewellery. It is quite a treat to see female elephants wearing anklets, which tinkle as they walk. The most beautifully decorated elephant is awarded.

Searching for that youthful look? Forget expensive surgery or dangerous therapies! Japanese housewife Chikako Hirama has the answer and it is as simple as it is, well, unusual. Just pop the colorful Pupeko gently into your mouth, clench your jaw and breath in and out.

This will then start training and tightening your cheek and jaw muscles, helping to offset the signs of aging and bringing a fresher, youthful look back again to your cheeks!

(via Boing Boing)

Morning Toilet

YouTube link

(thanks Cora)

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Vatican City may have fewer than 1,000 citizens and span only 110 acres, but it also has a multimillion-dollar budget and an unbelievably complex history. Understanding how it all works requires parsing through centuries of religious texts. Is the Vatican confusing and mysterious? Is the Pope Catholic? Here's a look behind the scenes.

Rusty Cans is a web site dedicated to providing information about beer can collecting.

(via Everlasting Blort)

Landing In The Hudson River - 3D Reconstruction

On January 15, 2009, an Airbus A320-214 was successfully ditched in the Hudson River adjacent to midtown Manhattan six minutes after takeoff from LaGuardia Airport after being disabled by striking a flock of Canada geese during its initial climb out. The incident became known as the 'Miracle On The Hudson.'

We all saw this after it happened, but this video gives an idea of what captain Chesley Sullenburger and co-pilot Jay Skiles went through as it happened.

(thanks Cora)

Timeu.se is a web tool for investigating how millions of people report spending their time. This is done by collecting and aggregating millions of messages from Twitter. Some people say that Twitter conversations are 'pointless' or 'babble.' It's great that people tweet what they had for breakfast, or that they're stuck in traffic or are mowing the lawn.

Because what sociologists have always wanted to be able to do is get very detailed measures of how people spend their time without bothering them too much by asking them. Now, by simply examining the conversations that they're having in public, we can do it without bothering them at all.

(via Sargasso)

Ex E.T.

On a planet far, far away, where life is well regulated and orderly, a child just doesn't want to fit in. Ex-E.T. is a 3D animation produced by 4 students from the school ESMA Montpellier. Directors: Benoit Bargeton, Remy Froment, Nicolas Gracia and Yannick Lasfer.

Vimeo link

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Wittenoom is a ghost town located in the Hamersley Range in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. It's the site of Australia's greatest industrial disaster. The area around Wittenoom was mainly pastoral until the 1930s when mining began in the area. In 1947 a company town was built. During the 1950s and early 1960s Wittenoom was Australia's only supplier of blue asbestos. The town was shut down in 1966 due to unprofitability and growing health concerns from asbestos mining in the area. Today, travelling to Wittenoom presents a public health risk.

Today, eight residents still live in the town, which receives no government services. In December 2006, the Government of Western Australia announced that the town's official status would be removed, and in June 2007, Jon Ford, the Minister for Regional Development, announced that the townsite had officially been degazetted. The town's name was removed from official maps and road signs.

One Minute Fly

The One Minute Fly has got a very limited lifespan. One minute in which it wants to experience everything that makes life worth living.

YouTube link

Reformed Gambling Swindle Becomes A Punch Board of Love

Handheld punch-board parlor games, like Coo Coo and its companion The Fortune-Teller in Rhymes, were the icebreakers du jour at cocktail parties of the 1920s and '30s. They were sold by the checkout at five-and-dimes.

First designed for gambling, punch boards quickly became the go-to scam for gangsters and mobsters like Jack Ruby (yes, the man who kiled Lee Harvey Oswald ), con artists, and lottery operators hoping to swindle the gullible.

(thanks Lisa)

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The Daleks are a fictional extraterrestrial race of mutants from the British science fiction television series Doctor Who. They are evil alien mutants who travel inside cyborg shells and try to exterminate other beings. They are also funny-looking, and have inspired many cooks to recreate their appearance in tasty treats.

(via Everlasting Blort)

Celebrity Sleepovers

Comedian and filmmaker Mark Malkoff didn't want to spend thousands of dollars on hotels during his recent visit to Los Angeles. His solution was to ask famous celebrities if he could sleepover at their homes. He sent them Facebook messages, emails, and even letters.

To Mark's surprise thirteen famous celebrities said yes. The video, 'Celebrity Sleepovers' features Rob Corddry, Dave Coulier, Kate Walsh, Justine Bateman, Ed Begley Jr. Kristen Schaal, Camryn Manheim, 'Bridesmaids' director Paul Feig, Larry King, Steven Weber, and Lisa Loeb.

(thanks Mark)

I guess I missed something in biology class.

(via Criggo)

Bliss Kolb, born and raised in Seattle, has been creating cabinetry, furniture, set pieces and props for theatre and film, delicate containers, and other wonderful things for over 30 years. He also makes automatons, self-operating machines.

(thanks Jimmy)

Chinese Boy Can See In The Dark

A Chinese boy has stunned medics with his ability to see in pitch black with eyes that glow in the dark. Doctors have studied Nong Youhui's amazing eyesight since his dad took him to hospital in Dahua, southern China, concerned over his bright blue eyes. Medical tests conducted in complete darkness show Youhui can read perfectly without any light and sees as clearly as most people do during the day.

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How shoes affect human gait is a controversial topic these days. The popularity of barefoot running, for instance, has grown in large part because of the belief, still unproven, that wearing modern, well-cushioned running shoes decreases foot strength and proprioception, the sense of how the body is positioned in space, and contributes to running-related injuries.

Whether high heels might likewise affect the wearer's biomechanics and injury risk has received scant scientific attention, however, even though millions of women wear heels almost every day. Neil J. Cronin, a postdoctoral researcher at the Musculoskeletal Research Program at Griffith University in Queensland, Australia, looked at the dangers of high heels, one of the first studies of its kind.

The same monolithic vending machine found in arcades, amusement parks, and novelty shops, this is the 7' tall gumball machine that holds over 14,000 gumballs. Requiring no coins for operation, the mechanism and dispenser are 49" high, allowing chewers of all ages to retrieve gumballs.

The acrylic globe is fitted with a spherical insert that keeps all 14,450 of the included multi-flavored gumballs pressed outward and visible to expectant children and passers-by alike. And it's yours for only $3,900.

Digital Death - What Happens Online When You Die

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(thanks Kristy)

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Although it is thought to date back to the Ch'in and Han Dynasties, the true beginnings of the Chinese Lion Dance are a mystery. For a start, how did an animal not native to China become such a large part of Chinese tradition? One popular legend tells of a monk who dreamed that China was about to be plagued by many evils.

On waking he prayed fervently to the gods for a way to avert the coming catastrophe, and was rewarded with a vision of a lion. Because the monk had never seen or heard of a lion before, he created his own from many other mythical creatures including the dragon and unicorn. This certainly explains why the 'lions' used in the dance don't look too much like real ones!

Moby Dick Typed On Toilet Paper

If you are one of those people who like to read while on the toilet, then this is for you. For sale on eBay: Moby Dick typed on toilet paper. There are 4 full rolls, kept in a box in a cool, dry place for the last 10 years. Starting bid is $999.95.

(via Everlasting Blort)

A cupcake is a small cake designed to serve one person, frequently baked in a small, thin paper or aluminum cup. The first mention of the cupcake can be traced as far back as 1796, when a recipe notation of 'a cake to be baked in small cups' was written in American Cookery by Amelia Simms.

The ingredients of a cupcake are familiar items we always have on hand. Like most anything we eat nowadays, the cupcake represents global effort of laborers and products from places we don’t tend to think about. Check out this graphic weighing the ingredients of this trendy personal treat.

8 Year Old Guitarist Zoe Thomson

Zoe Thompson from Thatcham, in Berkshire, UK, working on a Stratosphere.

YouTube link

Films To... is a new site by Philipp Lenssen. The site shows you hundreds of random videos to laugh, think, cry or clap.

This artwork was commissioned by Tropicana (PepsiCo) to support their current advertising campaign. Art collective Greyworld created the spectacular sun which was raised over Trafalgar Square as part of Tropicana's 'Brighter Mornings' campaign.

The Trafalgar Sun, which took six months to create, is 30,000 times bigger than a football. Its internal light source produces 4-million lumens of light, the equivalent of 60,000 light bulbs, making the artwork visible from space.

(thanks Cora)

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Astronauts living and working in space rely on the International Space Station as their port of call. The iconic ISS is a modern engineering triumph, zipping around the Earth every 90 minutes at a height of 200 miles above the surface. Its construction required careful coordination between nearly a dozen countries working through five space agencies.

Yet the history of space station design is littered with concepts - some elegant, some strange, and some remarkably cute - that were passed over for one reason or another. Take a look at some space station ideas that didn't quite make it off the drawing board.

When Larry Met Sergey: From Grad School to $150 Billion Company. An interactive guide to everything Google.

(thanks Peter)

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The world is an amazing place, and it looks its best when the sun goes down. Here are some of the best pictures of great sunsets from all over the globe.

Zurich Chamber Orchestra Rollercoaster

Visualization of the 1st violin of the 2nd symphony, 4th movement by Ferdinand Ries in the shape of a rollercoaster. The camera starts by showing a close-up of the score, then focuses on the notes of the first violin turning the staves into the winding rail tracks of the rollercoaster.

Vimeo link

(thanks Cora)

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Did you know there's a country with more than 3 million lakes? What is the least densely populated country? Here's a list of countries that are not like other countries. Some countries are specific for its natural beauties, some by the demographic characteristics, some by tourist visits.

(thanks Bosko)

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Beautiful pictures of stars and galaxies. They are all the more spectacular if you consider how far their light had to travel to reach us: millions, sometimes billions of years.

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The Williams Formula One team has joined forces with Olympic gold medalist Michael Johnson in a bid to improve their performance on and off track. Michael Johnson Performance Inc, a company founded by the athlete, will focus on providing an intensive training programme for the team's pit crew, as well as conducting an evaluation of the team's training regime.

Since refueling during races was banned in 2010, pit stops have fallen into the three-second range and become increasingly crucial in a sport where every moment counts.
Enter Michael Johnson. His firm will help Williams' pit crew build its speed, agility, strength and stamina to improve its peformance. Johnson, a fan of F1, says he's confident of cutting hundredths and even tenths of a second from their pit stop times.

Special Delivery

The U.S. Postal Service's new recruitment video.

YouTube link

(thanks Matin)

Akamai monitors global Internet conditions around the clock. With this real-time web monitor you can identify the global regions with the greatest attack traffic, cities with the slowest Web connections, and geographic areas with the most Web traffic.

The popular CBS TV-show 'The Big Bang Theory' presents a complex network of characters.
This network diagram illustrates the various types of relationships.

(thanks Beat)

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Scouting New York has gone down into a 9-story Cold War missile launch facility hidden in the wilderness of the Adirondacks.

(thanks Cora)

Bat Infestation Under Tile Roof In Miami, USA

Hundreds of bats come flying out from underneath the tiles.

YouTube link

(via Nothing To Do With Arbroath)

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Do cats wear glasses? Of course they do!

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Winnie the Pooh is a fictional anthropomorphic bear created by A. A. Milne. The first collection of stories about the character was the book Winnie-the-Pooh from 1926.

The hyphens in the character's name were later dropped when The Walt Disney Company adapted the Pooh stories into a series of Disney features that became one of its most successful franchises. Here are a few things you might not know about Winnie the Pooh and the rest of his pals.

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So what happened with the Internet in 2011? How many email accounts were there in the world in 2011? How many websites? How much did the most expensive domain name cost? How many photos were hosted on Facebook? How many videos were viewed to YouTube?

Royal Pingdom has got the answers to these questions and many more. A veritable smorgasbord of numbers, statistics and data. Here are some of the more interesting numbers that describe the Internet in 2011.

Tiger On Hotel Roof Rescued By Firefighters

Firefighters sometimes receive calls out to get cats out of trees. But what happens when they get calls about a tiger on a roof? The Houston Fire Department received several calls last week about a tiger on the roof of an abandoned hotel. Fire crews removed the tiger, saying it posed a hazard because drivers kept stopping to look at it.

YouTube link

With a few liberating swipes of their paws, a group of research rats freed trapped labmates and raised anew the possibility that empathy isn't unique to humans and a few extra-smart animals, but is widespread in the animal world.

In a study published in Science, Mason and University of Chicago psychologists Jean Decety and Inbal Ben-Ami Bartal describe their rat empathy-testing apparatus: An enclosure into which pairs of rats were placed, with one roaming free and the other restrained inside a plastic tube. It could only be opened from the outside, which is exactly what the free rats did - again and again and again, seemingly in response to their trapped companions' distress.

Five kitchens, five stories - and you! Jump into the characters, travel through the kitchens, get inspired by a unique experience.

(thanks Cora)

Regarding the disaster with the Costa Concordia we will not exactly know what happened until the Voyage Data Recorder, aka Black Box, is analyzed. But John Konrad, who is a professional seaman and author at gCaptain, a maritime and offshore industry news blog, narrates a video with the final maneuvers of the Costa Concordia.

(thanks Michael)

Yosemite

Beautiful daytime/nighttimetime-lapse of Yosemite National Park shot over an extended period of time by Sheldon Neill and Colin Delehanty.

Vimeo link

The Bald Eagle is off the endangered list. He doesn't seem to be too happy though.

(via Criggo)

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Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Monday, January 30, 2012

Sunday, January 29, 2012

Saturday, January 28, 2012

Friday, January 27, 2012

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Monday, January 23, 2012

Sunday, January 22, 2012