"I live in New York, and I was thinking about the lagoon in Central Park, down near Central Park South. I was wondering if it would be frozen over when I got home, and if it was, where did the ducks go? I was wondering where the ducks went when the lagoon got all icy and frozen over. I wondered if some guy came in a truck and took them away to a zoo or something. Or if they just flew away."
- The Catcher In The Rye, J.D. Salinger
Rest In Peace.
I've always been obsessed with small things. From action figures to dioramas for school projects, I have alway loved looking at the world through the eyes of a small being. That coupled with the use of ordinary materials to create these miniature landscapes is why I love the work of Matthew Albanese. The Martian landscape above was created with paprika, cinnamon, thyme, chili powder, charcoal. Check out some behind-the-scenes photos on his facebook page. While there, you should become a fan.
For the fifth year in a row (officially), designer Nicholas Feltron has released his Annual Report. Feltron painstakingly collects data on several aspects of his day-to-day life. He then consolidates the data and the result are these wonderful visualizations.
Yesterday, a rain storm with heavy wind gusts moved through NYC. This video shows my office building actually swaying back and forth.
What I love the most about data visualization is that, when done right, it equally pleases both hemispheres of the brain. The above project, entitled Flickr Flow is a great example. It was created with an algoithim that uses colors found on Flickr from images of Boston Common. Summer is at the top . This visualization is the work of Fernanda Viégas and Martin Wattenberg, who do this for a living at IBM's Visual Communication Lab.
This beautiful film called The Third & The Seventh was completely constructed using CG software. The film is by Alex Roman who directed, modeled, edited, and composed the score as well. If you are skeptical that this is all CG, check out his video showing the compositing process.
These are a couple of shots from a series of 'exploded' photographs by Austin-based photographer Adam Voorhes. His other series include creations out of office supplies, extreme close-ups of eyeballs, and guitars used by famous Austin, um guitarists.
Zombie Outbreak Simulator' is not so much a game as it is a disturbing Google Maps view of what a real zombie attack in a suburban setting might look like. But it will be a game called Class 3 Outbreak, as you play as one of the brain-possessing humans, trying to survive in an ever more zombified world. Class 3 Outbreak is still in development by game makers Binary Space.
Today is the first day of UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. Right now diplomats, world leaders, scientists and activists are all heading to the fair Danish city. This is the biggest meeting about climate change since the Kyoto Protocol. Which, under G.W. Bush, was smirked at and dismissed by the United States. But hopes are high this time around.
The image above is an installation in Copenhagen by artist Alfio Bonanno and architect Christophe Cornubert. The piece is 27ft. cubed, which visualizes the average carbon footprint of a single person in a month. It will feature video content with real-time data and streaming footage from the convention.
In an unlikely, but awesome co-branded product release, Muji (the Japanese minimalist product design company) and Lego (the Danish Toy company) have joined up to create a very cool mashup product. Using paper cutouts and a custom Lego peg holepunch you can create all kinds of fun little things. I'm not sure if this is only available in Japan (I can't read Japanese, sorry).