There have been a number of tribute videos to Miyazaki this year I have noticed, but this one really evokes a sense of wonderment akin to the revered storyteller’s own realized and adored imaginings:
Fan-made Tribute to Hayao Miyazaki’s Enchanting Worlds & Characters
•August 3, 2015 • Leave a CommentCalculate Your Age on Other Planets!
•August 3, 2015 • Leave a CommentSo apparently, I am only 15 years old on planet Mars, 2 years old on planet Jupiter, and 119 years old on planet Mercury!!! Click the image link below to calculate your own birthday relative to the revolution of another astronomical body:
R.I.P. Roddy Piper 1954 ~ 2015
•August 2, 2015 • Leave a CommentWWE Hall of Fame Superstar, Roddy Piper, has passed away at the age of 61. Born Roderick Toomes, a Canadian wrestler who used his Scottish family roots as a character trait and became one of the biggest heels of the 1980’s. Although, I’ll always remember him for his role in John Carpenter’s alien indoctrination cult classic “They Live” (1988)
Nada (Roddy Piper), a wanderer without meaning in his life, discovers a pair of sunglasses capable of showing the world the way it truly is. As he walks the streets of Los Angeles, Nada notices that both the media and the government are comprised of subliminal messages meant to keep the population subdued, and that most of the social elite are skull-faced aliens bent on world domination. With this shocking discovery, Nada fights to free humanity from the mind-controlling aliens.
Twizzler Cthulhu Meets a Sweet Ending
•August 1, 2015 • Leave a CommentSome guys were on a road trip when they caught their buddy Micah asleep with his mouth wide open. So what’s any good friend to do? Stuff his mouth full of Twizzlers, of course. Laughs and free candy! That’s a win-win situation by all standards.
“Embroidered Zoetrope” by Elliot Schultz
•July 30, 2015 • Leave a Comment
Australian animator and digital artist, Elliot Schultz, embroidered discs with animated sequences that can be played on standard turntables. “Embroidered Zoetrope” was Schultz’s final art school project when he graduated from ANU School of Art back in 2013. His project encourages viewers to watch and engage with animation physically:
“Inspired by the work of Alexandre Alexeieff and Claire Parker, I aimed to guide my production process indirectly through the limitations afforded by alternative media. Their invention, the pin screen, was used as the sole medium in the production of six short films, and shaped the outcome of their work. In response, I have designed and embroidered animated sequences onto discs, similar to the Phenakistokope, Zoopraxiscope and Stamfer Disc layouts. This repurposing of media introduced strict parameters, namely spatial, tonal and temporal, and has greatly informed all stages of my process.” ~ Elliot Schultz
‘Sunburn’ Photographs by Thomas Maileander
•July 30, 2015 • Leave a CommentFrench artist, Thomas Mailaender, applied 23 old photographic negatives from the Archive of Modern Conflict collection, onto the skin of his volunteer models using a UV lamp to create a sunburn effect. Having substituted human skin for photosensitive paper, he then photographed the fleeting imprints before they disappeared. The results have been compiled into a book called “Illustrated People” which can be seen here:
I like that these are produced through a person’s natural skin tones, and the fact that they are photographic as opposed to just graphic, and fade, meaning they don’t last, adds a special charm to them too I suppose. Would be a nightmare of a thing if sunburns never healed away, am I right.
Perpetual Motion Machine by Norwegian Artist & Inventor Reidar Finsrud
•July 30, 2015 • Leave a CommentNorwegian artist and inventor Reidar Finsrud believes constant motion isn’t only possible, but will give free energy to the world. He’s even built a machine to prove it. Watch to try and determine where the power comes from that keeps his device going:
What’s a perpetual motion machine? It is a machine that can operate indefinitely, without one having to connect it to any energy source. But the possibility of ever producing such a machine has been a contentious issue, as most scientists believe it is impossible.
The reason behind this contention is the first and second law of thermodynamics. The first one states that the amount of energy contained in a particular system remains constant, as it can not be destroyed so as to reduce it, or increased in any way. What changes are the forms of energy, which transform from one state to another.
The second law also concurs with the first, stating the energy in a system never goes down. But these facts were still not enough to stop Reidar Finsrud from believing in the impossible.
Liking to think outside the box, Reidar set out to actually produce a perpetual motion machine. Not only has he done so, but he believes that he has succeeded in producing the first of its kind.
If this machine actually turns out to be a perpetual one, I wouldn’t be surprised if all energy producing companies saw this as a threat to big business (like Nikola Tesla all over again). Reminds me of M. C. Escher’s Ascending and Descending (1960), don’t you think?
Yakuza Apocalypse: The Great War Of The Underworld
•July 29, 2015 • Leave a CommentI love Japanese filmmaker Takashi Miike. He is so prolific. I discovered him for myself in a terrific video store way back, and since then I have actually lost count of how many of his films I have seen on the big screen during the film festival season. So naturally, YAKUZA APOCALYPSE was no exception. Not his finest work but definitely a midnight movie worthy of festival goers. Went along with a friend this time and her reactions were just as entertaining lolz.
The Smiths – “How Soon Is Now?” [music video]
•July 26, 2015 • Leave a Comment“How Soon Is Now?” was originally a B-side of the 1984 single “William, It Was Really Nothing”. “How Soon Is Now?” was featured on the compilation album Hatful of Hollow and on U.S., Canadian, Australian and Warner UK editions of the group’s second album Meat Is Murder released in 1985.
Weezer — “Go Away” ft. Bethany Cosentino [music video]
•July 25, 2015 • Leave a CommentWeezer make fun of the Tinder dating app, as frontman Rivers Cuomo uses the “Winder” app and emulates a myriad of personas to create the perfect picture, but his every attempt fails to impress Winder user Bethany Cosentino (songwriter, guitarist and vocalist of Best Coast). Until, that is, he finds a creative way for them to meet:
Directed by Brendan Walter + Greg Yagolnitzer / Produced by Green Glow Films / Off the album “Everything Will Be Alright In The End” — download on iTunes http://apple.co/1I0FzMd.
Other Weezer hits:
Freaky Flowers — Echinopsis Cactus Flowers Blooming Like Bursting Fireworks [time-lapse]
•July 20, 2015 • Leave a Comment
Echinopsis cacti have some of the most brilliant flowers of any cactus, with vibrantly colored petals and explosive blooms — The trick is actually seeing it. The cacti bloom only late at night, and even then the peak moment of beauty may only last an hour or two at the most. Lucky for us, Echinopsis enthusiast Greg Krehel has a knack for catching these blooming succulents in the act.
When one of his specimens looks like it’s about to bloom, Krehel brings it inside and films it overnight with a special HD time-lapse setup. Gathered in this video is a montage of his favorite shots from the 2014 season, and he’s already posting new videos from this spring on Vimeo (via National Geographic):
“The evening when it looks like a plant’s flowers are about to bloom, I bring it indoors to image. Most of the clips in this montage show approximately 8 hours of change as the flowers open and bloom. A little more than halfway through the montage, there’s a series of three clips showing different views of a 24-hour period in the life of a yellow-flowered ‘Daydream’ plant.
I hope you enjoy “Freaky Flowers” and invite you to contact me via my Vimeo account and/or visit echinopsisfreak.com where you’ll learn more than you ever wanted to know about these cacti.” ~ Greg Krehel
Visit either one of Krehel’s links and it is clear to see that this man has fallen in love with Echinopsis cacti, so much so that he even gave them an endearing pet name. Endearing in the sense I suppose, because these beautiful plants really aren’t that freaky at all.
If they were to spring legs and decided to literally dance about and burst like fireworks, now that type of behaviour would be freaky.
🎭 