Vincent Laforet has been instrumental in showcasing the video capability of Canon’s HD DSLR cameras. If you are interested in what gear he uses for production, here’s a thorough description of the newer pieces of equipment that he uses.
2010 HDDSLR Gear Video from Vincent Laforet on Vimeo.
Controlling a cursor on the screen using brain waves is one thing, but researchers at Intel is working on computers that can directly read the words thought by a user. Whenever we think of a word, brain activity occurs in parts of the brain associated with what the word represents. For example, when we think of a word for a type of food, such as apple, activity occurs in the parts of the brain associated with hunger. Think of a word with a physical association such as spade, and activity occurs in the areas of the motor cortex related to making the physical movements of digging.
The computer determines what words are being thought by looking at similar brain patterns and looking for key differences that suggest what the word might be. If you think this is far-fetched, Intel scientists already have a working prototype that can detect words such as “screwdriver”, “house” and “barn”, by measuring around 20,000 points in the brain.
Communication may soon acquire a totally new paradigm and it remains to be seen just how exactly it will be implemented. People may object to a computer reading their thoughts but there are obvious advantages in being able to control a computer with thoughts not only by those with certain disabilities but also in dangerous situations.
[PhysOrg]
When hardened war photographers break down as they covered the story… When it takes you well over a year to get over the experiences and things witnessed… When you see the very worst — and the very best — of humanity in the span of minutes… When you plead to be sent to Iraq instead of going back there for a follow-up…. Welcome to New Orleans after Katrina — and now five long years later, and everyone is wondering: Did we keep our promises?
View the slide show at: vincentlaforet.
[Planet5D]
As scientists discover new asteroids, they add them to a map and highlight them white to indicate they are new ones. The final color of an asteroid indicates how closely it travels into the inner solar system: Earth Crossers are Red, Earth Approachers are Yellow, and all others are Green.
The time lapse covers the period from 1980 to 2010.
From szyzyg
Video created by Scott Manley.
source PopSci
The touchscreen interface is useful if implemented properly, as in the iPhone and iPad. Many digital cameras also now sport a touchscreen interface that is very usable.
Mark Micire is a graduate student at the University of Massachusetts-Lowell and, for his Phd thesis, showed a demo of his swarm-control interface using Microsoft Surface, which is an interactive tabletop.
From mmicire
source PopSci
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The world's smallest University of Michigan logo Source: University of Michigan News Service
If you love the iPhone 4′s “Retina Display,” then you’ll marvel at what researchers at the University of Michigan are working on. Jay Guo, an associate professor in the University’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, and fellow researchers Ting Xu, Yi-Kuei Wu, and Xiangang Luo have created pixels eight times smaller than the ones on Apple’s iPhone 4 using nano-thin sheets of metal with precisely spaced gratings. The gratings act as resonators, trapping and transmitting light of particular wavelengths. By changing the space between the slits, different colors can be generated.
The pixels in the nanoresonator displays are about ten times smaller than those on a typical computer screen, and about eight times smaller than the pixels on the iPhone 4. Not only is the technology useful in projection displays, it can also be part of wearable, bendable and extremely compact displays.
[PopSci]
Here is this week’s (Aug 21-27, 2010) digital camera review roundup:
as a “solidly made and well designed camera.“I remember when creating this website that it was a never ending work in progress. There was always one more aspect to get right before going live. But when is your website ready to go live — and when do you still need to polish it? My rules are simple: if you have something interesting and of value for your readers, then publish it — and never mind that the logo is not there yet or your sidebar isn’t quite what the final product should be.
This in no ways means that you should publish a site that is obviously a work in progress, with missing links, code that does not work and broken layout. A first impression is important if you want readers to visit, come back and stay.
On the other hand, if you are just polishing an aspect of your site, remember that a logo can change, layout can change and so there is no really “finished” product. Some of you might disagree and want to stay with a design that does not ever change, but I like change. I am always getting ideas and trying new stuff — and sometimes break the site, forget to update a link, etc. Fortunately, readers take the time to write about these broken links and help get the site better.
Beate Chelette (Ask the Photo Business Coach) over at Black Star Rising answers the question, “When is my portfolio in a new specialty good enough to promote on my Web site?”
