Spirograph Art
Had James May’s toy progamme on in the background and he started talking about spirograph, complaining how noone can do it! Wikipedia has a detailed mathematical description of how it all works …
Then they cut over to Leslie Halliwell, who has used spriograph to create very large works of art. Her patience must be nearly infinite! The large scale works are very, very impressive.
Of course, today for the rest of us, we can keep the biros in the drawer and just use a computer …
Kevin.
World of Legocraft
Have just seen the trailer for the new Lego Universe virtual world. I’ve heard various things about it over the last 18 months or so, but the final form seems to be some kind of Lego MMO, a Lego version of World of Warcraft if you will, with customisable characters, quests, building, levels and so on. You will also have to pay for it by a monthly subscription. I had assumed it would be more along the lines of, say, Disney’s Pixie Hollow or a Lego version of Habbo Hotal, but it looks much more a gamey than social virtual world.
The trailer is very impressive, but as its a digital film, it doesn’t really give anything away about the actual game.
Still, looks like it will keep Lego fans old and young busy for some time. For more info, see Wikipedia and www.legouniverse.com.
Nod to Tervicz for the link to the video.
Kevin.
The Corpse Bride
For some reason, The Corpse Bride is one of those films that just managed to pass me by, until this weekend. We picked it up on DVD and just watched it, and I have to say, what a weirdly, wonderful tale it is, and very expertly done. Tim Burton‘s bizare tale apparently has its roots in folklore (according to wikipedia). It’s certainly quite an odd story. I do like the gothic nature of the heroine, in contrast to the shy Victorian gentleman hero.
If you haven’t seen it before, its well worth watching. If you have, why not pull it out and again revel in the craftmanship of the animation and quirkiness of the story. It is superb.
Kevin.
Museum of Bad Art
This is an interesting place, by the sounds of things – the Museum of Bad Art. I quote – “The Museum of Bad Art is the world’s only museum dedicated to the collection, preservation, exhibition and celebration of bad art in all its forms.” So there. Why did this all start? Wikipedia explains:
The thing that made me smile though, is this account of two thefts at the gallery.
In one case, a reward of $6.50 was offered for the return of the first. 10 years later, a ransom note was received, but left unpaid. Then the thief just returned the painting anyway! In the second case, a painting was removed and replaced with a demand for $10. Eventually, the painting was just returned, but this time with a donation for $10!
Wacky.
Kevin.
As Slow as Possible
Ok. I am quite a fan of experimental music, but this is stretching even my credulity a little far.
This piece was on the news today. It is a performance of John Cage‘s ‘As Slow as Possible‘, which started with a rest. For 17 months. According to wikipedia, the first audible sound appeared in 2003 and there have been 7 changes of note todate, with the most recent being this month (Feb 2009) – hence the news item.
Actually, reading about it now, I am slightly more inclined to see this as a ‘bit of fun’ (albeit one that is scheduled to last 639 years). I quite like this quote from what I assume is a sort of fan website:
Well, why not I guess? For full details, see ‘The John Cage Project’ website. I wonder what will happen in 630 odd years time, when the last notes dies. What would they do as an encore?
Kevin.
Contact – Carl Sagan and pi
My previous musings about xkcd finally let me to read their whole archive … which means that I eventually found this one, which is possibly one of my favorites.
Got me thinking about Carl Sagan‘s novel, Contact. Loved the book. Film was ok, but I was really disappointed that the bit about pi never made it in.
Whilst browsing wikipedia about this subject, found a link to http://www.pisearch.de.vu/ (currently unavailable though). Struck me that this would be a good way to collect personal details about people (‘try it with your credit card number’ 
Further browsing has turned up Pi-Search, which you can use to look for sequences in the first 200 million digits of pi. Did you know that the sequence 12345678 occurs at position 186,557,266? Well now you do.
The Feynman Point is also interesting. Maybe one day, I’ll give both Richard Feynman and Pi an entry of their own.
Kevin.
Motorways
Having recently been doing a bit of Motorway driving, including crossing the Severn Bridge, it reminded me of a page I stumbled across on wikipedia about English roads. There is a page which shows how roads are numbered, along with detailed pages about Britain’s Motorways.
Not quite sure why!
I’ve seen trailers for an up-and-coming documentary about Motorways – well, if you want a sneak preview (or at least alternative description) then have a browse of the Motorway pages on wikipedia – there is some interesting history.
(There are loads of UK related pages on wikipedia – see this list of lists for some!)
Kevin.
Tron – 1982 film
This was a surprise – picked this up this weekend for 50p on video. Haven’t seen this film for 20 years! This is a real blast from the past. I remember seeing Tron fairly soon after it came out. I was in mid teens and into computers and games (I still have my Spectrum 128 in the loft). Never did really understand it much at the time, but thought it was a great film anyway. The thing I remember most is playing the video games whilst on holiday – it wasn’t long before you have the music and similar graphics in the arcades and lets face it, the graphics in Tron are pretty unique. Apparently this was the first real use of computer graphics in a film, but it wasn’t exclusively CG – most of it was still traditional animation and special effects.
Seeing it again now, it really feels like it was ahead of its time. I remember wondering at the time if all computers were somehow connected in the ‘digital world’ but then that didn’t really make sense in a time of tape drives and standalone machines. I ended up concluding that the world of Tron must have been inside a single computer, and there would be other worlds in other computers. Of course, 25 years on, with every computer connected to every other one (well, nearly anyway), the concept behind Tron could be expanded so much, and potentially be much more sinister!
I read on wikipedia that Disney were thinking about a new Tron, based around the Internet, but the collective opinion seems like it won’t happen. Actually, I don’t think they should anyway. Tron is a child of its time and is all the better for it in my opinion. I wonder what my kids will make of it.
Enjoyed watching this one again.
Kevin.
Northampton Lift Tower
Despite living in Northampton for some time, I’ve never actually been up close to the lift tower. Well, that changed last week, when I had some time to kill, so drove into the estate to have a look.
Its quite breathtaking really, standing at the bottom of the thing! Its a shame that there’s no information about it though. I had to turn to its wikipedia entry for help.
If you’re local and never been there, its worth a quick 5 minute diversion next time you are driving by.
Shame we can’t go to the top though. We have to make do with pictures from the top instead..
Kevin.
