Tag: 5things

Five things on Friday #65

Things of note for the week ending March 28th, 2014.

Kuratas

1. Kuratas is coming to get you
This is nuts.

Above photo via The Verge.

2. 8 bit Fight Club
Remarkably well done.

3. The Seven Best Games for Non-Gamers
I’m a gamer. I make no secret of that. From original Super Mario Bros on my NES, to games on my phone to my PlayStation 4, I’ve been a gamer for as long as I can remember. But not everyone else has. So, in fear of being told they’re ‘like a dog at the controls of a helicopter‘ what can those people play? Well, fortunately enough, Kotaku has put such a list together. Worth reading.

4. The second best Lorde cover EVER  [CLOWN KLAXON]
Last month I showed off a video of Puddles the Clown covering the Lorde hit ‘Royals’. And it was spectacular. Well, he’s back. This time covering ‘Team’ and it too is bloody fantastic.

5. The Instagram Bazaar
While we’re on a ‘Five things rewind!’ trip, back in Five things #56, I mentioned a nifty little trend in Middle Eastern e-commerce in the shape of using Instagram to sell sheep. Well, it would seem that this trend has gone global. Not the sheep-selling aspect, but the small-business-using-Instagram-as-a-shop-window element is taking off stateside, as this article from the New York Times reports –

Beverly Hames, owner of the shop [Fox & Fawn], said she began posting items on Instagram as an experiment a year and a half ago. Now, sales deriving from those postings make up 20 to 40 percent of the store’s daily revenue, she said, and they come from all over the country and occasionally from overseas.

Markets in everything indeed. When all the talk is about how the lack of paid budget will slowly push the little guy out, there are small businesses all across the world cutting corners and capitalising on any and every opportunity possible.

Fair play to them.

 

 

Five things on Friday #64

Things of note for the week ending March 21st, 2014.

Jaws

1. Retro Film Posters
I’m such a sucker for this kind of stuff. The Jaws one above is super-subtle but there’s a Die Hard one which rocks my face off and an Iron Giant one that makes my heart leap. Go look, and enjoy.

2. The Circle of Life
This National Geographic video of a jaguar taking out a crocodile has done the rounds a lot (so much so that by the time I saw it it was already an animated gif) but still, it’s so badass you just have to watch it again.

3. Eat Sleep Social

Eat Sleep Social

There aren’t that many social media blogs that I read regularly, let alone recommend. However Eat Sleep Social is one of the better ones I’ve come across. I do read it regularly and look at that, here I am recommending you do the same. Amazing.

Hop to it.

4. Batman vs Terminator
This is cool.

5. Life Improvement: Five Simple Emails
Every now and then, one of these ‘Improve your life in five easy steps!’ things actually makes sense. This is one of those times. Read it, and then do the hard part – make it happen.

And we’re done.

Well, nearly. Here’s three bonus things  –

Now we’re done.

 

Five things on Friday #62

Things of note for the week ending March 7th, 2014.

FlashGordon_onesheet_teaser_USA_PhilipCastle-1-500x752

1. Flash. Gordon.
This original poster made me smile a lot when I saw it. Related fact: about ten years ago I received Flash Gordon on DVD on the exact same day that I happened to meet Brian Blessed. Yes, he signed it. Yes, it is a treasured possession. And yes, he was awesome.

2. Creating Your Habit Environment
Old habits are hard to break. Zen Habits talks about how your environment contributes to that difficulty and suggests ways to help make that change. There are a bunch of quotes I could nab from it, but it really is just worth reading the whole thing.

3. Batman: Arkham Knight
The trailer for the third official* Arkham game dropped earlier this week and it looks awesome. Gamer or not, the work and animation in this video is outstanding. So good in fact that I’d be quite happy to watch a short film in this format.

Watch this one in full screen –

4. A tall tale about The Players Club, NY
This post, entitled ‘The Players Club, David Carradine, And The Guy From Revenge of the Nerds: The Mystery of the Broken Window’, not only seeks out the truth behind a legendary story about the people and things listed, but also gives a fairly decent guided tour of the Players Club on the way.

A fairly decent piece of random reading for your Friday and definitely worth a look.

5. Finders Keepers
I adore this.

finderskeepers

Via

’til next week…

 

Five things on Friday #61

Things of note for the week ending February 28th, 2014.

Peter Sellers

1. Peter Sellers in a moving red car trying to take a picture of his wife, Britt Eckland, riding on the scooter near the Colosseum in Rome.
This needs no explanation.

Via

2. Funk is not dead

Jungle – Platoon from Jungle on Vimeo.

3. Awesome 60s Batman Art is Awesome

Batman is AWESOME

Via

4. Triple City Exposures

Marcus Yam

Created completely ‘in-camera’, by photographer Marcus Yam, the above image is one of a larger set put  together for a Seattle Times photo essay. They’re all gorgeous, so go take a look.

5. The Secret Life of Heroes
I know I’ve featured a lot of imagery this week, but this stuff – by artist Gregoire Guillemin – is just great. The easy way forward was Batman but he’s already had a go this week so I figured Supes was the next best thing. Plus – THIS IS AWESOME.

Superman - Secret Life of Heroes

via My Modern Met.

Bonus things –

  • This set of tiny Lego photographer photos are really, really well done.
  • Like writing letters but never have time to buy the materials? Look at Gramr.
  • Seth Rogan spoke at a senate committee to help raise awareness for Alzheimer’s Disease. It’s funny, moving, and only six minutes long. You should watch it.

That’s me done this week. Technically that’s eight cool things you’ve just had. Aren’t I nice to you? Tell you what, if you liked this post this week, why not tell your friends about it. There’s buttons just down there for you to do that so go on – click one. I dare ya.  

 

Five things on Friday #60

Things of note for the week ending February 21st, 2014.

Beard

1. How do strategists level up?
This piece, written by Clay Parker Jones from Undercurrent, puts forward an extremely well-thought-out and logical case for how to ‘level up’ as a strategist. The whole article is worth a read (it’ll take 10mins to consume but you might be coming back to it for a while to come), especially for the planners and strategists out there looking for something new to take into their next review.

2. How do you get a job in North Korea?
Next time you’re staring at your CV (or even that cover letter) and stuck for what on Earth you could possibly put down next, thank your lucky stars that the hiring process [for good jobs] isn’t akin to the way North Koreans have to seek decent employment –

In response to the increasing demand for more rewarding jobs, bribery is becoming more common in North Korea. There are certain steps to follow to get the desired job: First, you have to bribe the officers and steal your personnel record from the local administrative agencies. Then you have to bribe the factory managers or party secretaries so that they will issue letters of confirmation that they would like to hire you. Lastly, you have to submit the letter to the administrative agency in charge of assigning jobs. Everyone involved knows about the other parties’ bribery, but they choose to overlook.

Source – ‘How do you get a job in North Korea?‘

3. NYC Henge

NYCHenge

According to WIRED, twice a year, the setting sun lines up with the street grid of New York City’s Manhattan, creating an incredible show and a free-for-all for amateur photographers. The phenomenon is known as Manhattanhenge, but the map above, dubbed NYCHenge and made by Javier Santana shows when and where the show can be caught all across New York City, any day of the year.

If you’re headed to New York at all this year, use this map RIGHT NOW and plan those epic Instagram photos today.

4. The Secret Autobiography of Tom Cruise

If there’s a thread that runs through Cruise’s recent movies, it’s this: You may think you know me, but you don’t. His character in the Mission: Impossible movies seamlessly switches faces and is described as “a ghost”; even Ethan Hunt’s surname reflects his elusive nature. In Knight and Day, he’s a high-level spook who’s built an untraceable life on a private island. And in last year’s Jack Reacher, he’s a man without a country, an American citizen who’s barely set foot on the nation’s soil: “blood military,” he’s called. Jack Reacher has “no driver’s license, current or expired, no residence, current or former, no credit cards, no credit history, no P.O. Box, cell phone, email.” By the standards of his home country, he doesn’t exist.

I came across this piece after reading Tyler Cowen’s review of Oblivion where he mentions the parallels between the film’s plot and the star’s chosen religion. Someone in the comments of that post mentioned that Slate had seen it too and also goes into a bit more detail with its analysis. There be spoilers here, but it’s still a darn good read.

For what it’s worth, I loved Oblivion (and really don’t know enough about Scientology to spot any references); it’s a great sci-fi flick and well worth watching.

5. Floating in Space
The story of ‘SuitSat-1’, aka ‘Mr Smith’, the sensor-filled spacesuit that was hurled from the International Space Station back in 2006, is one of the best things I’ve read this week.

 

You can close the tab now, we’re done here.

Five things on Friday #59

Things of note for the week ending February 14th, 2014.

hi_human

1. Stunning animals
Wolf Ademeit has a habit of taking amazing photos of our fellow Earth inhabitants and this latest batch is no exception. The above, ‘hi human’ is my favourite, by a long way. But all of them are just beautiful.

2. Treat life like an Experiment
You only get one shot, so why not? Fast Company, on Leo Babauta.

This:

Analysis frequently provides paralysis. Sartre said that man is condemned by his freedom; if you’ve ever stood slack-jawed in a cereal aisle overwhelmed by granola granularity, you’ve tasted that existential quandary. As Babauta notes, we get paralyzed because we’re fretting about making the perfect choice–and worried about making the wrong choice.

It’s a little micro moment of perfectionism. And as psychologist Brené Brown has told us, if perfectionism is driving, then shame is riding shotgun. Why? Because when we make choices, we make ourselves vulnerable to being “wrong,” and since we always need to be right to maintain a sense of self worth, it would be really, really shamefulto select the wrong brand of cereal.

And from Babauta himself, this:

With an experiment, you run a test, and see what the results are. If you don’t get good results, you can try another option, and run another test. Then you can see what the outcomes of the choices are (the info you didn’t have when first thinking about the decision), and can make a better-informed decision now.

Try it, what’s the worst that could happen?

3. LASER-GUIDED MILKY WAY TRACKING
Apologies for the capitals but, seriously, this is one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. Plus: SCIENCE. Open it in a new window, load it up in HD, then make it full-screen. It just gets better and better…

Via

4. Pinky & The Brain do tongue twisters.
These guys were easily the best thing to come out of The Animaniacs and the writing was nearly always superb [in the show overall]. But man alive, the script team must’ve had a field day with this one. Enjoy –

Oh, and the transcript is available too. Tres awesome.

5. The best Lorde cover EVER [CLOWN KLAXON]
I played this to death towards the end of 2013. But today, on Valentine’s Day, it seems oddly fitting.

See y’all next week.

 

 

Five things on Friday #58

Things of note for the week ending February 7th, 2014.

StationtoStationTrainRenderingCDougAitken

1. Station to Station
For three weeks late last year, Doug Aitken took an LED-laden train from New York to San Francisco, making ten stops along the way, as a kind of ‘kinetic sculpture’. At each stop, artists, musicians, writers, film makers and other creatives were asked to contribute to this mobile happening.

Personally, I just love the idea of an LED-lit train (it is a gorgeous image).

More.

2. Banishment Rooms
In Japan, this incredible practice is unbelievably commonplace –

“Shusaku Tani is employed at the Sony plant here, but he doesn’t really work.
.
For more than two years, he has come to a small room, taken a seat and then passed the time reading newspapers, browsing the Web and poring over engineering textbooks from his college days. He files a report on his activities at the end of each day.
.
Sony, Mr. Tani’s employer of 32 years, consigned him to this room because they can’t get rid of him. Sony had eliminated his position at the Sony Sendai Technology Center, which in better times produced magnetic tapes for videos and cassettes. But Mr. Tani, 51, refused to take an early retirement offer from Sony in late 2010 — his prerogative under Japanese labor law.
.
So there he sits in what is called the “chasing-out room.” He spends his days there, with about 40 other holdouts.”

via The New York Times

3. Travel Lessons
This collection of travel advice is pretty invaluable. Having been lucky enough to see more than my fair share of this world already, many of these tips speak to me. Especially the ones about the ability to travel lightly (this is coming from the guy that only took hand luggage on a two week, two festival, three country trip back in the summer of 2013 – not kidding). So yeah, I like this because in the main, this is how I travel.

4. Emptying Gestures
The output of this artist isn’t anything mind-blowing. But how she gets there, to me at least, is pretty mind-blowing. First, look at the work –

2

22

3

But now the killer (emphasis mine):

“Emptying Gestures is an experiment in kinetic drawing. In this series, I am searching for ways to download my movement directly onto paper, emptying gestures from one form to another and creating something new in the process.”

The very idea of ‘downloading movement onto paper’ sparks my mind into all kinds of interesting places. How do you ‘download’ kinetic motion, something intangible, onto paper – and make it tangible? I just love the whole thought behind it.

5. Something creepy to sign you off with
It’s Friday, so why the hell not?

CREEPY

Until next week.

 

 

 

Five things on Friday #57

Things of note for the week ending January 31st, 2014.

ROBOT BUILDING IS AWESOME

1. Robot Building: Big, Bold, and Benign
One of my favourite blogs to appear in 2013 was ‘Adam’s Apples’, the blog of design/storytelling agency, FreeState. The image (and title) above is taken from a post exploring the virtues of ‘building as message’. I love the photo but the short, accompanying post is worth a look too.

2. I really like the idea of ‘secondary attention’
That is all.

3. Hope Soap
Washing hands frequently with soap, is the most effective way of preventing the spread of infection and deadly disease. Providing the disadvantaged children of South Africa with free soap is one thing, but how do you get them to use it?

I love this idea. So much.

4. Stop the Cyborgs!
Are you a shop/venue owner? Do you fear the impending onslaught of Google Glass-based surveillance about to come swarming through your door? Is the very thought of your own customers being able to record everything that you do FROM THEIR FACES break you out into cold sweats?

Then you need to get your hands on one of these handy signs!

BAN GOOGLE GLASS

Find out more more about these signs, and this movement in general, over at Stop the Cyborgs. The future of surveillance-free zones may depend on it. Speaking of the future…

5. 2014: Year of the Drone?
They’re cheap, they’re useful, they’re coming –

Drones designed to do the bidding of ordinary people can be bought online for $300 or less. They are often no larger than hubcaps, with tiny propellers that buzz the devices hundreds of feet into the air. But these flying machines are much more sophisticated than your average remote-controlled airplane: They can fly autonomously, find locations via GPS, return home with the push of button, and carry high-definition cameras to record flight.
Besides wedding stunts, personal drones have been used for all kinds of high-minded purposes — helping farmers map their crops, monitoring wildfires in remote areas, locating poachers in Africa. One local drone user is recording his son’s athletic prowess at a bird’s angle, potentially for recruiting videos.

Much more via Tyler Cowan.

 

Until next week.

 

Five things on Friday #56

Things of note for the week ending January 24th, 2014.

supermag

1. Supermag
There are so many things that I love about the picture above I could write a whole other ‘5 things’ post about it. Screw it, I will anyway –

  1. I LOVE the casual way she’s sitting on top of an EFFING RHINO
  2. THE EFFING RHINO (with. handlebars.)
  3. Oh hey, I’ve just got here, do you like my SAMURAI SWORD?
  4. Good pumps.
  5. Dat ink.

Anyway, Supermag is by Jim Rugg, and it is…

“A glossy, magazine-format collection of “narrative collapse.” It showcases his interests in genre, irreverent humor, graphic design, drawing, and typography. SUPERMAG features new work as well as collecting the best of his recent anthology contributions.”

Available at Amazon right now.

*adds to wishlist – scratch that, I now own this.

2. Japanese Thundercats
I don’t really think I have to say anything else really. Just LOOK –

Panthro IS A BADASS.

Sidenote: I really wanted to use the picture of Lion-O but Panthro’s tattoo is so many kinds of awesome it couldn’t be ignored.
Source.

3. The Dawn of Instagram Commerce
Something new I learnt this week: in the Middle East, savvy Kuwaiti retailers are using Instagram as an ad platform to sell them shift sheep. That’s right, sheep.

Sheep Selling on Instagram

This insight, along with several others, comes via this rather awesome Middle East Social Media Trends post from Ema Linaker. I love this kind of stuff. You might too.

4. Miniature Dino Skateboarders are AWESOME
This guy took a bunch of toys, cut them up, and them put them together again to create some wicked hybrids. Oh, and then he took photos of them –

Mini dino skateboarders of win

via

5. Why do we cry on planes?
This this article, from The Atlantic, is pretty spot on – and it’s definitely worth reading the whole thing. However, one quote in particular stood out for me –

When you’re alone, in a situation where you can’t can’t fiddle with your smartphone or turn your anxieties outward toward your social network, the apprehensions and fears of loneliness quickly overtake you. Then you have no choice but to face the fact: you’re a person, in the universe, and you are in some way big or small, alone here. You might cry.

So, y’know – go be alone, and have a cry. You never know, you might need it.

Bonus  thing of the week –
I updated my #EmptyUnderground website a couple of weeks ago, with a fresh batch of photos and a brand new theme and, as a result, it got picked up and featured by It’s Nice That then Time Out London and then Buzzfeed. Amazing.

 

Five things on Friday #55

Things of note for the week ending January 17th, 2014.

monster club

These guys could be the five things on their own, bless ’em. But they’re not. They’re just here because I think they’re darn cool. Right, let’s do this –

1. Lessons from a dog

Lessons from Dog

There are a bunch of these over on My Modern Met, but this one above is by far and away my favourite. I guess we can all learn lessons from a dog.

2. How Broadway has changed 
Alec Baldwin has a semi-regular column over on the Huffington Post and he is, in my opinion, one of the smartest and sharpest writers I’ve read in a long time, and a huge advocate for the arts. Yes he can be an offensive loose cannon but, from time to time, I enjoy him. You might too. This piece from last year, on why and how Broadway has changed so much is a great case in point:

A critic’s job is to evaluate two things: what you are attempting to do and how close do you come to pulling it off. Highbrow, lowbrow, Shakespeare, Williams, movies like The Hangover, movies like Lincoln, they all deserve the same fate. If it’s trash, then call it. But is it good trash or is the bar too low? Then call it. Is the piece ambitious and groundbreaking? Factor that in. But never say “why bother?’

3. The man who hugs LIONS
This video, from those epic makers and takers, GoPro, was published in November last year but for some reason only started to go viral get popular over the past week or so. If you’ve not seen it, it features Kevin Richardson – aka ‘The Lion Whisperer’ and… y’know what? Just hit play and see if you don’t end up watching the whole thing. It’s incredible viewing.

If you want to find out more about this work, or make a donation to help preserve the habitat for the animals in this video, you can at Kevin’s Lion Whisperer website. Give a little, it helps a lot.

4. Awesome Street Art is Awesome

sex

Found via ‘10 street art images you need to see‘ – to me, the above is just so pure; the colour, the stance, the casuality of it all. It’s just perfect. Weirdly, it reminds of this punk girl I used to date back in college. I wonder where she is now.

5. DOOMED
The story behind the it-was-so-bad-it-was-never-released(-but-wait-that-was-the-plan-all-along) 1994 version of THE FANTASTIC FOUR, is looking for support to help tell get the documentary put together.

It looks like a doozy –

Background // Support

Amazing. Fantastic.

Have a great weekend.