Clipmarks | Mohir's clips

Brilliant Minimalist Ads

Wed, 02 Dec 2009 12:18:39 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

It’s not difficult to love minimalist ads, but to create one requires a brilliant idea. Most successful minimalist ads depend a lot on iconic brands, items, places and people.

1. Faber-Castell: Permanent Markers

2. Hut Weber: Hitler or Chaplin? – It’s the hat

4. WWF: Polluted river water kills as many people as a nuclear explosion

5. McDonald’s WIFI

6. McDonald’s 24/7 drive thru

7. Children of Offenders: Help us break the cycle

12. Google: Find more easily

14. LEGO: Imagine

Tags: advertising

Best Science Visualization Videos of 2009

Thu, 26 Nov 2009 14:53:13 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: More at source

Clip Source: www.wired.com

Some of the most impressive images in science are produced when researchers take numerical data and represent it visually through modeling and computer graphics. The Department of Energy honored 10 of this year’s best scientific visualizations with its annual SciDAC Vis Night awards, at the Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing conference (SciDAC) in June. Researchers submitted visualizations to the contest, and program participants voted on the best of the best. From earthquakes to jet flames, this gallery of videos and images show how beautiful (and descriptive) visual data can be.

Impact of a Copper Bullet on 6 Layers of Harness Satin Weave Kevlar Fabric

Tags: science, visualization

A joyride through the nanoscale

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 12:13:34 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.newscientist.com

Chemist George Whitesides has collaborated with MIT and Harvard photographer-in-residence Felice Frankel to produce No Small Matter, a book of images of the micro and nanoworld.

Even the most committed Beatles fan might fail to spot the classic track in this image. It's a chunk of a vinyl copy of the Revolver album, specifically part of Eleanor Rigby, as seen through a Nomarski microscope , which uses differences in the record’s refractive index to emphasise its surface structure.

Space Hotel on Schedule to Open spa

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:42:15 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.acceleratingfuture.com

[Video]

Tags: space

GE Reveals Phone-Sized Ultrasound Device

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:20:05 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: singularityhub.com

The first time I saw this thing I thought, “Holy crap! An iPod mated with an X-ray machine.” General Electric (NYSE: GE) CEO and Chairman Jeff Immett debuted a pocket sized ultrasound scanner a few weeks ago at the Web2.0 conference in San Francisco. The Vscan is aimed at enhancing the level of diagnostic power of the average doctor, helping detect dangerous conditions before they get worse. Check out the introductory video from GE Reports after the break.

Ultrasound has a wide range of uses from examining fetuses to checking on the heart. It’s non-invasive, provides relatively quick results, and costs less than other examinations. The Vscan puts all of those advantages in the palm of your doctor’s hand. GE hopes that the device will become as common as the stethoscopes doctors rely upon today.

[Video]

Tags: ultra sound, medicine

The Average Color of the Universe

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 12:08:10 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov

Explanation: What color is the universe? More precisely, if the entire sky were smeared out, what color would the final mix be? This whimsical question came up when trying to determine what stars are commonplace in nearby galaxies. The answer, depicted above, is a conditionally perceived shade of beige. To determine this, astronomers computationally averaged the light emitted by one of the largest sample of galaxies yet analyzed: the 200,000 galaxies of the 2dF survey. The resulting cosmic spectrum has some emission in all parts of the electromagnetic spectrum, but a single perceived composite color. This color has become much less blue over the past 10 billion years, indicating that redder stars are becoming more prevalent. In a contest to better name the color, notable entries included skyvory, univeige, and the winner: cosmic latte.

Tags: astronomy

Irving Penn,Photographer, Is Dead at 92

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 13:51:35 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

Irving Penn, one of the 20th century’s most prolific and influential photographers of fashion and the famous, whose signature blend of classical elegance and cool minimalism was recognizable to magazine readers and museumgoers worldwide, died on Wednesday at his home in Manhattan. He was 92.

Probably most famous for photographing fashion models and cultural figures, he seemed equally at home photographing Peruvian peasants or bunion pads. Merry A. Foresta, co-organizer of a 1990 retrospective of his work at the National Portrait Gallery and what is now the Smithsonian American Art Museum, wrote that his pictures exhibited “the control of an art director fused with the process of an artist.”

Tags: irving penn, photography

Life-size whale exhibition in Norway,

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 13:24:42 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

Photographer Bryant Austin has spent five years taking pictures of whales to produce life-size images that are on show at the Whaling Museum in Sandefjord, Norway

[Video]

Tags: photography, whales

The DNA Mystery: Scientists Stumped By "Telepathic" Abilities

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 14:57:44 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: Even so, research published in ACS’ Journal of Physical Chemistry B, shows very clearly that homology recognition between sequences of several hundred nucleotides occurs without physical contact or presence of proteins. Double helixes of DNA can recognize matching molecules from a distance and then gather together, all seemingly without help from any other molecules or chemical signals.

This recognition effect may help increase the accuracy and efficiency of the homologous recombination of genes, which is a process responsible for DNA repair, evolution, and genetic diversity. The new findings may also shed light on ways to avoid recombination errors, which are factors in cancer, aging, and other health issues.

Clip Source: www.dailygalaxy.com

DNA has been found to have a bizarre ability to put itself together, even at a distance, when according to known science it shouldn't be able to. Explanation: None, at least not yet.

Scientists are reporting evidence that contrary to our current beliefs about what is possible, intact double-stranded DNA has the “amazing” ability to recognize similarities in other DNA strands from a distance. Somehow they are able to identify one another, and the tiny bits of genetic material tend to congregate with similar DNA. The recognition of similar sequences in DNA’s chemical subunits, occurs in a way unrecognized by science. There is no known reason why the DNA is able to combine the way it does, and from a current theoretical standpoint this feat should be chemically impossible.

Tags: dna, biology

The Sombrero Galaxy -Caps a Massive Black Hole (Photo)

Mon, 14 Sep 2009 16:43:34 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.dailygalaxy.com

The awesome Sombrero Galaxy M104 discovered in May 1781 by Pierre Méchain is a spiral galaxy in the constellation Virgo. In the 1990s, a research team, using data from the Hubble Space Telescope, discovered that a supermassive black hole with a mass 1 billion times the mass of the Sun is present at the center of the galaxy's large bulge. This is among the most massive black holes measured in any nearby galaxies.

Scientists have long suspected that massive balck holes existed at the centers of most galaxies, beginning with Sir Martin Rees in 1974. But the mystery has deepened. For a brilliant essay on that mystery click here.

Tags: photos, astronomy

Sept. 9, 1982: The First Private Rocket Launch

Wed, 09 Sep 2009 12:45:45 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: More than a generation before the X Prize spurred billionaires to put up 10 times a $10 million purse to pursue scientific and technological achievements that have eluded even governments with limitless resources, this was a shot heard ’round the world. It was fired by people who weren’t out to invent anything — they just wanted to prove that you didn’t need a massive space program to power something into space.

Clip Source: www.wired.com

1982: It’s more than a quarter century since the start of the U.S.-Soviet space race. A decade after the seventh and final manned moon mission. Reusable space shuttles are already making regular sojourns, taking squads of astronauts back and forth into low-level orbit. But on this day, starry-eyed geeks get to witness something really special: the first private launch of a rocket ship.

The Conestoga 1 — aptly named after the covered wagons that carried settlers to the American frontier during the 19th century — was the stuff dreams are made of, and little else. It was constructed from the spare parts of mightier cousins. Its launch pad was a Texas cattle ranch, not NASA’s picture-perfect Cape Canaveral. The payload, 40 pounds of water, was carried a mere 321 miles during a 10.5-minute, sub-orbital flight that reached an elevation of 195 miles — in space terms, a modest Wright Brothers sort of proof-of-concept outing.

Tags: space, history

Lost World Found in Papua New Guinea Volcano

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 15:33:39 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: www.physorg.com

A BBC expedition exploring inside the crater of an extinct volcano in Papua New Guinea (PNG) has discovered a lost world of dozens of weird new species and rare animals, including new frogs, a giant rat, many new insects and spiders, giant caterpillars, and a new bat species.

The Mount Bosavi crater is 2.5 miles wide and over 3,300 feet high, and is located in the remote and mountainous southern highlands of Papua New Guinea. The mountain and its pristine, extinct crater are so inaccessible that even the few people in the Kasua tribe who live in nearby villages rarely enter the area.

The number of new species found cannot be confirmed until the biologists have finished evaluating the finds, but they believe there may be up to 40 previously undescribed species. This includes 20 new species of insects and spiders, 16 species of frogs, a new bat, and at least three fish species. Many of the new species discovered are believed to exist only in the Mount Bosavi crater.

Tags: volcano, papua, life, animals, plants

Recent Hindu festivals and rituals (Photos)

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 14:19:19 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: The Big Picture,

Clip Source: www.boston.com

Many Hindus throughout India recently celebrated Ganesha Chaturthi, a 10-day festival celebrating the birth of Ganesh, their supreme god of wisdom, prosperity and good fortune. Hinduism, the predominant religion in India, is rich with traditional festivals and rituals, celebrated in many ways and locations around the world. Collected here are a few photographs from recent Hindu festivals and of Hindu devotees worshipping and practicing ritual ceremonies in India, England, Nepal and Indonesia.

Tags: hindu, photos, india

Jupiter Over the Mediterranean (Photo)

Mon, 07 Sep 2009 16:09:56 GMT

clipped by: Mohir

Clip Source: antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov

This vacation included a sight to remember. Pictured above, a picturesque starscape capped a serene seascape as seen from Turkey this past August. In the above digitally stitched panorama, the Gelidonya Lighthouse shines in the foreground before a calm Mediterranean Sea. On the left, Jupiter is the brightest point in the image and since on the same side of the Sun as the Earth, was near its yearly brightest. Glowing just shy of magnitude -3, Jupiter was brighter than any star in the sky, and brighter even than Mars was during its famously bright opposition of 2003 August. On the right, the band of the Milky Way Galaxy fades into distant atmospheric haze above the Jupiter is nearing the closest part of its elliptical orbit to the Sun and so will appear even brighter during its next opposition in 2010 September.

Tags: jupiter, astronomy, photos

London’s Surveillance Fails - Only 1 Crime Solved per 1000 Cameras

Fri, 04 Sep 2009 14:22:25 GMT

clipped by: Mohir
clipper's remarks: Whether you like or not, digital observation is only going to get more prevalent in the future. We have faster, cheaper, and more plentiful recording devices everywhere and attached to everything. You’re already recorded many times a day by private cameras, and that’s only going to get more invasive when implants, facial recognition software, and 3D scanning get going. What’s happening in London, both the wide spread public use of CCTV and the complications from it, is a precursor to what the rest of the world can expect.

Clip Source: singularityhub.com

Some people don’t mind being watched. Apparently London criminals are among those. According to several major UK news outlets, an internal Metropolitan Police report was released last week that admitted less than 1 crime was solved per year for every 1000 CCTV cameras in London. This comes as a major blow to the UK police who spent £500 million between 1996 and 2006 installing 4 million cameras nationwide, with 1 million in London alone. Despite claims that each citizen might be seen on 300 cameras a day, perhaps half of all CCTV camera footage is unsuitable to convict criminals in court. The British public is crying foul, the police force is scrambling to access the problem, and everyone is watching to see what the world’s most recorded country is going to do next.

There has been little evidence of CCTV serving as a deterrent to crime in London.

Tags: london, cctv, privacy