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Electric and Compacts: They Are Here

1 Nov

So maybe you’ve noticed them on the streets already, or maybe your city has been plastered with billboards of them, there’s no denying, a new era of the automobile has arrived. Who ever believes that all North Americans drive hummers and other excessively large SUV’s is still living that 2002 generalisation. It was hardly true then, and its definitely not true now, its 2010! Let it go.

North American society is ready for the change, then again, it always was. Because after all, nobody wants to intentionally damage the environment, they just never had the opportunity for change. It is evident the worlds auto manufacturers have built it, and yes the people, they are coming.

It appears that things are fast changing, the streets are filled with the likes of Juke’s, Cubes, and Mini’s. And the CRZ’s, Leaf’s, Cruze’s, and Volt’s are on the way. It’s true, insanely small engine, hybrid, diesel, or full electric cars are fast replacing the fleets of models that ruled the streets before. And they’ve come with a variety of entertaining media campaigns!

 

The B Train Band

24 Oct

Skimming the homepage of CNN today was a little story on these guys. If you don’t want to lug your instruments onto the train to perform, you can always just bring your iPhone. This is a band called AtomicTom and they recently performed an entire song on the B Train in New York City. The catch is they only brought their iPhones (and a an amp). Ive seen alot of train musical acts on my travels, but never one like this. Granted I still dislike the entire iPhone empire, I’ll let it slide this time for doing something so cool with an iPhone app and bringing some smiles to peoples faces on their commute.

You can check out their facebook fanpage here.

Cats and Cows and Bears oh my…

23 Oct

Favorite youtube videos of the day goto cyriak. With some truly bizarre animation that will get you scratching your head. Whats almost more funny than the videos themselves is the comments below. Such as “mind = blown”, “just an average day in my neighborhood”, or “I like the part where the cats meow”. It’s strange that comments are fast becoming one of my most entertaining experiences on youtube. I really do not know what else to say. Just watch.

Cows

Bears

Cats

The Art of Tilt-Shift

12 Oct

Tilt shift is a method of photography which can provide a new aspect to traditional photography that was previously imposibble. One of the most common effects that tilt-shift photography can accomplish, is the effect of miniatures. By altering the focus of an image you can present a very real subject with a miniature effect. This can be done either with the hardware itself, or through a method which is becoming more and more common today and that is done digitally in post production. I presented a video previously on the blog which had this effect, and it spurred me to elaborate more on the subject.

If you are unfamiliar with tilt-shift photography, the basic principle is that you can alter the plane of focus of the lens through phyiscally tilting or shifting a specially designed lens. Whichever method a photographer or artist chooses to create these effects, the results are truly amazing. And with that, I am including a couple of my favorite tilt-shift videos.

Shrimp+Cashews=Yum

10 Oct

After whipping up a delicious dish the other night, I thought I’d share what it was all about. This is a pretty quick dish which only takes about 15 mins to make.

Here is what I used in this stirfry:

Shrimp, Cashews, Celery, Romain Lettuce, Ginger, Garlic, Honey, Canola Oil, Soy Sauce, Ketchup, Chili Peppers, Rice.

First things first, I cut up all my veggies into decent portions, remember that if your cooking lettuce it shrinks alot, so dont break it up too small. I then thinly sliced up the ginger and pressed the garlic, and put them both in the pan with some oil. You can start to slowly simmer your ginger and garlic while you prepare the sauce.

For the sauce, I read online about the use of ketchup, so I gave it a try. But before starting, you can put your shrimp and cashews in the pan and let them start to warm up. As thats going, I put a little bit of ketchup in a bowl, added, soy sauce, honey, canola oil, some water, and some chili peppers. I mixed this all together with a little bit of cornstarch to thicken it up.

I was using precooked shrimp so I didnt need to wait long to start adding everything together. I added the lettuce and celery, and then poured all the sauce into the pan. Keep your heat on medium and keep stirring it all together, and after about 5 more minutes, your done!

Served it all over some rice, but you could also serve this over noodles if you like. Time to eat!

Home

7 Oct

I just finished watching a documentary called ‘Home’. It’s a film about our home, not the roof over your head but the planet you live in, earth. I sat in my dark living room learning about our planets extraordinary beginnings, and its progression through its own life. Then came humans, you and I, and as the music and images build tension, you start to lose faith in the role of mankind. The film paints a gloomy picture of the effects of humans on the planet, and it builds up to a climax where you think the film couldn’t get any more depressing. But luckily there is a turning point in this film, as the good things that mankind has done, and can do are outlined, leaving you with a spark of hope in a dreary mind.

Here is some of the good and the bad, according to the film:

Over 50% of the grain traded around the world is used as livestock feed or biofuels.

13 million hectares of forest disappear every year.

100L of water produces 1kg of potatoes, 4000L produces 1kg of rice, 13000L produced 1kg of beef.

Since 1950, fishing catches have increased from 18 million to 100 million metric tonnes per year.

The average global temperature in the last 15 years is the highest on record.

1 in 10 rivers in the world no longer reach their delta’s for months at a time due to heavy irrigation.

95% of soybeans produced in Brazil are used to feed livestock and poultry in Europe and Asia.

3/4 of the varieties of crop developed through mankind’s history have been wiped out.

Antarctica has immense natural resources which no country can use for themselves.

2% of the worlds territorial waters are protected, not much, but thats 2 times more than 10 years ago.

13% of the continents of the world are covered in natural parks.

South Korea restored 65% of its depleted forests through reforestation.

The U.S, China, India, Germany and Spain are the biggest investors in renewable energy.

Although the dialogue and text may be a little rough around the edges, the imagery is stunning, and the message is important and clear. We must change.

 

The Beauty of Time Lapse

29 Sep

I was recently introduced to 2 videos from 2 friends, and I thought they were so good that I was obligated to share them. One video documents Hong Kong, and was shown to me by a friend there, the other is of Mexico City, and was shown to me by a friend who is from there as well. They both deal alot with time lapse, which is quickly becoming a favorite technique of mine, and these works only further inspire me. I think they are well put together, much props to the creators who took so much time to do them, check them out below!

Both are on Vimeo, so check them out here: Hong Kong, Mexico City.

Painting Time Lapse

27 Sep

Incase you ever wondered what it would look like to paint a garage in under 2 minutes, I recently did some time lapse of that exact job in my garage. 15 second intervals, and my garage is finally in a state that resembles what a garage should look like!

Check out the video!

180South: Impressions

7 Sep

Can challenging yourself, both physically and mentally drive you to change, inspire others to change, and to view the world differently? In 180 South, Jeff Johnson embarks on an epic journey for adventure, and also a journey to save one of the largest untouched wilderness spaces on the planet; Patagonia.

This documentary by Woodshed Films chronicles Jeff Johnson as he follows in the footsteps of a similar 1968 journey that his inspirational friends; Yvon Chouinard and Doug Tompkins did long ago. The goal is to reach Patagonia in South America, and try to save this majestic wilderness from encroaching development. It is through this journey of sailboats, surfboards and rock climbing that the deeper meaning of conserving not only Patagonia, but the entire planet is revealed. And the ultimate question is presented to ourselves as society; can we simplify our lives?

Whether you think these guys are a bunch of hippy surf bums or not, this film definitely gets you thinking. And it also features some amazing videography and original music. The website www.180south.com is also fantastic and a great resource in addition to the film with some cool wallpapers and music to boot. Check out the trailer below, its 180 South, and its worth a watch.

iPhone 4: Worth Pitching a Tent For?

24 Jun

At 07:00 Thursday June 24, 2010 the new Apple iPhone 4 will be released in the United States, exciting apple fans across the globe. And as with any new release, such as the iPad and the iPhone 3GS etc, there are those hardcore fans that have been lining up outside apple stores across the US. According to this article on CNN, the first was a Dallas man who pitched his tent outside an apple store over a week ago already. If you take a spin down 5th avenue in New York tonight, you’ll probably see the line-up beginning to swell already as that 7am release time creeps closer and closer.

But I have to wonder, is it really worth it lining up for yet another hyped up release of an apple product? Lets look at 5 new features with the iPhone 4.

1.First up, the new iPhone 4 is boasting its new multi-tasking capabilities, now you can run up to 7 app services at the same time. But other smart phones such as the Droid have had unlimited multi-tasking capabilities for a long time already, old news…

2.The iphone 4 has the standard camera on the back, but now also a front facing camera as well for ‘FaceTime’ video calling. Yeah that’s cool, but my Nokia X6 has had that feature long before Apple thought about it. Its technology dating back to 2004.

3.Increased battery life is a new thing for apples latest phone. You would think that as Apple releases more and more versions of the same product, that things such as weight would be decreasing. But that’s not the case, the iPhone 4 weighs more than both previous version of the iPhone. A larger battery is attributed for this, which is a good thing, as the 3GS had one of the shortest battery lives of all smartphones.

4. Optics have been greatly improved and apple is claiming the new version has a display that ‘exceeds what’s perceivable by the human eye’. Maybe, but Apple has been lagging behind other smart phone display quality such as the AMOLED and TFT screens that Android phones like the HTC Evo4 have been using already.

5. The iphone 4 has moved the simcard slot to the right spine, but has switched to micro-simcard format. No longer will standard simcards be able to be used with the new phone. While this may not be a big deal to many. For myself, I value the compatibility a standard simcard format has when travelling etc.

I know I am a notorious Apple critic, but I do think the iPhone 4 is a great phone, just not worth the usual apple hype that goes along with it. Apple has been neck deep in lawsuits over patent infringement with multiple other phone companies over the past couple years, which only makes apples revolutionary claims even more questionable. Apple always does a great job at selling a decently ordinary product at an inflated price, and I’m sure they will continue to do this with the new iPhone 4. I mean what other company can make people call in sick for work, so they can run into a store first thing in the morning, high-fiving people, laughing and smiling as they purchase a mediocre product at steep price. Apple can. So if you feel this apparent breakthrough phone is worth sleeping in a tent on a cold hard sidewalk for a week, then by all means, go ahead, but I wont be there joining you!

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