CollectSpace gives us one last look at the now defunct Shuttle Atlantis. Incredible detail in these interiors, I can’t even imagine the level of engineering and testing that went into even the smallest components on this spacecraft. More images here.
Further reading / viewing – Discovery: A Visual Eulogy
The more I listen to Clams Casino the more I hear what makes him special, Tom from Beacon turn me onto this track after playing me some ASAP Rocky and Lil B, this track stuck with me, couldn’t wait to go home and hunt it down. I love that the high hats aren’t just set at 64 notes but instead you get these waves of variation and the vox is almost like something from Deep Forest but feels refreshing.HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
This Floating Points track is a long one but a very rewarding listen. I’m amazed that the Detroit Techno influences feel so pure here, there’s no question this guy can produce and it comes from the right place and for the right reasons.
Kuedo made a lot of Best Of lists, I foolishly missed it somehow, i’m only human though, nice soft emotions attached to the synth parts.
Since this is the last music post of 2011 I wanted to end it with a classic, a must own from Dopplereffekt, see you in 2012.
Bay Area photographer Lauren Crew has updated her portfolio with some great new work. I’m not quite sure what camera she is using, but I went to one of her shows in Oakland a few years ago and remember that she used mostly film, which is evident from the beautiful analog grain in some of these shots.
More over at Lauren’s Portfolio
Room557 is the recently launched blog of Academy of Art University instructors Hunter Wimmer and Anitra Nottingham. I’ve had the good luck of studying under Hunter numerous times at the Academy. His advisement has been instrumental in pushing me to improve my work at every step, and I wanted to share one of his teachings that has had an important impact on my design education.
Hunter was responsible for giving me my first (but sadly not my last) failing grade, and although it was hard to stomach at the time, it was a much needed wake up call. Up to that point my barometer for successful design was how “cool” something looked. I didn’t understand the importance of having a strong concept, choosing appropriate typefaces, or using relevant materials. I saw little value in learning how to comp, bind, or print on anything other than my Epson. I didn’t understand the importance of these things because I wanted to be a designer, not a salesman, typographer, printer, or bookbinder. Thankfully Hunter was there to explain Why “It” Matters:
Would you trust a civil engineer — who’s responsible for the stability of bridges and the like — if there was a math error on their cost-estimate? Would you trust a mechanic who drives a broken-down hatchback? Would you trust a personal trainer with love handles? Now, I don’t care if my engineer has love handles or if my personal trainer drives a smoking Hyundai, but there are minimum expectations in each profession. In order for a personal trainer to convey a sense of health and well-being (and that they’ve mastered it enough to pass it on to me), they should also be fit, right?
Where does that leave the graphic designer?
When you fail you can take it one of two ways: as a rejection of yourself, who you are and your talent as a designer, or as practice, an experiment that isn’t successful… yet. Once I was able see the latter I could ask myself what was expected of my work and where it was falling short. As designers we are called to be communicators, aesthetes, conceptual-thinkers, and craftsmen. Now that the dust has settled from another semester it’s nice to go back and be reminded of what we’re called to do, why it can be frustrating, but ultimately what makes it so fulfilling when countless hours of practice result in that brief moment of success, before we go back and repeat the whole process all over again. If you are a designer or have any interest in the profession, Hunter’s informative post is well worth the read.
via Room557
Many of you I know that read this blog have a great knowledge of music, most of what I share isn’t new to you so I have to dig deep and one route I like to go is solo projects off bands I love. One thing I completely overlooked this year was this Steve Hauschildt record, it was under my nose all this time, he’s a big part of the group Emeralds and runs Gneiss Things and it came out on Kranky which means i’d gotten there eventually. Either way i’ve staring off into the distance and letting this beautiful album take its course and I haven’t had such a quality full album experience in months. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
Xaver Von Treyer new album is a bit all over the place genre wise, almost like a collection of songs from over the years he’s made, one song that grabbed my ear was She Is My Virgo Supercluster which i’m guessing is an ode to Cluster?
Whenever I put on Raime I know what i’ll be getting mood wise, its a very precise passion project committed to darkness and the care for it all sound wise is impeccable. It makes me question a lot of the dark pop and goth music thats out there when this music begins.
Laurel Halo has had a great year and her sound has matured into trustworthy to go for the expansion of what New Age can fuse with and mold into, really excited to hear more from her.
I’m always looking for new eyeglass frames, I think people think they’re usually too expensive to be replacing often but if you dig around the internet there are soo many quality choices. Recently i’ve been checking out the rounder Warby Parker frames that seem to be all around $95, which is a steal. Any others you guys like? besides Oliver Peoples 😉
Shooting at 2000fps never gets old. A few months ago I had the opportunity to work with the Olympus iSpeed 3 from Jordy Klein. The iSpeed 3 is a high speed camera that can shoot up to 2000fps at 1280 x 720. It will actually shoot 1280 x 1024 if you want it to but most of us are looking for 16:9, 2:1 or 2:35:1 ratios. I won’t go into too much technical detail, but I’ll respond to any questions about the camera in the comments. It has an on-board CDU (Controller Display Unit) which acts as a monitor and control. Phantom cameras have been using something similar as well, but it’s great to see the progress. This feature is big for high-speed cameras because it means you can be more mobile. It used to be, and still is, that you control these types of cameras via a laptop or desktop computer, the CDU changes that. One other feature of the iSpeed 3 is that it saves to compact flash cards, which we all have. It’ll save uncompressed and a fairly compressed AVI file, as options. The uncompressed file is really high quality for use in post, but takes about 30 minutes to save to the CF, not good for swift production. It was fun to have a camera like this to use on my own for a bit rather than a quick production. However, it was a little overwhelming with the time constraint I had it in to think of stuff to shoot. The most interesting thing, and I don’t think I’m giving away any secrets here was driving around downtown and shooting out the window. Since it’s such a high frame rate you get dolly type shot with people almost frozen in time. I’d like to try that down the road more. Mostly, the things that look the best are the most ridiculous things like breaking something or water.
Shoot anything with water and it’s instantly magical.
Big thanks to Jordy Klein Film and Video, if you need rental equipment definitely check out his site or give him a call. Also thanks to all my friends that subjected themselves to all the random stuff I was egging them on to do.
I’ve posted the few pieces I’ve shot with the camera. The first one up top is a reel of everything I shot in the short time. There’s a bunch more footage, but it’d be dreadfully long if I edited it all together. Hopefully next year I’ll get to test another one.
Be sure to check out Tycho’s tour in 2012, there will be a bunch of footage that I shot with this camera used in the visuals.
Videos after the break:
You may remember Swiss flickr user Afghtiga as the guy who collects various design icons in the form of consumer electronics and catalogs them with beautiful photographs. Well he also has an equisitely detailed scale-model collection featuring Le Mans cars from the 60’s and 70’s which he has ben photographing as well.
I used to do a fair amount of model building as a kid but I never got anywhere near this level of detail. I wonder if he build them himself or if these are just those super-expensive ones you’d see pre-built at model shops. Either way, love the shots.
More models at Afghtiga’s Flickr
Here’s the last bit of the end of the year playlists, I’m sure I missed some key players but getting all 60 tracks together felt great. I’d love to see your lists, feel free to post them in the comment section.
60. ADR – Jupiter Rising
59. Samiyam – Pressure
58. The Miracles Club – A New Love
57. Pure X – Twisted Mirror
56. Solar Bears – Cub (Keep Shelly in Athens remix)
55. Silk Flowers – Columns
54. Le Révélateur – Bleu Nuit
53. Light Asylum – Dark Allies
52. Gold Zebra – Love, French, Better
51. Geotic – Beaming Husband
