Photosynth

OoooOOo... I've just been playing with this demo of Photosynth. It's fun and amazing on so many different levels. The demo is a 3D reconstruction of St Mark's Square in Venice, made up of photos taken from Flikr. The photos are arranged based on their spacial relationships, creating a virtual model that can be rotated and zoomed. Graphics indicate where the picture was taken from and outline of other near by photos. This demo was released almost a year ago by Microsoft Live Labs and featured at this year's TED conference.

What is really amazing to me is how such large amounts of data can be so easily manipulated (accomplished partially by just focusing only on what is within the parameters of your screen). For more about the technology and it's uses check out this video. (Thanks Mike!)

Street View

Wow...Street View on Google Maps is really amazing. It is street level photos that you can rotate 360 degrees and zoom in and out to show what you would see if you were standing on that point in the map. So far it only exists for New York City, Denver, Miami, Las Vegas and San Francisco but hopefully this is just the beginning. This is one of the Google Map features that I've been waiting for, (although it wasn't quite as awesome in my head... it was more about photo reference shots for directions). If you haven't tried it out yet, go do it right now at maps.google.com and click on Street View.

Botanist

This gorgeous series of tables and benches, called Botanist, was designed by Brandon Lynne and Dario Antonioni. They are made out of cut and bent aluminum covered in a glossy high impact powder coat or a natural wood veneer. Their simple shape, combined with the use of materials allows these benches fit nicely into any environment, indoor or out.

Arc

Check out this new visualization tool by Digg Labs called Arc. It shows popular stories in arcs based on themes. It's not quite as effective at seeing the overall picture as Swarm or Stack are (see previous post) but it's very pretty to look at and I like that they keep exploring new ways to visualize ever changing and expanding data.

Cycloc

I've seen this Cycloc bike rack a few times now, originally at an RCA grad show and most recently at ICFF. It is such a simple and elegant solution. Your bike basically twists into it, using the unbalanced weight to keep itself in place. The inside of the Cycloc provides storage for your bike gloves or other accessories and holes in the top and bottom allow a bike lock to be added to the mix. It comes in 4 colors to match your interior including a black option which is made out of recycled plastic. Designed by Andrew Lang. Brilliant!

The Trafalgar Great Chair Grab

I attended a talk by Tom Dixon earlier this week at HauteGREEN 2007. Part of his talk was about this project, the Trafalgar Great Chair Grab. The thinking behind the project is that a lot of designer objects are very expensive and not affordable to many people. Tom Dixon was attempting to give design away for free by filling Trafalgar Square in London with chairs he designed and then just inviting people to take the chairs home with them.

This is an interesting idea in itself but what caught my attention was the second half of the scheme. In order to fund the project he took one of the chairs and left it in a copper bath in an effort to make one 'precious' or valuable version of the chair to sell. The idea being that one precious object would pay for the others.

Ocean Levels Bilboard

This billboard is well thought out. Created by the World Wildlife Foundation to raise awareness about climate change, this billboard uses an awning and the motion of the sun to create the effect of rising water. (Found through (Marketing-Alternatif)

Evian Ballet

I never thought a ballet would be so fun to choreograph... especially in German. I guess when it involves knee high water, dolphins, diamonds, and giant cherries, it's hard to go wrong. Create your own here, care of Evian.

100 Mondays

Plataforma Humana is trying to collect "100 days in 100 images of 100 people, or better yet of 100 people around the world taking 100 pictures of their Mondays". Basically on any old Monday you take 100 pictures (about one every ten minutes) of whatever you are doing (eating, staring at the computer, dancing). The idea is to take the photos from your own viewing perspective so that the final effect is to live 100 Mondays from different people's points of view. They are not publishing the results until they have received all 100 Monday's worth or photos (currently at 22). I'm adding this to my To Do list!

Underwater Sculpture

This is one of the pieces from the Grenada Underwater Sculpture Gallery in the West Indies. The gallery was stared by artist Jason Taylor in May 2006. The underwater gallery has a couple purposes; one is to attract tourists to Grenada, another is to act as an artificial coral reef, and the last is to create a unique way of looking at art by utilizing the effects of water, light, and sea life to distort or highlight aspects of the sculptures. All of the underwater art celebrates Caribbean culture and people. The sculputres are located about 5 meters underwater; viewable by snorkelers or divers. (Found through Wooster Collective)

Hungry Suitcase

Ever wonder what your perfect vacation is? 50% Relaxin', 40% Adventure, 10% Culture? Try out this Vacation Fun-a-lyzer. Just pack the objects that appeal to you into the mouthy suitcase and out spits your perfect vacation (Uh... or at least your perfect Royal Caribbean vacation). Very fun site.

Shinebox Business Cards

Shinebox is trying to reinvent business cards by providing them in little perforated booklets. It's actually quite a good idea. The booklets keep the cards neatly together and you can put each booklet in a different spot so you are never without your cards. They are not the cheapest option at $149.60 for 10 books of 20 (card prices get lower with increased quantities), but there is something strangely satisfying about the idea of ripping cards out of a booklet.

Instant Outdoor Sink

I like the idea of this simple outdoor sink. It seems like a lot of added functionality for your backyard without too much cost or installation effort. The sink hooks up to your outdoor tap using a 4' hose; no complicated pluming involved. It includes two small work surfaces, a coverable sink, hanging hooks, and a 40' winding hose. (Found through Outblush)

Moody

I was playing around today with an app called Moody by Crayon Room. It is an iTunes add on that allows you to tag songs based on emotional criteria. Songs are tagged using a colored grid to indicate how happy or sad, calm or intense your find them. Songs can then be played back using one, or multiple mood tags, essentially creating a mood specific playlist.

I like this idea because I do listen to different music depending on what mood I'm in, but I wish there was a more automated way to create the tags. I appreciate that adding the tags yourself makes them personalized (as in, a song that makes me happy could make another person sad), but I don't have time to tag all 2500 songs in my library. It would be better if songs were automatically tagged based on variables such as song speed, genera, etc, and then I could go back and adjust them later.

I was also really intrigued by the idea of using colors to represent moods, as opposed to smiley faces or some other method. It takes a little while to get your head around which colors represent which moods, but I think it works. (Thanks James!)

Smoon Bijou

The Smoon Bijou necklace turns lighting into interactive jewelry. This glowing silicon orb is like wearing your own personal moon around your neck. It comes with a silver chain and replaceable battery. Available through Generate.

Fish Loft

If I ever get a fishpond, I'm definitely adding one of these fish lofts. It is basically a clear capped plastic tube, filled with water, standing off the bottom of the pond and rising out about the water. Assuming you have curious little fishies, they would swim up the loft to enjoy the view and you could enjoy watching the fish swim around above the pond. (Found through Teckie Diva's)

Amaznode

Looking for an interesting new way to search Amazon? Try Amaznode. It is a Flash based searching tool that visualizes Amazon's products based on matches to your keyword and information from Amazon's "customers who bought this item also bought" data.

SELK'BAG

I'm sitting here in the unseasonably hot New York weather and all I can think about is how much I want one of these Selk'bags. Designed by Musuc, the Selk'bag is an evolution of the sleeping bag. It has the same puffy goodness as a sleeping bag but with a form fitting shape for warmth and added mobility, both in and out of the tent. (Found through The Cool Hunter)

Lori Early

I came across the work of Lori Early last weekend in SoHo's Opera Gallery. Her work was so striking and beautiful that it drew us in from the street. All of her paintings have a certain eeriness that grabs your attention. The big gothic black frames enhance the grandeur and mystique of the images they contain. Once you see the paintings up close you are drawn in even closer by the fine detail, until your nose is almost touching the surface and you have to fold your hands together to keep from reaching out and touching the hair or fur. Neither the artist's site nor the gallery's site do the paintings justice. Her show has only been on for about a week and already all of her paintings have little sold stickers beside them (each selling for a reported $55,000-$95,000).

Surface View

I just spent the last 15 minutes daydreaming about which of these murals I want on my office wall and which would be best for the bedroom wall. Surface View has a large collection of beautiful wall murals that can be customized for any wall and sent to you in wallpaper style strips for easy application. Of course if you can afford the wall coverings than you can probably afford the professional installation option as well. The images include about 120 pictures from the Victoria and Albert Museum, as well as a wide range of illustrations, photography and etchings. Their website is very nice and offers to show you the murals behind different pieces of furniture to help you daydreaming along. (Found through FWA)

Hello My Name Is

This witty name tag cracked me up. Any fellow Princess Bride fans will appreciate it. (Thanks Q and Courtney)

Mechanical Music Box Kit

This is an interesting twist on the traditional music box. It's a music box kit that comes with a small hand cranked music box and strips of paper music to determine which song the box will play. The kit comes with the paper strip music for Happy Birthday as well as some blank sheets, a hole punch and instructions on how to make your own music. This is a fun way to learn how to write music or show off your music box composer skills. Available at Grand Illusions or The Curiosity Shoppe. (Found through Cool Hunting)

Peter Callesen

Peter Callesen creates some amazing artwork out of cut paper. I particularly like his A4 Papercut series. Most of his pieces use the cutout in the paper to create part of the imagery and the sculpture formed out of the cut area to complete it. You can't help but be amazed at how much thought, effort and delicacy goes into each piece of paper.

Worldmapper

Worldmapper is an interesting website that contains 366 maps that visualize different global stats. The maps use equal area cartograms that re-sizes each country according to a variable. For example, the above map shows Research and Development Expenditure. The country size is shown in proportion to the worldwide research and development spending. These types of maps are very good at quickly illustrating statistics and their popularity seems to be growing.

Red Interactive Agency

I get very excited when someone does something unique with a website. There are so many awesome websites out there that it is hard to pull off something new and interesting but I think Red Universe has done it. Each user to their site becomes a character in their universe. You get to run around exploring the site and chatting with other visitors. You even get to fly about in a little superman pose. It is simple but also fun, interesting, and most importantly engaging. The site recently won a well deserved FITC award in the Self Promotion category and ultimately won Best in Show. (Found through the FWA)