Last Updated 26.02.06

The figures below have been made by my friend Xerome by folding carefully chosen tree leaves. I consider him an expert in origami, able not only to fold the most intrincate models but also to create new ones of his own. With these new creations he has gone a step farther in his art, not only being able to fold the leaves as if they were normal paper but also to bring hidden shapes out of them in a series of impressive masks. As far as he and I know nobody has ever done this before, but beyond the novelty of the technique I believe that these figures show an artistry that very few people can achieve.

Update 26.02.06 I added a picture of Xerome taken at the Origami meeting which took place this weekend in Santiago.

When I first wrote an article on Hitachi´s waterscape, I defined the device as a “study for new, more intuitive ways of accessing data in electronic devices”, also pointing out that the technology could be used not only for browsing through data but for playing interactive videogames too. Now, it seems that other major companies are making noticeable movements into these directions. Read the rest of this article »

Even those who study a science can´t know with precision how long will it take to learn it. This is only possible to know when already being skillful at it.

Many times I’ve thought about what would have been the first music I ever heard in my life. I don’t expect to find a concrete answer, but I like to imagine it.

That’s one of the reasons I am fascinated by “Genesis”, the soundtrack composed by french Bruno Coulais for the homonym filmic documentary about the origin and course of Life. It illustrates what I like to call “inward music”. Read the rest of this article »

http://www.pliws.com
Original site, in Korean and English.
http://www.superrollers.com
Very informative Australian-N.Zealand distributor site.

an abreviation for PLay In WheelS(…) two wheeled flashing roller skate that attaches to the heel of your skate or sport type shoe(…) you can fit them to your favourite shoes and as your feet grow or you change shoe preference, you can simply adjust them to suit the new shoe instead of being limited to the pair of the shoes with the wheels in them!

On my way back from Canada (which I like more everytime I go, though Ottawa´s streets are really slippery in winter) to Santiago I went through Amsterdam, so I had to stay at the Schiphol airport for a few hours. I decided to spend the time visiting the airport rather than sleeping, mainly because sleeping wouldn´t make me feel any better but also because the three times I have been there this was the first one where I could actually Read the rest of this article »

http://www.teamhassenplug.org/robots/legway/

I’ve been able to put it on a table, and tilt the table, and LegWay continues to maintain its balance.

The Legway is a successful recreation of the famous, albeit a little expensive Segway, a transportation device which makes use of gyroscopes in order to provide stability with only two wheels. The Legway obtains the same results by adding proximity detectors (provided by hitechnic), to a mindstorms core. These sensors provide the core with precise and continuous measures of the distance to the ground, which are used to make the calculations that allow two motors to keep the thingy always up and proud.

The model shown is currently able to follow a line, and it can also be remotely controlled. Steve, the Legway designer, has also included links to the building instructions and the program he used, so you can try making one for yourself! (and if you succeed, next step is the real thing).

I’m going to seize the première of the last film directed by Sam (“American Beauty”) Mendes, “Jarhead”, just to talk about War considered from a different point of view. “Jarhead” is the most recent opportunity for realizing that war movies have generated a sub-genre: the antiwar movies, which reflect the feelings and expectations of the soldiers before the war, and their angst, doubts and behaviour when exposed to real combat situations. Read the rest of this article »

There are many ways to teach. Several times I have refused to expose my doctrines to certain men, but with this attitude I have also given them a teaching; the silence does not demand any effort, but it is also eloquent.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7502458538500026068&q=shirt+fold

Coincidentally, it happened that this morning I had a huge pile of tshirts waiting to be folded, and so I have spent some time putting in practice the method shown in this 33 second-long video.

I must admit that I have always had some problems with folding shirts, so this was a very good opportunity to try to refine my skills, and I have to say that the method works well, though you may need to watch the video several times to understand the “flip”. A bit of advice: make sure that you’re grabbing both front and back layers of the shirt when you first pinch it, and that you’re grabbing all the layers right after you take the neck to the bottom. Notice that I say “take” instead of fold. Folding would make the neck turn inside, while you want the neck to be looking outside all the time (they show this step in more detail in the video when folding the second shirt). Give it a try!

ps. Unfortunately, the method is not as efficient on long sleeve shirts, but you can always add some extra folds here and there until it looks good.

Related Article: Tshirt Folding ex Machina: The FlipFold

http://www.bathsheba.com/crystal/largescale/

The cosmological model for this piece is tuned to match the Sloan Survey, an investigation of all galaxies we can see in one quadrant of the sky. It takes us out to within 1000 megaparsecs of Earth. The survey isn’t finished yet, so you are looking at current research.

Bathsheba Grossman is an artist who finds herself at ease in the convergence between sculpture and science. The subjects of her work, whether mathematical shapes, proteins or galaxies, are by their complex nature impossible to render by means of traditional techniques, which has led her to Read the rest of this article »

http://arch.ced.berkeley.edu/kap/background/history.html
(scroll down the page to see the picture)

the oldest conserved aerial photograph.

Long before airplanes traveled across the skies, aerial pictures took off by means of balloons and kites. Since then, kite and photography enthusiasts around the world have kept the spirits and the pictures high, producing photographs of amazing quality.

http://scotthaefner.com/kap/

it isn’t completely ridiculous to suspend an $800 camera from a kite(…) Be sure to see my 360° virtual reality (VR) panoramas taken from a kite’s eye view.

Among the kite aerial pictures I have found, the ones I liked and still like the most are those taken by Scott Haefner. An accomplished professional photographer, he puts his skills to good use in obtaining crisp detailed pictures that are always delightful to Read the rest of this article »

If we make an effort to act towards others as we would like them to act towards us, our behaviour will be very near to perfection; this way of acting is the one which will get us the closest to acquiring Goodness.

Is it worth being a secondary role? Many of us think that these roles are completely necessary for raising a series or TV program up to a first rate show. This is my particular tribute to those people whose short and memorable interventions make our lives more gratifying. Here’s an example: Read the rest of this article »

Since life is maybe not only about cool gadgets, movies, videogames and robots, today we feature the recipe for the “world’s best chocolate chip cookies” (according to my girlfriend). They are very easy to make and taste awesome, so grab your apron and go for it!

Your cookies are now ready. Enjoy!

Related Article: Taste the Tril-o-bites

Even though the sky is far away and we cannot reach the stars, it is not difficult to discover the laws of the universe through their effects; if we know the laws of the universe, it will not be difficult to predict the exact date on which the winter solstice will occur, a thousand years from now.