A no-solder, 3d printed, miniature anglepoise lamp in black and UV.
Above, you can see my weekend project – a 3d printed, no-soldering-iron-required, LED using miniature anglepoise lamp. I printed it on Saturday, and assembled it on Sunday – it’s fitted with 6 UV LEDs (because I couldn’t find any white at the time) and the lamp shade has a thin accent line of glow-in-the-dark plastic as a highlight.
Concept art for Jensen's apartment in Deux Ex: Human Revolutions - note the candelabra
I’ve been playing Deus Ex: Human Revolution, and reveling in the stealth-puzzle options available to me. It means I spend a lot of time in one area, creeping around like the Creeping Kid, and because I’ve turned off the object highlighting and mission arrows, I need to actually look at the environments.
One environment that struck me more than many others, was Jensen’s apartment – the second the artificially intelligent door opened for me, I was drinking in the strong Bladerunner vibe. Noir-ish lighting spills through room high, slatted windows, casting long dark shadows across the jumble and accumulated debris of Adam’s life and upheaval – it feels like a refugee from Tron was put under house arrest in a long abandoned, 18th Century Parisian flat. In short, I liked it.
Versions 01 to 06, in my TARDIS printing iteration
I’m still having fun with the best toy in the world – my 3d printer! This week, I decided to try to make a tiny, light up, TARDIS model – ideally to fit on one of my hair clips. At the moment, the LEDs are too big, so the model above is approx 5cm tall – way too big for a hair clip.
Light Muses EL-bodysuit by Visual Drugstore
EL wire is a gift to anyone who’s ogled Tron – indeed, EL wire is far more high tech and real than the original Tron effects could dream of! The slinky outfit above is from Visual Drugstore, and while I love the effect, two things about it worry me –
Certain caterpillars and lizards have an amazing escape strategy – when startled, they’ll suddenly snap into action, curling into a wheel shape and rolling at proportionally breakneak speeds away from danger. 1G of acceleration, and over 200RPM. Zoom! This unusual movement method (specifically the non-gravity-assisted version) is the one that the above video (of the GoQBot) is designed to imitate.
So once again, science imitates nature, and discovers more amazing secrets – and yet some aspects are still a mystery. How does a mere caterpillar generate as much force as a leaping locust with its soft, flabby body? Yet to be discovered. But GoQBot, by Huai-Ti Lin, Gary G Leisk and Barry Trimmer, is already incredibly impressive.
Pyrocycstis lunula algae viewed under a USB microscope
Ok, I need you to squint a little at the photograph above – look for a vaguely crescent-moon shaped outline, with a yellowy-whiteish blob in the middle. Found one? That’s a Pyrocycstis Lunula alga! They’re about 0.1mm to 0.14mm in length, and they’re one of the bioluminescent algae strains that I’ve been culturing.
A Glowing Encrustation of Penellus Stipticus
Sometimes those crazy things we see in games which are too good to be true, have more than an ounce of truth in them. Those CG scenes of Pandora that so wowed 3d audiences showing an alien landscape more alive in the dark, than during the day – had some small element of more terrestrial lifeforms at their heart. Bioluminescent fungi like Panellus Stipticus.
I love things that glow; that flicker and twinkle, fade and pulse. Obviously then, I love LEDs! Soft circuitry and electronic clothing facinates me, but like great swathes of fashion, I’m convinced that they’re usually doing it wrong. The LEDs you see on clothing, frequently flashes, blinks or blinds – these LEDs I do not care for. How, and why, I made the gentle glowing LEDs above, is below.
Eszter Burghardt's 'Wooly Magma' from the Wooly Saga series
Miniature landscapes again – I love them so. Maybe it’s the incredible detail that people, such as Eszter Burghardt manage to create with unexpected materials like wool, felt and fuzz, such as in the Wooly Magma photograph above, or perhaps it’s the age old child-like conflict that means that far away things often seem so small.
The photographs that Eszter Burghardt creates, with both foodstuffs and fiber, appeal to senses we might not often associate with scenery – our sense of touch and our sense of taste. It’s that, coupled with the beauty of natural landscapes that she’s recreated, and the desire to reach out and touch these little worlds, that appeals to me so much. That, and I love volcanic scenes, and I am particularly curious as to how the under-lighting has been achieved!
Via NotCot.
Marin Sawa's Algaerium
I love this photograph – it’s Guan Lee’s shot of Marin Sawa’s Algaerium interior design project (seen over at Inhabitat). I love the muted earthy tones with both a watery organic feeling, and brittle clean science fiction vibe.
It doesn’t hurt that algae are such a strange and wonderful kingdom of living curiousness. Not animal, and in a different (but distantly related) biological category to plants – algae is different enough to be all on its own.
Then add in the fact some kinds can be eaten, some are fertilizer, some can be used as biofuel, some efficiently scrub CO2 into oxygen for us to breathe (potentially in space) and some even glow. Glow!
Myriad Whimsies 