kulturbrauerei on schmap
I am delighted to let you know that your submitted photo
has been selected for inclusion in the newly released fifth
edition of our Schmap Berlin Guide. (my flickr gallery)
Klikk 4.0: baseball-ütővel balettre tanítani
Két perc múltán már bántam, hogy újságíró lett belőlem. Ott álltam a Science Museum ipari forradalmi vívmányokat felsorakoztató termében, gondolatban heveset maszturbáltam a világ első gőzmozdonyára (az elsőre, pendejo, az elsőre), velem szemben a Deep Blue kávézó Blade Runner-t idéző neon-mélykék oldalsávja és fogaimat összeszorítva próbáltam nagyon nem rossz példát mutatni a pakisztáni iskoláscsoportnak. Őrült tudós akartam lenni, neuronfoltos köpenyben, nagyfeszültségtől szétálló hajjal és ugyan egy helyes asszisztenssel is, de most nem megyünk félre a témától.
Ha a brit anyabirodalom vérlázító adagnyi adrenalint lőtt belém tíz perc alatt, akkor a Nyócker emlékeitől füstölgő Király utca Bodies kiállítása újfent meggyőző erejű: vérszagú, fekete miazma lesz a dohányos tüdőből, öregkorunkra elzöldülnek a belső szerveink, rosszabbfajta gombamezőként duzzadoznak a ráktumorok, a limbikus idegrendszer pedig padlószőnyegként legalább annyira izgató szexuálisan, mint teljes falat beborító ornamentumként. Hathetes magzatot akár még nyakban is lehetne hordani, ha az etikai gyorsrendőrség nem büntetne érte, a lényeg azonban már átfolyhatott: nem akarok biológus lenni, de tisztességgel végigjártam legalább két órát, felelevenítettem Kovács Október abszurd humorba folyó biológiaóráit és felfogtam a szervezőgárda elrejtett rosszindulatát, nincs annál humorosabb dolog, amikor paranoidok arról képzelegnek, hogy miként rothadnak el élve.
Két perc múltán már bántam, hogy újságíró lett belőlem. Ott ültem a Millenáris sajtóbemutatóján, a digitális játszótérnek keresztelt Klikk rendezvénysorozat negyedik etapján és én magam voltam az ország fájdalmas értetlenségbe meredt kérdőjele, gondolatban érfalban lassan lebomló koffeinpirulákat csomagoltam ki magamban, velem szemben pedig Béres "Ujjongó Banshee Vagyok" Alexandra rugózza ki jólábmozgással a 258 méteres összesítettet a sáncugrásban, csúcsmondata azonban valahogy úgy hangzik: "figyeljétek, mert most én vagyok a golyó!".
A Klikk 4.0 a 7-18 éves fiataloknak akarja bemutatni azt, hogy az egészség mennyire fontos, mindezt pedig számos támogatóval teszi, ezerszer kihangsúlyozva azt a kiállítás weboldalán, hogy a kutatások szerint a fiatalok egyre egészségtelenebbül élnek, egyre kevésbé tudatosan, egyfajta követendő társadalmi szerepvállalás tehát, hogy a Millenáris a B épület teljes testével beáll a fiatalok meg a világ közé, mindenféle riogatás nélkül (ezt kiemelve), ismeretterjesztés gyanánt. Ez az a pillanat, ahol a precíziós légkalapács kicsorbul, bármennyit is agyalhattak a rendezvény kreatív koncepcióján, bajos a brainstorming. A Nintendo Wii és az ottlétemkor irigyelésreméltóan nagy sikert arató Dance Dance Revolution a digitális játszótér igazi tengelye.
Lehet, hogy régen voltam gyerek, de telibevert ötlet olyan információs pultot adni kölykök kezébe, amin sok olvasnivaló van, a gyerekek nem olvasni jönnek ide, hanem szórakozni. Szkeptikus énemet elég jól blokkolja a Millenáris oktatási vezetője, aki kérdésemre elárulja, hogy ide délelőttönként gyermekcsoportok járnak tanulni, az oktatási anyaghoz szereznek itt extrákat a Jövő Iskolája projekt pedagógusainak felügyelete alatt. Hagyom elnyomni a fröcsögő szkepticizmust, elvégre is rengeteg lelket megérint a takaró, amivel burkolóznak: ha a gyermekeket akarjuk megvédeni sajátmaguktól, mindegy, hogy hogyan csináljuk, csak csináljuk. Emögé a takaró mögé rengeteg gyengeséget, amatőrizmust és hozzánemértést lehet söpörni, a "hadd csináljam én szarul, ha már senki más nem csinálja" megint virágkorát éli.
A legfőbb fájdalmam valahol ott fakad fel, hogy az egészségtudatosító játszóház (aminek eddig nem említett részeiben ügyességi, erőnléti és egyéb fizikai játékokat gyúrnak, nyúznak, emelgetnek és pusztítanak el a fiatalok) egyfajta modern digitális játszótérként adja el magát, a kölykök meg hiába kölykök meg hiába magyarok (mi meg kicsi ország vagyunk, nincsen pénzünk, blabla), nem ezt érdemlik. Nem kell a riogatás, mondja a Klikk weboldala, de azért visszamennék megkérdezni a gyerekcsoportokat, hogy értik-e azt, hogy miért lesz nekik szar igazából harminc év múlva. Nem fogják. Nincsen semmi "aha!-élmény", ami a Science Museumban és a Bodies-on alig pár perc alatt építette át az agyamat, nincsen semmi egyedi a Klikkben, az animátorlányok szomorúan álldogálnak a sejtek mellett, ahol Zsolt, a megfáradt akármilyentanár élettörténetét kell átkattintgatnom egy sanyarúra tervezett háromgombos interfészen és gyanítom, a tócsaszemű iskolásoknak nem mond semmit egy előző évszázad igényeire tervezett oktatási rendszer által megnyomorított, kilátástalan tanár helyzete, a DDR kipróbálható a plázákban, a Wii meg remélhetőleg ismeretségi körben van már. You people, you just never learn.
the future of healthcare systems (and stabbing a knife in klikk 4.0)
This Microsoft vision of the future of healthcare systems might be an old one (dated somewhere around March 08, actually), but I'm actually researching the topic and a bit of extra info/touchscreen surfaces cannot hurt us. On a sad sidenote: just been to the Klikk 4.0 press conf in the Millenaire and if you've seen a good and socially responsible exhibition fucked up mile-long in the ass, it's that one. Did you really think that making kids read long pages of text will make them more health-conscious? Or even interested? Making them play Wii is a way better idea but then again please don't feed it to the press that this is one of the most interactive and technically advanced etape of the exhibition series. Even Bodies had a hard time driving the point home about the adverse effects of drinking and/or smoking.
new project - making voice in the machine
Australian cyberpunk/industrial metal formation (and messiahs of ROCK!) NEW PROJECT is on its way releasing some behind-the-scenes videos, hopefully synched to their up-and-coming DVD release which nobody knows anything about, but still. Watch fingerstomping moshpit action!
platige teases 'teaching infinity'
Teaching Infinity (Lekcja nieskończoności) trailer from Quiet Earth on Vimeo.
Polish CG arthouse Platige is back with a teaser for their new project TEACHING INFINITY, directed by Jakub Jabłoński and Bartłomiej Kik. We'll be back more info on Platige as they're quite a massive player to deal with - if you remember THE CATHEDRAL (that's their first CG short that made them real famous in the googler crowd, I guess) in 2002 - that's a SIGGRAPH main prize and an Oscar-nomination there. As for the new trailer, that looks like some wicked Escheresque android development myth with a distinct Platige touch. (via quietearth.us)
void manufacturing interviews gibson
"The limitation to what you can find on Youtube is basically your own imagination. When I think of something, if I don’t automatically think of searching for it on Youtube, I will never see it. When something comes to mind, I try to train myself to google it and then look on Youtube, often with the most amazing results. I think, in the end, if we just kind of run this technology out to its logical conclusion, we will end up with something like a single retina that covers the entire inner surface of a sphere, looking at itself, being quite self-sufficient, and made completely of Youtube videos."
There's a new Gibson interview out on Void Manufacturing by Ulrich Gutmair, focusing on YouTube, AR, marketing, American politics, voodoo and many others. Great stuff, gz!
xbox 360 beats ps3. post is all about japanese girls.
Kotaku writes about how Xbox 360 beat PS3 in September in Japan. The tech background: when you follow up feeds in your reader, big images are always ranked first in the attention priority. So there. (link)
interactive bar
Hurry Up Please: It's Time - Interactive Installation from vjdrmo on Vimeo.
Storming off for a rewarding Tom Yum Khai experience with a friend, so I'm brief on this one: interactive bar surface by Alex Haw, as aptly summarized by grinding.be: the more activity a person generates on the bar, the more images are created, along with an increase in movement. (link)
the glorious planetdamage hvg promo campaign
And it starts like this.
HVG (Weekly World Economics) Háló IT add-in publication, thanks to my colleagues who were probably very, very bent on emphasizing the fact that I'm desparately crying for help in Japanese. Anyways, sidegrin.
weirding wednesday: the lego bdsm scene
Ectoplasmosis always has the weirdiest, tentacly links for your daily pleasure to freak out your fellow workers and friends. This time, a new LEGO scene. (And, by the way, merry October for you, pussies.)
film industry rumour: blade runner 2 in the works
Slashfilm has a longer post on whether Travis Wright, Eagle Eye co-writer is really working on a sequel to Ridley Scott's Blade Runner. Travis revealed that during the past few years they (referring to John Glenn as his partner) have been working on various treatments on a sequel and not only had they worked with Bud Yorkin, BR co-executive producer, but also they are already working with a pre-visualization team on a few hunter action sequences. Screenwriter Glenn sez there actually was a time when Travis and he worked with Yorking but that was years ago. Slashfilm concludes that nothing is being developed by the studio itself, or with the studio’s involvement. (link)
fuck you, weather
Fuck the Rain umbrella available from Art Lebedev store from September 24th. (Warren's gonna love this, even for 35 euros.)
[itsuki takashi の マンガ] を探している / amputee robot dolls
And you can imagine the rest. Artwork's by Itsuki Takashi, a very obscure mangaka even in Japan, the one who did Yoso no Himitsu, a manga based on a Cthulhu story by Robert Bloch. Itsuki's been known in the past few weeks via Ectomo and Coilhouse for his amputee robot doll set, partially published on the baby art blog (link one, link two).
bpm by paul sizer: life of a dj compressed into 96 pages
In the past six years I was always more of a promoter than a DJ, even when I moved a dancefloor of two hundred, I knew it was nothing really like the real thing, vinyls, Technics, the crossfader: all the real deal. We always loved CDs and laptops more, either because we were a new generation or we were just wannabes and couldn't afford the original way. But how we lived our life and the typical problems that we all had at the time because of what we did is awesomely reconstructed in the new graphical novel by Paul Sizer.
B.P.M. has an awful amount of teaser pages on the project site and as far as my knowledge goes, it'll be available in November. Read the teasers, order the rest with me. Let me share the official stuff with you.
BPM is a full color 96 page graphic novel written and drawn by Paul Sizer (LITTLE WHITE MOUSE, MOPED ARMY graphic novels). The graphic novel will contain the main story, plus a comprehensive sketchbook section and detailed playlists and notes. Plus, the book will also be linked with iMixes from the Apple iTunes website that provide a “soundtrack” to accompany the book, as well as playlists for each of the main DJ characters, showing each person’s musical tastes.
“B.P.M.” is Paul Sizer’s love letter to the music he loves. In combining the story of a young DJ with the power of computer enhanced artwork, Paul’s goal is to merge his love of comics and his love of music into a moving, dynamic story of passion, motivation and hard choices over following one’s creative dreams. Paul has challenged himself as a writer and artist, using new techniques to tell this story. Combining his art with hundreds of photos he’s taken in New York, Paul has worked to make “B.P.M.” a unique visual experience as well as a thoughtful and engaging story that transmits the raw power and inspiration that music can generate.
seven scenes of ego (london, science museum)
Seven pics from the Science Museum, a place of utmost rock. This contraption above is a central hub for the comment delivery system. Visitors can leave their remarks at certain terminals that start to live a life on their own and start running around in the building, sometimes in full length, sometimes just as brief flashes of white data. You'll see more when I post my own pics, this is the end of the Girl Wonder series, I was more focused on stuff that are blog-ready.
I guess this was either Floor 1 from a half floor above or a disused Floor 3. Elevators are for the weak. One of the messages in the background explicitly details filthy details on what I did with the plastic sheets at the World of Plastic exhibition. Photoshop has an undocumented feature that can uncompress this data for you.
Topmost floor. There are huge touchscreen table games for children here and an anal probe that you can sit on and it gives you a thorough chem check. I am also screaming on this image, but thankfully we've turned down the volume a bit.
Ohohow. The Science Museum (along with a few others) are for free but for a few mini-exhibs you have to sacrifice a few quids, just like this interactive one. You enter with a card that you swipe on the yellow circles just like the on you see on the pic, activating mini-games about how you imagine your life in 2050. You can design future food, vehicles, homes, transportation system and stuff and finally you get an evaluation and your mini-city gets included in a mega-town that comprises of all the visitors' experiments. Very childish and very enjoyable at the same time. I am designing caramelised sweets with vaccine here.
Grab the receiver and follow the instructions to choose the energy reserves you'll use for your future homes. I went nuclear. Literally.
If you know me well enough, you know what I'm thinking here.
You'll get more images in another set, so this is just a teaser about Floor 5's exhibition on the history of medicine. They had wicked Chinese and Sumerian shit in there, also some amazing and not so amazing urine collection systems and this trepanation set also comes in handy when you need to skullfuck someone like this is the last day on Earth. Have fun, children.
cluster housing by björn börkur eiríksson
Icelandic concept designer Björn Börkur Eiríksson, lead artist/designer at CCP White Wolf, has some deeply depressing artwork to share on his site. IO9 mostly focused on the post-apocalyptic city exteriors: the image that reflects a more Europeanized/Balkanized version of capsule hotels seemed like a good idea for the front page: there are no doors on the "flats" and the only entrance is the elevator robot that's a bit unreal for me - given that you have an environment like these, you'd expect custom-made rope ladders, at least.
(This concept actually has a name called cluster housing'and there's one amazing concept that grabbed me. Useful and Agreeable, abbreviated as U+A, designed by Neil M. Dinari is a kinky little construct, according to archintect, the u+a house options range from the "mini hi-rise" to "low-rise", or "high and wide" options extending up to 1800 square feet (167 m2). innovations include lightweight aerospace grade aluminum panels, solar power, rooftop patio, rain collection, flexible floorplans, plus some built-in furniture designed by nmda). Denari also says that "far different from most pre-fab designs, the u+a pre-designed house submerges the 'off-the-shelf' appearance in favor of an aesthetic that is closer to product design of a smaller scale."
another cyberpunk comic @ bloodfire to be made as big-budget web anime series
The Gene Generation goes on DVD next January and if you've seen the comics (if you haven't, grab it like fuck), you know it's out on Bloodfire Studios. Now Wired drops the hint that Bloodfire received the rights to make an indie comics series from an anime-style big-budget web series that has RDF USA behind it (who were responsible for shows like The Two Coreys or Wife Swap). Release tentatively set for 2009, so far there's only one leaked cityscape image, according to Wired.
the unfinished swan and whitewash
The Unfinished Swan - Tech Demo 9/2008 from Ian Dallas on Vimeo.
Back with more obscure indie game techdemos at your fingertips! The Unfinished Swan, described as a surreal maze game set in an entirely white world is all about splattering paint around yourself to find your way. There's a very similar techdemo called Whitewash that plays along the same line, though you'll need to have a Unity plugin to check that out. Games' been nominated at a few places - if you're interested, check the original post on Indiegames.
call the ships to port, an intermezzo
the line becomes a circle
spin the wheel of fortune
or learn to navigate
eleven scenes of mount avalon (of doom)
The London Eye - a fantastic place, mostly because of Café Manga, the motherfuckingly awesomest Dalí exhibition (really restored my faith in spoken word and the classic piano sound) and the fact that we sort of managed to hack the hourlong queues, getting through in ten minutes' time. Will have mid-air pics later on of the pods, need to send memo to engineer guys to add Brian Eno-esque ambient background.
The moment when you realize that you really, really have five channels in the Paki neighbourhood and HAHA gives you a decent flavour of monochrome lullaby.
The Dev, right on the back corner towards Camden Market - also the moment when you realize that Goths are the same everyone. If you don't look like them and they don't recognize you, you're just street gomi. Sounds awful, doesn't it. Nah, seriously, nice vibe.
Featuring Drew, vocalist of New Project - too bad Claire's not visibly around, she's possibly getting a seventeenth pair of stiletto heels. Drew, man, if you read this, we owe you one big time :)
Interior of Camden Market, lack of rain, excess of Thai, in the triangle of Damage 311, Hexagon and some Chinese vendors who were hellbent on the idea that I'd need to buy samurai tees. No samurai tees.
Moi, at the Market, just minutes after FSOL Papua New Guinea from a green coffee shop sent me into sweet sobbing.
Typical scene. Maps, coffee and things going blurry. Especially after Zen Revolution. But I'll tell you more about that anyways.
Seriously.
A piece of organic aesthetics of doom and also, DOOM. Lovely, Brain's gone unwired. Will post more pics later.
covenant - bullet
Back from Avalon, Budapest's hung like a dark grey rag in a shitstorm, installing a new wifi router, rechecking on the Collide live DVD, re-designing the whole Dose mag and sending this clip to m1k3y of grinding.be, because I'm sure he's gonna like that. Be back later when I'm past the culture trauma.
The London Trip, day 1
Hello there, filthy readers. We're currently at the Lebanese neighborhood on Central and this is Ramadan AND full moon. So, as you can gather, we've arrived to London. Girl Wonder is getting extremely efficient in blocking my amok runs into Viet and Jap restaurants and also, reducing my shopping frenzy to bits. Luckily, she's not that efficient, although in Chinatown, she didn't really need to be, because the sheer quantity of stuff to buy just slapped me in the face and I broke down and started crying. (Chinese people actually loved that.) Brain is monkey custard now. The Paki hotspot downstairs doesn't really work, so I'm using the 3G card and it's wonderful. And I'll also post random stuff more randomly. B12 is legal here, by the way, stashing up is fantastic, I can now give people DNA tests just by looking at them. Not to mention Zen Revolution that I'll be pouring right onto my eyeballs. And we have a design festival here this week, which means we'll be basically rushing around from exhibitions to galleries all day long. All in all, mission of rock.
