Dutch to build £270bn fake mountain

The Netherlands is to spend 30 years and as much as £270 billion building a fake mountain to help the famously flat country become a winter sport superpower.

The idea came from a Dutch sports journalist called Thijs Zonneveld, who suggested in a tongue-in-cheek article that a man-made mountain should be built to help overcome the lack of decent hills in his homeland.

But his cheeky suggestion was taken seriously by Dutch architects' firm Hoffers and Kruger, who drew up plans for a 7,000ft mountain - that's twice the height of Snowdon, and far bigger than 4,409ft Ben Nevis.

The plans caught the imagination of the Dutch, and quickly received backing from the Dutch Ski Association, Dutch Climbing and Mountaineering Association and Royal Dutch Cycling Union.

Now, local authorities and several major corporations are getting involved in the idea, with sponsorship deals on the horizon that could help start the far-fetched plan on the road to fruition - and the man who had the original idea is delighted.

"This plan is serious," insisted Zoneeveld. "All kinds of big companies have now stepped in, various municipalities and investors are interested."

Source

Batman trailer

Amazing building collapse from the to-be-released Batman movie [It is only 1 second, 1.52- 1.53, long but worth watching].

Sketches [looking for inspiration...]

While looking for inspiration for my building, I started looking at robots...

Banksy unveils church abuse work

Street artist Banksy has installed a vandalised sculpture of a priest in a gallery in Liverpool.

source- http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-16184773

ITTA 1 representation essay abstract

The title of my essay I choose for the ITTA 1 is Game Architecture- use of game as an architectural representation.

I will be looking at various games visuals and create a relation with architectural representation. Above is the draft I am about to submit today.

Game Architecture

Came across this video whilst working on the abstract for my essay. The video is about looking/visualising a building, in this case Falling Water by Frank Lloyd Wight, through a game environment.

Project 2.3 sheets

A generated image of my proposed building from a user point of view.

Top view of the proposed building.

Building proposal

My animation for my proposed structure on my site.

Samsung Mobile Display produced a short Video (in Korean) showing a transparent, flexible 3D AMOLED display based tablet. This is obviously just a concept device, and it'll take years before they'll be able to commercialise something like that, but it's still cool:

source

Thought sketches

 

Was trying to put down some of my thoughts about the design of my building on paper...

First movie to be shot on a mobile phone

Olive is the first full length feature film shot completely on a smart phone. A 35 mm lens adapter was fabricated to fit the smart phone in order to achieve a shallow depth of field. The film stars two time Academy Award nominated actress Gena Rowlands (the Notebook, A Woman Under the Influence, Gloria). The film simply put is about a little girl that goes into the lives of three people — an old lonely woman, a foreigner having a hard time acclimating in the United States, and an obese man — and transforms their lives without saying one word!

The financing of Olive was done independently of any corporation. The goal now is to be the first film to not only be shot on a cell phone but to also be the first independently financed feature film on 2,000+ theaters across the United States without the backing of a Major Studio.

Source

Space carving

First trial at carving out the possible areas where the building could be accommodated.

Spacial and physical building possibilities

I started looking for spaces available [since my chosen location is quite limited] around my site on which my building [or parts of it] would be constructed and possibly enhance the lifestyle of the residents.

Urban Design Project_ Site further analysis

My site, situated in a world parallel to ours, is truoC amuP as they call it or Puma Court in english. The image above is of the site, flattened, to get a better understanding of what surrounds the alley.

Parallel Worlds

Parallel universe proof boosts time travel hopes! [click here]

video game urinals

Came across this article in the telegraph. The Exhibit pub in Balham has installed a urine controlled  video game [using the wii technology] in its toilets... fun times ahead....

source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/8916942/The-latest-in-Wii-technology-video-game-urinals.html

Site Drawings

Drawing shows the location of my chosen site.

A diagrammatic description of what surrounds the alley and the activities in the area.

Project 2.2_ Site analysis animation

Animation shows a visual analysis of life on my site, Puma Court, lying between Wilkes Street and Commercial Street.

Tesco's augmented reality

Tesco is running an augmented reality (AR) trial in six of its stores, giving shoppers a 3D look at products on sale but not found on shelves.

For the pilot, which kicked off on Wednesday, the retail giant has placed computers with webcams in store aisles in Tesco Extra supermarkets in Milton Keynes, Wembley, Borehamwood, Cheshunt, New Malden and Hatfield. Shoppers can hold a Tesco Direct catalogue page or Tesco Clubcard to the webcam to generate an image of a product, then manipulate the page or card to see different aspects of it.

"It is not often not practically possible to display, for example, the more than 180 televisions that sell in a store," a Tesco spokeswoman told ZDNet UK. "Through AR we are able to offer realistic and life-size representations of what that product will look like."

Tesco expects to run the trials to the end of the year, with weekly checks on how it is going. The in-store programme uses the same augmented reality tool provided on Tesco's website, with the technology provided by Kishino.

Source: http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/enterprise-apps/2011/11/18/peering-into-tescos-augmented-reality-40094457/

World's Lightest Material

Researchers have created a material that's so light it can rest comfortably on a dandelion seed head without disturbing the fluffy, delicate structure of the plant. The "ultralight metallic microlattice" invented by scientists at UC Irvine, HRL Laboratories, and Caltech is described in the Nov. 18 issue of Science.

The new material is 100 times lighter than styrofoam, according to reports. The secret to its lightness is a cellular architecture fabricated from hollow tubes that supports a material structure that is in reality 99.99 percent air, according to the research team that built it.

That means the material's density is less than one-thousandth that of water. And the stuff is pretty resilient as well—researchers said that when squashed to half its height, the material rebounds 98 percent of the way back.

"The trick is to fabricate a lattice of interconnected hollow tubes with a wall thickness 1,000 times thinner than a human hair," lead author Tobias Shandler of HRL said, according to the Los Angeles Times.

The material seen resting on a dandelion seed head in the picture above is 90 percent nickel, according to the Times, but Bill Carter, manager of the architected materials group at HRL, told the newspaper that it can be made out of other materials as well.

One UC Irvine researcher involved with the project suggested the ultra-lightweight material might be used for impact protection, and might have applications "in the aerospace industry, acoustic dampening, and maybe some battery applications," according to the Times.

The material behaves somewhat like a feather when dropped, floating to the ground, Carter told the paper.

"It takes more than 10 seconds, for instance, for the lightest material we've made to fall if you drop it from shoulder height," he said.

Source http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2396633,00.asp

Future of mobile phones

Concept mobile phone by Nokia: Virtual world embracing the physical. link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?nomobile=1&v=ZdeWK6G3p5U

Promising...

Virtual Overlay: a documentary on Spitalfields & Banglatown

Project 2.1

Images that follow are part of the log that explains the documentary, will be uploaded shortly... The film is the result of a group work with me and Neil as members [and information exchange between Georgina and Natasha].

Site, Spitalfields& Bangla Town in the borough of Tower Hamlets.

Progressing from mine and Neil's previous films, we decided to have a gaming look approach to the documentary as we both of our films contain the same gaming essence.

     

Close up of camera attached to Neil.

 

Mini storyboard of how we moved with the rig attached.

                                         
                                           Post production pages to show how film was made.

Short Film v2 explanation stills

Some stills from my 'exploring the grounds of Spitalfields' film:

The first scene pictures my shadow roaming the streets of Spitalfields in search of the ideal spot for the project.

Image shows the point at which the shadow intersects the body, the foot which carried the body for the search...

The realisation [and revelation] of the silhouette [my body] that the ideal location was the one which first caught my attention when I initially entered the site [alley]: the plant taking over the human dewelling.

Project 2.1_ Storyboard

The image shows the level 1 storyboard panels for our film, starting with an overall look at Tower Hamlets then zooming in onto the area in question: Commercial Street, Fournier Street and Brick Lane.

Project 2.1_ Chronogram

Group work project , me and Neil, on producing a mini documentary of Spitalfields. Initial idea was to  analyse the historical and social aspect of Commercial Street and Brick lane and provide contrast around the religious buildings.

Short Film v2

I played around with my short film to include some [After Effects] effects...  [Story] An introduction to the site whereby me and my shadow [as companion] explore the East London area to find a praiseworthy scene: a plant, slowly, taking over the facade of a human dwelling...

First trial at After Effects

Inspired from the After Effects tutorial we had on Wednesday, I decided to have a go at making my own 2.5D image...

My short film reworked

My initial film, being a bit lengthy, I decided to try and shorten it. On the reworked version of the film, I wanted to make it the starting point, almost like a trailer, for the films we are going to be making.

The film starts by showing my shadow with the texts, defining it, which is followed by a few 'shadow stunts' that occurs due to the various illuminations on site. The ending reveals the lower part of my body, point at which my shadow connects to it. The idea was to show this gradual connection from the lowest possible point of my body to the highest [to be featured in future films].

Initial short film

My first attempt at making a short film using Spitalfields as my area. I initially focused on 2 different aspects of the site, due to my 2 personas: the high vision [roof of buildings] and lower vision [that's of the ground and my shadow as character].

Real-Life 3rd Person View

Found this website about real-life gaming [third person] view the other day.

Throwable Panoramic Ball Camera

Amazing piece of technology! [Click on title]

Project 1.3 - TIMELINE

The timeline above depicts stills from my short film entitled, Stroll in Spitalfields. The idea behind the film was to show shots of the translated vision [high and low] of my personas [open and shy] through a camera lens whilst walking around the Christ Church in Spitalfields.

The image shows the camera movement, around the site, that collected footage for the film shows from 3 different angles.

A description of how I captured footage for the short film is shown in the drawing above.  For the scene of the first person view representing my open personality I attached my phone, the nokia N8, to my cap and walked around the area. As for my shy persona, I filmed the ground [translating the tendancy for low vision for that personality] and my shadow accentuating the different grounds it covered. The shadow also gave the video a different feel, almost virtual, similar to that of a video game [specially its positioning giving it the over-the-shoulder view you commonly now find in games].

Unit 15 on facebook

Project 1.3 - TIMELINE

As part of making the less than 2 minute film, I went to get some test footage at the site yesterday. The one above shows stills of the footage whilst wearing my camera, a Nokia N8, to my cap and walking round my site. Video showed me the hidden heights, views of buildings people are not accustomed to seeing, of the site.

Second walk I did was with the mobile phone filming the ground, catching my shadow on the various 'architectures' and man-made structures of the site, until it fades... Hopefully getting some nice shots tomorrow.

Project 1.2 MULTIPLICITY: ONE AND SEVERAL SPACES

Project 1.2 requires us [one of our personas] to find a site or a piece of architecture in Spitalfields, East London to use as a setting for our first video exercise.

The area and alleys [as shown in the image above] around the Christ Church is of interest to me. The church is of interest to my timid/shy persona. Being a gamer I am accustomed to seeing prominent sites, as the Church in this case, always featuring in games.

I want to create a game-like atmosphere to my video, possibly using game-like cinematics [such as the image of the Church above].

Project 1.1 Wings of Desire_Chronogram

The first project for this year is to map, chronogram, an extract of the movie 'Wings of Desire'. Image above shows my understanding of the camera movement[divided into 4 distinct scenes, first being at the bottom and last scene being at the top], movement of people, and sound associated to the clip. Height of the sound waves demonstrate the depth/height of the space of the scene.