I’m sure that by now people living in the United States know about the US Mint 50 State Quarter program by now. For those who haven’t used cash in a while I’ll fill you in on the rough details. The US Mints decided to add a little much needed variety to our currency. So, after having a nice long think about just how well the Sacajawea dollar coin did (it didn’t, it’s been universally declared a flop) they decided that celebrating each of the 50 US states would be a good thing. So far it’s working out rather well. People love them and are even collecting them. The program started in 1999 and the quarters are issued in 10 week cycles in order that the state joined the country. There is a lengthy process to decide the actual design of the coin but towards the end the states can put the finalists to a vote. The Arizona quarter is slated to be minted in mid 2008 and the five finalists are up for the popular vote. I figure that as everyone in America will be using them I don’t see why non-Arizonians shouldn’t be able to have a voice in selection. So have at it and see if your choice ends up in your pocket.
Author: John
Homeless James Bond
I wonder if he got his ’00’ by washing car windows with dirty newspapers…
(A big thanks to special agent Steven for this tip)
Clever Soylent Greeen Prank
This is just brilliant. I see a lot of clever things on the ‘Net but this one is funny as hell.
So here’s the deal. Soylent Green is people! Someone’s got to tell them. In this age of disposable prepackaged everything, we are getting further and further withdrawn from the actual sources of the products we consume on a daily basis. This is particularly what interested me about the prospects of putting my "additional labeling" on foodstuffs.
[via cockeyed]
the WAREHOUSE
Tiny R/C Star Wars R2-D2
Ooo, neat! A very tiny remote controlled R2D2 Astromech droid of your very own!
This R/C R2-D2 Action Figure is like a Star Wars fanboy’s wet dream come true. The size of a regular action figure, this tiny droid is fully controllable from the included lightsaber remote. Authentic R2-D2 sounds, turning head and red LED eye complete the package.
The lightsaber controller is a nice touch.
But all this begs a question. As this ‘toy’ only has one drive motor it’s not going to be doing any fancy moves. It’s limited to forward and turning while in reverse. Has anyone modded one of these for better movement? What about the old R2D2 model kit, has anyone built a little robot out of one of those?
3D Video Blogging the Next Big Thing?
Ok kids, grab your anaglyph (red/green) glasses and see if you think that this might be the ‘next big thing’ to hit the ‘Net.
What you are about to see is the product of two DV camcorders, a firewire interface and some nifty software. The nifty software is ‘Stereo Movie Maker’ and it’s free and quite handy for making all thing moving and stereo. The firewire cards and DV camcorders, well your on your own getting your hands on those. By the use of red/green glasses a 3D stereo effect is achieved. The sudden inclusion of depth in the moving image and impressive to say the least. I just wish there were more people doing this out there on the Interweb. You can see more examples of 3D vlogging on RogerTube’s YouTube page or better yet, go visit his web page for even more theory and application of this very interesting method. Enjoy!
New Breed of Stereoscopic Video Camera
This is a lovely video clip demonstrating the latest and greatest in 3D video technology from the mind of James Cameron. The system uses two high def cameras and a nice little parallax adjustment to create two images that are fused in the user’s head via polarizing glasses.
This should make this a wonderful camera if it ever become a standard production camera. The mass adoption of LCD screens in the home may make this rather tricky however. It’s common to use an alternating left right frame display coupled with LCD shutter glasses worn by the viewer. This is fine with old CRT tube TVs and monitors because of the way the images are ‘painted’ on the screen but it won’t work on LCD displays. I have no idea if it would work on a plasma or a DLP screen. Anyone know the answer to this?
I look forward to seeing the movie when it comes out, in an IMAX theater near you I should think. One extra note, it’s nice to see that I was on the right track with my own 3D video camera. I would ‘toe in’ the cameras when the subject would get near to mimic the way the human eyes deals with moving targets. Nice to see I’m on the right track.
[via uberreview]