Category: Technology

Making The Future Brighter For Film

Super 8

I saw this on Ektopia today.

If you’re into all things film you should check out Retrothing’s call for help in saving Super 8 from premature doom. Making the Future Brighter for Film. “Film is an endangered species; it’s estimated there are only 20,000 serious Super 8 shooters left. To raise the profile of the format and keep it alive, a German publisher is introducing small format, an English language version of their 50 year-old German moviemaking mag. To be successful, they apparently need 1000 subscribers. That’s a lot of people for such a small community.”

This is what you will get in the first issue of ‘Small Format’:

Take a look at our first issue: It’s got everything you want to know about the international Super-8 scene, new products, tips for better filming, tests, labs, film material, the history of camera brands, a collector’s marketplace, and portraits of interesting groups and films – worldwide. And it’s got stories on cameras, projectors, splicers, and covers details about every format: Super-8, Single-8, 8mm, 9.5mm, 16mm.

When was the last time you saw info on things like that in a magazine? Last time I saw it it was in old issues of ‘Cinemagic‘
Go have a look and support this fine film format.

Making The Future Brighter For Film

Super 8, film, magazines

Scribbler Programmable Robot

scribbler

I found this on MAKE today. Not as expandable as the Boe Bot, but then again it’s price tag is lower. From the photos on the Scribblerrobot main page it looks as if the micro controller is not socketed, that’s a pity because it means you can’t replace the Basic Stamp with it’s pin-for-pin compatible ( and much more powerful) rival, the Basic X-24 – one look at the other chips specs and you will see what I bring this up. Still, if you on a budget and just want a simple robot to use as a basic programming platform or you need robots for a classroom you could have a lot of fun with this. The down looking IR sensors could either follow a line (like for a race) or to keep the robot on a piece of paper (draw a black line on the edge of the paper ad use a light colored pen). Other features include:

* 3 photoresistor light sensor
* 2 Infrared object sensors
* 2 Infrared line detection sensors
* 2 independent DC motors
* Stall sensor
* Speaker with full range of notes
* 3 LED indicator lights

The Scribbler Robot kit includes:

* Fully assembled Scribbler Robot
* Programming Cable (serial)
* The Scribbler Robot Start-up Guide
* Scribbler Software and Documentation CD-ROM

Parallax to intro Scribbler programmable robot

The Scribblerrobot home page

robotics, Parallax, robotics

EckBox

Hacker
This is a future project for me. After hearing about Van Eck phreaking in high school (I think it was that far back) I have wanted to give it a try. I don’t have a real reason to do it other than to say that I did. Good enough. I just want to be able to see what my PC is displaying. I’ll have to get Linux up a running on a box first but that shouldn’t be a problem. Oh wait, my work bench is no more, a move to a tiny apartment took care of that for me. Hey, I have an idea, just click on the ‘donate’ button and send the TeamDroid site $5. All of it will go towards a new research center (bigger apartment). Once I have that I’ll have a place to build and review all sorts of cool stuff.
But I bet your still wondering what the hell this ‘Van Eck Phreaking’ thing is aren’t you? Well, think of your computer as a series of radio transmitters. You can pretty much think of all electronic devices as transmitters and receivers in some way or another actually. What a Van Eck rig lets you do is tune into the radio station in your computer that is coming from your video card. I think your seeing the idea here. Once you have all the timing right you should be able to see what is one someone else’s computer screen. Cool, eh? Sounds like a dandy cloak-and-dagger sort of thing that would be happening all over the place don’t it? Well, as will most things, the truth is that it’s hard to get it to work and when it does the results are sometimes not all that good. Van Eck Phreaking is also known my another name, TEMPEST – that was an old code word for a general electronic surveillance project back in the ’50’s and the name stuck.
Things like this are pretty much the reign of the NSA and cyberpunk authors, but if you have the time and will you can play with it yourself and if I get a larger work bench I’ll do the same.

EckBox – an Open Source van Eck Phreaker
AllYouEverWantedToKnowAboutTempest

hack, phreaking, Van Eck, project

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is On The Way

MRO

On Friday the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter lifted off on a seven month journey to the red planet on a mission to see if there is any evidence of water.
Once in place the orbiter will not only conduct sub surface mapping and weather surveys, but will also be acting as a communications and navigations link for future missions.
The cameras on board will be able to detect a dinner plate sized object on the surface in order to assist in future landing site selection. It will also be the first link in the ‘Interplanetary Internet’ system that will link other space missions in a more efficient manner.

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

space, science, NASA, JPL,
Mars

A Reader For My PDA That Works!

reader

Tonight I was looking to add a copy of the latest Cory Doctorow novel to my PDA. Doctorow’s site has versions of his book in just about every format you could ever want, go take a look – it’s positively impressive.
I figured I’d have an easy time finding a format that would work on my PDA but I was sadly mistaken. At first I tried an HTML file, figuring the built in Internet Explorer would be able to load it but it barfed and locked up. Then I tried the Microsoft Reader, you know the LIT files that all the DRM junkies just love? Well it loaded it just fine and looked great but informed me that it could no longer display the book after page 14. Somehow, that makes sense in a Microsoft sort of way. Looks great but screws you on performance.
I didn’t even bother with the PalmOS PRC file, my Mobilpocket reader is a pain to use.
And a Pocket Word document is out of the question, the batteries will run out before it would ever load.
After almost giving up and forgetting the whole thing I spotted the Fictionbook 2 format one and a new reader called Haali Reader. What the heck, I’ll give it a try. So I downloaded the book and reader and ran it on the PDA and bingo, instant book. No problems with memory issues and it looks great! I throw a 2.2MB text file at it half expecting to need to reset it and to my amazement it works. I poke through the settings and discover that I can rotate the text for horizontal reading, auto scrolling, and bunches of other stuff.
Take a gander at the list of features:

* Loads plain text and XML files. (There were rumours that Haali Reader can open Microsoft LIT files. This is not the case. LIT format is not supported and will never be supported.)
* Cyrillic encodings support with autodetection.
* Last viewed position in file is saved on exit.
* ClearType support.
* Any font/size can be selected.
* Fullscreen and landscape mode.
* Colors can be adjusted.
* Text search.
* Dictionary support. Tapping a word opens a translation window.
* Automatic hyphenation (russian language only).
* Table of contents and bookmarks
* Multiple columns support (1-4)
* PRC/PDB files support (plain text and XML only, HTML is not supported).
* Builtin ZIP archives support.
* Autoscroll (controlled from keyboard/buttons only, settings are in Options->Buttons).

If you have a PocketPC go grab a copy of Haali reader, you won’t regret it.

Haali Reader – a book reader for Windows CE

cool, windowsce, pocketpc, reader, PDA

Clavius Moon Base

Moon Base Clavius

I found this while researching my Abandoned Spaceship and Moon Buggies post – this is a must read site, if only for the ‘Why a Conspiracy’ page.

Moon Base Clavius is an organization of amateurs and professionals devoted to the Apollo program and its manned exploration of the moon. Our special mission is to debunk the so-called conspiracy theories that state such a landing may never have occurred.

Clavius Moon Base – debunking the moon hoax

conspiracy, debunk, hoax, moon