Moby music free for non-profit filmmakers

nino film reports: [edited]

Moby has released a set of 150 songs to be used for by filmmakers in their non-profit projects. Proceeds from commercial projects go directly to the Humane Society. The dedicated website mobygratis has been online since 2008.

All the videos need to be checked by Moby’s team, but according to him, they haven't said no to any production so far – and their feedback comes within 24 hours. They also encourage users to upload their videos to the site, so everyone can see them.
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The Secret Life of the Cat

BBC has published a fascinating mini-site which allows you to track a group of GPS-tagged cats studied in the village of Shamley Green, Surrey, for Horizon's programme The Secret Life of the Cat.

The Horizon team - aided by the Royal Veterinary College and Lincoln and Bristol Universities - tracked dozens of cats over several 24-hour periods using specially-designed collar GPS devices and tiny "cat cams".

The result? Scientists discovered the cats appeared to timeshare territory to avoid confrontation with neighbouring felines and visit each others houses. However, the cat cam footage also revealed squabbles over territory remained. There was also an incident with a fox and with a nest of fledglings.
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Windowseat Lounge

dornob reports: [edited]

A seat that loops over the head of the sitter provides a sense of enclosure and privacy in busy public environments like airports and hotel lobbies, or simply reduces distractions at home. ‘Windowseat Lounge’ by San Francisco design studio Mike & Maaike simply extends three ‘walls’ to create a room within a room.

Incorporating these architectural elements makes it easier for the sitter to shut out the hustle and bustle of the room just beyond their safe little refuge. The back is left open so you can easily lean back and peek out, maintaining a connection.

This unusual chair design would also fit right into offices with open plans, where it’s easy to feel very exposed. Closing yourself off in a private space to think or make a phone call is as easy as sitting down. The walls of the Windowseat Lounge muffle ambient noise.

Made of a steel frame upholstered in wool, Windowseat Lounge is available in four colors from the Haworth Collection.

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Cheetahs not as fast as we thought

New Scientist reports: [edited]

"Everyone thinks cheetahs run at incredibly high top speeds, over 60mph, but these measurements were made with imprecise speedometers," says Alan Wilson of The Royal Veterinary College at the University of London.

In the quest for better data, Wilson designed solar-powered collars with GPS trackers, accelerometers, gyroscopes and other bits of kit to get a snapshot of life on the savannah, and fitted them on three females and two males.

The fastest speed recorded was 58mph, but the team was surprised to find their cheetahs tended to run at a more moderate 34mph. What made them such good hunters was their ability to accelerate up to 3 metres per second and decelerate by 4 mps in a single stride. The muscle power required to generate this acceleration was four times what Usain Bolt used for his 100-metre world record.

"Cheetahs don't run particularly quickly," says Wilson. "Their success is more a matter of the manoeuvering and acceleration." The impala, gazelles and other animals they prey on are agile, and the final moments of a hunt are often played out with an intricate to-and-fro of footwork, rather than a flat-out race.
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The Psychology of Colour

Painters of Louisville has created a useful infographic illustrating the way colours can affect our moods.

PDF version available here.
------------

Sony PS4

techradar reports: [edited]

The PS4 will cost £349 when it goes on sale later this year.

Sony announced a number of PS4 games, including the 'Sony exclusive' Final Fantasy XV.

There will be no need for an online check-in, even for authentication purposes, unlike the 'every 24 hours' requirement of the Xbox One. The PS4 has no used game restrictions, and owners can lend a game to their friends, trade it in at retail or sell it.
------------

Apple WWDC, June 10, 2013

Apple has announced a slew of new products, including

- OS X Mavericks

- Upgraded MacBook Airs

- iOS 7

- iTunes Radio

- An all-new Mac Pro

For far more than you want/need to know, including an opportunity to watch the keynote address, click here.
------------

Nikon Coolpix A

Digital Photography Review have published a comparitive review of Nikon's £840 high-end APS-C compact against Ricoh's £600 GR

Conclusion snippets follow:

"Nikon has brought its mass-market expertise to make a camera that offers the same simplified interface and pleasant JPEGs that underpin its popular entry-level DSLRs."

"The Coolpix A JPEGs have the pleasant color response of the company's DSLRs, as well as offering the clever Active D-Lighting processing option for getting well-balance images straight out of the camera. Low light performance is also good."

"While many photographers will be very happy with it, a considerable portion of its thunder is stolen by the Ricoh GR - a camera that achieves the unusual trick of being a touch better in almost every respect while also being significantly cheaper."
------------

Xbox One - latest news...

The Register reports: [edited]

Microsoft has confirmed that Xbox fans' worst fears are at least partially true: Although the new Xbox One gaming console won't need an always-on internet connection, that connection had better be on pretty often or you can forget about gaming. And don't assume you'll be able to sell or trade your old games, either.

What that means is that while offline gaming is technically possible with the Xbox One – as an earlier leaked memo suggested it would be – it will only actually work as long as the console is able to phone home at least once per day.

While a persistent connection is not required, Xbox One is designed to verify if system, application or game updates are needed and to see if you have acquired new games, or resold, traded in, or given your game to a friend. Games that are designed to take advantage of the cloud may require a connection.

Although it will be possible to trade in, resell, or give away your disc-based games in some cases, and Redmond won't charge you any fees to do so, it's up to game publishers to decide whether it's allowed for their games – and how much it might cost.

Even giving games away is subject to approval. According to Microsoft, you'll only be able to give them to people who have been on your friends list for 30 days, and each game can only be given away in this fashion once. And even then, it's up to game publishers to enable the feature for their games.

Worse still, for now all of this is hypothetical. "Loaning or renting games won't be available at launch," Microsoft writes, "but we are exploring the possibilities with our partners."

image courtesy of Forbes
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Interval Training Infographic

Greatist has published a helpful infographic illustrating a range of interval training techniques.

For a print-friendly version click here
------------

MindWalker

New Scientist reports: [edited]

Two years ago, Antonio Melillo was in a car crash that completely severed his spinal cord. He has not been able to move or feel his legs since. And yet here I am, in a lab at the Santa Lucia Foundation hospital in Rome, Italy, watching him walk.

Melillo is one of the first people with lower limb paralysis to try out MindWalker – the world's first exoskeleton that aims to enable paralysed and locked-in people to walk using only their mind.

Five people have been involved in the clinical trial of MindWalker over the past eight weeks. The trial culminates this week with a review by the European Commission, which funded the work; the project has been carried out by a consortium of several major universities and companies.

After some tentative first steps, Melillo is looking more confident. He won't be swapping his wheelchair for a MindWalker just yet, but hopefully one day. "It's great finally being able to look people in the eye," he says.

Image courtesy of New Scientist
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Musguard

Core 77 reports: [edited]

The now-on-Kickstarter Musguard is a blade-like strip of polypropylene that is affixed to one's seat tube with a velcro strap, fixed in place at the seatstay bridge such that it sits almost directly above the rear wheel.

The Musguard is produced locally in Slovenia, and is not only removable and rollable but also recyclable as well:

Musguard is looking to reinvest some of their Kickstarter funding in developing a matching front fender. They surpassed the $10,000 funding goal within just a few days of launching their campaign about two weeks ago.
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Adobe Kuler for iOS

Adobe reports:

Kuler lets you capture colour inspiration anywhere you find it. Capture colorus from a mural, garden, or wherever you happen to be with a snap of your iPhone camera. Browse, create, and customize themes for your designs – all on your phone.

The color themes you create with the Kuler app can be synced to the Kuler website, an online community for colour enthusiasts, for use with other Adobe applications such as Illustrator and Adobe Ideas.

Whether you’re a designer, artist, developer, hobbyist, craft maker, or just somebody who loves colour, Kuler will transform your phone into the ultimate color inspiration tool.

- Choose and adjust your colour themes with the colour wheel

- Edit your colors using RGB color sliders

- Five pre-set colour moods in camera mode, such as colorful and muted

- Six pre-set colour rules in the colour wheel, such as monochromatic and complementary

- Set the base colour to quickly identify other colours that will work well with together
------------

Printable Papers

Doing what it says on the homepage, a site that hosts PDFs (some customisable) that allow you to print out a wide range of page grids.
------------

Scientific 7-Minute Workout Video

LifeHack reports: [edited]

News about the 'Scientific 7-Minute Workout' has been buzzing around the web for the last month.

The workout was developed by The Human Performance Institute and requires only resistance from body weight, so you don’t have to purchase any fancy exercise equipment or visit a gym to get in shape. The downside is that the 7-minute workout explanations from Institute and The Times only featured descriptions of the exercises paired with pictures or illustrations -something hard to base an exercise routine on if you’ve never actually done these workouts before.

Fortunately, we are here to help and have created a video of the 7-minute workout so you can see exactly what goes into the routine before you try the famous 7-minute workout for yourself and, when you do try it, this video can help you keep track of the exercises and your time.
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London, Nottingham, Lincoln, London - 25-05-13

London to Nottingham
Sigh’s Smell Of Farewell - Cocteau Twins
Thank You Girl - John Hiatt
September Night - Van Morrison
Married to a Lazy Lover - The Auteurs
Streams From The Fountain - Kevin Prosch
Jump - Paul Anka
Oh, To Be Back With You - Steve Forbert
I Want A Little Sugar In My Bowl - Nina Simone
I Think I'll Disappear Now - Crash Test Dummies
Words With The Shaman Pt. 1 Ancient Evening - David Sylvian
Chemo Limo - Regina Spektor
Man Gave Names To All The Animals - Bob Dylan
Your Lucky Day In Hell - Eels
Bridge Over Troubled Water - Elvis Presley
Good-Bye To Carolina - Lyle Lovett
Distant Sun (live) - Crowded House
Wrapped in Grey - XTC
Rock & Roll Heaven's Gate - Indigo Girls
Take These Chains From My Heart - Hank Williams
Nasty Dan - Johnny Cash
Help Me Somebody - Brian Eno & David Byrne
My Head Is My Only House Unless It Rains - Captain Beefheart
Violin - They Might Be Giants (TMBG)
Wings - Josh Ritter
The Same Old Rock - Roy Harper With Jimmy Page
Hang On Every Word - Vigilantes Of Love
Livin' In A House Full Of Love - Glen Campbell
Sunshine After The Rain - Elkie Brooks
Honey Child What Can I Do? - Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan
The Wind Cries Mary - Sting
Sad About Girls - Elvis Costello & The Attractions
Homecoming / The Death Of St. Jimmy / East 12th St. / Nobody Likes You / Rock And Roll Girlfriend / We're Coming Home Again - Green Day
Rebel Without A Pause - Public Enemy
Window Wide Open - Scritti Politti

Nottingham to Lincoln
L'Americano - The Gypsy Queens Feat. Madeleine Peyroux
Fire - Kasabian
Super Freak (Part 1) - Rick James
Such Great Heights - The Postal Service
Down In Mexico - The Coasters
I Love You Always Forever - Donna Lewis
Parklife - Blur
Three Small Words (Movie Theme Song) - Josie and the Pussycats
Human - Daughter
Breakout - Swing Out Sister
I'm Beginning to Think You Prefer Beverley Hills 90210 to Me - Fight Like Apes
Reptilia - The Strokes
Big Girls Don't Cry - Frankie Valli And The Four Seasons
TVC 15 - David Bowie
Get Lucky [ft. Pharrell Williams] - Daft Punk
(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher And Higher - Jackie Wilson
Moves Like Jagger (feat. Christina Aguilera) - Maroon 5
Mountain Sound - Of Monsters and Men
Helena Beat - Foster the People
Diane Young - Vampire Weekend

Lincoln to London
Do You Believe In Magic - The Lovin' Spoonful
Only Imagine This City - DJ Schmolli
Who Loves You - Frankie Valli And The Four Seasons
Float On - Modest Mouse
Whiskey In The Jar - Metallica
Half Moon Street - Pete and the Pirates
The Boys of Summer - DJ Sammy
That's Alright - Laura Mvula
Shoot the Runner - Kasabian
Zing! Went The Strings Of My Heart - The Coasters
Bottle Rocket - The Go! Team
The American - Simple Minds
Policy Of Prutataaa - DJ Schmolli
Never Wanted Your Love - She & Him
Where Do You Go to (My Lovely) - Peter Sarstedt
Get Dancin' - Disco Tex & The Sex-O-Lettes
A Taste of Honey - Herb Alpert
The Jean Genie - David Bowie
Dashboard - Modest Mouse
Hooked On A Feeling - B.J.Thomas
While We're In Love feat. Ghost Beach - Viceroy
There Are Bad Times Just Around the Corner - Noel Coward
Chelsea Girl - Simple Minds
Respect - Otis Redding
Gudbye T'Jane - Slade
Chop Suey - System Of A Down
GMF (feat. Sinéad O'Connor) - John Grant
Rock On - David Essex
Lady Like - The Coasters
Want You In My Soul (daft punk mix) - Stee Downes
Feel Good Inc (Single Edit) - Gorillaz
Do I Love You (Indeed I Do) (bootleg?) - Frank Wilson
Silence (single) - Delerium
Burst - The Darling Buds
Charlie Brown - The Coasters
I've Been Thinking about you - London Beat
(There's) Always Something There To Remind Me - Sandie Shaw
She Will - Savages
Fighter [Sped Up] - Christina Aguilera (mix by djbj)
It's Better To Have (And Don't Need) - Don Convay
Generator - The Holloways
Tiger Feet - Mud
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Free FontFont Fonts

25 in total, Motter Festival and Fancy Writing being my personal favourites, available from their Pinterest site.
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Photography Infographics

Designzzz has curated a useful range of photography infographics.
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Why 3D Printing is Overhyped

Gizmodo has published an excellent article on the current limitations of 3D printing. The whole article is worth reading, but for the time/attention deficient, snippets follow:

"The main issue lies with raised expectations, build quality, price and usability."

"3D printed parts are not as strong as traditionally-manufactured parts.In something like injection moulding, you have a very even strength across the part, as the material is of a relatively consistent material structure. In 3D printing, you are building it in layers — this means that it has laminate weaknesses as the layers don’t bond as well in the Z axis as they do in the X and Y plane."

"Surface finish: People hear you can print in plastic, so they visualise a plastic item [that is] glossy and smooth. They don’t visualise a matt finish with rough layer lines all over."

"Cost is based on material used, so big things are expensive, and small things are cheap. That’s it. There is no economy of scale, so if one item is $1, a thousand items are $1000. Producing anything in bulk that is bigger than your fist is a waste of time."

"Items regularly take hours to print, even days. The notion of ‘but it’ll get faster in the future’ is not necessarily true, as we are limited by the chemical properties of materials such as ABS and PLY — these materials can only be extruded so fast, and at such a rate before you start to destroy the properties of the part."

"To print something, you need a CAD model. Getting that is hard. Really hard. When you write a letter, you don’t just click ‘print,’ do you? You have to actually type it and check it for mistakes. Now this is the same for 3D printing, but a million items harder."

"A great analogy I once read was the comparison of 3D printers to the bread making machine. In the '90s, bread makers suddenly became affordable and everyone got one; they then went and spent $4-7 on the ingredients. They followed the instructions and left the bread cooking overnight. In the morning they came down to the wonderful smell of freshly cooked bread. They smugly sat eating their bread thinking "this is the best loaf of bread ever". Two weeks later the bread machine is in the cupboard and they’ve gone back to buying their carbs from the shop. I’d say that 99 per cent of the population would rather go out and buy a loaf of bread for $1, rather than making one for $3, despite it being more rewarding."

"3D printing will continue to grow in areas like the prototyping market, low-volume production runs (on very high-end machines), medical, aerospace — the list goes on. But as an everyday household object? I’m not convinced."
------------

Pixelmator 2.2

9to5Mac has published a review of one of the best budget (£10.50) Mac image editors.

Snippets follow:

"Pixelmator 2.2 focuses heavily on shapes and vector drawing options. The new Shape Style palette lets you set and tweak a variety of different settings on your shape. From the Shape Styles palette, you can edit properties such as fill and stroke colors, stroke size, drop shadow, inner shadow, and more."

"Any text, from full sentences to individual letters, can be turned into a shape, making it much easier than before to work with fonts and type. Once you’ve turned text into a shape, all of the same shape style properties that are applicable to normal shapes are available to your text shape as well, meaning it’s now really simple to create great looking, stylized type, right in Pixelmator."

"Pixelmator 2.2 gains a new retro Light Leak Effect, which contains 8 customizable Light Leaks, each offering a unique look and sliders for adjusting the intensity.These new effects are great for pictures that you want to a retro feel."

"Pixelmator 2.2 includes many other small tweaks, including an improved Type Tool, new gradient presets, improved Drawing Toools, the ability to copy a shape’s style to another shape, as well as some much welcomed performance improvements."
------------

Adobe Project Mighty

core77 reports: [edited]

The Adobe Mighty Pen is designed for sketching on tablets. The screen can distinguish between the pen's nib and your mitts, so you can draw with the pen, then erase with your finger. No more having to click a submenu to change the tool. And when you do need a submenu, you click a button on the pen itself to make it appear on-screen.

The second device is the pen's Napoleon Ruler. Adobe's VP of Product Experience Michael Gough was trained as an architect, and wanted to bring the efficacy of sketching with a secondary guiding tool to the tablet experience.

The pen and ruler are not available yet, and no release date has been given.

For a video demonstration, see below.


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Grenade Reload Protein Flapjack (Chocolate Browning)

Protein bars have three things in common. They possess daft names, upset your stomach and taste dreadful. The featured bar stays true to the first, but (for me at least) escapes the second and third.

The consistency is dry, chewy, not-too-sweet and with a pleasant mouth-feel and after-taste. The 70 gramme bar contains 280 calories, similar to a Kit Kat Chunky or a 45 gramme chocolate bar. However you get 14 more grammes of protein and a much slower release of sugars, helping to stabilise your insulin levels. One thing to note, if you're intolerant to oligofructose products, you should avoid these bars.

There are other flavours available, but I haven't tried them.

For those who study these things, nutritional details follow:

Energy: 279 Calories
Protein: 15.5 grammes
Carbohydrates: 32.4 grammes
Sugar: 18.9 grammes
Total Fats: 9.9 grammes
Of Which Saturates: 2.9 grammes
Dietary Fibre: 11.7 grammes
Sodium: 0.1 grammes
Salt: 0.4 grammes

Ingredients: Oat Blend (Jumbo Oats, Rolled Oats, Oat Bran) (34%), Oligofructose, Protein Blend (Soy Protein Isolate, Defatted Soya Flour, Whey Protein Concentrate, Casein Protein), Invert Syrup, Rapeseed Oil, (Vegetable Oil, Water, Emulsifier (E471)), Dark Chocolate Pieces (4.3%) (Sugar, Cocoa Mass, Cocoa Butter, Vegetable Fat, Soya Lecithin), Fat Reduced Cocoa Powder (2.8%), Natural Flavour.

Price: £24.99 for a box of 24

Thanks to Zak Jordan for the heads-up
------------

Sony Xperia ZR

The Verge reports: [edited]

Sony has unveiled a new variant of its flagship Android smartphone, launching the LTE-enabled Xperia ZR with enhanced waterproofing for use at depths of up to 1.5 meters. The Xperia ZR is a mid-range smartphone and ships with a slightly smaller 4.6-inch display than the Xperia Z. While the device utilizes Sony's Reality Display technology, it only features a 720p panel.

The Xperia ZR still offers plenty of power with its 1.5GHz S4 Pro quad-core processor and 2GB of RAM, with Android 4.1. The device also includes the same 13-megapixel sensor as the Xperia Z, and with an IP55/IP58 Ingress Protection rating, offers slightly improved water resistance compared to its bigger counterpart. Sony says the Xperia ZR will launch in "various global markets" in Q2 but has yet to set a price.
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€250,000 test-tube burger served soon in London

The Verge reports: [edited]

A hamburger created from bovine stem cells will soon be served in London. The €250,000 (roughly $325,000) burger is the result of years of research led by Dr. Mark Post in the Netherlands, who hopes to show the world that so-called "in-vitro meat" could become a viable food source.

The burger was crafted using cells from the neck of a slaughterhouse cow and techniques developed for the creation of organs. Stem cells have the ability to turn into a multitude of other cells, including the muscle cells needed for the burger meat. Dr. Post's team used tens of billions of muscle cells to create 20,000 thin strips of cultured muscle tissue, which amount to a quarter-pounder. Although his in-vitro burger has no fat, Dr. Post assures The New York Times that it tastes "reasonably good."

In the future, Dr. Post believes the cost of in-vitro meats will come down significantly, but admits there are major hurdles that will have to be solved by the scientific community before the mass production of meat could start. One hurdle isn't scientific, but cultural: persuading society that meat grown in a lab is safe to eat is a tall order.
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Olympus E-P5, Video Review

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London-Nottingham-London

London - Nottingham
Analogue - a-ha
Blood Red Roses - Sting
Big River - Johnny Cash
Aftermath - Vigilantes Of Love
Midas Shadow - Al Stewart
Ugly Guys With Beautiful Girls - Sparks
Chain Gang - Sam Cooke
The Liberation (Red, Black & Green) - Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson
If You Go Away - Dusty Springfield
A Letter To Heaven - Wynona Carr
Why Get Up? - Robert Palmer
I Come And Stand At Every Door - This Mortal Coil
Cry, Cry, Cry [Live] - Elvis Costello & The Attractions
Parting Shot - Vigilantes Of Love
Avalanche - Vigilantes Of Love
Dizzy Dean Movie - Charlie Peacock
Cannibals Hymn - Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds
Abbey Road (entire album) - The Beatles
Perfect Stranger - Steve Forbert
Get Off Of My Cloud - The Rolling Stones
Lucille - Little Richard
Liar [2011 Remaster] - Queen
Available Space - Ry Cooder
Ms. Jackson (live) - Outkast
Miracle Of The Rosary - Elvis Presley
The Valley Of Malls - Fountains Of Wayne
Gun Shy (live) - Natalie Merchant
True Love - Elvis Presley
Good On the Sally Army - Cliff Richard
Rock Island Line (alt 2) - Johnny Cash
Crown of Thorns - Yngwie Malmsteen
For A While - Nina Simone
Afraid To Fail - Josh Rouse

Nottingham - London
6 Music - Sasha's Dance Mix
Spin On A Red Brick Floor - Nanci Griffith
Life On Mars? - David Bowie
Our House (Stretch Mix) - Madness
Mind Games - John Lennon
Girl In Saskatoon [Album Version] - Johnny Cash
Go (up) - Moby
Life In The Fast Lane (live) - Eagles
Life's Been Good (live) - Eagles
Democracy - Leonard Cohen
Words Of Love Spoken - Vigilantes Of Love
Wobbling - Victoria Williams
Front Porch - Slobberbone
Cinderella Man - Eminem
I'm Looking Through You - The Beatles
On Coming From A Broken Home (Pt. 1) - Gil Scott-Heron
Just - Radiohead
Why So Close - James
The Painter's Link - Kate Bush
Boots Of Spanish Leather (alt) - Bob Dylan
Furry Sings The Blues - Joni Mitchell
Seven - James
A Million Days - Prince
I Think Ur A Contra - Vampire Weekend
------------

The Scientific 7-Minute Workout

The New York Times reports: [edited]

An article in the May-June issue of the American College of Sports Medicine’s Health & Fitness Journal does just that. In 12 exercises deploying only body weight, a chair and a wall, it fulfills the latest mandates for high-intensity effort, which essentially combines a long run and a visit to the weight room into about seven minutes of steady discomfort — all of it (allegedly, Ed.) based on science.

“There’s very good evidence” that high-intensity interval training provides “many of the fitness benefits of prolonged endurance training but in much less time,” says Chris Jordan, the director of exercise physiology at the Human Performance Institute in Orlando, Fla., and co-author of the new article.

Work by scientists at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, and other institutions shows, for instance, that even a few minutes of training at an intensity approaching your maximum capacity produces molecular changes within muscles comparable to those of several hours of running or bike riding.

Interval training, though, requires intervals; the extremely intense activity must be intermingled with brief periods of recovery. In the program outlined by Mr. Jordan and his colleagues, this recovery is provided in part by a 10-second rest between exercises. But even more, he says, it’s accomplished by alternating an exercise that emphasizes the large muscles in the upper body with those in the lower body. During the intermezzo, the unexercised muscles have a moment to, metaphorically, catch their breath, which makes the order of the exercises important.

The exercises should be performed in rapid succession, allowing 30 seconds for each, while, throughout, the intensity hovers at about an 8 on a discomfort scale of 1 to 10, Mr. Jordan says. Those seven minutes should be, in a word, unpleasant. The upside is, after seven minutes, you’re done.

The original article is available here, complete including a link to a PDF describing how to perform the exercises.
------------

Free Font - Clutchee

A decorative block face, designed by Sinisa Komlenic.

Available from Font Squirrel.
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AL13 iPhone case

ZDNet reports: [edited]

The AL13, referring to the abbreviation for aluminum in the periodic table and the fact the case weighs 13 grams, the product has the same brushed metal look as the iPhone 5. It's available for the iPhone 4/4S and iPhone 5, in five colors —black, silver, red, blue, and gunmetal. It's half the weight of most other metal iPhone cases, doesn't require any tools to install, and has a shock-absorbing rubber lining inside the metal.

The AL13 sells for $79. It is undoubtedly a premium product. But, for those who want the best case that money can buy to suit up with an iPhone, then you'll be hard pressed to find a better alternative than the AL13.
------------

Specialized Turbo

Wired reports: [edited]

The Specialized Turbo is their first electrically assisted bike. It’s been on sale in Europe for a year.

“Turbo” is an appropriate name for this rig. With a 342 watt-hour lithium-ion battery pack sending juice to a 250-watt hub-mounted motor, this e-bike will hit its top speed without breaking a sweat. It’s also the first electric bike that doesn’t look like a grade-school science experiment or a rejected Blade Runner prop.

This is among the few electric bikes that actually looks like a bike. It’s an odd blend of mountain bike ruggedness and city bike ergonomics. It’s sized like a 29er, but the lack of any suspension combined with the stiff tires that look like over-inflated tubes make it strictly something for the street. And be prepared to use your legs as buffers when going over ruts and uneven asphalt.

This thing is huge. The downtube, which holds the battery, is about the size of a softball bat, and every other tube had to be similarly oversized to maintain some semblance of visual balance. And although the frame is made of aluminum, the Turbo tips the scales at more than 50 pounds. You’ll feel every ounce of it as you huff and puff along without the electric assist and, worse, as you schlep it up and down the stairs to the train. Shouldering this thing is quite a workout, and will leave you with more than a few bruises and aching muscles if you aren’t careful.

Flip the motor to its highest of four settings — called, appropriately, “turbo” — using the red button near your right thumb and this thing flies. It’s like a tailwind on demand, providing superhuman boost that has you over the 20 mph mark in seconds.

The instantaneous speed is a blessing and a curse. While it’s crazy fun while riding, you must keep that hair-trigger acceleration in mind when stopped. Apply the slightest bit of weight to the pedal and the Turbo rockets forward beneath you. It’s best to hold the front brake when stopped.

If unfettered speed isn’t your thing, Eco mode drops the assist down to 30 percent of capacity to maximize range. “Off” is self-explanatory, and useful only if you really want to build up your quads. “Regen” applies a little drag to the rear motor while coasting to send power back to the pack. The pack is good for 45 minutes to an hour of moderate to high-speed riding.

Price: $5,900
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Joby Grip Tight Micro Stand

Digital Photography Review Connect reports: [edited]

The Grip Tight Micro Stand is small enough to carry it in your jeans pocket or even use as a key fob. Yet it's a nicely made and sturdy mini-tripod that firmly holds your smartphone in place and allows you to easily adjust the shooting angle.

The Grip Tight Micro Stand is two products. The Grip Tight is a foldable spring-loaded smartphone holder that screws on to any standard size tripod mount. The Micro Stand is a foldable micro-tripod that can be combined with the Grip Tight but also works well with compact cameras. The mount's socket joint is stiff enough to even hold larger models, such as a Micro Four Thirds camera with a kit lens.

It works well as a table tripod but doubles as a smartphone stand for watching videos or conducting Skype calls.

Price £25.00
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Google Glass - A 60 second introduction

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Nikon D7100

Digital Photography Review has published a very positive (85%/Gold Award) in depth review of Nikon's 24MP 'enthusiast' APS-C DSLR.

Edited snippets from the conclusion follow:

"The D7100 is a fast, responsive camera in most operational aspects. Most impressive though is just how many features it shares with its higher-priced full frame siblings. The D7100 one-ups its Nikon stablemates with an RGBW rear LCD which offers more efficient operation and gives the option for greater brightness than an RGB panel.

"The D7100 delivers outstanding image quality and detail rendition at low ISOs in both JPEG and Raw mode. Noise does start to become visible at the pixel level even at moderate ISO sensitivities, but is kept well under control given the pixel density of its 24MP APS-C sensor."

"The camera's auto white balance does a fine job of rendering accurate colors in all but the more extreme lighting conditions. We also find that the camera's default JPEG settings produce pleasing files that avoid prominent sharpening and/or noise suppression artifacts."

The D7100 maintains nearly every operational and handling feature we liked about the D7000, improves upon those we found fault with and offers a compelling upgrade in resolution, image quality and high ISO performance. And at a list price of £999 (body only), the D7100 inherits an impressive amount of features and performance from the much higher-priced full frame Nikon DSLRs.
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Behind the Scenes of The Empire Strikes Back

Some brilliant images here.

via Daring Fireball
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GoComics

Comics Alliance reports: [edited]

Universal Uclick's GoComics has launched a free app that enables you to read many classic comic strips on your tablet and phone for free, including Peanuts, Doonesbury, Garfield and The Boondocks.

The most notable inclusion may be Calvin and Hobbes, marking the first time the entire archive of the legendary strip have been legally available to read on your phone.

The app offers users '20 years of back issues of comic strips', and allows them to bookmark their favorites and share them with friends via email, text, and social media, including Twitter and Facebook.
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Nitecore Tiny Monster TM26

GizMag reports: [edited]

Nitecore’s new Tiny Monster TM26 is billed as the world’s smallest 3,500-lumen flashlight.

The hard-anodized aluminum-bodied TM26 utilizes four Cree XM-L LEDs. These are protected by coated mineral glass lenses and powered by four 18650 or eight CR123 rechargeable lithium-ion batteries. Those batteries are charged via an AC adapter that plugs directly into the flashlight.

You can switch between eight brightness levels – along with other modes – via a single multi-function switch. An OLED display indicates level of brightness, battery status, battery voltage, approximate run time remaining and operating temperature.

If the four 18650s are used it can reportedly put out 3,500 lumens for 45 minutes. It has a beam distance of 415 meters. The flashlight is waterproof to two meters.

The Nitecore Tiny Monster TM26 is available for £209 from Amazon.
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Solar Impulse

New Scientist reports: [edited]

A solar-powered aircraft has this week been plying the skies around Moffett Field in San Francisco, California, as its inventors rehearse for their next ambitious move: a coast-to-coast sunshine-fuelled flight across the US.

The latest design of the 80-metre-wingspan plane, which has 12,000 photovoltaic cells peppered all over its wings and tailplane, charges batteries that power four electric motors. It manages a speed of just 64 kilometres per hour so, although it can stay aloft for 36 hours, it cannot manage the coast-to-coast trip in one hop. It will stop over a number of times: at Phoenix, Arizona; at Dallas, Texas; at St Louis, Missouri (or Atlanta, Georgia); and at Washington DC en route to New York City.

Weather permitting, the coast-to-coast attempt should depart from Moffett Field on 1 May - with a round-the-world attempt slated for 2015.

Image: J. Revillard/Solar Impulse
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iBeetle

Mactrast reports: [edited]

European car manufacturer Volkswagen is introducing an all-new version of the Beetle, designed specifically with Apple users in mind. Dubbed the iBeetle, the car offers an integrated iPhone dock. It also features a specialized app used to control certain functions of the vehicle, deliver oil and coolant temperatures, provide diagnostic information, and more.

The iBeetle app will also offer features such as a g-force meter, a compass, a chronometer, and a special Trainer mode which can compare driving times, and help you make the most of your fuel economy.

The iBeetle will be available starting in early 2014, and pre-orders will begin this October.
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Zero DS

Wired has published a full and very favourable review reports: [edited] of Zero's leccy motorcycle.

Excerpts follow:

"The Zero DS is a true motorcycle, not just a scooter with sport bike pretensions. Going from a standstill to 60 mph takes a tick over five seconds, and high-end torque slings the bike through on-ramps with aplomb. The Zero has the power to inspire that smirk of speed euphoria I crave from a bike."

"The motor’s capabilities are akin to a 600cc sport bike, with 54 horsepower and 68 pound-feet of torque motivating the 400-pound Zero DS. In Sport mode, speed maxes out at 95 mph. Eco mode reduces torque to 70 percent of capacity and limits the top speed to 70 mph, but both numbers are adjustable. For range, you’ve got two options: 95 miles of city driving on the base model ($14,000) with an 8.5 kWh battery, or 126 miles on model with the 11.4 kWh battery, an option which adds $2,000 to the price. Riding at an average of 55 mph on the freeway knocks those numbers down to 57 and 76 miles of travel, respectively."

"As a two-wheeled electric vehicle, the Zero DS is perfect. The engineering has accounted for everything important in a transportation vehicle. Riding the Zero, you think, this is how a civilized society should move about."
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New Battery Technology

Mashable reports: [edited]

Scientists claim they have made a giant leap in power storage, giving lithium-ion batteries 30 times more power and the ability to recharge 1,000 times faster "than competing technologies."

The team at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, headed up by Professor William King, wrote about the technology in the April 16 issue of Nature Communications. The batteries are so powerful, King says you could use the power storage device in your cellphone to jumpstart your car battery.

The secret is extreme miniaturization of the conventional elements of traditional batteries, the anode and the cathode. Assembling these in a 3D microstructure, the researchers have developed what their press release says is "a new way to integrate the two components at the microscale to make a complete battery with superior performance."
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Google Glass, erm, specs and API released

The Register reports: [edited]

The 'Google Glass Explorer Edition' (for those who pre-paid $1,500 for it last year) is rolling off the production line, and an application programming interface (API) guide and management software for the headgear is available.

Each set comes with a 16:9 640x360 pixel screen over the right eye that Google says will look the same as a 25-inch high screen seen from eight feet away. It has 16GB of flash (12 usable), a five megapixel camera capable of 720p video, Bluetooth and 802.11b/g Wi-Fi. Sound is transmitted via bone conductivity from the arms of the headset.

Google estimates that the glasses will have a day's battery life (each set comes with a MicroUSB charger), although it warns that Google Hangouts and video recording can cause a big drain.
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Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH3

Digital Photography Review has published a full review of Panasonic's Micro Four Third flagship.

Snippets from the conclusion follow:

"In terms of Raw capability the images it produces are sharp and have reasonably low noise levels. There's not a tremendous amount of additional dynamic range to be had out of the files, but they're reasonable malleable. The JPEG noise reduction isn't quite as impressive - with higher ISO images losing all their fine detail."

"Anyone who found the OM-D's handling too fiddly will love the GH3's substantial grip, while its magnesium-alloy build strikes a good balance between offering a feeling of solidity, without adding excessive weight."

"The GH3 has some of the most comprehensive wireless control we've yet seen on a camera of this type, with full control over exposure, focus and the majority of camera settings. Wi-Fi can also be used to automatically download files to your computer or upload them to the web."

"The Panasonic GH3 is the new standard bearer for video on a consumer stills camera. At the time of writing no other camera at a similar price point offers so much for video shooters and filmmakers. Whilst the Nikon D5200 / D7100 and Canon 5D Mark III perform better in low light, neither have the range of video features and frame rates the GH3 offers for $1299 - nor quite the crispness of detail at 1080p."

"For us the GH3's stills capabilities, while good, are not enough to make it stand out - Olympus' more compact E-M5 produces nicer JPEGs, while the likes of Nikon's D7100 offer an edge in stills image quality."
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£10,000,000 iPhone 5

stuarthughes.com reports: [edited]

This handset (commissioned by a  Chinese businessman) took 9 weeks of intricate work to re-create the original chassis of the iPhone 5 in solid gold, including a flawless black single deep cut diamond weighing in at 26 cts to replace the home button.

The chassis was inlaid with a circa of 600 white flawless diamonds with full gold dressing for the rear section with the logo in solid gold with 53 flawless diamonds. It boasts 135 grams of 24ct gold and a sapphire glass screen.
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Samsung NX1100

Digital Photography Review reports: [edited]

Priced at $599.99, the camera is available now in black or white and comes with a copy of Adobe Photoshop Lightroom. In common with its predecessor, the NX1000, it includes 8fps continuous shooting, a 3-inch/921k-dot rear display and Full HD video recording. The only significant change is the Autoshare feature that automatically sends full resolution images and videos to mobile devices over Wi-Fi. There is currently no information about a European release.
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Status Board for iPad

Status Board is an app that groups a number of useful data streams on to an 'at-a-glance' panel on your iPad.

At £6.99 it isn't cheap (by app standards at least), but I've been using it for a couple of days now, and I like it a lot.

It allows me to have the time/date, weather and my email, newsfeeds and twitter messages in plain view at all times. The panels can be moved/resized/deleted. And there are customisable widgets which allow you to channel your own data to the panel.

For more information, visit Panic.
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Crucial 1TB SSD prices drop to 62 cents per GB

ars technica reports: [edited]

The 2.5-inch M500 SATA III SSDs use 20nm MLC NAND sourced from Micron along with a Micron-provided SSD controller. Performance for the M500 drives is what you'd expect from a drive in this class: sequential read and write speeds of 500MB per second and 400MB per second.

The M500 is available in standard pedestrian capacities of 120GB and 240GB, as well as a large capacity of 480GB, but the top-end SKU is the exciting one: 960GB for just $599.99 (62¢ per raw GB). The MSRPs for the smaller capacities are $129.99 for the 120GB (about $1 per raw GB), $219.99 for the 240GB (about 91¢ per raw GB), and $399.99 for the 480GB (about 83¢ per raw GB).

Crucial's M4 has a good reputation for reliability, avoiding a lot of the pitfalls and blowouts that have plagued its competition (like the much-lamented OCZ Vertex lines).
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Panasonic Lumix DMC-GF6

Digital Photography Review reports: [edited]

Panasonic has announced the Lumix DMC-GF6 - a 16MP entry-level mirrorless camera with Wi-Fi. Like many of its competitors it has a capacitive touchscreen, that can tilt both downwards and upwards to face forwards for self-portraits.

It gains a compact-camera style zoom lever around the shutter release that can alternatively be used to set exposure compensation, and an exposure mode dial on the top plate. It's also the first interchangeable lens camera with Near Field Communication (NFC) that allows setup of Wi-Fi connections with compatible smartphones and tablets, simply by tapping the devices together.

For a hands-on preview, click here
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Cover Disasters

Where Magazine is published by Morris Visitor Publications. Like many publications, they occlude part of the title with a 'cutout' of the main image. These two covers are good examples of why you should be very careful which areas of type you exclude.
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Polar Bear Ice Tray

black+blum reports: [edited]

A polar bear that lives in your freezer... how cool is that? Simple to fill, easy to load into your freezer and to decant individual cubes without having to touch the ice. Because it is sealed, it stops the ice from absorbing the odours and crumbs of other foods in your freezer.

Price: £9.99 (free shipping in the UK)
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Solar panels becoming viable?

The Verge reports: [edited]

Solar energy has a reputation as being a clean energy source but hasn't earned it — at least not up until now. That's because the power used to manufacture solar panels still comes mainly from electricity generated by fossil fuels.

But a new study from Stanford researchers says that the balance may be tipping: all the solar panels online around the world last year produced enough energy to make up for the energy it took to make them, researchers are able to say with more than 50 percent confidence.

The future looks even brighter, according to the study, with researchers projecting that the industry will be generating enough power between 2015 and 2020 to offset all of the historic creation costs.

There are some important caveats to that future outlook, including that installation and materials costs continue to drop at the rapid rate they have been. Still, the researchers are optimistic solar has finally turned an important corner on its way to becoming a more mainstream energy source.
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Forecast

Forecast reports: [edited]

How is Forecast different from other weather services?

Maps and rain animations: We’ve taken radar animations and expanded them to allow you to scrub up to a week into the future to see how storm systems will develop and evolve world-wide.

Down to the minute forecasts, for your exact location: We can predict when it will rain or snow — down to the minute — at your exact location anywhere we have radar coverage (currently the United States, the UK, Ireland, parts of Canada, and Puerto Rico, with more countries coming soon).

Intelligent text summaries: Most people don’t really care about things like wind speed and humidity unless it’s exceptional for their location. Using the historical data, we know what “exceptional” is for any time and place, and roll it up into the summaries.

It works on all your devices: There’s a web interface for your laptop and a mobile version for your iPhone, Android phone, or tablet. You can install Forecast directly on your phone simply by visiting forecast.io on your device and adding it to your home screen. It’s completely free.
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BionicOpter Dragonfly Drone

Engadget reports: [edited]

Festo's 17.3-inch long dragonfly drone can flutter through the air in any direction, and even hover, just like its biological inspiration. Its four carbon fibre and foil wings beat up to 20 times per-second, propelling it through the air as if it were swimming rather than flying.

Piloting the robo-bug is achieved through a smartphone app, but an on-board ARM-based microcontroller makes small adjustments to ensure stability during flight.
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Free Font - Exo

Font Squirrel is hosting this 'technical' sans serif family, available in a very useful nine weights from thin to black, with complementary italic versions.
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