NASA’s Stunning Tour of the Moon

in Astronomy, Science, Video - Science | April 2nd, 2012

On 18 June 2009, NASA launched the Lunar Recon­nais­sance Orbiter (LRO) from Cape Canaver­al to con­duct inves­ti­ga­tions that would pave the way for future lunar explo­ration. The main objec­tives? To scout for safe and pro­duc­tive land­ing sites, locate poten­tial resources (with spe­cial atten­tion to the pos­si­bil­i­ty of water ice) and char­ac­ter­ize the effects of pro­longed expo­sure to lunar radi­a­tion. All along, the LRO has col­lect­ed sci­en­tif­ic data about the moon’s topog­ra­phy and com­po­si­tion, result­ing in some of the most spec­tac­u­lar images ever tak­en of the moon. NASA’s God­dard Space Flight Cen­ter has assem­bled some of these images into a won­der­ful ani­mat­ed tour of the moon.

By pro­fes­sion, Matthias Rasch­er teach­es Eng­lish and His­to­ry at a High School in north­ern Bavaria, Ger­many. In his free time he scours the web for good links and posts the best finds on Twit­ter.

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Address is Approximate: A Lovely Animated Film Made with Google Maps

in Animation, Maps, Video - Arts & Culture | November 28th, 2011

Next up: a love­ly film about a lone­ly desk toy that longs for adven­ture. Observ­ing the space around him, a robot finds a toy car and heads off on a road trip across the Unit­ed States, guid­ed only by Google Maps Street View. We start on the Brook­lyn Bridge and fin­ish on the Pacif­ic Coast High­way in Cal­i­for­nia. Parts of the video look like sequences from a Pixar film, they are so well made. In real­i­ty, the film was pro­duced, ani­mat­ed, filmed, lit, edit­ed and grad­ed by one per­son: Tom Jenk­ins.

A great treat to start the week.

via Flow­ing Data

Eugene Buchko is a blog­ger and pho­tog­ra­ph­er liv­ing in Atlanta, GA. He main­tains a pho­to­blog, Eru­dite Expres­sions, and writes about what he reads on his read­ing blog.

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Crossing El Camino del Rey, the Most Dangerous Hike in the World

in Random | October 17th, 2011

El Camini­to del Rey (The King’s Lit­tle Path), often abbre­vi­at­ed to El Camino del Rey, is a walk­way that winds its way along the walls of El Chor­ro, a gorge in south­ern Spain near the vil­lage of Álo­ra. It is gen­er­al­ly con­sid­ered one of the most dan­ger­ous hikes in the world. The con­struc­tion of the walk­way was fin­ished in 1905, and after King Alfon­so XIII crossed it in 1921, it became known by its cur­rent name. In recent decades, large parts of the con­crete rest­ing on steel rails have dete­ri­o­rat­ed so bad­ly that it has become a life-threat­en­ing endeav­or to tra­verse the camino. After sev­er­al fatal acci­dents, author­i­ties offi­cial­ly closed the path in 2000. But there are still dar­ing hik­ers who man­age to get around the bar­ri­ers and make their way across the gorge. The video above shows in impres­sive detail how dan­ger­ous the camino is.

If you feel an inner urge to walk the camino, there are two impor­tant things to keep in mind:

  1. It real­ly is insane­ly dan­ger­ous. Mata­dor has some life-sav­ing tips if you want to trek the camino.
  2. If you want to get the true camino expe­ri­ence, you have to hur­ry up. The walk­way will be restored for 9 mil­lion euros between 2011 and 2015.

Bonus mate­r­i­al: The Cheap Route has a first-per­son account and some fan­tas­tic pho­tos of a camino hike.

By pro­fes­sion, Matthias Rasch­er teach­es Eng­lish and His­to­ry at a High School in north­ern Bavaria, Ger­many. In his free time he scours the web for good links and posts the best finds on Twit­ter.

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Name That Painting!

in Art, History, Music | July 14th, 2011

In Feb­ru­ary 2010, the Paris-based band Hold Your Hors­es! released a music video to go with their song “70 Mil­lion,” which became an imme­di­ate suc­cess. In the video, the band mem­bers recre­at­ed famous paint­ings, tak­ing the view­er on an enter­tain­ing tour through art his­to­ry. Try to iden­ti­fy as many paint­ings as pos­si­ble, then com­pare your results with the list of the actu­al paint­ings below the jump. Enjoy — and let us know your scores! And, of course, Hap­py Bastille Day.

(more…)

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Teens Ponder Meaning of Contemporary Art

in Art, Video - Arts & Culture | March 14th, 2011

In 2009, Tate Liv­er­pool dis­played four works of con­tem­po­rary art in dif­fer­ent loca­tions around the city. Acclaimed film direc­tor Mike Fig­gis was asked to turn the reac­tions of Liv­er­poodlians to these sculp­tures into short films. The video above shows teenagers dis­cussing Jeff Koon­s’s “Three Ball Total Equi­lib­ri­um Tank.” Anoth­er short film cap­tures the views of stu­dents when one of Dan Flav­in’s instal­la­tions called “Unti­tled” was dis­played at their school for one day.

By pro­fes­sion, Matthias Rasch­er teach­es Eng­lish and His­to­ry at a High School in north­ern Bavaria, Ger­many. In his free time he scours the web for good links and posts the best finds on Twit­ter.

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