What's inside your cellphone?

Ever wonder what demonic creature is unleashed when you stick your cellphone into a microwave oven?

Watch:

Right wing talk show host shows his ignorance on Hardball

On Hardball with Chris Matthews, blowhard radio talk show host Kevin James sought to attach the "appeaser" label to Barack Obama. Trouble is, he doesn't know what the term meant.



This just confirms and puts to rest what a lot of people have known for a long time about these conservative attack-dog talk show hosts. By using tactics that include hysterics and excessive decibel levels, not permitting the other side any time to respond, they distract from their ignorance of the subject matter at hand. Even if the other side does somehow get a chance to defend themselves, their arguments are tossed aside and any attempt to bring it back to the table is drowned out with an even louder and abrasive repetition of their slogans. Eventually their opponent gives up out of disgust.

That's not an open debate. It's a deplorable practice, they shouldn't be able to get away with it for as long as they have been. It's good that once in a while someone calls their bluff and puts their idiocy to shame.

Freestyle Trial

What is it about the French that makes them do crazy (albeit in a spectacular kind of way) stuff like this? From the people that developed freerunning or Parkour, Freestyle Trial is what you get when you combine Parkour with a motorbike.

This guy Julien Dupont is freaking awesome.



Here is Jean-Yves Blondeau, another crazy Frenchman with his awesome body roller suit.

Via Fresh Creation

Audiosurfing the classics

This ad promoting the Zurich Chamber Orchestra transforms the lines of sheet music into the rails of a roller coaster:



This so reminds me of the awesome indie game Audiosurf, where you turn your MP3 songs into a playable, gem-collecting obstacle course. Well worth the $10 purchase price, in my opinion. Here's a clip of a guy playing Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor in Audiosurf:

Very good documentary on ape intelligence

Ape Genius, a documentary from PBS Nova. 52 minutes.

Dude(tte), get a grip.

This is what happens when you've lost yourself to the cult worship of a personality. All the nasty reviews of Britney's trainwreck of a performance at the 2007 MTV VMA awards is too much for this Britney fanboy (or fangirl?).

I just can't think of anything to say on this, except that this guy urgently needs help.

Great advert for Epuron.

This has been out for a while but I came across this commercial only recently.

At first I thought this guy was a total jerk and felt very little sympathy towards his situation if at all. However the ad reveals his true identity in the last 10 seconds, and at that time I instantly and completely understood his character. It's a brilliant ad.

2 minutes is a long running time for an advert, but I don't think you could have sufficiently told the story and built up the emotional volume in less time.

A Gentleman's Duel.

I just finished watching Blur Studio's most excellent recent short film, A Gentleman's Duel as part of the Siggraph 2007 Electronic Theater. This entry was easily my favorite out of all of the shorts I saw. It had a great story, the animation was well-acted, pretty good lighting, and to top it all off, the main characters dueled each other aboard cool steampunk mecha!

What I really noticed the most was the character design in this film. It may very well not be easy to design human characters for an animated film, but a lot of major studios seem to go out of their way to make their CG humans look creepy.

I mean, compare these ugly characters from another film franchise. They all look like transgendered clones of John Lithgow. These characters are utterly bland:



Now look at the characters from A Gentleman's Duel. With these characters, you only need a quick glance to divine their individual personalities:



The character designers used a more cartoon-style plastic-like solid surface with painted streaks to represent hair. These guys decided not to have them fitted with CG hair, which I think worked out for the best. CG hair is a pain in the ass to achieve the right look, and if you don't get it just right, it will look odd and swishy, ultimately distracting the viewer from the story.

Great job guys!