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The New York Times brings Bowie exhibit to your phone with AR
Now that Google has released its first take on an Android augmented reality framework, ARCore 1.0, quite a few AR apps are taking advantage of it. The New York Times, who has already released an AR experience around Olympic athletes for iOS, is now launching a new AR feature that focuses on David Bowie's "visual legacy." This is also one of the few AR experiences that supports both ARKit and ARCore, making it available on both iOS and Android.
David Bowie fused science fiction and pop culture
David Bowie passed away yesterday following an 18-month battle with cancer. The news was confirmed through his official website, his publicist and son Duncan Jones, who tweeted, "Very sorry and sad to say it's true." Though he only lived to 69, it's hard to think of an artist who had a larger impact on pop culture. Bowie was a gifted and prolific songwriter who created iconic albums like Diamond Dogs, Heroes and Let's Dance. He was also a fashion icon, actor, painter, producer, Broadway star and performer who invented iconic alter-egos like Ziggie Stardust, the Thin White Duke and Major Tom.
Life on Mars cast into doubt as Curiosity fails to find methane
[Click] Hi, is that David Bowie? [Silence] ... It's NASA here. We've got some news. While it's not a conclusive answer, the Curiosity Rover wasn't able to detect any traces of methane in the Gale Crater. Presence of the gas is one of the things that we were hoping would support our theories about life on Mars, so this comes as a bit of a blow. Now, there *are* terrestrial microbes that don't generate methane, so it's not as if this is a firm "no," but it's not looking anywhere near as likely as it was before. So, uh, does that help at all? [Silence] ... Uh, well, thanks. Bye! [Click]
Simulated NASA mission to ask 'Are there snacks on Maaaaaaarrrrrs?'
When we've been forced to travel to an alien world, the one thing that makes us more likely to turn feral and murder our crew-mates than anything else is a lack of variety at mealtimes. Fortunately, Cornell University has teamed up with the University of Hawaii to build a simulated Mars mission to determine which foods people don't mind constantly consuming, given that there are no In-N-Out Burger franchises on the red planet. The mock base will be constructed in the midst of a Hawaiian lava flow, with the crews dressed in "spacesuits" and eating a mix of NASA-issue rations and shelf-stable foods like flour, sugar and freeze-dried meat. Applications for the four-month program remain open until the end of the month, so if you fancy all the free (bland) food you can manage, head on down to sign up!
Blood Sport: Patch 3.2.2, the times they are a-changin, Part II
In keeping with our musical theme, here's David Bowie's Changes. Most of you have probably heard it, but most of us have not really listened to it. Take some time to enjoy one of Bowie's most renowned pieces with the article today.Last time, I went over a few significant arena modifications that 3.2.2 brought us. Square pillars for line-of-sight, the armor penetration nerf, focus frames, flying in battlegrounds, and the Onyxia loot table can be found here.This article is going to talk about five of the nine classes discussed in the 3.2.2 patch notes (warlocks were left out). The reason we won't be talking about the other four is sheer article size. I'm not getting blamed for breaking anyone's scroll wheel today! We'll go over death knights, hunters, druids, and mages in the second part of this part II (which should be in a day or two).I'm giving analysis on class changes; I hope we will agree on most things, but if you disagree or decide I don't understand a mechanic properly, please let me know in the comments below. I read all your comments and am often stunned with how gracious our readers have been towards me. Thank you for all the kind words, those of you who took the time to write them!Please don't assume that I don't care if I don't write a large amount about the horrors of nerfing or the glories of buffing your main character's class (triple negative hooray). I probably don't know enough about the intricacies of the change to make an educated prediction, and would say little rather than proclaim "this will gimp class X vs. class Y" and have it fail to come to fruition.I'm going to be ignoring all non-pvp related notes. If you think I left something out, please post a comment below and I will (most likely) edit the post accordingly.Also, 3.3 patch notes are out already! Next week, part III will be merged with the 3.3 patch notes that are coming; there's a lot to talk about!So, without further ado, here's what 3.2.2 is cha-cha-cha-cha-changing in the arena world.
Let's Brass to the song they're playing on the DS
More DS training is on the way, to make sure you're working whenever you could be playing. The latest piece of software to come down the pipes is Let's Brass, a music training program dedicated to -- you guessed it -- didgeridoo horns.The software is pretty danged cool, actually: in addition to a metronome and a series of music lessons, Let's Brass also guides you through breathing/blowing exercises and tuning (via the DS microphone). These features can even be transmitted to nearby bandmates via download play, so you can practice together! Of course, we suggest doing this at home, since playing a band-practice video game is an advanced level of nerdery that seems guaranteed to attract shoe wedgies.
Rock Band Weekly: Bowie's 'queen bitch' has 'moonage daydreams' about 'heroes'
We're a little under pressure this week as David Bowie becomes the DLC content on XBLM and PSN for Rock Band. Why under pressure? Well, we're sure that the covers for Heroes and Queen Bitch are of the highest Harmonix quality, so we're having pre-stress in case Bowie has a The Romanics nutter and sues everyone because the covers are too good! We're gonna watch that man. This week's Rock Band DLC is:Bowie Pack - $5.50: Moonage Daydream ($2) Heroes ($2 *Cover*) Queen Bitch ($2 *Cover*) We're hoping everything willl be hunky dory with Bowie about these covers, but can he justifiably complain about anything being married to a goddess like Iman?
Today's most Bowie video: Rock Band's Suffragette City
Everyone needs a little bit of Bowie in their day. Today's hit of Bowie comes care of a Rock Band trailer showing off David Bowie's "Suffragette City" with brief snippets of the title being played as a four-player rock fest. We still can't wait to get our hands on the the drum controller. Again.Video embedded after the break.%Gallery-3923%
