CirqueDuSoleil
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Cirque du Soleil turns drones into dancing lampshades
Before quadrocopters become the four-winged horsemen of the robopocalypse, we're quite happy making 'em dance for our entertainment. A new artistic collaboration between the ETH Zurich university and Cirque du Soleil isn't your standard swarm show, though, imagining a more intimate relationship between man and machine. "Sparked" is the short film born out of this partnership, featuring the talents of several pre-programmed quadrocopters, one human performer and zero special effects. Rather than a technical demonstration, it's a story of a lonely lamp-maker and the (seemingly) inanimate creations that fill his workshop. We won't spoil any more of it for you, so head past the break for the full film, as well as an explanation from the creative and technical minds behind the project about how it came to pass.
Chrome experiment explores new types of navigation, degrees of embarrassment
What you're about to see, should you choose to click the source link below, is far from perfect. On the other hand, it's clearly had a lot of effort and expertise put into it -- not only by HTML5-savvy coders, but also by a troupe of performers from the Cirque du Soleil. It's called Movi.Kanti.Revo, which is a fancy way of saying Move.Sing.Dream, and it involves navigating through an ethereal and slightly laggy landscape using only swaying gestures, your singing voice (mournful sobbing sounds also worked for us) and a bunch of APIs that conveniently fail to work on FireFox, Safari or Internet Explorer. It's well-suited to those with a mic and webcam, preferably sitting in a open-plan and bully-ridden workplace, and if you don't like it there's always Bastion.
The Beatles just 'LOVE' iTunes
The Beatles/Cirque du Soleil collaborative "LOVE" is available for pre-order through iTunes. The US$12.99 album will be released on February 8 with two bonus tracks, and based on the page for the album, none of the tracks will be available for individual sale. The documentary behind the show, "All Together Now," will also be sold for $9.99. As with the previous Beatles digital releases, this appears to be exclusive to iTunes. [via Business Insider]
Sony's Hot Ticket program brings live events to theaters at $20 a pop
If you're a live event nut but live in the sticks, listen up: Sony is about to bring live performances to digital theaters with its new Hot Ticket program. Sony will broadcast Broadway shows, concerts, and sports events to around 500 digital theaters, live and in HD digital projection for about $20 a seat. The venture will launch with Cirque du Soleil's final performance of Delirium from London and for the two of you who haven't seen it yet, Rent's final Broadway performance will be shown in September. We have to admit, though, this could create some fun SuperBowl parties with rival factions on either side of the aisle, Congress style.
Hit the Strip with a new Rainbow Six Vegas 2 Trailer
Ever since the first lackluster trailer was revealed at the 2007 Spike TV VGA's, we've been curious about the direction which Ubisoft is taking our favorite terrorist-hunting franchise, Rainbow Six: Vegas. Sure, we've been promised that that Vegas 2 will improve on the mechanics of the Vegas the first, but we haven't heard much about the storyline for this "part prequel, part sequel". The newest trailer for the game still doesn't tell us about the subject of Six's Sin City romp, but it does drop a few vague clues. For instance, most of the trailer takes place in a large concert hall. Can we expect to rescue a helpless Celine Dion from a pack of disgruntled Cirque du Soleil performers? We can only hope, as this would provide the greatest video game soundtrack since Revolution X -- but it's a fairly unlikely scenario. Ah, well. Our hearts will go on.
LG introduces Cirque du Soleil Quidam LCD
Taking a page out of Samsung's book of naming conventions (see Bordeaux and Cannes), LG has introduced the Quidam series of flat-panels: six LCDs based on a show by world-famous performers Cirque du Soleil, which follows a little girl's desire to escape from sadness and alienation into an imaginary world -- fitting for a screen you use to forget about your dreary life. With a semicircular stand and automatic brightness adjustment sensors, the sets will be available as a 32-incher for $1,614 or 42-incher for $3,336.
