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Visualized: the Apple mothership
We've already caught a glimpse of Apple's proposed science fiction museum new campus in Cupertino, but screen grabs just don't do this behemoth justice. A recently released set of renderings of Apple Campus 2, as it's known to the city of Cupertino, however, give it that proper otherworldly glow. According to the accompanying proposal, the building will take up a measly 2.8 million square feet, contain a 1,000-seat auditorium and research facilities totaling 300,000 square feet. Really? Is that all? If architectural renderings are your thing, hit the source link for some building-plan booty. %Gallery-130561%
Christopher Trout08.13.2011
Visualized: A gadget graveyard
Wonder where your old SDTV went to die? Wonder no more.
Dana Wollman08.12.2011
Visualized: Objet's 3D printer breathes plastic life into Hollywood creatures, layer by layer
It ain't easy being plastic, you know? Objet -- the 3D printing house that aimed to replace your office's all-in-one Epson back in July -- brought a few of its snazziest pieces here to SIGGRAPH, and we popped by to have a gander. Targeting the animation-inspired crowd that showed up here in Vancouver, the company brought along some Hollywood examples of how its multi-material Objet260 Connex helped movie makers craft prototype creatures before they were inserted into the storyline. Thor's Destroyer and Avatar's Na'vi were both on hand, as well as the two critters shown above. The hothead on the right was crafted in around 18 hours (and subsequently painted), while the cool cat on the left was built in three fewer. Wildly enough, that fellow required no painting whatsoever; so long as you're cool with shades of grey, you can program your object to be colored from the outset. Oh, and as for his cost? Around $80 for the materials -- slightly more for the printer itself. %Gallery-130291%
Darren Murph08.11.2011
Visualized: 3D3 Solutions scans our face in two seconds flat
See that bloke? That's Darren Murph. Well, a digital representation of the human version, anyway. That image was captured in two painless seconds at the hands of 3D3 Solutions, which was on-hand here at SIGGRAPH to demonstrate its newest FlexScan setups. The rig that snapped our face rings up at around $10,000, and relies on a Canon DSLR (strictly for capturing textures), a projector and a secondary camera. As you've likely picked up on, this is hardly designed for average DIYers, but these solutions are also far more detailed and flexible than using Microsoft's Kinect. We're told that the company recently started to support Nikon cameras as well, and for those who'd prefer to use their existing cameras / PJs, a hobbyist-centric software package will allow you to do just that. The only problem? Figuring out where the $2,700 (for software) is going to come from. Head on past the break for a demonstration vid, or peruse the gallery below if you're feeling extra creepy. %Gallery-130289%
Darren Murph08.10.2011
Visualized: Boeing 747-8 makes its longest flight to date, writes name in the sky
It's always fun to write your name on things -- chalkboards, diplomas, speeding tickets, yellow snow... you know, the usual. The folks at Boeing couldn't agree more, which is why they tasked 747-8 pilots with writing the jet's name in the sky on a flight test across the US. What could be called the "747-8 wuz here" mission is designed to test the outer limits of the jumbo jet in a max endurance operations test. Taking off yesterday morning from Seattle's Paine Field, the jet flew across 18 states in a 747 pattern until it landed on the west coast a little after midnight -- 17 total hours of mayhem. It seems like everything went swimmingly, which means the brand spanking new jet will be sold to Cargolux, a ginormous cargo airline, later this year. The jet writing does somewhat resemble a drunken righty's attempt at left-handed writing, but hey, who are we to judge?
Lydia Leavitt08.04.2011
Visualized: this gel-filled Sprint head is testing all sorts of futurephones
Chamber testing is most certainly nothing new for your average carrier -- every one of the big boys here in the States already does something similar to this -- but it's not often that we're given an inside look at what exactly happens within those elusive doors. During a recent Sprint campus walkthrough, we peeked into the carrier's network development lab for a glimpse at what it takes to certify a phone for use on its network. Granted, the vast majority of Sprint's testing is done elsewhere across the industry, and we were informed that the yellow dome shown above is actually a minty fresh model that includes "gel" within its borders, seemingly to produce a more realistic testing ground. You know -- because human brains are clearly shrinking, while craniums are being increasingly filled with nondescript fluids. All jesting aside, we were told that this is the place where Sprint ensures Antennagate never comes to its side of town, and every Now Network phone (present and future) has to roll through here before being allowed out. The reason? Sprint needs to be absolutely certain that there's no stray radio emissions bleeding into frequencies that it doesn't support, and of course, to ask the Verizon guy if he can hear him now. %Gallery-128959%
Darren Murph07.22.2011
Visualized: 130 years of GE innovation, accentuated with 130-year old Instagram filters
It may not pay any taxes, but General Electric sure knows how to use an iPhone 4 to upload photos to Tumblr. Hit the source link for a boatload of other shots that probably are as old as they look. But, not at all.
Darren Murph07.07.2011
Visualized: a zettabyte
Remember the good old days when a gigabyte was considered a lot of space? Improvements in hard disk technology have allowed the humble magnetic drive to reach the dizzying heights of multiple terabytes of storage, but Cisco foresees a future that's a few orders of magnitude more impressive. Pinpointing 2015 as the commencement of what it calls the zettabyte era, the company has put together a handy infographic to show us just how much data can be fit into one: you can alternatively think of it as the equivalent of 250 billion DVDs, 36 million years of HD video, or the volume of the Great Wall of China if you allow an 11oz cup of coffee to represent a gigabyte of data. So "zetta" must be Greek for one hell of a lot, but what Cisco expects is that we'll be pushing that much information around the web each year by 2015. Any bets on how many exabytes of it will be to stream videos of cats diving into cardboard boxes?
Vlad Savov06.29.2011
Visualized: Acer's Iconia Tab A500 is 'a better choice' than the iPad (update: video!)
We were making our way through Taipei's sublime metro system this week and what did we see on the side of the stairway? Why, it was a collection of iPad images, but rather than an Apple-funded advert, this was an Acer-instigated bit of spec sheet trash talk. The captions beneath the images read, in order: "no open operating system, no high resolution display, no Dolby Surround Sound, no Flash, no microSD, no USB port. Why do you want to choose this type of tablet?" Gracing the opposite wall was the tablet that ticked the "yes" boxes to all those items, Acer's own Iconia Tab A500. Perhaps once Acer figures out the answer to its own question, it can stop overhauling itself and get back to the job of chopping the iPad's market share down to size. Check out the full ad in the gallery below. Update: Looks like there's a video ad to go along with the print campaign! Check it out after the break. %Gallery-124902%
Vlad Savov06.05.2011
Visualized: Samsung wants to see the iPhone 5 and iPad 3
Samsung lawyers recently asked the court to make Apple show them the as-yet-unannounced iPhone 5 and iPad 3, claiming that they need to know what Apple's products will look like ahead of time to avoid future lawsuits and uncanny similarities.If only it were this easy.
Sean Hollister05.28.2011
Visualized: a decade of mapping the universe, and all we got was this bloated JPEG
Thousands upon thousands of galaxies. Ten years to complete. A glance at the most complete map of the local universe anywhere in existence. Something tells us Richard Branson's getting a print for his Virgin Galactic headquarters...
Darren Murph05.28.2011
Visualized: Porsche's GT3 R Hybrid has its very own boost button
Sure, it may seem like any old Formula 1 steering wheel, but take a closer look. See that big red button sitting on the left side, just begging to be pressed? That, friends, would be a boost button, capable of giving this Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid racer an extra burst of acceleration. Unlike most battery powered hybrids, both the 911 GT3 R and the 918 RSR run on an inertial flywheel that's spun by the momentum generated whenever the car brakes. All it takes is one tap of the boost button, however, for that momentum to be instantly converted into a potent jolt of KITT-like horsepower. We still don't really know what we'd do with all the other buttons, but we definitely know which one we'd keep our thumb on.
Amar Toor05.09.2011
Visualized: Google searches around the globe
You've already seen Android activations mapped around the globe over time, now how about some Google search volumes? Using WebGL and different color crayons for each language, the coders at Mountain View have put together the above Search Globe, which presents a single day's worth of Google queries in a beautiful, skyscraper-infused visualization. Jacking yourself into the source link below (your browser can handle WebGL, right?) will let you twist and turn the model world for a closer exploration of global Google use. And if you get tired of that, there's an alternative map showing world populations over 1990s -- that's available at the second link.
Vlad Savov05.06.2011
Visualized: Growing up in arcades
If you're anything like us -- and you are -- you can get quite nostalgic (and often downright teary-eyed) when contemplating your geek past. That's why we know you'll just love our latest favorite Flickr pool, Growing Up In Arcades: 1979-1989. We'd like to stay and chat, but there are well over a hundred pictures featuring stonewashed denim, cheesy mustaches, and coin-op console games that we are dying to check out. Feel like joining us? Hit the source link. [Photo credit: Daves Portfolio]
Joseph L. Flatley04.28.2011
Visualized: ring around the world of data center power usage
Facebook may have recently boasted about how energy efficient its data centers are, but it is still Facebook, and that means it consumes plenty of power regardless -- more than anyone else, in fact, according to Peer1's recent survey of the world's most visited websites. As you can see above, that bit of data has also been conveniently visualized by the company in a colorful chart (with a noticeable lack of green), and there's plenty more details where that came from for you to dive into in the infographic linked below.
Donald Melanson04.26.2011
Visualized: a Foxconn worker walks into an Apple store...
... and thinks, "I should ask for another raise."
Richard Lai04.23.2011
Visualized: what Motorola Android users want
16,611 votes and counting. We sure hope Motorola is getting the hint here. [Thanks, Arjen G.]
Richard Lai04.20.2011
Visualized: the National Ignition Facility in a pannable, spherical panorama
Hopefully your brain has recouped from the explosion it endured when you first laid eyes on some glorious shots of the NIF out in Nor-Cal. Now, xRez Studio's imaging gurus have provided the common folk the ability to virtually stand in front of a 500-trillion watt laser experiment at ultra high resolution. Better yet, the interactive, detailed look at an attempt at nuclear fusion allows for zooming and a full, 360-degree pan-around experience. Since this might be closest in proximity you'll get to the NIF, hit the source link to truly get a feel for what we're yapping about, and -- if you're feeling audacious -- be sure to check out the BBC video tour after the break.
Sam Sheffer04.13.2011
Visualized: IE10 and Windows running on ARM at MIX
Well, what do we have here? It's IE10 and Windows 32-bit running on a 1GHz ARMv7 chip... live, right here at MIX 11! Update: Wonder what kind of ARM chip that might be? NVIDIA just tweeted that it's actually a Tegra 2 SOC.
Myriam Joire04.12.2011
Visualized: jousting on a Segway
Remember the olden days? When honor and valor were the only things that mattered and vast metallic armor suits were less of a laughing matter and more of a practical necessity? Neither do we, but that doesn't stop us from enjoying a good video gaming romp through such settings when we have the time for it. We don't know that we'd necessarily care to reenact medieval battle scenes physically, but that's exactly what a witty new marketing campaign for Washington's Lottery has done. It asks simply "what have you and your friends always wanted to do" and then answers its own query with the nutty answer of Segway jousting. See the resulting video, which was partially shot in Phantom slow-mo, after the break.
Vlad Savov04.07.2011