I love puzzles, I have a drawer full of those metal nails that are stuck together and you have to find a way to take them apart, and I love online puzzle games.
So today I came across The Google Puzzle. Not sure how long it has been up, but I only saw it today.
So I pressed the Get it back button and wasted spend a good hour on solving the 5 puzzles to get it back.
It is a Chrome experiment, written in HTML and it has some really quirky stuff in it.
if you get stuck there is the friendly Hint button – thank god for that one.
so if you are into puzzles, make sure you give it a go
I love puzzles, I have a drawer full of those metal nails that are stuck together and you have to find a way to take them apart, and I love online puzzle games.
So today I came across The Google Puzzle. Not sure how long it has been up, but I only saw it today.
So I pressed the Get it back button and wasted spend a good hour on solving the 5 puzzles to get it back.
It is a Chrome experiment, written in HTML and it has some really quirky stuff in it.
if you get stuck there is the friendly Hint button – thank god for that one.
so if you are into puzzles, make sure you give it a go
The APG held a Cannes Highlights evening last night at the Verona, themed around ‘Unexpected Thinking’. As well as the usual suspects (Nike ‘Write the Future’, Walkers ‘Sandwich’, TippEx ‘Hunter Shoots A Bear’ etc) here are a few examples that hopefully haven’t been blogged to death:
Media generally doesn’t turn up the most electrifying case studies but this was a truly ingenious idea: build up anticipation for a new album release by giving it away – as sheet music. The outcome: cover version mania sweeps Norway.
2. Gigantic Nose, BGH (Saatchi & Saatchi, Buenos Aires)
It’s fashionable for digital people to slag off big ideas but this is a great example of how a creative strategy can create excitement over the dryest of product benefits. To promote a new airconditioner with an above average filtration system, Saatchis focused on those who needed it most – people with massive noses.
3. Monopoly City Streets, Hasbro (Tribal DDB, UK)
OK, so this has been around a while but it’s still a nice idea. A lot of digital campaigns try and get people to participate for the sake of it but this is a lovely example of how a campaign that’s genuinely fun to get involved in can yield dramatic results. How do you promote a board game that’s already turned out more ‘special editions’ than Sports Illustrated? Go large by turning the whole world into a giant game.
Video content tends to play a standard role in most websites. The functionality is seldom messed with : Users click a play button to start (or get annoyed it played without your permission) and play only one video at a time. Normally video sits in a fixed position and will be of a set size. Indeed, screwing around with ‘standard video UI design’ can be a dangerous game but when it’s done right, it’s easy to start believing that video should be some much more in so many sites. Check out the Uniqlo website… it’s cool, fun, breaks some boring old rules and is our site of the day.
Arguably the best post production house on the planet have put together a project that documents the back catalogue of their work into an interactive touch experience.
Apart from being a brilliant project I thought the documentation of the process was handled brilliantly and makes a great case study.
I finally had the time to read about this “little” screen at SIGGRAPH, the article has been open in my browser for about 6 days.
And it was well worth the wait.
A projected capacitive display is nothing new, multiple smartphones, including the iPhone has one, but having an 82 inch one is something very special.
check out the video below and dream about having one of these puppies in your living room some day.
Right now this kind of screen is still really expensive ($120 000) and even the CEO said that consumers will see this in the market as soon as it is more affordable.
The success of Tesco’s new retail store in Korea is something to behold:
Why? Because there is no physical store and no physical product. However the experience of the store has been fully recreated two dimensionally as a backlit poster with the products and ordering fulfilled using mobile and QR codes. It’s a neat idea and solves a number of issues:
1. The familiar supermarket experience. Tick! 2. Impulse shopping. Tick! 3. Cheap rent. Tick! 4. Open a new store in high traffic areas in one day. Tick! 5. No internal fit out costs. Tick! 6. No need to stock shelves Tick! 7. No Staff wages. Tick! 8. Open 24hrs. Tick! The list goes on.
Personally I’d like to see NFC integration as well as QR codes. I think we can also expect to see these walls become screens rather than printed products in the very near future.
Printing is not something that makes digital headlines to often but it’s an area set to take a big twist over the next few years. Whilst most consumers still tend to think of a printer as something that squirts ink onto paper, the reality is that printing is becoming one of the most interesting emerging digital technologies and is progressing at a steady speed.
What do 3D printers do? Essentially they take some raw material (often in the form of a roll of plastic (ABS) or powdered resin) and build objects by printing the plastic in micro thin layers on top of each other. 3D printers can also print objects that have moving parts, with no need for assembly. The video below gives a good idea of how it works:
Example of an industrial 3D printer in action printing a wrench with moving parts.
This head was ‘printed’ with a colour 3D printer (see here)
Today you can create your own DIY 3D printer for around $1000 (kits here) or a commercial desktop 3D printer for as little as $2500. The prices go up from there as you start to add colour, size, speed and detail. Most are a little sluggish and can take a few hours to produce objects the size of a coffee cup, but it’s very compelling watching objects appear out of thin air. The early adopters of 3D printers have mainly been designers, artists, prototype makers, model makers and other enthusiasts with initial uses ranging from sculptures to making custom lego parts.
Above: This light was created with a 3D printer by artist Bathsheba Grossman.
Above: A commercial 3D printer. Below: The open source DIY RepRap 3D printer.
Devices that replicate themselves? It sounds a little “SkyNet”, but one of the interesting things about some of todays 3D printers is that already they are able to reproduce parts of themselves. The open source RepRap 3D printer already enables users to ‘print’ it’s own upgrades as well as most of the parts to build a new one. Pretty cool.
The future of 3D printers and the role they will play? Lets jump ahead 15 years and imagine every house having a 3D printer. This will partly be possible because if you own one, you’ll use the printer to create all the parts to give one to your neighbour to assemble – these devices will be able to self replicate very easily. Most of your materials for printing will be from recycled materials in your house. Now picture that this printer is super high resolution, fast, and can print a wide number of materials including organic substances. Instantly certain products like kids toys can be ordered on demand, downloaded and printed out with no waiting for delivery from the postman (note: watch out for the next wave of piracy – which could potentially impact companies like Lego because making compatible parts will be a click away). Also, because these printers will be capable of printing organic material certain foods will be printable from online menus or a cooking show you might have seen on TV – for instance you may use the printer to print some amazingly intricate chocolate shells to be filled with fresh cream and fruit from the fridge. Of course the picture hook you need for the wall can be printed in a couple of minutes along with the spare part for the broken dishwasher, bike or car.
3D printing raises many interesting questions, as well as threats and opportunities for businesses. Environmentally they could turn out to be a godsend if the recycling can be dovetailed into the technology. Right now this is a very early and emerging space but expect to see much more of this over the next few years.
We all remember the original 8bit Outrun Game from 1986. I remember playing it until my fingers were bleeding.
So what would it be like if you could have this in real life? That is what the people at the University of California Irvine ask themselves and they created a system that, with the help of cameras and some customized software, looks in front of the vehicle and reproduces a map of what lies ahead of you onto the screen in 8bit rendering just like Outrun.
All you have to do now is follow the route. Simply awesome.
Promoting the launch of Cosmo For Guys, Viral marketing company Thinkmodo thought it would be a great idea to put a girls head in a 4 iPad contraption and turn heads. Some people will call it awesome, some will call it creepy, I am just wondering how she is seeing where she is going and if that guy touching her “face” is really annoying her.
Cosmo for Guys is a new digital magazine that is exclusive to the iPad.
Posted by stephanlange 
