Jonathan Harris's Whale Hunt

Jonathan Harris is an artist who works out of Brooklyn, New York. He combines anthropology and computer science to tell stories and explore human experiences. He recently went to Alaska to document the hunt of Bowhead Whales by Inupiat Eskimos, by taking photographs at specific times throughout the trip:

"I documented the entire experience with a plodding sequence of 3,214 photographs, beginning with the taxi ride to Newark airport, and ending with the butchering of the second whale, seven days later. The photographs were taken at five-minute intervals, even while sleeping (using a chronometer), establishing a constant “photographic heartbeat”. In moments of high adrenaline, this photographic heartbeat would quicken (to a maximum rate of 37 pictures in five minutes while the first whale was being cut up), mimicking the changing pace of my own heartbeat."

The photos themselves are fantastic, however its the system that he has designed for us to view his trip that is most special. You can choose 3 different ways of navigating the story (the mosaic version is really satisfying as a user) and the timeline that has been put in place manages to heighten the experience.

Go to thewhalehunt.org and a good old look, its really well thought out project and i for one have found myself drifting back more than once. Johnathan also has his own site number27.org which has details of his previous work.

Something for the weekend sir?

My crazy Italian friend sent me this first thing yesterday and it wasn't until i obeyed his instructions of "You must listen with headphones" that i understood the slightly unnerving chaotic look in his eye that he gets when he's found something cool.

Over at Gustavo Moura, who from what i gather is a designer/blogger has come across an awesome demonstration of sound design. I couldn't download the audio, so i urge you to pop over to here, and check it out. Its set in a barber shop and uses a host of different sounds to help your brain create a 3D space, its really freaky and i'll give five English pounds to anyone who doesn't either turn around when someone clicks their fingers or doesn't feel slightly odd when the bag goes over your head.... you'll know what i mean.

Its been a while....

Welcome back Fishtankers, and firstly, massive apologies for any lack of interesting or indeed dull news, the run up to last year was fairly hectic and my geek-news fest had to be put on the back burner. Anyhoo, hopefully this will be the beginning of more regular updates so lets get started shall we.....

Wiki Videoville - Musicvideo-arama!

A friend of mine at work sent me this and at first i wasn't sure what to make of it, a cursory glance left me thinking too many links and not enough 'stuff'. However on my return i dug deeper, to find a brilliant source of video content. As it's a Wiki site, it's open source allows any budding (or indeed 'budded) film maker to display their work together with a generous amount of contact info, website links etc.

Videoville lets you browse the library by a host of different meta data tags, including the obvious 'Director', 'Artist' and 'Video' but also 'Genres', 'Stylists' and even 'Cliches'. Within minutes i'd watched 2 great clips and followed a link to a cool website for up and coming directors in Brooklyn.... I'm not sure why, i don't live in Brooklyn, but it was easy so why not.

The video/sound quality is excellent (so far) and if it doesn't contain a clip, it will send you to the required site. Slightly odd is that the Quicktimes i found seem to be locked even with QT Pro, but yet the site gives info on how to capture them with freeware, not sure how that sits with some of the people involved, but i guess it'll happen anyway, so may as well make it good quality. There are some dead links, leading you to a list of a Bands songs, with no other info, but thats a small criticism.

All in all, very cool indeed. Go, try it, now.

iPod File Share is back, ding ding round 3!

Apple are not going to be happy, I on the other hand, plus millions of frustrated iPod users will be if this works like it says it does. It's called the miShare (someone needs to tell people that if you invent a product that works with Apple, the small case first letter thingy is not mandatory) and as the image shows, allows the harmonious connection of 2 iPods, enabling the users to swap tunes, as well as video, pics etc.

Engadget didn't have much info on the company behind it, but we do know that "The unit is actually running a lightweight Linux installation and is using open source tools to access the iPod as a mass storage device and open up the database files" Cool.

File selection is done by playlists, although how that works with Pics I'm not sure. Now all i need is the ability to get back in my computer.

Paul Rand's Free Advice

My dutch counter parts have discovered this great video of an interview with Graphic Designer Paul Rand, thats been jazzed up with some groovy animation. It's a great piece of video and worth watching, advice nuggets such as 'Don't try to be original, just try to be good' should be a mantra for any creative business.

Paul Rand by Imaginary forces

Flickr Book anyone?

I can't believe someone hasn't come up with this before.

You know the kind of person I'm talking about. They carry their mobile phone around in their hand, finger poised, quivering over the 'record' button, ready for any moment of hilarity that may come around the corner. I've come a cropper thanks to these Mobile-Michael Moore wannabes (mental note to stop doing 'air drums' when i'm drunk) and now it's only a matter of time before I'm able to watch myself in good Victorian Vision in the form of a Flick Book.

Silent Flicks offers the service of turning any video file into a flickbook, which is such an annoyingly simple idea (export as Targa, print, done), but good on em, especially as its probaby run out of some nerdy students bedroom.

They will also make a flickbook from your photos if you wish, and will except a range of graphics files. Someone should create an Ap for Facebook that lets you push photos from your album, that'd be cool or even via Flickr.....