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Sunday, February 20, 2011

DIY Balloon Aerial Photography on the Cheap [Weekend Project]

Source: http://lifehacker.com/#!5765075/diy-balloon-aerial-photography-on-the-cheap

The GrassrootsMapping wiki details how to put together a balloon-powered aerial photography kit with $35 and some elbow grease.

Here's what you need to put together this weekend project:

A balloon or even a giant trash bag: ~ $1.50
Helium: ~ $30 for a tank
Long String: ~ $3
Camera Mount: ~ Crafted from scraps or a soda bottle
Camera: ~ $0-$100 (Even a cameraphone will work)

Your camera must be able to take photos at a regular interval. CHDK, which we've walked through setting up in the past, is a great firmware replacement that adds loads of useful features (including interval photos) if you have an old Canon laying around that you are willing to fool around.

After your balloon has returned to earth, you can use the Cartagen Knitter to sync up your photos into a large photo.

For full instructions, check out the Grassroots Mapping wiki, and make sure you are following any local rules and regulations regarding balloons. If you give it a try, share any photos of your project below and offer any tips you might have for our other readers! Photo remixed from nadya.

Balloon Aerial Photography [GrassrootsMapping Wiki]

Kayaker Takes "Best Ever" Shot of English Sea Monster Using Cellphone [Wtf]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/#!5765192/kayaker-takes-best-ever-shot-of-english-sea-monster-using-cellphone

Cellphone cameras are everywhere. Kids, adults—all armed to the teeth with capable cameras. With so many in so many hands, it's no surprise that a kayaker just captured the best photo ever of an infamous English sea monster using—you see where I'm going with this, yes?—his cellphone.

The kayaker was Tom Pickles, and IT guy on retreat with his company, CapGemini. The lake, Lake Windermere. The creature was the English version of Nessie, called Bownessie, and not the infamous creature Nellie that legend says still patrols Loch Ness in the Scottish Highlands.

The picture was deemed "authentic [...] but because it's been taken on a phone the file size is too small to really tell whether it has been altered on Photoshop or not," said photo expert David Farnell of Farnell's photographic laboratory in Lancaster.

Whatever it might be, Bownessie sounds absolutely terrifying:

Mr Pickles said he saw an animal the size of three cars speed past him on the lake and watched it for about 20 seconds. He said: "It was petrifying and we paddled back to the shore straight away. At first I thought it was a dog and then saw it was much bigger and moving really quickly at about 10mph. "Each hump was moving in a rippling motion and it was swimming fast.

Sonar surveys of the loch have, as expected, turned up nothing over the past five years, but that hasn't stopped people from reporting a creature that looked very much like what Pickles captured this week. There have been no fewer than eight sightings of a multi-humped creature patrolling the water since 2006. [The Telegraph]

Saturday, February 19, 2011

Motorola Atrix 4G already rooted, and it's not even out yet

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/19/motorola-atrix-4g-already-rooted-and-its-not-even-out-yet/

If you thought the lack of root on the Atrix 4G was going to save you a couple hundred bucks next week... well, we hate to break the bad news, but you're going to need to find another excuse not to buy it (more on that in a second). Long story short, the phone's already been rooted by a gentleman over on the ever-resourceful xda-developers forums, which means you can do all the normal things that require root access like enabling the standard Froyo mobile hotspot feature, using root apps like Titanium Backup (pictured above), and generally looking 1337 compared to your friends locked up in their walled gardens. Now, the bad news: the bootloader remains firmly locked and encrypted, so custom kernels are still just a dream -- but hey, where there's a will, there's a way. Keep the faith!

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Motorola Atrix 4G already rooted, and it's not even out yet originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 19 Feb 2011 13:40:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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How That Impossible Escher Waterfall May Have Been Built [Video]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/#!5764700/how-that-impossible-escher-waterfall-may-have-been-built

Remember this? Still pretty crazy! But maybe a little less so after taking a look at David Goldman's theory of how exactly this contraption was put together:

It's amazing what a little forced perspective and careful editing can do. Remember, though, that this is pure speculation. There's still a distinct possibility that the real answer is magic. [BoingBoing]

HTC Incredible S auto-rotating buttons explained? (video)

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/02/18/htc-incredible-s-auto-rotating-buttons-explained-video/

We were quite bedazzled by the HTC Incredible S after our hands-on at MWC, but it's the auto-rotating icons for the capacitive buttons that left us most intrigued. So we went back to the HTC booth to try to make sense of it all. From what we were able to observe, there's some optical trickery happening here: the icons appear to be glittering and shimmering depending on viewing angle as if lit through a prism, half-mirror or grate of some kind. We think that a pair of LEDs are used to project the intended icon onto the glass surface via either a combination of prisms and half-mirrors, or via horizontally and vertically polarized grates. Watch our video after the break, and let us know in the comments how you think this actually works.

Continue reading HTC Incredible S auto-rotating buttons explained? (video)

HTC Incredible S auto-rotating buttons explained? (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 18 Feb 2011 17:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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