think different

Though we are all probably intimately familiar with his branding work, we might not have recognised the name of the individual Paul Rand (Peretz Rosenbaum, *1914 - †1996) who was one of the first Americans to adopt and champion the Swiss Style, a typographical offshoot of the Bauhaus movement, of graphic design without news of an upcoming auction of his creations. Rand fashioned iconic logos, the cohesive and unifying stuff of corporate identities, and advertising campaigns for Westinghouse, Yale University Press, the United States Postal Service, and Apple as well as for IBM and ABC television, whose emblems in one form or another are still in use.

rosy fingered dawn

Reopened to visitors after restrictions were lifted due to damage sustained by an earthquake strike two years hence, an inaugural group of photographers hiked into Kikuchi Valley nature preserve before the sun rose to capture the elusive effect of rising mists broken by divine beams of light. Known as kobo (光芒), witnessing such rays certainly provide a transfixing experience and would be well worth the early morning trek to experience and share. Visit Spoon & Tamago at the link above for more.

7x7

tarnkappe: world’s first graphene jacket gives it wearer super-powers

like my mom used to say, if you need calcium, eat a milkman—yep, she said it: Ze Frank (previously) returns with true facts about carnivorous plants, via The Art of Darkness

67/p churyumov-gerasimenko: peruse one hundred thousand striking images of the alien landscape of the comet that the Rosetta probe rendezvoused with

global statesman: former United Nations Secretary-General and Nobel laureate Kofi Annan has passed away

forever blowing bubbles: a look back at the financial crash of 2008 and realising how little things have changed

pulsars: instructive and interactive coding tutorials on creating generative art (previously here and here), via Waxy

take care, tcb: some superlative obituaries and appreciations on the passing of Aretha Franklin 

attention generative adversarial network

Miss Cellania has given us a home work assignment that’s going to occupy us for the next few hours at least in the form of Cris Valenzuela’s laboratory’s latest artificial intelligence generative image maker. Earlier iterations of its kind sought to caption images submitted but this programme attempts to paint abstractions of text entered. Here are a few that I requested. Learn more about the methodology behind the demonstration project, and give it a try yourself (I think it might be overwhelmed at the moment so do give it a go later) at the links above and be sure to share some of your results.

pykrete

Channeling the inventive spirit of World War II English mad scientist Geoffrey Pyke (previously) who among other suggestions to the Admiralty, recommended that bombing runs be staged from aircraft carriers with runways made of ice, reinforced with a mixture of sawdust and wood pulp called Pykrete, a London-based food studio has developed an assortment of frozen treats able to resist melting in 24°C heat for one hour, substituting fruit fibre for sawdust.
It might at first glance seem a frivolous thing to worry about but this second look at a composite material that was abandoned during the war due to other priorities and pressures could indeed translate to other applications from ways to keep foods and medications cooler for longer in places without reliable refrigeration or even something more ambitious that what Pyke envisioned himself as girders and frames to help stabilise and hold together ice sheets and icebergs until they can heal themselves. Pyke’s cousin, incidentally, Magnus was a radio and television presenter and celebrity, hosting many programmes on the topic of nutrition and food science and was the Home Doctor for Thomas Dolby’s 1982 song, She Blinded Me with Science—the one who interjects, “Science!” Maybe science and innovation can indeed save us yet.

internet caretakers

Via the Awesomer, we are directed back to Wikimedia’s Gift Shop (previously) for a look at its further adventures into street apparel with the foundation’s collaboration with Advisory Board Crystals. All proceeds go to funding the foundation and its many projects—beyond its flagship undertaking of free knowledge for all.

bongóblíða

We learn that Icelanders have a catchy-sounding colloquial term, bongóblíða—bongo weather, to describe this rather pleasant respite from the sweltering heat we’re currently enjoying, though still quite seasonable and hot conditions. The word is a lyric from the 1988 Eurovision entry Sólarsamba (Sunny Samba) from father-daughter duo Magnús Kjartansson and Margrét Gauja Magnúsdóttir. Check out the link above to see a music video of the song for pronunciation help.

island one

The always engrossing and thematic Things Magazine directs our attention to a visionary and indulgent overview about how we’ll need to reassess our geometric conceits when outer space is no longer the beyond and we are living in orbit or in transit or as colonists on world’s where constants lose their consistency due to our perceptions warped by scale.  A series of studies held at Stanford University from 1975 to 1976 invited speculation on the form that future space stations might take and produced some fantastically ambitious illustrations for insular habitats composed of toruses and Bernal spheres which were self-sustaining environments and generated artificial gravity from rotation.

The article and images invites one to imagine what will it be like to live under a wrap-around sky with the horizon at the vanishing point and gravity is not an obstacle but rather a force harnessed in one’s favour and making us a bit superhuman in our strengths and capabilities..