I love lamb

This one is for all of my vegetarian and vegan readers out there:

How to Stop a War

This just in, artists all around the world have finally worked out how to stop wars:

















The people are rejoicing, John and Yoko have risen from the dead (like jesus himself) to proclaim that:

Alas, all the troubles of the world are not over yet, politicians are now trying to find a solution to get rid of all of this graffiti and decide who is going to kill John again!

Would you like to go 'up' to dinner with me?

The dictionary definition of Ex-treme: the furthest or utmost length beyond the ordinary or average.

Benji Fun definition of Ex-treme: Dinner in the sky, Car Bungee, Toilet Racers and many more seemingly ridiculous definitions including "death riding".

Dinner in the sky is my favourite and probably the most 'practical'. It shows us that with the technology that surround us today and manifests itself as the tools of creativity the sky is the limit...or is it?



I do wonder though what would happen if you dropped your fork or needed to go to the toilet!

Benji Fun have also given me a great marketing idea that would work well locally - Segways with advertising on them. If you think about local scooter advertising campaigns and the costs involved the segway could be a good alternative; being much cheaper, better for the environment and standing out as much if not more than scooter ads. The only real question is could they reach as much of an audience as the scooter ads?

We may see this trend over the next few years!

Happy snaps from last nights dream

Happy snaps of my new friend I met in my dreams last night, lucky I had my camera!

Skippy spends most of his time drinking near the bright lights. He likes sailing his ship on the high seas but loves nothing more than visiting his extended family in Vegas.

If you can guess where I met Skippy I will give you lifetime membership to all Callitech happenings!

Theo Jansen: A Modern Day Da Vinci

Theo Jansen is a Dutch artist/engineer who lives and works in Holland. Studying Science at The University of Delft Theo soon delved into a more artistic interpretation of science, spending 7 years painting and then progressing into kinetic sculpture. His earlier ‘sculptures’ included a flying saucer that actually flew over the town of Delft and brought the streets and police into commotion. He has devoted the last 15 years of his life to “making new life forms”.

Dubbed “strandbeests”, these skeletal animals are made of plastic electrical conduit and are powered by the wind. A large amount of technology, engineering and science has gone into these animals including genetic algorithms.

Genetic Algorithms simulate evolution to solve complex systems and measure for variables including ‘fitness’. In Theo’s case the algorithms are used to keep the animals in movement within the enclosed lines of the water and the inland edges of the beach.

Theo lets them roam free on the stormy beaches of Netherland and measures their success to update his model and “map the progress of mobility”. Eventually Theo wants to put a whole ‘herd’ of these animals on the beach and let them live in complete autonomy.

This type of work is indeed being researched with utilitarian ends in mind. Andrew Biewener a Professor of biology at Harvard studies the economy of movement and is developing robots with legs that will be able to handle terrain that wheels cannot.

Theo believes that these animals are actually much closer to real animals than the audiences first thought – “It's a sort of symbiosis. I live on these beasts - they give me income - and they live on me, because they need me to make them. You could also say they make me make them. It's already a life form that lives in the media. Many people understand what I'm doing without my having told them; even children, they don't know anything about evolution, but when they look at a beach creature they seem to understand what I'm doing. It's strange. Even in nature - butterflies need flowers, and flowers can't work without worms - everything depends on each other. It's a big symbiosis of many creatures.”

Some of the income that he speaks about comes from his BMW “defining innovations” advertisements, but it’s not hard to guess that he is a “bloody Volvo driver”!

Border Community

Border Community is James Holden's stalwart record label for music "that doesnt fit in a category". It's all "about providing djs with the tools to innovate".

Artists Released include:
James Holden
Dextro
Lazy Fat People
Extrawelt
Nathan Fake
Petter
Ron Trent

A cool thing about the community (border) is the artworks used for the vinyl labels is all submitted by fans and community members.

My favourite is the cover for Holden's "The Idiots Are Winning" ep painted by Gregory Dourde:

Time-Lapse Graffiti

German Artist Lichtfaktor is exploring new creative materials through a much less destructive interpretation of graffiti:



Want to try it out yourself? Well Lichtfaktor has been kind enough to let us in on his technique...

The Basics:
To get the best results you need a tripod
The exposure should be around 10-30 sec (or longer if needed)
Be sure to stay in front of the camera while light writing
To avoid overexposure set the camera to about iso100, and close your aperture as much as possible. if there is still to much light you might have to use a nd-filter
Experiment with filters and light reflection materials

Basically you can use different types of lights depending on the effect you are looking for:

• xenon - warm golden light
• LED - thin precise lines
• cold cathode - thick line
• flashlights
• biking lights
• flashing LED's
• fireworks

See Through Desktops

Desktop...you're so vein, I can see straight through you! I'm glad there is someone out there doing this kind of thing to entertain the rest of us!

Quirky Minimal Fuss Advertisement

Pictures speak a thousand words and so does a girl holding up placards with nonsensical words!

Clever, cute and mildly mysterious...god bless the bear headed girl and all the minimal fuss behind her!