1988
Some of the best music and culture of the decade. Man – the 80’s were awesome. 🙂
Update on $1 Homes in Italy
I wrote previously about the 1 Euro homes for sale:
Some time has now passed, and interviewers are starting to get the stories from those that gave it a try. The reality is that they have cost much more than $1 – but it has still has worked out great for many that tried it. Worth a listen.
AI Enhanced Moon Landing
Historic footage from the Apollo Moon landings is not so great. The footage is often grainy, blurry, and in some cases (to conserve film) only 24, 12, 6, or even 1 frame per second.
A photo and film restoration specialist, who goes by the name of DutchSteamMachine, has worked some AI magic to enhance original Apollo film, creating strikingly clear and vivid video clips and images. Read more about the technique here.
Apollo 15’s landing site at Hadley Rille in 60 fps (originally 12 fps)
Apollo 11 First Steps on the moon in 24fps, originally filmed in 12fps.
Come out to the coast, have a few laughs
The Die Hard shop light.
Mandalorian filming
Watch this great video on how the Unreal game engine and a nearly 360 degree LED stage/video wall has transformed how special effects are done for films like The Mandalorian. It’s a complete game changer because it solves almost all the problems relating to green screens and digital effects.
Update: I recently listened to a talk at PAX 2021 that included A J Wedding from Orbital Virtual Studios that worked with Robert Rodriguez on the LED studio setup.
3dSen – Play your NES games in 3D
3dSen PC is a special emulator that converts a number of favorite 2D NES games them into 3D and letting you play them in real-time.
Here’s the list of currently supported games. It reminds me a bit of the project by Mausimus to bring 3D to old Sierra games (Police quest, Kings Quest, etc)
Spy Hunter
800 wood cuts in motion
American Animals
I think they wanted things to come easy for them. They didn’t want to work for a transformative experience. They didn’t want to help other people achieve a transformative experience. I find them all very selfish.
-Betty Jean Gouch
I still have trouble figuring out how a person crosses a line in their own mind, to be willing to hurt another person to get what they want. I think once you’ve crossed that line, I think it’s a dangerous line to cross.
It makes me wonder if they really know why they did it.
American Animals is a 2018 movie based on the true story of four young men who attempt to execute an audacious (and ill executed) art heist by stealing 2 rare Audubon books from a nearby library’s special collections. Struggling to find meaning in their dull lives, they formulate a daring plan for the robbery only to watch their mistakes and reality catch up with them.
The quote comes one of the real life office workers who encountered them when they tried to steal the books. Of all the characters, I think she grasps the humanity of the situation the best.
Doug Aitken’s Lighthouse
Doug Aitken’s ”Lighthouse’ outdoor art project uses projectors placed outdoors and cast rolling hills, open fields, and hardwood forest onto the structure. The artwork phases in and out of synchronicity with its surroundings, shifts between the seasons, and drawing on both micro and macro views.
See more at doug aitken’s virtual road trip through the creative process.
Mother 2 interview with Shigesato Itoi
GameCenter CX is a Japanese show with comedian Shinya Arino (one half of the comedy duo Yoiko) who plays home console video games from previous decades and usually attempts to get the game’s ending within a single day. The show has been on-air since 2003 and has gone for over 15 seasons and hundreds of episodes. You can watch re-runs on Twitch.
When Arino played through Shigesato Itoi’s game Mother 2 (released in North America as EarthBound), Itoi came to visit Arino Kacho while he made his way through the game. They talked about their memories of the game on the 30th anniversary of the original Mother title.
Read the transcripts of their discussion here:
https://www.1101.com/gccxmother/en/