Links and write-ups about beautiful things from around the web!
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Comptine D’un Autre Été, L’après-Midi, for Six iPhones
Yann Tiersen’s Comptine D’un Autre Été, L’après-Midi played on six iPhones. While far from a perfect, beautiful performance, I have a soft spot for this piece and it’s fun to see someone trying to overcome the limitations of the tiny virtual keyboard.
(Via SwissMiss)
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AAAARG.ORG
A ‘conversational’ collection of academic theory and discourse on arts, aesthetics, architecture (along with other non-alliterative disicipines), a user-contributed journal. Who needs grad school?
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Dreaming the Industrial Body
Dreaming the Industrial Body. I’m not sure that I’m following the info that they’re trying to convey about the sun’s effects on our bodies, but it’s definitely an eye-catching image as far as medical literature goes. From Der mensch gesund und krank [The Healthy and Sick Human], menschenkunde 1940 … . Vol. 2, displayed as part of the National Library of Medicine’s Dream Anatomy exhibit. Speaking of which, check out their cool children’s art page!
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This Creative Destruction Began in the 60s As
This “creative destruction” began in the ’60s, as did many things that we now both love and regret, and it was initially a spinoff of a project funded by US military agencies. […] Mephistopheles came to Faust in the form of a poodle. After all…in some versions of the story, he cannot enter your house unbidden — you have to invite him in, like a vampire. From Internet Antichrist, a thoughtful piece by David Byrne on the the development of the ARPANET, psychoacoustics research at Bell Labs leading to vocoders and Kraftwerk, the rise of digital recording and transmission, and the possibility of the near-future demise of physical media and risks to personal privacy. The market forces of creative destruction.
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15 Pixel Video Game Minimalism
Clever 15-pixel video game minimalism, courtesy of the London-based design and animation concern Alaskan Military School.
(Via GameSetWatch)
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Nintendo‘s First Print Mention in the West
Nintendo’s first print mention in the West? From the NY Times, October 8, 1955. Back then the company was known best for its hanafuda playing cards and toys (and love hotels, and taxis and…)
(Via 4 color rebellion)
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Pellet Gunn by Tim Beckhardt
A dog, a cyclops, and others kill some time with the help of wormholes and hobbyist self-modification. Made in 2008.
Pellet Gunn by Tim Beckhardt. Not 100% sure that I get the full story, but it’s great in a non sequitur, underground comix sort of way. His line work and hand-filled blacks are nicely composed, and the animation is fun. Extra points for the Philip Guston painting in the background.
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Katie Couric Goes All Regulators on Some FMV
Katie Couric goes all regulators on some FMV villains in this circa 1990 clip about arcade laserdisc sensation (well, maybe not so much) Mad Dog McCree. It’s kind of sad to see early 90’s tv – the production values on the crummy video game look far more polished than the Today Show’s.
(Via GameSetWatch)
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Another World Ported to HTML5 Canvas and JavaScript
Another World ported to HTML5’s <canvas> and JavaScript.
One of the best games of all time, now running experimentally in your browser, demonstrating that the future could be very bright for non-proprietary interactive content on the web. It’s only the first part of the 2nd level (or whatever you want to call the cage-swinging, alien-buddy-meeting scene) and it’s glitchy, but still looks beautiful and smoothly animated (maybe a bit too smooth, due to the <canvas> polygons being all anti-aliased and filtered out of the box). If you’ve never played the original game, an amazing high-res WinXP-compatible remake came out a couple of years back in honor of the 15th anniversary of its original release.
(Via GameSetWatch)