Here’s a great set of characters drawn on cardboard sheets! I love cardboard…it’s one of those essential elements that you always have, use, and end up building halloween mazes, castles, mock-ups, storage bins, costumes, or as with many artists, the ultimate canvas. Hit up THIS Flicker Set for all the images and closeups, otherwise, I’ve posted an index of all of them after the jump.
Cute in some weird dumb way….thought some of ya’ll might like these dumb dunnies. Otherwise, get some classic dunnies!
Here’s a pretty nifty idea for a new visual search engine. “Like.com” creates results from both text and image matches! Take for example, a silver watch you saw in a magazine, but you had no clue which brand it was. If you had an image of it, you would pop that image in, and ask the service to look for things that, well, looked “like” it! (They call it “likeness” technology) In most cases, people would go to Google Image or Froogle, but as we all know, not everything pops up in those searches, especially the ones you were looking for, mainly because not everything is indexed with the right meta tags.
Like.com is from the creators of Riya.com,which in short, is a photo sharing storage system with some smart AI(artificail intelligence). You dump in a thousand plus images in, tag a few, and riya starts to recognize images of people, puts them in groups, and automatically tags them over time. Riya recognizes colors, images, text, faces, and much more. The more people that do this and share their images, the better. Imagine seeing all those pictures of yourself from other peoples cameras during those holiday vacations you walked into!
Anyhoots, I tried out riya fro some time and enjoyed it, but never found those many tourists pics of my smiling in the mysterious background which I try to do often. Hopefully like.com will change and improve the image/product search world quickly.
Just a reminder from Seth Godin:
“Normally, people just show up. They show up at work, or at a conference. They show up on vacation or even sometimes they show up at home.
They aren’t doing anything special, they’re just doing.
Well, I spent the day with several hundred enthusiastic people.
This group, led by Jennifer Young, didn’t just show up. They arrived. They were purposeful and positive and prepared and in a hurry… but in a good way.
It didn’t cost anything. It didn’t take any more effort (in fact, it probably ended up being less of an effort.) They got more out of me, more out of each other, more out of the day.
Enthusiasm has a lot to be said for it.”
via Seths Blog
This is soooooo true! I’ve been at several firms, corporations, conferences, parties, etc…and you know what, it’s a real turn off when people show no excitement in their work, their life, or just meeting new people. People or places that thrive with energy, excitement, and enthusiasm really makes any kind of experience better and usually more productive.
If your office space lacks this energy, try throwing a goofy day, some wild retreat, a few wacky toys around(airZooka)(or a handful of toys from Kidrobot), buy a few bean bags or a beanbag chair, add more jazz and color to your space, dress up for halloween, or pretty much anything that makes ya feel like a kid again. If ya work in a stressful environment, perhaps you can make some foam soccer heads for everyone to kick around. Perhaps just the soft lovable “living stone” pillows will do the trick. If you have a larger budget and a larger space, get a robocoaster, a kick butt slide, fun art on the walls, a kitchen full of goodies that change often, or a few razor scooters. Keep in mind, Work is play, play is work!
Who says you can’t reinvent the wheel? Well, Michelin Tires did just that by creating a revolutionary airless tire that needs no air, can absorb shocks, wear, tear, and even survive explosions. Pretty cool, watch the videos here and here. (above)
A bunch of you have asked me about this ring which I wear every so often. Well, I was playing around with some cork for a side project, and decided to make something from the leftovers, and bahm, a ring made from cork, then squished into a rectangle shape, then hardened with epoxy, though I’m testing out other elements such polyurethanes, glues, starches, and other such compounds. I’m still playing around with mixing cork with other materials such as leather, silver, or wood…hopefully I’ll have more to show soon.
I’ve added it to the sidebar “Stuff I rock” section, or you can get a larger glimpse of it here.