Thursday 29 July 2010

Barcode battlers

If you found us via the QR code, welcome along. If you can make the above, which will be an excellent night of music from 8pm to 1am, come say hi and we'll give you a badge for being special.

If you found us via Facebook, a bookmark or any other way, interacting with the above image could send you on a neverending loop back to this very page (you can also have a badge).

Wednesday 21 July 2010

Saikat Biswas Holga D Design


I think that this is just a concept design, but as I have been using an Analogue Holga for a few years now I found it interesting. Holgas are Chinese plastic cameras, that were given away as cheap prizes at American fair grounds in the 80's. They have been resurrected in recent years by the lomography company. Despite being poorly built they produce images like the one bellow.


The digital concept by Saikat Biswas is a more compact version with the same plastic lens of the original. This is perhaps the obvious way to create a digital version but the interesting twist is this - it doesn't have a view finder at the back. So like the analogue version you can't see what your pictures are like until you develop/download them. This is the most exciting part of using a film camera. It would be nice to try one for a day.

Andy

Latitude Festival 2010: Post two

The week before the festival Uprocker Steve said that he had booked us a table at the Giant Robot restaurant at Latitude. It was the first time the festival had had a proper restaurant. I thought - great, I'll write a blog on that.


It was great to sit down at a proper table and use a fork and spoon (that's how I eat spaghetti). It was also nice to sit down with friends to discuss what we had all seen so far. It was lucky that we had so much to discuss as we had a long wait. The service was pretty bad, they had sold out of quite a few dishes, and it was only Saturday. The food was good though when it did come. Hopefully they will sort themselves out if they come back next year.


As this was the case I was unable to give Giant Robot my award this year for best festival food. That accolade goes to Pizza to the People. They take your order and freshly bake your Pizza in 5 minutes. The queue was long and people were complaining. As soon as customers got their pizza they quickly realised that they had just purchased the best item of food they will have all weekend, and all was forgiven.

Andy

Latitude Festival 2010: Post one


Woo! Latitude! Got to love it. See you again next year hopefully.

Lots went on this weekend, plenty of good bands and odd stuff going down. We'll get round to writing up our experiences soon.

First though, the song of the weekend for me proved to come courtesy of a band who weren't playing but still seemed to follow me around.

A couple of times after watching the comedy a mix cd was thrown on, and on both occasions a mellow track with children singing on it kicked things off.

The first time I heard it I noticed a woman singing along. I was struck by a feeling of inadequacy for having never heard this song that was obviously so close to her heart.

I'd soon enough forgotten about it until after Emo Phillips's set, when it came on again. Shazam was called into action but sadly the reception wasn't strong enough to send the track off for identification.

Back at work today and I suddenly remembered the track, checked Shazam and it was still stored, waiting to be sent off.

A few seconds later and it came back as the below.



It's as nice as I remembered it. I read up a bit and found out that Ryan Gosling's in the band.

That's a pity, I thought, I really hate him as an actor. I then looked him up and realised it's not actually Ryan Gosling I dislike, but Ryan Phillippe.

I don't actually recognise Ryan Gosling, but see he was in Flashforward. Poor old Benford.

Richard

Monday 12 July 2010

BLU's history of the world

A little while ago we were talking to BLU about coming to Ipswich to paint a big wall for us. It was looking promising, but sadly he was too busy working on his new animation to come to the UK.

Well, the new film is here and it's absolutely mind blowing.

Funny, poignant, incomprehensible...do yourself a favour, find 10 minutes to sit down and immerse yourself in Big Bang, Big Boom.

BIG BANG BIG BOOM - the new wall-painted animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.