If you own an iPhone or iPod Touch you have, quite probably, dabbled at some point with one or more of the many musical iPhone/iPod Touch applications – personally I managed to recreate Kraftwerk’s entire back catalogue in one evening doing just that, but I don’t like to blow my own (virtual) trumpet, so the speak – but now UK girl group the Mentalists have taken things one step further by performing a cover of MGMT’s track ‘Kids’ live using just downloaded iPhone/iPod Touch applications with a little (reasonably harmonic) vocal accompaniment.

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It’s been a while since I built anything using Lego and, at the time of writing, I lack the child that would give me an excuse to purchase (especially) Lego Mindstorm sets en masse on their behalf (solely for their enjoyment, you understand) – but I certainly never got close to building something quite as cool as Anders Søborg’s DIY Lego Mindstorm NXT Colour Scanner.

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Boston Dynamics have released new, remarkable video footage of their robotic quadruped ‘pack mule’ in action showing just how far developed this DARPA funded robot’s sense of balance has developed – even to the extent that it can maintain its balance whilst climbing obstacles and when loosing its grip on black ice (as well as being kicked).

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Few of you will not know that the double decked Airbus A380 is the world’s largest passenger plane to see commercial production and even fewer of you are ever likely to see the A380’s flight deck in all its glory (especially in the worlds present security conscious climate) which is why we found this 360 degree panoramic image of the A380 cockpit created by Gilles Vidal for Airbus SAS especially interesting and undoubtedly worth a brief mention here on TFTS.

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On a somewhat lighter note from our usual posts, we could not help but offer a brief heads up concerning this cool advertisement for Aliph’s Jawbone Bluetooth Headset which uses a bikini clad (and rather foxy) woman to promote the Jawbone’s Noise Shield Technology.

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We have to hand it to Prince Charles as, whilst he seems to court more than his fair share of bad press in the UK, he is rather more forward thinking than we’ve come to expect from the immediate royal family and now, apart from being the first royal to freely admit to conversing with flowers (I recall having a rather heated conversation with a Geranium myself some while back, but that’s another story) he’s become the first royal to attend a conference virtually as a 3D hologram.

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Ordinarily we wouldn’t offer up a post that simply diverts you straight away from us to another site but, in light of the fact that Gizmodo have always been extremely gracious to credit us for a wealth of our finds subsequently featured by them, we take great pleasure in making an exception in this case as the video of their antics at this year’s CES with the TV-B-Gone gadgets supplied by MAKE had us in stitches.

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This Halloween we saw a raft of ingenious costumes make it onto the net but, as far as we are concerned, those iPhone and YouTube costumes paled into insignificance when compared with the awesome BioShock inspired Big Daddy costume lovingly crafted by Nathan Sharratt featured in this video interview from Collage Humour.

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If you are familiar with the story of Pinocchio then, like me, you’ll be surprised that Zeno, a robot boy presently being developed by David Hanson, presently does not appear to come with an inbuilt lie detector and extending nose but, lie detecting nose aside, what Zeno does offer is yet another tantalizing glimpse into the future of robotics and the mind boggles as to quite where its all going to lead.

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We would urge to you view this video as it’s not often that we come across a new web technology that not only absolutely amazes us but that, we feel, could potentially have far reaching implications as far as web browsing is concerned, but this new dynamic, content aware image resizing technology developed by Dr. Ariel Shamir and Dr. Shai Avidan very much looks to be the future as far as displaying web based imagery across multiple screen resolutions is concerned.

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If you’ve had a particularly stressful day or are feeling a little fed up this video featuring the Keepon Dancing Robot is sure to bring a smile to even the sternest of faces.

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A while back we posted about designer Issey Miyake’s (then) new website on account of the fact that we found the flash intro absolutely mesmerising. We also loved the soundtrack.

Since then we’ve visited thousands of sites in our relentless trek for material for the site but nothing in that time has jumped out at us in quite the same way as Issey Miyake’s site.

Or at least it hadn’t until around half an hour ago when we found the Uniqlock website – and we’ve been marvelling over its design since ever since.

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Following on from the OVO Minimalist Watch we featured earlier on TFTS I was reading Electro Plankton today who noted that Issey Miyake’s new website had launched and I was tempted to take a look. And we’re glad I did.

It’s not very often we post about a site in particular here on TFTS, and its even less often that we don’t skip lengthy flash (often extremely laborious) introductions to websites, but the Flash intro to the new Issey Miyake website simply blew us away with its brilliant concept, fluid animation and great sound track. It simply oozes style.

You can see the flash intro below, and it’s well worth a look.

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Welcome to model making of the future courtesy of the Synthetic Reality Project at Carnegie Mellon.

Claytronics consists of a programmable matter made up of billions of microscopic robots each with computational abilities and sensors that allow for interaction, resulting in a mouldable and programmable tactile medium that can be formed and altered dynamically in your hands.

In the video below, you can see the astonishing Claytronics concept in action and, don’t let the above sentence put you off – it really is astonishing stuff.

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We have not posted a curious video for a while here at TFTS so, by way of reassurance that we have not suddenly begun to take ourselves too seriously (God forbid), we have somewhat of a gem for you.

As many advertisers have come to realize, the best way to get your products seen – or, at least, to create a buzz – is to produce something that will cause a stir by invariably coming from somewhere just left of centre (something Sony excel at). And, in that respect alone, whoever came up with the idea behind this Samsung sponsored video is either seriously twisted or something of a creative genius, or both – and we would tend towards the latter.

If you have ever wanted to see what would happen if insects were to get miniature pies and such like thrown at them from a mini catapult then this curious Samsung sponsored video entitled ‘Millimetres Matter’ is for you.

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If you found the Humping Dog funny, you’ll love this curiously amusing video featuring the worlds first robotic adult film star, aka Hector the Humping Robot (actually a Robonova-1 robot) getting it on with all manner of things. In fact, he’ll seeming try and hump just about anything (just like a friend of mine, except that Hector is a little more fussy).

You can watch this extremely amusing robot sex romp video below and I should stress that it is entirely safe for work (it also has a great soundtrack). Enjoy.

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How do you clean all the crumbs and pieces of food that come out of a deep fat fryer? Which ever way you do it, I strongly suspect that, unlike this restaurant in Japan, you don’t install a fish tank underneath, pop in a few goldfish and simply let them consume whatever falls into the tank.

You have to feel sorry for the fish as, whilst the fact that oil floats on water saves them from cooking themselves (the oil ejected into the tank can reach temperatures of 163 degrees Celsius) their cholesterol levels must be off the scale. Apparently, however, the fish seem perfectly happy with the arrangement and can live for between 5-10 years.

You can watch the video of this bizarre piece of cooking apparatus below.
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Some weeks ago we featured an animation called ‘Wii – Hold on Tight’ that caused quite a stir, not only on TFTS but across the net in general (if you missed this first installment, you can see it here).

Brent Young, one of the chaps behind the animation has been in touch with Thoughts from the Sidelines to tip us off concerning the next instalment, Hold on Tight 2 – Revenge of the Nunchuck, which we have great pleasure in offering here in case you have missed it.

Not only that, but Brent has been kind enough to offer a little background information concerning the Wii Hold on Tight animation series that may be of interest which is featured below, with the second instalment of the Nintendo Wii inspired animation shorts.
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The greatest form of camouflage is a cloak of invisibility and these videos show that quite apart from being science fiction, such technology is already science fact.

We’ve seen a fair few posts concerning new technologies that, in essence, offer camouflaging by seemingly rendering an item as invisible – such an ‘invisible’ coat and even and ‘invisible’ car – but we’ve held back from posting concerning these items as they have been extensively covered on numerous other sites.

This video, albeit rather short, tipped the scales as it really serves to show this emerging technology in action to great effect and, if you have not seen it before, it’s well worth a viewing.
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It’s been a while since we posted a video on TFTS but to be entirely honest with you it’s been equally as long since I’ve watched a video that struck me as worth posting. But there can be little doubt that this video, showing IO2’s M3 holographic display in action is something that we’d be negligent not to post.

The M3 Heliodisplay produces a 20 inch holographic display based on a 4:3 aspect ratio which is visible in normal lighting conditions, rather than having to be in a darkened room to see the effects, which the images playing directly from a computer of DVD player via a standard video cable.

The M3 is available in two models, the standard M3 unit and an enhanced M3i model that offers interactive capabilities allowing virtual control of the holographic imagery via a mouse – with the models being priced as $18,100 and $19,400 respectively.

Its fascinating stuff and the video featured below offers a tantalising glimpse of what the future of holographic displays hold. Quite how long it will be until we can a food replicator such as seen in Star Trek remains a separate issue entirely.
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There are, as with all things in life, pros and cons concerning each of these methods of gaining a kill. Firstly, using an explosive charge adds weight to the projectile but if pin-point accuracy cannot be assured then all you have to ensure is that the target is within the weapon’s blast radius, and the bigger this radius the less the accuracy required. A good example of this would be the experimentations with air burst nuclear anti-aircraft missiles in the late 50’s and 60’s (which just needed to be in the general area to wipe out an entire squadron of aircraft). It was crude, but it worked.

Conversely, in using pure kinetic energy alone, Lockheed’s CKEM (Compact Kinetic Energy Missile) needs to be extremely accurate in order to achieve a kill and, not only that, it needs to travel as such a speed that its kinetic energy alone has enough destructive power to decommission whatever it hits. And it is this level of accuracy that is, in itself, quite astonishing as the CKEM can hit something up to five miles away with pin point accuracy whilst flying at speeds of over Mach 6.5.
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What may not come as a surprise is that there is no evidence of either a keyboard or a mouse, with everything being controlled by a series of gestures on what appears to be a colossal touchscreen (projected on a wall?) displaying highly visual components. What is also interesting is that not only do keyboards and mice seem to have become a thing of the past in this trip into the future of computing, but that chairs also seem to have been removed from the equations, with the user having to stand to operate the elements flying around him.

Other items notable for their absence are a desk covered with empty cups, a bin overflowing with beer tins, an ashtray piled to the ceiling and a wife persistently complaining in the background that the housework isn’t going to do itself. A mixed blessing then.

You can view this insightful video after the jump.
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The magic number they are looking for is an astounding 253mph/407km/h, which, out of interest, is faster than an F1 racing car and is the equivalent of covering the entire length of a full football pitch every second – so fast that the Veyron’s tyres will only last for fifty minutes.

Does the Veyron deliver? What the video below to find out.
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As a result advertisers are persistently coming up with new ways to present ads that will break through our rapidly evolving ‘content filters’ so as to gain our attention with view to prompting a sale.

The following videos taken from Japanese subway trains show a new breed of subway advertising that uses multiple imagery to produce a seemingly animated visual message as the train passes by – and it’s certainly impressive stuff.

You can view the videos below.
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But, like many theories, something often gets lost in the transition from theory into actual practice and our experiments with voice recognition certainly haven’t been a particularly productive affair.

This video, which goes on a bit but is frankly hilarious for the first few minutes, shows Windows Vista voice recognition software in operation as the user tries out a little Perl programming language with inevitably frustrating consequences. And if you’ve ever dabbled with voice recognition software, you’ll no doubt be reminded as to why you stopped by watching this video – though I must say that the user in the film can’t be faulted for his patience and, in fact, he even manages to complete the sentence in the end.

Such videos and experiences certainly serve to reassure us that our humble keyboards won’t be disappearing from our desks anytime soon.
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Boeing’s target for this particular test was that the wing should be able to withstand up to 150% greater force than ever realistically would ever be exerted on it and, to put this into start perspective, this entails an astounding wing deflection of over 24 feet.

Needless to say, when the wing decides enough is enough it certainly goes with a bang.

You can watch the video of the B777 wing stress test, as well as read some interesting facts concerning the triple seven below.
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Created by Michael Wesch who is Assistant Professor of Cultural Anthropology at Kansas State University, this video attempts to explain exactly what Web 2.0 is and the very foundations behind it – and it does it extremely well and in a very accessible (and well realised) manner.

If you haven’t seen this yet, and you would like to know what all the fuss concerning Web 2.0 is, then I would highly recommend a viewing.
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Surrounded by a selection of vinyl records, these Juke Bots don’t just play the music but actually start pulling a few DJ tricks, such as scratching.

You can view the video of the Juke Bots ‘doing their thang’ below (just be warned that they don’t take nicely to people leaning over them asking for requests).

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That said, it’s been a while since we’ve posted any aircraft related posts and, in a bid to make up for this, we have selected some of the best videos of low level flying fighters we have come across and present them here for your viewing pleasure.

You can view the videos after the jump. Turn up the sound, sit back and enjoy.

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And, if anything, this short and cleverly realised animation from Super78 – who made this video off their own backs and without agency involvement – has convinced me all to more that the point is rapidly approaching where I should notch up my ‘We need a Wii’ campaign and go in for the kill.

The sense of fun this animation conveys is extremely entertaining as it takes the stories of Wii controllers flying out of people’s hands that one step further – to the point at which the controllers themselves take on a life all of there own and battle it out on screen.

You can see the animation below.

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We’ve all made shapes on the wall created with our hands and, it must be said that I consider myself to be somewhat of a master of the art of hand shadowing – my best examples being a bird which just looks like a hand, a duck which again looks just like a hand and a complete, detailed animated image of the internal workings of a modern jet engine which really, all said and done, looks remarkably like just a hand).

In stark contrast at my pathetic attempts to create shadows on the wall – usually employed to cheer up the wife who, living with me, frankly needs all the cheering up she can get (Prozac isn’t cheap you know) – this advert shows just what can be achieved when hand shadowing is placed in the hands of professionals (that’s this week’s puny pun taken care of then).

I’m not quite sure just how many performers are involved towards the end when things become truly spectacular but, in fairness, wishing to distil the mechanics behind the advert merely detracts from its charm.

You can watch the video in question below.

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Following on from our video post showing off the iPhone’s advanced and much hyped features, assessable here, this video expands, in a gloriously tongue-in-cheek fashion, on the iPhone’s feature rich functionality in a rather amusing fashion.

Is there anything the iPhone can’t do?

You can view the video below.

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Created entirely using standard Lego and Lego Mindstorms kits by Robotik-Gruppe des Veit-Höser-Gymnasiums Bogen, this is an entire car production line that builds Lego cars completely automatically and, as if that wasn’t impressive enough, the user can even select the required colour scheme.

I’ve watched it three times now, and I still find myself staring at the screen in complete disbelief. Astonishing.

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In the video below you can see Lala the 14 year old shopping king penguin in action wearing its own backpack as it visits the fishmongers for a tasty treat before picking up the rest of the family’s dinner and waddling back home.

According to the video, Lala was rescued from a fisherman’s line and has remained as the family pet ever since which is a stroke of luck as now the family can obviously sit at home and just send Lala out crossing roads, risking life and waddle, in order to get supplies. Of course had Lala been a whale the chances of us seeing a video of it out shopping would be rather slight as it probably would have been eaten in the name of scientific research – which is a shame really, as a video of a whale popping off to the shops for supplies would be quite something else.

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You can read more concerning the technical specifications of this awesome machine via Dolmar’s Website which is linked here, or you can watch an impressive video of their Chainsaw Powered Harley in action below.

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A little (probably too honest) background.

The first time I saw this was in a pub this weekend whilst I was supposed to be Christmas shopping but felt curiously drawn to a pint or two of liquid refreshment having flexed the plastic all morning and it had a rather odd effect on me as, for some strange and wholly inexplicable reason, I was shocked to feel a tear roll down my cheek (no sniggering at the back please).

Why, I know not, but having seen it again later that evening it had the same effect again (only a little more pronounced) and I have no idea why. Either ways, this is a truly remarkable advert which needs to be seen and so I have hunted around and I am thrilled to have found that it is available on the net, and consequently I have been able to provide it below for your viewing pleasure.

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You can see the RC Dragonfly in action below in a video courtesy of the fabulous T3 magazine.

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The video is not in English but the instructions are abundantly clear and serve to show how, with a little tinkering, your dearly departed Guinea Pig can once again roam the land (albeit on all wheels) using nothing more that a disposable teddy bear, an RC vehicle and a bizarre desire to turn a dead animal into a RC vehicle.

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As Wii fever continues to take hold reports are already emerging of women behaving very strangely in front of these white boxes and now, rather than just relying on hearsay, we have firm documentary evidence that Wii and women just don’t mix.

This video, obtained from an unnamed top secret source with an aversion to sushi, serves as damning evidence of just what happens when a Wii and a female of our species are placed in the same room without due diligence and, I’ll be frank with you here, it’s not a pretty sight.

I advise extreme caution when watching the following video.

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It is hard not to feel like bowing down to its creator, Pierre Scerri, who not only produced this masterpiece from scratch – spending 3 years just producing all the required diagrams – but who hand-tooled everything himself, including all the valves and the gearbox, and even learned to manufacture glass just so as to produce the exact pattern on the headlights and make rubber to mold the tires.

The model took Pierre a total of fifteen years and 22,000 hours to produce and you can see a video featuring the resulting masterpiece (and it is undoubtedly a masterpiece) – including the firing of its engine, complete with the resulting Ferrari growl – as featured on Jeremy Clarkson’s Extreme Machines television programme, below.

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