blog.aka.me - Filed under 'wow'

December 11, 2006

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| design | wow |

"Tokyo without the Ginza"

The New York Times: Streets Are Paved With Neon's Glare, and City Calls a Halt (By Larry Rohter - Published: December 12, 2006)
SAO PAULO, Brazil - Imagine a modern metropolis with no outdoor advertising: no billboards, no flashing neon signs, no electronic panels with messages crawling along the bottom. Come the new year, this city of 11 million, overwhelmed by what the authorities call visual pollution, plans to press the "delete all" button and offer its residents an unimpeded view of their surroundings.

Of course, detractors came up with all the most alarming forecasts they could think of:
- Advertising and business groups, though, regard the legislation as injurious to society and an affront to their professions.
- They say that free expression will be inhibited, jobs lost and consumers less informed in their purchasing decisions, and even that streets will be less safe at night with the loss of illumination from signs.
- This is a radical law that damages the rules of a market economy and respect for the rule of law
- We live in a consumer society, and the essence of capitalism is the availability of information about products.
- the result will inevitably be a diminishing of urban life - "like New York without Times Square or Tokyo without the Ginza"
- "I think this city is going to become a sadder, duller place"
- "Advertising is both an art form and, when you're in your car or alone on foot, a form of entertainment that helps relieve solitude and boredom."
- "It's easier to attack McDonald's and Coca-Cola and the banks, because that doesn't offend anybody."

hmmm... I am personally incredibly excited at what new forms of expression people will come up with to circumvent this new law.
I am also convinced that all those ads we get bombarded with everywhere we walk or stand are inhibiting our creative sense and happiness, not enhancing it.
Lastly, a Tokyo without the neons in Ginza would not make me flee the country, screaming, on the contrary. I hope 10 times more tourists flock to Sao-Paulo next year.
I dare you Ishihara-san...

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March 2, 2006

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| design | wow |

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Beautiful Evidence

Edward Tufte new book - Beautiful Evidence, is now at the printer and should be available in May 2006. On his site, you can order only that book, or all 4 of them in one convenient pack...
Guess what I just got meself...

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January 15, 2006

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| UI | wow |

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Cover Flow

The last time I bought an actual CD was 4 years ago, so the only contact with my music collection for 4 years has been lists and lists and lists of titles... Lost the emotions of handling your own CDs, broken covers, and gaze at their covers. When is the last time you had a discussion with a friend about a great CD cover art.
For me, music is a line on a P2P soft, or on the iTunes store, then a line on iTunes and then sound.
Imagine if the time continuum warped and all the people who ever designed a CD jacket disappeared in a sneeze... We wouldn't be left with much.

Cover Flow is a new software that brings back physicality to your CD collection in an overwhelming, submersive 3D interface.

The software presents your music collections as standing CD covers you can flip through sideways. It's simply beautiful with its black background and reflections, intuitive. Magical.
(more on the original concept)

Of course I spent hours making sure that every single album I have would get its original cover. The app automatically does most of the work for you but some older or badly indexed albums do get left out. The app then allows you to quickly search for artwork on Amazon or Google and import the found artwork in a simple Drag & Drop gesture.

Anyway, enough talking, just go download it immediately! (thanks Olivier!)

Things I am waiting for in a future release:
- a way to represent incomplete albums and even single tracks as opposed to full albums.
- full screen browsing
- more browsing options such as genres, star level sorting...
- song list display somewhere (back of the CD?) so I can actually choose another song in the album without going into iTunes.
- better app icon
- last but not least: a way to import all the album artwork (that I spent hours downloading) BACK into iTunes...

Now. How long before this interface gets borrowed by Apple and included in the next version of FrontRow?

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April 12, 2005

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| UI | wow |

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Bosch's crazy infolight

[Bosch] The Integra Vision dishwasher is so quiet, we had to create INFOLIGHT, a device that beams a small light onto the floor so you can tell it's running.[Via]

Was this really the only way to let us know that it is running or not? I refuse to believe this. I understand the need and also the limitation considering that they like to keep their doors free of any buttons or indicators but the solution is way too stretched. A light embedded in the handle, making it discreetly glow or reflecting on the door just seems a more logical way to do that since this is where the action happens when you open a dishwasher.
How weird!!? Can't really get excited for that one...

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January 23, 2005

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| Cars | wow |

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Toyota Prius taxis in Tokyo

Granted, I tend to ride taxis to work and back more than I like to talk about (especially in winter Brrrrrr). But I balance the impact on the environment by riding my bike to work the other days... Maybe I should only ride Prius taxis... but in more than 2.5 years in Tokyo, I have only seen one.
Well, until this morning...

It was stopped in the traffic in front of my building. Not the latest model, but a Prius nonetheless. And the fare was starting at only 500yen. A bargain! The driver was really nice and chatty; I gathered that he works for ECO TAXI, a company with a fleet of only 20 similar taxis. There was a cool animation on the dashboard monitor showing at any moment which engine (the electric or the gaz one) was powering the car.
Anyway, tonite after work, I made my way to the taxi station and BAM! There was another Prius at the top of the line! A black one, new model. Talk about a hidden message (I work for Honda R&D)... This one was from a company called ASSIST, and there are only 10 of them.
So in 1 day, and 2 fares, I managed to ride 2 of the only 30 Prius taxis that are working in Tokyo. hahaha and I also got a great idea for a novel speed meter for my work while riding the Prius in the evening. Thank you Toyota!

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November 24, 2004

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| Media Arts | wow |

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3D display LED cube

2 weeks ago, I met James Clar in the elevator taking us to the Waist Down expo on the 6th floor of the Prada shop in Omotesando. He is a talented artist dealing with "Interactive Lighting Design and Retail Environments". I actually had no idea who he was until I found out he is the 3D-display-LED-cube guy! I know him from this MoCoLoCo entry 3 months ago. He has shown at the New Museum of Contemporary Arts and the Chelsea Art Museum amongst others. This year he won the Design Distinction Award from ID Magazine and also was recently selected to exhibit at the 8th Japan Media Arts Festival which will be held at the end of Feburary 05 at the Museum of Photography in Ebisu.
Right now he is in Japan to promote his work and an installation he did for Shift Magazine's Dot Mov Festival help in Sapporo.
He's just launched his new website, check it out.
And now Phillip Torrone wants to show us how he did it...

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November 15, 2004

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ResFest 2004

My good friend Gaku is quoted in this article on ResFest 2004 over at The Japan Times Online.

This time, look for Tokyo-born Gaku Kinoshita's entry, "For Your Blossom..." The six-minute animated film tells the story of a little boy soldiering through a big, indifferent world and an encounter that will free him from his destiny. The spare drawing and subdued pastel color scheme work perfectly for this touching little tale. "I guess the biggest inspiration was coming from the conformist and conservative idea of Japanese society," 27-year-old Kinoshita said in an e-mail from London, where he works for an independent film-production company. It is stunning to realize that the filmmaker made "For Your Blossom..." on a laptop computer, and indeed, many ResFest films prove how much is possible with just a few thousand dollars worth of equipment -- plus plenty of talent, of course.

This theme is recurrent in his animation work. And it has given him plenty of food for thought which he has until now always managed to beautifully interpret for our viewing and reflecting pleasure. Check out A Clown on his website. Congrats Gaku, I'll make sure to catch the show!

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June 17, 2004

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| design | Exhibitions | wow |

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Tiny Tokyo

[cityofsound] In last month's Wallpaper* magazine ("Size matters" cover), a typically luscious photospread juxtaposed a series of groovy objects on to some wonderfully detailed and massive models of New York, Tokyo, and Shanghai. Checking the resources section at the back of the mag, turns out the models are from the Mori Urban Institute for the Future, part of the giant Mori building complex in Tokyo.

I saw the Tokyo, NYC and Shanghai models last year in the Ropongi Hills building and it blew me away. I wanted to take pics to no avail, it was dark outside and you could see the real Tokyo through the window with a reflection of the Tokyo model onto the window at the same time... a double exposure of some sort... a golden shot for sure. But to no avail... Only bits of details I got was that it had taken a month to 30 Chinese people and 4-5 Japanese to do Tokyo alone (I read somewhere else that it took 130 model-makers 8 months to complete the 8 cities). They have 8 of the biggest cities in the world done like that. Mori only kept the 3 that had Mori buildings in them. I can't remember where the other ones are now.

On the same level was a little cinema room where you could view a high definition movie called Tokyo Scanner: a 17-minute film shot from the skies above Tokyo. The film was supervised by Mamoru Oshii (director of the Patlabor and Ghost in the Shell films and series) and directed by Hiroaki Matsu. It was really incredible to see so much definition, you could make out the details of each of the tiny buildings below, I was speechless... really! Tokyo was absolutely beautiful! I bought the DVD, which is obviously not nearly as high def and good as the real thing but it'll be a nice reminder. Unfortunately, you can only buy the DVD in the building, not online...

Oh, and if you haven't seen that already, do not miss the Mid-Tokyo Maps... an amaxing flash based project.

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February 3, 2004

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| Games | UI | wow |

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Solar-powered game

[CNN.com] A GameBoy Advance title "Boktai" uses sunlight as an essential part of the game. The amount of light determines the amount of power your hero has to defeat his enemies.

The content of the game changes according to time:
- the Undead come out at night and stay in dungeons during the day

and according to sunlight:
- Solar Gun power is charged by sunlight.
- Puddles dry up if exposed to sunlight continuously.
- The stronger the sunlight, the stronger the wind in certain areas.
- There are enemies that reveal themselves when the sunlight is weak.
- There are enemies that slow down when the sunlight is weak.
- The Pile Driver becomes more powerful.

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February 2, 2004

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| ego | wow |

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new tatoo

Shelley Jackson is looking for 2095 people to each get a tattoo of a single word from her novel Skin.
To keep company to the tatoo i got on my right hand palm a few years ago, I eventually decided to take part in this piece of mortal art.
If you too want to participate, check her news.
Update (2003-11-14)= Shelley accepted me as part of her project, i am waiting for my word, should get it within the next 2 weeks.
Update (2004-02-03)= I received my word yesterday! --> over
I am quite happy with it, it could have been anything and people who decide that they don't like their word can opt out but can't apply again for a new one.
It's rather neutral and won't steal the focus of the questions I'll get for the rest of my life, I'll be able to talk about the art project behind it instead.
Next, I have to get it tatooed in a classic book font like Times New Roman, take a picture of it and send it to her. Only then will I receive a copy of the full story, which I am forbidden to share with other people(!). But she reserves the rights to publish about the project process and she even engages herself to attend the funerals of all her "words". This is taking on a slight Master/Slave connotation... ;-)
Anyway, I already know where I'll get it tatooed but won't tell you until it's done.
Olivier, will you take a nice portrait of me with it pretty please?
Now, can anyone recommend me a good tatoo artist in Tokyo?
More: great article in the Guardian, and a gallery of lettering tattoos with quite a few "words" already.

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