Friday, February 8, 2008

the fifth late friday night eclectic buffet

friday night again! it's been a sort of unfocussed week with energy coming and going and lots of little things to deal with. i've got lots of odds and ends to share here tonight so settle back and enjoy!!

i love taking photographs but find that roughly two in every ten pictures i take are slightly fuzzy and i know why. shaky hands. i’ve tried everything - holding my breath, resting my elbows on objects, cleaning up the pics afterwards with iphoto but all too often i lose photos to the slight jarring that goes with being a wobbly man on a wobbly planet.

so here’s the simplest product imagineable that appears to offer a solution to this that doesn’t involve hauling around anything even remotely substantial, in fact it’s so small it’ll fit in your wallet - or shoulder bag or pocket!

here’s a pic of the fozi tripod:


and here’s where you can see it being set up for a digital camera

if you’d like one for yourself then order it from here. it’ll set you back $8.95 in australian dollars and it’s well worth it in my opinion if it saves you the hassle of lost pictures.

you might need a tripod to help you get some nice pics of this vehicle, although i've got a few here.

the exotic electric car market just got a little hotter with the possibility of production of the zap alias moving (on paper anyway) closer to reality. the price tag set by the company, and bear in mind that this is a pre-production, pre-anything actually, is $30,000 which would put it in that magic price range where many might be inclined to buy something that doesn’t look like it would transport a family let alone a week’s groceries but who cares because a lot of what a car like this is about is image!

here are some pre-production images of the alias.
coming . . . .

and going . . . .

and here’s a promo video:


timelapse photography and film is fascinating to me in the way that it captures long term events and compresses them such that i can see the big patterns like cloud movement, and crowd movement, the passage of light, the passage of life and experience them quickly. this speeded up experiencing heightens my awareness of the incredible forces that define our existence and how infinitesimally small we are in comparison.

here are some film clips from movies that really show the power of timelapse film. especially, the speed of life.

chronos




if these clips from chronos appealed to you, then you might like to buy yourself a copy here.

koyaanisqatsi



if you enjoyed these clips from koyaanisqatsi then you might like to purchase a copy here.


finally. i was talking with a friend from friesland today and i mentioned how one of the few places in the world i'd like to visit besides friesland would be iceland. by coincidence, this lovely poem from icelandic poet jónas hallgrímsson came my way. so here you are.

the vastness of the universe

Alheimsvíáttan
(The idea is from Schiller)
I am the speeding
spark of light
flung by God
from the forge of Chaos.
I soar on wings
swifter than wind
above the paths
of the pulsing stars.
Faster! faster!
to find the place
where cosmic waves
crash ashore:
to cast anchor
off that empty coast,
that far frontier
and final reach
of created things: ---
the edge of heaven.
I watched the stars
in the womb of youth
rise from the still
streams of heaven,
eager to make
their million year
race through the thin
ethereal blue.
Later they flickered
faintly behind me
as I rushed on
to the rim of worlds.
I peered with anxious
eyes about me:
now I was steering
through starless voids.
Faster! faster!
to find the place
where Nothingness reigns
and inane Chaos,
wending my way
on wings of light,
steering toward port
with steady courage.
As I dart on
through dim greyness,
I encounter clouds
of cosmic dust.
Behind me I hear,
hushed in distance,
dark cataracts
of dying suns.
Suddenly, something
comes swiftly toward me
through empty night ---
an image that speaks:
"Stay, oh traveller
tired with flight!
Tell me, wanderer ---
what are you seeking?"
"My way leads on
to the worlds you come from!
My flight is destined
to those distant shores,
that far frontier
and final reach
of created things: ---
the edge of heaven."
"Cease your search,
sojourner! end
your futile wandering
through wastes of ether!
Know that ahead of you
lie nothing
but infinite tracts
of endlessness."
"Cease your search,
sojourner! end
your futile wandering
through wastes of ether!
Behind me, too,
lie torrents of stars
and infinite, empty
endlessness."
Oh eagle-mounting
imagination!
Cease your soaring,
descend to earth!
Oh swift voyager,
venturesome poet:
tired of creating,
cast your anchor here!

jónas hallgrímsson
july/august 1837 iceland

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