Obscura CueLight Pool Table

via Gizmodo

If you like being distracted by projections and badass animations while you play pool, the Obscura CueLight is for you. It uses sensors and an overhead projector to create images that follow the balls as they bang around the table.

The system itself will set you back $80,000, no pool table included. At the Esquire Ultimate Bachelor Pad, where it's currently set up, it's projecting on a $125,000 pool table. Bottom line: you can't afford it.

In addition to this setup, where the balls reveal an image hidden underneath, you can also set it up to have flames track behind the balls, or water that ripples as the balls pass over it. It's a pretty awesome trick, one that works surprisingly smoothly.

They're working on new software that will make it more useful than flashy, too. Imagine playing pool and having the lines where you should shoot projected down on the table, with a computer doing all the math necessary to show you just where to aim and how hard to hit. Pretty sweet.

How Would Dubai Look In the Future?

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz

Ah Dubai, you and your glittery airports and your insane skyscrapers and your Death Star Island. If you don't fall into the desert first, this is how you may look in the future.

For some reason, some production company thought it would be nice to promote themselves using an annoying fake trailer depicting a futuristic version of Dubai. I don't care. I just like the coruscantbladerunnery of it all. I wish they included the one kilometer-high Nakheel Tower, though.

Japan's Most Insane Custom Cars

via Gizmodo by Adam Frucci

In Japan, they take custom cars seriously. Just look at some of these! A Buddhist priest spent $110,000 creating a car with gullwings, scissor doors and a splithood. Oh, and then there's the $280,000 Batman van.

The vehicles appearing in this video are:

- A rather ordinary-looking BMW E66 whose trunk is decked with Buddhist sutras written in 30,000 Swarovski crystals (the owner, a Buddhist priest, also owns the next vehicle).

- A Toyota Celsior UCF20 with gullwings, scissor doors and a split hood, which took 12 years to build and cost 10 million yen ($110,000). The interior includes 24 monitors, including several mounted in the headrests behind the passengers� heads (you can watch them with the eyes in the back of your head, according to the priest).

- Batman van, a rolling tribute to the superhero that cost 25 million yen ($280,000), took 13 years to complete, and earned the owner a divorce.

- Rocket launcher van, a 1981 Daihatsu Hijet outfitted with a cheap launcher for an 8-meter (26-ft) water rocket (the owner is an eggplant farmer).

- Replica of the �Pointer,� the famous battle vehicle used by the Earth Defense Force in the Ultra Seven TV series that aired on Japanese TV in the late 1960s.

- Fan-flapping Hitachi ASTACO machine, which the Tokyo Fire Department Hyper Rescue Team uses to clear debris from disaster sites.

Nokia Erdos

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz

Believe it or not, Nokia keeps doing their expensive 8800 series. And believe it or not, they still run the dreadful Symbian S60. This is the next model, the Nokia Erdos, carved out of a single piece of stainless steel.

The 3G Erdos has a 2.4-inch OLED 320 x 240 display that remains invisible under mirrored glass until you turn it on. It also has Wi-Fi, GPS, stereo Bluetooth, 8GB of internal memory, and a 5 megapixel autofocus camera with Carl Zeiss lens, dual LED flash, and video recording capability.

Birds Are Secretly Composers

via Gizmodo by Rosa Golijan

A normal person sees these birds perched on electrical wires and worries about getting crapped on. Jarbas Agnel looks at them and sees musical notes. Maybe he's smarter than the rest of us because the melody is utterly oh-so-sweet-that-I-could-doze-off-right-now.

Agnel explains that he was simply curious about what sort of tune he could create by transcribing the birds into musical notes.

BMW's Augmented Reality Glasses

via Gizmodo by Mark Wilson

If BMW's research labs have a say, future service staff will learn the intricacies of working on German cars through a pretty handy looking augmented reality interface.

Look beyond the cheesiness of the music, smug actor and his Oakley Thumps for a moment and actually examine the incredible practicality at work�highlighting/identifying parts of an engine and offering step by step instructions for completing complicated procedures.

NASA - Cryosphere Video 2009

This Is How the CIA Kills Terrorists Using Predators

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz

This redhead is an angel. An angel of death, working for the CIA. And in this chilling video you will see how she flies a Predator, and delivers its lethal payload along with another agent in the next computer rig.

Both are "pilot" and "sensor" in the same mission. What you see in the video is a simulation, but that's how it works: Two agents in Langley, Virginia, on a basement, pulling levers and clicking buttons on a multi-display rig connected in real time with Predators flying anywhere around the world.

The Creation of Time and Space

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz

Maybe I like this because it looks like a Leopard desktop�I hope Leopard came with the animations�but if you have to watch a science video today, let astrophysicist Janne Levin explain you what the Big Bang was.

Still there? Well, then maybe you want another science video. One mindblowing one.

The Most Amazing Photo of the Universe, Now In 3D

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz on 8/11/09

Showing 10,000 galaxies, the overwhelming Hubble Ultra Deep Field is the most amazing, most humbling image in history, demonstrating how tiny and precious we are. This video explains how it was taken, and shows it in three dimensions.

Top Gear's James May rides in a U2 Spy Plane

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz on 8/6/09

I love Top Gear, but when James May gets the opportunity to fly to the edge of space on board a U2 spy plane, my love turns to plain, absolute, complete, overwhelming hate. Bloody good video indeed.

The Lockheed U2 is an amazing plane, developed to spy enemy countries by the CIA and the United States Air Force. Flying at 70,000 feet, the U2 can fly day or night, rain or sun, photographing ground facilities on very short notice, something that satellites can't do. It was created in the 50s, flying for the first time in 1955, and despite some being shot down over the Soviet Union, Cuba, and China, the fleet is still in use today. In fact, the successful design outlasted the SR-71 and the secret A-12 CIA spy plane, and will keep flying till 2014 or even later.

How Not to Demolish a Building

via Gizmodo by Adam Frucci on 8/3/09

Most building demolitions are precisely planned and controlled. When they aren't, a factory in Cankiri, Turkey, does a barrel roll through the streets. Oops!

This Is Exactly What Touchscreen Surfaces Were Invented For

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz on 7/24/09

Generally I skim through videos of more than one minute. This video demo of Ruse running on a Microsoft Surface is 4:23, and I watched every second of it in complete amazement. And then, I watched it again.

Soliloquy Super-Yacht

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz on 7/23/09

According to Alastair Callender, his 190-foot Soliloquy would be able to fully propel itself using a combination of solar power, wind, and hybrid marine power technology. And it looks like a metamorphic alien mothership to boot.

It looks cool, but I have a hard time imagining this titan moving at a decent speed using these technologies. On the other side, if Cousteau's Alcyone ship�with its wind towers�can work, maybe this design could work too.

I would pass even if I had the money to buy it, though. Why would I get a cold, super-expensive super-yacht for a gazillion dollars when I can use the same money for a fast 100%-wind-powered three-mast schooner, with fully automated sail deployment,and have a crew of Scandinavian sailorettes with unbuttoned white shirts, short navy blue skirts, and no panties for the rest of my life? See? Rich people don't know how to spend their money.

OK. Perhaps that was way too much. Screw the automatic sail deployement. Let the sailorettes do their job.

Idiots Want to Draw Ads On the Moon

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz on 7/20/09

A company wants to "license a technology" to draw advertisements on the Moon's surface, which according to them could be watched from Earth. If nobody shuts them down, I'll be there at the launch. With my land-to-air rocket launcher ready.

I thought this was a joke, but apparently this deranged people are serious enough about it to put out a press release and a 3D animation.

Robots to Advertise on the Moon

WEST VALLEY CITY, Utah, July 20 /PRNewswire/ � It's one giant leap for robot-kind. New Shadow Shaping technology creates images on the Moon that can be seen from Earth. Robots are used to create several small ridges in the lunar dust over large areas that capture shadows and shape them to form logos, domains names, memorials or even portraits. Talk about the Man in the Moon! You can even carve your initials in a heart to impress your sweetheart.

The advertising potential is mind-boggling. Never in history have companies been able to penetrate every market on Earth, reach every person on the planet, and touch them at an emotional level only possible with the beauty of the Moon on a starlit night. Twelve billion eyeballs looking at your logo in the sky for several days every month. And since there is no atmosphere on the Moon, the images last for thousands of years.

"Finally dependency on government to travel beyond Earth is over," says inventor David Kent Jones. "This new commercial incentive will turbo charge space technology development. Shadows are just the beginning; eventually robots will be planting crops on other planets."

Beginning July 20, 2009, the fortieth anniversary of man's first step on the Moon, exclusive licensing for this patent pending technology is publicly available. Moon Publicity is accepting bids from accredited investors and companies for 44 lunar regions until October 20, 2009. You could license moon-imaging technology potentially worth a fortune in advertising value for about the cost of an SUV. Minimum bids start as low as $46,000. For more information visit MoonPublicity.com.

Of course, anybody can do this. The whole things sounds like a scheme to get easy money, yes. I have a hard time thinking someone may take them seriously, but it's a matter of time before some idiots actually manage to pull it off.

Blonde Blows Bubble from CD

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz on 7/13/09

Watch this purty Russian blonde heat up and blow a CD to create a giant bubble out of it. She blows my mind. OK, too many bad puns here, but a good alternative if you are short of zubbles.

Some people are telling me this can't be done with actual CDs, others say they can. I've seen a couple more videos in YouTube, but never tried it myself. Any experiences out there?

Kinchan no Kasoh Taisho entries are entertaining

via JapanSugoi by Japan Sugoi on 7/9/09

Still by far, the most entertaining Japanese TV airing today is Kinchan no Kasoh Taisho ????????? ??????????????. This amazing competition showcases the most imaginative and creative minds and is all �low tech�. Take a look at the latest season�s entries.

rocket launch

daughter carries family

soccer ball

kaiten sushi

grabbing a donut

3mm-Thin Digital Booth Babe

via Gizmodo by Adam Frucci on 7/9/09

This super-thin booth babe display was recently spotted on the floor of the high-octane International Stationary and Office Supply Fair (slogan: "You'll get punched in the face with excitement!").

this eye-catching digital signage system consists of a 0.3-millimeter-thick high-luminance rear-projection film (Vikuiti Rear Projection Film developed by 3M) applied to a 3-millimeter-thick glass substrate cut into the shape of a woman. A rear projector beams video onto the film, whose microbead-arrayed surface produces a crisp, brilliant image viewable from any angle, even in brightly lit environments.

That's all well and good, but can she pretend to not be skeeved out by chubby, sweaty dudes who want their pictures taken with her? That's the sign of a real booth babe.

The Tokyo Gundam Like You Have Never Seen It Before

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz on 7/1/09

Now fully finished, the amazing full-scale Gundam has become an unofficial Tokyo landmark. The robot is so impressive that photographers are populating Flickr with beautiful photos showing every single little detail.

The Nazi Stealth Planes

via Gizmodo by Jesus Diaz on 7/1/09

Nazis or aliens or Nazi aliens are back and they have invaded Northrop Grumman's top secret grounds in California, where engineers have been testing the surprising anti-radar capabilities of the Horten 2-29 fighter. The results: It could have changed everything.

Germany lost the Battle of Britain partly thanks to the British radar. The fat baton-bearing lunatic and chief of the Luftwaffe Hermann G�ring turned to the Horten brothers to develop something that would give the German air force superiority. They came up with the most advanced plane of the war, one that surpassed everything else out there by three decades but fortunately never had the time to be produced in any kind of significant numbers: The Horten 2-29, an airplane unlike anything else out there, which�as this reconstruction shows�looks alien in its design.

Northrop Grumman's black-op engineers�who usually work in top secret USAF projects like the B-2 Stealth Bomber, Ho 2-29's design heir�analyzed (again?) the remains of the only surviving plane, reconstructed it, and tested its stealth capabilities. It's probably not the first time they have done that, but this time they did it for a National Geographic TV documentary.

As it turns out, Hitler had an stealth fighter in the Ho 2-29. Thanks to the use of wood and carbon�which increased its radar absortion�jet engines integrated into the fuselage, and its blended surfaces, the plane could have been in London eight minutes after the British radar system detected it. In comparison, other planes took 19 minutes since detection to target, which gave the RAF fighter enough time to scramble and hunt down the bastards. The Ho 2-29 would have made the interception almost impossible, if at all.

The bad news is that this plane could have completely changed the course of the war if Germany only had one or two extra years of lead time. Not only in the fight against Britain, but also against the US and the Soviet Union. The Horten brothers had another design based on the Ho 2-29. A design for a intercontinental strategic bomber, the Ho 18.

The 142-foot wingspan bomber was submitted for approval in 1944, and it would have been able to fly from Berlin to NYC and back without refueling, thanks to the same blended wing design and six BMW 003A or eight Junker Jumo 004B turbojets. As the documentary shows, had the Nazis extended the war in 1946 and developed the atomic bomb as planned, the Ho 18 could have been their Enola Gay.