…A stitching of 2,346 single photos showing a world-record breaking, very high-resolution panoramic view of the French capital (354,159x75,570 px). One can zoom in on famous monuments of the French capital, such as the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, the Beaubourg and the Notre Dame de Paris.
http://www.paris-26-gigapixels.com/index-en.html…the music, the views –they take you right there…
Why India Loves Facebook
Tunku Varadarajan is a national affairs correspondent and writer at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a research fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution and a professor at NYU’s Stern Business School. He is a former assistant managing editor at The Wall Street Journal. (Follow him on Twitter here.)
Getty Images The social-networking giant has opened its first-ever office in Asia—in the country where being all up in one another's business is practically a birthright.
Facebook and Indians have a magnetic connection. Everyone in my family in India except my father—who, at 77, is entitled to his suspicions of the medium—is a Facebook user. Every single friend of mine in India—except for an eccentric Bengali writer who idolizes a 19th-century British viceroy, Lord Curzon, for which reason he cannot be said to have come to terms with the modern world—is a Facebook user.
Facebook “allows [Indians] to do two things they love: Tell everyone what they are doing; and stick their noses into other people’s business,” says Sree Sreenivasan.
Every single friend of mine of Indian origin, anywhere in the world, is a Facebook user. And a great number of my Facebook "friends" are Indians who, having read my journalism, or seen my name on a sibling's or (genuine) friend's page, have sought me out and "friended" me as a reflexive act of connection; and being of Indian origin myself, I've always found it infernally hard—if not virtually impossible—to say "no."
Facebook Mania.... :-)
Future Games....... Worth listening to this!
ARCSABER Z-SLASH smash speed of 421 km/h is certificated as the world record!!
[Topix] …2010/03/11
YONEX Co. Ltd. (HQ: Tokyo, President: Ben Yoneyama) is proud of announcing that Guinness World RecordsTM certified the fastest badminton hit (male) is 421 km/h (261.6 mph) by Tan Boon Heong (Malaysia) using ARCSABER Z-SLASH on September 26th, 2009.ARCSABER Z-SLASH is the first of a new generation of slim racquets which has reduced air resistance whilst providing maximum smash speed. We already had recorded a smash speed over 400 km/h at the speed test in the development stage. (Tested by nac Image Technology Inc.)
In September, 2009, YONEX Co. Ltd. shot the moment of Tan Boon Heong (Malaysia)’s smash using ultrahigh-speed camera. The camera can shoot 20000-exposure a second. We calculated the initialspeed of shuttlecocks by the photography records.
As a result, the record for the initial speed of badminton smashes, at 421km/h has been certificated by Guinness World RecordsTM. On March 8th, the President of YONEX Co. Ltd., Ben Yoneyama received the certification.
The camera's only job is to get out of the way of making photographs.
Ernst Haas commented on this in a workshop in 1985:
Two laddies from Nova Scotia had made a huge effort to be there and were great Leica fans, worked in a camera store, saved to have them and held Ernst on high for being a Leica user (although he used Nikons on his Marlboro shoots, when the chips were down).
About four days into the workshop, he finally maxxed out on the Leica adoration these kids displayed, and in the midst of a discussion, when one of them asked one more question aimed at establishing the superiority of Wetzlar, Ernst said, "Leica, schmeica. The camera doesn't make a bit of difference. All of them can record what you are seeing. But, you have to SEE."
Nobody talked about Leica, Nikon, Canon or any other brand of camera equipment for the rest of the workshop.
He also said, "Best wide-angle lens? 'Two steps backward' and 'look for the ah-ha'."
Worth reading the entire Article...
Avatar trailer whets the appetite
August 22, 2009Australian actor Sam Worthington is shown in a scene in James Cameron's 3-D sci-fi adventure "Avatar."
If James Cameron wanted to light up the internet by releasing footage from his upcoming film Avatar, he got his wish - just don't expect him to be glued to a computer screen, soaking up the online buzz.
The Titanic director has people to do that for him.
"I've had it kind of broken down for me, what people are talking about," Cameron said Friday.
"I know we have right now, historically, broken the record for the total number of downloads for the trailer."
The two-minute online trailer for the 3D science-fiction epic, which debuted on Thursday - and the unprecedented 16-minute previews shown in theatres worldwide Friday - inspired steady traffic on Twitter and Facebook.
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Avatar tells the story of humans who travel to a distant planet and have their brains linked to cloned versions of a native species in order to explore the otherwise unsafe environment.
But Cameron, a champion of 3D technology and a pioneer of computer-generated effects in modern moviemaking, says he lacks certain social networking skills to take part.
"I don't even know how to Twitter," the 55-year-old filmmaker said in an interview Friday.
"I'm so unhip that it's tragic."
Unhip maybe, but forward-thinking enough to try the "crazy stunt" that he says he and his team came up with: Invite people to the movie theatre to watch 16 minutes of scenes for free. The footage was being shown Friday on 102 screens in the US and 342 screens internationally - 58 countries in all - to fans who scored free tickets online.
"And it's not even a continuous 16 minutes," Cameron said.
"There are a number of scenes, about three or four minutes apiece. And the idea was to let people come in and really sample the quality of the goods."
Multi Oscar-winning Cameron already knows how to make a splash on screen. Reactions to the mammoth marketing blitz were rolling in on the web, where Avatar was among the top topics on Twitter on Thursday.
Many were struck by its visual splendor, including Hong Kong moviegoer Jason Poon, who tweeted that it was "probably the best CG and 3-D I've ever seen".
James Hilder in London said it was "mega impressive".
One fan disappointed with the online trailer said seeing the extended preview in 3D changed his mind about the movie.
"It is essential that you watch it in IMAX 3D, or 3D," Manoj Patel wrote on the film's Facebook page.
"I just got back from watching the 15-minute footage, and I've got to say, my mouth was wide open all the way through."
Not all the early reactions were laudatory.
In Tel Aviv, Shay Ringel tweeted after a screening: "What was THAT?! ... Everyone walked out (scratching) their heads saying, 'Why are we here?"'
Studios usually closely guard footage of movies before their release, only occasionally offering glimpses to the public at special events.
AP
Watch in 3D Only... A very good conceptualisation by James Cameron.
Some simple Ideas can make a huge difference!
Now I'm searching for the cheapest Solar cells that I can get this thing working....
