We’re 11 days into 2011 and I’m watching the north of my country drown on live-television, as they in turn switch between exhausted officals giving press conferences, to reports straight from social media. In fact, they’re just sending viewers straight to #qldfloods. But, look.. SHINY!

Let’s face it, we’re going to need ever better methods to record disaster pr0n and navigate our way through it. OK, we don’t need them, but some kind of distraction is needed now and again. What have we got so far this year?

Augmented reality HUDS? Check. This was just released for skiers:

Introducing  Transcend, Recon Instruments’ collaboration with Colorado’s Zeal Optics. Transcend is the world’s first GPS-enabled goggles with a head-mounted display system.

Minimum interaction is required during use, sleek graphics and smart optics are completely unobtrusive for front and peripheral vision making it the ultimate solution for use in fast-paced environments.

Transcend provides real-time feedback including speed, latitude/longitude, altitude, vertical distance travelled, total distance travelled, chrono/stopwatch mode, a run-counter, temperature and time. It is also the only pair of goggles in the world that boasts GPS capabilities, USB charging and data transfer, and free post-processing software all with a user-friendly, addictive interface.

Just like the dashboard of a sports car or the instruments of a fighter jet, Transcend’s display provides performance-enhancing data, but only when you choose to view it. Safe, smart, fun…all wrapped up in the hottest goggle frame of 2010/11.

Now, of course you ask, but how will I best show my friends a panoramic, interactive recording of that sick black run (or train for the next one)? Sony has just the thing:

Besides looking über futuristic, Sony’s “virtual 3D cinematic experience” head mounted display (aka ‘Headman’) sports some fairly impressive specs. The tiny OLED screens inside are head HD resolution (1280 x 720), and the headphones integrated into the sides of the goggles are outputting high quality simulated 5.1 channel surround sound.

OK, that’s just a prototype. But something like it will be coming soon, so leave some space for it in your underground bunker.

But m1k3y, you say.. “those are great and all, but WHERE’S MY CLATTER?!” Well, I saved the best for last:

In 2008, as a proof of concept, Babak Parviz at the University of Washington in Seattle created a prototype contact lens containing a single red LED. Using the same technology, he has now created a lens capable of monitoring glucose levels in people with diabetes.

It works because glucose levels in tear fluid correspond directly to those found in the blood, making continuous measurement possible without the need for thumb pricks, he says. Parviz’s design calls for the contact lens to send this information wirelessly to a portable device worn by diabetics, allowing them to manage their diet and medication more accurately.

Lenses that also contain arrays of tiny LEDs may allow this or other types of digital information to be displayed directly to the wearer through the lens. This kind of augmented reality has already taken off in cellphones, with countless software apps superimposing digital data onto images of our surroundings, effectively blending the physical and online worlds.

Making it work on a contact lens won’t be easy, but the technology has begun to take shape. Last September, Sensimed, a Swiss spin-off from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, launched the very first commercial smart contact lens, designed to improve treatment for people with glaucoma.

The disease puts pressure on the optic nerve through fluid build-up, and can irreversibly damage vision if not properly treated. Highly sensitive platinum strain gauges embedded in Sensimed’s Triggerfish lens record changes in the curvature of the cornea, which correspond directly to the pressure inside the eye, says CEO Jean-Marc Wismer. The lens transmits this information wirelessly at regular intervals to a portable recording device worn by the patient, he says.

Like an RFID tag or London’s Oyster travel cards, the lens gets its power from a nearby loop antenna – in this case taped to the patient’s face. The powered antenna transmits electricity to the contact lens, which is used to interrogate the sensors, process the signals and transmit the readings back.

Each disposable contact lens is designed to be worn just once for 24 hours, and the patient repeats the process once or twice a year. This allows researchers to look for peaks in eye pressure which vary from patient to patient during the course of a day. This information is then used to schedule the timings of medication.

…

Parviz, however, has taken a different approach. His glucose sensor uses sets of electrodes to run tiny currents through the tear fluid and measures them to detect very small quantities of dissolved sugar. These electrodes, along with a computer chip that contains a radio frequency antenna, are fabricated on a flat substrate made of polyethylene terephthalate (PET), a transparent polymer commonly found in plastic bottles. This is then moulded into the shape of a contact lens to fit the eye.

Parviz plans to use a higher-powered antenna to get a better range, allowing patients to carry a single external device in their breast pocket or on their belt. Preliminary tests show that his sensors can accurately detect even very low glucose levels. Parvis is due to present his results later this month at the IEEE MEMS 2011 conference in Cancún, Mexico.

“There’s still a lot more testing we have to do,” says Parviz. In the meantime, his lab has made progress with contact lens displays. They have developed both red and blue miniature LEDs – leaving only green for full colour – and have separately built lenses with 3D optics that resemble the head-up visors used to view movies in 3D.

Parviz has yet to combine both the optics and the LEDs in the same contact lens, but he is confident that even images so close to the eye can be brought into focus. “You won’t necessarily have to shift your focus to see the image generated by the contact lens,” says Parviz. It will just appear in front of you, he says. The LEDs will be arranged in a grid pattern, and should not interfere with normal vision when the display is off.

For Sensimed, the circuitry is entirely around the edge of the lens (see photo). However, both have yet to address the fact that wearing these lenses might make you look like the robots in the Terminator movies. False irises could eventually solve this problem, says Parviz. “But that’s not something at the top of our priority list,” he says.

So close… And Terminator eyes? That’s a feature, not a bug. YES PLEASE!

via Chris Arkenberg

Video via lifehacker.

The QR cloud project is a recent temporary installation by the amsterdam based design group golfstromen. The project began in july 2009 and is still running in the west end of their city. the project consists of embedded QR codes in the urban environment, linking to pieces of artwork. the project features seven large QR codes that when photographed on a web-ready cell phone link viewers to small stories, poems or proverbs by dutch writers and poets. Each written piece was commissioned for the project as a short inspirational message to users. The QR codes were placed on a soon to be demolished building and focus on making the public aware of QR codes in contexts outside advertising.

Picture and words from DesignBoom.

Via dvice.com.

Syuzi, from FashioningTech explains:

The Binary Glove, by game designer Pete Hawkes, is a fun interactive gaming wearable that teaches you a bit about bits. Each fingertip represents a bit value in a simple binary sequence 1, 2, 4, 8, and 16 and is fitted with a pressure sensor that turns each bit on and off. The LCD displays the sum total of the sequence along with each value in the sequence.

A ‘clockwork snow’:

Created by tjep, link and photo via designboom.

Original pieces of polar ice will be sold in a shop in Amsterdam from this Friday the 25th. MyPolarIce is a venture led by Coralie Vogelaar and Teun Castelein. They went to the northern part of Greenland to harvest some of the finest polar ice still available. The pieces of ice were extracted from the Sermeq Kujalleg glacier, and were put on transport to Amsterdam

Starting from November 26th till December 5th your are invited to get your piece. It is the chance of a lifetime to obtain a frozen relic from the last ice age.
A piece of polar ice will cost 24.95 euros, but if the stock rapidly diminish prices may rise. A fixed amount of 1000 pieces is for sale, each numbered and a certificate of authenticity is attached. The pieces are packed in special capsule-shaped containers. This packaging ensures that the ice remains frozen up to three hours outside a freezer. The goal of MyPolarIce is to sell the pieces to people that cherish and preserve it.

Via nextnature.

Via CrunchGear, the experiment streams live tomorrow.

From tonyleather over at EnvironmentalGraffiti:

LAPP-Pro is a Bremen, Germany-based duo that specializes in light art performance photography, often accompanied by music. Jörg Miedza and Jan Wöllert have been working together since the autumn of 2007, although both have photographic connections going back many years. The basic concept of LAPP was invented by Jan, accidentally trapped overnight in an old industrial complex in Bremen, back in the summer of 2007. He amused himself by making shapes and patterns with some LED lamps, quickly realising that he had discovered a new way of creating photographs.

Descended from light drawing, the basis of their work are long-time exposures, with moving light sources used to create luminous light sculptures that are captured in photographs. Many compositions consist of up to 20 single steps between the opening and closure of the shutter. This requires that, apart from imagination, fantasy and creativity, the performer must have body control to achieve the exact pace of synchronised steps with the handling and distribution of lights. It is very much a performance that must in many cases be rehearsed before the images are made for real.

See also:

• Skatepark Angel

Tongue tied on your next date? Let your bottle of vodka do the talking for you. Medea Vodka can be programmed with up to three messages, 255 characters each in length. Your chosen message will then scroll across the screen, speaking for you, when you can’t.

Via nytimes.com.

The famous NASA doped spider webs, created by French designer Guillaume Lehoux for his SOD Project :

Link and photo via treehugger.com.

From Gizmodo, play with digital clay and then print out your masterpiece:

It’s probably the easiest way to design 3D objects, without mucking around on CAD or other design programs. Actually using your fingertips to bend the lump of clay within the iPad app, turning it into a little object to print out—well, it sounds like a dream come true. Imagine your mom making Christmas tree ornaments this way, or being able to conjure up a little doohicky for sliding under a short table leg, within minutes?

Now the 3-D printers need to drop in price, just a little more…..

When gorgeous mountain views, sandy beaches or unknown cities will no longer thrill:

Cambodia depends on tourism for about a fifth of its GDP. Its premier attraction is Angkor Wat, the magnificent complex of ancient Buddhist and Hindu buildings, which draws 2 million visitors annually, by some estimates. But hundreds of thousands of tourists also visit two sites in Phnom Penh with a more grotesque appeal: S21, a Khmer torture center that later became a museum; and the killing fields at Choeung Ek, where some 9,000 bodies were buried en masse and where more than 5,000 human skulls are displayed in a glass-and-concrete stupa.

Now the Cambodian Ministry of Tourism plans to restore 14 Khmer Rouge–era buildings in Anlong Veng, which became the Communists’ last pocket of resistance after Vietnamese troops overthrew the Khmer Rouge in 1979. For years, the town was a fief run by Pol Pot (the dictator formerly known as Saloth Sar) and his deputy Ta Mok (who was known as “The Butcher”). A number of sites from that era will be rebuilt as attractions, including Mok’s lakeside compound, Pol Pot’s house and the bungalow on a cliff where he was eventually imprisoned, a radio station that used to broadcast propaganda, and a munitions warehouse—complete with stockpiles of the anti-personnel mines that not infrequently still rip the legs off local farmers.

From The Atlantic, by Andrew Burmon.

Not something you see everyday outside your office window:

MASS MoCA director Joseph Thompson describes the development of Geometric Death Frequency-14: “Pure data and algorithms based on particle physics served as the primary guiding forces behind the sculpture’s shape, texture and size.”

Assembled from 420,000 robotically milled black spheres, Federico Díaz’s sculpture draws inspiration from a digital photograph of the museum’s clock tower entryway. The artist, who lives in the Czech capital Prague, transformed the two-dimensional image into pure data, then used analytical and fluid-dynamic modeling techniques to reshape the building’s contours into wavelike forms.

“Federico is the ultimate shape-shifter, in a way,” said MASS MoCA director Joseph C. Thompson in a statement. “The bricks and mullions and windows of our buildings become files of digital data; the pixels become black spheres meticulously cut, stacked and assembled; the courtyard becomes and contains sculpture. There’s something alchemical or magical about it, and all the while Federico remains behind the curtain, as if to say, ‘Look ma, no hands.’”

Words and picture via wired.com.

The fantastical becomes real:

Imagine objects three-dimensionally printed from a bed of nylon powder; shapes appearing to seamlessly morph and merge with each other; and new forms randomly self-generated by computer software. Lab Craft, a new Crafts Council touring exhibition, presents the imagined as real objects.

Curated by design commentator Max Fraser, the exhibition features 26 of the most experimental names in craft and design, each of them combining traditional craft skills with the use of cutting-edge digital technologies.

One of my favorite pieces shown:

In this vessel, Eden likens the symbolic surface decoration on an ancient Chinese ceremonial wine vessel to the encoded information of a QR code. The vessel’s unique QR code forms the footprint of the piece, which is created by a 3D printing process, and so runs throughout the form

Words, pictures and links via guardian.co.uk. See the exhibit in person at Turnpike Gallery, Leigh until December 18th.

Via core77.

From slashgear, a prototype Retinal Imaging Display:

The images projected directly onto your retina simulate a 16-inch screen viewed for about three feet away according to the maker. The tech came from the Brother printer tech for laser and ink jet printers. The AirScouter will be launched in Japan for industrial uses like overlaying manuals on machinery. That is pretty cool and I could see a market for this thing in the DIY realm for folks that like to fix things themselves. Nothing like step-by-step directions clipped to your eyeball.

Thanks and hat tip to @bindychild!

I was very disappointed with the recent Futurama ep Lethal Inspection, in which Bender learnt he was created without the online backup unit that made all other robots immortal. To me, this would’ve been the perfect opportunity to rip on mind-uploading; have Professor Farnsworth mocking Ray Kurzweil’s head-in-a-jar, asking him what happened to that Singularity of his.

So when this most recent episode of Futurama, The Prisoner of Benda, did some genuine SF for once, exploring the relationship between body and identity, I thought it deserved props. Also, because it was hilarious, and peaked with this insane scene (SPOILER):

This is what I want from my SF; crazy human, alien, robot body-swapping action. (Versus lame iPhone/Twitter satire.) See io9 for a more in-depth review.

In other Identity news, Orkut (the SNS that we are constantly told is “huge in India and Brazil”) are now letting you split your personality; or more accurately easily control what aspects of your life you share to different groups of ‘friends’.

Facebook have a clumsy implementation of this, but Orkut seems to be the first to tackle this big problem in Social Network design properly: do you want your boss, co-workers and friends getting the same information? More details over on Read Write Web.