hollywood – Page 2 – Tech Today w/ Ken May

Scientists Sent a Rocket To Mars For Less Than It Cost To Make ‘The Martian’

Ipsita Agarwal via Backchannel retells the story of how India’s underfunded space organization, ISRO, managed to send a rocket to Mars for less than it cost to make the movie “The Martian, ” starring Matt Damon as Mark Watney. “While NASA’s Mars probe, Maven, cost $651 million, the budget for this mission was $74 million, ” Agarwal writes. In what appears to be India’s version of “Hidden Figures” (a movie that also cost more to make than ISRO’s budget for the Mars rocket), the team of scientists behind the rocket launch consisted of Indian women, who not only managed to pull off the mission successfully but did so in only 18 months. Backchannel reports: A few months and several million kilometers later, the orbiter prepared to enter Mars’ gravity. This was a critical moment. If the orbiter entered Mars’ gravity at the wrong angle, off by so much as one degree, it would either crash onto the surface of Mars or fly right past it, lost in the emptiness of space. Back on Earth, its team of scientists and engineers waited for a signal from the orbiter. Mission designer Ritu Karidhal had worked 48 hours straight, fueled by anticipation. As a child, Minal Rohit had watched space missions on TV. Now, Minal waited for news on the orbiter she and her colleague, Moumita Dutta, had helped engineer. When the signal finally arrived, the mission control room broke into cheers. If you work in such a room, deputy operations director, Nandini Harinath, says, “you no longer need to watch a thriller movie to feel the thrill in life. You feel it in your day-to-day work.” This was not the only success of the mission. An image of the scientists celebrating in the mission control room went viral. Girls in India and beyond gained new heroes: the kind that wear sarees and tie flowers in their hair, and send rockets into space. User shas3 notes in a comment on Hacker News’ post: “If you are interested in Indian women scientists and engineers, there is a nice compilation (a bit tiresome to read, but worth it, IMO) of biographical essays called ‘Lilvati’s Daughters.'” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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Scientists Sent a Rocket To Mars For Less Than It Cost To Make ‘The Martian’

LA beats out SF to host George Lucas’ art museum

Unbeknownst to some, Los Angeles and San Francisco had been clashing for months on yet another front: Which would win the right to build an elaborate, expansive museum housing film ephemera and personal art collected by George Lucas. As is only proper for the nexus of cinema, Hollywood won the fight. Yes, the upcoming museum will feature choice souvenirs from the Star Wars franchise, but it aims to be a serious institution with the money to back it up. Lucas will allegedly front $1 billion himself in construction costs and art as well as the creation of a $400 million endowment fund. The 275, 000 sq ft building will sit in Exposition Park south of downtown, joining the California Science Center, Natural History Museum and California African American Museum. It will house over 10, 000 paintings and illustrations including works by Rockwell, N.C. Wyeth and R. Crumb, according to The Los Angeles Times . Canny fans will note that the future site of the George Lucas Museum of Narrative Art is blocks away from the University of Southern California campus, where he studied as a young filmmaker. It’ll also be an hour-drive away from another sizable monument to his legacy when Disneyland’s upcoming Star Wars Land eventually opens. Source: The Los Angeles Times

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LA beats out SF to host George Lucas’ art museum

Hollywood forces VidAngel to stop streaming its movies

The Hollywood Reporter is reporting that Warner Bros, Disney and Fox have won an injunction against “family values” streaming service VidAngel. In the aftermath, VidAngel has announced that it will “cease streaming all works for which it has not obtained licensing.” The company has also pledged to appeal, taking the fight all the way to the Supreme Court if necessary. VidAngel’s pitch is twofold: you can stream new movies for a dollar , with the added bonus of very specific censorship options. In its commercial, it suggests that you can watch The Wolf of Wall Street without the language or Game of Thrones without the nudity or violence. Which will save you a bucketload of time, since a sanitized version of each would last about four minutes. In order to make that happen, however, VidAngel purchased movies on DVD, uploaded them to its server and then “sold” a copy to its customers for $20. When the film had been seen, the company would then “buy back” the copy for $19, making the price for each rental a tidy buck. It sounds dodgy, but VidAngel felt that it was protected by the Family Movie Act (2005), which relaxed provisions of the DMCA for this sort of “family-friendly filtering.” The studios felt differently, and called VidAngel an unlicensed VOD streaming service that violated windowing regulations. For instance, you could watch an edited version of Star Wars: The Force Awakens days after it was available on DVD, even though it wasn’t yet due to appear on streaming services. Judge Andre Birotte Jr. sided with the studios, saying that the protections afforded by the Family Movie Act didn’t apply. Mostly because you need to work with an “authorized” copy of a studio movie, not just a DVD you picked up at the store. As a consequence, VidAngel has stopped offering its current catalog to users, but has pledged to keep fighting. It’s not shutting down in the interim, however, and will stream its first fully-licensed movie to customers at some point this week. Although there’s no guarantee that it won’t be something starring Kirk Cameron. Via: THR Source: Judgment (Documentcloud)

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Hollywood forces VidAngel to stop streaming its movies

Unreleased ‘Akira’ title for Game Boy resurfaces

Akira , still one of the most definitive manga and anime ever made , never really got a game to do the source material justice. While that’s probably not going to change, Patrick Scott Patterso n, retro game hunter-gatherer, managed to pick up four slightly different copies of the mid-development Akira title on the Game Boy. They are all experiment builds, so all that mid-test gaming nougat is housed in open-air cartridges — which makes me nervous. The title is primarily broken into two (pretty broken) parts: Bike-based levels where you dodge static obstacles and an awkward-looking platform section where you punch and kick enemies that are, for some reason, much shorter than you. There’s also a bunch of jumping which will be familiar to anyone that played handheld games that were Hollywood movie tie-ins back in the 90s. You do, however, get to run around as protagonists Kaneda or Tetsuo — which is cool. There’s even a brief hovercraft shooter level and mutant bosses that Patterson was able to try through debug level options. The ideas are all very Akira , but the game is severely unfinished. There’s a single cloying soundtrack and only a few sound effects repeated constantly. Level design is all delightfully broken up too, but what are you expecting from a collection of decades-old mid-development cartridges? Patterson plans to pull together the workable parts of each cartridge, pulling them into something vaguely playable for fans that probably don’t even care how the game plays. Via: Kotaku

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Unreleased ‘Akira’ title for Game Boy resurfaces

Tesla unveils its solar roof and Powerwall 2

At Universal Studios in Los Angeles Tesla CEO Elon Musk showed off the company’s solar roof-top panels and new Energy initiative. It also showed off its new $5, 500 Powerwall 2 high-capacity residential batteries and Powerpack 2 for businesses. Musk and company have been teasing the photovoltaic cell-embedded rooftop panels for a few weeks . It’s also using the announcement of the new product as an explanation for why its acquiring Solar City. Musk said that if the merger doesn’t go through, the launch of the new tiles will be difficult. During the event, Musk sort of talked about the price of the panels. He said that when a house has these the “installed cost is less than a normal roof and the cost of electricity.” But there was no concrete pricing announced. The event was held on a Hollywood backlot where Solar City and Tesla had installed non-operating solar panels onto the houses you might recognize for the TV show, Desperate Housewives . The houses didn’t attract any attention before the event because they appeared so normal. He also showed off a house with a Tuscan style glass tiles that to the naked eye, you would be hard-pressed to notice that the roof was actually sucking up the energy of the sun. “People love their homes and we want them to be better, ” Musk said. Of course the entire equation requires batteries for a home to keep it lit up when the sun goes down. Tesla says the new Powerwall 2 will power a four bedroom house with lights, refrigerator and other appliances for an entire day. Musk said that they expect to start installing the glass tiles in summer 2017 and for the roofs to last a very very long time. “We expect this to have two or three times the longevity of asphalt. It’s really never going to wear out. It’s got a quasi-infinite lifetime. It’s made of quartz, ” he said. Tesla and Solar City are working with 3M on the coating on the glass tiles. Tesla has just come off an impressive quarter where it posted a profit for the first time in two years . It also announced earlier this month that all vehicles produced going forward would have the hardware capable of full autonomous driving . Developing. Source: Tesla

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Tesla unveils its solar roof and Powerwall 2

Kodak is giving free film to Kickstarter directors

Crowdfunded filmmakers will be able to shoot on film for a lot less money thanks to a partnership between Kodak and Kickstarter. Kodak says it will provide free 35mm or Super 16mm film stock for select projects, up to a total of around $20, 000 for 35mm film, depending on the total budget. Beyond that, the company will provide discounted film and mentoring for packaging, financing and sales strategies. The choice of filmmakers appears to be at Kodak’s discretion, but so far the company has picked several Kickstarter productions that will launch this spring. Kickstarter has successfully funded 20, 000 productions totalling $330 million so far, though it didn’t say which were shot on film. The platform has garnered a lot of bad publicity in the past by funding large projects like Veronica Mars and Zach Braff’s Wish I Was Here , since the well-known producers probably could have raised the cash elsewhere. On the other hand, it’s an excellent platform for up-and-coming filmmakers, and has helped get Oscar-nominated projects with very small budgets off the ground. Kodak VP Anne Hubbell says that “Kodak understands that artists working at all budget levels strive to tell their stories with the unique quality and emotion that film provides.” The company points out that footage can be purchased by Kickstarter producers in eighteen countries, including the US, UK, France and Canada. Kodak’s situation is a lot more secure in the film industry since it struck a deal with Hollywood to supply film for the foreseeable future. DarkFall, a Kickstarter film backed by Kodak However, it’s equally likely that many young, inexperienced directors would rather shoot digital, given advantages like speed and the ability to easily review takes. As we have pointed out , the costs of shooting on film go way beyond the stock itself. Filmmakers also need to consider processing and transferring footage to a format that can be edited, color corrected and converted to a final screening format. That, combined with the lower sensitivity of film compared to digital cameras (which necessitates more complex lighting) means that the total budget will likely still be higher, even with the film thrown in. That said, it’s always good to have choices, so if it’s an aesthetic that a director absolutely can’t live without, good old celluloid is now a much more feasible option. Source: Kodak

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Kodak is giving free film to Kickstarter directors

This Newly Discovered Octopus Species Totally Looks Like a Ghost

Octopuses, undoubtedly the best creature lurking in the ocean, come in all sorts of shapes and sizes and colors but this one might be gnarliest of them all: it’s a ghost. Or at least it looks like it. Recently spotted in the deep sea 2.6 miles down in the ocean, the octopus could very well be an entirely new species. To my eyes, it’s like a real life cartoon ghost or if the ghosts from Pac-Man came alive. Read more…

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This Newly Discovered Octopus Species Totally Looks Like a Ghost

Pseudoscientific terror ended fluoridation in Calgary, now kids’ teeth are rotting

Five years ago, the city of Calgary gave in to a scientifically illiterate campaign against fluoride in its water supply; five years later, Calgary’s grade two children each have an average of 3.8 extra cavities. (more…)

Build a Magic Mirror with a Raspberry Pi and an Old Monitor

One of the trademark devices in nearly every Hollywood blockbuster version of the future is a smart mirror that shows off a daily schedule, clock, weather, and other important updates. Blogger Dylan Pierce built his own powered by a Raspberry Pi. Read more…

Researchers inject oil into cells and create little lasers

The Massachusetts General Hospital research team that lit up human cells with the help of jellyfish genes a few years ago are back with a more advanced version of the technology. This new version forgoes the complicated external mirror setup in favor of injectable oil droplets impregnated with fluorescent dye. This is the same basic idea as what a team from St Andrews University recently created, except that the plastic bead that served as the their laser’s resonating chamber is now an oil droplet. While the technology isn’t ready for therapeutic applications just yet, it does hold a great deal of promise. The problem with conventional cellular markers and dye is that they have a broad emission spectrum which can make it difficult to spot the marked cells amidst the rest of the tissue. But with these miniature lasers, doctors will be able to mark and track individual cells no matter where they are in the body. The team recently published their findings in Nature Photonics . a dye-impregnated fat cell – Massachusetts General Hospital [Image Credit: Top – Arbi Babakhanians, inline: Matjaž Humar/Seok Hyun Yun] Filed under: Science Comments Source: Nature Photonics

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Researchers inject oil into cells and create little lasers