The Loop: Superb Remote Control Design
There was once a time when two buttons were added to remote controls for every TV feature. That worked fine … when all TVs had were channels and volume. But with today’s TVs that have tuners for everything from reception to feeding your dog, it should be a hint that more buttons are NOT the way to go! (Perceptive readers will sense that I’m frustrated over modern thousand-button remotes). Thankfully some companies realize this, and I recently came across a lovely example of that. It’s a simple design called “The Loop”: It has two buttons, a scrollwheel and … that’s it! A built in motion system tracks your movements, allowing you to select from menus on screen. No overflow of buttons! Beautiful. [Continue reading for video]
As brilliant as many successful AI & robotics developers are, robots often lack aesthetic value. A recent robot debut revealed such a hideous design that I felt compelled to write up a summary of the world’s ugliest robots. So in short, this post has nothing to do with the brilliant technologies behind some of these robots — just their pretty (or not) little faces.
Sharp readers of Think Artificial may have noticed that I sometimes use bizarre, yellow icons to spice up the entries (like the one on the side here). They’re part of a 15 icon set I created sometime in 2006 during what must’ve been a night of insomnia. In any case, I’m releasing them into the public domain in this post! Hope some of you find them entertaining or even useful, or at least not annoying. Continue Reading to see all of them and download the package (”Spambots” is my favorite).
This video is making it’s rounds on the web; UFOs flying over Haiti, made to appear like an amateur camera recording. The UFOs look really fantastic in both their design and the superb realism, achieved through sound/lighting effects and out-of-focus sequences. There are some speculations in the YouTube comments that it was made with 
Crysis is a new war-type game which must certainly be one of the flagships of modern state-of-the-art tech in the gaming industry. I came across this three part video recorded at E3 and just couldn’t tare myself from the screen until I’d watched all three parts. Crabs & swarms of fish habit the photo-realistic oceans and react to your presence, as well as dry land animals like chickens who behave incredibly realistically (the blurred shapes in the corners of the thumbnail are the player’s hands, reaching to pick up the chicken).
I came across this video in the tubes today. A telepresence platform built in 1996 — primarily using off-the-shelf, simple technologies. Like the remains of an electronic weelchair after a nuclear holocaust, retrofitted with a tube-screen, wheels and accompanying wireworks — the chassis screams retrofuturism galore.
The Female Type (FT) is a humanoid robot designed in female proportions, and whose movements resemble a model’s. Tomotaka Takahashi, creator of FT even consulted a few real models during FT’s year of development. Personally, I think they’ve done a magnificent job. Both when it comes to shapes, color and general movement. But she’s made out of plastic and lacks facial features: What exactly makes her look feminine?
Just wondering.