Geek Tyrant (or perhaps Geekty Rant) has posted a list of 5 Films that changed the way people look at Sci-Fi Movies. Starting with Metropolis, lobby posters and film clips are included. Over at Bookstove there is another list of the top 10 Science Fiction authors of all time. As with all such lists, both of these are subjective decisions, but it is fun to see what others think and comment on your own inclusions for the list. If you are at all into art, be sure to check out Mari Kasurinen’s My Little Pony collection. She has done some amazing work; I particularly like My Little Stormtrooper, Han Solo, and Boba Fet from the Star Wars universe, as well as the Trek, Batman, and Cthulhu entries. And a little Nerdcore…
The comic-con is coming next week, already sold out, and filled with some amazing guests. For those of us who can’t be there, G4 will cover it, as will several hundred bloggers.
You have to love the section of the TOR website called Of Interest, and here are a few recent examples why. The Web Urbanist has put together one of the best collections of Science Fiction Weapons assembled on a single web page. While mostly blasters, it includes one or two other types of offensive toys (not much for defense, here). Something Awful had its usual collection of Forum entries that allowed them to put together this excellent collection of Star Wars Classic Art. That may not mean exactly what you think it does, so be sure to take a peek. And from Geek Tout came the link for Silence of the Lego Lambs, the Musical (WARNING: not work friendly)…
A few blogs I like include The Way The Future Blogs, Frederik Pohl’s entry into the online world, and a bit of a play on his book title, The Way The Future Was. Another good one is Today in Astronomy, and both blogs give a historical perspective to the business of the future. Battlestar Galactica does its final episode tonight, and just a few days ago the cast spoke at the U.N. about human rights. Joss Whedon did a Q and A about Dollhouse, and Fancast covered it. For the 10th anniversary of Farscape, Season 1 is online on Fancast, so you can watch the whole thing. Finally for tonight, a friend passed me a link to an amazing video; this maniac creates an outer space painting using spray paint and random items from his kitchen… in 60 seconds! Enjoy…
Erik Johansson takes pictures and then digitally manipulates them. So do lots of other people, but not many get such interesting results. If I had to guess, I don’t think he’s from outer space, but the universe next door wouldn’t surprise me. I thought the link to this artist came from Six Revisions, but now I can’t find it to confirm. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t visit that site; lots of great info about building your own piece of the web to be found there.
This is a tool we should all have in our arsenal: Portable Apps, the ability to take any open source program and use it anywhere the mood strikes us. Just because using any program wasn’t enough, using that same program in any operating system is even more important. For the final tweak, you should be able to use it from any local launch platform; the two most important being a Memory Stick and a LiveCD. This system does all of that, built in. Then it gives you a simple programing environment to add your own additional software, modify the basic environment (wallpaper, sounds, security protection, etc.), and otherwise make it your own. It comes pre-bundled with some very powerful software, like FileZilla, The Gimp, and NVU Portable. Then it gives you some more build-your-own tools, like Virtual Dub and WinMerge. My favorite bit, is it is dirt simple to add your own open-source programs to the arsenal; see the Development Guide for specifics.