Hasta La Gadget!

The Android-based Desire HD and Desire Z phones get an updated Sense interface and tap into a new service to expand what the gadgets can do. pOriginally posted at a href=”http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-20016488-264.html” class=”origPostedBlog”Deep Tech/a/p

The good news first: the Sony Move, Xbox 360 Kinect, Amazon Kindle, and Apple iPad are all about to get more prominent placement in your local Best Buy, ahead of the holiday season.

And the bad news? Well, that space has got to come from somewhere. The big box retailer will be scaling back its CD and DVD shelf space in order to make room for the season’s latest entertainment gadgets.

Best Buy CEO Brian Dunn addressed the issue on a recent conference call, telling industry analysts,

We’ll have another store reset before the holidays, which will include an increase in the space for higher-growth and, in the aggregate, higher-margin categories, like Best Buy Mobile, e-readers and gaming, with a heavy emphasis on new gaming platforms and pre-owned game titles. This will be enabled by our reorganization of the DVD and CD sections. The CD section in particular will shrink in space allotment.

It’s the latest blow for industries that have already seen a major decline in retail shelf space, thanks in no small part to the rapid shuttering of music and video specialty stores.

As with almost any software update, Apple has seemingly introduced a few new issues while ironing out a couple of others. Automotive forums around the web are ablaze with talk that iOS 4.1 has introduced any number of playback problems, with the bulk of complainers citing scratching, crackling or random disconnects when piping audio from their device to their vehicle via the dock connector. We’ve tested two iOS 4.1-equipped iPhone 4 handsets in two separate vehicles here at Engadget HQ, and we saw no quirks whatsoever, but we’ve no doubt that the issue is real to some extent. Prior firmwares have caused permanent incompatibilities between our iPods and vehicles before, and we’re about at our wit’s end. We know it’s impossible for the software engineers at Cupertino to test new builds on every car adapter out there, but we’re starting to wonder if they bother to plug ’em into any vehicles at all. Tell us below if you’ve pulled any hairs out in recent days, won’t you?

[Image courtesy of Murphy5156 / TiPb]

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Did iOS 4.1 introduce in-car USB playback problems for you? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 15 Sep 2010 10:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Time to make space in the living room. You weren’t really using that piano anyway, were you? Microsoft principal researcher Bill Buxton, a driving force behind what would ultimately become the Surface, spoke about the future of the now fairly unwieldy device.

Among other revelations, Buxton spoke of a far cheaper device that will be “no thicker than a sheet of glass.” The future device will also have cameras embedded in it, a feature which Buxton believe will make it less of a niche product.

How soon will you realistically be able to get your home? Buxton predicts that the product will begin appearing in homes in the next three years. We’ll believe it when we see it. The Surface, after all, is a cool project, but it’s always been more a signpost of what Microsoft could or will be doing for consumers, rather than what it is doing.

In this short film, iPads create three-dimensional images out of light, using long-exposure photography and stop-motion animation.

The resulting animations are astonishingly versatile and beautiful. They include abstract alphabetic and geometric figures, but also dancing robots, blocky automata, and diffuse molecular effects.

The filmmakers also make terrific use of their landscape; some of the light figures are photographed reflected on or seen through surface. The ghostly city lights and shadowy iPad “handlers” are also part of the film, and surprisingly moving.

The first half of the video above describes the process used to produce it, which Jack Schulze from design consultancy Berg compares to a virtual CAT scan. The filmmakers first created a software template that plots 3-D models and generates 2-D stills. They then replay those stills on the iPad in sequence. Helpers hold the iPad and move it through space, so the stills assemble themselves in space as if the iPad were “extruding” the 3-D object. Long-exposure photography stitches everything together.

The film was made by Berg on behalf of creative communications giant Dentsu. Dentsu’s London agency asked: “What might a magical version of the future of media look like?” Berg responded with this film.

Dentsu’s Beeker Northam writes that the project grew out of the meaning of each of the three words, “Making,” “Future,” and “Magic”:

• “Making”, with its emphasis on craftsmanship, understanding of materials and media, and collaboration;
• “Future”, meaning something not seen before, something new and unexpected (not so much sci-fi, as near-future);
• and “Magic” – surprising, culturally powerful, unusual, capable of delighting.

This is the first of two collaborations between Berg and Dentsu. I don’t know what these film costs or how long they took to program and photograph, but I see tremendous potential here. Light is the new clay.

Making Future Magic: light painting with the iPad [Berg London]
Light Painting Video ‘Making Future Magic’ Is Made of 3-D and iPad Genius [Switched]

See Also:

• Patina and use-wear by BERG
• The City is A Battlesuit For Surviving the Future
• Wired 14.03: How Digital Animation Conquered Hollywood
• Equation: Quantifying Light = Great 3-D Animation
• In Praise of Ralph Bakshi, Animation Pioneer
• Big Bang Big Boom: Stop Motion Animation at Its Finest