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Considering the expense, precision and difficulty of manufacturing computer chips, you would think the engineers designing them are pretty serious people.

But it’s not all business inside a chip fab, as these microscope photos reveal. In fact, the designers of microchips frequently hide tiny cartoons, drawings and even messages alongside the super-tiny circuits and semiconductors they create.

Chipworks, a company that analyzes microchips by peeling them apart and looking at them under microscopes, has discovered many examples of silicon art. We’ve selected a few highlights here from the firm’s extensive galleries of silicon art, but check the Chipworks website for more.

The images in this gallery are magnified 200 to 500 times.

As Chipworks explains, these drawings are made with the same processes used to assemble the rest of a computer chip. Designs are etched onto photolithography plates which are then used to “print” the chips’ circuitry, layer by layer, in thin films of silicon, silicon dioxide, aluminum and other materials. It’s a complicated process that takes hundreds of steps and millions of dollars worth of machinery, and it requires incredible degrees of precision and repeatability.

But if there’s a little unused space in a chip, why not fill that with an entertaining design? It’s not as if most of the chip companies’ customers will ever notice. The only people likely to see these designs are the chip engineers’ supervisors and analysts at companies like Chipworks.

“The mass production of these works of art as parasites on the body of a commercial IC goes unnoticed by most observers,” writes Chipworks. “Their existence is a tribute to human resourcefulness and creativity, surfacing from deep within a complex process.”

Sharp isn’t apt to sell but 15,000 of its Touch Wood SH-08C handsets, but after watching the ad below, you can bet there will be demand for more. It’s a bit baffling to think of the trouble Drill, Inc. went through in order to assemble the pieces necessary for a wooden ball to trickle down a homegrown marimba, particularly in the midst of Kyushu, Japan’s woodlands. Kenjiro Matsuo was responsible for the creation of the instrument, while Morihiro Harano is being handed credit for the idea itself; in fact, he confirmed to The New York Times that no artificial music was added whatsoever, with only the background levels being adjusted up for effect. You may have never listened to a piece of classical music in your life, but you’re sorely missing out if you ignore Bach’s Cantata 147, “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring.” Or, at least the version in that video below.

Continue reading Mesmerizing Touch Wood SH-08C ad showcases Japan’s beauty, mankind’s ingenuity (video)

Mesmerizing Touch Wood SH-08C ad showcases Japan’s beauty, mankind’s ingenuity (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 31 Mar 2011 13:59:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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See that chart up there? That’s a beautiful visualization of a dozen folk models surrounding the idea of home computer security, devised by Michigan State’s own Rick Wash. To construct it (as well pen the textual explanations to back it), he interviewed a number of computer users with varying levels of sophistication, with the goal being to find out how normal Earthlings interpreted potential threats to their PC. His findings? A vast amount of home PCs are frequently insecure because “they are administered by untrained, unskilled users.” He also found that PCs remain largely at risk despite a blossoming network of preventative software and advice, and almost certainly received an A for his efforts. Hit the source link for more, but only after you’ve spiffed up, thrown on a pair of spectacles and kicked one foot up on the coffee table that sits in front of you.

Visualized: preconceived notions about personal computer security originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 24 Mar 2011 13:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You know that special Mortal Kombat kick where there are, like, multiple Johnny Cages? Well, by firing a flash a bunch of times during one photo, you can create Johnny Cage kicks out of anything. More »