Hasta La Gadget!

In last weekend’s episode of The Good Wife, Julianna Margulies’ character interrogates a girl about her voice recognition software and cites our favorite technology website (that would be us, Gizmodo) as saying that the software was fantastic. More »

Welcome to Growing Up Geek, a feature where we take a look back at our youth, and tell stories of growing up to be the nerds that we are. This week, we have our very own Ben Gilbert! He likes ninja turtles, obviously.

To me, being a “geek” about something — anything, really — is being super, super passionate about that subject. It’s that passion that drew me to documentaries like Helvetica, or King of Kong. It’s that passion, witnessed in speeches and conversations with colleagues, that renews my love of video games every year I attend GDC. It’s that passion that endears me to people like Stephen King and Trent Reznor. And it’s that passion — that nerdery — that I’ve brought to music, journalism, and the medium of video games.

But that’s always something I took for granted. My father’s passion for art meant growing up in a house filled with his incredible paintings. Didn’t everyone? My mother’s passion for learning meant she had three degrees, including a Ph.D., despite having little financial assistance and coming from another country. Totally normal!

My point isn’t to brag (though, come on, my parents are basically superheroes), but to say that the concept of being a “geek” was never a foreign one to me. Being an obsessive weirdo was always pretty normal in my family. I mean that in a good way.

Continue reading Growing Up Geek: Ben Gilbert

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Growing Up Geek: Ben Gilbert originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 24 Sep 2012 14:25:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Ya’ll are a weird bunch. While the rest of the world happens upon our fine blog through, probably, the expected avenues of entry—”iphone” and “android” and “mars”—you, yes you searched some pretty strange stuff to land here. Stranger by the hour. Super strange at night. More »

Take one look at the upcoming 3D stop motion film ParaNorman and it’s easy to see that moviegoers are in for some stunning visuals come August 17th. Once you realize the contribution of 3D printing to the film’s creation, however, you’re likely to appreciate the movie on an entirely new level. In order to portray a wide array of emotions on the faces of the film’s 62 characters, animation studio LAIKA tapped 3D Systems and their ZPrinter 650 to generate over 31,000 individual facial parts for inclusion in the production — talk about working overtime. According to Brian McLean of LAIKA, “By using a color 3D printer we were not only able to push facial performance to new levels, but we were also able to achieve a level of detail and subtlety in characters’ faces that a few short years ago would have seemed impossible.” If you’ve yet to catch a preview of ParaNorman, just hop the break to see some of the printed handiwork.

Continue reading Stop motion animated film ParaNorman taps 3D printers to create 31,000 unique facial features

Filed under: Misc. Gadgets, Home Entertainment, Meta

Stop motion animated film ParaNorman taps 3D printers to create 31,000 unique facial features originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 08 Aug 2012 23:18:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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