Aaron Koblin collected a single day’s worth of mundane air-traffic data from the FAA and rendered the associated traffic patterns and density output as a gorgeous video. He then laid a gentle, trance-y soundtrack over the top of it, and the result is an abstract, interpretive map of the US.
Equal parts genius and beauty, the light-display-map shows familiar shapes, drawn by flight patterns, emerging from the darkness. Can’t spot Hawaii? You will in about 5 seconds.
[Via Collision Detection]
Whenever I travel somewhere, I love to saturate myself with movies about the destination. For my upcoming trip to Chicago, it’s Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. For Vegas in March, it’s Ocean’s Eleven — one of my all-time favorite Vegas movies (along with Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas).
In Ocean’s Eleven, Danny Ocean and crew took Vegas — and three of it’s largest casinos — by storm. In Ocean’s Twelve, they went across the Atlantic and stole some stuff from Europe (and made a not-so-good film while they were at it). I’m happy to say that this summer, the bunch will be back in Vegas for a third installment of the Ocean’s series, and there’s a new teaser trailer out for the June 8th release date:
It can’t be worse than Ocean’s Twelve. Impossible!
This week’s video comes from YouTube user utubenerd, who filmed a Veneziani twisting and tugging a flaming ball of red-hot glass into the shape of a delicate cat — all in under two minutes. The process is called solidworking, a method of sculpting where, according to this site, “glass is gathered from the furnace on the end of a solid metal rod called a puntil, or punty, and shaped into a sculpture,” in this case a cat. Quite extraordinary.
Two and a half years ago or so I took a trip through India. I found it to be one of the most amazing trips I’ve ever taken. Like so many who make a trip to this massive subcontinent, I wish I could have stayed for a year or more. There was so much to see and do. One of the most fascinating places I visited was the city of Varanasi, said to be the oldest living city on earth. it is hard to describe Varanasi. The city is old, but it is also very much live, very dirty, but also beautiful. It sits on the Ganges and is the place where thousands of Indians come every week, literally, to die.
I did a video on my experience in Varanasi that ran on Al Gore’s Current TV. The Ganges is the lifeline of the country, it’s spiritual spinal cord. But it is also a filthy, highly polluted body of water. I came across this article just now while browsing around that reveals just how dirty it is. And things for the most part are not getting better. Scientists, in fact, say that sewage and pollution have devastated the 1,550-mile river, which spills from a Himalayan glacier and cuts through India’s plains before flowing into the Bay of Bengal. There are places near Varanasi with a fecal bacteria count nearly 4,000 times the World Health Organization standard for bathing.
I like to see that people are calling attention to the state of the Ganges, because the Indians are in need of help turning things around.
Laos is a long, skinny, landlocked country in southeast Asia, often overlooked by tourist-friendly, coastline-owning Thailand. However, with its centuries-old temples at Luang Prabang, 4000 islands at Si Phan Don, and easily-reachable (depending on your definition of easy) Army of Buddhas at Pak Ou, Laos may be one of the most overlooked travel destinations on the planet. While your travel dollars can go far in this beautiful, mountainous country, your memories may be hard-won — especially if you’re a high-maintenance traveler. To see what I mean, check out this excellent 2-minute video of portions of Al Brenner’s bus ride through Laos. Gorgeous…but by no means first class.