Leonard DaVinci’s masterpiece Mona Lisa
The secret behind Mona Lisa’s enigmatic smile has been explained by scientists who believe it changes depending on which part of the eye sees it first.  One of the charms of the world’s most famous painting is that she appears radiant one moment and then serious and sardonic the next.  Now [...]

Baby Tesla’s favorite holiday was always Halloween
The only difference between daytime and night time is sunshine. Well, that and vampires and other creatures of the night that never come out during the daytime because the sunshine will cause their face to melt. Some people would actually look better if they let their face melt, but [...]

(YouTube Link)
 The Electronic Rock Guitar Shirt isn’t just a t-shirt. You can actually play music on it. Use a magnetic pick over the string markings and press down on the frets with your other hand. There’s also a volume nob and an amplifier that fits on your belt. Has it been a long time since [...]

Do you like to block the world out completely when you’re working at your desk? Copenhagen-based design team GamFratesi has created a prototype for a sleek, dinosaur egg-like work environment that they call Rewrite. It reminds me of those cubicles they had at my grad school library, except they’re a lot nicer-looking.

The world’s smallest working model train set has been unveiled – measuring just 1/8th of an inch by 1/4 of an inch.
At 1-35200 scale to the real thing, the five-carriage train travels around an oval route including a ride through a tunnel.
Created by New Jersey model train enthusiast David Smith, the model was built using [...]

(YouTube Link)
 Five artists from the art collective Cube Works in Toronto recreated Leonardo Da Vinci’s The Last Supper out of 4,050 cubes, in all measuring 8.5 by 17 feet. The work was entered into the Guinness Book of World Records and sold to a collector in Florida.

Photo Manipulations are always very interesting to watch because – and that’s what is important – they give a realistic view of an unreal picture. Erik Johansson, a 23-year-old computer engineering student, from sweden has a sense for good ideas for manipulations.
1. First of all we would like to thank you for taking the time [...]

Somehow judgement day feels different when you’re a highly trained cow
The reason why we spend time putting together this weekly assortment of “life beyond the edge” photos is because creativity is inspiring. Ingenuity has a way of unleashing the inner trolls in each of us and replacing them with the kinder, more gentler turbo-gnomes [...]

Lighthouse in a storm
Some of these photos are facinating, some are disturbing, but all tell a story. (pics)
 

Cows are both the cause and the victims of today’s obesity problem
Last week we started down a different path, but somehow we ended up on the path we were meant to be on anyway. So we’ve concluded that there are no different paths. Every “new” path is merely our destiny wrapped in new clothing, secretly [...]

Image: Anne Cavanagh and Dave McCarthy
The Wellcome Image Awards are given annually for achievement in scientific imagery. The 2009 winners were announced this week in London. Among those winners was the above image showing:
…the synthetic polymers used to coat a drug, either to target the release of the drug in a specific part of the [...]

All hung up on DNA

Irina Alexandru’s design is more of a coat hanger than a closet, but it’s intended to allow for the maximum amount of clothing hangers in the smallest amount of space. We just plain like the curvy double helix design.
For those who are having flashbacks to biology class: Yes, a double-helix is actually [...]

Young Girl in Profile in Renaissance Dress

This painting, which was sold in auction as “German, Early 19th Century” has gone from being worth $19,000 to millions overnight. The new owner who won it decided to give the painting a thorough checkup, whereupon a fingerprint was found. It matched another found on a confirmed da Vinci [...]

The pit crew worked furiously to get Bossy ready to roll again,
but as everyone knew, cow repair was not an exact science

Andy Warhol once said, “Before I was shot, I always thought that I was more half-there than all-there – I always suspected that I was watching TV instead of living life. Right when I [...]

Simply amazing
Master juggler Michael Moschen performs his incredibly famous, jaw-dropping piece where three balls and a triangle become a musical and visual work of art. (2nd video after the jump)

Engineeer and cartoonist Tim Hunkin created an arcade game that at first appears to be an ATM or banking kiosk. When coins are inserted, the banking poster drops and reveals Wack-A-Banker, giving you an opportunity to take your aggressions out on a group of financially oppressive stereotypes.

Stonehenge offers many mysteries

This Canadian brainstorm actually makes sense. The town proposing the Stonehenge replica is in a compatible global location. The folks at The Vancouver Sun tell us more.
“The town of Barriere is hatching a plan to place a concrete replica of England’s Stonehenge at the centre of a major park development.
Barriere’s version would [...]

An Italian scientist says he has reproduced the Shroud of Turin, a feat that he says proves definitively that the linen some Christians revere as Jesus Christ’s burial cloth is a medieval fake.
The shroud, measuring 14 feet, 4 inches by 3 feet, 7 inches bears the image, eerily reversed like a photographic negative, of a [...]

Beware of crazy little men carrying vacuum cleaners,
for they represent an entirely new breed of suckers

Some photos cause headaches and others cause scandals. However, this particular combination of photos has been selected to cause a jock rash in people without a sense of humor. (Pics)

Behold the incredible inspiring carvings of Takashi Itoh.

Anybody can carve a pumpkin. In fact a couple companies have devolved templates and tools for the carver handicapped among to produce astounding results. However Takashi Itoh’s original watermelon carvings put most of them to shame!  Takashi says it only took him three weeks to become skilled at it, but he has been [...]

Sometimes nature gives a photographer a stunning opportunity to take magnificent pictures. Clouds and light produce some of the most stunning yet transient works of Mother Nature.  Take a look at some incredible sky photos.

Junior cowboys always work their way up the
livestock food chain before they get to horses

If wishes were fishes, and hope springs eternal, then wishes for hope would be wishes for eternal fishes. Hmmm, maybe not. Putting a square peg in a round hole is not the same as drilling a round hole into the side [...]

A new view on pool

Playing pool (or billiards if you prefer) is such a great game. Where else can expert players show off their physical strength, skill, and finesse, all on the confines of a felt covered slate table? And speaking of pool – although they all come in many different styles and sizes, once you own one, unfortunately it [...]

Talk about computer viruses! Sculptor Forrest McCluer took salvaged 30 old PCs from the landfill and turned them into sculptures of viruses (the biological kind). This one above is inspired by the T4 Bacteriophage:
The “T9 Track Virus” is another version of the T4 Bacteriophage. It consists of PC power supply cables, CD-ROMs, sections of 9-track [...]

[process2a: Dodecahedron]
The folks over at Vague Terrain have spent some time reprocessing  the power of  Platonic Solids.
“In this project we explore three-dimensional subdivision algorithms. These have traditionally been used in computer graphics to produce smooth, rounded forms from coarse polygons. By modifying and expanding these established algorithms to include additional weights, one can generate forms with [...]