3d illusion arts: Oddity Central

Oddity Central

Jeweler Creates Mechanical Creepy Crawlers from Watch Parts and Light Bulbs
72-Year-Old Grandpa Finds Internet Fame after Modelling Teen Girl Outfits
Overcrowded Japanese Subway Inspires Original Photo Series

Jeweler Creates Mechanical Creepy Crawlers from Watch Parts and Light Bulbs

Posted: 19 Nov 2012 04:57 AM PST

JM Gershenson-Gates is a Chicago-based jeweler who creates unique accessories from discarded watch parts, in a bid “to show the beauty of the mechanical world, a place generally hidden from the public behind metal and glass.”

On his website, Jason Gershenson-Gates says he has always been fascinated with mechanical things. The son of a “gearhead”, and the grandson of a railroad man, he used to always take apart his toys to see how they worked, but never seemed to be able to put them back together again. Nowadays, he takes apart old watches collected from all over the world and rearranges their parts into fantastic designs. Although his Mechanical Mind jewelry series is nothing short of awe-inspiring, in both size and design, it’s his latest series of mechanical insects that caught my eye. The idea of making miniature arthropods and insects out of watch parts and dead automotive light bulbs apparently came to him recently, after a jewelry show this past summer. He was experimenting with watch part anatomy when he decided to create fragile spider and insect legs. One thing led to another, and now Jason has an entire menagerie of incredibly detailed mechanical creepy crawlers.

We’ve featured some pretty amazing works of art made from watch parts, but JM Gershenson-Gates’ insects have to be the most incredible yet. The level of detail for the scale alone is pretty unbelievable, but it’s the work the artist puts into making every piece that I find most impressive. Each of these tiny masterpiece takes several hours to create, and because the design is too consistent to suffer any breaks, Jason has to complete every one of them in a single sitting. That means he sometimes spends up to 12 hours assembling watch springs, stems, gears and straps, and soldering them all together.

via This Is Colossal

Jeweler Creates Mechanical Creepy Crawlers from Watch Parts and Light Bulbs was originally posted at OddityCentral.com

72-Year-Old Grandpa Finds Internet Fame after Modelling Teen Girl Outfits

Posted: 19 Nov 2012 03:59 AM PST

Photos of a 72-year-old Chinese man modelling stylish clothes for young women have recently went viral online, after his granddaughter posted them on China’s largest retail website. What started out as a silly joke turned into a massive advertising campaign for her store.

We’ve had posts about successful elderly fashion models before, but Liu Xianping, a grandfather from China, is the first elderly male model who reached Internet stardom for modelling girls’ clothes. Liu, 72, has been posing for his granddaughter's female fashion store on Tmall and although the garments are designed for sweet and cute teen girls, featuring rosy shades, laces and ribbons, he totally pulled it off. His confidence in front of the camera, his slim physique and pair of long skinny legs have apparently gained the admiration of millions and made some girls green with envy. And most importantly, his granddaughter’s store sales have increased 5 times since his pictures went viral.

Liu Xianping has been modelling clothes for Yuekou, a Tmall female fashion store started in May by 5 recent college graduates. One of the five is Liu’s granddaughter Ms. Lv. Apparently, the whole thing started as a joke, one day when her grandfather came to help them with unpacking their creations. In an interview with Chinese media, the girl said: "He picked up one piece and tried to give some advice on how to mix and match. We thought it was fun so we started shooting." Apparently many of the combinations in the fashion photos are her grandfather’s ideas. He put on short skirts, long stockings, dresses and sometimes even wore wigs to get that genuine teen girl look.

So how does Liu Xianping feel about his fashion exploits? “Why unacceptable (for someone like me to wear women's clothes ? Modeling for the store is helping my granddaughter and I have nothing to lose. We were very happy on the day of the shooting. I'm very old and all that I care about is to be happy," he told a journalist. Reactions from Chinese netizens have been overwhelmingly positive; many of them thought he was cool, open-minded, and some even compared him to Karl Lagerfeld.

via Offbeat China

72-Year-Old Grandpa Finds Internet Fame after Modelling Teen Girl Outfits was originally posted at OddityCentral.com

Overcrowded Japanese Subway Inspires Original Photo Series

Posted: 19 Nov 2012 02:37 AM PST

Tokyo Compression is an ongoing photo series by German-born artist Michael Wolf that shows daily commuters with their faces pressed against the steamy windows of Japan’s overcrowded subway trains.

Japan has one of the highest population densities in the world. Tokyo, its capital city, and the surrounding metropolitan area has a population of over 35 million, living in an area just 8,000 square kilometers in size. As you can imagine, the cost of living in such a densely populated metropolis can be considered astronomical, and that forces a lot of people into neighboring areas, where housing is more affordable. The result of this phenomenon is a large number of commuters traveling into Tokyo for work and back home, on a daily basis. Although Japan’s capital is famous for its advanced transportation infrastructure, not even its punctual subway trains can handle the large number of people using them during rush hours. In order to fit them all in, the subway even has "passenger arrangement staff", commonly known as “people pushers”, main goal is to cram as many people as possible into the subway tram. The white glove-wearing personal actually pushes people into the train, so the doors can shut. Seeing commuters’ faces pressed against the windows like sardines inspired Hong Kong- based photograph Michael Wold to create his Tokyo Compression photo series.

According to the description on Wolf’s website, “The images create a sense of discomfort as his victims attempt to squirm out of view or simply close their eyes, wishing the photographer to go away. Tokyo Compression depicts an urban hell and by hunting down these commuters with his camera, Wolf highlights their complete vulnerability to the city at its most extreme." Looking at the the faces immortalized in Michael Wolf’s photographs, I’m sure you’ll realize the New York or London metro is really not as bad as you thought, during rush hours.