3d illusion arts: Walyou

Walyou

3D Printed Super Mario Animated Cloud Pendant
Amazon Considering Taxis For Same Day Deliveries
Wellograph Watch Displays Fitness and Health Stats Using an Infographic UI
Sesame Touch-Free Smartphone Uses Head Gestures Instead

3D Printed Super Mario Animated Cloud Pendant

Posted: 13 Nov 2014 05:00 AM PST

DIY tech blog Adafruit shows us the combined beauty of 3D printing, micro controllers, and the nostalgic gaming retro skies of Super Mario Bros.

The blue pixelated skies of the original Super Mario Bros. is as nice a view as they come. And if you could wear it around your neck? That would be better, and is exactly what you can do with Adafruit's 3D printed pendant, which plays an animated scene of the Super Mario Bros. clouds.

Shaped in the appropriate visage of a Nintendo Gameboy, Adafruit inserted their custom-made microcontroller, the Pro Trinket, as the base for this unique piece of jewelry. The Pro Trinket measures 1.5″ x 0.7″ x 0.2" around. Tiny, but featuring enough processing power to run the 1.44? LCD display that's playing the looping animation.

The process requires a little soldering know how, along with the use of a 3D printer, but Adafruit’s simple step-by-step video can easily guide you into rocking your own pendant.

VIDEO TO ADD [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqcTEZpB780]

Source: Adafruit

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Amazon Considering Taxis For Same Day Deliveries

Posted: 13 Nov 2014 04:00 AM PST

Looking to offer same day deliveries without expensive logistics, a new report suggests that Amazon is turning to taxis to do the trick.

In this day and age of downloadable music, books and games and Internet speeds that see things load in an instant, we want things now. That’s especially the case of online shopping as while free delivery might be the cheapest option, it’s usually the slowest and so it’s not uncommon for online shoppers to chip in a few quid/dollars more to have the goods delivered the very next day.

But what of those shoppers who are more impatient than that? And for whom 24 hours seems agonisingly long? Amazon has been considering same day delivery for some time, and while their plans to use drones as a logistics alternative to vans and postmen and women on foot, the online retailer is now said to be looking at taxis.

Taxis: not just for people! It may seem surprising or nigh on ludicrous for our packages to show up in the back of a minicab in the same way we’d ferry ourselves around a city but the benefits are definitely there for shoppers and Amazon alike.

How it would work is that the taxis would drive to a specific neighbourhood with 10 or so packages on board and would then drop them to our doors. Sound simple? It is and on top of this it also means that packages wouldn’t be hampered by delays such as those that occurred last Christmas when UPS and Fedex’s slow delivery of Amazon products led to customer disgruntlement.

The price of luxury could come be an expensive one though. It’s being estimated that to get the package delivered within an hour (as the service would mandate) it would cost people $5 per package which seems a little pricey when the alternative is walking to the shops for free and buying it yourself.

Other concerns arise in the security of the deliveries. What if I order a plasma TV as big as my wall and a reckless taxi driver accidentally puts a crack in the screen thanks to a sharp right turn? And what of reasonably sized neighbourhoods where there are 5 people looking to take advantage of same day delivery but Amazon doesn’t deem that worth their time?

The scheme appears to be in the development stages with tests being set-up in San Francisco and Los Angeles using taxi-hailing service FlyWheel. We’ll know more should those initial tests prove to be successful.

Source: CNBC

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Wellograph Watch Displays Fitness and Health Stats Using an Infographic UI

Posted: 12 Nov 2014 12:45 PM PST

Some manufacturers of wearables seem to think that a smartwatch doesn’t need to have a gazillion functions, so long as it looks nice. That’s surely the case with the Wellograph Watch.

Take HP’s MB Chronograph, for example. That wearable doesn’t even have apps, so there’s no way it could have an extensive functionality, not to mention that its design isn’t exactly otherworldly. The tech giant hasn’t understood that it needed to bring something new to the table in order to stay relevant and sell its product. Wearables don’t even need to have a display to perform a task flawlessly, and the Articheck Assure is a clear example of that. Back to smartwatches, though, Wellograph manages to integrate a simplistic range of capabilities in a sleek-looking timepiece featuring an unusual way of displaying things: on an infographic UI.

Don’t expect the Wellograph watch to do much. It’ll monitor your activity, heart, number of steps taken each day (which, as you know, should be north of 10,000 if you want to live long and prosper), and your world records in terms of speed. Just kidding, the wearable also comes with a stopwatch, should you decide to use it for running, swimming, or other sports where speed matters.

It’s funny how Brian M. Wolfe of AppAdvice thinks the Wellograph won’t win any design awards, seeing how it was actually nominated for the 2014 CES Innovations Design and Engineering Awards.

That being said, this $349 smartwatch has a sapphire crystal display. On the software side of things, it features a firmware that’s updated regularly, which means that new features are provided frequently.

It works equally fine with Android, iOS and Windows Phone smartphones, so you shouldn’t really worry about its compatibility. The week-long battery life is about as much as the one of the improved Pebble. Bear in mind that the Pebble smartwatch has an e-paper display, while this one is a 1.26-inch low-power rectangular LCD with integrated backlight. The bulky design also brings the Pebble Steel to mind, so I’m going to subtract some originality points from there. At least the Wellograph charges wirelessly.

Given the small number of functions, Wellograph’s price will definitely seem steep to most people. If you’re willing to sacrifice that for great design, then I won’t blame you.

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Sesame Touch-Free Smartphone Uses Head Gestures Instead

Posted: 12 Nov 2014 12:30 PM PST

Besides the magic word from Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, Sesame is also the name of a touch-free smartphone that could prove very useful to people who can’t use their hands.

Touch-free devices are currently being developed for disabled people only, but the truth is we’re heading to a future where we no longer use taps in order to control things. The change from hardware buttons to touchscreens, something that seems perfectly normal now, would’ve been classified as sci-fi a couple of decades ago, but the way we’re interacting with our devices doesn’t stop here. Moving our hands through midair or doing a certain gesture with our heads will trigger specific actions, and even though this sounds a bit far-fetched, I’m fairly certain that’s how it’s going to be. The Sesame touch-free smartphone is only one of the many devices that will pave that future.

Sesame Enable created this smartphone thinking that disabled people have a right to their privacy, as well. I’m saying that because in most situations, whenever these patients want to text or talk on the phone, they need to rely on someone to write the messages or dial the number and hold it as long as the conversation lasts. You know, not everyone has access to Stephen Hawking’s resources.

The developers of this phone haven’t built it from scratch. Instead, the Sesame touch-free phone is in fact a modified Nexus 5 with some special software. And some expensive software that is! From the $350 that the Nexus 5 costs, Sesame gets as high as $900.

In order to work without having to use the screen, Sesame makes use of the front-facing camera for tracking head gestures. Any movement is translated into a new cursor position. To switch the smartphone on or off, people need to use voice commands, so it seems like Sesame is always listening.

Currently featured on Indiegogo, the Sesame touch-free smartphone will get to backers in April 2015, provided that the $30,000 funding goal is reached in the next 30 days. To secure one for yourself, you need to pledge at least $900, half now and half at the time of delivery.

The noble intention of Sesame Enable may meet its end unexpectedly, as touch-free devices are known for their lack of precision. On top of that, I still can’t get over how expensive Sesame is…

Be social! Follow Walyou on Facebook and Twitter, and read more related stories about the Leia display system that lets you interact with midair projections, or these eerie projections of deities on trees.