Oddity Central

Oddity Central

Kindhearted Woman Saves 100 Dogs From Being Eaten During Controversial Festival

Posted: 30 Jun 2015 05:32 AM PDT

A 65-year-old dog lover from China, has gone to great lengths to save as many dogs as she possibly could from being eaten during this year’s Yulin Dog Meat Festival. She managed to pay around $1,000 for the release of 100 otherwise doomed canines. It may not sound like much, but the media attention her actions got in international media also helped raise awareness about the cruel festival, thus increasing the chances of it being banned in the near future.

Yang Xiaoyun, a retired school teacher from Tianjin, China, traveled 1,500 miles from her home to the city of Yulin, to save scores of dogs from being slaughtered and eaten during the Dog Meat Festival. Photos shared on Chinese internet portal Netease show the 65-year-old woman walking through a market where dogs were kept in cages and paying for various sums of money for their release. Reports say she ended up paying 7,000 yuan ($1,000) to save 100 dogs.

Yang-Xiaoyun

Awesome Beer Portraits Prove Beer Goes Great with Art

Posted: 30 Jun 2015 04:00 AM PDT

Some artists rely on a pint of ice cold lager for a bit of inspiration, but Chicago-based illustrator Kyle Bice actually uses amber brew to create his signature beer portraits.

Kyle Bice graduated from the American Academy of Art with a degree in traditional oil painting, but since he didn’t really believe there was much of a career for him as a painter, the young artist turned to illustration. After making a name for himself in advertising and the world of comic books, Kyle met with Fred Bueltman from New Holland Brewing, who had seen his work and asked him to redo a bunch of labels for the company. It was during this time that he discovered his passion for craft beer.

beer-portraits

Meet Weesay, the Blind and Homeless Oil Can Guitar Master

Posted: 30 Jun 2015 02:00 AM PDT

Wesseh Freeman, a.k.a Weesay, became an internet sensation last December for his badass strumming skills. His unique handmade guitar – cobbled together from an old stick, a paint can, and three used strings – caught the attention of brothers Nikhil and Sachin Ramchandani, the owners of O! Chips, a potato chips company in Liberia. So they asked him to write a jingle for their brand, and posted a video on the company’s YouTube channel. The two-and-a-half minute clip instantly went viral.

Weesay, 37, is blind and homeless. But that hasn't affected his musical abilities in the least. The man is truly gifted, and that's evident just from the guitar he managed to fashion for himself. According to Guitar World, "His frets are made from bike spokes or coat hangers and are apparently movable; yet he has a mastery of intonation. This instrument should be completely out of tune…but it's not! Weesay plays it like a boss."

10868189_1395450994082527_8724297501502085850_n (1)

Dornob | Design Ideas Daily

Dornob | Design Ideas Daily

The Droid: Star Wars Coffee Table Cum Pinball Machine

Posted: 30 Jun 2015 08:20 AM PDT

Anorher view of The Droid coffee table
It's a coffee table. It's a pinball machine. It's a "Star Wars" lover's dream. It's the Droid, a piece of furniture so cool, you'll want it whether you grew up with Darth Vader, Yoda and C-3PO or not. Created by utterly inventive Hungarian ALTAR furniture, this "one and only love child of Star Wars pinball and R2D2" has snagged a 2015 A'Design Award and garnered – deservedly – lots of international attention. Read more…

Daily Optical Illusion for 06/30/2015

Mighty Optical Illusions
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Simple Crooked Lines Optical Illusion

simple optical illusionI’ve been having a bit of trouble lately trying to find new and different illusions to feature on the site. I’ve realized that there are only so many illusions out there, and they aren’t exactly being created at an industrial rate. Today, I have a pretty simple lines optical illusion for you. It’s plain, black […]

The post Simple Crooked Lines Optical Illusion appeared first on Mighty Optical Illusions.

See the entire illusion: http://www.moillusions.com/simple-crooked-lines-optical-illusion/
 
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Walyou

Walyou

Link to Walyou

VKWORLD VK6050 Astounds with Its 6050mAh Battery

Posted: 29 Jun 2015 01:40 PM PDT

VKWORLD VK6050 01

While Samsung is developing technologies that could double the battery life of future smartphones, companies such as VKWORLD are taking the inexpensive route and cram batteries with thousands upon thousands of milliamp hours in their devices.

New technologies often come at a great price for the final consumers, so when Samsung’s revolutionary graphene-coated anode batteries will hit the market, they surely won’t be cheap. For the time being, it’s more cost-efficient to increase the capacity of regular Li-Ion batteries, to the detriment of design and portability.

Had it been a 5″ device, the VK6050 would have definitely been much thicker, but at 9.5mm, it proves to be quite pocket-friendly. The 5.5″ HD display won’t have that great of an impact on the battery, mostly because of the resolution. Also, the smaller then Full HD resolution will also help the device score higher in benchmarks, but the 1GB of RAM might actually counter-balance that. As for storage, the device comes with 16GB of ROM that can be expanded by up to 32GB with the help of a microSD card.

VKWORLD also opted for an energy efficient chipset, in the form of MediaTek’s MT6735i SoC. Included in this one are a quad core CPU clocked at 1.0Ghz and a Mali T720 GPU.

While flagships are rocking NFC, among many other connectivity options, cheaper Android smartphones, such as the Ulefone Be Pure and VK6050 sport MediaTek’s similar technology, Hot Knot. Sure, that won’t be implemented any time soon for mobile payments, but it still a great way of transferring files (think Vcards and photos, mainly) wirelessly, by bringing the displays of Hot Knot devices close to one another.

On top of that, VK6050 features off-screen gestures that provide quick access to various things by drawing letters or lines on the display, while it’s turned off.

VK6050’s 13 and 5MP cameras are promoted as having large apertures and wide-angles, but the expectations in this department should be realistic. VKWORLD packed this device with decent specs, and chose battery capacity as the main selling point, so smart dialing, smart answering and all these functions fall into a second place.

Currently the subject of a pre-sale on GearBest, the VKWORLD VK6050 can be ordered for $138.99 (or $127.98, if you use the coupon code RMNTGB at checkout). While some may complain about the phone having only 1GB of RAM, these people need to remember that not everybody is looking to but flagships, and to some, great battery life is more important than everything else.

Be social! Follow Walyou on Facebook and Twitter, and read more related stories about the Mlais MX Base, or the Mstar S700.

A Nintendo Gem: the big N shows the first hand-drawn Super Mario level

Posted: 29 Jun 2015 12:00 PM PDT

Nintendo Mario Bros hand-drawn 10

Fans and critics agree that Nintendo didn’t have the greatest E3 event this year, but at least a beautiful piece of art shown in it filled us with nostalgia. Master creator Shigeru Miyamoto, the man behind Donkey Kong, Zelda and Super Mario Bros explained during a presentation on the new Super Mario maker how the plumber’s levels were created way back when, in graph paper.

 

30 years ago, creating a Super Mario Bros level was not the same process as it is now, and game creators had to get creative. The upcoming Wii U title Mario Maker is, partly, an homage to those early days of the plumber – but the point was truly driven home when they showed these extremely detailed designs that are an extremely valuable relic from the olden days by now.

Miyamoto explained that back in the day, in order to create the Mario levels they used graph paper, which were then shown to the programmers and designers. If there were any errors, they had to go back to these graphs, and mark the modifications they were supposed to make.

"changes had to be minimal because of the design and code limitations. Once a level had been built, it wasn’t that easy to modify it. The “magic” and personality of each of the mythical Super Mario levels has a really simple beginning", explained Miyamoto.

Miyamoto also mentioned that part of the design just came from drawing levels that he’d just like to play himself, by just letting himself go on pure impulse and creativity. The big exception was the first level of the game, which was thought of as a tutorial for the rest of the game, where they spent several hours thinking and designing each of the elements. The idea was to throw the play into a playground where they would intuitively figure out the game mechanics based on what they saw. The goombas and mushroom placement on the levels were very deliberate, for example: the mushroom is hard to avoid and the goombas, designed so the player would instantly figure out he had to either eliminate them or get out of their way.

Mario Maker is a simplification of those years. With tools that ease the creation of levels via both software and hardware (the Wii U control is perfect for this), the idea is to turn the player into Shigeru Miyamoto and unleash their creativity.

Be social! Follow Walyou on Facebook and Twitter, and read more the first announcement of the Mlais MX Base, or the Mlais M7 Android flagship.

Optical Illusion of The Day: Simple Crooked Lines Optical Illusion

Optical Illusion of The Day: Simple Crooked Lines Optical Illusion

Link to Mighty Optical Illusions

Simple Crooked Lines Optical Illusion

Posted: 30 Jun 2015 04:31 AM PDT

I’ve been having a bit of trouble lately trying to find new and different illusions to feature on the site. I’ve realized that there are only so many illusions out there, and they aren’t exactly being created at an industrial rate.

Today, I have a pretty simple lines optical illusion for you. It’s plain, black and white, and straightforward. Today’s lines optical illusion has no bells and whistles and it’s modeled after several classic lines optical illusions.

simple optical illusion

ow, all you have to do is look at the lines optical illusion above and ask yourself—”are the lines straight and parallel?” The answer of course, is that even though they appear to be at an angle or bulging, the lines above are perfectly straight up and down and parallel to one another. They only look crooked because the patterns used to create each bigger lines are made of smaller diagonal slanting lines.

Why such a simple crooked lines optical illusion today, you ask? Well, because the line illusion above is the first optical illusion I’ve made so far! I figured I’d start out small and work my way up to making larger illusions. I’m a savvy kind of blogger—if I can’t find something, I’ll make it!

Feel free to try your hand at making your own optical illusions too! Maybe I’ll start featuring some of y’all’s own original illusions! Just submit them via the Mighty Optical Illusions Facebook page.

If you liked this crooked lines optical illusion, head over and tell me—are the purple lines straight or bent?

The post Simple Crooked Lines Optical Illusion appeared first on Mighty Optical Illusions.

Web Design Core

Web Design Core

5 Secrets to Email Marketing Success for Small Business

Posted: 29 Jun 2015 04:35 AM PDT

When running a small business, email is one of your principal forms of advertising and marketing. Luckily, email is a very powerful way to get people's attention. This is because people are inexplicably drawn to their email inboxes – sometimes to an excessive degree – to have whatever mail can make it past the spam filter shoved in their faces. Getting a receiver to look at an email is easy, but getting them to actually read it and take some action because of it is much more difficult. One of the great things about writing is that, although the final product reads as a rapid-fire stream of thought, you get to deliberate over your words all you want when composing the email. This means that quality email writing that will draw in the recipient is indeed possible, but, as we touched upon, it is not easy. The following list from Designhill details a few tips to keep in mind when writing emails to market your business.

shutterstock_183228008

 

  • Show Admiration – Everyone likes to feel adored, even if that feeling is subconscious. When reading emails, it will always please a recipient and make them want to read more if the content makes them feel like their work is appreciated. For example, you could compliment the recipient on past work and say that you would be honored to support such a successful enterprise (this may be an exaggeration, but you get the idea). This is especially helpful for small businesses, as they are often relatively new and have an easier time playing up the "I have a lot to learn from you" angle.

  • Be a Person – Remember that the readers of the emails you send will be real people with real lives, real problems, and real emotions, and that people are more open to other individuals they can sympathize with than they are to faceless businesses. Because of this, make sure to come off as a guy sending an email rather than an organization trying to establish a business contact. Use "I" instead of "we," and don't write in a way in which a person wouldn't actually speak. Of course, it is important to remain professional, but it is equally as important to create a conversational narrative.

  • Be Unique – Especially for a small business, which is usually not widely known, it is important to show what makes you different and unique as a company. When writing, consider what your business's major selling points are and what you worked on the hardest when building the organization. You should not always highlight those points specifically, as you do not want to come off as arrogant, but keep them in mind and try to hint at them with your writing. If possible, you might even want to establish your value by bringing up a niche that only you can fill and suggest a collaboration based on that.

  • Don't be too "Salesy" – Of course, the primary objective of a small business's marketing outreach email is marketing, but that should not be obvious to a recipient when he or she reads the email. The "Be a Person" point touched on above goes a long way towards masking your monetary motivation, but you should also avoid salesman's terms like "if you buy today" and "limited-time offer" like the plague. Basically, talking about most subjects directly related to money is a bad idea. Speak to the heart, the actual desires and interests of the recipient, and you should be fine. This advice is especially important to remember when composing the email's subject header. Again, DON'T misinterpret the "don't be salesy" approach as "don't sell."

  • Be Careful With Tone – No matter what the content of an email is, it can easily be ruined by the tone the writer establishes. For example, emoticons should be limited to one per email. Make sure to capitalize the proper letters, be they the first letter of a sentence or a proper noun. Don't mix up "their" and "they're", "it's" and "its", and "then" and "than." Use exclamation points very conservatively. Don't use text shorthand like "lol." Stick with a professional-looking font. Don't be overly-personal in your writing, as it is uncomfortable and awkward to the reader. And, most importantly, double and triple check your email for mistakes after you finish. These may sound like the tips of an overly-anal writing instructor, but their importance when composing marketing emails is actually immeasurable.

These are only a few of the most important tips to composing effective marketing emails. Other tips include keeping your email short, establishing merit, and even spicing your email up with images from a service like graphic design by Designhill. You'll be surprised by how drastic a difference in rate of return your emails will generate if you can master professional email design principals.

Oddity Central

Oddity Central

Artist Turns Old Circuit Boards and Electronic Components into Beautiful Winged Insects

Posted: 29 Jun 2015 03:00 AM PDT

UK-based artist Julie Alice Chappell has chosen an unusual medium for her sculptures – discarded electronics. She tears out circuit boards and other components from broken devices, and converts them into delicate insect figurines.

Julie's introduction to the unique art form occurred several years ago, when she happened to find a big box of tiny electronic components at 'The Craft Bank', in Portsmouth, UK. "The first thing that came into my head when I looked at them was, 'a mass of tiny bodies and legs… ants!' I took them home to my children and we made ants."

Julia-Alice-Chappell6

Man Spends 50 Years Visiting Every Country in the World

Posted: 29 Jun 2015 02:30 AM PDT

Calling Albert Podell 'well traveled' would be an understatement. 78-year-old Podell, a former Playboy editor, can truly say that he's seen it all, after spending half a century visiting every country in the world. He's encountered pretty much everything on his travels, right from guerillas in Yemen, to flying-crab attacks in Algeria, and police interrogations in Cuba. He has chased water buffaloes, broken his bones, and eaten all kinds of weird stuff. He's been robbed, arrested, and almost lynched!

Podell was bitten by the travel bug at a very young age. "Aged six, I started to collect postage stamps, and where the other kids specialised in certain countries, I wanted a stamp from every country in the world," he told Daily Mail. "Getting a passport stamp from every one may have been inspired by that."

"Those little coloured bits of perforated paper also instilled in me a fascination with travel because I wanted to see the lands where all the objects, people, and places depicted on those stamps came from." So he resolved early on that "there was more to life than hanging around in one city forever."

Albert-Podell3

Real-Life Tony Stark Builds Awesome Replicas of Superhero Suits

Posted: 29 Jun 2015 02:00 AM PDT

Communications specialist Clay Hielscher seems like an average guy, but pay his home a visit and you'll realise why he’s called the real-life Tony Stark. The Kansas man not only resembles the popular comic book character, but he is also passionate about building superhero suits from scratch – his house is like a costume prop shop for a motion picture studio.

Hielscher is a former law enforcement officer, which sort of explains his obsession with superhero battlesuits. It all started a few years ago, when he was building a 17-foot kayak, just to let off some steam. One of his friends took a look at his work and suggested that he try to construct an Iron Man battlesuit.

superhero-costumes5

Dornob | Design Ideas Daily

Dornob | Design Ideas Daily

Leaning is the New Standing: Clever Chair Takes the Pressure Off

Posted: 29 Jun 2015 10:00 AM PDT

leanchair
Remember a very, very recent time when standing desks were all the rage and doctors were telling us that sitting down to work was as bad for our health as smoking? Well, that's actually still true, but now you can quit pretending to be ok with standing up all day at work because the LeanChair is about to switch things up a little. Read more…

Floraform: Jewelry for the Future

Posted: 29 Jun 2015 07:00 AM PDT

Peloria pendant by Nervous Sytem
Tiffany & Co., Cartier, Harry Winston. These hallowed names in jewelry are so … not cerebral! Enter Floraform, a new line of computationally crafted 3D-printed jewelry from Nervous System. This innovative generative design was "inspired by the biomechanics of growing leaves and blooming flowers and explores the development of surfaces through differential growth." There you have it. Read more…

Warehouse to Home: Challenging Site Leads to Creative Solutions

Posted: 28 Jun 2015 04:00 PM PDT

warehouse conversion 1
Clients looking to convert an old warehouse into a home heaped just about every challenge you can think of onto Corben Architects in the planning stages of creating their ideal space. Not only was the warehouse under a flight path and in a flood zone; it's also protected by heritage laws requiring that no changes be made to its facade or roof trusses, and the interiors were cut off from natural light and air flow. Read more…
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