yewknee.com

General Orders No. 9

At first glance I'd say that General Orders No. 9 will be nothing short of an absolutely beautiful film. The shots shown in the trailer are gorgeous - every single one of them. As a film I'm not sure what to expect - the narration is quite odd, the genre is described as experimental / art / documentary and, more than likely, will appeal mostly to film geeks that can fully comprehend an obtuse tale told with poetry, maps, dreams and prayers (I don't count myself among that group). That being said, it really is stunning how great it looks.. do yourself a favor and, at the very least, watch the trailer.

via Lactarded.

Velcro Suit: Adam Hill

The work of Adam Hill, aka Velcro Suit, runs a wide gamut of styles. His poster archive goes from old world illustration manipulation to contemporary original illustration to clever infographic and back again. And if that weren't enough, all of his other portfolio entries show off his ability to embrace variety as well. Comparing My Home Is My Castle to The Sleepers & Coal to Fountain Counsulting proves he's got more than one trick up his sleeve.

via Courtney.

The Disappearing Face Of NYC

James and Karla Murray have done a phenomenal job of documenting the, now, declining storefronts of NYC. This gallery shows a tiny bit of their eight year undertaking and the great signage they were able to capture. I'd love to believe that one day all the Papa Johns, Subway and Burger King signs scattered about any metropolitan area will look as vintage and compelling as this but their lack of uniqueness prevents that from ever happening. These stores are, most likely, Mom and Pop undertakings that are seeing their last light.. it's a bummer to see them go but at least someone is out there capturing them.

via Courtney.

Coolrunnings - Dracula Is Only the Beginning

Courtney pointed me in the direction of COOLRUNNINGS and their full-length album, Dracula Is Only The Beginning. A move I must remember to thank her for (thanks!). The album has a load of influences revealing themselves, echoes of plenty of bands you're familiar with but never in such a way that it feels derivative. I'd attempt to actually describe it with words but I'm sure I'd fall flat. Just go listen to it and consider dropping the whopping $5 for the privilege of listening to it whenever you please.

Oh, and that cover art is by Thee Ruiner; hilarious and vaguely disturbing at the same time.. always a pleasant mix.

Double Exposures by Dan Mountford

I'm a sucker for a well done Double Exposure photograph and this entire set from Dan Mountford is a prime example of why. According to the descriptions none of the effects were created in Photoshop, only color and level balancing. It's actually hard to believe that since they are so so good. Take some time, browse them all and then visit his online store if you're curious about the possibility of purchasing one of these incredible creations.

via Courtney

Greplin: Autocomplete your life

Courtney just clued me in to the existence of Greplin - a service touting itself as "the search bar for your life." The short of it is that it connects to a bunch of different API's - Gmail, Twitter, Facebook, Google Docs, Evernote, Dropbox, etc - and allows you to live search all of them simultaneously. This is, obviously, a phenomenal tool to have around and they've actually done a great job of implementing it. Your search can index can only get so big before you'd need to upgrade and start paying them a monthly fee but, for the meantime, it's well worth trying out.

Editions Of 100

Editions of 100 is exactly what you'd assume - limited edition art prints in quantities of 100. You can see some behind the scenes photos and enormous versions of a few of the prints over here. I'm particularly into the Tempest Image Series but would be remiss if I didn't express my enjoyment of other prints as well. Oh, and for all my loathing of Star Wars overloading that occurs online I can't deny this X-Wing Print is pretty phenomenal.

via Courtney

Invisible Cities

The Invisible Cities project takes all sorts of real-time social data and aggregates it into a terrain based map. The more activity an area has, the more the terrain swells to indicate the hotbed of activity. This video gives a good introduction to the concept and shows off the beta execution. It's interesting to think of this sort of data being used in an area that isn't New York City - would the hotbeds of activity be more obvious? Would the terrain swells in your city be in the same place you predict? Lots of questions come to mind with this.. it's worth a bit of investigation and pondering.

via Courtney.

Arian Behzadi

The work of Arian Behzadi is engaging to say the least. However, once you read this little blurb:

I am currently a Biological Sciences major with an emphasis in Neurobiology, Physiology, and Behavior at UC Davis. In between classes, however, I do personal and commissioned visual design work. I have always found parallels between art and the sciences so a lot of my studies find their way into my artwork.

You realize that it's even more-so impressive that such work is able to be produced in such an environment. The overall palettes and ambient swatches of color are right up my alley.

via Courtney

'Love' Movie Trailer

The movie trailer for the forthcoming independent film Love is one of the most baffling things I've seen in a long time. For one, the whole thing is put together by Angels and Airwaves, a band that I know absolutely nothing about but still find it odd when a movie is produced by a band. Secondly, the film seems to be about an astronaut that loses contact with Earth, stumbles upon a Civil War diary that's been stored in his space station and starts going mad from the isolation. During the trailer we see shots of massive Civil War battles, a few shots of Middle Eastern warfare, documentary style confessionals, traces of The Fountain style special effects, a random babe in lingerie, a man stopping a fireball comet with his hand and then chopping through a cloud nebula, the Borg mothership and, finally, a hushed mysterious conversation between the lead character and a female lead we've not seen anywhere prior to in the trailer.

I am all for trailers that don't give everything away and stir up a desire to see what the full movie is about but this just looks insane! How could all of these things relate and relate well?! I'm perplexed by the insanity of it all.

Heads up via Courtney.

Stephen Shore, Photography

There are a handful of photos from Stephen Shore that seem to originate from some time ago. Without any supplemental information to go along with them, there's no way to tell when they were actually taken but I choose to believe they were taken recently of a town where modernization hasn't been a high priority.

There are also some great sets of American Surfaces and a Glenfiddich campaign that you should take a peek at. Quality stuff.

via Courtney.