The unconventional analogies of ‘Your Hands Are Feet’

Last week, we held the first Engadget Experience in LA, where Your Hands Are Feet was one of five immersive art projects to debut. The virtual reality experience drops you into a surreal world, full of experiential metaphors. Experiences like, for instance, what it’s like to shave a giant’s hairy pink leg in the desert. In our documentary, creators Sarah Rothberg and Amelia Winger-Bearskin explain their working partnership, visual style and the inspiration behind their psychedelic worlds.

’Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp’ is now available, a day early

This week, Nintendo announced that the mobile installment in its popular Animal Crossing franchise, called Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp, would arrive on iOS and Android devices around the world on November 22nd. But it turns out that the game is here a little bit early. It is apparently available now for download on both iOS and Android.

Despite the fact that you can download it from both the App Store and Google Play, it appears that the servers supporting the game are overwhelmed due to its popularity. Pocket Camp does require you to have an internet connection while you play. Gamespot reports that the situation seems to have improved in the past few hours, though.

Pocket Camp is free to play (Nintendo seems to have learned from the mistakes it made when it priced Super Mario Run so high), but this version of the game has players populating a camp full of animals, rather than a town. The game will also have microtransactions in the form of Leaf Tickets, which allow you to buy items and build things faster. It’s safe to say that many of us are impatient enough to put some real money into this game.

Via: Gamespot

Source: App Store

Laser wormhole art is as dazzling as it is dangerous

When an artwork in features both high-intensity lasers and a carbon fiber sculpture meant to keep spectators back, you know it’s not going to be dull. Rita McBride’s Particulates art installation at the Dia Art Foundation in Chelsea, New York features 16 lasers, scattered by particles of dust and water, forming a visual depiction of a science fiction “wormhole.” The barrier, meanwhile, is meant to keep you away from said lasers, which are strong enough to do some harm.

The low-key exhibition is located at Dia:Chelsea, a former factory where marble was cut (by saws, not lasers). As spotted by Design Milk, there’s a sign outside the entrance door warning of laser radiation of 1.2 watts per beam, easily enough to damage your vision or burn you.

McBride drew inspiration from another exhibition at Dia:Chelsea by Dan Flavin, a minimalist piece called untitled, to you Heiner. That features a low, metal barrier 110 feet long adorned with green fluorescent lights that transform the drab cement space into something otherworldly.

Much like Flavin, McBride’s piece was conceived specifically for the Dia space and uses green light, in this case from lasers. However, it varies in that the light itself forms the “structure,” and is separated and delineated by the carbon-fiber fence structure for both artistic and safety reasons. Unlike most sculptures, it’s also unaffected by gravity, and with the powerful lasers, would be an infinitely large piece unbounded by space if not for the back wall.

Though you can call the piece minimalist art, it’s based on McBride’s interests in space, time travel and quantum physics. “I’ve always loved the efficiency of wormholes and the possibility of time travel,” McBride said last year. “And also this highly hypothetical, theoretical position that seems to give a lot of possibilities.”

It also just looks cool from various angles, as the beams criss-cross and vary in intensity, depending on where you stand and how much dust and mist is floating around at any given moment (see the video, above). As such, you can enjoy it as a contemplation of physics, art or geometry, making the whole thing more fun as a spectator.

Particulates is now exhibiting at the Dia:Chelsea in New York until June 2, 2018. If you can’t make it in person, there’s a livestream every few days shot from a camera that’s located at the one place you don’t want to be as a spectator: Inside the circle of lasers.

Via: Design Milk

Source: Dia Art

AI spots art fakes by examining a single brushstroke

Attempts at art forgeries run from the laughable (remember Monkey Jesus?) to the exquisite (this ambiguous Baroque masterpiece nearly cost a gallery €120 million last year), and traditionally the art world has had to rely on expert knowledge and supporting documentation to weed out the real from the fake. But now researchers claim AI is able to identify forgeries simply by looking at the brushstrokes used to compose a piece.

Researchers from Rutgers University and the Atelier for Restoration & Research of Paintings in the Netherlands have demonstrated that their system broke down nearly 300 line drawings by Picasso, Matisse and other famous artists into 80,000 individual strokes, learning how to match the features of each stroke to the corresponding artist. Some artists push harder on their brushstrokes than others, for example. The researchers then commissioned a team of artists to recreate the pieces in the data set, with the AI correctly identifying forgeries every time on the basis of a single stroke.

The system is currently only useful where brushstrokes are clear, so it’s not helpful on pieces where the paint has been blended. However, the team is now planning on testing the method on Impressionist art to further validate their results, heralding a potentially revolutionary technology for an industry which is traditionally slow to embrace change.

Source: Technology Review

Apple’s Early Version of HomePod Stood Three Feet Tall and Packed Dozens of Speakers

While the HomePod was only unveiled five months ago, a team of Apple audio engineers developed several speaker prototypes as a side project over the past five years or so, according to Bloomberg.

HomePod was originally a side project cooked up about five years ago by a group of Mac audio engineers, who wanted to create a speaker that sounded better than the ones sold by the likes of Bose, JBL, and Harman Kardon. Side projects aren’t uncommon at Apple, where employees are encouraged to follow their muse so long as their day jobs come first.

The report claims one of the prototypes stood three feet tall, roughly five times as tall as the current HomePod, and was equipped with dozens of speakers. Another supposedly looked like a flat panel with a mesh screen on the front.

The side project was reportedly canceled and revived several times. It wasn’t until 2014 that development of the speaker began to ramp up within Apple’s accessories division, which also worked on the wireless AirPods.

Apple’s focus was on creating a speaker with premium sound quality through the use of beam-forming speaker technology. The report claims Apple tested many variations of the speaker in specially designed audio chambers.

That same year, the report adds that Apple engineers were “blindsided” when Amazon launched its Echo speaker integrated with its voice-activated personal assistant Alexa, which is considered a hit with customers.

The Apple engineers jokingly accused one another of leaking details of their project to Amazon, then bought Echos so they could take them apart and see how they were put together. They quickly deemed the Echo’s sound quality inferior and got back to work building a better speaker.

Despite the Echo launching, Apple has maintained its focus on the HomePod being a high-quality speaker, which is exactly how Apple’s marketing chief Phil Schiller positioned the product at its Worldwide Developers Conference in June.

The Siri team was told that the HomePod was about music and quality sound, one of the people said. Yes, the speaker would be voice-activated but it wouldn’t be positioned as a personal assistant.

As of this year, the report claims the HomePod was just one of four or five areas that Apple’s Siri team was working on, given the company apparently sees it as more of an accessory than a core product like the iPhone.

Given the HomePod will be mostly limited to streaming Apple Music, controlling HomeKit accessories, and sending messages through an iPhone, the report claims Apple will be “playing catchup” with Echo-like devices.

Apple could still eventually add features to the HomePod. These might include its own app ecosystem and support for competing music services. Even so, until that happens, Apple will still be playing catchup in a category invented by a company better known for e-commerce than hardware.

Apple will be even further behind after it delayed the HomePod’s release until early 2018, after originally promising it would launch in December. The delay means the $349 speaker won’t be ready in time for the holiday shopping season, which could lead customers to purchase an Echo or Google Home instead.

Related Roundup: HomePodTag: Amazon Echo
Discuss this article in our forums

‘Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition’ is coming to PC

BioWare’s Dungeons & Dragons-based RPG Neverwinter Nights (NWN) is getting an enhanced edition for PC. The revamped game from Beamdog — a studio that cut its teeth on remasters of PC classics, such as Baldur’s Gate and Planescape: Torment — will be up for pre-order tomorrow for 20 bucks.

As with the publisher’s past upgrades, NWN packs a graphics bump, including UI and menu scaling up to 4K. But, as you can see in the trailer above, the enhancements don’t exactly make for a comprehensive overhaul. You’ll also be able to access saved games, modules, and mods from the original, so you can pick up where you left off, and catch up on what you missed. Plus, Beamdog is throwing in the Pirates of the Sword Coast, Infinite Dungeons, and Wyvern Crown of Cormyr modules, and two soundtracks.

The bugbear’s out of the bag! Join us at noon PST Nov. 21 on #Twitch (https://t.co/MTxjfuCw5K) as we introduce #Neverwinter Nights: Enhanced Edition to the world. #NWNEE pic.twitter.com/FKph5I9mgE

— Beamdog (@BeamdogInc) November 21, 2017

The cheap and cheerful price should be enough to lure nostalgic gamers looking for another Dungeons & Dragons fix. You can tune into Beamdog’s Twitch livestream tomorrow at 12pm PST to presumably find out the release date, and more.

Source: Beamdog (Twitter)

Leica’s CL gives an iconic design the modern tech it deserves

Up until recently, Leica built lovely, expensive cameras that no-one ever called “state-of-the-art.” The TL2, however, recently marked a change in direction. Not only was it relatively cheap for a Leica at $1,950, but it was endowed with modern features like 4K video. It’s pushing that idea further with the CL, its new $2,795 flagship 24.2-megapixel APS-C mirrorless that looks and feels more like an old-school Leica, thanks to a new body and manual dials. At the same time, it’s got the tech you’d expect in a modern camera, including an all-new electronic viewfinder.

Leica’s aim with the TL2 was to bring modern performance and specs to the T, its first APS-C camera. It replaced the sensor and electronics wholesale, endowing it with a new 24-megapixel sensor, 4K video, a touchscreen interface and relatively fast autofocus performance. “Everything the customers asked for, we gave it to them in July with the TL2,” Leica Product Manager Maike Harberts told Engadget.

What it was missing, though, was a Leica-like tactile feel, which is where the CL comes in. The new model has the same electronics as the TL2, but looks much like the German company’s more traditional M or Q full-frame models with a smooth, low-profile metal body and manual dials.

More importantly, it has a new 2.36 million dot electronic viewfinder (EVF) built expressly for it. “It’s for people who love to take the camera to their eye, adjust the most important values and just be in the zone and take pictures,” explained Harberts. In exchange for that manual functionality, the CL has a smaller 3.0-inch touchscreen with menu functions driven by the D-pad. Touch options are reserved for reviewing and zooming in on photos.

Looking at the numbers, the Leica CL has the same 24.2-megapixel sensor, 49-point contrast autofocus and Maestro II series processor that’s on the TL2. That gives the CL 10 fps burst shooting speeds in both mechanical and electronic shutter modes, letting you capture around 33 RAW images before the buffer fills.

ISOs range from 100 to 50,000, while the shutter speed goes up to 1/8000th of a second in mechanical mode and 1/25,000th electronically. The electronic shutter makes nary a peep, which is good news for street or golf photographers. Unfortunately, there’s no optical image stabilization on either the body or TL lenses. The only way to get it is by using a full-frame, stabilized SL lens, which can be mounted without an adapter, but will cost you a hell of a lot more than a TL lens.

AOL/Steve Dent

For video, you get (yay!) 4K at 30 fps, or 60 fps 1080p, but no microphone input (boo!), so you’re limited to the onboard mic or an external recorder. It’s fair to say, however, that not many folks in Leica’s intended market will be using the CL for anything other than casual video.

You also get WiFi — the only way to transfer pictures directly from the camera, since there’s no USB port — and a single UHS-II-supported SD card slot. The TL2 didn’t have great battery life, and the CL is even worse, letting you shoot about 220 photos on a charge. In other words, order at least a spare battery or two.

I’ve had a few days to play with Leica’s CL, equipped with a brand new 18mm f/2.8 pancake lens. Together, they make a combination that’s ideal for street photos, something Leica is famous for, so that’s what I tested in my Paris neighborhood.

Built in Germany, the body is magnesium with anodized aluminum top and bottom covers. If you’re into that classic Leica style, it’s hard to call this camera anything but “gorgeous,” especially if you add the optional leather half case. It’s pretty light at 403 grams with a battery, less than Sony’s A6500 (453 grams) and the Fuji X-T2 (503 grams). With the pancake lens, it’s about as light an APS-C interchangeable-lens camera can be, and I could (just) fit it in my jacket pocket.

The top left button/dial combo is reserved for aperture or shutter, depending on the mode, but the right-hand dial can be programmed for shutter, exposure compensation, ISO and five other settings. The two dials and their buttons let you change most settings, but it’s not quite as nice as having, say, five dedicated dials like you get on the X-T2. There are also three rear buttons (“play,” a programmable “function” and “menu”) and a D-pad. There’s a small, backlit screen on top that shows essential settings like shutter speed, aperture and exposure compensation.

The camera was fairly easy to learn, and I could indeed shoot without taking it away from my eye. The EVF is as bright and fast as promised and delivers accurate colors. The rear display is visible in sunlight, but it’s not tiltable like on most of the CL’s rivals. That’s unfortunate, especially for low- or high-angle street photos, but then again it would add weight and take away from the camera’s solid-slab-of-metal feel.

Thanks to the silent electronic shutter, it was easy to be discreet while shooting. That said, the mechanical shutter makes a very satisfying sound, so I was sort of torn between the two. Given the lack of stabilization, you may want to go with the electronic mode in low light to reduce vibration.

That lack of stabilization isn’t a huge issue on a wide lens like the 18mm; I could shoot sharp photos at a shutter speed as low as 1/25th of a second. On a longer, heavier lens it would be, though, and shooting hand-held video is pretty much impossible unless you have steadier hands than I do.

With the color set for “natural” (there’s also “vivid,” “standard” and two black and white settings), the Leica CL produced accurate colors that were just on the side of “warm” that I prefer, with fairly punchy contrast. I took most of the photos at ISO levels of between 1,600 and 6,400, and found noise levels to be very acceptable. When you push it up to 12,800 and beyond, however, images start to get a bit crunchy. The CL’s DNG images carry a decent amount of image data (14 bits), so it’s easy to pull details out of sections that are too dark or too bright.

In sum, the CL isn’t terribly different from the TL2, but Leica is clearly pitching it at Leica-philes who prefer the classic form and dials. The biggest addition is the built-in electronic viewfinder that goes a long way to transforming it into a rangefinder-like model beloved by fans of the brand. What’s missing compared to rivals is image stabilization and USB transfers, items that probably aren’t deal-breakers for most wannabe Leica buyers.

The $2,795 price tag for the CL (in anodized black only) isn’t cheap, but it is still less than most Leicas, making it feasible for well-off amateurs and professionals. Leica glass is also notoriously expensive: The 18mm f/2.8 pancake lens (in black or silver) is now Leica’s cheapest TL lens at $1,295, while the 18-56mm f/3.5-5.6mm model is around $1,695, and you can get the CL in a kit with those lenses for $3,795 and $3,995, respectively. The Leica CL mirrorless arrives at the end of November.

Now you can send PayPal invoices over Facebook Messenger

PayPal has spent the last few months adding more integrations to make sending money easier. Sure, some are gimmicky (like ‘friendship gift cards’), but a new feature to keep track of group purchases is nifty. The platform also started allowing folks to send cash over Facebook Messenger — and now you can send invoices on it, too.

To do so, just open the ‘Extensions’ tray in Facebook Messenger, select PayPal, and create the invoice. The buyer hits the button marked ‘Pay with PayPal’ and completes the transaction using the platform’s One Pay system.

Sure, it’s just a plugin that routes existing PayPal functionality through Facebook Messenger’s chat. But it’s a lot more convenient to bring services into an existing conversation than send a buyer off to an external site. It’s certainly useful for more professional exchanges, especially to preserve purchases within a chronology of interactions, a la Slack. But there’s nothing stopping you from using PayPal to invoice for self-employed or private business.

Source: PayPal

Misfit’s latest hybrid smartwatch focuses on classic style

If it wasn’t already evident that Misfit is on a fashion kick with its smartwatches, it is now. The Fossil-owned badge has unveiled a new hybrid smartwatch, the Command, that promises to track your fitness while looking appropriate for formal wear. It delivers notifications and tracks activity (including step count, calories, distance and sleep) much like the Phase did, just without screaming “I am tech.” The steel bracelet model in particular wouldn’t be out of place at a formal event, even if people won’t mistake it for a Montblanc.

This may also be the Misfit watch you want if you can’t stand the thought of charging your wristwear. The Command has the longest battery life of any of the company’s watches, lasting for up to a year before you need to replace its cell. It helps that the timepiece is water-resistant to 164 feet, too. And as you’d expect, you can swap the 20mm straps if the stock options don’t quite fit your style. Misfit is selling the Command in black, black copper, blue and steel variants.

You can pre-order the Command now at a starting price of $150, which is a solid price for a pseudo-analog smartwatch that hopes to rise above the rest through good looks. With that said, the Android Wear-packing Vapor smartwatch only costs $50 more. If you’re more interested in functionality than looking the part at a gala, it’s probably worth the premium.

Source: Misfit

Apple Taking Action After Students Worked Overtime to Assemble iPhone X at Foxconn

Apple and its manufacturing partner Foxconn have confirmed instances of students working overtime to assemble the iPhone X, and both companies are now taking remedial action, as reported by the Financial Times.

A technician inspecting iPhone components at a factory
Apple conducted an audit and confirmed “instances of student interns working overtime at a supplier facility in China,” according to the report. “We’ve confirmed the students worked voluntarily, were compensated and provided benefits, but they should not have been allowed to work overtime,” it added.

Foxconn said that “all work was voluntary and compensated appropriately,” but admitted that the interns “did work overtime in violation of our policy,” which reportedly prohibits interns working more than 40 hours per week.

The statements from Apple and Foxconn come after six high school students told the Financial Times they routinely work 11-hour days assembling the iPhone X at Foxconn’s factory in Zhengzhou, China.

“We are being forced by our school to work here,” said Ms Yang, an 18-year-old student training to be a train attendant who declined to use her first name for fear of punishment. “The work has nothing to do with our studies.” She said she assembled up to 1,200 iPhone X cameras a day.

The students, aged 17 to 19, reportedly said they were told that a three-month stint at the factory was required “work experience” that they had to complete in order to graduate from Zhengzhou Urban Rail Transit School.

Foxconn is believed to hire a significant number of seasonal workers each year to assemble the latest iPhone models in time for the busy holiday shopping season. The report, citing an anonymous Foxconn employee, said there can be up to 300,000 workers producing up to 20,000 iPhones per day.

As part of its supplier responsibility efforts, Apple requires its manufacturing partners like Foxconn to limit working hours to no more than 60 hours a week, with a mandatory rest day once every seven days.

Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Related Roundup: iPhone XTags: Foxconn, supplier responsibilityBuyer’s Guide: iPhone X (Buy Now)
Discuss this article in our forums