retrievr is an experimental service which lets you search and explore in a selection of Flickrimages by drawing a rough sketch.
Currently the index contains many of Flickr’s most interesting images. If you’d like to have yourimages (or the images for a specific tag) added, please let me know. A submission interface is planned!
Yes! That is, it depends. (Mainly on your expectations!)
In my experience, the results are usually fairly good, sometimes even stunning – considering the artistic sophistication most of us are able to come up with (gallery forthcoming); and in the cases they’re not so stellar, they are at least entertaining ;-) But clearly, the approach has its limits.
One thing to keep in mind is that retrievr doesn’t do object/face/text recognition of any kind, so if you’re drawing an outline sketch of a chair, it almost certainly won’t get you one back (except your index only contains images of chairs). The same holds for corporate logos, icons &c.
It helps to think of it as matching the most pronounced shapes and slabs of colors.
Another thing to know is that there’s currently no way to specify the aspect ratio, so you have to rescale the image in your head (things that are close to the borders of the image you’re thinking of should be close to the borders of your sketches), but that’s really more of a missing feature of the drawing flashlet than an inherent problem. Sometimes it also helps to removedetail instead of adding it.
Personally, I see retrievr more as an “exploration” tool than as a “search” tool, and it seems to work very well for that.
When posting or watching youtube videos just add &fmt=6 to the end of the url to get better resolution if available. Adding &fmt=18 will download .mp4 instead of the crappy .flv version.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDYCf4ONh5M]
Interesting. Very interesting. Amazing and scary. Definitely worth watching.
If you  just wanna show a part of a youtube video, just go to splicd.com, enter the URL of the video, the start point and the end point and voila there you have it!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aXxJMjujjMo]
Here is an other Firefox plugin browser approach that I have not yet tried myself but the video looks interesting. In many ways, its similar to Firefox Ubiquity. If anyone tries it, let me know how it is!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvjdXNnRMfU]
I’ve recently tried this Firefox application prototype called Ubiquity and I like what I see so far. I especially use the def-function and the wiki-function. Where ever I am on the internet and I find a word that I want explained, I simply highlight it and press Option+Spacebar and Ubiquity pops up and I just write def or wiki and I get the answer without having to leave the page I’m on.
This is the most interesting thing I have seen in a while. Shared Space tries to bring back the human elements to the city by removing all the signs, speed bumps, directions, etc.
“Shared Space is a European project that is part of the Interreg IIIB-North Sea programme. The project aims to develop new policies and new methods for an integral approach of the planning of public space for which man and his surroundings are taken as the basis.”
Documentary:
Part 1
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLfasxqhBNU]
Part 2
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuxMuMrXUJk]
People in St. Paul (somewhere in the US) are sick of speeding drivers. An artist together with the city council made an experiment by putting up weird traffic signs in order to slow the drivers down. The first results were not impressive however, due to the on-going state fair. Now they are moving the signs to different location to give it another shot.
Amazing traffic flow in India. It’s hypnotic!
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsPbLC8ppoU]
Shockwave effect creates traffic jams
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Suugn-p5C1M]
Chao sent me a small video of his visit at this year’s Ars Electronica festival. Thanks for sharing this Chao!
His Quicktime movie: ars_electronica_by_chao
Hi all,
a quick note to let you know I upgraded WordPress (the blog engine behind the site) to the lastest available version. Let me know if you notice problems or inconsistencies.
This new version includes a Media Browser that should make adding videos and images easier.
/Camille
