Photographs of Japan from the Meiji and Taisho Periods (1868-1926) have captivated viewers around the world since they were first circulated. One photographer in particular captured Japanese life so beautifully that his work has been seen by countless people all across the globe. Until very recently, though, his name was virtually unknown. Now we know that the prolific photographer’s name was T. Enami – or rather, that was his trade name. He was born Enami Nobukuni, and his work made a deep and far-reaching impact on photography.

Some of T. Enami’s most popular and memorable works were his stereograms: two nearly-identical 2D images taken from slightly different angles that, when viewed together through a stereograph, appear three-dimensional. Here they are animated to give the 3D effect, but all of the originals can be seen on Okinawa Soba’s Flickr collection.

Enami started his career as a traditional photographer, but later embraced the more “modern” stereoviews and lantern slides. Judging from his carefully staged stereograms, he approached his work with a great deal of attention to detail. The colors on these stereograms were all hand-painted, and the resulting product was sold around the world. Today, collectors treasure these exquisitely detailed antique images.

T. Enami ran a photography studio in Yokohama until his death in 1926. His work spanned a multitude of areas, including postcards, large-format prints, private portraits, glass transparencies, photo processing and print-making, and numerous commercial photography projects. His photographs have appeared several times in the pages of National Geographic, a true honor for any photographer. One of his half-stereoview images was even used on the cover of their 100th-anniversary book Odyssey: The Art of Photography at National Geographic.

Despite his monumental contributions to early Japanese photography, T. Enami’s identity was not widely known outside of Japan until around 2006, when his descendants shared information about him with biographers and collectors. He was the only photographer of his era known to work in all contemporary commercial and artistic formats, and it can be said that his work has been seen by more people than that of the more established “masters” of his time.

The appropriate credit is now being given to thousands of Enami photographs that were previously unattributed or simply attributed to the wrong photographer. Enami is now, finally, in his rightful place amongst the most influential early Japanese photographers. A detailed biography of T. Enami can be found at T-Enami.org, and even more of his animated stereograms can be found at Pink Tentacle.

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Mostly harmless? I think not! Any aliens who receive our old TV and radio transmissions will be raising their tentacles in submission once they get a glimpse of sci-fi's greatest hitmen and their weapons of mass annihilation. Click Here to See More

We geeks love our gadgets. We get bored with simple office instant messaging to co-workers. We get creative. But of course our creativity ties back into our computers and a USB port. It started with ninja-geeks and weapon-shaped USB flash drives. However, that was not enough to spice things up around the office. The USB arms race began and sneaky office warfare has never been the same. Some USB weapons are fun to shoot at your office buddy, but some are used to strike fear in your cubicle neighbor’s heart. Guard your office, guard your room, guard your computer. Here are 17 USB “weapons” made by geeks for geeks, from FAIL to fantastic.

USB Ninja

(image credits: geekstuff4ugeekstuff4u)

Awaken ninja-geek with these weaponized USBs. First there is a USB knife, a Kunai shaped USB thumb drive with 2GB of storage capacity, a great solution for the Ninja spy. Or how about a Shuriken shaped USB which also holds 2GB of storage capacity that you can sneak out of the building or can throw the star to kill your opponent?  These are perfect for the ninja-geek.

USB Bullets, Grenades, Chainsaws, Bombs

(image credits: walyou,gadget4all,i.Saw,ubergizmo)

These are a few more USB weapon wannabes. The flash drive shaped like a large caliber bullet offers geeks both fashion and 1GB of function, plus it might put a bit of a scare into those people who see it. As in don’t anger that geek!  More on the fail side are these brightly colored Grenade USB drives, but they do offer 4GB of memory. These next two should frighten your co-workers at the very least. The i-Saw is USB 2.0 compatible and offers a vicious five-volt trickle of destructive chainsaw power. The Bomb USB is one flash drive that we don’t think people would want to carry around in airports as they might actually get held up by airport security.

USB Tank Missile Launcher Steps Up Office Warfare

(image credits: OhGizmo)

There is no better way to annoy a co-worker than with a barrage of tiny foam missiles with a RC tank that can deliver a payload at a distance from up to 12 feet. It can also be remotely controlled via the included ‘USB Tank’ PC software that allows you to steer the tank and raise of lower the missile launcher. This might offer you some level of deniability since you’ll never be caught holding a remote. There’s no camera on board so you’ll need to have a line of sight in order to properly steer it into position, but it does have a wireless range of about 25 feet to give you a tiny head start when the inevitable and immediate retaliation begins.

USB Powered Gun

Here we begin a tour of USB-powered guns. Get ready to launch your flying foam missile attack on annoying co-workers. These do take some creative thinking, made by geeks to be appreciated by geeks. Those are some things all the USB weapons have in common. We’ll leave it up to you if a USB weapon is fantastic or fail.

DIY USB-Controlled Servo Squirter Water Pump

Straight from a nerd-kit, here is a DIY USB-controlled water squirter weapon. The steps are laid out in great details when you watch the video. The main plus factor to this USB gun is that it does more than fire foam darts or missiles. For example, your co-worker would be surprised to be blasted with water. Or if you have a cat that won’t stay away from your computer, pow-squirt! Kitty should then run away.

Missile Laucher (Lanciamissili) USB

This is a Lanciamissili USB weapon. The USB missile launcher is remotely controlled by a PC with a web cam.That’s right, a barrage of foam missiles and then retribution will be forthcoming from your geeky co-workers. Basically, these USB weapons are all the same, point, fire and shoot. You are free to decide FAIL or fantastic.

Laser-Guided USB Missile Launcher

This USB weapon uses a laser pointer and a web cam. The software tweaked with some custom Visual Basic lines of code equal a laser-guided USB missile launcher.  When a laser pointer is moved into the field of the web camera, the gun turret will move to point and fire its missiles. A person might wonder why you are pointing your laser at them, but they won’t wonder for long  before your missiles attack them.

Wiimote USB Rocket Launcher

This USB weapon is a rocket launcher that uses the Wii remote tilt function to control the launching missiles. Whether or not that pushes this USB rocket launcher from FAIL to fantastic is not clear, but if you are a Wii gamer and would like a USB weapon, then this one might be for you.

Battery of USB Missile Launchers

Clearly this was devised by some ticked co-worker intending to exact a little vengeance. Not a mere USB weapon that launches deadly foam missiles, but instead an entire battery of USB weapons. This is moving closer to fantastic if for no other reason than the chaos it would clearly create in the office.

USB Machine Gun and Rocket Launcher

This modified USB rocket launcher shoots infrared machine gun rounds and foam missiles. One other major difference with this USB weapon is that it was created to do more than wreak office destruction or family chaos. The machine gun can be calibrated to shoot down any remotely controlled toy plane or helicopter.

USB Missile Launcher Pimped to be a Weapon

So we’ve tried to be nice and tried to be polite up until now. This one might have more potential to launch sharp pointy weapons. Put it near to guard your computer privacy and it might work as a deterrent. Yes it gets points for being a USB weapon. Otherwise, FAIL.

USB BB Gun Turret Demo

Straight out of the Virtual Crib is an active defense system. It’s close to deadly and USB-controlled. The creators of this USB weapon suggest that if someone is breaking into your house, you don’t wait for the police to arrive. Instead you drive the thieves out of your house with this USB BB gun. This is much closer to fantastic, shooting BBs and not mere foam projectiles, but the next one is a clear winner.

Auto Targeting Turret Sentry

Now this USB gun is awesome! This one is fantastic! Watch the video and then you too will be wanting one. Lucky you, there is still time before Christmas.

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The study of musical instruments (’organology’ – no, really) is the study of the human condition. Every culture is defined by its own distinctive set of trills, whistles, parps, honks and beats, and every corner of the world has evolved its own location-specific indigenous instrument to renew a sense of cultural identity through noisy self-expression. And instruments evolve – never more so than now, in the midst of a technological revolution that has opened up entirely new ways to make music. So settle back and compose yourself as we look at ten new instruments that look set to accompany us into the world of tomorrow.

1. Eigenharp

(Images via: Eigenlabs and engadget)

In development for 8 years with funding of over £10m / $16.5m, the Eigenharp is a slow-crafted technological marvel. 120 keys (each one tilting to give a flexible tone), percussion buttons, built-in sound management capabilities including recording, playback and looping, and a potentially limitless range of noises thanks to running on uploaded digitally sampled sounds. It is played via keyboard, tap-pad and mouthpiece – and the result is an instrument that sounds like a band.

2. Electric Violin

(Images via: Wired and Riverstring)

Similarly digitally enhanced are the electric violins, a family of new hybrid instruments that are sufficiently well-established to become a mainstay of the modern music scene. Thanks to electrical pickups inside or outside the instrument’s body, the violin’s vibrations are run through electronic processing and transformed into any sound under the sun – most effectively, the noise of an electric guitar. Witness the magic of Ed Alleyne-Johnson performing on the streets of Chester, England.

3. Tenori-On

(Image via: Yamaha)

No, this isn’t the first good-to-go version of Minesweeper: this baby is for making beautiful music with.  The 16 x 16 grid of LED lights on the Tenori-On responds to touch and to real-time looped programming, creating soaring, rippling compositions that mesmerise beginners and experts alike (Peter Gabriel is a fan). If you want a hands-on demonstration of its power, try Andre Michelle’s ToneMatrix, an online AudioTool-powered simulation.

4. Samchillian

(Images via: Eitan Shefer)

Musical instrument or chest expander? You’d be forgiven for asking – but the Samchillian is a new, ergonomic-minded take on the keyed instrument, with each key representing a relative, not fixed, note. As the musician plays, the function of each part of the instrument is constantly changing, allowing a full range of musical expression (provided the player has a really good memory, of course).

5. BeatBearing

(Images via: BeatBearing)

And moving further into the realm of instruments that look like anything but – we have the BeatBearing. Instead of generating noise itself, the BB triggers the timing of preselected types of percussion – simply drop a steel ball-bearing in the right slot to get the beat you want, when you want. The inventor isn’t interested in manufacturing his design: instead, he has published the plans on DIY-tech online magazine MakeZine to encourage people to build their own - and with more than 1 million views of the Youtube demo (below) at the start of this year,  we reckon there will be plenty of takers.

6. Hapi Drum

(Images via: Wikimedia Commons/OrangeHat)

At least the Hapi looks like what it is (well, kinda) – a steel drum with a hole in the base that allows the player to control the amount of noise emerging, using their lap. Since each key (or “tongue”) is part of the main body of the instrument, each note is accompanied by a subtle resonant harmony from other musically compatible notes. Time for a demonstration, methinks…

7. Electroencephalophone

(Images via: Glogger/Wikimedia Commons)

At first sight, you’re looking at a lady trying to listen to her iPod underwater, and a collection of buff young people stood up in a hot-tub. In fact in both pictures depict music-making, via an electroencephalophone – a device that converts brainwaves into sound (and therefore a quintephone). The lady is psychotherapist Ariel Garten participating in a concert performance – and the “hot-tub” trio are an electroencephalophonist and two assistants accompanying on electrocardiophones.

8. Hydraulophone

(Images via: wearcam)

Now to the merry, messy world of the hydraulophones. Water flows out holes in the instrument, and the player uses his fingers to block or divert each stream, triggering internal mechanisms – discs, shafts or valves – that produce sound. In other words, it works like a woodwind instrument, except the wind is replaced by water (which doesn’t directly create the sound).

9. Drawdio

(Images via: Jay Silver via Wired)

Daring you to not burst out laughing when it gets underway is the Drawdio, a homespun theramin. There are a number of ways to make one (cheaply and easily), but the working principle remains the same in all models – it runs a current through the graphite deposited from the end of your pencil (or any other appropriate medium, including yourself), and translates it through a synthesizer to create a noise like a kazoo in a gale.

10. Ocarina

(Images via: Smule)

But for breadth of lateral thinking, hats off to Smule, the inventors of the Ocarina iPhone application. Using the phone’s built-in movement sensors and touch screen, your phone becomes either a wholly keyed instrument…or a kind of flute, by detecting the passage of your blown breath and translating it into intensity of sound. Once you’ve finished your piece, upload it to the Ocarina online community and listen to the work of others. A virtual instrument that automatically shares its output online – can you get more contemporary than that?

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What do Bill Clinton, Bruce Lee, Charlemagne and Jack Kervorkian have in common? They’ve all been made into custom historical LEGO mini-figures by LEGO artist Jamie Spencer. Spencer, also known as Morgan190, created an incredible collection of historical figures for the 2007 Fine Clonier Historical Figure Contest.

Each historical “minifig”, as these LEGO creations are called, had to be made only from official LEGO elements for the contest – hence, Spencer explains, the “Conan O’Brien hair” seen on many of them, and the Harry Potter scar on John Lennon’s forehead.

The figures range from the obscure  – like Charaka, the founder of Ayurveda (Indian Medicine) – to ubiquitous modern personalities like Donald Trump.

Spencer, a longtime LEGO enthusiast who spent untold hours building with them as a child, cites the Space and Castles lines as his favorite LEGO themes.

Spencer’s other LEGO minifigs often have dark sci-fi themes, and he has also created a few ornate steampunk designs. Asked by BuySteampunk.com where he gets his parts from, Spencer replied, “I don’t necessarily limit my collection to any one of LEGO’s lines so I happily pull accessories and parts from wherever will work.”

“The source of minifig parts ranges anywhere from Indiana Jones to Castle. One of the greatest aspects of LEGO is that it’s all interchangeable!”

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Nicola L. is one of those artists who has simply been around forever. She’s known by only her first name and last initial, and she manages to bring unmistakable style to each and every thing she does. She’s been known to create performance art, films, conceptual art, and sculptures, but perhaps her most enduring form is her functional art. It’s at once whimsical and serious, serving a very real function but having loads of fun doing it.

Looking at Nicola L.’s art, it’s hard not to notice her preferred subjects: eyes, heads and snails make repeated appearances. Though she does at times visit different forms for her functional art, the human body remains a subject of continued interest for her.

Since her first solo gallery show in 1969, French-born Nicola L. has been showing her functional art in galleries all over the world. She makes her pieces – lamps, planters, fish tanks, tables and sofas – in extremely limited editions, and in 2006 she had a large retrospective show of her functional art in Ingrao Gallery in NYC.

These stylized shapes of the human head, eyes, body and limbs take on a whole new meaning when they are in the context of functional art. They become familiar and warm, but also very playful. We don’t usually see head-shaped bookcases or eye-shaped ceiling lamps, so Nicola’s pieces often inspire wide smiles as the unexpected shapes are noted by viewers.

But there is also a hint of creepiness about some of the pieces, especially those featuring eyes. The artist manages to interject that tiny bit of discomfort into these pieces that many of us are used to feeling from conceptual artists: it seems that there might just be a subtext there, but we feel like we are missing it.

The artist says that she came by functional art almost accidentally after constructing a foot-shaped sofa for her and her friends to sit on. Nicola L.’s impressive body of work spans over 40 years and is truly something to behold. And if you can afford to furnish your home with functional art, hers is some of the most timelessly impressive you’ll find.

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