Science Lush

The Lush List: Sundance 2014 Edition - Science & Technology Films

The slopes are empty and the theaters are full in Park City, Utah, which can only mean one thing - it's time for Sundance. The 30th anniversary of the festival kicked off on January XX with 121 feature films, plus a plethora of shorts, panels and events. Nestled mong the gritty relationship dramas, star-studded character pieces and international gems are always at least several films that riff on or are inspired by science and technology. Here's a look at this year's crop, which includes stories across a wide variety of genres ranging from romantic drama to a Western to documentary film.

**Descriptions for the films and events have been taken from the Sundance Film Festival Guide.

 
I ORIGINS
Screening in Premieres
Dir: Mike Cahill


Ian Gray, a PhD student studying molecular biology with a specialty in eye evolution, leaves his lab to go to a party and has an intense, but fleeting, encounter with a mysterious, masked model who escapes into the night. With only a picture of her stunning and iconic eyes, he tracks her down, and they fall in love. Their fundamentally different beliefs about life only serve to intensify their connection, and they vow to spend forever together. Years later, Ian and his lab partner, Karen, make a stunning discovery with profound existential implications. He must risk his life's work and his family to travel across the world to find the truth behind what he has found and what it may mean.

Writer/director Mike Cahill returns to Sundance (Another Earth screened at the Festival in 2011) with a new, enthralling exploration of the connective tissue between love and science. He casts Brit Marling again, as well as Michael Pitt and Astrid Bergès-Frisbey, and utilizes their onscreen chemistry to vigorous effect. As emotionally moving as it is intellectually stimulating, I Origins solidifies Cahill’s position as a distinctive cinematic voice.

 
YOUNG ONES
Screening in Premieres
Dir: Jake Paltrow

Water is running out. Land has withered into something wretched. The dust has settled on a lonely, barren planet. Not long from now, the hardened survivors of the loss of Earth’s precious resources scrape and struggle. Ernest Holm, played by Michael Shannon, lives on this harsh frontier with his children, Jerome and Mary. He defends his farm from bandits, works the supply routes, and hopes to rejuvenate the soil. But Mary's boyfriend, Flem Lever, played by Nicholas Hoult, has grander designs. He wants Ernest's land for himself, and he means to get it.

Grounded by pitch-perfect performances, writer/director Jake Paltrow's sophomore effort reverently strips down genre tropes, inventively layering Greek tragedy over an ethereal narrative that’s steeped in the values of the American West. With a visceral application of cinematic and theatrical shorthand, and a passionate storytelling sense, Young Ones quickly establishes a distinct, fully realized universe and never lets go.

ALIVE INSIDE: A STORY OF MUSIC & MEMORY
Screening in U.S. Documentary Competition
Dir: Michael Rossato-Bennett

Video from the director from the film's Kickstarter campaign

As dementia continues to affect millions of elderly Americans, Alive Inside: A Story of Music & Memory reveals a remarkable, music-based breakthrough that has already transformed lives. Spearheaded by social worker Dan Cohen and captured on camera over the course of three years by filmmaker Michael Rossato-Bennett, we learn that songs from a patient’s past can awaken memories and emotions that have been asleep for years, sometimes decades. Within a moment of hearing “I Get Around” by the Beach Boys, Alzheimer’s patient Marylou jolts back to life, dancing around the living room and expressing a euphoria her husband hasn’t witnessed since her illness took effect. Countless instances in Alive Inside provide proof that music stimulates activity in dementia-affected parts of the brain and transforms the quality of life of those often left to languish in silence.

Through revealing conversations with renowned neurologist Oliver Sacks and musician Bobby McFerrin, as well as powerful firsthand experiments conducted by Cohen in nursing homes, this groundbreaking documentary demonstrates how connecting the elderly to the music they love not only combats memory loss but also supplements a broken health-care system often indifferent to interpersonal connections.

DINOSAUR 13
Screening in U.S. Documentary Competition
Dir: Todd Miller

On August 12, 1990, in the badlands of South Dakota, paleontologist Peter Larson and his team from the Black Hills Institute unearthed the largest, most complete Tyrannosaurus rex ever found. It was the find of a lifetime—the world’s greatest dinosaur discovery. They named their dinosaur Sue.

Two years later, when the FBI and the National Guard showed up, battle lines were drawn over ownership of Sue. The U.S. government, world-class museums, Native American tribes, and competing paleontologists became the Goliath to Larson’s David as he and his team fought to keep their dinosaur and wrestled with intimidation tactics that threatened their freedom as well.

Dinosaur 13 chronicles an unprecedented saga in American history and details the fierce battle to possess a 65-million-year-old treasure. With consummate skill, filmmaker Todd Miller excavates layer after layer, exposing human emotion in a dramatic tale that is as complex as it is fascinating.

The film has been acquired by Lionsgate and CNN Films.

THE INTERNET'S OWN BOY: THE STORY OF AARON SWARTZ
Screening in U.S. Documentary Competition
Dir: Brian Knappenberger

As a teenager, Aaron Swartz was a computer-programming prodigy with an unquenchable thirst for knowledge. After emerging as a pioneer of Internet activism, education, and politics, he was indicted on multiple federal charges in 2011 and 2012, setting off a complex chain of events that left the Internet community reeling. Shortly thereafter, at the age of 26, Swartz was found dead of an apparent suicide in his Brooklyn apartment. His family, friends, and supporters immediately blamed the prosecutors of the case, who aimed to put him in jail for 35 years and brand him a convicted felon for life. Swartz was persecuted for the very rights and freedoms for which he stood, and that ultimately broke him.

Weaving together home video footage and anecdotal interviews from his closest confidants, Brian Knappenberger creates a dynamic portrait of a precocious boy who grew up to lead the Internet community into a new age of data sharing and free speech.

 
COOTIES
Screening in Park City at Midnight
Dirs: Jonathan Milott and Cary Murnion

Elementary schools have given birth to great thinkers, innovative scientists, and inspiring leaders. They are also malignant cesspools, teeming with grime and disease.

Directors Jonathan Milott and Cary Murnion’s first film, Cooties, focuses on the virulent underbelly of grade school. Except this time, the bug that’s going around is transforming the student body from spazzes, tattletales, and brats into deranged, cannibalistic mutants. After an uncharacteristically blood-soaked recess, the surviving teachers and students band together in a desperate attempt to leave the building without being permanently dismissed.

This appealingly preposterous scenario comes together in a hilarious script by cowriters Leigh Whannel (the creator of Saw) and Ian Brennan (the creator of Glee). The strong ensemble cast includes Elijah Wood as a failed writer-turned-underwhelming substitute teacher, Alison Pill as his childhood crush, Rainn Wilson as a mustachioed gym teacher, and Jorge Garcia as a drug-addled crossing guard. Nasim Pedrad and Jack McBrayer are welcome additions to the roster.


THE SIGNAL
Screening in Park City at Midnight
Dir: William Eubank

Nick and Jonah are MIT freshmen with a passion for hacking. While driving cross-country through Nevada with Nick’s girlfriend, Hailey, they follow rival hacker Nomad’s clues to a location 180 miles away. After a terrifying confrontation with Nomad in the middle of the desert, the trio regain consciousness in captivity. Struggling to comprehend the true nature of their confinement, they discover they are part of a plot much larger than themselves.

With his second sci-fi feature, William Eubank continues to prove that grand scale can be achieved on any budget. Starring up-and-comer Brenton Thwaites as Nick and Laurence Fishburne as his stoic captor, The Signal is a contemporary genre film with heart and imagination to spare. Beautifully shot and energetically directed, it lets the circumstances behind the trio’s imprisonment slowly unravel, leading to an epic and mind-blowing conclusion.

 

TO BE TAKEI
Screening in Documentary Premieres
Dir: Jennifer M. Kroot




TK Note: While technically this isn't a film about science or technology, I couldn't leave a film about Takei off of this list. Between his iconic role in Star Trek and his use of social media, he occupies a unique place at the intersection of art and science.

George Takei doesn’t shy away from digging into his remarkable career and personal life in Jennifer Kroot’s delightful and incisive film To Be Takei. As a child forced into Japanese-American internment camps, the actor-turned-activist reveals the ways that racism affected him well into his early acting career, where he played stereotypical Asian stock characters in film and television shows. Even after landing the iconic role of Hikaru Sulu on Star Trek, Takei’s sharp eye, coupled with his wicked sense of humor, continued to challenge the status quo well into the twenty-first century.

Now at 76, nine years after formally coming out of the closet, Takei and his husband, Brad, have become the poster couple for marriage equality, highlighting homophobia through television interviews and hilarious skits, many of which have gone viral and garnered widespread attention. Whether dishing on William Shatner or parodying the now-infamous comments made by Tim Hardaway, Takei proves time and again why his presence in popular culture remains as fresh and necessary as ever. - H.V.

 

LOVE CHILD
Screening in World Documentary
Dir: Valerie Veatch

In 2010, a South Korean baby named Sarang died of malnutrition. The death of a child is always horrific, but the circumstances leading up to this one were even more shocking: Sarang died because her parents were playing games online. Ordinarily, this would be a clear case of negligence, but Love Child takes a different approach by looking at what led to the parents’ gaming addiction and how their child became a secondary concern. The film then expands from this tragedy to examine the way that South Korea’s place as the world leader of Internet infrastructure has adversely affected its communal society.

Director Valerie Veatch skillfully weaves a story of personal tragedy together with social commentary. Instead of merely condemning the parents, she shows how embracing technology can have unforeseen negative consequences. By interjecting footage from the game the parents loved to play into the film, Veatch vividly conveys how intoxicating these games can be and shows how easily the lines between real life and virtual reality can blur.

WEB JUNKIE
Screening in World Documentary
Dirs: Shosh Shlam, Hilla Medalia

China is one of the first countries in the world to label overuse of the Internet a clinical condition. To combat what authorities deem the greatest social crisis for youth today, the Chinese government has created treatment facilities to detox and cure teenagers of their addictions to online life.

But what starts out as an already-fascinating look at ways that technology may be destroying the lives of Chinese youth quickly becomes something more. As the unorthodox psychological sessions continue and the teenage boys begin to share with their parents the reasons why they feel more connected to disassociated voices in cyberspace than to their families, Web Junkie chronicles the results of a nation going through one of most drastic transformations in human history. In honest and wrenching ways that transcend national borders, this film is a thoughtful examination of a society in flux and a technology-addled generation on the precipice of an unknown future.

 

PANELS

EXPLORATORY DETOURS
Part of the Free Fail program

One of the enduring human enigmas is that so many iconic endeavors—from Nobel Prize–winning achievements to entrepreneurial inventions and works in the arts—are not discoveries but conversions, corrections after failed attempts.

Moderated by author, scholar, and curator Sarah Lewis, whose upcoming book The Rise: Creativity, the Gift of Failure, and the Search for Mastery explores this theme across myriad disciplines from science to athletics to music and art. Exploratory Detours takes a look at this intriguing issue.

By pulling together science, scholarship, and philosophy, we can better understand the fascinating relationship linking creativity, failure, and mastery that extends far beyond the familiar platitudes. What does it mean to have grit? How does validation work? What can we learn from the way jazz musicians improvise? Our diverse group of panelists look at the ways irreplaceable gifts spring from failure in creative endeavors.

Panelists include: Sarah Lewis (author, The Rise: Creativity, the Gift of Failure, and the Search for Mastery), Charles J. Limb, MD (Dr. Limb studies the neural mechanisms behind deep creativity, especially in relation to music and other art forms), Jill Soloway (director, writer, and producer for the film Afternoon Delight, and TV series such as Six Feet Under and United States of Tara), Chris Stone (President, Open Society Foundations), and Sundance Institute President and Founder Robert Redford.

THE COSMIC CROSSROADS

Whether it’s searching for life in the universe or searching for results in a lab, scientists often have a number of theories but are not quite sure what they will find. It’s an enigma that compels filmmakers regularly, but it also brings up an interesting question about process that unites science and storytelling. How do you see what’s not there? How do you form narratives? How do imagination, logic, creativity, and empiricism ally in film’s creative mix? Moderated by Flora Lichtman (multimedia editor, Science Friday, NPR), this year’s group of scientists, Kevin Hand (deputy chief scientist, Solar System Exploration, NASA) and Jill Tarter (SETI Institute), and writers, Jon Spaihts (Prometheus, The Darkest Hour) and Max Mayer (Adam), discuss their work as well as good and bad science-in-film. Supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

AFTER SUNDANCE: EMBRACING CHANGE
New Frontier panel

Learn from former Sundance filmmakers who have paved their own path in this changing media landscape and embraced new models of business, technology, and content creation at this very special “show-and-tell” panel. Moderator Chris Horton (director, #ArtistServices, Sundance Institute) along with Jill Soloway (director, Afternoon Delight), Tiffany Shlain (filmmaker and founder, The Webby Awards), Jared Geller (producer, hitRECord), and Dennis Dortch (CEO/founder, BLACK&SEXY.TV) share their tales of creation and innovation. You can also get a sneak peak at Soloway’s television pilot Transparent.

THE BEAUTY OF FAILURE
Part of the Free Fail program

How does embracing risk and failure drive the creative process? Creating something new goes hand in hand with the risk of failure, which the New Frontier artists confront with every project. These artists continue to push boundaries and embrace the new in both their work and their lives. Join Aaron Koblin (creative director, Google Creative Lab), Sam Green (filmmaker, Weather Underground), Jillian Mayer (artist/filmmaker, director #PostModem), Nate Mitchell (Oculus Rift), and Mike Stubbs (FACT) as they share what it takes to be on the vanguard of art, film, and technology, and how overcoming failure can lead to some of their best work. Moderated by Ruby Lerner (executive director, Creative Capital).

 

THE STORYWORLD: CREATING INTERACTIVE EXPERIENCES THAT WORK
New Frontier Panel

Actively incorporating your audience members gives them permission to become part of the story rather than mere observers. But letting go of authorship can be tricky. How do you create effective, yet compelling, interactive experiences that audiences want to be part of? Join us for a creative, mind-opening, and inspiring conversation as we break free of the linear narrative and discuss the innovative and rich world of interactive storytelling with artist/director Chris Milk (Sound and Vision, Arcade Fire’s Wilderness Downtown), artist and computer scientist Jonathan Harris (I Love Your Work, I Want You to Want Me, Cowbird), game maker Nick Fortugno (cofounder and CCO, Playmatics), Sep Kamvar (professor, MIT), Nate Mitchell(VP Product, Oculus Rift), and transmedia leader Susan Bonds (CEO, 42 Entertainment). Moderated by Charles Melcher (founder, The Future of Storytelling [FoST] Summit and Melcher Media).

HOW TO BE SUCCESSFUL ON YOUTUBE
New Frontier Panel

YouTube's top creators, learn the key strategies filmmakers can use for creating successful content on YouTube that keeps audiences engaged and coming back for more. The session explores questions you should ask yourself when developing new online content and provides examples of the way YouTube offers filmmakers the opportunity to have creative freedom and reach a wide audience.

The Lush List: 7/5/12: Higgs Boson, Mysterium Tremendum and Internet Celeb Commercials

Higgs Boson Sweetly Explained

Big news in the science community this past week about discovery of the Higgs boson particle [general readers may be more familiar with this as "The God Particle,' a term that raises the hackles of many scientists]. While the folks at CERN, the home of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), are being cautious and saying it's too soon to know for sure, the discovery is exciting physicists around the globe.

And just what is this li'l particle that's making them jump for joy? As THE NEW YORK TIMES describes it:

According to the Standard Model, the Higgs boson is the only manifestation of an invisible force field, a cosmic molasses that permeates space and imbues elementary particles with mass...Without the Higgs field, as it is known, or something like it, all elementary forms of matter would zoom around at the speed of light, flowing through our hands like moonlight. There would be neither atoms nor life.

So yes, it's a big friggin' deal!

Still lost?

For those of us who want to know more but don't have a string of letters after our name or spent most of science class flirting with the guy behind us, Guardian science correspondent Ian Sample explains what a Higgs boson is, how Cern physicists are looking for it, and why it matters if they find it. And he does it all with very sophisticated tools: ping pong balls, sugar and a cafeteria tray. After watching, I wasn't sure if I should go bake cookies or dig out my set of paddles and get ready to serve...

 

The Grateful Sounds of the Universe

I am definitely NOT a Deadhead. In fact, my musical taste (or lack thereof) could almost be described as the complete opposite of the Grateful Dead: Jersey rock (think ROCK OF AGES soundtrack), Top 40 dance tunes and Broadway musicals. However, when I read this post on Open Culture about Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart's latest project, I finally found a set of tunes for which I'd be willing to take a road trip.

On his new record MYSTERIUM TREMENDUM, Hart used "cosmic sounds" composed in outer space to create the tracks. As described on the site:

To make music like this, you need some unusual collaborators. Hart went to NASA, Penn State, and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, working with scientists like George Smoot, winner of the 2006 Nobel Prize in Physics with John C. Mather. They helped convert light, radio waves, and other electromatic radiation into sound waves that Hart and his band could put to musical use.

For a sampling of "the songs our universe sings," you can watch below in the recording of the Madrone Studios performance in San Francisco on 4/4/12. Gotta love it when a musician kicks off his set explaining that the piece he's about to play is based on "the sounds of the sun and some very deep star clusters."

Just have to give a shout out to Open Culture, which has the tagline "the best free cultural and educational media on the web."  They constantly point me to coolness that I find myself wanting to share with y'all. If you like what I write about here, they are definitely a site to check out.

 
Internet Celebs in Commercials

As you may remember, I'm a big fan of well-done commercials (especially when I see them online instead of in the middle of my favorite TV programs). All sorts of creatures have been utilized in the selling of things, including scantily clad celebrities, gekkos, and funny ladies with headbands dressed in all white. But lately, internet-age celebs have been cropping up in commercials. And I don't mean YouTube stars - I mean the folks who actually created YouTube.

London agency Albion made this film for Code Club, a startup that teaches children coding after-school. In the spot, three savvy kids interview prospective employees for Code Club, including Tim Berners-Lee, YouTube founder Chad Hurley, Skype's Niklas Zennstrom and Brent Hoberman and Martha Lane-Fox, founders of LastMinute.com, among others. And they're not exactly impressed...

The spot reminded me of the ad from Best Buy which debuted during the Superbowl. It features the inventors and Silicon Valley folk who are behind li'l things like the camera phone, Instagram and Square. It's quite a change from their 2011 Superbowl campaign, which featured Justin Bieber and Ozzie Osbourn. 

 

 

Lush List 6/18/12: Udacity courses, Materials Science photos and LA Film Fest

Udacity courses

When it comes to higher education, I've often wondered when we'll switch to a model of distance learning. As four-year universities become pricier, ya' gotta think that at some point, somehow it'll be possible to just stay home in our jammies, stream our lectures, participate in weekly study groups via Google hangouts, and save a hell of a lot of money on room and board.

Sebastian Thrun is bringing that model a little closer to reality. His new venture, Udacity, is offering a selection of MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses), beginning on June 25th. In addition to Intro to Physics, the free classes include Algorithms: Crunching Social Networks and Intro to Statistics: Making Decisions Based on Data.

The idea is pretty simple: courses are broken down into units; each unit comes with corresponding homework; there are forums where you can interact with instructors and other students; and some classes offer the opportunity to take a certified exam, which does have a cost attached to it. For more details, check out the Udacity wiki.

Just because the classes free of charge, though, don't think you're getting off easy. Thrun was tenured at Stanford, where he taught artificial intelligence, and helped invent the self-driving car at Google. He was intrigued and inspired by the possibilities of online learning after teaching a MOOC on AI at Stanford. While Udacity students won't get an established University's recognition for their coursework, they might get something else more valuable - a job. Udacity is working directly with companies who are seeking employees with specific skill sets.

For more on MOOCs: Instruction for Masses Knocks Down Campus Walls [NYTimes]

Stats or physics not your thing? Open Culture has a list of 500 Free Online Courses from Top Universities.

 

Intro Video for Intro to Statistics.
I have actually signed up for this...remains to be seen if I am disciplined enough to tune in regularly when there's not a real grade at stake.

 

Science As Art

This very purty video from the Materials Research Society features a collection of photographs from their "Science as Art" competition. As described on their site:

Visualization methods provide an important tool in materials science for the analysis and presentation of scientific work. Images can often convey information in a way that tables of data or equations cannot match. Occasionally, scientific images transcend their role as a medium for transmitting information, and contain the aesthetic qualities that transform them into objects of beauty and art.

As a special feature of recent MRS Meetings, we have offered the popular Science as Art competitions, with entry open to all registered meeting attendees. 

My favorite images are Sedat Canli's "Rising Moon" and "Nano Graveyard" by Steven Herron.

[Source: Maria Bellantone]

Los Angeles Film Festival

So many movies, so little time!

The LAFF is in full swing in Downtown Los Angeles, with tons of movies, panels and events to satisfy your cinematic yearnings. Here are a few selections that might appeal to S'Lush readers...descriptions taken from LAFF program guide...

Robot and Frank: Frank is an aging ex-con, played to perfection by Frank Langella, living alone in a house filled with clutter and memories. When his son insists on buying him a robotic caretaker, he is quite resistant, futilely searching for an off switch on his new housemate. Over time, however, the two come to an understanding and even a friendship. But when Frank begins to re-explore old vices, it leads both him and his cybernetic pal down a dangerous path. With supporting performances by Susan Sarandon, James Marsden and Liv Tyler, Robot & Frank is a comic look at the very near future of family and friendship.[For a clip, check out EW's piece on the movie from Sundance]

Seeking a Friend for the End of the World: In this comedy that explores the funnier side of the apocalypse, an asteroid is hurtling through space on a collision course with Earth. Unlike some who decide to party their way out, Dodge, played to perfection by Steve Carell, is taking the news rather calmly, content to putter around his empty apartment until the end. Then he meets Penny, his spirited neighbor from across the hall, played in a delightful turn by Keira Knightley. With a stack of LPs clutched under her arms and a letter from Dodge's high school sweetheart in her hand, she convinces him to try and get his life together even as the world is falling apart.

The History of Future Folk: Sent to destroy the human race, General Trius, the most decorated soldier from planet Hondo, has a change of heart when he hears music for the first time. Taking on the alias Bill Hunt, Trius settles down in Brooklyn, where he starts a family and plays bluegrass banjo at the local tavern. When an assassin from Hondo comes to kill Trius, the two quickly bond over the power of music and form Future Folk — think Flight of the Concords from space. The duo rocks the house every night, but can they save Earth and Hondo from certain destruction in this wonderfully odd, surprisingly sweet sci-fi musical comedy?

 

 

 

Martha Graham Google Doodle

As you may know, I'm a big ol' So You Think You Can Dance addict, as well as a fan of any movie that features a rich ballerina with family problems who meets an earnest yet troubled guy from the opposite side of the tracks who teaches her how to dance from her soul (cue breakdancing scene in an abandoned warehouse).  So of course this Martha Graham-inspired Google Doodle caught my eye as a lovely fusion of tech & dance...

Google - Martha Graham from Ryan J Woodward on Vimeo.

[Via Business Insider SAI]

YouTube & NASA Plan Streaming Interview From Endeavour

Head's up - the April 30th deadline is approaching to submit your questions to YouTube for the live broadcast with the crew of the upcoming Endeavour voyage. As detailed on Mashable, NASA and YT have partnered on the interview, which will be streamed from space on PBS NewsHour's YT channel on Monday, May 2nd at 2:15pm, barring any launch delays.

Intrigued? Miles O'Brien, who will conduct the interview, tells you all about the project in this li'l video...

The Lush List: 07/18/10: Summer Entertainment Options

1)INTOXICATING MOVIES: INCEPTION

While not strictly science-related, I saw Inception last night and had to post about this smart, gorgeously shot movie that will satisfy your desire for popcorn action thrills as well as provide some more deeply nourishing food for thought.  If The Matrix, 2001 or Blade Runner hold any fascination for you, get your butt into a theater to check out Christopher Nolan's latest. I won't give away any other details from the film because you should see it without knowing too much about it, but I'll just add that Nolan (The Dark Knight, Memento) continues to remain one of my favorite filmmakers. 

2)ONLINE SHOWS: JOE GENIUS

If you don't feel like hoofing it to the theater for your entertainment, check out Joe Genius, the new online show from Revision3. As described by their PR materials, "Joe Genius highlights home-grown Newtons who experiment, tinker, and yes, blow stuff up in the name of science. And it's all caught on tape! Join [comedian] Jonah Ray as he whizzes through these geniuses' most epic failures and thrilling successes -- and of course, the science behind it all."

The show features online vids from citizen scientists and students - some that go well, others which go horribly wrong. The first episode focus on chemistry, and includes such experiments as mixing rubbing alcohol and chlorine, concocting homemade rocket fuel, and an endeavor titled "watermelon versus liquid nitrogen."

Much like G4's new show It's Effin' Science, the show approaches science like an extreme sport, accompanied by comedic commentary. I am curious about the very last line of the show, which states that the show is "brought to you in part by the National Science Foundation"...interesting...will let y'all know when I find out more...

3) PBS'S HISTORY DETECTIVES

The PBS show History Detectives traces the history, mythologies and family legends behind found objects. This year, as part of the 8th season space-themed premiere, the show made a direct interactive pitch to viewers to help solve the mystery of whether or not a miniature piece of collaborative art was snuck aboard the Apollo 12 space mission, possibly created by Andy Warhol, Robert Rauschenberg and others. It's a story of collaboration between engineers and artists, cryptic telegram messages and the fascination with getting a teeny bit of oneself up into space. The show's producers ask the public to help solve the mystery here and over 170 viewers have already done so. 

Watch the full episode. See more History Detectives.

[Source: Cynopsis Digital]

4)NSA GEEKY AFTER DARK

Many folks get through the hot summer by heading out to the pool club. The folks at the NSA have a different idea of how to blow off steam. A post on Wired's Danger Room blog details how NSA staffers get down & dirty after work. Turns out that hacking at top levels during the day isn't enough for these guys - they continue their exploits in 12 different "Learned Organizations" after the work day is done. From the Wired post:

Most of the clubs revolve around cryptoanalysis, communications analysis and language translation. Which is pretty much what employees at the NSA do from 9 to 5 — and, it seems, still shell out $15 in annual fees to do on evenings and weekends, too. But at least on evenings and weekends, snacks are involved...

The clubs offer more than chips & dip. In addition to the work they do, the Crypto-Linguistics Association (CLA) has an International Cookbook; the KRYPTOS Society has an annual literature contest; and the Crypto-Mathematics Institute (CMI) has a fondness for word puzzles.

I'd love to sit in on a meeting of the Pen & Cursor Society (P&CS), which sponsors “creativity seminars,” where members are invited to “explore childhood memories,” “break rules!” and “fertilize the garden in which you grow ideas.” I'd even bake some killer cupcakes if they'd let me come play, but alas, the clubs are only open to NSA Staff.

The Lush List: 2/26/10

1. The annual TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) took place from February 9-13, 2010, in Long Beach, CA, and videos of talks from the event are slowly rolling out online. Overwhelmed by all the video goodies? GOOD has put together a collection of their 10 favorites so far. Lots of science & medical folk features in their picks, including biochemist and cell biologist Mark Roth, vaccine researcher Seth Berkeley and spider silk scientist Cheryl Hayashi.  

2. Y'all know my fondness for well-crafted commercials. In honor of the just-finished Olympics, here's a trippy gem from AT&T of Gretchen Bleiler snowboarding into space set to Lou Reed's "Perfect Day."

3. And speaking of random collisions of space and pop culture, Dancing with the Stars will take on a whole new meaning when this season debuts on March 22nd. Astronaut Buzz Aldrin will be joining the cast, which also includes the likes of Shannen Doherty, Kate Gosselin and skater Evan Lysacek.

4. I've been keeping an eye on the new interactive series Future States, a project from ITVS (Independent Television Service). Eleven fictional digital shorts explore possible future scenarios through the lens of today’s global realities. ITVS asked a group of filmmakers to take the current state of affairs in the United States, and extrapolate them into stories of the nation in the not-so-distant future. The result is an exploration of social issues, with elements of speculative and science fiction. Along with the shorts, there are also a variety of interactive elements featured on the Future States site, including the usual sharing tools plus a nifty Predict-O-Meter. This allows users to enter their own future predictions, as well as see what others think is in store.

Science Online 2010: Am Amazing Experience + Science & Entertainment Panel Review

Finally catching up on some long overdue blogging!

I spent a big chunk of January on the road, first in North Carolina at Science Online 2010, then at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. To read about my festival adventures, head on over to the News on the Doc blog at Documentary.org, where I chronicled my daily dose of movies and events and posted filmmaker interviews for the International Documentary Association.

While I'm a bit embarrassed that it's taken me so long to get something up about Science Online, aka scio10,  it's also been useful to have some time to reflect on the experience (multiple plane rides = good thinking time). A huge thank-you to conference organizers Bora Zivkovic and Anton Zuiker, the masterminds behind the 4th annual event.

I must admit, I wasn't quite sure what I was getting myself into when I agreed to head out to the Research Triangle. Compared to the rest of the attendees, I'm relatively new to the science blogging community, though I've had a lot of experience in the online space. But something about the participatory nature of the way the conference was put together (and the exuberant nature of Bora's Tweets!) gave me a good feeling, and now I'm so glad I followed my gut and made the trip. I knew it would be a weekend full interesting discussions about science; what I never expected was that there would be so many wonderful conversations about writing as well. Indeed, Science Online is just as much a conference about 21st century communication as it is about what happens in the lab.

Another unexpected delight at Scio10 was the diverse group of panelists and attendees. In addition to the expected authors, bloggers and scientists, there were museum outreach directors, high school students, teachers, science pranksters, iPhone app developers, underwater cinematographers, librarians, software developers, and more. The connective tissue amongst the group was a love for science and an interest in how it's being explored in the online space.

To that end, the event and its attendees made excellent use of Web 2.0 tools. Conference tweets, tagged with #scio10, were projected onto screens at the event venues. While you were in one session, you could see what you were missing in the others by keeping an eye on your phone's Twitter feed. Several panels were streamed into Second Life and live streamed on U-Stream, and those observing from afar could submit questions to the room. The wireless during the sessions, provided by SignalShare, rocked - it was robust enough to allow me to Skype in a guest speaker during my session. Almost everything was videotaped, and Bora & Anton & Co. are in the process of getting the vids online. You can find them here on Science in the Triangle's YouTube channel.

Science & Entertainment Session
I co-hosted a panel on Science and Entertainment with the lovely Jennifer Ouellette, author and science blogger extraordinaire. I presented several examples of cutting edge online campaigns and content pieces that either made use of or were inspired by real-life science, and Jennifer talked about her work with the Science & Entertainment Exchange, a program of the National Academy of Sciences.  In true UnConference model, we then posed several questions to the audience and opened it up to the whimsy of the room.

Topics of discussion included:

• If science's responsibility is to accuracy and Hollywood's responsibility is to good storytelling, where and how - or should - the two meet in the middle?
• How can science bloggers pursue relationships with Hollywood studios? Does Hollywood really care about what they have to say?
• Studio films such as Angels & Demons, Terminator, Star Trek and Avatar have the budgets to create innovative online content as part of their marketing campaigns. How can science adapt what they've created in the fictional realm and use it to explore real science online in new, attention-grabbing ways?
• With rich media experiences becoming more common online and drawing more eyeballs, how can good ol' fashioned blogging evolve so that it doesn't become the print media of the Internet?
• Currently, it's common for bloggers to point out the errors in the science contained in movies and television. Yet, film and TV have proven to be sources of inspiration for students, as good storytelling stokes the curiosity that eventually leads kids to pursue careers in science. With this in mind, is there a way to establish a more cooperative relationship between the the worlds of science and entertainment?
• As entertainment consumers move from a lean back experience to a more participatory role, how should science on the web adapt? 

Thanks to all who joined in the robust conversation; this sampling of Tweets from our panel will give you a sense of it...

@f1000 talks about scientific consulting on films like Avatar, TV shows like CSI and video games at #scio10 http://bit.ly/5PYlLn

@thegarbagegirl  Love this! http://www.thesoulstoragecompany.com/ Presented at #scio10 session on science and entertainment

@abelpharmboy  Alastair Jeffs: Have to be able to tell a good story; the science is great but...people want a story. Work w/a classical writer

@abelpharmboy  @tamarakrinsky noted that some networks have diversity mandates #scio10 12:09 PM Jan 16th from TweetDeck

@abelpharmboy @edyong209 @docfreeride So if one convinces a filmmaker that a young black girl discovering a drug would be a money-making story...#scio10

@edyong209  Passive consumers of entertainment are becoming active consumers. Want to take part. #scio10

@thegarbagegirl  @tamarakrinsky said something I've believed all along: people want to be involved in the story telling process

@abelpharmboy Hrynyshyn: why aren't there more "normal" people on Bones or House - Jen-Luc says normal does not make compelling characters

Janet D. Stemwedel (@docfreeride) has archived her extensive tweets from the session on a post on her blog Adventures from Ethics in Science - a great collection of observations! 

Another thing I'm digging about Scio10 is the continuation of conversations begun in North Carolina via blogs and tweets. Over on The Intersection, Chris Mooney posts: 

Science and Entertainment: Beyond Blogging – Tamara Krinsky and Jennifer Ouellette: Hollywood getting into science = definitely cool. But will Hollywood’s ace marketers ever see a real need to court science bloggers to get the word out about films, given the relatively small size of our audiences and the vastness of their ad budgets? Not clear to me how much *we* matter, at least so far.

My response to Chris is that Hollywood will care as long as they think there's money to be made. And when I say Hollywood, I'm talking about the studios and the marketing engines...individual creatives like directors and writers usually have much more genuine interests in the science that's inspired them. Increasingly, bloggers fit into that revenue-generating equation. As audiences become more and more fragmented, finding ways to catch hold of the individual shards who may have interest in a film becomes increasingly important. For example, the online campaign for Coraline was built on identifying and generating interest from several different niche audiences. They buzz created by these early fans bubbled up to larger outlets, feeding the campaign and driving coverage by more mainstream media, thus helping the film to attract a wider audience.

LINKS
If you want to take a peek at some of the projects we showcased during the panel, here are some handy-dandy links for ya'...

Star Trek
This is an example of the innovative banner ad campaign designed for the film which allows users to rotate through the bridge (this one appeared on MySpace). At various places, hidden features allow you to launch a picture gallery and videos. Museums and labs take note: this could serve as inspiration for a virtual tours.
Agency Credit: Avatar Labs

Terminator: Salvation
[Note: the title link takes you to images used in the application, which is no longer available]
This Skynet Adobe Air Application developed for the Terminator: Salvation domestic movie release campaign featured a faux information processor. The sinister Skynet Corporation invited users to download the app to their desktops to help process information.  It mysteriously “broke” the day the film was released. This kind of app is an engaging way to distribute new video and text information to fans.

The designers were inspired by “SETI at Home,” a distributed computer programm  where users can download and analyze radio telescope data to help with SETI. Agency credit: Crew Creative

Cold Souls
This film stars Paul Giamatti as a man who puts his soul in storage for awhile so he can deal with some of his issues. As part of the marketing campaign, they created a humorous site for the fictional "Soul Storage Company," which allows customers to store their souls online. Site features include the ability to browse the soul catalog and take an office tour, complete with some lovely B-movie-esque video.

Angels & Demons
The “On Location” section of the movie site is an interactive map that contains factual information about the various historical locations used in the film. Hotspots open images, video, models and behind-the-scenes commentary to bring to light the fact behind the fiction. It's an engaging example of the way that a sci-fi film could potentially showcase real science, differentiating between movie and theory in a way that celebrates both the truth of the science and the imagination of the storytellers.

Avatar
The site for the film features an Adobe Air application which allows users to download an interactive trailer to their desktops that includes regularly updated newsfeeds and links to external content on sites such as YouTube and Twitter. The site creates a community by incorporating social networking tools such as the Typepad community and Facebook Connect.  

Routes Project
This groundbreaking multi-platform exploration of genetics and bio-ethics used a variety of platforms to engage a young audience. The science underpinning Routes was developed in partnership with the Wellcome Trust as part of the Darwin200 program celebrating the bicentenary of Darwin's birth. It included the following elements:

• An eight-part online mini series called ROUTES in which Katherine Ryan, a Canadian stand up comic, submits herself to a series of genetic tests by 23andme. The Routes website tracked Katherine's progress as a video documentary.
• The site featured community challenges and flash based games based on genetics. Taking part allowed users to amass points. The highest scorers each week were entered into a prize drawing for a chance to win a gaming console.
• A corresponding fictional murder mystery intertwined with the documentary. Eight 4-5 minute episodes aired online and on Channel 4. The audience could delve deeper into the mystery through character video blogs, images from the "investigation" on Flickr, and SMS/text clues.
• Live promotional events included a launch event and comedy show.

**A special thanks to Alistair Jeffs from Oil whom we Skyped in during the panel to talk about the details of the Routes project.

Agency Credit: Oil

The Lush List: 10/19/09 - Eye Candy

Over the past several days, I've stumbled across several fantastic vids and pics, some old, some new. I'll let the images speak for themselves.

1)Symphony of Science: "We Are All Connected"

From melodysheep's YouTube note (full lyrics avail there):

"We Are All Connected" was made from sampling Carl Sagan's Cosmos, The History Channel's Universe series, Richard Feynman's 1983 interviews, Neil deGrasse Tyson's cosmic sermon, and Bill Nye's Eyes of Nye Series, plus added visuals from The Elegant Universe (NOVA), Stephen Hawking's Universe, Cosmos, the Powers of 10, and more. It is a tribute to great minds of science, intended to spread scientific knowledge and philosophy through the medium of music.

[found my way to this via Andrew Baron on Magma, who found it via Sam Lehman]

2)Gorgeous pics of Antarctic icebergs

Inhabitat.com has some incredible images of icebergs featuring stripes and beautiful blues taken by Norwegian sailor Oyvind Tangen on a research ship 660 miles north of the Antarctic. Apparently, the pics made the rounds via email, which skipped my in-box, so glad to have a chance to see them featured here.

3)A Picture is Worth 1000 Words...

The Department of Energy honored 10 of this year’s best scientific visualizations with its annual SciDAC Vis Night awards, at the Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing conference (SciDAC) in June, and Wired.com has showcased them for our viewing pleasure. Warning: If you live in Southern Cali, you might not want to watch the simulation of  a magnitude 7.8 earthquake on the San Andreas fault...

Google Celebrates H.G. Wells' Birthday

The aliens are taking over!

Google's logo, that is...

In celebration of science fiction author H.G. Wells' 143rd birthday, Google has featured several cryptic logos over the past month, culminating in today's design.

Ben Parr's post on Mashable chronicles the stealth campaign, which included an earlier 'o' abduction, crop circle logo, and various corresponding tweets.

Wells is generally credited with popularizing the concept of time travel in his novella The Time Machine. But is time travel really possible?

-For a primer on the topic, read "How Time Travel Will Work" at HowStuffWorks (from the Discovery Corp).

-Listen to this July 2009  story on Minnesota Public Radio featuring Ronald Mallett, a professor of physics at the University of Connecticut and the author of Time Traveler: A Scientist's Personal Mission to Make Time Travel a Reality. Director Spike Lee has acquired the rights for a film he plans to write and direct. Mallett's work has some of its inspiration in Wells' The Time Machine, which he first came across as an 11-year old in the midst of mourning the sudden death of his father. He thought if he could just build a time machine, he could go back in time and warn his dad about what was going to happen and prevent his death...

-In a 2006 MSNBC article, theoretical physicist Brian Greene (The Elegant Universe) and John Cramer, a physicist at the University of Washington, discuss the realities of time travel.

-Courtesy of the internet, go back in time to NOVA's 1999 special on the topic. The companion website includes text & audio from Carl Sagan, an Einstein thought experiment and a "time travel" glossary.