Simon's Cat "Santa Claws"

Winter Solstice Lunar Eclipse

We were lucky enough to be in the right place, at the right time to see a total eclipse of the sun back in August 1999 - we were near Lizard Point in Cornwall and the forecast was bobbins - I vividly remember sitting in a field, above cliffs looking at a grey and over cast sky thinking I should have stayed in London and being generally grumpy, as well as cross for dragging so many people down to the South West for this when, with moments to go, the sky in our area cleared slightly and we all saw this natural wonder - the speed at which it went dark was incredible, the temperature dropped massively, yes, the birds did stop singing - but the moment the sun popped out from behind the moon and blasted us with light and heat once again was simply breathtaking - its power is something we all take for granted. Got it on VHS somewhere, need to convert it to share the experience, but for this, here's Professor Brian Cox talking about it for his fantastic Wonders Of The Solar System for the BBC;


Anyway, those that know me (Ritch) well, will know how much I look forward to the lighter nights / clocks going to BST - and to celebrate this in 2010, we had a lunar eclipse on the Winter Solstice. It's not as spectacular or as rare as a total eclipse of the sun, but a fascinating display all the same - we weren't so lucky with the cloud cover last night, so here's a stunning time lapse from Florida.

Photographic Documentation Of A Space Shuttle Launch

The noisiest noise that man has made other than a nuke I guess - quite a long film, but has some stunning shots of a shuttle launch

Talking Piano

No tricks, it's a grand piano talking - its very eerie - shame about the german narrator.

"You SUCK At Photoshop" Series

By far the funniest and original tutorial series on YouTube - running over several episodes, Donnie Hoyle teaches viewers how to use Photoshop, but it's also an insight into his sad, sad life and how it falls apart. It won several Webby Awards in 2008, the first episode went live almost 3 years ago - so in the words of b3ta.com, its a bit GC - but then again, it deserves to be watched again and again.. full 20 episode playlist available to watch here

In the first tutorial, Donnie pulls a digital end-around on a restraining order and vandalizes a Vanagon.


In the second, Donnie shows you how to fix mistakes you've made.


In the third, Donnie makes a very big mistake go away.


There are 20 glorious episodes to watch, click here to see them all - but you MUST watch them in order!

Transformers 3 Trailer

15 years ago, a bloke I knew at Kingston University called Kevin started talking about something called "conspiracy theories" - in this he claimed that a lot of what we are told isn't the true. In his convincing ramblings, he talked about symbols on US Dollar notes, blood lines, why JFK was shot, free masons and as well as the moon landings being fake. It was interesting to a point, but I can clearly remember the moment he said that Neil Armstrong's first words weren't "One Small Step For Man, One Giant Leap For Mankind" (which as my father will endlessly point out should've been "One small step for A man, one giant leap for mankind, but hey, Neil's mind was probably elsewhere) but were actually "Oh look at all the buildings".

Anyway, many years later, Dan Brown wrote The Da Vinci Code, I wonder if Kevin was involved. Or if he was part of the team behind Transformers 3.

Meet Buck

This is beautifully animated - I'd love to see a music video made with this styling / feel, wouldn't you - or even a video game - anyway find out more about the team behind this here

"Buck is an ordinary guy. Well...if you except the "deer head" thing. And today, Buck is gonna spend this cool Sunday afternoon with his girlfriend who's so happy to see him (she's pretty much always happy). But when Buck find out that her father is not the sympathic and tolerant guy he excpected, the Sunday afternoon turns really bad"

Meet Buck from TeamCerf on Vimeo.

Thanks to taters on b3ta.com for spotting it

Making The Invisible Visible

Love creative advertising like this - so simple, clever but highly effective - how could you walk past this and not stop to look? No doubt be used by other larger brands very soon, but this is the work of Brothers and Sisters creative team Lisa Jelliffe and Kirsten Rutherford who teamed up with an anonymous German street art collective Mentalgassi, to create art installations called "Making the invisible visible" for Amnesty International.
This highlights the case of Troy Davis, a man who has been on death row for 19 years in the USA. Displayed on fence railings you see nothing but bars, his face only becomes visible from an angle. To find out more and to help Troy click here.



Thanks to The Cool Hunter

BBC: Woman Dials 999 To Report Snowman Theft

Absolutely amazing. "It's made of snow, I made it myself"


"A woman who dialled 999 to report the theft of a snowman from outside her home has been branded "completely irresponsible" by Kent Police.

The force said the woman, from Chatham, thought the incident required their involvement because she used pound coins for eyes and teaspoons for arms.

During the call the woman said: "It ain't a nice road but you don't expect someone to nick your snowman."

Click here to visit the BBC News Website to read more and listen to this fantastic phone call.

Melting Rock With Focused Sunlight

Absolutely amazing. Focused sunlight isn't just for burning twigs and scolding ants with a magnifying glass - this reaches temperatures in excess of 3500c "Nothing on Earth can withstand this" says the scientist from the Solar Furnace Research Facility in Southern France. So all this incredible energy from the Sun, is free?! Imagine what else you could do with it.

It's also amazing because I've always thought that the BBC's Bang Goes The Theory is a dumbed down version of the classic science program of yesterday, Tomorrow World, as well as a blatant copy of Mythbusters for those that don't have the Discovery channel.

Thanks to the fantastic Geekologie

The True Size Of Africa / Fun With Maps

LOVE this. Click here to see it in all its splender.

Lennart Green

One of my all time favourite clips, from the TED series of talks, this is rumpled Swedish doctor Lennart Green, who has definitely got that Tommy Cooper gene, the ability to make people laugh without really doing much. Oh, and whilst appearing to be rubbish at magic tricks. This is superb.

PVC Pipe Instrument (2.0)

Amazing what people get up too isn't it.. and the with internet, we can all watch. Found on b3ta.com. More info about the performer Snubby J click here

1,200 Hot Wheels

Incredible Pics From The International Space Station

On September 22, 2010, with the departure of the Expedition 23 crew, Colonel Douglas H. Wheelock assumed command of the International Space Station and the Expedition 25 crew. He is also known as @Astro_Wheels on twitter, where he has been tweeting pictures to his followers since he arrived at the space station.

Simply stunning photos from the ISS. Click here to see them all and read more from Astronaut Wheelock. Thanks also to J McNamara from Retrofuzz for posting them on Facebook.

Charlie's Finger Bite Has Been Watched Over 250million Times

Officially the most viral video of all time, "Charlie Bit My Finger" has now been watched over 250million times on YouTube, the moest watched video on YouTube of all time. Why? Why!

Here's YouTube's Top Ten Most Watched Videos Of All Time (as of 20/10/2010)
1. Charlie Bit My Finger Again! - 250,450,874 Views
2. Sneezing Panda - 85,581,204
3. Paul Sings Neesum Dorma HQ Version - 72,121,438
4. Coldplay "Viva La Vida" - 62,837,622
5. High School Musical 2 "Everyday" - 60,801,332
6. Dirty Dancing "Time Of My Life" - 57,465,403
7. Susan Boyle "Britain's Got Talent 2009" - 53,067,060
8. Queen "Bohemian Rhapsody" - 45,498,090
9. Very Angry Cat "Funny" - 37,572,642
10. The Ultimate Drunk People Compilation - 33,353,074

Hold on a second. What happened to Evolution Of Dance, I thought that was the most watched video of all time EVER?! Ah - here it is. 156,946,269 view. Well that makes it the 2nd most watched video of all time? Oh dear YouTube..

The Severn Bore From The Air

One of the things i'd love to see first hand, and coming from Malvern, which is only a few miles from the River Severn you'd think I would've done it regularly - nah, too busy walking on the hills. It's a tidal wave, and one that occurs regularly - find out more here. Beautifully shot video below - showing how fascinating the natural world is

Worldwide Teleport

Travel the world from the comfort of your keyboard.. visit MapCrunch - it'll randomly stick you somewhere in the world using Google's street view. For added time wasting, turn the location map off, and try and work out where the hell you are.. this is Yi Tung Road in Hong Kong;

Milk Crate Stop Frame Animation

Utterly Brilliant Marble Run

Bet he doesn't get much sleep..

John Cleese's Speech At Graham Chapman's Funeral

North Korea Military Parade

Beautifully shot this, its just asking to be made into a viral..

Free Running.. On Two Wheels

Blurring The Lines Between CGI & Reality

I remember watching an episode of BBC's Horizon program over 20 years ago, about the development of computer graphics, and the then incredible speed in which processors worked to conjure up the fantastic image of a ball rolling on a flat surface. Towards the end of the show it aired clips of Pixar's Luxo Jr, which compared to anything else at the time was absolutely breathtaking.



Computer animation has come a long way Toy Story, Shrek, Wall-E, Avatar.. now, watch this TV ad - it is entirely computer generated by Alex Roman from Third Seventh

Silestone -- 'Above Everything Else' from Alex Roman on Vimeo.

'Above Everything Else' found on Gizmodo

External Linking Annotations To SBE's Within YouTube Example

External annotations at the top of this video link through to SBE's (Significant Business Events) - the links themselves are trackable via Bit.ly - and as this demonstration shows, they work when this video is embedded outside of YouTube, and the viewer does not necessarily have to be logged in. This is only possible with YouTube's minimum advertising spend.