Jet’s have been screaming over the house and park all week in preparation and then during the Air and Water show here in Chicago. Its quite a display and just a bit frighting for the kids. But its certainly nothing compared to San Francisco’s Imperial Fleet Week!

Now, lets be clear, this is not a future vision, but its a cool example of rotoscoping and its a lot of fun. I’m a big fan of rotoscoping. It takes quite a bit of work to get it right, but done well, its highly convincing - which makes it an intriguing presentation tool for design innovators. The future is much less exotic than it is usually depicted. Its much more likely that the future is just layering on top of the present. Taking this perspective not only makes very convincing illustrations, but it also should help innovators to gut check their solutions.

Below, i’ve embedded the video done by First Avenue Machine which I’ve posted about before. You have probably seen their work lately in an AT&T commercial. But this video is their best by far and makes a future world shared with robotic devices very plausible indeed.

Its sooo Minority Report. Obscura Digital, the guys behind the Gorillaz holographic performances have created an amazing holographic interface, ostensibly for presentations but its performance that will benefit first. Its one of those ground breaking moments when something dreamed in science fiction becomes technically possible and the opportunities of use open up before our eyes.

Johnny Lee’s desktop VR (embedded above) is also one of those ground breaking visualization capabilities. And Johnny’s solution is something that I expect we will see applications for in the near term as the technology is available en mass today.

UPDATE The FaceAPI provides the same experience set up by Johnny Lee by using your existing webcam instead of the wonky (but cool) wiimote hack.

Joshua Klein suggests we should teach crows to do our dirty work. I can only imagine what Darpa could do with this one.

favorites at: TED.

Its certainly hard to discern propaganda from reality when it comes to the Military Industrial Complex. But the full scale model test footage sure adds that nice layer of reality. All I have to say is that I’m much happier watching this thing flying away from me.

via gizmodo

A solar home, off the grid. Michael Strizki built his house as a proof of concept and I’m sold. Its a great video that walks through his four step fail over. Solar electricity, overflows to battery storage, overflows to an electrolyzer that splits tap water into oxygen and hydrogen gas, which is stored as backup energy for winter months. Add in a geo-thermal cooling solution and Mike never has to go to his final fail over - the grid.

via materialicio.us

Ecovative Design plans to use fungus to replace styrofoam. Grown in forms and then dried, the fire retardant material can be used as a replacement for styrofoam packaging or as insulation boards. When you’re done, just throw it in the garden to feed the worms.

Closely related is the B-12 infused paper pulp cubes from earth friendly moving. A replacement for styrofoam peanuts, these smart little space fillers can also be thrown in the garden once you arrive at your new home, speeding the growth of those summer veggies.

via springwise.com.

One of my favorite TED talks this year (embedded above) - long in the middle but be sure to stay for the great finish. Paul Stamets: 6 ways mushrooms can save the world, is an amazing overview of his work. Paul suggests that mushrooms are the key to inoculate us from virulent flu, clean up brown fields, and produce enough econol to run our vehicles - among others. After 30 years of research I hope he decides to turn towards commercialization. Any VC’s listening?

via Ted

Ink jets have come a long way. From printing pics, to chips, the venerable technology is now being deployed in a larger scale for the creation of homes. A new fast drying concrete + a colossal ink jet x infrastructure innovation = a home in one day. Or so the thinking goes.

Printing your house is faster, cheaper, and more environmentally sound because it uses a fraction of the resources required in traditional construction, with very little waste.

via the next big thing

A Japanese firm, the Kajima Corporation, has developed a method to deconstruct a building one floor at a time. The support columns are cut and replaced by computer controlled jacks. Not the same shock and awe effect we seem to love here in the US, but purportedly 20% faster than cleaning up a pile of rubble and dust.

via pink tentacle

The app store opens in 3 days. Hence, Scanlife, an 8 year old company that will popularize for the US what is already emerging in Latin America, Europe and has been happening in future forward Japan for years.

Barcode readers through the smart phone camera will change traditional marketing and advertising forever. Why? Because that  $75,000K+ print ad in Vogue that your target customer just casually flipped past is no longer just expensive awareness branding. No, now with an integrated barcode, its a trigger. And your personal, widescreen, location-aware, network-enabled, media device is perfect for extending curiosity into engagement. 

whalla. (via techcrunch)