Freaky Flowers: Echinopsis Cacti in Bloom

Freaky Flowers: Echinopsis Cacti in Bloom from EchinopsisFreak on Vimeo.

A montage of a dozen types of Echinopsis cactus flowers blooming. And wilting. And just generally showing off their mind-blowing colors. My favorite cactus flowerings from the 2014 blooming season.

Echinopsis cactus flowers bloom overnight and the flowers last for only a day. Actually, the flowers are at their peak beauty for an hour or two at the most. That's what turned me from a cactus enthusiast into a cactus photographer ... the desire to try to preserve some aspect of their freaky beauty. Prior to becoming an Echinopsis addict a few years back, I had never owned a DSLR or image/video editing software.

The cacti shown in this video come from my collection. The evening when it looks like a plant's flowers are about to bloom, I bring it indoors to image. Most of the clips in this montage show approximately 8 hours of change as the flowers open and bloom. A little more than halfway through the montage, there's a series of three clips showing different views of a 24-hour period in the life of a yellow-flowered 'Daydream' plant. Six flowers that opened the night before I started filming wilt to nothingness and another 4 flowers grow dramatically and then open. This series of 'Daydream' clips is followed by another three showing other types of flowers wilting. These additional wilting clips are also taken over a daylong period.

The question I'm asked most often about my cactus flower still images and timelapses is whether I've "Photoshopped" them, that is, have I used editing software to juice things up and create the flowers' intense colors. I do, of course, use Photoshop and Lightroom and other editing software. But not in the way most suspect. Rather than using these tools to overstate reality, I actually use them to reduce the intensity of the colors my camera captures. I have reduced the color saturation in every timelapse clip in this video by a minimum of 10% and some ('Yes', 'Cabaret' and 'Antimatter') by 30% or more in order to have something that wasn't just completely blown out.

I hope you enjoy "Freaky Flowers" and invite you to contact me via my Vimeo account and/or visit echinopsisfreak.com where you'll learn more than you ever wanted to know about these cacti and also be able to reach me via a contact form should you wish.

The 2015 blooming season is just about to start now that April approaches and I hope to be posting new timelapses soon here at Vimeo.

Best! Greg

Video: Greg Krehel. 

Sound: "Chin Swee Sunset" with the permission of the artists O$P$ (Owe Money Pay Money) ... SoSolid Records

ORIGINAL: EchinopsisFreak

NASA Animation Shows Mount Etna "Breathing"

Photo credit: NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory

A “breathing” volcano sounds like something out of an ancient myth, but this animation of Mount Etna is very much the real deal

The incredible visualization from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory shows how the ground surrounding the volcano pulses and morphs as a result of changes in the volume of a shallow chamber about 5 kilometers (3 miles) below sea level.

The data from the animation was picked up by radar interferometry on the European Space Agency's ERS-1 and ERS-2 satellites. This technique is so sensitive, it can detect ground deformation within 2.8 centimeters (1.1 inches). 

Mount Etna, located on the island of Sicily, is one of Europe’s tallest active volcanoes at over 3,350 meters (10,990 feet). While on the whole its activity is fairly contained, it’s not without its temper tantrums. For example, in 1928 a particularly heavy flow of lava led to the near-total destruction of a town called Mascali.

The colored bar in the upper left corner of the video details how much the ground is falling in centimeters. Keep your eyes peeled for the red and yellow notches in the bottom right bar too. Each of these signify a volcanic eruption, with moderate eruption activity shown in yellow and strong ones shown in red.

ORIGINAL: IFLS

by Tom Hale

May 15, 2016

Conservation.org's video series "Nature is Speaking"

CONSERVATION INTERNATIONAL PRESENTS "NATURE IS SPEAKING"

STARRING

• LEE PACE as MOUNTAIN
• REESE WITHERSPOON as HOME
• LIAM NEESON as ICE
• JULIA ROBERTS as MOTHER NATURE
• HARRISON FORD as THE OCEAN
• KEVIN SPACEY as THE RAIN FOREST
• EDWARD NORTON as SOIL
• PENELOPE CRUZ as WATER
• ROBERT REDFORD as THE REDWOOD
• IAN SOMERHALDER as CORAL REEF
• LUPITA NYONG´O as FLOWER

ORIGINAL: Conservation.org

Robots are learning from YouTube tutorials

Do it yourself, robot. (Reuters/Kim Kyung-Hoon)

For better or worse, we’ve taught robots to mimic human behavior in countless ways. They can perform tasks as rudimentary as picking up objects, or as creative as dreaming their own dreams. They can identify bullying, and even play jazz. Now, we’ve taught robots the most human task of all: how to teach themselves to make Jell-O shots from watching YouTube videos.

Ever go to YouTube and type in something like, “How to make pancakes,” or, “How to mount a TV”? Sure you have. While many such tutorials are awful—and some are just deliberately misleading—the sheer number of instructional videos offers strong odds of finding one that’s genuinely helpful. And when all those videos are aggregated and analyzed simultaneously, it’s not hard for a robot to figure out what the correct steps are.

Researchers at Cornell University have taught robots to do just that with a system called RoboWatch. By watching and scanning multiple videos of the same “how-to” activity (with subtitles enabled), bots can 

• identify common steps, 
• put them in order, and 
• learn how to do whatever the tutorials are teaching.

Robot learning is not new, but what’s unusual here is that these robots can learn without human supervision, as Phys.Org points out.

Similar research usually requires human overseers to introduce and explain words, or captions, for the robots to parse. RoboWatch, however, needs no human help, save that someone ensure all the videos analyzed fall into a single category (pdf). The idea is that a human could one day tell a robot to perform a task and then the robot would independently research and learn how to carry out that task.

So next time you getting frustrated watching a video on how to change a tire, don’t fret. Soon, a robot will do all that for you. We just have to make sure it doesn’t watch any videos about “how to take over the world.”

ORIGINAL: QZ

BY Adam Epstein

December 22, 2015

"CHASING ICE" captures largest glacier calving ever filmed - OFFICIAL VIDEO

This rare footage has gone on record as the largest glacier calving event ever captured on film, by the 2016 Guiness Book of World Records. 

On May 28, 2008, Adam LeWinter and Director Jeff Orlowski filmed a historic breakup at the Ilulissat Glacier in Western Greenland. 

The calving event lasted for 75 minutes and the glacier retreated a full mile across a calving face three miles wide. 

The height of the ice is about 3,000 feet, 300-400 feet above water and the rest below water. 

Footage produced by James Balog (http://jamesbalog.com) and the Extreme Ice Survey (http://extremeicesurvey.org) 

Chasing Ice won the award for Excellence in Cinematography at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival and a 2013 Emmy Award for Outstanding Nature Programming. 

It has won over 40 awards at festivals worldwide, and was also nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song, "Before My Time" by J. Ralph featuring Scarlett Johansson and Joshua Bell. 

Listen to the song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qB4UEQzUmWc 

And watch the trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eIZTMVNBjc4 

ORIGINAL: Extreme Ice Survey

Dec 14, 2012

Founded in 2007 by James Balog, the Extreme Ice Survey (EIS) is an innovative, long-term photography program that integrates art and science to give a “visual voice” to the planet’s changing ecosystems. We believe that the creative integration of art and science can shape public perception and inspire action more effectively than either art or science can do alone.

EIS maintains an extensive portfolio of over one million single-frame photos celebrating the the art and architecture of ice. We have 43 Nikon cameras watching over 24 glaciers in Antarctica, Greenland, Iceland, Alaska, Canada, Austria, and the Rocky Mountains. Our cameras record changes in the glaciers every hour, year-round during daylight, and yield approximately 8,000 frames per camera per year. We combine these images intostunning time-lapse videos that reveal how quickly climate change is transforming large regions of our planet. Our pictorial archive serves as a visual legacy and provides a baseline—useful in years, decades and even centuries to come—for revealing how climate change and other human activity is dramatically impacting the planet.

EIS is a program of Earth Vision Institute (EVI). Visit the EVI Events page to track our traveling exhibition “ICE: Portraits of Vanishing Glaciers” and watch and share our videoswith your community. It is our work to share the ‘voice’ of the glaciers with you; if you are moved and inspired by what the glaciers have to say, please use your voice and share it.

Biomimicry by Tree TV

Biomimicry, the practice of looking deeply into nature for solutions to engineering, design and other challenges, has inspired a film about it's ground-breaking vision for creating a long-term, sustainable world. This film covers how mimicking nature solves some of our most pressing problems, from reducing carbon emissions to saving water. 

The film, titled "Biomimicry" features Janine Benyus, is brought to you by Leonardo DiCaprio, Executive Producers Oliver Stanton, directed by Leila Conners, produced by Mathew Schmid and Bryony Schwan, created by Tree Media with Executive Producers Roee Sharon Peled and George DiCaprio. 

For more information on Biomimicry: http://www.biomimicry.org 

For more on the film:http://www.treemedia.com

GREEN WORLD RISING SERIES

Green World Rising is a series of short films on the state of climate and solutions to the climate crisis. All the films of Green World Rising are for global distribution, free to the public and hold a Creative Commons License Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International. Green World Rising is brought to you by the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation and Tree Media Foundation. The series is narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio, presented by Thom Hartmann and directed by Leila Conners. Executive Producers are George DiCaprio, Earl Katz and Roee Sharon Peled, and produced by Mathew Schmid. All four films are now live and they are: Carbon, Last Hours, and Green World Rising and Restoration. 

ORIGINAL: Tree Media Foundation
Sep 11, 2015

"Apis Mellifera: Honey Bee" a high-speed short

Last week I wanted to film something in high-speed (I shoot something every week to keep it fresh).
 My Bullfrog film had done well on the internet and I wanted to step up and challenge myself. I have wanted to film bee's for quite a while and luckily for me there happened to be an apiary in my town. Allen Lindahl owner of hillsidebees.com stepped up and allowed me to film his hives. It was 92 degrees out (33°c) and the sun was bearing down, but I was told sunny days are when the bee's are most active. Without a bee outfit, I was ready to shoot. I was able to get pretty close to one of the hives (about one and a half feet) which was perfect for using the Canon 100mm Macro IS. I primarily filmed with the Canon 30-105mm Cinema zoom lens wide open. I also used a 300mm Tamron and a Nikon 50mm. I had my trusty Sound Devices Pix 240i as a field monitor and for recording ProRes via the HD-SDI out of the Photron BC2 HD/2K. It was very hard to track the bee's as they fly very fast and were getting a little bothered by how close I was to the hives. I was only stung three times which is pretty remarkable due to my proximity and my lens poking almost into the entrance way of the hive. I shot for approx 2.5 hours each day. It was so hot I got a pretty bad sunburn and the camera was hot enough to cook a fat porterhouse. There was a few moments that were intimidating when bee's started landing on my arms, face, in my ear and on my eye. I just stayed still and they went on their way with the exception of the three stings (1 on the arm, 1 on the neck and 1 under my ear). Bee's are actually quite docile and would prefer not to sting. They just want to make honey.

Shot/Dir/Edit by: Michael Sutton @MNS1974

Equipment used:

• Camera: Photron Fastcam BC2 HD/2K high-speed S35 camera system w/ custom trigger & batteries (1000-6800fps) 2K, HD (1080p & 720p) and SD
• Lenses: Canon 30-105mm Cine zoom, Canon 100mm Macro, Nikon 50mm, 300mm Tamron SP
• Recorder: Sound Devices Pix 240i w/ Sandisk CF cards
• Support: Kessler Crane Carbon Fiber Stealth, Manfrotto 516 head w/546GBK tripod

Music Licensed via:

• Licensor's Author Username: lacisz
• Licensee: Michael Sutton
• Song: Dubstep Drift
• audiojungle.net/item/dubstep-drift/4234563
• Item ID: 4234563
• Purchase Date: 2014-07-01 23:08:46 UTC

Special thanks to:

• Mike Cohen
• Allen Lindahl of Hillside Bee's
• Heather Sutton
• Eric Kessler and Chris Beller of Kessler Crane
• Contact: Michael Sutton
• website: frozenprosperity.com 
• email: mike at frozenprosperity dot com
• phone: listed on website
• twitter: @MNS1974 &@frozenpros

ORIGINAL: "Apis Mellifera: Honey Bee" a high-speed short
from Michael N Sutton / @MNS1974 on Vimeo.

Neil deGrasse Tyson Hosts “Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey” (at SXSW)

How did we discover the laws of nature? 
How did we find our coordinates in both space and time? 

“Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey” uses rich, epic storytelling to ignite our curiosity and inspire us to take a deeper interest in science and the world around us.

The series is hosted by astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, who will be delivering a SXSW Interactive keynote speech on Saturday, March 8th.

Three decades after the debut of “Cosmos: A Personal Voyage,” Carl Sagan’s scientific exploration of the universe, Executive Producer Seth MacFarlane is working with Sagan’s original creative collaborators to produce the series.

The television premiere will take place Sunday, March 9th, debuting simultaneously across 10 U.S. networks, including Fox and National Geographic Channel. National Geographic Channel will be airing Cosmos every Monday night at 10pm, which will include additional bonus footage and behind-the-scenes content.

Be the first to see it at the SXSW Film Festival on Friday, March 7th at the Paramount Theatre at 10pm, followed by a Q&A with Neil deGrasse Tyson.

ORIGINAL: SXSW

by Cori Burford

February 26, 2014

Video: Fish leaps to catch birds on the wing

The waters of the African lake seem calm and peaceful. A few migrant swallows flit near the surface. Suddenly, leaping from the water, a fish grabs one of the famously speedy birds straight out of the air.

Les Gibbon/Alamy. An African tigerfish caught on the Lower Zambezi River.

Source: Nature (see link below) 

“The whole action of jumping and catching the swallow in flight happens so incredibly quickly that after we first saw it, it took all of us a while to really fully comprehend what we had just seen,” says Nico Smit, director of the Unit for Environmental Sciences and Management at North-West University in Potchefstroom, South Africa.

After the images did sink in, he adds, “the first reaction was one of pure joy, because we realized that we were spectators to something really incredible and unique”.

This is the first confirmed record of a freshwater fish preying on birds in flight, the team reports in the Journal of Fish Biology1. Rumours of such behaviour by the African tigerfish (Hydrocynus vittatus), which has been reported as reaching one metre in length, have circulated since the 1940s. But Smit says that his team was “never really convinced by the anecdotal reports”. So, when they set out to study of the migration and habitat use of these animals in a South African lake in the Mapungubwe National Park, near the border with Botswana and Zimbabwe, they were not necessarily looking for fish flying out of the water.

Nevertheless, during their time at the lake, the researchers saw as many as 20 successful fish strikes on barn swallows (Hirundo rustica) every day. These ranged from pursuits by fish at the surface, followed by leaps, to direct attacks from deeper water.

Smit says that this remarkable behaviour has been under the radar until now because the study of freshwater fish in Africa is very limited. “We hope that our findings will really focus the attention on the importance of basic freshwater research, and specifically fish behaviour,” he adds.

    Nature
    doi:10.1038/nature.2014.14496

References
    O’Brien, G. C., Jacobs, F., Evans, S. W. & Smit, N. J. J. Fish Biol. 84, 263–266 (2014).

SOURCE: NATURE

Tigerfish swallows swallows after grabbing them out of the air over African lake.

Daniel Cressey

09 January 2014

ORIGINAL: Science Dump
by Jur
01/12/2014

Super hydrophobic surface and magnetic liquid in slow motion

The Slo Mo Guys are in the GE lab using nanotechnology to show you cool liquid physics at 2500fps.

Check out the cool video below

SOURCE: http://www.youtube.com/user/theslowmoguys?feature=watch

ORIGINAL: Science Dump

by Jur

01/09/2014

Eagle Steals Wildlife Camera From Crocs, Makes Its Own Viral Video

Just wait 'til the beak comes at you.
So this isn't exactly from the point of view of an eagle as much as it's from the point of view of an unlucky mouse. The Gooniyandi Rangers, an Australian Aboriginal group similar to American park rangers, inadvertently captured this video when a sea eagle stole one of their cameras and flew with it some 110 kilometers. They had originally set the motion-triggered camera by a river in hopes of catching some footage of crocodiles. Australian broadcaster ABC News has the story.

The rangers believe the eagle must have been young, because more experienced eagles normally drop captured prey from a great height to kill it, ABC News reports.

Our rookie eagle friend lives in the Kimberley region of western Australia, a tropical area the size of California that's home to many unique animal species.

ORIGINAL: Pop Science
By Francie Diep

12.03.2013

Alien Squid Footage Surfaces

(ANIMAL NEWS/OCEANS DISCOVERY) Rare video footage (from 2007) of an unusual squid has the Internet in a frenzy over alien conspiracy theories. The squid in question is a 26-foot-long Magnapinna squid, one of the most curious-looking ocean dwellers.

The squid was recorded by a remotely-operated underwater vehicle (ROV) in the Gulf of Mexico. The footage shows the rarely seen mysterious squid displaying its floor-length tentacles. Read on to find out more about this fascinating alien-like creature and watch the footage in the video clip below. — Global Animal

The Magnapinna squid was recorded by a remotely operated
underwater vehicle in the Gulf of Mexico. Photo credit: Shell Oil

Daily Mail, Victoria Woollaston

Lurking deep beneath the Gulf of Mexico is a species of squid that wouldn’t look out of place in a sci-fi thriller.

The Mangapinna squid, sometimes referred to as the bigfin or long-arm squid, is around 26ft in length with thin elastic tentacles thought to be between 15 to 20 times larger than the squid’s body.

Adult bigfins have never been captured or sampled but rare video footage recorded by the Shell Oil company reveals their alien-like behaviour.

The footage was captured using a remotely operated underwater vehicle known as an ROV.

Shell Oil, along with other companies, uses the vehicles to study the water around its oil rigs and this particular recording was filmed in the Gulf of Mexico in the Perdido Area of Alaminos Canyon.

The rare sighting of the squid was discovered at a depth of more than 7,800 ft back in November 2007.

Shell oil has a rig located 200 miles off the coast of Houston, Texas.

Mangapinna squids were first discovered in 1907 but it wasn’t until 1988 that the first footage of the bizarre creatures were caught on camera by a submersible off the coast of Brazil.

Ten years later a Japanese submersible called Shinkai 6500 filmed another long-armed squid in the Indian Ocean south of Mauritius.

Photo credit: Shell Oil

The majority of other sightings have been in various canyons in the Gulf of Mexico.

A squid spotted in 2000 was thought to have been around 23ft long.

However, more recent sightings have estimated lengths in excess of 26ft.

Aside from their overall lengths, the arms and the tentacles of the Mangapinna squid are the same length and look identical.

Squids traditionally have two shorter arms and eight longer tentacles.
These ten appendages of the Mangapinna are also often held at right angles to the body, or mantle, which gives them the appearance of having elbows.

The arms and tentacles are said to stretch up to 20 times longer than the mantle while the fins are larger than other species and in some sightings were around 90 per cent as big.

It is thought the squids use their long arms to grab or trap food along the floor of the ocean, although this has never been seen in action.

Watch the squid footage in the video below.

ORIGINAL: Global Animal
By Sonia Horon 

November 21, 2013

Google+ Hangouts goes HD as it switches from H.264 to VP8. Next up, WebRTC.

ORIGINAL: GigaOm

by Janko Roettgers

Oct 28, 2013

SUMMARY:

Google is adding HD video quality to its video chats. But the upgrade isn’t just about looks: It’s part of a bigger move towards open standards and a plugin-free video chat experience.

Noticed any differences when using Google’s Hangouts video chat lately? If you did, then you may be one of the lucky users who has already received an upgrade to 720p HD video. The company quietly started to roll out HD for Hangouts to a subset of its users in the last few weeks and hopes to complete the rollout soon. But the change isn’t just a quality upgrade – it’s part of a bigger move towards open standards that will eventually bring us video chat in the browser without the need for any plugins.

To enable HD, and prepare for this plugin-free future, Google quietly started to transition Hangouts from the H.264 video codec to VP8, an open and royalty-free video codec the company released back in 2010. Google’s Vice President of Engineering Chee Chew told me during a recent interview that the switchover from H.264 to VP8 should be more or less invisible to consumers, with some possibly noticing a little less choppiness. “It will be cleaner, better video,” Chew said.

One of the key advantages of VP8 is that it will enable Hangouts in HD, something that Chew said simply wasn’t possible with H.264, because handling HD streams from 10 participants would have required too much processing power. The new video format also makes it possible for Google to serve up better-looking streams at low bit rates, which is especially important when it comes to mobile video chats.

What birthday hats have to do with the future of video chat

But the move to VP8 isn’t just about looks. It’s also a first step towards letting users video chat in the browser without the need for any plugins, thanks to an emerging standard for real-time audio and video communication called WebRTC. Google has been a big proponent of WebRTC, and integrated it into the desktop and Android versions of its Chrome browser.

The company hinted at plans to utilize WebRTC for Hangouts when it launched the video chat platform two years ago. So what took Google so long? Chew told me that the Hangouts team first concentrated on optimizing the experience for end users, and that the standard had to mature. But there were also less obvious problems that have so far prevented Google from fully embracing WebRTC for Hangouts. Yes, we are talking about birthday hats, scuba glasses and cat whiskers.

Hangouts have for some time offered users the ability to apply silly effects to their video chats. These effects, which use facial recognition to make sure that the cartoon birthday hat is actually on top of your head, are rendered on the sender’s client side, and there’s currently no easy way to do this with WebRTC. “We will eventually move over to WebRTC,” said Chew, but this process may take several more months.

However, eventually, WebRTC could actually provide an even more immersive video chat experience, explained Chew. That’s because when the video becomes a native HTML element, it will be even easier to add overlays and other, more subtle improvements.

No more third-party code to run Hangouts chats

One of the more immediate consequences of the switch-over to VP8 is that Google is phasing out the use of third-party code provided by the video conferencing technology vendor Vidyo. Google started licensing technology from Vidyo back in 2008 when it first brought video chat to Google Talk, and the companies continued to cooperate when Google launched Hangouts and eventually absorbed Talk and other messaging clients in that platform.

Talk and Hangouts relied on Vidyo’s implementation of the H.264 codec as well as the company’s scalable video coding technology, which essentially allowed Google to seamlessly switch to a lower bitrate in the case of network congestion.

With the move to VP8, all of that is being replaced – but Vidyo CEO Ofer Shapiro actually seemed understanding of Google’s motives when I talked to him about the switch this week. “The need to install something is somewhat of a barrier” to the use of video chat, he acknowledged, adding that a royalty-free codec like VP8 was promising as well.

That’s why, moving forward, Vidyo actually wants to support WebRTC and open video codecs. The company is announcing Wednesday that it will contribute client-side scalable video coding technology to VP9, the next generation of Google’s open video codec. Vidyo will also cooperate with Google to incorporate some of its technology into enterprise versions of Hangouts. Both companies haven’t said yet what exactly they’re working on, but it’s possible that Google would want to make more inroads in the corporate world to take on traditional video conferencing vendors.

Codecs, browsers, standards: welcome to a hybrid world

Google wants to switch over all of its users to VP8 by the end of next week and add the ability to do HD Hangouts soon after. However, the complete switch-over to VP8 may take a bit longer. Mobile clients can’t be forced to upgrade, so there will be some time in which VP8 and H.264 coexist — what Chew called a “hybrid world.”

Add caption

That pattern will likely repeat once Google moves Hangouts to WebRTC in a few months. Chrome, Firefox and Opera support WebRTC natively, but Microsoft has actually been trying to push for a different take on the standard that isn’t based on the VP8 video codec, and Apple has given no indication that Safari will ever support WebRTC. “Some browsers will have the plugin to fall back on,” acknowledged Chew, but others will be able to run Hangouts completely without a plugin.

Eventually, he hopes that all users will be able to start their video chats in their web browsers without the need to download any additional software. “The role of the plugin will diminish,” he said.

Updated at 7:40am with additional details on the timeline for the HD and VP8 rollout.

WebRTC logo image courtesy of Flickr user Tsahi Levent-Levi.

Elise Andrew on Dog Lions, Jetpacks and more! - IFLS

ORIGINAL: IFLS

Would you be fooled into thinking a dog is a lion? Kids ever bug you so much you want to consume them? How about your very own personal jetpack?! Elise Andrew brings all that and more this week on I F#!&ing Love Science!

Join Elise each week to see the all the latest and greatest stories from the lighter side of science, including popular science, space, biology, nature, and more.

Learn more about the topics discussed in this episode:

Jetpacks:
http://news.discovery.com/tech/jetpac...

http://martinjetpack.com/video-galler...

Brains:
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3...

Beetles:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland...

Exoplanet:
http://www.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/ke...)

http://iopscience.iop.org/0004-637X/7...

New mammal:
http://www.pensoft.net/journals/zooke...

Zoo Dog:
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/weird-ne...


=======================

Subscribe now! http://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvOTg...

Watch on TestTube: http://testtube.com/iflscience

http://facebook.com/ifeakinglovescience

https://twitter.com/iflscience

http://twitter.com/elise_andrew

For more awesome science, check out Brain Stuff:
http://bit.ly/155hEIv

Also be sure to check out DNews:
http://bit.ly/WHH2Mc

The Life of flowers Timelapse 1080p

ORIGINAL: Vladimir Vorobyov

Tribute to Imagination True Colors V3a

ORIGINAL: Dominique BOULAY

This video is a pale copy of TRUE COLORS PRESHOW by KODAK which was presented few years ago in most DISNEYLAND PARC.

(EPCOT, PARIS ...)

The original text and soundtrack were finding on many Internet Site.

The soundtrack is a specific version of the song "True colors" of Cindy LOPER. 

Pictures and effects using are not exactly the same as the original show. 

The source of pictures are from WallBase.cc and some other internet site. 

Not having found on the Internet the original good quality video, it is what motivated me to create this new version.

Un maravilloso ejemplo local de transformación a la educación

ORIGINAL: ParqueSoft

Nahko Bear (Medicine for the People) ღ Aloha Ke Akua

ORIGINAL: http://nahko.com

Oregon-native Nahko, born a mix of Apache, Puerto Rican, and Filipino cultures and adopted into an American family, suffered an identity crisis from an early age. But the unifying power of music entered his life as a healing remedy, when he took up the piano at age six. Armed with his new found talent, he set out to bridge the cultural gaps dividing his own psyche and began producing a public, musical journal of his journey toward personal, spiritual, and communal healing.

From his hometown of Portland to the shores of Hawaii or Bali, wherever he has traveled, Nahko is joined by a tribe of culturally alienated truth seekers for whom Nahko’s story resonates with their own, and who find redemption in his voice, guitar, flute, and drum. Whether solo or with the dynamic group of musical troubadours known as “Medicine for the People,” Nahko delivers a soulful dose of curative vibrations that moves audiences to dance, laugh, and cry. His ‘spirited redemption music’ lays bear the scars of cultural wounds, environmental wrongs, and social injustices. His lyrics bear the burden of heavy messages, but the load is lightened by agile melodies and driving rhythms that coerce all who bear witness into spirited, purifying, movement. His humor disarms, and his lyrical stories open listeners to the power of “Real Talk Music”—songs that reveal an honesty and depth so raw, it inspires an internal revival that echoes out into the world. Sometimes exuberant, sometimes savage, but always transformational, Nahko makes the movement move.

TEDxSF - Louie Schwartzberg - Gratitude

ORIGINAL: TEDxSF

Louie Schwartzberg is an award-winning cinematographer, director, and producer whose notable career spans more than three decades providing breathtaking imagery for feature films, television shows, documentaries and commercials.

This piece includes his short film on Gratitude and Happiness. Brother David Steindl-Rast's spoken words, Gary Malkin's musical compositions and Louie's cinematography make this a stunningly beautiful piece, reminding us of the precious gift of life, and the beauty all around us.

As a visual artist, Louie has created some of the most iconic and memorable film moments of our time. He is an innovator in the world of time-lapse, nature, aerial and "slice-of-life" photography - the only cinematographer in the world who has literally been shooting 24 hours a day, 7 days a week continuously for more than 30 years.

Louie was recognized as one of the top 70 Cinematographers for the On Film Kodak Salute Series. He is a member of the Directors Guild of America and the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences.

Louie is credited by many with pioneering the contemporary stock footage industry by founding Energy Film Library, a global company with a network of 12 foreign offices, which was acquired by Getty Images in 1997. Motion picture clients of his cinematic artistry include Sex in the City, The Bourne Ultimatum, Die Hard 4, Syriana, Crash, Men in Black and classics such as American Beauty, Koyaanisqatsi and E.T. among others. 

Louie went on to found BlackLight Films, a creative production company specializing in producing original theatrical feature, large format films, HD and TV programming.

In 2004, BlackLight Films completed production of the theatrical feature film, America's Heart & Soul, distributed theatrically by Walt Disney Pictures. In 2006, BlackLight Films completed a series of HD shorts, Louie Films, for the launch of Buena Vista Home Entertainment's Blu-Ray DVD releases. In 2007, the company produced a 1-hour special, Chasing the Light, which aired nationally on PBS.

Past projects include the 35mm film Seasons of the Vine for Disney's California Adventure Theme Park and a 26-half hour series, America!, for The Hallmark Channel.

Louie has won two Clio Awards for Best Environmental Broadcast Spot, an Emmy nomination for Best Cinematography for the Discovery Channel Special, Oceans of Air, and the Heartland Film Festival's Truly Moving Picture Award for Walt Disney Pictures' feature film release America's Heart & Soul. 

Louie completed production on a feature length nature documentary, Wings of Life, to be theatrically released worldwide, under Walt Disney Pictures' new production banner, Disneynature. The film was released in France (March 2011) under the title Pollen and won the Roscar Award for Best Cinematography at the 2011 Wild Talk Africa Film Festival. 

Louie spoke at the TED 2011 conference in Long Beach, CA and has been a regular presenter at the annual Bioneers Conference in San Francisco. Currently, Louie is in production with National Geographic to produce Hidden Worlds, a 3D Imax film.

event video by: http://repertoireproductions.com/

The Climate Reality Project – Colombian coffee on the frontline

ORIGINAL: CIAT

by Neil Palmer

19 December, 2012

It was probably only a matter of time before the names Andy Jarvis, Peter Laderach and Al Gore appeared in the same sentence.

So it’s great to see that a recent documentary about climate change and smallholder coffee production in Colombia finally unites these two beacons of CIAT’s climate change research with the former US Vice President, Nobel Laureate and climate change activist.

Aired as part of The Climate Reality Project – founded and chaired by Mr Gore himself – the five-minute film featured in a recent 24-hour online stream of specially-commissioned climate change documentaries and panel discussions, aimed at raising awareness of climate change and building a global movement to tackle it. Last year 9 million people tuned in to watch.

In advance of this year’s broadcast, Andy, Peter and a film crew from the Project travelled to Colombia’s Cauca department, to lift the lid on the impacts of climate change on coffee production there. To watch it, click the screen above and scroll to 05:28. You’ll almost certainly recognise a few familiar faces from our 2010 photofilm series Two Degrees Up, as well as seeing Andy and Peter in action. Mr Gore is part of the panel discussion that immediately follows the documentary.