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Posts Tagged ‘Tracks’

Auschwitz Museum urges visitors to not be disrespectful by taking selfies on the train tracks

24 Mar

Train track, in operation May–October 1944, leading through the gate to the gas chambers at Auschwitz II-Birkenau

The Auschwitz Museum has asked visitors to be more respectful after an upsurge of pictures posted on social media showing people posing on the train tracks that lead to the main gate. The Museum is concerned that the tracks, which brought over a million people to their death in the camp during WWII, are being used as a photo opportunity with some visitors losing sight of what they represent.

The Museum used its Twitter page to urge those posting on social media to respect the memory of those who died there, stating that ‘There are better places to learn how to walk on a balance beam than the site which symbolizes deportation of hundreds of thousands to their deaths.’ The posting is accompanied by a collection of images showing people walking along the tracks apparently oblivious to where they are.

Speaking to the Business Insider website the museum’s press officer, Pawel Sawicki, said that posting pictures of people disrespecting the site wasn’t intended to shame them ‘but to raise awareness. People have to be aware of the nature of the place they visit.’

Searching under the hashtag #Auschwitz on most social media sites, such as Instagram above, demonstrates the prevalence of the behaviour the museum objects to, with those posing for pictures seeming to have forgotten what occurred at the camps during the Holocaust.

For more information see the Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial and museum website.


Photo credit: Nelson Pérez, used under CC BY-SA 3.0

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
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This Samsung infographic tracks the evolution of the camera phone

10 Mar

With a variable aperture, super-slow-motion and (in the case of the Plus model) a dual-camera setup, Samsung’s newly announced flagship smartphones Galaxy S9 and S9 Plus put a lot of emphasis on camera features and performance. But, of course, this is far from Samsung’s first foray into camera phone tech.

Samsung has long been at the forefront of mobile imaging, and to visualize this fact, the company has released am infographic that puts its camera phone innovations onto a timeline of the past 18 years.

The graphic starts with Samsung’s first camera phone—the SCH-V200—which was launched in 2000 and allowed you to shoot and store up to 20 0.11MP images (you still needed a computer to view them, though). From there, it move on to a number of flip-style feature phones and smartphone classics, such as the first Galaxy S or the Galaxy S4 Zoom.

As you would expect, the infographic ends with the new Galaxy S9 models, but it includes technical data and interesting tidbits about all the featured phones—well worth a closer look for anyone interested in tech history. Check it out for yourself below:

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
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Bokeh Market site tracks used camera market value, offers alerts on price changes

11 Nov

A new website called Bokeh Market aims to take some of the work out of buying and selling used camera gear by providing users with real-time market value info. The website, which is free to use, provides a graph showing an item’s value over time, its individual seller rating and, when possible, its trusted seller value. The site also culls active listings for the item from various online destinations, including eBay and B&H Photo.

The website is search-based, meaning users search for the gear they’re interested in. Though an account isn’t necessary to use the Bokeh Market, registering one allows users to create their own gear list, making it easier to see its value. Additionally, accounts can be used to get price alerts for specific items and to create bundles of items, the value of which is provided based on Bokeh Market’s data.

Via: PetaPixel

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
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Trainspotting Hotel: Stacked Shipping Containers Overlook the Rail Tracks

16 May

[ By SA Rogers in Boutique & Art Hotels & Travel. ]

The phrase ‘Trainspotting Hotel’ probably doesn’t conjure visions of a cozy, comfortable and safe place to lay your head at night, but this hotel gets its nickname from its location overlooking rail tracks rather than anything relating to the heroin-charged cult classic film. Obviously, that’s a good thing for guests who want to enjoy a peaceful getaway on the Elbe River near the town of Litomerice, Czech Republic at this unusual pop-up structure by Artikul Architects. 

The hotel is comprised of just three shipping containers, with one forty-foot crate stacked atop two twenty-foot crates in a perpendicular arrangement to create a covered space underneath. The two ground-floor containers house the bathrooms, storage and one of the guest rooms, while four more guest accommodations are set into the top layer.

The client commissioned Artikul to produce a modular design that can be easily taken apart and moved when desired, and would have a light footprint on the land. The hotel has its own built-in water reservoir for the showers and sinks, and utilizes waterless toilets, and the bedrooms are compact but warm and welcoming, fitted with bunk beds and lined with birch plywood.

Artikul is known for producing sustainable structures, so it’s no surprise that they did something creative using recycled and natural materials. Barely any modification to the containers was necessary, preserving the ability to load them onto a truck. The top container is sheathed in reclaimed wood and features a terrace and awning so guests can hang out in the open air and enjoy the views.

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[ By SA Rogers in Boutique & Art Hotels & Travel. ]

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Photographers react with outrage at National Geographic train tracks photo

14 Apr

‘Don’t take photos on train tracks.’

If you feel like you’ve been hearing this message a lot lately, it’s because you have. And it bears repeating because apparently, it hasn’t gotten through. Not even a month after another tragic, well-publicized incident, National Geographic is coming under fire for posting a photo of a woman standing on train tracks at sunset to its Instagram account.

One more time for everyone in the back: Don’t take photos on train tracks.

Taking photos on active train tracks, or putting your subjects on train tracks, is illegal and dangerous. As a recent Today Show segment reminded us, despite their size trains are surprisingly quiet and may not be heard until it’s too late.

Plenty of Nat Geo’s Instagram followers have apparently heard the message and taken it to heart, judging by the numerous negative comments posted in response to the photo. But many other commenters are expressing approval, and the photo has well over 485,000 likes. Regardless of the circumstances surrounding this particular photo, publishing it to a much-respected and much-followed account could lead others to think taking this kind of photo is a good idea.

Unfortunately, there are many, many examples of why this is not a good idea. 

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

 
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Commuter Olympics: Indoor Running Tracks Link Japanese Airport

13 Apr

[ By WebUrbanist in Design & Guerilla Ads & Marketing. ]

japanese airport terminal tracks

Combining a novel form of wayfinding with a nod to the upcoming 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, this new airport terminal trades moving walkways for a color-coded circuit of racetrack paths.

japan indoor running track

japan domestic international terminal

The airport extension to Narita International anticipates the additional capacity needed in a few years for the upcoming event but also reflects a limited budget for expansion, together driving a design that needs no illuminated signs and skips people-moving devices.

japan walking running

japan olympics promotion

japan wayfinding system

Blue leads to departures and red takes people to arrivals – a simple scheme but easily visible when set against the more monotone surrounding interiors. The collaborative project featured contributions by PARTY with consultants from Nikken (photography by Kenta Hasegawa).

japan airport furniture

japan blue red departures

japan race track path

Of course, we all know the experience of being late for takeoff – beyond its aesthetics, it could indeed prove quite useful to have fast and slow lanes during busy times and for those whose commutes demand they make their plane in time.

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Set Sail on Rail: Quirky Vehicles Explore Abandoned Tracks

26 Oct

[ By Steph in Technology & Vehicles & Mods. ]

abandoned railroad vehicles 1

Before the abandoned railroad tracks of Paris officially disappear – which is bound to happen, as cities realize the potential for reclamation as High Line-style parks – some intrepid locals are taking the opportunity to explore. “Train Project” by French design studio HeHe is a series of fun, quirky handmade vehicles that traverse the city on a line that most local residents never get to experience firsthand.

abandoned railroad vehicles 3

The autonomous vehicles include ‘Metronome’ and ‘M-Blem,’ two transparent, cylindrical solar-powered electric vehicles, and the sailboat-inspired ‘Radeau de Sauvetage.’ HeHe also developed additional vehicles made for train tracks in other cities, like an individual transport system to transfer objects from one place to another in Slovakia, and a one-person platform making use of the urban tracks in Istanbul.

abandoned railroad vehicles 2

HeHe calls The Train Project “an ongoing body of speculative investigation into the language and aesthetics of transport culture,” proposing personal rail travel as “a temporary, imaginative solution to question our industrialized conscience in relation to locomotion.”

abandoned railroad vehicle 5

abandoned railroad vehicle 6

The collective invited members of the public to travel on the vehicles, “journeying through space and time to experience the past and future of local transportation networks.” The idea is to take a picturesque trip through areas of the city that can’t be seen from the roads, reclaiming spaces that have been left to deteriorate until they’re inevitably integrated back into the functional urban landscape.

Custom-Railroad-Exploration-Car-1-644x429

A similar project (above) explored sections of the 5,500-plus miles of abandoned railroad tracks in Mexico with the retro-futuristic SEFT-1, modeled after a midcentury vision of a spaceship.

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[ By Steph in Technology & Vehicles & Mods. ]

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Trained Eye: Rail Art Plays Visual Tricks with Tracks & Ties

04 Aug

[ By WebUrbanist in Art & Street Art & Graffiti. ]

train art rail music

This artist colors outside the lines (or off the rails, if you will) with his clever train-centric creations, dashing onto the tracks to complete pieces that play with the site-specific transit infrastructure in public places.

train painting hand shake

train graffiti scary jump

Portuguese artist Artur Bordalo (AKA Bordalo II) works in and around the train lines, using what is there as props and backdrops for his colorful compositions, turning them into musical lines, extended arms or text underlines.

train on off art

bordalo train tick tac toe

train outside the lines

Many of these are necessarily quickly-executed pieces, placed as they are around active train tracks, while others use abandoned railways and include three-dimensional objects in the mix.

bardalo wall apple mixed

bardalo installation art

bardalo mixed media art

We would be remiss not to mention his other works of urban installation art, often vibrant and including mixed-media elements drawn together, collaged and montaged from their environments (often including garbage and even its receptacles).

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Tramboarding: Hacked Wooden Pallet Slides Down Rail Tracks

15 Jul

[ By Steph in Technology & Vehicles & Mods. ]

Tramboarding 1

Four wheels fixed onto an ordinary wood pallet have transformed it into a skateboard of sorts that can slide down tram tracks in Bratislava, Slovakia. The rails in the city happen to be just the right width to fit a standard Europallet perfectly, turning the humble warehouse staple into a personal vehicle.

Tramboarding 4

Tramboarding 5

While the streetcar systems of many cities run on wider ‘broad gauge’ tracks, Bratislava is among those with a one-meter width. Other cities where the pallet tram hack would work include Antwerp, Basel, Belgrade, Bern, Frankfurt, Helsinki and Zurich. Watch it in action at Vimeo.

Tramboarding 3

Tramboarding 2

Slovakian artist Tomas Moravec says of his project, “A new transport vehicle brings change into the spatial perspective of a passenger in motion and generally changes the life of the city, through which the pallet can run, guided by a map of the city lines.”

Tramboarding 6

Where pallets were once used just a couple times and then thrown away, now they’re reclaimed for all sorts of projects, often requiring very little modification. Check out 13 DIY pallet projects for porch swings, home theaters and garden trellises, as well as 19 more clever pallet creations.

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Inventionland Offices: From Tree Houses to Race Tracks

17 Jan

[ By Steph in Architecture & Offices & Commercial. ]

Inventionland Creative Offices Main

If your office was a pirate ship, would you be more or less likely to slack off? The incredible offices of Inventionland design factory in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania look more like a theme park or movie sound stage than a workplace, keeping their employees inspired to come up with creative ideas of their own. Inventionland invents nearly 2,000 new items every year, putting out one product every three days.

Inventionland Race Track Office

Inventionland Race Track Office 2

Inventionland Cave Office

The 70,000-square-foot space is divided into 16 different ‘sets’, each with a unique theme of its own. There’s a race track with a distinctive checkered pattern, elevated like a miniature arena, with the desks in the center. Caves provide peaceful work spaces for those who need isolation to perform at their best.

Inventionland Castle Office

Inventionland Castle Office 2

Inventionland Treehouse Office

Inventionland Treehouse Office 2

A massive castle has a sense of highly polished Disney-esque luxury, while a treehouse and a waterfall offer tranquil getaways of the sort most cubicle-dwellers only dream of.

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Inventionland Offices From Tree Houses To Race Tracks

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