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2012

November 18th, 2008

2012 is a new movie coming out next summer about the end of the world (starring John Cusack, of course. Who better to break the news?)

Brilliant trailer.
Music from The Shining (says Kottke.)

I used to have recurring nightmares about giant waves. Still do occasionally.

IH010586| Standard RM| © CORBIS
A man (see arrow) is about to be killed by a tsunami as it sweeps over Hilo’s Pier 1 on April 1, 1946. This man was one of 159 people killed by the wall of water, which was set off by an earthquake in the Aleutian Islands which registered 7.3 on the Richter scale.

HT002259| Standard RM| © Historical Picture Archive/CORBIS
Under the Wave off Kanagawa by Hokusai

© Burstein Collection/CORBIS
Storm on the Sea of Galilee by Rembrandt van Rijn

N-188-0178| Standard RM| © Steve Wilkings/CORBIS

BE087997| Standard RM| © Bettmann/CORBIS
Image of the Mayan calendar.


Unrelated, I found this image while browsing “ocean enormous”.
What an incredible scene.

42-15367601| Standard RM| © Bettmann/Corbis

SS United States Arrives in Manhattan
A huge cordon of tugs accompanies the new superliner United States past the New York skyline, June 23, as the 73 million dollar passenger ship completes her shakedown cruise from Newport News, Va. New York gave the new queen of the nation’s merchant fleet a royal welcome upon her arrival, turning out helicopters, fireboats, and blimps for the occasion. At Pier 86, West 46th Street, Moran tugs completed the entire docking operation in 25 minutes.

New image - First of Firsts

November 4th, 2008

Sorry for the lag in updates.

New Image - Space Face

October 8th, 2008

new image - contender

October 2nd, 2008

wherein tom waits..

October 2nd, 2008

.. makes you wish you had a little more personality.

Eiffel

October 2nd, 2008

↑Gorgeous shot of Eiffel in his workshop. Click for a slightly larger view.

Original caption:
Gustave Eiffel is shown in his work room, experimenting with aerodynamic balance to find the exact pressure of the tower against the four caissons which support the four huge piers. Interest in the Eiffel Tower, called one of the seven wonders of the modern age, has been revived because of France’s plans to honor the great designer and builder of the forerunner to the skyscraper. The huge tower, 984.25 feet high, and completed in 1889, is still the tallest structure built by man. On April 29, the City of Paris will unveil a monument and bust of Eiffel by the famous sculptors, Auguste Perret and Andre Granet, erected at the base of the Tower. Eiffel is known as a great visionary and was forced to battle against architects and others of the time, who said the wind would destroy his tower, as that of Babel was destroyed. Since its completion in 1889, 13,153,921 pers

Apolitycs

October 1st, 2008

Just watched a short documentary on child soldiers in the Sudan.

Andre Roussimoff

October 1st, 2008

RIP Paul Newman

September 27th, 2008


↑ 30th Annual Academy Awards. Newman’s wife, Joanne wins Best Actress of the Year Award for her work on The Three Faces of Eve.


↑ From Somebody Up There Likes Me.


↑ in Harper.


↑ From Winning


↑ Debating Charlton Heston on nuclear power freeze.
Video of the debate


Newman on racing.

A couple quick anecdotes which I think summarize the man fairly well:

Newman’s film career almost ended with his first movie — he considered his performance in the sword-and-sandal 1954 drama “The Chalice” so mediocre he paid for a page-size ad in a Hollywood trade publication to apologize.

(From Brietbart)

Newman’s Own regularly receives — and rebuffs — acquisition offers from larger companies, and it always raises profits by more than 10 percent annually. How big can the enterprise become? To Mr. Hotchner, the idea of watching Newman’s Own double in size over the next few years is particularly appealing. ”Think of what we could do with the money,” he says.

Mr. Newman thinks this over, rocking harder on the creaking swing. ”I just want to be able to give away more than Dick Cheney got in tax relief,” he says. ”That’s what I want.” And after a slight dramatic pause, he and Mr. Hotchner burst out laughing.

(From the NY Times)

He will be missed.

new image - Ruby

September 26th, 2008

Named for Ruby, the painting elephant.

New image - Emo

September 25th, 2008

What’s this, then?

September 23rd, 2008

This is the press release that was sent out this morning.
It’s fairly self explanatory.

On a personal note, the motivations behind Schtock are genuine. The Corbis library is inspiring to say the least, and I will continue to make posts and updates to both the site and the blog for as long as I am able.



/ For immediate release

Schtock.com

Agency:
General Projects

Brief:
As a newly formed design shop, General Projects launched with a self-assigned first project – to get the attention of Corbis and eventually turn that into a client relationship. This was done by launching a faux-viral campaign online with the intention of getting the Corbis name in front of as many members of their target audience as possible on a limited budget.

Schtock.com posed itself as the brain-child of a stock photo employee who cataloged images for a living. Inspired by the photos that crossed his desk on a daily basis, he “couldn’t help but play around.” Schtock was the result of these visual experiments. While Corbis was never overtly mentioned in order to maintain the plausibility of the site’s motivations, the photos used were of such a nature that they could only be found in their deep library of both contemporary and historical images. As the site was updated daily with new images and blog posts, it was launched via personal emails sent to select sites. The blogosphere was actively encouraged to believe that Corbis was the source of the campaign by way of clues that were left around the site, driving up traffic and intrigue.

Results:
- Mentioned on over 150 separate sites, putting the Corbis brand in front of over 200,000 viewers over the course of 4 days.
- Over 20,000 unique visitors to the site itself during just 4 days.
- Positive feedback across the board:

“Schtock: Modern Day Folk Hero”
- Veer

“Of course it’s viral advertising. Smart too.”
- Comment, PDN Magazine

“I hope this blog becomes so popular that the company this person works for, sponsors it or lets him list the company’s name, such a great advertisement for their images.”
- Hero Design Studio

“Possibly suspect, but one of the most interesting links i’ve seen on here for a while”
- Comment, QBN.com

“..whether this is just some guy who get’s bored at work, or a genius marketing campaign, it seems to be stirring up the design blog world.”
- Design Fix

“STOP getting hung up on the idea that video is the only thing that can be ‘viral.’ [Here are] examples that border on guerilla, experiential, interactive, whatever. First, for Corbis, check out schtock stock.”
- Make The Logo Bigger

Images
See select Schtock images attached

About General Projects:
General Projects is a full-service design agency that focuses on highly original marketing concepts with limited budgets.

While a partner at his previous firm, Fwis, General Projects founder Ben Pieratt launched such projects as Readymech, The Covers Blog, The Museum of Art for the Arts, and Readycam.

CD: Ben Pieratt
Dev: Eric Jacobsen

Relevant URLs:
http://general-projects.com
http://schtock.com
http://blog.schtock.com

- -
http://readymech.com
http://covers.fwis.com
http://corbis.readymech.com
http://mofaa.org

___________________________

Ben Pieratt
Creative Director
General Projects

general-projects.com
pieratt.com

Cell: +1 978 / 491-7637
Fax: +1 978 / 231-0407

New Schtock image - Tricky Dick

September 22nd, 2008

Graphs, Charts, etc

September 22nd, 2008


“A radically new theory “that the universe began in an explosion of an original single gigantic atom 10 billion years ago..”


↑ This was done in 1984. Nice.


↑ golf balls from the 1800s

No new images today

September 18th, 2008

Sorry. In meetings.

really nice critique of Schtock

September 18th, 2008

What I Learned in Design School has done a great job of breaking down my site and letting me know what can be improved. There’s some keen insight into the information architecture and user interface. I’d encourage anyone who’s interested in that sort of thing to go give it a read.

Great group shots

September 18th, 2008


↑ The National Geographic Society. That’s Alexander Graham Bell on the far right, first row.


↑ The Sex Pistols. Great caption for this one: Punk rock group Sex Pistols start a four letter television storm. Viewers jammed a television companies switchboard after an interview by TV personality Bill Grundy with the punk rock group Sex Pistols ended in a string of swear words.


↑ The Stooges circa Wanna Be Your Dog


↑ Robert Scott’s infamous expedition to the South Pole. Not only did they get beat by a month by the Norwegians, but they all died on the return journey.


↑ Settlers try and fight off Israeli soldiers with soap.


↑ Beatles fans

↑ Andy Warhol’s Factory


↑ David Bowie circa Heroes

New image - Strummer

September 18th, 2008

Great patterns

September 16th, 2008

Will definitely be using these soon to one extent or another.

Gah!

September 16th, 2008