5 Obstructions Bunkers Blackboard Courseware Photograms and Cloud Printing

La Perouse National Park - The image above is from one of the WW2 old bunkers which are on the outskirts of the rifle range at La Perouse in Sydney. I was on holiday this week and my son suggested we visit there with his cousin. I have been visiting here off and on since I arrived in Sydney some 20 odd years ago as it is one of the few National Park areas that hasn't been upgraded to protect government from libel suits. Sure there are a few more grills bolted over tunnels and some doors have been concreted up but generally, as you can see from the image, it still has that wonderful sense of decrepitude. I was mentioning this to one of my friends later in the week and was told there were plans to redevelop the area and gentrify it ... not sure how I feel about this.

Google Cloud Print - Last week I signed up for this free service which allows you to print to your home printer from just about anywhere and also allows you to share the printer with others like your family. I'm hoping my son will make some good use of this at school this year. Google Cloud Print

The Five Obstructions - this came up when I was discussing Melancholia which I'd seen recently. Although not a huge Von Trier fan he has, I think, produced some outstanding successes along with failures. But at least he's taking risks. My all time favourite Lars von Trier film is The Five Obstructions which is based on one of Von Trier's all time favourites The Perfect Human (1967). It is amazing to watch as Trier challenges The Perfect Human director Jorgan Leth to remake it 5 times but each time with an obstruction devised by Von Trie. For example remake it in Cuba with no shot longer than 12 frames, or making it in the worst place on earth without showing the location etc it's amazing. But while it's interesting seeing the parts on You Tube you seeing the whole film is a must especially watching how the dialogue between Trier and Leth reinvigorates Leth's love of film-making.

Photogram's by Haholy-Nagy - Paul Wilson who is also working with me on TAM came across these two wonderful original photograms in the Collings Collection at the Powerhouse Museum. They are both greeting cards with a constructivist design from 1937 and 1938 respectively. You can see them here on the Museum's Blog.

Video of multitouch Wav Player works using AIR app - This is a module designed to play Wav files, show graphical waveform representations, and display embedded XMP or user entered metadata. Multiple touch players can be displayed on stage and each touch object can be manipulated using the TAP, DRAG, SCALE and ROTATE multitouch gestures and standard PLAY, STOP, BACK, FORWARD and PAUSE touch buttons. All multitouch gestures can be activated and deactivated using the module XML settings. The Wav Player is an AIR only application. see more

Wireframe your website - I thought this was a pretty nifty alternative to setting up your wire frames using software. These are physical stencil sets produced by UI Stencils which allow you to trace your wire frames directly onto paper to work with them. see article

15+ Project Management and Collaboration Tools for Graphic and Web Design. Teambox , Basecamp , Activecollab , 5pm , DeskAway , Wridea free online brainstorming tool , ZOHO projects free for first project , Central Desktop free first 25Mb

See more at see article

12,772,528 stock images & illustrations - 128,367 contributors many free or cheap bit. see @ Dreamstime

Blackboard courseware Blackboard classroom software has changed its billing structure to make it possible for schools to share their courseware without having to pay fees for members of the public who audit the course or download its materials. see Cory Doctorow's article here

ProPublica’s TimelineSetter - the investigative journalism news site ProPublica has made the timeline setting code available for others to use, enabling journalists to build interactive timelines from a spreadsheet. see here. I thought this may also be of use for Museum professionals? Another non coding option is Dipity see here.

Parramatta Observatory - Australia's First Observatory

Sir Thomas Brisbane

The astronomical and surveying instruments relating to the Parramatta Observatory were some of the earliest brought to the Australian colony. Many were purchased by Sir Thomas Brisbane, Governor of New South Wales and were fashioned by some of the leading European instrument makers of the day.

Brisbane was a keen amateur scientist who viewed his appointment as Governor of New South Wales as an opportunity to do astronomical work oand he employed two astronomers, Carl Rumker and James Dunlop, to travel with him. They arrived in November 1821 and by March 1822 an observatory had been erected next to Government House at Parramatta. They immediately set to work and by 1825, when Brisbane returned to England, many of the observations had been completed and a few papers were sent for publication by the Royal Society in England. 

Upon his departure Brisbane sold the books and instruments to the Colonial Government and by 1827 these were being used by Carl Rumker who had been appointed as Australia's first Government Astronomer. In May 1831 he was replaced by James Dunlop who upon his return to Australia, Dunlop found the Observatory and its equipment in a bad state of repair but nevertheless commenced observations using the Troughton transit and mural instruments. 

In 1835 a new transit telescope made by Jones was delivered to the observatory which replaced the Troughton transit. The Jones telescope however proved too difficult for Dunlop to manage on his own and instead he used the Troughton mural circle for most of his observations. 

In 1846 the Lords of the Treasury requested Sir George Gipps, the then Governor, provide further information on the state of the observatory. As a result a commission, under Captain P. P. King, was set up to report on the Observatory and Dunlop's tenure was ended as a result of this. From around 1837 Dunlop's failing health led to a decline in activity which was partly responsible for the closure of the Parramatta Observatory in 1847. 

In July 1847 Sir Charles Fitzroy sent a letter to Earl Grey explaining that the observatory was in such a poor state that it needed to be closed and the instruments packed in boxes and put in charge of the Ordnance Storekeeper. The instruments were then put into storage and remained so until the new Sydney Observatory was built above the Rocks. 

The opening of the new observatory in 1858 saw the original Brisbane instruments taken out of storage for use. Unfortunately there were only a few which the new Government Astronomer Rev. W. Scott felt remained good enough to use in Sydney observatory. While these select few continued to give sterling service, the others were stored away and over the course of the nineteenth century, Parramatta Observatory's original collection remained more or less intact. This rare and valuable collection was transferred to the Powerhouse Museum along with the Sydney Observatory instruments in 1982. 

Geoff Barker, December 2007

References
Lomb, N., 'Earnshaw's Excellent Timekeepers', in Davison, G., Webber, K., 'Yesterday's Tomorrows; the Powerhouse Museum and its precursors 1880-2005', Powerhouse Publishing, 2005
Haynes, Raymond, Haynes, Roslynn, Malin, David, McGee, Richard, Explorers of the Southern Sky, Cambridge University Press, 1996
Australian Commonwealth Government, Historical records of Australia, Series 1, Governor's Dispatches to and from England, Volume 25, April 1846 - September 1847, Library Committee of the Commonwealth parliament, 1925
Australian Commonwealth Government, Historical records of Australia, Series 1, Governor's Dispatches to and from England, Volume 17, 1833- June 1835, Library Committee of the Commonwealth parliament, 1925
Forwarded to H. M. Secretary of State by Despatch, No. 141, 1847, Federation and Meteorology, http://www.austehc.unimelb.edu.au/fam/1541.html
Richardson, W., Catalogue of 7385 Stars, Chiefly in the Southern Hemisphere, prepared from observations made in 1822, 1823, 1824, 1825 and 1826, at the Observatory at Paramatta, New South Wales, Printed by William Clowes and Sons, For His Majesty's Stationary Office, 1835

Code Academy .. Blended Learning .. and .. Tubular Bells

AND ... TUBULAR BELLS - Great end to the week as today I watched Mike Oldfield's Tubular Bells being performed by two Australian Musicians Daniel Holdsworth and Aidan Roberts. Along with 22 musical instruments these two Australians performed the entirety of the 1973 prog rock classic live - it's 20+ years since I last listened to this but I certainly never expected to see this complex instrumental work performed live but amazing watching them swapping instruments, swapping pedals and of course banging a set of tubular bells. One of the main things was simulating the sounds of the original instruments and central to this was their use of the Roland SH 201 pictured below. I only hope that they have been booked to tour this overseas so other can see this.

TWEET YOUR THESIS - I was also taken this week with the #tweetyourthesis hash tag on Twitter and rose to the challenge, along with many others, of condensing our theses (that sounds really wrong) into 124 characters mine went something like - C19th Pacific photographers primarly came to do something other than take photos - problems past analysis without context.

ICANN RELEASE NEW DOMAIN NAMES - This Read Write Web article on the International Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) nearly slipped by but is well worth the read given what happened in the heady early years of the release of the first run of domain names. This week ICANN opened up its new registry for generic Top Level Domains and ... it will have a profound affect on how people find and consume information on the Web. A top level domain is a core part of how the Internet organizes and parses the names of websites. The most common, of course, is .com, but other TLDs are .net, .org and country domains like .CO or .UK. ICANN's new gTLDs will allow companies, governments and other organizations to register unique strings. For instance, are we about to enter the era of .pepsi? However the $185,000 price tag might hold back the gold rush. See Article

FINGER PAINTING LANDSCAPES - What next - ahh I liked this guy who I think may be a New York artist but he produces the the equivalent of the wolf mountain/sunset stag landscape painting on glass - and in 3 minutes with his fingers rather than brushes - have a look at ow.ly/8rBcw

CODE ACADEMY - I also signed up for with the Code Academy who are offering a free online course to learn how to code for anyone who wants to do it. Really great idea - so sign up for free online lessons to learn programming code. sign up here

BLENDED LEARNING PILOT - The White Paper: Lessons Learned from a Blended Learning Pilot, which brings together online learning and traditional brick and mortar classrooms. This was written by Brian Greenberg, Leonard Medlock and Darri Stephens for educators, funders, policy makers, and the general public interested in how technology will transform schools. The paper focuses on the insights and lessons learned from the Khan Academy pilot in Oakland, CA.

UK NATIONAL ARCHIVE TO DIGITISE 165 YRS OF BRITISH TELECOM HISTORY - Coventry University in collaboration with British Telecom (BT) Heritage and The National Archive, have been awarded funding from the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) to catalogue, digitise and develop a searchable online archive of almost half a million photographs, images, documents and correspondence assembled by BT over 165 years. Examples of interesting documents in the archive include: details of the introduction of the telephone at Balmoral Castle, Buckingham Palace, and Windsor Castle in 1910-11; early videoconferencing and viewphones from 1960’s and the queen making the first automatic long distance telephone call from Bristol to Edinburgh in 1958. read more

3D HUMAN BODY AND 3D OPEN SOURCE VIEWER - Google Body was built by Google engineers in their “20% time” was retired along with Google Labs last year and now the software underlying Google Body has been made open source. Zygote Media Group, which provided the imagery for Google Body, has used this open source code to build Zygote Body (zygotebody.com). Zygote Body offers the same navigation, layering, and instant search as Google Body. Like Google Body, Zygote Body can be used in browsers that support WebGL, like Chrome and Firefox, without needing to install additional software. read more

PLAY OUTDOORS - this was a nice promotion from U.S. National Parks who offered free admission to their parks for the weekend this weekend!

SHACKLETON'S 100 YR OLD WHISKEY RECREATED - not sure why they did this but apparently Scottish Scientists with plenty of time on their hands have re-created Shackleton Hundred-Year-Old Whisky bit.ly/xFtc8V

BRAIN ROT - HIP HOP HISTORY IN A COMIC STRIP - fantastic first installment of the history of hip hop done in a comic strip family tree by Ed Piskor (part 1) read it

QR CODES ON CARDBOARD TO RAISE MONEY FOR CHARITY This nice idea was covered in an article by Paul Sawyer - QR codes on cardboard? Leeds-based creative agency Propaganda helped homeless charity Simon on the Streets this Christmas by launching a QR code campaign to help raise funds for those sleeping rough on the streets of Yorkshire in the UK. Rather than sending Christmas gifts to its clients, the agency laid out QR codes printed on cardboard and positioned them amongst blankets and belongings, to replicate the outdoor dwellings of homeless people. read article

TURNING A BRICK WALL INTO A WIND SCULPTURE - nice idea - The Randall Museum commissioned Charles Sowers to transform its brick facade using wind activated read article

TOP 100 GENEALOGY WEBSITES - fantastic resource from GenealogyInTime a list of the top 100 Most Popular Genealogy Websites. Link here

PRINT YOUR MINE CRAFT DESIGNS IN 3D - new Service from Mineways will print your Mine Craft designs as 3D sculptures using their 3D printers. see examples

MUSIC VIDEO PICK OF THE WEEK - WILCO MAVIS STAPLES & NICK LOWE - impromptu cover of "The Weight" in the dressing room. video here

Victorian Steampunk Jewellery

This blog is really a response to Maduncle Cliff’s posts the other week. His look at the ‘steam punk’aesthetic caught my eye as I happened to be working on what appeared to be a couple of 150 year old examples in the Museum’s watch collection.

The urge to cut-up and repurpose old watch parts into new artistic forms was something the Victorians appear to have been aware of in the 1880s. But although the results look very much like steampunk they appear to have been made as a direct result of changing times in the watch-making world rather than a desire to embrace a new aesthetic.

Sprial chain drive from a verge watch, Powerhouse Museum H9076

For around 300 years most watches used a verge escapement which controlled the speed of the unwinding spring (the escapement is also responsible for the ‘ticking’ you can hear as the spring unwinds). By the 1850s however big changes had taken place as new escapements and mass produced Swiss parts made the old verge watches redundant.

But these old watches were not cheap items. In many instances the cases were made from gold or silver and sometimes the owner would have a new mechanism fitted into the case rather than give it up. This was not the norm however and most ended up being either melted down and reused or claimed as collector’s pieces.

An Early Edison Tinfoil Sound Recording Machine

This tin foil sound recording and play back machine [H3168] has been in the collection since 1915. For many years it was presumed to be a model of the original machine designed by Thomas Edison but in fact its story is far more interesting. Edison designed the first recording machine in 1877 but soon after small number of commercialphonograph  machines were made in England based on Edison’s design. While early Edison machines were hand cranked these utilised a falling weight to turn the cylinder. This style of machine appears to have originated in London’s General Post Office after Mr. W. H. Preece, Engineer-in-Chief at the General Post Office. arranged for a tinfoil machine to be made by Augustus Stroh a colleague of his. This was done under the guidance of Henry Edmunds, a British engineer who had seen Edison’s original and had written an article on it for The Times 17 January 1878.
Stroh’s machine was demonstrated at the Royal Institution on 1 February 1878 and when theLondon Stereoscopic Company recieved a license to make machines based on Edison’s patent the incorporated Stoh’s and their own design features making distinctly British models. By 1886 the company was offering three models, including one driven by a falling weight, and one which was spring driven. After an email correspondence with Rene Rondeau, a specialist in tin foil machines, we believe this is one of the London Stereoscopic Company’s spring driven models with an air controlled governor attached to the spinning axel.

Collection; Powerhouse Museum

 Tinfoil Phonograph, detail of governor, H3168

Edison’s tin foil machine never achieved great commercial success as they were expensive and the delicate nature of the foil surface made them fragile. Instead it was another sound recording machine designed by Alexander Graham Bell and Charles Sumner Tainter, called the ‘graphophone’, which established a popular standard for the sound recording industry. As a result tin foil machines like the ones designed and made by the London Stereoscopic Company fell into disuse although they remain rare examples of the early days of sound recording.