The Loris Bite : Japan

Short Film: Walk Signal Man Takes A Walk Through Tokyo

cstanton — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 16:21:00 GMT

A short film directed by Johnathan Bensimon features a walk signal man taking a nice little stroll through the streets of Tokyo.

The video is a compilation of over 1,000 individual digital stills. The illuminated suit was made with a whole lot of high voltage LED lights with a translucent nylon cover to make it appear as if it were glowing.

Tokyo/Glow via TokyoMango

Tokyo Sky Tree Goes Up

cstanton — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 18:32:00 GMT

Tokyo has been growing very quickly and the construction of new skyscrapers has been posing a problem for the NHK broadcasting company because their 333 meter high Tokyo Tower just isn't tall enough to give complete broadcasting coverage.

Their solution has been set to build a tower nearly twice the high of the Tokyo Tower. The Tokyo Sky Tree was started back in 2008 and the foundation was finally set in April of 2009 to start building it up towards the sky. The monster skyscraper, when completed, will be 634.00 m (2,080 ft) tall and will be the tallest artificial structure in Japan, and the second tallest artificial structure in the world, next to the Burj Khalifa in Dubai.

Here is a time lapse video of the Construction from March of 2009 up until February 21st, 2010

Prankster Olympics!

cstanton — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 05:46:00 GMT

I've watched a lot of prank videos, and it seems like different parts of the world have their own style because I guess different cultures find different things funny. The one thing that we can all appreciate though is a good laugh at someone else's expense!

These are some great pranks from all different parts of the world (I've tried to order them from mild to hardcore):
BRAZIL:

AMERICA:

GERMANY:

ITALY:

JAPAN:

I hope that you enjoy, I say that the Gold Medal goes to Japan!

Fish Robots - Useless But Cool

cstanton — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 19:49:00 GMT

Masamichi Hayashi, the president of the marine education establishment kyg-lab, is a determined teacher and has dedicated hours and hours of his time to teaching children how fish move and their habits. Seriously, how fish move. And whats better than showing them a video of a real fish? Letting them see a fake robotic fish in action!!!

Hayashi has made over 100 sea creature robots. What's more impressive is that he's a self-taught roboticist and he creates most of these sea creatures out of random trash like plastic bottles, Styrofoam, tarps, old clothing, and windshield wiper motors. He is able to give the robots pretty realistic movement since he has spent his studies in marine science.

The picture above is a Coelacanth with a diver.

He's made robots of all kinds of sea creatures. Here's a video showing some of them:

His masterpiece is a 5 foot long coelacanth robot that weighs 105 pounds and cost $22,000 to build. Sounds a little bit more expensive than trash and windshield wiper motors to me, but whatever. Way cooler than a car, right? Check 'im out.

Chanel Samurai Armor

cstanton — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 19:41:00 GMT

So Chanel made this awesome Samurai style Armor that allows you to show that you're wallet is fatter than everyone elses' while you're out deflecting arrows and slicing enemies up with your samurai sword (sold separately, of course). Feared and stylish you will be.

Even this guy looks like a high roller!

VIA

Creepy Robot Twins Sold In Japan

cstanton — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 08:43:00 GMT

Sogo and Seibu department stores in Japan have announced that they will be selling two scarily realistic humanoid "clone" robots that will be fashioned meticulously after the person that purchased them.

Orders will be taken from January 1st through the 3rd of the upcoming year at Sogo, Seibu, and Robinson's department stores in Japan.

Hiroshi Ishiguro, director of the Intelligent Robotics Laboratory at Osaka
University who developed the humanoid robots with Kokoro, stands next to his
likenessthat he calls Geminoid

The robots are engineered by the Kokoro robotics firm and will have every facial feature down to the eye lashes modeled after the purchaser. The facial expressions and upper body movements will also be examined and replicated down to the smallest possible detail.

Kokoro is most famous for their extremely creepy Actroid receptionist robot [below], that loves the color green.

Two doesn't seem like a whole lot, but they put a pricetag on the bots that will probably scare off the average buyer. The Robots will cost 21,100,000 yen, which would cash out to about 223,000 USD.

If more than 2 people sign to purchase the robots, then the winners will be selected in a random drawing.

Time Lapse Sequences in Tokyo by Samuel Cockedey

cstanton — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 20:38:00 GMT

Samuel Cockedey is a photographer from Northern France that moved to Tokyo in 2000 where he developed a strong interest for tilt-shift photography and time lapse sequences, sometimes incorporating the former in the latter.

Tilt-shift photography is photography which uses tilt, or the rotation of the lens relative to the image plane, and shift, the origin of the lens parallel to the image plane left and right.
You can see more of his tilt-shift photos on his website.

Here's a couple of the time-lapse sequences. And its a plus, they're in HD.

remanence : variance from Samuel Cockedey on Vimeo.

Ganked the idea to put the definition of these words off the Vimeo account.

Remanence

a. The state of being remanent; continuance; permanence.
b. The magnetic flux remaining in a substance after the magnetizing force has been withdrawn.

Variance

a. A difference between what is expected and what actually occurs.
b. The number of thermodynamic variables, such as temperature and pressure, required to specify a state of equilibrium of a system, given by the phase rule.

static : pulse from Samuel Cockedey on Vimeo.

Static

a. inactive, not in physical motion
b. of or relating to bodies at rest or forces in equilibrium
c. a crackling or hissing noise caused by electrical interference

Pulse

a. rhythmical beating, vibrating, or sounding
b. a transient variation of a quantity whose value is normally constant
c. an electromagnetic wave or modulation thereof of brief duration

I really like the remanence : variance piece, especially the shots at 2:16 and 2:23 at the end.

Nomura's Jellyfish Can Be Made Into Space Candy

cstanton — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 17:17:00 GMT

A little while back I wrote a blog post on how Nomura's Jellyfish are swarming the seas of Japan. Since then, the Japanese have been trying to figure out what they can do about the jellyfish problem and how they can use the goliath cnidarians.

Echizen kurage Jellyfish

Every year when the Echizen kurage swarm the seas they halt fishing operations, causing serious frustration to the industry. One group of highschool students has been cooking with the jellyfish since 2003 in their efforts to battle the jellies.

These students from Obama Fisheries High School have developed a way to make jellyfish powder by boiling the creatures down into a paste, drying them out, and then grinding them up into a fine powder.

Students that developed candy at Obama Fisheries High School

The students have developed a caramel candy made out of sugar, starch, syrup, and of course, jellyfish powder. They have requested from JAXA, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, that their jellyfish caramel candies be available to astronauts aboard the International Space Station. According to Chunichi there is a representative from JAXA going to the school today, Sept 17th. to evaluate the candy.

Apparently there is a caramel candy trend going on in Japan, so the students are hoping to catch that ride with their new recipe.

Since the powder has been developed other local companies have put it to use in their recipes. One local company made jellyfish cookies with the powder. The powder is said to have a salty taste which compliments the cookie's sweetness.

Ekura-chan saku-saku cookies, sold in boxes of 10.

Its great that people can turn lemons into lemonade and jellyfish into space candy.

Solar UFOs Clean The Osaka Canals

cstanton — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 19:55:00 GMT

Osaka, Japan is having an Aqua Metropolis festival and these alien looking watercrafts are actually going to serve a very healthy purpose. These vessels are in place to purify the water!

Each one of these "Solar UFOs" has 27 solar panels that provide the power it needs to purify very large amounts of water each day. Up to 2,400 gallons per day is purified. Impurities are removed from the water while oxygen is pumped into it. The clean water sprays out the top of the vessel like a fountain, cleaning the solar panels of grime.

During the day, the powerful filtration system is powered by sunlight, but at night, a 1.3 kilowatt solar battery will power the LED lights around the rim and on the bottom of the vessel.

The crafts will be deployed into the Osaka Castle's moat and into the canals throughout the city. One Solar UFO is scheduled to remain in the Dotonbori canal until the middle of October. The vessel in the Osaka Castle moat is scheduled to stay fully operational until March 2010. NTT Facilities, the people who designed the filtration system, also announced plans to deploy Solar UFOs in Tokyo-area waters.

Currently, the UFOs are not for sale.

Japan Builds Teddy Bear Nurse

cstanton — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 14:53:00 GMT

The Japanese never cease to amaze me. As the Japanese population is getting older, nurses are being stretched thin and there just aren't enough of them. The people at RIKEN, or Japan’s Institute of Physical and Chemical Research, have built a robonurse to help with the solution. RIBA, Robot for Interactive Body Assistance, was built by RIKEN and Tokai Rubber Industries (TRI) to assist nurses in lifting patients out of their beds.

Gotta love the music.

The robot features a large array of tactile sensors that help it to adjust to any kind of situation and help it raise and lower the patient with as little discomfort as possible. The robot features long jointed arms that can lift up to 135 pounds. The arms even slightly give, giving it a more human feel. TRI developed a lightweight urethane foam for the skin, which is also supposed to give the patient a nice human skin feel. The robot can respond to voice commands and has a facial recognition program so it can recognize specific coworkers and patients. It sits on omnidirectional wheels that allow it to move around in tight spaces as is necessary in the nursing stations and hospitals where it will be used. The sensors also allow it to utilize video and audio to react to immediate changes in the nearby surroundings very efficiently.

What's really great about this robot is that it has the face of a big teddy bear. RIKEN released in a press conference that designing the robot to look more like a human would probably just scare patients, so a big teddy bear was obviously their second choice.

Technology like this is thought by many to be the solution to the shortage of nurses in the overfilled hospitals of Japan. RIKEN plans to have RIBA at work in hospitals and nursing facilities within the next 5 years.

Giant Jellyfish Travel To Japan

cstanton — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 20:45:00 GMT

A research team led by Shinichi Ue, a professor of biological oceanography at Hiroshima University, has had some very alarming findings off of the pacific coast of Japan. They have been monitoring the Yellow Sea and the East China Sea for jellyfish movement and found shocking numbers of Echizen jellyfish, also known as Nomura's Jellyfish. Nomura's Jellyfish are monsterous and can measure up to 6 1/2 feet and weigh up to 450 lbs. The scare is that they could very seriously negatively affect the fishing industry.

In 2005, Japan had suffered a similar invasion and it cost the industry billions of yen. The numbers recorded in 2007 weren't so great either, when they had measured .77 jellyfish per hundred cubic meters. In 2008, they had only measured .01 jellyfish per hundred cubic meters and the fishing industry did very well. This year, based on the study done in June, they have measured a ridiculous 2.14 jellyfish per hundred cubic meters. That's almost three times as many jellyfish as in 2007, and over 200 times the amount of jellyfish recorded in 2008.

At the peak of the largest invasion in 2005, there were said to be as many as 500 million gargantuan jellyfish floating through the Tsushima Strait each day. If each of those were to weigh 400 pounds, that would be 200 billion pounds of jellyfish flowing through the straight. While Japan is worried about these invasions, China has a positive outlook on it. In China, jellyfish is considered a delicacy. The Echizen jelly actually sells for 375 yen per half kilogram.

While China is busy harvesting and munching down on these monster jelly's, the jellyfish are busy destroying fishing nets and capsizing trawlers and stinging fishermen. The jellyfish's only damage doesn't come from destroying nets though. They also sting and sometimes kill fish with their venom, decreasing the quality if not only the quantity of each catch. Hopefully Ue's research will help to prevent outbreaks like this in the near future.

Giant Gundam Monument Towers Over Park In Tokyo, Japan

cstanton — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 17:09:00 GMT

If you weren't worried about Japan building huge manned robots and taking over the world, then maybe you will be now! Odaiba Shiokaze park has had a huge makeover, and now, standing right in the middle of it, a "life-sized" Gundam stands towering over everything like an attentive prison warden.

Bandai, a toy company that has been around since the 50s, has been building the robot for the last few months and now it is nearly, if not fully, complete. The official unveiling is scheduled for July 11th, but it is hard to keep a giant humanoid robot covered up. The huge robot was built as a monument to the 30th anniversary of Mobile Suit Gundam, an anime TV show in Japan. The show has featured monsterous bipedal robots equipped with rocket launchers, lasers, and jetpacks. As you can imagine, the technology hungry country of Japan has MILLIONS of fans... enough fans to build a huge monument.

The Gundam is designed to look like a model RX-78, one of the original robots from the show. It stands at 18 meters or 60 feet tall, dwarfing everything around it. Its colorful armored plating is well lit and is complimented by mist machines. Not only is it a statue, it is actually a robot! Its head can move in all directions, making it seem a little more all-seeing. It stands tall, appearing to watch over the city.

This isn't the first monument to the Gundams though, there has been a much smaller gundam that stands about 4 meters tall at Shinjuku’s Kamiigusa train station. Numerous japanese companies have used Gundams in their advertisements and even a poster designed by the actual japanese fire department features a Gundam shooting water at a flaming building. I guess the japanese love their mythic metal gunslinging warriors a bit.

There are some more pictures on Pink Tentacle