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The powerful art of the opening shot of iconic movies

A movie’s opening shot prepares you for the entire movie. Sometimes you already know a masterpiece is being woven together. Other times you buckle in for a wild action packed ride. Or know that you’re about to laugh the theater’s roof off. It’s important for a movie’s opening shot to set the tone. Here is…

This Is What the New Ghostbusters Will Drive

If you weren’t already excited about seeing the Ghostbusters’ new proton packsand jumpsuits, director Paul Feig is now offering a sneak peek at the iconic Ecto-1 vehicle. Like its predecessor, it’s a vintage Cadillac. Somewhat unlike the original Ecto-1, however, this new car is undeniably a hearse. As he’s done with past leaks, Feig tweeted…

This Massive Plume of Smoke Puts Canada’s Wildfires Into Perspective

Western Canada is getting absolutely hammered by wildfires right now. At the moment, there are at least 182 reported wildfires burning in British Columbia, as these shocking satellite images make painfully clear. The scourge of wildfires, prompted by hot and dry conditions, have forced thousands of residents from their homes and caused at least one…

Find Out How Loud Your Neighborhood Is With These Sound Maps

People choose where to live based on all sorts of data: Price, public transit, proximity to pizza chains. But noise is tougher to measure. And since sound is pretty much invisible, you might not know about the nightly clanking from the local concrete recycling plant until you’re all moved in. A new mapping app can…

Jack Black Fights His Literary Monsters in the First Goosebumps Trailer

We’ve known for a while that the Goosebumps movie would be a weird metanarrative about the books themselves rather than inspired by them, with Jack Black as original writer R. L. Stine. Now we’ve got a first look at the movie in action, and it looks just as weird as this original idea sounded. The…

Video: The unbelievably soothing sounds of making an iced latte

Coffee tingles the senses. Before you even drink it, you smell it and smell the day’s morning or your local shop or a pot brewing while you’re getting ready. And when you finally taste it, you feel it and get a jolt of energy or escape last night or immediately feel the need for another.…

What’s It Really Like To Have Your Pleasure Center Stimulated?

We know that having an electrode zap your pleasure center on command will cause you to neglect your work and friends, and become a dried husk of a human being. But at least it makes you feel pleasure. Or does it? The B-19 experiment is one of the most famous muddles in psychology. Robert Heath,…

Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees Aren’t so Terrifying as Potato Heads

Mr. Potato Head has had more alternate identities than even Barbie at this point, but his latest disguises have taken a turn towards the macabre. Although, these Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees Potato Heads do make Fry-day the 13th feel a little less spooky. Available later this year just in time for your Halloween celebrations,…

The 9 Most Ridiculous Badasses of the Warhammer Fantasy Game

Tabletop game maker Games Workshop has announced that the world of its long-running Warhammer Fantasy Battles game is coming to an end, to be replaced by a new setting. With its departure, we have to say goodbye to some over-the-top heroes and villains that made Warhammer so great—and here’s nine of the best. 9) Josef…

Hacking Team’s Lame Excuse for Selling Digital Weapons to Sudan

Hacking Team, the company now equally known for selling intrusive spyware to governments and getting royally hacked, has words for people who disagree with its habit ofpeddling powerful cyberweapons to regimes with terrible human rights records: What’s a “repressive” regime, anyway? I asked Hacking Team if someone would speak directly to its reputation for selling…

Where did the records for the tiles lining the space shuttle disappear to? The database on the life of each and every one of the 24,000 tiles has itself gone missing. In some cases, NASA still has tabs on the tiles themselves, but some have made their way out into the world, both deliberately or…

All US United Airlines Flights Are Grounded Due to “Automation Issues” (Updating)

All United Airlines flights are currently grounded, and the Federal Aviation Administration is blaming “automation issues” for the travel nightmare. United told its employees it was experiencing a “network connectivity issue” but did not elaborate. According to Denver International Airport, it appears the check-in system has failed. Airport officials and frustrated passengers have already started…

The Manhole Covers in Japan Are Absolutely Beautiful

Manhole covers don’t have to be ugly sewer lids. In Japan, they can be astoundingly intricate, colorful, museum-worthy feats of urban design. Photographer S. Morita (Flickr name MRSY) has snapped over a thousand manhole covers around Japan over the years. In a country renowned for its attention to detail and rich artistic heritage, it’s pretty…

Beautiful animation blends together the stories of famous books

This ad for Gandhi Bookstores in Mexico is a stunning work of animation and 3D art and splendid visual effects. The tagline is simple, “One book leads to another”, and you see characters you recognize from the most famous of books battle each other for your attention. It’s a commercial meant to take your money…

There’s Finally an Official Star Wars App To Feed Your Obsession 24/7

There’s no shortage of Star Wars-related games on the iTunes and Google Play stores, but today finally sees the launch of the first official Star Wars app that will now serve as your one-stop portal for everything from news, to trivia, to even sound effects. Never again will you have to scramble to find a…

Self/Less Proves That The “Posthuman Thriller” Is A Thing Now

Self/Less, the new movie starring Ben Kingsley and Ryan Reynolds, clearly wants to remind you of Limitless, the hit movie from 2011. There’s the similar title, but also another story of human enhancement with a dark side. And Self/Less proves that “posthuman thrillers” are becoming a genre. Spoilers ahead… Not that Self/Less has the exact…

This Is What Happens When You Remix Calvin and Hobbes Using Math

What happens when you take one of the world’s best cartoon strips and remix it with some random process math? Wonderful gibberish is what. Josh Millard has used aMarkov chain process to remix Calvin and Hobbes strips into a glorious mess. Markov chains are a random mathematical system where the next step depends only what…

Astronomers Have Discovered an Exotic Quintuple Star System

Scientists at the Open University, UK, have discovered a rare group of five gravitationally bound stars they say should “put the makers of Star Wars to shame.” Above: Two of the stars are a contact binary, meaning they share the same atmosphere. The system, designated 1SWASP J093010.78+533859.5, consists of two sets of eclipsing binary stars,…

7 Innovative Concepts are Getting Closer to Reality Thanks to NASA

NASA just funded research into releasing robot-swarms during flybys, improving life support system, laser-mapping lunar lava caves, exploring the hydrocarbon seas of Titan, converting torpedo power supplies for deep space, creating an oasis of perpetual sunshine on the moon, and characterizing electric sails. Awesome. NASA pushes boundaries between science fiction and science fact with the…

What Are You Reading?

The weather’s warming and the pages are turning. To me, my summer reading lists! What books have you been reading this summer? Fill us in on the details of your latest reads or your latest to-be-reads, and what you thought of them. Still looking for your next novel, biography, or DIY manual? Then ask for…