My Mom is an Airplane - Yulya Aronova

Why Do Clouds Stay Up?

Quilting in Space - Karen Nyberg

NASA Astronaut Karen Nyberg, a lifelong lover of sewing, is inviting fellow crafters to join her in stitching together a global community space quilt. Nyberg, in the final weeks of her mission, recently shared a star-themed quilt square she was able to complete inside the International Space Station. Now, she's inviting quilters from the public to create their own star-themed quilt squares to help celebrate her mission and passion for the quilting arts. The International Quilt Festival and Nyberg will work together to have the squares stitched together for display at the 40th annual International Quilt Festival in 2014 and other public displays. Nyberg's complete biography.

 For more information about Nyberg's personal sewing hobbies

Alfred Russel Wallace's Personal Cabinet - NSF

To know where modern biological science began, take a look at the incredible and extremely well-preserved collection within Alfred Russel Wallace’s personal cabinet, as showcased in this video by the National Science Foundation:

Discovered by a Washington, D.C., lawyer in search of antique furniture, this is truly a Cabinet of Wonders, for inside is the 1700-specimen personal collection of 19th Century British naturalist, field biologist and contemporary of Charles Darwin, Alfred Russel Wallace.

From the Washington Post:

There are butterflies and beetles, moths and shells. There’s a small bird. Flies. Bees. Praying mantises. Tarantulas. Seedpods. A hornet’s nest… “I think it’s a fabulous thing,” said David Grimaldi, curator of invertebrate zoology at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. “I think it’s a national treasure, actually.”

Making a Box from a Greeting Card

My fifth grade teacher, Mrs. Lee, first taught me to make these.  I remember going to my grandmother's house and proceeding to make a bunch of them for her.

Story of One Crime - Fyodor Khitruk (1962)

Gumbasia - Art Clokey (1955)

Gumbasia was Art Clokey’s first film, made in 1955 at the University of Southern California. It was a parody of Disney’s Fantasia, using stop-motion clay figures. This short film led to funding for his first Gumby film.

Let's Make some Great Fingerprint Art - Marion Deuchars

Let's Make some Great Fingerprint Art from Marion Deuchars on Vimeo.

The Postal System from A to B - Ruben van der Vleuten

This hidden camera adventure through the postal system, From A to B, began when Ruben van der Vleuten wanted to know, ”What happens when you send something by mail?”

So instead of sitting back I started a simple project to actually see it myself. I put a small camera in a box, build a timer circuit using Arduino and shipped it.

That’s as simple as it is. The timer circuit was set to make a 3 sec video every minute and make longer videos while the box was moving: to not miss on the ‘interesting’ parts.

…like conveyor belts! We love videos like this, not only because we get to see from a perspective that we’ve never seen before, but because it would make a great DIY project.

Check out van der Vleuten’s site to see more about the box, its innerworkings, and a highlights video with some real time clips.

My Financial Career - Gerald Potterton (1962)

An animated film based on Stephen Leacock's witty account of a young man's first brush with banking. When he tries to make his deposit, he is so intimidated by the institution that nothing he says comes out right. Directed by Gerald Potterton - 1962

Kew Gardens / LonelyLeap Collaboration Botany Videos

KEW GARDENS - Beyond the Gardens: The Fungarium from LONELYLEAP on Vimeo.\



KEW GARDENS - Beyond the Gardens: The Millennium Seed Bank Partnership from LONELYLEAP on Vimeo.

Most people know Kew Gardens as home of the world’s largest living plant collection but are not aware that it is also the location of an internationally important botanical research and educational institution. Going beyond the gardens as we know them, Lonelyleap produced two films for 2012’s Tropical Extravaganza Festival which showcase the behind the scenes work of Kew’s scientists whilst also exploring two of the festival’s themes, Earth and Air.

The first in the series explores the importance of fungi to all plants and ultimately all life on Earth through several members of the Mycology Department committed to the conservation and exploration of fungi.

The second film in the series looks at the work of the the Millennium Seed Bank Partnership in Surrey, home to 10% of the world’s plant diversity, and how the Seed Conservation Department is helping to save wild plants and habitats for our future.

And a bonus!

KEW GARDENS - Beyond the Gardens: The Plant Family Tree from LONELYLEAP on Vimeo.

The Dragon Hedge

Retired fan maker John Brooker was bored with his plain hedge in East Rudham, Norfolk, and so he decided to shape it into something more interesting. Note to self: it takes around 10 years to sculpt a hedge into a 100 foot long dragon-shaped topiary.

With extreme dedication and precision, Brooker used hedge clippers to sculpt six legs, a large head with pointy teeth, scales, and wings into what was once a simple, rectangular row of shrubbery. He spends three days every two to three weeks taming the ever-growing beast and has to climb up a pair of 6-foot-high ladders to reach the top. Photo by Damien McFadden.

via My Modern Met.

"Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy of Company B" (1941) - The Andrews Sisters

Nothing gets you moving quite like boogie woogie and The Andrews Sisters-Patricia Marie, Maxine Angelyn and Laverne Sophie-were brilliant at it. Here they are in a 1941 clip from Abbott and Costello’s Buck Privates.

No Noodles Stop Motion Animation Video - Tyler Nicolson

No Noodles! Small creatures explore and inhabit an even smaller world. A short stop motion film by Tyler Nicolson, music by Chris Adriaanse.

Doctor Who Shoes and an Essay about River Song

Hello!  These are my Doctor Who shoes, themed with the Eleventh Doctor and River Song.

Double Knit OSU Beaver Scarf

Hello!  I'm going to start by posting a run-through of a scarf I made this summer, my monster OSU Beaver Scarf.  The scarf is double knit, and therefore double-sided, and ended up approximately eight feet long!

The scarf draped over a chair

Foxes Use Earth's Magnetic Field to Hunt Mice - Jaroslav Cerveny

With its exceptional hearing, the red fox can detect when a small animal is scurrying around up to 3 feet under the snow, and their high jump to surprise and catch that animal — called “mousing” — is pretty spectacular. But even more spectacular is what we can’t see: the possible influence of magnetic alignment.

Jaroslav Červený and a large research team observed almost 600 mousing jumps by 84 foxes, and based on the data, they proposed that “…mousing red foxes may use the magnetic field as a ‘range finder’ or targeting system to measure distance to its prey…” From Ed Yong in 2011:

If they pounced to the north-east, they killed on 73% of their attacks; if they jumped in the opposite direction, they success rate stayed at 60%. In all other directions, only 18% of their pounces were successful… 

Many animals have magnetoreception capabilities including birds, bats, mice, mole rats, fruit flies, honeybees, turtles, lobsters, sharks and stingrays.

If Červený is correct, then the red fox is unique in many ways. It would be the first animal known to use a magnetic sense to hunt, and the first to use magnetic fields to estimate distance rather than direction or position.

Wild Life (Short) - National Film Board of Canada

Nominated for an Oscar® for Best Animated Short at the 2012 Academy Awards This animated short tells the story of a dapper young remittance man, sent from England to Alberta to attempt ranching in 1909. However, his affection for badminton, bird watching and liquor leaves him little time for wrangling cattle. It soon becomes clear that nothing in his refined upbringing has prepared him for the harsh conditions of the New World. A film about the beauty of the prairie, the pangs of homesickness and the folly of living dangerously out of context.

When I Grow Up - Jasmin Lai

A smart young girl starts thinking about what she wants to be when she grows up. How will she decide? When I grow up by Jasmin Lai.

Dolphins Communicated with Ecolocation

At the Kolmården Wild Animal Park, dolphins like young Luna can now aim their echolocation beam at shapes on an underwater screen to indicate their choices and answer questions. The project is called ELVIS (The Echo Location Visualization and Interface System) and it’s currently being used to help the dolphins choose the types of fish they want to eat. Research Director Mats Amundin hopes that the system can someday help dolphins make more choices about toys or music, or even use it to express their emotions.

Celebrating Crystallography - The Royal Institution

One of the great innovations of the twentieth century is likely not well-known, but this video from the Ri Channel is looking to change that:

This is X-ray crystallography. 

Discovered in 1913 by William and Lawrence Bragg, x-ray crystallography is a technique that reveals the atomic and molecular structure of a crystal. When a narrow beam of x-rays is shown through the crystal, it diffracts into a pattern of rays through the other side. 

“To date 28 Nobel Prizes have been awarded to projects related to the field” and 100 years after its discovery, the Curiosity Rover is using x-ray crystallography to analyze soil on Mars.