Photos of Russian Daredevils

Be it climbing up as high as a 380-meter crane or a 22-storey building – two young Russians have got it all, and more, on their cameras. Vitaly Raskalov and Alexander Remnov call themselves skywalkers, and take incredible, vertigo-inducing pictures of each other on top of the highest buildings in Moscow and some other cities in Russia.

Armed with no special protective equipment but a camera, these thrill-seekers plank on top of the Russian Academy of Sciences or enjoy a nocturnal panorama from a turret in the Kiev railway station just for a good shot. It’s hard to imagine what these guys feel, when their pictures are enough to make one dizzy.

Posting in his blog, Vitaly was extremely happy about conquering the tower of the Moscow State University, which is generally protected with security cameras and special entry codes:

“For three years, I thought that it is impossible to get here, but as they say – everything is possible, the main thing is to want it bad enough.”

Beautiful, but don’t take this as an encouragement!

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Shipping containers and silos house students at Mill Junction

In Johannesburg, where student housing is sparse, one developer is taking extreme measures — by creating a 370-bed dormitory out of shipping containers perched atop a set of abandoned concrete grain silos.

Mill Junction will open its doors to students tomorrow, offering amenities like roof decks and free Wi-Fi. It’ll also offer the chance to live inside decades-old industrial infrastructure, which is either a plus or a minus, depending on the person. It’s taken less than a year to put the final pieces into place, a remarkably short amount of time to build a 15-story structure. That’s thanks to the virtue of the already-built structural system provided by the concrete silos, which have sat empty for years.

To ready them for human habitation, the empty silos had to be retrofitted with flooring and dorm rooms — not to mention windows, which had to be cut into the thick concrete:

According to a local news site The Citizen, the shipping containers themselves are over 50 years old — and the structure’s developer, Cintiq, had to import a special diamond-titanium blade to saw windows into the sides of each crate.

Using a massive crane, they were lifted into place and bolted together above the silos this summer:

Finally, they were given a fresh coat of paint, and plenty of interior finishes to make them livable. The spaces themselves are unusual — the shared dorm rooms are circular, while the communal spaces up top are low-ceilinged and thin.

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The Guangzhou Circle Mansion

Italian architecture firm A.M. Progetti recently completed work on a circular-shaped skyscraper based in Guangzhou, China, dubbed the Guangzhou Circle Mansion. Despite its appearance, the building's design bears no relation whatsoever to tasty dough-based treats.

Guangzhou Circle Mansion has a total floor space of 85,000 sq m (914,000 sq ft), spread over 33 floors, and is 138 m (452 ft) high, with the circular hole measuring 48 m (157 ft) in diameter. The building currently serves as home to the Guangdong Plastic Exchange, and also hosts several exclusive office units, plus a hotel.

According to the architects, the unusual double-disc design was inspired by the iconic value of jade discs in China and the numerological tradition of Feng Shui. Gizmag's knowledge concerning the ancient Chinese philosophy of Feng Shui is rather lacking, so we're going to take that on faith.

Additionally, when reflected in the nearby river, the building's shape also corresponds to the number 8, which is an admittedly very nice touch for this arguably gaudy project. The number 8 is considered especially lucky in Chinese culture, and A.M. Progetti correctly points out that the Beijing Olympics kicked off at exactly 8:08 am, on 8-8-2008, for that very reason.

It seems that not everyone's a fan though, as Sky News reports that locals refer to it as "the flashy rich people's circle."

Source: A.M. Progetti via Arch Daily and  Gizmag

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Iphone 6 bakal memakai panel surya?

CALIFORNIA – Belum lama ini Apple memasang sebuah iklan di situsnya yang menunjukkan bahwa raksasa Cupertino, Amerika Serikat (AS) itu tengah mencari seorang ahli teknis untuk membuat iPhone bertenaga surya. Kabar yang beredar mengatakan, saat ini perusahaan sedang sibuk menggarap iPhone 6 secara lebih serius.

iPhone generasi kedelapan itu rencananya akan mengusung layar yang lebih besar dari sebelumnya dan casing yang terbuat dari panel fotovoltaik.

“Tim Device Mobile mencari seorang profesional berpengalaman di bidang deposisi lapisan tipis,” tulis kolom deskripsi pekerjaan untuk posisi Thin Film Engineer.

Ya, tampak jelas sekali Apple menginginkan insinyur yang dicarinya itu untuk membantunya dalam pengembangan serta penyempurnaan teknologi lapisan tipis pada perangkatnya.

“Teknisi yang berhasil dalam peran ini akan bekerja sama dengan pemasok untuk mengantarkannya ke proses manufaktur,” lanjut Apple, seperti dikutip dari Softpedia, Minggu (15/9/2013).

Disamping itu, pengalaman yang luas terhadap teknologi lapisan tipis itu baik dalam pengolahan semikonduktor maupun industri surya juga menjadi kunci kualifikasi yang akan dipertimbangkan.

Sebab, dengan membenamnkan layar yang lebih besar pada iPhone 6 maka harus memiliki permukaan yang lebih luas pula untuk sel surya untuk metode daya pengisian yang lebih efisien.

Rupanya, Apple sudah lama menaruh perhatian yang besar pada baterai besutannya. Tak heran, pihaknya selalu berusaha meningkatkan kualitas teknologi baterai di setiap model generasi terbarunya. Mungkinkah ini menjadi inovasi dari Tim Cook selaku pimpinan tertinggi perusahaan? Kita tunggu saja..

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iWatch jam sporty dari Apple

Tim desainer dan IT desainer asal Italila memperlihatkan spekulasi desain jam berteknologi tinggi besutan Apple tersebut. Jam yang banyak dirumorkan dengan berbagai konsep itu kini diungkap dengan konsep sporty.

Tim desainer bernama Ciccarese Design ini menggambarkan jam pintar besutan Apple ini mirip dengan gelang. Juga bisa dibilang seperti iPhone yang melengkung melingkari tangan. Sebagaimana dirumorkan sebelumnya, Apple disebut-sebut membentuk tim khusus namun tak pernah memberi tahu siapa sekelompok orang yang diberi tugas untuk merancang jam ini.

Terkini baru diketahui bahwa Apple merekrut konsultan olahraga ternama Jay Blahnik yang juga bekerja dalam proyek Nike's FuelBand. Seperti dikutip dari Mashable, Jumat (23/8/2013), Apple menyediakan dua pilihan warna untuk jam sporty nan pintarnya itu. Yakni hitam dan putih sebagaimana warna pada iPhone sebelum-sebelumnya.

Namun sayangnya Ciccarese Design tak memberikan detail spesifikasi dari produk jam pintar Apple bernama iWatch tersebut. Sedangkan perusahaan saingan Samsung yang juga memproduksi ponsel pintar bernama Galaxy Gear dikabarkan memiliki variasi warna untuk jam pintarnya. Samsung menyediakan lima pilihan warna untuk Galaxy Gear.

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