Tag: video

Frank Gehry on Costs

The first documentary ever to focus on the tense process of architectural competitions, The Competition captures a fascinating account on how 5 world renowned architects – Jean Nouvel, Frank Gehry, Dominique Perrault, Zaha Hadid and Norman Foster – “toil, struggle and strategize to beat the competition.” The premise is based on a nearly forgotten, 2008 competition for a new National Museum of Art of Andorra, a small Pyrenees country nestled between Spain and France, which has yet to be realized.

Rayleigh scattering lights

Developed by CoeLux in Italy, this new form of artificial light is able to dupe humans, cameras and computers alike using a thin coating of nanoparticules to simulate Rayleigh scattering, a natural process that takes place in Earth’s atmosphere causing diffuse sky radiation. Far beyond simply making lights brighter or bluer, this approach accurately replicates how miles of atmosphere transform light within just a few millimeters of surface space.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt

Tina Fey’s new show Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt debuted on Netflix last yesterday.

Vulture is calling it terrific; Slate is calling it the new 30 Rock. Other reviews describe the show as “delightful but strange even by the standards of 30 Rock” and Ellie Kemper’s performance as “hilarious, advancing perkiness to a comically psychotic level without having Kimmy ever lose her fundamental appeal”.

The Los Angeles Times notes that it is “a series in which 3 of the 4 lead characters are female, of different ages, and the 4th is a gay black man. Because that never happens.”

The way of the dodo

Starting as a ‘rewind boy’ at his local cinema in east London in the days when film prints had to be reset by hand, Ümit Mesut has since made it his mission to keep celluloid alive. He’s converted his shop Ümit and Son – once a video and general store – into a haven for likeminded cinephiles on the lookout for old and rare prints and projectors, and he tirelessly scours conventions for films to add to his collection. Ümit’s love for film is contagious and gets at something fundamental about collecting – those who dedicate themselves to preserving what the rest of us might overlook are keeping our history and memories alive.