Freaky faces gallery: Monoface

Mono, a Minneapolis-based branding agency, created a wonderful Flash based New Years “card” called Monoface.

Each staff member had a head shot taken, which was then cropped into individual parts: mouth, nose, head, and each eye.

With over half a million possible facial combinations, it’s a freakishly fun site. You can browse the gallery or have fun making your own weird combinations.

http://www.mono-1.com/monoface/main.html

Robot controlled by slime mould’s fears

With the amount of time we spend in front of computers, gaming systems and the TV, I’ve often wondered what the future holds for us.

Will we end up morphing into shapeless, wobbly masses of flesh, solely dependent upon swarms of mini-droids to complete phsyical tasks? (All controlled with wireless handheld devices, of course.)

You may laugh, but that scenario might be closer than you think…

Researchers at Kobe University in Japan and Southamton University in the UK have developed a slime-controlled robot

Check it out at: Robot moved by a slime mould’s fears.

Hi-tech but energy-efficient homes

There are inexpensive things you can do to increase your home’s energy efficiency, and then there are expensive things you can do.

Wired has an interesting story on some pretty cool things that some people have done to their homes. And these aren’t things like replacing lightbulbs…

Check out some of these hi-tech homes…

Man, that’s fugly!

Odds are, you receive at least one e-mail (a day…) with photos of cute, fluffy little baby animals.

You quickly scroll through the e-mail, think “aw, cute” and delete it. Or, you just delete it as soon as your realize it’s yet another assortment of cats dressed up as people.

As with most things, however, there’s an opposite that provides some balance.

UglyOverload is the answer to those opposites — featuring the not-so cute and the “that’s so fugly it’s cute!” of the critter world.

Giraffe Weevils

When we lived in Oman, I remember picking or sifting out all the little weevils (aka "snout bugs") that lived in the bags of flour or oats.

When I picture weevils, I don’t usually picture giraffes… until now.

The Giraffe Weevil can grow up to 3 inches long, and has a long, segmented neck.

It’s a perfect "ugly bug" but is also very much a cool bug.

Do I Really Look Like That?

Nobody likes to see a photograph of themselves. Now you can shudder and squirm even more, thanks to The Perception Laboratory and the University of St Andrews’ Facial Transformer.

It’s as easy as uploading a mugshot and then selecting one of their transformation filters.

Here’s what the buggers did to MY beautiful mugshot…