“Savior Bud” by Kim Hyo Jin and Seol Ah Sun
Presented at the Seoul Design competition, the “Savior Bud” is inspired by the “Giving Tree,” latches on to trees and uses it’s natural recycling processes to obtain water. In a simple process which basically involves collecting the moisture from the leaves and emptying it out into containers, the Savior Bud takes one more step toward acceptable living conditions in Africa.
SolarCharger 906 by i.Tech Dynamic
i.Tech Dynamic has launched on the market a solar charger for mobile devices. SolarCharger 906 is about the size of a deck of cards and lets on-the-go users charge their mobile devices such as cellphone, PDA, GPS, PMP with solar energy. This device features monocrystalline solar panel and does efficient solar conversion. Other than sunlight, the portable charger can also get power from a PC via USB port.
i.Tech Dynamic’s $59.99 SolarCharger 906 comes with 10 adapter plugs for use with a variety of mobile phones and entertainment devices, including iPhone, iPod, BlackBerry and other name-brand products.
Link Via [ecofriend]
L House, Poland by Moomoo Architects
Polish architecture practice moomoo have designed a house that is entirely clad in a plastic insulating material normally used for roofing. It is the first house that the elevation has been made entirely of a plastic insulating material namely – Thermopian. This plastic has good thermal, acoustic and insulating properties. It can be acquired in many different colours and looks very cool.
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SonUmbra Interactive Solar-Powered Tree Provides Sound and Light After Dark
Folks over at Loop.pH have designed a unique interactive solar-powered tree, which was unveiled at the London Design Festival. The structure comes with strands of light-emitting fabric woven into a lucent web of branches.
The Capture 180 by Lucas Ainsworth
Last week at the Intel University Design Expo, several students from the California College of the Arts were showcased for their innovative work with cameras and mobile technology, exploring new ways to capture landscapes, print photos and connect with your children.
The Capture180 Camera brings in the news with its Virtual Reality imaging proposal. It uses a 180 degree fish-eye lens to capture 180 degree hemisphere and stores the information as meta-data within each shot, allowing the camera’s viewfinder, a digital picture frame, or your computer screen to come alive with the images.
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Water Logo by Hara Design Institute, NDC & Atelier OMOYA
Water Logo ’09 by Hara Design Institute, NDC & Atelier OMOYA for TOKYOFIBER09 use a hidden mechanism; water seeps through the fabric in groups of drops that spell out “Senseware”. The fibres are treated with an ultra-water-repellent coating at the nano level to completely repel drops of water. When the droplets of water exceed a certain size, they roll away down the sloping surface under the influence of gravity. The water drops well up to form letters on top of the sloped fabric, a new drop of water grows up to take the place of each drop that rolls away, so the water logo is constantly renewed. The water drops form tails as they roll away.
Portable Photobooth by Marija Ivkovic & Lachlan Moore
Created by two Melbourne based photographers, who believe it to be the world’s first portable design, the photo booth is perfect for events where party goers are prone to a spot of exhibitionism after a drink or two. The booth can also be branded to transform it into useful marketing tool.
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Sensia DAB and Wi-Fi Radio Delivers Big Touchscreen, Twitter and Facebook Apps
The PURE Sensia couples a DAB/DAB+ digital radio and WiFi streaming into a single model, complete with a 5.7-inch 640 x 480 capacitive touchscreen and social networking plug-in apps including Twitter, Facebook and Picasa.
The radio itself has integrated stereo speakers each with 15W RMS, a 3.5mm headphone socket and an RF remote control. Connectivity includes WiFi b/g, DAB and DAB+ support, as well as FM radio, a 3.5mm input for hooking up an external audio source, and a USB port for firmware updates (though PURE will also distribute them for wireless installation over WiFi). While it’s natively AC powered, the Sensia also has an optional internal battery pack good for up to ten hours of use.
There’s even an on-screen keyboard for searching and adding comments. The PURE Sensia radio will be on sale by Christmas in Europe, priced at £249.99
Lamp Powered By Blood by Mike Thompson
Designer Mike Thompson has designed an innovative light called “Blood Lamp” that as depicted by its name, generates power from blood.
For the lamp to produce light one must break off the top of the lamp, dissolve a tablet in the solution and use their blood to power the light. This creates a lamp that can only be used once and forces the user to consider the most important time that they need the light. It forces them to be more considerate and reflect of how wasteful we are with energy on a daily basis. There is also a deep metaphor in this as well where the blood in our bodies represents life and the energy we use everyday effects the world we live in somehow some way, thus effecting our quality of life. See, everything is cyclical. Check out Mike’s very interesting portfolio of work here.
Link Via [FLYLIYF]
Toshiba’s Overture LED Installation
To represent their lighting systems division, Toshiba has created this beautiful installation titled “Overture” at the Milan Design. The installation aims to show how dramatic and emotionally engaging lighting can be employed while respecting the natural environment.
Sticky Light
Sticky Light by Sticky Light is a student project at the Department of Information Physics and Computing at the Ishikawa Komuro Laboratory of the University of Tokyo.
A laser spot bounces on a figure being drawn on paper, trying to escape the labyrinth of lines. It can track the contour of objects and even augment real-time drawings. Or you could build games like air hockey or a pinball game.
FlipWing Turbine Generates Hydroelectricity Without Dams
Hydrovolts, Inc. has developed a new technique which can be used to generate electricity from water without the use of dams. Rather than damming mighty rivers or installing turbines in unpredictable oceans, Hydrovolts has aimed its sights on a much smaller target: placid canals and other managed-flow water courses. Even at low flows, a predictable and reliable current is more than enough to power the company’s unique Flipwing Turbine.
Micro Butterfly RC Plane by Plantraco
The Micro Butterfly RC plane manufactured by Plantraco weighs just a fraction of its heavier counterparts used by RC plane hobbyists.
The biggest advantage to flying a tiny RC plane like the Micro Butterfly from Plantraco is that because they’re so light.
Thanks to a “body” made of durobatic foam and carbon fibre the batteries that go in the 4 channel fully proportional remote control are probably heavier.
Magic Spheres by Morteza Faghihi
Magic Spheres, designed by Morteza Faghihi, an Iranian designer, are speaker and subwoofer sets that coordinate perfectly with either your PC or Home Theatre.
The lights patterns displayed by the set go in sync with the rhythm and beats of the music being played.
Beyond awesome is the graphic bars representation that corresponds to the equalizer of the speakers.
Dumbs Want Robots to Draw Ads On the Moon’s Surface
A company called Moon Publicity proposes to use robots to carve the lunar surface dust into patterns which could be watched from Earth and that could serve as advertisements.
I have a hard time thinking someone may take them seriously, but it’s a matter of time before some idiots actually manage to pull it off.
New Shadow Shaping technology creates images on the moon that can be seen from Earth. Robots are used to create several small ridges in the lunar dust over large areas that capture shadows and shape them to form logos, domains names or memorials.
The firm says that it will start taking bids from accredited investors and companies today for one of the 44 lunar regions that are publicly available. Bids start as low as $46,000 and will be accepted until October 20, 2009. I expect we will hear what this is really all about in the next few days.
The Orb, New Bluetooth Headset
An innovative new Bluetooth headset called the Orb folds neatly into a ring when it’s not in use.
While in its ring form, its flexible organic light emitting diode (FOLED) displays caller ID, calendar items and voice-to-text info, and if you want to answer a call, simply take the ring off your finger, twist it into its headset shape, and hang it on your ear for hands-free talking.
Gizmag says it’s due to hit the market come January 2010.
Box To Play
The Box To Play phone from Japan’s KDDI AU Design Project introduces a new form factor for musical phones, as it transforms into a beautiful box shape, illuminated by a graphic equalizer on all four sides.
Aside from the sweet transformation and the graphical interface, the Box To Play also has a few other tricks up its sleeve. For one, the circular disk feature on its face allows you to act the DJ and scratch along to your favourite tunes.
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Lotus Electrive Concept by Diseno-art.com
Diseno-art.com designers have designed a sports car aimed towards the Lotus brand – The Lotus Electrive. The sports car is not designed as an everyday office vehicle, but has been tailored to meet the demands of all those who need a much powerful ride on their sunny weekend outings.
