Strip The City: Dubai

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZpQzcQezvY

 

I believe that Dubai is one of the most fascinating metropolis all around the world. The incredible growth of this city, thanks to the strong economy based on the oil extraction, let Dubai become an important place not only for its financial and economical importance, but also for its majestic buildings and awesome skyline.

This episode is part of a docu-series about big capitals of the world called "Strip the City". The series shows which are the structural characteristics that allowed man to build towns in places that most of the times do not look like fit for modern society.

As regards Dubai, the discovers made about the geologic conformation of the territory and the related studies made let this city become a 12 millions people capital. The tallest building in world is the Burj Khalifa, which is in Dubai, (United Arab Emirates).

Engineers and geologists managed to find and provide freshwater in a desert area. They studied how to build high buildings in a place with high winds and to make artificial islands protecting the marine ecosystem. In a part of the video ti also explained how an oil-plant is made and how it works in presence of an oilfield in the see.

The Language used is quite simple, and ,in spite of the technical and scientific lexicon, the presence of images and videos helps to understand the meaning.

Rescue Dawn by Werner Herzog (2006)

 

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meq7PRw6174

 

Last weekend I found on BBC iPlayer this film, which is possible to watch on YouTube.

This movie is based on a true story of a German-American pilot of the U.S. Air Force (Dieter Dengler), who was sent for a mission to Laos at the beginning of the Vietnam War.

The idea of making a movie inspired to this story was in Werner Herzog's mind from 1997, but the lack of interest by Hollywood producers let him broadcast (with the personal collaboration of Dieter Dengler) only a docu-film entitled Little Dieter needs to Fly. In the new century the presence of great actors, like Christian Bale, Steve Zahn and Jeremy Davies in the cast, makes Herzog's dream come true. Unfortunately when the film was released (2006), it was five years from Dengler's death.

I enjoyed the content and is very interesting to see how the director translated through the cinematographic language Dengler's point of view and feelings about his personal experience in Asia.

An apt example is the absence of subtitles during the Vietnamese speechs. The protagonist communicates with his enemies by gestures and shouts, sometimes tries to open a dialogue. They do not understand eachothers and you, as audience, live this situation like a character of the story. And if there were any incomprehesion between the two parts (American soldiers and Vietnamese soldiers), who is stronger rules.

Obviously, if the story is based on the experience of an american soldier it is difficult that the point of view is neutral, in particular as regards the representation of the enemy troups (Viet congs first).

3D printing: watch a statue spring to life

 

http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/video/2013/oct/23/3d-printing-statue-come-to-life-video

Well, few years ago I heard something about new Printing Technologies, regarding the possibility to create by a printer 3D-subjects instead of simple images (or projects) portraying the horizontal vertical and lateral view.
This new idea let create plastic models of architectonic projects working directly from CAD softwares and using a printer linked to the computer.
Then, thanks to the success of this invention, they began trying to make 3D-photo printings.
It is very funny thinking of having a little knick-knack which depict you in scale, even though I do not know if one day it will become a big business. Anyway it sounds interesting.
If you want to know a bit more about 3D Printing, I found this other video which explains quite simply and more generally how it works:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CP1oBwccARY