It was an odd way of promoting classical music, but it’s also hard to deny that it was a cool way to virtually experience the London Eye and a view of London’s skyline.
As is always the case, one unusual 360° video invariably leads to another.
If you’re a fan of John Williams and his movie tunes, then you might like taking a side adventure to watch the scads of YouTube videos that show him conducting his greatest hits …
Finally, here is my own little experiment in 3D music fun.
Here’s my Music HeavenToy World. Click on notes to learn about music.
This adventure begins where that one left off, but this is a very different, and fun excursion that happened because Boaty McBoatface surfaced in my news feed.
In case you never heard of him, Boaty’s a submarine that got his name via a publicity stunt by the UK’s National Oceanography Centre that went viral and didn’t turn out like they expected. He turned up in my news feed this week because he’s been doing science similar to the kind that the seals in my last post were doing, and the results have just been published.
Google assumed that if I would want to know what seals with antenna were doing in Antarctica, then I would definitely want to know about Boaty’s activities.
Here’s a video about Boaty’s discoveries as well as the fiasco that led to his name.
Boaty’s research is important, but seeing him, whose thoughts could help but wander to The Beatles’ song/album/movie Yellow Submarine?
Google/YouTube couldn’t resist helping me along with those musings. Next thing I knew, nostalgia kicked in, and I was watching a trailer for the re-release of the movie in the UK and Ireland that was done for the movie’s 50th Anniversary.
Then I discovered that The Beatles have official Playlists on YouTube, and there’s even a dedicated Yellow Submarine Playlist that has over twenty videos with all sorts of insider stuff about the movie.
The Internet then led me to scads of ancillary products inspired by the movie. For example, there’s a Yellow Submarine turntable from Pro-Ject (YouTube). Who knew?
LEGO also released a Yellow Submarine Set, and here’s their colorful trailer for it.
If you’re inspired to book a trip on a real Yellow Submarine, then here’s a link to a video with some background on the Canary Islands that you may want to know before you head out on a real-life adventure.
There you have it. One minute you’re doing science with seals in Antarctica, and then the next thing you know, you’re exploring the warm waters of the Canary Islands in a Yellow Submarine.
Isn’t the Internet a wonderful place?
Finally, if all this talk about The Beatles has you craving something a bit more psychedelic, or you just want to play a little while longer, then here’s a trippy little 360° video that claims to be “inspired by The Beatles’ Yellow Submarine.
It turned out that Sam Battle’s odd creation, Furby Organ, led YouTube to suggest all sorts of other intriguing music related mischief to explore. So I took the bait and went surfing.
The first, most insistent suggestion that YouTube made was to take a look at Wintergatan’s unusual Rube Goldberg’esque extravaganza called the Marble Machine!
Like many other music hackers, they posted numerous videos about how they did it on their YouTube Channel. That includes “How it Works” Part 1 and Part 2. You can also visit the retired Marble Machine at the Speelklok Museum in Utrecht.
Next YouTube incessantly suggested that videos from Animusic were worth a watch.
Animusic also posted a video about making it on their YouTube Channel.
A little less predictable suggestion was a video about how Intel built a physical Pipe Dream demo for a conference. Take a look, but be aware that it’s not until the middle of the video that you can start to get the gist of the demo.
Of course, Fantasia has been re-imagined many times over the years, and modern digital wizardry has aided and abetted in adding a few honorable mentions to that pantheon.
It always struck me as a shame that no 360° version of that scene was ever made. Apparently I wasn’t alone. There are a couple of 360° fan videos by some school kids and a cover band that try to get the job done as best they can.
Perhaps One Republic felt the same way, too.
They never did a 360° video for Secrets, but later on they did make an enchanting 360° video of their hit song Kids. Here’s a link to that awesome video.
It’s worth a watch, or even better, two. It so well done that it takes a few viewings to catch how much is going on in the scene.
Like all great musical tech wizards, they also did a “behind the scenes” and posted it on their YouTube Channel.
Now here’s another inductee into this informal “Musical Tech Wizard Hall of Fame” that’s evolving right here in this post.
If you watch television at all, then you’ve probably seen a commercial for the Elton John biopic Rocketman that’s being released May 30th. It’s timing coincides with his final world tour Farewell Yellow Brick Road that will include more than 300 shows across five continents.
What you may not know is that at the same time as he announced the tour, he also published a lovely 360° video that includes recreations of some of his most iconic performances. Here’s a link to that fun video.
As you watch the video, you can’t help but wonder how it was made. The good news is that you don’t have to guess, because being the great music hacking wizard that he is, Elton John also posted a Making of Farewell Yellow Brick Road that explains the amazing amount of work that went into the clip.
While on the topic of tech wizards of the musical world, it would be remiss to not also include another leader of the pack.
Paul McCartney has never been one to shy away from cutting edge tech, so it’s no surprise that he was one of the first artists to publish a 360° video of a live concert — it was filmed during his historic final show at Candlestick Park. Sadly, that video is not available on YouTube, but a couple of his other forays into 360° video are on his Pure McCartney YouTube Channel.
Here’s one of them that’s an amusing experiment in multimedia and montage.
It’s not often that mice sneak into the news, but they do manage it from time to time.
One story that gotten a lot of attention is about how researchers created “super mice” by injecting nanoparticles into their eyes to give them “night vision.” Here are links to the stories about that research.
In case you’re wondering what that would look like, here’s a link to a 360° video about how animals see the world that will give you a sense of it. The video concludes with segments on how rats see the world normally (2:32) and snakes see the world in the infrared (3:30).
Another story was a bit more entertaining. It involved a critter called Alston’s singing mouse. Here’s a link to a one minute introduction and an article about the talented little guys.
In fact, these mice, and others, actually sing ultrasonic love songs. Here’s a link to a video and some articles about the talented, frisky little guys.
Finally, the most interesting news was about how studying the singing mouse’s serenades could lead to treatments for humans with communication disorders that are a result of things like stroke or autism. Here’s a link to a video and some articles about that research.
So that’s neat stuff, but if you’re sad because you thought this was going to be about a mouse actually singing a song, with words, here’s a link to a clip from Sing to help you feel better.
NASA engineers had quite a New Years celebration in 2019 when New Horizons successfully executed a flyby of a tiny object named 2014 MU69 while moving at 32,000 miles per hour.
The planetesimal 2014 MU69 is better known by it’s nickname Ultima Thule, and it’s located way out past Pluto in a region of the Solar System called the Kuiper Belt.
Here’s a link to a video covering the achievement as well as what it has to do with the rock band Queen!
Some scientists may be referred to as “rock stars” from time to time, but it’s seldom literal. It’s also fairly rare for an astrophysicist to be mentioned in Rolling Stone.
Most news stories about Ultima Thule mentioned that it’s the furthest object that’s been photographed. However, New Horizons isn’t the spacecraft that’s the furthest away.
That honor belongs to the twin Voyager spacecraft. In fact, months before New Horizon’s encounter with Ultima Thule, Voyager 2 joined Voyager 1 in interstellar space. Here are a couple of stories abou that feat.
Many stories about the Voyagers mention that they both carry special golden records. Here’s a link to a video that explains how the records were designed to communicate with any aliens that might happen upon them in the distant future.
Believe it or not, there’s even a tie-in with rock ‘n’ roll here, too. The cool scientists that designed the record included a recording of Chuck Berry’s Johnny B. Goode!
There was a lot of news about space rocks closer to home around that time as well. That’s because, not just one, but two spacecraft reached milestones in their respective journeys to explore two asteroids.
The biggest news was that NASA’s OSIRIS-REx entered orbit around asteroid 101955 Bennu on New Years Eve. Among other things, this set records for the smallest body ever orbited by a spacecraft and the closest orbit of a planetary body by any spacecraft.
Here’s a video and press release about this milestone that was posted by the OSIRIS-REx Mission on December 31st.
There are many reasons that Bennu is an interesting object, but one of its biggest claims to fame is that it is a “potentially hazardous object” that is listed on the Sentry Risk Table with the second-highest cumulative rating on the Palermo Technical Impact Hazard Scale. The only one with a higher rating is asteroid (29075) 1950 DA (JPL/NASA) (Wikipedia). Neither of these asteroids are very likely to hit Earth, but they are the most likely (that we know of, so far).
That holiday season also brought continuing coverage of Japan’s nail-biting Hayabusa2 Mission to asteroid 162173 Ryugu (Wikipedia). The mission is scheduled to collect a sample of Ryugu and return it to Earth in December 2020.
Here’s a fun bit of trivia. Last summer Brian May also created a 3D stereoscopic image of Ryugu using a picture captured by Hayabusa2.
Of course, almost every story takes advantage of the teachable moment to clarify that it should be called the “far side” rather than “dark side” of the Moon, because it isn’t dark there. There are also inevitable references to Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon. In fact, when I went searching on YouTube for videos about China’s landing, it served up this trippy 360° video.
I’m sort of sad that it happens to be Pink Floyd’s album that’s getting a bit of play over this, because the more relevant rock music about the Moon is probably David Bowie’s Space Oddity. Notably, astronaut Chris Hadfield paid homage to this by making a music video of it while living on the International Space Station (ISS).
So that’s a wrap up of that wild holiday season in space exploration, and I hope you enjoyed the detours into rock ‘n’ roll, too.
Space Rocks & Happy New Year!
If you want to learn more about the the Solar System, explore this Toy World!
Click the 360° image below to explore it, click the menu in the upper right for controls and click “i” buttons on/off for links to experiences. Use “portals” to visit otherToy Worlds.
If you are a language or communication expert, rock and roll fan or not, you probably have a bit more nuanced response that might begin with the phrase “it depends” and end up including words like perspective and context.
But what do lady bugs think?
Your answer might be who knows … or cares?
Well, it turns out that somebody tried to find out, and the answer is surprisingly relevant as well as entertaining.
Personally, I found it funny that they singled out Willie Nelson as representative of the “not rock and roll” condition. I also couldn’t help but wonder if the ladybugs were just too busy dancing to eat 🙂
Seriously though, the study was actually about an important issue. There really is such a thing as noise pollution, and in some cases, it can be harmful to animals (including us). Here’s a link to an informative video about the impact of noise on humans.
So, that study about ladybugs opinions on rock and roll had a point, albeit an odd one.
However, I’m still not convinced that rock and roll is noise pollution. I lean towards siding with AC/DC on this one, although I must confess to being more on the same page as Joan Jett.
Finally, for those who are too young to know or too old to remember, here’s a fifty year old pre-MTV flashback by the The 5th Dimension singing the song that inspired the title of this post.
Groovy!
If you like this adventures then perhaps you will enjoy these other posts …
