Department of Creative Bank Accounting

Vermillion Cliffs Roadside Attraction

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From the Exploration Unit

I was going through an archive of images I've puled from online and saw the first image up there and it reminded me of when the Parker fam visited this spot a few years ago on an overcast day.

This is the stone house at the Vermillion Cliffs location in northern Arizona. Visiting here feels like walking into a Moebius drawing.

It's a place out of time that instantly opens up your imagination.

Located here: LINK​

-Jake

Cyborg Turtle

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From the Department of Creative Bank Accounting, in cooperation with the Office of Good News

Back in 2015 this story of a loggerhead turtle that what injured by a boat made the rounds on the internet when scientists equipped it with a 3-D printed prosthetic jaw at a rehabilitation center in Turkey. I missed this story back then, but it was just brought to my attention recently, and now I share this with you.

A few searches didn't bring up any update on whether or not the turtle's body rejected the implant, or whether it was returned to the sea. However, I love that this happened. Warms my heart to see technology put to good use, righting a wrong.

-Jake

Japanese Tōmyōdai

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From the Department of Creative Bank Accounting, Architecture Desk

I learned about Japanese lighthouses this week. Most of the lighthouses you'll see in Japan look like traditional western style light houses. In the Meiji era Scottish engineer Richard Henry Brunton supervised the building of 26 of them and established a system of lighthouse keepers. Prior to his influence, Japanese lighthouses looked like this:

There's only a handful of these left and they aren't very well known. All of these are Edo period and look distinctly Japanese. I love the squared off and squatty look to them.

For some reason whenever I've thought of lighthouses I always thought of the traditional New England cylindrical style. It never occurred to me that other cultures would need to have solved the same problem and would've done it in their own style. Something to think about next time you sit down to design a spaceship or castle. Try to think about how this particular alien or fantasy race would approach the problem and let that influence the design, from the bones up.

(Via @UrbanFoxxx)

-Jake

Carl Størmer's Spy Camera Street Photography, Circa 1893

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From the Department of Interestingness, in association with the Photography Desk in the Department of Creative Bank Accounting

In 1893 a mathematics student, 19 year old Carl Størmer, had a crush on a girl. Being the shy creeper that he was purchased a spy camera so he could get a photo of her without her consent.

He got that photo of her, but surprisingly the relationship never developed further than that. However, young Carl kept on taking candid photos of people on the streets of Oslo, and personally I'm grateful for these human snapshots.

Most photos from this time period are stuffy and posed making that time period seem distant and unrelatable. Størmer's photos peel back the formality and show us that these folks weren't so different from us. This kind of stuff is the closte to backwards time traveling I'll ever get, so I just bask in it from time to time.

Emu Foot

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From the Department of Creative Bank Accounting, Flora and Fauna Unit

Our neighbor has an emu they inherited from someone who couldn't take care of him any more. He's about 18 years old, and they call him Kevin. One day I was feeding him grapes and he snagged my ring finger instead of the grape. Took a bunch of skin off of it as I jerked it away from his maw. Don't mess with Kevin.

My favorite thing about this guy is watching his graceful walk. His feet and claws are massive, yet he moves nimbly around like a ballet dancer. Found these cool photos of an emu foot. Living dinosaurs, I tell you.

-Jake

Mysterious Drone

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From the Department of Creative Bank Accounting, Office of Aerial Design

A drone washed ashore Taketomi Island . It's a US training drone called the Beechcraft MQM-107 Streaker. They launch these things from the ground, then it deploys a target that it tows behind it. Jet fighters catch up to it and practice shooting the target with missiles. Then the drone drops to the ground to be retrieved, outfitted with a new target and launched again.

I feel like this could be the first scene in a story. Some strange technology washes ashore a tiny island in the pacific. They're able to reverse engineer it, and create a weapon to help them defend themselves from some outside threat (kaiju maybe? or pirating raiders?)

Anyway, I thought it looked cool upside down.

-Jake

David Roberts (1796–1864)

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From the Department of Creative Bank Accounting, Office of Environment Design

I've been a huge fan of David Roberts since I stumbled on his work in an old book I found at the Greenwich Library one morning about 13 years ago. Since then I've collected a few books of his work, but I recently found some more art of his I hadn't seen. These street scenes of 1800s Europe...maybe Spain?

This is the level of ability I aspire to. Maybe in another 10 years? More images here: LINK

-Jake

On Your Mark

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From the Film and Animation Division

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Studio Ghibli Cyber Punk. Four words you wouldn't think would go together...but oh they do so well. This is an animated music video created by Studio Ghibli for the song "On Your Mark" for a Japanese rock band. Made waaaay back in 1995 at peak animated cyber punk. I assume they did this for a quick cash infusion between films and to stay sharp...maybe even to explore a different style? Anyway, it's cool.

There's an indulgently long Wikipedia entry on it here: LINK

WATCH IT HERE: LINK