Painting of the Mona Lisa using Microsoft paint. Original painting time 2hrs 30mins. Plays in under 5 minutes.

This movie shows the extreme nutational movements of morning glory vines. Climbing vines need to find a suitable support on which to grow.

Accompanying video to Nick Paumgarten’s piece “Up and Then Down” from the April 21st issue of The New Yorker. Footage of Nicholas White trapped in an elevator in the McGraw-Hill Building.

Epson launches a revolutionary new durable graphics printer for the sign & display market which will be available from selected authorized Epson professional graphics dealers in October 2008 at a price to be announced.

Epson Stylus Pro GS6000

The Epson Stylus Pro GS6000 is a new 64” wide inkjet printer with an 8-colour ink set. The Epson GS6000 is designed for both indoor and outdoor applications, including photo applications and fine-art reproduction. It has an exceptionally wide colour gamut which provides enhanced support for commonly used spot colors. The Epson Stylus Pro GS6000 has a resolution up to 1440×1440 dpi and a smallest ink droplet size of 3.7 picolitres. The Epson GS6000 will be first shown at the FESPA Digital show in Geneva 1-3 April. Price to be confirmed.

Featuring Epson UltraChrome GS ink, a new solvent-based ink technology with eight individual colors, including an all new orange and green, the Stylus Pro GS6000 produces the industry’s widest color gamut for unparalleled output quality on nearly any solvent-based media. The printer’s new Dual-Array MicroPiezo AMC print head has been engineered for the demands of high-production solvent printing. The Stylus Pro GS6000 is also the fastest 64-inch wide roll-to-roll printer in its class, with print speeds of up to 340 sqft per hour for banner-quality printing, up to 180 sqft per hour for everyday production and up to 91 sqft for photographic signage output.

read more…

This board is to help network retail picture framers in Vancouver BC  Canada and around the world in discussions about the custom picture framing industry, covering:

The Grumble The Original BBS for picture framers, open to all with questions and interest in the picture framing industry. Retail, Homebased, Newbies, Suppliers, just interested in learning, everyone’s welcome. Lets us know what you like or problems that you are having in picture framing today. You’re not alone any more, come join the fun.

Picture Framing Business Issues If it is Marketing, Advertising, Pricing, Insurance, Leases, Business Plans, etc . . . This may be a better venue for your question or issue. Comment on the current trade magazine articles and Business Issues.

Warped Moulding An on-going Soap opera, we talk about music, pets, and any other personal insane things we can think of. We would welcome anyone who wanted to join, but beware if you start something you’ll reget later. You may leave your jokes here also. Anyone without a sense of humor please don’t enter.

Software, Computers, CMC’s Techie Stuff NEW Discussions about computers, picture framing software, computer mat cutters and related software, computer designed mats and fonts.

Picture Frame Design Please post images of interesting picture frame designs that you have done with a discription of how you did the design.

Commercial Posts, For Sale of Framing Shop Stuff and Art List your framing equipment you want to buy or sell for FREE. You may list any item as long as it relates to our industry, Commercial Posting welcome in this area HTML OK. thanks

visit ths forum: www.warpedmoulding.com/

A single village in China is responsible for cranking out 60% of the world’s paintings. The overwhelming majority of the paintings are slavish reproductions of famous paintings. The artists doing the work are very talented, however, and an organization called Regional asked some of the artists to paint themselves. The results are incredible.

read more…

If you fancy an old master but don’t want to pay millions, Dafen, China, is the place to go. For a few dollars, the ‘painter workers’ will whip you up whatever you fancy. The village already supplies 600 galleries.

Just 17 years ago, Dafen was a rural backwater. Then art entrepreneur Huang Jiang moved in. “I needed lots of people to work for me. Here was a whole village”, he explains. By applying China’s production line techniques to art and training lots of artists, he has boosted the town’s turnover to $22 million p.a. Orders come in from around the world.

Youtube related video:
Painting Village - China

From the Discovery Channel:

CANON　LENS MAKER:

A water balloon as captured by a high speed camera.

A high speed camera is a device used for recording slow-motion playback films, or used for scientific study of transient phenomena.

A normal motion picture is filmed and played back at 24 frames per second, while television uses 25 frames/s (PAL) or 29.97 frames/s (NTSC). High speed cameras can film up to 250,000 frames/s by running the film over a rotating prism or mirror instead of using a shutter, thus reducing the need for stopping and starting the film behind a shutter which would tear the film stock at such speeds. Using this technique one can stretch one second to more than 10 minutes of playback time (super slow motion). The fastest cameras are generally in use in scientific research, military test and evaluation, and industry. An example of an industrial application is crash testing to better document the crash and what happens to the automobile and passengers during a crash. MythBusters often use high speed cameras to see their tests in slow motion.

A problem for high speed cameras is the needed exposure for the film, so one needs very bright light to be able to film at 40,000 frame/s sometimes leading to the subject of examination being destroyed because of the heat of the lighting.

read more about High Speed Cameras

Theme: 2008 International Exhibition of Fine Art Photography will spotlight images from around the world. All subjects are eligible.

Eligibility: The exhibition is open to all domestic and international, professional and amateur, photographers working with digital or traditional photography or combinations of both. The Center for Fine Art Photography invites photographers working in all mediums, styles and schools of thought to participate in its exhibitions. Traditional, contemporary, avant-garde, creative and experimental and mixed techniques are welcome.

Founder of the Lucie Awards, gallery owner, photographer, Hossein’s passion for our art has led to his being instrumental in providing many opportunities for photographers. For more information about Hossein and his accomplishments please visit these links:

There are several categories of camera gear available: there’s the sensible, the desirable and then there’s the stuff that you’d never even imagined.
Here’s a selection of equipment that most definitely belongs in the latter category.
Sigma APO 200-500 F/2.8
Zeiss Apo Sonnar T* 1700 mm F4
Polaroid 20×24” Camera
Seitz 6×17” digital panoramic camera
Hasselblad H3DII
Canon EF 1200mm f/5.6L USM
The Gigapxl Project
Cameratruck
“The Great Picture”

read more and see the details for each

We went to the Burnaby Mountain park this weekend, when there is no light, no tripod and no good subject, then the best would be playing with lens and do some experiment, no Photoshop effects below expect color correction and some sharpness:

This series looks at contemporary American culture through the austere lens of statistics. Each image portrays a specific quantity of something: fifteen million sheets of office paper (five minutes of paper use); 106,000 aluminum cans (thirty seconds of can consumption) and so on. My hope is that images representing these quantities might have a different effect than the raw numbers alone, such as we find daily in articles and books. Statistics can feel abstract and anesthetizing, making it difficult to connect with and make meaning of 3.6 million SUV sales in one year, for example, or 2.3 million Americans in prison, or 410,000 paper cups used every fifteen minutes. This project visually examines these vast and bizarre measures of our society, in large intricately detailed prints assembled from thousands of smaller photographs. The underlying desire is to emphasize the role of the individual in a society that is increasingly enormous, incomprehensible, and overwhelming.

read more…

Remio is a graffiti artist in Vancouver Canada. He has some amazing work. This video has an exclusive interview with the writer.

The City of Vancouver’s Graffiti Management Program makes resources available to you to help wipe out graffiti should it appear on your building or in your neighborhood. It also creates new avenues for graffiti writers and other artists to display their work.

Graffiti Management Program overview:

* The graffiti by-law requires property owners to have graffiti removed within 10 days after being served a notice from the City. The by-law also includes a minimum $500 fine for anyone caught writing graffiti.
* In partnership with ICI Paints, the City of Vancouver offers property owners a free paint kit for graffiti removal.
* The City of Vancouver offers financial assistance to property owners for graffiti removal from heritage surfaces and repair of glass etched with acid graffiti.
* A mural program provides new, legitimate outlets for graffiti writers and other artists to display their work. Interested property owners can choose to donate a wall for the program, and the City will facilitate the process and provide the supplies.
* Community Paint Outs encourage community groups, businesses and residents to team up and improve the physical appearance of their neighborhood. The City will pitch in the supplies and will help promote your event.

Whether you’re a business owner, resident or artist, this Web site will help you learn more about the Graffiti Management Program and the resources available to you. You can also call the Graffiti Hotline at 604-873-7161 for more information.
read more…

Host Victoria Bidewell takes us to the 1 year Anniversary of Shop Cocoon which is an artist run shop in Vancouver.

Created by Vancouver Film School student Marcelo Ortiz through the VFS 3D Animation & Visual Effects program.

Call for Entries

Art in the Park 2008 is still accepting applications for participation in this year’s event.

Show times:
Friday: 4 to 8 pm
Saturday and Sunday: 10 am to 5 pm

’Art in the Park’ is the longest-running outdoor show in the Fraser Valley. After holding the show at Lynton Studio’s 2-acre garden for 7 years, the show moved to Trice Farms Garden Centre for the next 3 years.

This year, for our 11th show, they will be working in conjunction with the Downtown Maple Ridge Business Improvement Association, and they are happy to announce thier new location right in the heart of Maple Ridge, at the Memorial Peace Park off 224th Street .

Each year, they bring you new artists as well as returning favorites and this year will be no different. They expect this year’s show to be thier biggest and best ever.

Contact info:

Lyn Thomas, President
Lynton Studio
12151 McNutt Rd., Maple Ridge, V2W 1N6
lyntonart@shaw.ca
604-462-8380

web site: www.artintheparkmapleridge.com

This is a very good article about photo editing monitors:

1. Buy an Eizo if you can.(EIZO LCD monitor meet the strict demands of professionals for whom display performance is a vital, daily consideration. Benefiting from EIZO’s superior technology and total commitment to quality, each monitor offers imaging performance and adjustment capabilities that make it a leader in its class.)
2. Buy a NEC / Lacie / Apple if you can’t do #1. [Lacie is rebranded NEC and $400 more expensive]

read more…

The number of homeless on Surrey’s streets has jumped 15 per cent since the last Metro Vancouver count three years ago.

With the help of 670 volunteers, the Regional Steering Committee on Homelessness conducted the count over a 24-hour period on March 11 to gauge the depth of the problem so that advocates can find solutions.

Preliminary numbers released this week show that 2,592 people were found to be homeless in the entire Metro Vancouver region, or 19 per cent more than in 2005 and more than double the number in 2002. read more

Stephen Wiltshire from London is a star among savants. Stephen is autistic. He did not speak his first words “pencil” and “paper” until he was 5. Yet, when he was 11 he drew a perfect aerial view of London after only one helicopter ride. For this film we’re testing the “Living camera” in Rome.

Vancouver’s parks commissioners vote to send the upside-down chapel into artistic purgatory.

VANCOUVER — It was too hot for New York City; too hot for Stanford University. But a controversial, imposing sculpture by renowned international artist Dennis Oppenheim finally found a public home in laid-back Vancouver. Now, after 21/2 years in a prominent location near Stanley Park, the upside-down country church, denounced as “blasphemous” by some aghast Christians, is about to be unceremoniously dismantled, its future uncertain.

Too many negative comments and too many neighbours complaining that the sculpture interfered with their view of scenic Coal Harbour sealed the immediate fate of Mr. Oppenheim’s work, entitled Device to Root Out Evil. read more…

The Vancouver Art Gallery is bringing various forms of popular art together in one exhibition titled KRAZY! The Delirious World of Anime + Comics + Video Games + Art. On view from May 17 to Sept. 7, the exhibit aims to reveal the uniqueness of each medium, while uncovering their histories, interrelations and future trajectories. The installation is co-curated by such influential artists and producers as Maus author Art Spiegelman, The Sims creator Will Wright, comic artist Seth and animated feature film director Tim Johnson (Antz, Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas, Over the Hedge). read more

Caterina Fake knew she was onto something when one of the engineers at her Vancouver, British Columbia-based online game start-up created a cool tool to share photos and save them to a Web page while playing.

“It turned out the fun was in the photo sharing,” she says.

Fake scrapped the game. She and her programmer husband, Stewart Butterfield, transformed the project into Flickr. In less than two years, the photo-sharing site — now owned by Internet giant Yahoo — has turned into one of the Web’s fastest-growing properties. read more