Items of Interest

Tom Cruise's Halo Jump

#110
For the upcoming Mission:Impossible Fallaout movie, Tom Cruise trained and executed multiple HALO (High Altitube Low Opening) jumps to get the shot sequence for the movie. A HALO jump involves a parachute jump from an altitude of 25,000ft and free falling to 2,000ft before opening the parachute. Check out his behind the scenes video that shows the insane shot being filmed.
Video

Professional Diploma in UX Design

#110
Irish company UXTraining.com have launched the UX Design Institute, which offers an online Professional Diploma in UX Design, accredited by Glasgow Caledonian University. The course is 40 hours in duration with a 2.5 hour exam, delivered online and includes mentoring and support. I have attended a UXTraining.com course in the past, and I found them and the material to be excellent and very worth while. The Professional Diploma in UX Design is currently available for 30% off as part of a special launch offer.
Tech
Web Dev

New UK Drone Laws

#110
New Drone laws have/are coming into effect in the UK, that will restrict drones from flying higher than 400ft (120m) and within 1km of any airport. According to the UK government website, the laws are now in effect. According to dronesafe.uk, a CAA website, the laws don't coming into effect until July 30th.
Tech

Vegan Diet Best Way To Impact The Environment

#109
A new analysis published in Science by researches from Oxford on reducing food's environmental impact through producers and consumers has found that reducing meat and dairy is the single biggest way to reduce your environmental impact on the planet, far bigger than reducing flights or driving an electric car. The study gathered date from 38,000 farms in 119 countries across 40 food products. The results show that 80% of farmland is used for livestock which produces just 18% of food calories and 35% of protein. 
Life
Science

Pop Music Diversity

#109
The Pudding have a great interactive article showing the diversity of pop music across the decades. The article charts the similarity of hits based on their instrument gene, allowing you to filter by synth, guitar distortion or drums agressiveness among others. The article also ranks songs using the 8 data points of acousticness, danceablility, energy, instrumentalness, liveness, loudness, speechiness and valence in order to chart the similarity of songs across different decades.
Data Vis
Music

Tricking The Eye In VR Walking

#109
Computer scientists at Stony Brook University have developed a system to allow users of VR to explore large spaces without the need for physical spaces of the same size.The system uses eye tracking to detect when the user's eye is in saccade, when the eye rapidly darts around to take in data, which causes in the brain momentarily ignore visual signals during the motion between points in order to keep us orientated.The VR system takes advatage of these blind spots to slightly rotate the VR camera, causing the user to shift inline with their view.
AR & VR
Innovation
Video

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