Odd News, Tech & Gadgets

Pixie: Open Source Renderer For Windows/OS/Linux

2008-02-28T12:47:00.008-05:00

Being a HUGE 3D art/rendering enthusiast, I was pretty excited to find this. Pixie is an open source Photo-realistic rendering engine comparable to some of the higher end renderer's such as Maxwell, Brazil and Vray.

Some of the features of this project include:

Object instancing / delayed primitives
Displacements
Programmable shading
High quality texture/shadow/environment mapping
High dynamic range input/output
Scalable, multi-resolution raytracing using ray differentials
Motion blur
Depth of field
Level of detail
Reyes style rendering
Occlusion culling
Network parallel rendering
DSO shaders
Global illumination
Automatically raytraced smooth reflections / shadows
Caching/baking computation with LOD
Scalable, multi-threaded rendering
Arbirtaty output values
64 bit compatibility
Inline archives
Conditional execution
Named resources

The only downside I can tell so far is it appears that you'll have to compile it yourself if you want to tinker around with it. Besides that, it's nice to see a project like this in the works and plan on playing around with it over the next few months. It certainly looks very impressive.

If you try it, please let me know what you think!

Click the image above to go to the website.

Apple's Safari browser a security risk?

2008-02-28T09:55:00.005-05:00

If you're using Apple's Safari browser, PayPal has some advice for you: Drop it, at least if you want to avoid online fraud.

Safari doesn't make PayPal's list of recommended browsers because it doesn't have two important anti-phishing security features, according to Michael Barrett, PayPal's chief information security officer.

"Apple, unfortunately, is lagging behind what they need to do, to protect their customers," Barrett said in an interview. "Our recommendation at this point, to our customers, is use Internet Explorer 7 or 8 when it comes out, or FireFox 2 or Firefox 3, or indeed Opera."

Safari is the default browser on Apple's Macintosh Computers and the iPhone, but it is also available for the PC. Both Firefox and Opera run on the Mac.

Unlike its competitors, Safari has no built-in phishing filter to warn users when they are visiting suspicious Web sites, Barrett said. Another problem is Safari's lack of support for another anti-phishing technology, called Extended Validation (EV) certificates. This is a secure Web browsing technology that turns the address bar green when the browser is visiting a legitimate Web site.

When it comes to fighting phishing, "Safari has got nothing in terms of security support, only SSL, that's it," he said. Apple representatives weren't immediately available to comment on this story.

Click the Image above to read more

The Sun will distroy the Earth unless we can change our orbit

2008-02-28T08:52:00.005-05:00

[New calculations by University of Sussex astronomers predict that the Earth will be swallowed up by the Sun in about 7.6 billion years unless the Earth's orbit can be altered.

Dr Robert Smith, Emeritus Reader in Astronomy, said his team previously calculated that the Earth would escape ultimate destruction, although be battered and burnt to a cinder. But this did not take into account the effect of the drag caused by the outer atmosphere of the dying Sun.

He says: "We showed previously that, as the Sun expanded, it would lose mass in the form of a strong wind, much more powerful than the current solar wind. This would reduce the gravitational pull of the Sun on the Earth, allowing the Earth's orbit to move outwards, ahead of the expanding Sun.

"If that were the only effect the Earth would indeed escape final destruction. However, the tenuous outer atmosphere of the Sun extends a long way beyond its visible surface, and it turns out the Earth would actually be orbiting within these very low density outer layers. The drag caused by this low-density gas is enough to cause the Earth to drift inwards, and finally to be captured and vaporised by the Sun."]

To read on, please click the image above.

Manterns: Candles for Men? haha

2008-02-26T16:41:00.012-05:00

This is pretty humorous... and creepy. A candle company called Manterns caters to men who appreciate the smell of Dirt, Whiskey, Baseball Glove, Sawdust or Bacon Cheeseburger. This is a caption from their website:

"Manterns are 100% soy wax candles scented specially for men. With unique scents like bacon cheeseburger, the ballpark, dirt, beer and hot wings, the man in your life is sure to love this one of a kind gift. In fact, we guarantee it 110%. These manly candles come in 8oz whiskey and 16oz pint glasses for enjoyment long after the candle is gone.

What are you waiting for? Get a guy in your life the man-scented candle he'll enjoy!"

Click the Picture above to go to the website

1200HP Toyota Supra vs. 2008 Lamborghini LP640

2008-02-25T16:00:00.003-05:00

Wow! That's all I got to say about that. Enjoy

Ralph Nader back in it for 2008?

2008-02-25T15:00:00.012-05:00

The Democrats surely can't be too pleased with Ralph Nader's decision to run again in 2008 as a 3rd party candidate for the White House. Nader's been criticized in the past for "stealing" votes from presidential nominees and this year should be no different. He's been held liable by many political annalists for President Bush's defeat over Gore in the 2000 election. Will this revelation give the Republicans the presidency yet again?

Click the image above to read more

Very cost effective solution to shakey hands in Photography!

2008-02-25T14:12:00.005-05:00

This idea is ingenious. I wish I would of thought of it first :) Hopefully someone will be able to make use of it.

Cool script/tool for hiding images in text

2008-02-25T13:31:00.011-05:00

I stumbled upon this cool little tool to hide images in text or vice versa. Simply Highlight the text to reveal the hidden image. Must be using Safari or Firefox to use (or any browser that uses CSS3, from what I understand)

Click the image above to try it yourself. Enjoy!

Police Dogs in Germany are issued Shoes?

2008-02-25T13:04:00.010-05:00

It appears that Police Dogs in the German city of Duesseldorf are going to start wearing shoes as standard gear in an effort to keep their paws cleaner and safer. I guess it makes sense, but odd none the less.

"All 20 of our police dogs — German and Belgian shepherds — are currently being trained to walk in these shoes," Andre Hartwich said. "I'm not sure they like it, but they'll have to get used to it."

Click the picture above for the complete story!

A car made out of wood that does 0-60 in under 3 seconds?

2008-02-23T23:49:00.011-05:00

The car dubbed "The Splinter" is a wooden supercar built by Joe Harmon Design. It's powered by Cadillac's trademark 32valve 4.6L NorthStar engine, fed through 2 roots blowers producing a projected 600bhp via a 6 speed manual gearbox. Estimates indicate that the car would weigh in at 2500lbs and do 0-60mph in approx 3 seconds and have a top speed of 240MPH.

For more information, check out http://www.joeharmondesign.com/

Click The Image to see more pictures

Verizon Online Rejects Hollywood's Plea to Spy on Users

2008-02-23T19:36:00.012-05:00

Communications giant, Verizon online, has come out publicly to announce their rejection to Hollywood's request to monitor end-user traffic for illegal file sharing. Unlike AT&T, Verizon isn't willing to give up the privacy of their users and for good reason.

“We generally are reluctant to get into the business of examining content that flows across our networks and taking some action as a result of that content,” said Thomas Tauke, Verizon's executive vice president for public affairs.

Please read more by clicking the picture above.

nVidia launches the first of their new GeForce 9 series of video cards

2008-02-22T09:07:00.008-05:00

nVidia has finally released their long overdue 9 series of video cards in the form of the new GeForce 9600 GT. It looks to be a very nice performer and comes close to the coveted 8800GT in terms of horsepower.

Click the Picture above to read more about the latest ATi killer from nVidia