Latte Art Printer

Ink jet printers can do a lot of things beyond printing paper. These day they can print vascular networks and organic solar cells. Now, they can even print on top of your grande latte! Using caramel as an ink it generates the logo of a coffee giant. A little frivolous, but for anyone who dislikes frivolities, just know that they still tend to advance the state of the art.

BMW Kinetic Sculpture

I generally like abstract sculptures, but kinetic abstract sculptures are even better. Its also nice to see a company that puts a lot of effort into engineering put some effort into art. Art and science/engineering are really not all that different, though the people that study them might be. Well, this video gets pretty neat after about a minute. Its a bunch of metal balls suspended on wires from the ceiling making 3D sculptures.

Topology Meets Art

Topology and art definitely go hand in hand, though it may not seem obvious at first. Mathematical patterns underlie our universe, so it should be no surprise that they underlie our art as well. I found this awesome site with many unique abstract sculptures derived from areas of math including knot theory and surface geometry. The intricate abstract art below is a small sample from from Carlo H. Séquin.

Torus Knot 5-3

Poincaré Double Lace

Annual Eurographics Awards

Knot 7-7

Quad Rose

Scherk-Tower

Gears Are Really Awesome and Complicated

You bet they are. Gears that are practical have to withstand pretty large forces, like the gears in a car transmission. Gears in power generation stations have to withstand even larger forces. In these applications simplicity is key, but what about applications that can benefit from some complicated gear shapes? Well, there aren't any (at least not yet), but there is always art. Check out the videos below of a cube gear and a heart gear.

Pokemon Art and Childhood

If only pokemon cards had illustrations like these I might have been inspired to be a cool artist, rather than a boring engineer. Oh well, at least I'll never go hungry. I think. Whatever the case, these are some sick drawings of the only characters ever than can only say their own names. Their limited vocabulary was made up for by their super special awesome fighting moves! Oh, what I would give to be a kid again. I literally couldn't stop saving the images to my computer, they bring back such wonderful memories.