METU (ODTÜ) Science and Technology Museum, Ankara

On a recent trip to Ankara, Turkey, we visited the Middle East Technical University (Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi) Science and Technology Museum.

This museum is located on the university campus and the security guard was kind of confused as to why we were visiting. 

Steam Engine

Outside is a steam engine and several aircraft and several buildings that appear to be cover-ups for alien landings. The large saucer-shaped building is entered via an automatic door that makes a wooshing sound when opening.

Satellite map view courtesy Apple Maps.

The same satellite map via Google. What are they hiding?

Inside are two floors of exhibits of science and technology from prehistoric to modern times.

Hittite era guitar

With Gallipoli located in Turkey, there were items from World War I, including a medical tent and devices for carrying the wounded soldiers.

Army hospital tent from 1914-1922

The system to carry a wounded soldier on a horse

The system to carry wounded soldiers on a donkey

There were several variations of typewriters. 

QWERTZ (German/Polish) keyboard

AZERTY, (French/Belgium) keyboard

Turkish-F keyboard

Video cameras

Helicopter

I think my parents had a cassette deck and headphones similar to this in the 1970s.

Tape deck, headphones, cassette player

Home movie cameras

Movie projector

Oric Atmos Computer made by Tangerine Computer Systems

In another building are vehicles - mostly cars.

Yellow Desoto

Yellow Pontiac

Yellow and Black Chevrolet

Anadol Böcek, (Anatolian Bug), a Turkish made car from 1975

Thunderbirds Are Go

Over the weekend we saw several Thunderbirds Are Go episodes on a TV cartoon channel. I remember the original Thunderbirds were puppets and I thought the remake was all CGI. I am happily surprised to see this behind the scenes today talking about the amazing "bigature" sets created for the show.    

Tycho Brahe Planetarium

Did you know that Denmark has an amateur manned space programme?

On our summer trip to Denmark, we visited the Tycho Brahe Planetarium in Copenhagen and saw a slightly damaged spacecraft capsule from the Copenhagen Suborbitals programme. 

The Tycho Brahe spacecraft was launched with the HEAT 1X rocket from a vessel in the Baltic Sea in June 2011. The capsule contained a crash-test dummy and launched successfully but veered off course and the flight was cut short. During the flight the parachutes tore, causing the spacecraft to crash land in the sea at about 200 km/h.

The flight from the astronaut's perspective.

Data from the flight has been used to improve the programme and so despite this setback the missions are continuing. The recovered craft is on display in the planetarium along with many other exhibits about space exploration. 

My son created his version of a spacecraft ready for launch at the planetarium.

The complex contains an huge screen for 3D and IMAX movies. We saw a 3D movie about the journey to the planets and a Jean-Michel Cousteau film - The Marvelous Ocean.

Easter eggs

Easter eggs are hidden gems inside movies, DVDs, software and websites.

Have you ever made any?

I created a couple of Easter eggs three years ago on the Factory Reset wiki. This wiki has user created instructions for resetting a number of devices back to their factory settings and is a good resource if you need to get your device back.

http://factory-reset.com/wiki/Earth
http://factory-reset.com/wiki/Universe

Happy Groundhog Day

In celebration of Groundhog Day, Instructables has a special instructable today on how to modify the Groundhog Day Alarm Clock featured in the Groundhog Day movie. The Groundhog Day Alarm Clock consists of a Panasonic RC-6025 flip clock modified to play the audio from the movie Groundhog Day when the alarm goes off.

Make sure to watch the video!

Learn more about making the Groundhog Day Alarm Clock at Groundhog Day Alarm Clock on Instructables.

Are you a Geek or Nerd?

Last month the BBC featured an article: Are 'geek' and 'nerd' now positive terms? telling how Swedish campaigners are trying to force changes to the derogatory dictionary definitions of geek and nerd:

geek

noun /gēk/  geeks, plural An unfashionable or socially inept person A person with an eccentric devotion to a particular interest - a computer geek A carnival performer who does wild or disgusting acts

nerd

noun /nərd/ nurds, plural A foolish or contemptible person who lacks social skills or is boringly studious - one of those nerds who never asked a girl to dance An intelligent, single-minded expert in a particular technical discipline or profession - he single-handedly changed the Zero image of the computer nerd into one of savvy Hero

When I was at school in the 80's, the definitions were a good fit. The "nerd" was the guy who spent his lunchtimes in the library studying. He lacked social skills, was boringly studious and went on to become a pathologist. Personal computers were new then and us "geeks" hung out in the computer lab whenever we could. We were a little unfashionable and eccentric and did not get invited to parties.

From xkcd: A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language 

Now many (rich and) famous geeks and nerds are almost worshipped by the masses hungry for their latest electronic creations. A lot of the top rating movies and television shows feature geeks and nerds as heroes. The terms now have more positive meaning. New Zealand geeks got their own second level domain .geek.nz in 2003. Geekli.st is "a place for geeks to share what they've done, who they did it with and connect with great companies and communities".


From: MastersInIt.org

My "Geekly" playlist on GrooveShark:



More reading:
How to tell the difference between Geeks and Nerds: 7 steps.
Essential Nerd Movies

How monsters are made

During our travels in New Zealand we visited the How to make a Monster exhibit at the Waikato Museum.

Featuring animatronics, props and special effects from movies such as Inspector Gadget 2, George of the Jungle 2, Peter Pan and Pitch Black, the display highlighted some of John Cox's Creature Workshop's work.

Inspector Gadget hands

George of the Jungle gorillas

Animatronic head

Where's WALL-E?

Can you find WALL-E in this artwork by Richard Sargent?

How many of these robots from movies, television and popular culture can you name? The entry that identifies the most characters correctly by 31 August 2011, will win a signed poster print. See Hopewell Studio news and events for details.

Yetkin Telesystems to the rescue

We accidentally got a 3D movie for Christmas. Like most of the DVDs we buy here in Turkey there is a Turkish translation with Turkish dubbing, subtitles and the DVD cover in Turkish.

Someone had forgotten the important "D" in the title of this movie "Spy Kids 3D". There was no mention of 3D (or 3-Boyutlu = the Turkish term for 3D) on the DVD cover.

It is a good movie. There are a lot of 3D effects in the movie and a behind the scenes section on the production of the movie and the history of 3D movies but it gets difficult to watch the 3D sections without (red/blue) anaglyph glasses. Because of the missing "D" these were not included with the movie, but thankfully I am working with my friend Oğuz from Yetkin Telesystems on a web project.

Yetkin Telesystems are the Turkish suppliers of everything 3D, from 3D monitors and projector systems to holographic, lenticular and custom 3D photography and they have sorted us out with some 3D anaglyph glasses.

Thanks Oğuz.

Brix

Phones that merge screens!

Imagine if the MuzGadget bros had one or more of these gadgets each.

Latest gadget acquisition - looking for info

A friend who is leaving the country for a year or more gave us a Sharp Hi8 Camcorder (VL-AH50). It had an American power supply - easily fixed with a local plug and we should be able to pick up blank cassettes easy enough. The onscreen menu makes it easy to understand all the features, but I'm interested in locating a manual, accessories, etc.

It only has AV output so any recommendations for digitisers/converters for connecting it to a laptop so we can save movies to DVD would be useful.