4 ms·

Very very cool, mindblowing actually, seems legitimately useful. There have been a few art installations over the years that use these lights: https://www.you

Very very cool, mindblowing actually, seems legitimately useful. There have been a few art installations over the years that use these lights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hd077pa-5CI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hd077pa-5CI For a second I thought that the video was from this channel, which also does experimental cinematography stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4uzyhbDFas https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4uzyhbDFas

bcraven 3y ago
After seeing the Olafur Eliasson retrospective at the Tate Modern a few years ago I tracked down the components to build my own low pressure sodium vapour light. It's so weird, as those people say, so see things coloured... yet monochrome.
- jlarcombe 3y ago
  I rather miss them in the streets. It's only been, what, ten years or so since they've been replacing most of them with white LEDs round my way, but it's almost hard to remember that everything was yellow whenever you went out in the dark! Especially amazing atmosphere when it snowed...
  - BoxOfRain 3y ago
    I really prefer the old yellow sodium light to the harsher white LEDs, I get that the SOX bulbs weren't economical to make any more for various reasons but wish we could have migrated to monochromatic yellow LEDs instead of white ones. They're not just more pleasant aesthetically, they're also better for insects and animals than broad-spectrum white lights. I don't get the obsession with making lights as cold and harsh as possible, give me warm light that makes the night look like night rather than a bad approximation of day. At least by the time they got round to doing my street they used a lower temperature white than the ultra-harsh 'prison yard white' colour used in the earlier installations.
    - djmips 3y ago
      I don't have any solid evidence but I feel like the LED also disturbs sleep of people who live near street lamps. Also I found out recently that never putting an outdoor light shining upwards is somewhat less disruptive to moth navigation.
- harywilke 3y ago
  I was fortunate to be at the Tate for that exhibition and got to see when they turned the 'sun' off at closing time. I was visiting my brother in London at the time, he wasn't a big fan of modern art, so we split up, I went to the Tate, he went elsewhere to sight see, then later at dinner after effusing over the 'sun' exhibit and showing him photos of how cool it was, we rushed across town to get in just before closing. We got to see it together for about 10 minutes, before they turned it off. It went from a Sun to the Moon. Spectacular.
lqet 3y ago
Yes, extremely impressive. "Mary Poppins" rightfully received an Oscar for best visual effects. I am continuously amazed at the level of innovation done at the Disney studios back when Walt Disney was still alive. Rewatching Snow White with my daughter a few months ago, I was flabbergasted by the animation quality, even when compared to animation movies made decades later. Just look at these water scenes: https://youtu.be/54QeNL5ih6A?si=dOdrRrISu8f4I96G&t=95 https://youtu.be/54QeNL5ih6A?si=dOdrRrISu8f4I96G&t=95 https://youtu.be/khmrr7-W6BA?si=whn5mvuL9x95JP1l&t=70 https://youtu.be/khmrr7-W6BA?si=whn5mvuL9x95JP1l&t=70 This was in 1937! Compare these scenes to this Paramount animation clip (also featuring Snow White), which was finished just 4 years earlier: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKOSJ5AAwfc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKOSJ5AAwfc The multiplane camera [0] is also ingenious and is imho the single biggest reason why Disney could produce animation movies that looked "cinematic". I read somewhere that they re-used it for "The Little Mermaid" in the 80ies, and nobody really remembered how it worked anymore. Disney also developed Xerox animation [1], which is cheaper than traditional animation, but which gave 101 Dalmatians a very nice "sketchy", artsy look . [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiplane_camera https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiplane_camera [1] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/how-one-hundred-and-one-dalmatians-saved-disney-180977869/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/how-one-hundred-an...
- beAbU 3y ago
  Re the animation quality: I wonder if Disney didn't create a lot of their later animation by rotoscoping over live-action recordings? The quality of the animation and the realism of the characters' movements in those examples you posted definitely allude to this. Disney was known to recycle some of their animations in older movies [1], so this could be because they have a source live action recording somewhere that they rotoscoped over more than once for different productions. Also note the different backgrounds with different characters that move - excellent example of the multiplane camera in action. In the foreground they have a "recycled" animation, in the background they can then put something else in, and record it all in one go with their special camera. 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vd09WdOgOeg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vd09WdOgOeg
  - 3y ago

bcraven 3y ago

After seeing the Olafur Eliasson retrospective at the Tate Modern a few years ago I tracked down the components to build my own low pressure sodium vapour light. It's so weird, as those people say, so see things coloured... yet monochrome.

jlarcombe 3y ago
I rather miss them in the streets. It's only been, what, ten years or so since they've been replacing most of them with white LEDs round my way, but it's almost hard to remember that everything was yellow whenever you went out in the dark! Especially amazing atmosphere when it snowed...
- BoxOfRain 3y ago
  I really prefer the old yellow sodium light to the harsher white LEDs, I get that the SOX bulbs weren't economical to make any more for various reasons but wish we could have migrated to monochromatic yellow LEDs instead of white ones. They're not just more pleasant aesthetically, they're also better for insects and animals than broad-spectrum white lights. I don't get the obsession with making lights as cold and harsh as possible, give me warm light that makes the night look like night rather than a bad approximation of day. At least by the time they got round to doing my street they used a lower temperature white than the ultra-harsh 'prison yard white' colour used in the earlier installations.
  - djmips 3y ago
    I don't have any solid evidence but I feel like the LED also disturbs sleep of people who live near street lamps. Also I found out recently that never putting an outdoor light shining upwards is somewhat less disruptive to moth navigation.
harywilke 3y ago
I was fortunate to be at the Tate for that exhibition and got to see when they turned the 'sun' off at closing time. I was visiting my brother in London at the time, he wasn't a big fan of modern art, so we split up, I went to the Tate, he went elsewhere to sight see, then later at dinner after effusing over the 'sun' exhibit and showing him photos of how cool it was, we rushed across town to get in just before closing. We got to see it together for about 10 minutes, before they turned it off. It went from a Sun to the Moon. Spectacular.

lqet 3y ago

Yes, extremely impressive. "Mary Poppins" rightfully received an Oscar for best visual effects. I am continuously amazed at the level of innovation done at the Disney studios back when Walt Disney was still alive. Rewatching Snow White with my daughter a few months ago, I was flabbergasted by the animation quality, even when compared to animation movies made decades later. Just look at these water scenes: https://youtu.be/54QeNL5ih6A?si=dOdrRrISu8f4I96G&t=95 https://youtu.be/54QeNL5ih6A?si=dOdrRrISu8f4I96G&t=95 https://youtu.be/khmrr7-W6BA?si=whn5mvuL9x95JP1l&t=70 https://youtu.be/khmrr7-W6BA?si=whn5mvuL9x95JP1l&t=70 This was in 1937! Compare these scenes to this Paramount animation clip (also featuring Snow White), which was finished just 4 years earlier: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKOSJ5AAwfc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKOSJ5AAwfc The multiplane camera [0] is also ingenious and is imho the single biggest reason why Disney could produce animation movies that looked "cinematic". I read somewhere that they re-used it for "The Little Mermaid" in the 80ies, and nobody really remembered how it worked anymore. Disney also developed Xerox animation [1], which is cheaper than traditional animation, but which gave 101 Dalmatians a very nice "sketchy", artsy look . [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiplane_camera https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiplane_camera [1] https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/how-one-hundred-and-one-dalmatians-saved-disney-180977869/ https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/how-one-hundred-an...

beAbU 3y ago
Re the animation quality: I wonder if Disney didn't create a lot of their later animation by rotoscoping over live-action recordings? The quality of the animation and the realism of the characters' movements in those examples you posted definitely allude to this. Disney was known to recycle some of their animations in older movies [1], so this could be because they have a source live action recording somewhere that they rotoscoped over more than once for different productions. Also note the different backgrounds with different characters that move - excellent example of the multiplane camera in action. In the foreground they have a "recycled" animation, in the background they can then put something else in, and record it all in one go with their special camera. 1 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vd09WdOgOeg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vd09WdOgOeg
- 3y ago