Flour Power

FIFA and Sony have announced that 25 of the FIFA World Cup 2010 games will be broadcast in 3D.

With a total of seven pairs of Sony's professional HDC cameras on rigs at every match, the action on the pitch will be captured in a stunning 3D quality enabled through its proprietary multi-image processor and 3D Outside Broadcast truck. Sony’s cutting-edge processor, the only one in the market to date, makes an end-to-end workflow possible in the production process and automatically adjusts the depth-of-field to ensure an unprecedented and optimal 3D viewing experience around the world. Starting from the FIFA Confederations Cup last year in South Africa, Sony has been working on enhancing the 3D capturing of fast-moving football action and has since conducted a number of 3D filming trials in Europe.

Only five out of the ten stadiums - Soccer City and Ellis Park in Johannesburg, Durban, Cape Town and Port Elizabeth - are chosen for the 3D broadcast. Here's a complete list of the games to be broadcast in 3D:

June 11 16:00 RSA-MEX
June 12 16:00 ARG-NGA
June 13 20:30 GER-AUS
June 14 13:30 NED-DEN
June 15 20:30 BRA-PRK
June 16 16:00 ESP-SUI
June 17 13:30 ARG-KOR
June 18 16:00 SVN-USA
June 19 13:30 NED-JPN
June 20 20:30 BRA-CIV
June 21 20:30 ESP-HON
June 22 20:30 NGA-KOR
June 23 20:30 GHA-GER
June 24 16:00 SVK-ITA
June 25 16:00 POR-BRA
June 27 20:30 1st B-2nd A
June 28 16:00 1st E-2nd F
June 28 20:30 1st G-2nd H
July 2 20:30 Quarter-final
July 3 16:00 Quarter-final
July 3 20:30 Quarter-final
July 6 20:30 Semi-final
July 7 20:30 Semi-final
July 10 20:30 3rd place match
July 11 20:30 Final

In addition to this eight matches will be fed live to digital cinemas and selected venues in 3D HD quality around the globe. Swiss-based Aruna Media AG will manage the exclusive 3D cinema and entertainment venue rights for live games in 3D and plans to broadcast to around 26 countries and is in advanced discussions with several major markets.

(via Engadget)

The Holy Grail of comic books was sold earlier today for a record $1.5 million. Yes, you read that right. One and a half million dollars!

The 1938 copy of Action Comics #1, in which Superman made his first appearance, beat the $1.075 million record set at auction on February 25 for Detective Comics #27, where Batman debuted. Which in turn broke a record $1 million paid just three days earlier for another copy of Action Comics #1.

There are about 100 copies of Action Comics #1 believed to be in existence, and only a handful in good condition. This one was in a very good condition: 8.5 in the 10-point grading system:

For 50 years, the comic book was buried in a stack of old movie magazines from the 1930s. When the magazines were sold at a antique auction in Pittsburgh, the buyer was surprised to find Superman keeping company with Clark Gable and Joan Crawford.

Back in 1938 the Superman comic, boasting a cover picture of the red-caped hero lifting a green car, cost just 10 cents.

(via Associated Press)

Do you have a lot of free time? Here's a great time waster.

The Challenging Stage is an online puzzle game in which 56 video games are represented as abstract images populating a large city. And to make it all the more awesome, the whole thing is in pixel art!

The objective is to figure out what games these pictures are supposed to be. For example, in the image above you can see, among others, Double Dragon.

I'm nowhere near finding all of them, which is a big hit to my gamer-cred. Oh well...

(The Challenging Stage, via Geekologie)

Guinness, the brand that is a synonym of "the black stuff", is entering the black lager market with a new product - Guinness Black Lager.

Pitched at a younger market, the drink will be served up in 330ml bottles and supported by a new advertising and marketing campaign. It is being trialled in Northern Ireland and will go on sale at selected pubs and off-licences, priced similar to other premium lagers.

It seems like every once in a while Guinness tries to launch a crazy new product, and has failed consistently. Examples of such flops from Dublin's legendary St James' Gate brewery include "white Guinness" Breo and Guinness Light. But this time they're confident this new product will be a success, maybe because of the growing popularity of dark lagers. John Kennedy, Diageo's managing director, said the new beer had a unique taste which is "an evolution in lager making".

With this lager, the master brewers of Guinness have built upon 250 years of rich brewing heritage to take lager enjoyment to a new level.

(via Independent.ie)

Have you ever wondered what Lost would look like if it was created in the 60s? Well, me neither, but someone has. And they went ahead and created this parody opening sequence.

Fast forward 2 decades, and here's another alternate opening sequence, this one with an 80s feel to it:

But the best one is by far this Baywatch version. The Baywatch beach theme is also present in Lost, and the author chose footage that blends perfectly with the music. Even the syncing is perfect.

Last year I went to Dublin to check out the St. Patrick's parade (and saw some interesting stuff). I ended up not really seeing the parade, so this year I wanted to make sure I didn't miss it. This time in Galway:

And because I always talk about geeky Internet-related stuff here, Google has a St. Patricks's Day logo.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

If, like me, you've never been to Paris, this might be a good introduction. Paris 26 Gigapixel is an amazing panoramic picture of the city, created by Martin Loyer, Arnaud Frich and Kolor.

Paris 26 Gigapixels is a stitching of 2346 single photos showing a very high-resolution panoramic view of the French capital (354159x75570 px). Dive into the image and visit Paris like never before!

You can move around by clicking anywhere on the image and moving your mouse, and you can zoom with your mouse wheel (alternatively, you can use the arrows and +/- keys on the keyboard). It’s easy to get overwhelmed by this huge panorama, so there's a quick of 20 of Paris’ most impressive monuments.

There are also some easter eggs hidden in the picture. Can you find them?

And if you look carefully, you might even find odd things that weren't placed there by the authors. Like this gun...

Happy window hunting!

This is just brilliant!

The "Generic Movie Trailer" is a parody of Oscar-bait movies created by the comedy duo BriTANicK. It's a movie trailer where all the dialogue is reduced to a place-holder name, and most of the scenes can be traced back to famous Hollywood movies.

You should also head over to their website to check the rest of BriTANick's videos. They're fun.

And this reminds me of the "Generic News Report", a parody of news reports, from Newswipe.

I think it's little surprises like this that make people fall in love with this town. One minute I'm at home getting ready to watch a movie, the next I'm watching this cool band playing some covers on the street.

Prince - Kiss

Creedence Clearwater Revival - Fortunate Son

Tom Waits - Telephone Call From Istanbul

Led Zeppelin - Whole Lotta Love

Conan O'Brien just announced via Twitter that he'll be in a 30-city tour around the US, starting April 12th.

The tour is named "The Legally Prohibited From Being Funny On Television Tour", as a clear allusion to the fact that he's barred from having his own TV show until September, according to his severance deal from NBC. The shows are described at the official site - TeamCoco.com - as "a night of music, comedy, hugging, and the occasional awkward silence".

If you're in the US, you should go and buy a ticket now. For those of us in Europe, all we can do is hope Coco comes visit. Well, at least he should come to Ireland, to his ancestor's land. Right?