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8 Mind-blowing Gadgets You Can Control Just With Your Brain

Posted by Harshad

8 Mind-blowing Gadgets You Can Control Just With Your Brain


8 Mind-blowing Gadgets You Can Control Just With Your Brain

Posted: 20 Mar 2013 12:37 AM PDT

So Google Glass is the future, you say? Think again. Imagine a future where you can move anything with just your mind, with high concentration. If you think that is mind-blowing, get this, that future is already here.

emotiv epoc
(Image source: neurosky)

In this post, we want to bring to your awareness 10 existing gadgets that allow your brain to command and complete real-life tasks, including using your iPhone and moving virtual characters in-game! Let’s dive into the article for more revelation on this interesting topic.

1. Emotiv EPOC

Tired of using the keyboard and mouse to control your laptop? Would you prefer to use your mind instead? Emotiv EPOC can help you with that.

It’s not just about computer interface. EPOC is also capable of controlling your character’s movement in-game (talk about virtual reality). Best of all, it could also be utilized in any electrical application, such as a wheelchair, making it move with a simple thought. [$299]

emotiv epoc
(Image Source: Emotiv)

2. MUSE

MUSE is light and portable, and for now it can guide you to relax or focus before you perform any mentally challenging task. This is just the beginning, though, as the final purpose of MUSE is to allow you to control your iPhone or Android device with your mind power.

You can browse Hongkiat.com, play Angry Birds, and even accidentally message your boss that you deserve a higher salary, all done within your brain! [$165]

muse
(Image Source: CNET)

3. NeuroSky MindWave

NeuroSky MindWave might look geeky, but it’s actually a user-friendly neuro-headset that’s especially designed to improve your kid’s brain. Heck, it even has a custom app store with 79 ready-built apps, showcasing educational to casual games and even life improving-applications.

Train your kid into next-generation superhuman, with NeuroSky MindWave. [$79.99]

neurosky mindwave
(Image Source: NeuroSky MindWave)

4. BrainDriver

BrainDriver is actually a project utilizing the power features of the Emotiv EEG headset, and it presents us with an alternate future that could be more awesome than the Google Driverless Car – we can control there car by mere thoughts!

Nothing in-between, just hook up the EEG and do some mental (I prefer to call it ‘telekinesis’) training, and you’re good to roll.

braindriver
(Image Source: Autonomos Labs)

5. DARPA’s Prosthetic Arm

The greatest benefit of science is that, it gives hope to human with disabilities. In neuroscience, this DARPA’s Prosthetic Arm is set to take over a real arm, letting the receiver control it with their thoughts, fired up by brain cells. This is a better alternative to a prosthetic arm in function and for them to regain motor skills, and subsequently independence.

darpa prosthetic arm
(Image Source: DARPA)

6. Necomimi and Shippo

Fancy furry ears and tails? Then connect Necomimi and Shippo to your body! This pair of flurry ears could scan your brain wave on the move, and stand up when you concentrate, and relax when you are relaxed.

The tail is even more ‘moe’ (cute), it waves when you feel happy or relaxed, just exactly like how a furry animal does! [$99.99, TBA]

necomimi and shippo
(Image Source: neurowear)

7. Neuro Turntable Mobile

Remember how you used to lip sync to music on the radio. Wouldn’t you like to have the freedom to do that whenever you feel like it? Neuro Turntable plays music from your iPhone when you really want to listen to a tune.

It doesn’t come on when you are focused on work, but when you need to put a little jazz into your steps, skip the buttons and the playlists and let this device turn your music on for you.

neuro turntable mobile
(Image Source: neurowear)

8. Orbit Helicopter

Take about Jedi training! Use the NeuroSky MindWave headset to control this Orbit Helicopter and feel the force flow through your mind. Relax, concentrate and make that baby soar into the sky! on a side note, this little thing looks like a helicopter from Leonardo Da Vinci’s time. [$149]

orbit helicopter
(Image Source: Kickstarter)

Practical Approach To Choosing Website Color Scheme

Posted: 20 Mar 2013 12:42 AM PDT

Imagine a world without colors; that world would be such a boring place, right? This applies to websites without colors. Yet, deciding colors for website is not an easy task. I personally have been asked quite often on how to choose the right colors. If you are also wondering the same thing, this post is probably for you.

In this post, we are going to look into some simple and practical ways to choose colors for your website especially. You might also want to look at Jake’s post about the basics behind Color Theory and how less (or fewer colors) is more for some websites.

1. Brands and Identity

This is I think the easiest way. If you are currently working on a website for an established company or a well-known organization, choosing the color scheme would take no time at all, you can simply extract it from their brand identity.

For example, for McDonald’s you can instantly identify McDonald’s from their golden “M” logo with solid red as the background fill.


(Logo Source: McDonald’s Newsroom Official)

This identity is recognized around the globe, so if you for some reason use Green or Blue instead, people would probably not recognize it as McDonald’s, instantly. Thus, it is more sensible to use these colors as the primary colors.

We can then expand these color variations by tuning the tone (like contrast and the lightness). And there you go, we now have decent variations to make up the website’s color themes.

In some cases, these colors are even dominantly applied, like in McDonald’s Australia.

McDonald’s Australia

Here are some other examples:

Coca Cola Indonesia

Pepsi

Starbucks

2. Country-Specific

A country is more or less similar to a company; they also have an identifier, their flag. So it is also practical to extract the color scheme from the flag itself. There is one good example of this, the page of the US President, BarackObama.com.

In the website (before it was redesigned) the colors used clearly corresponds with the US’s flag which were red, white and blue.

Culture, People and Environment

The problem with using color schemes based on country flags is you are bound to bump into the same color scheme, for instance France also uses red, white and blue. If this is the case, we can try exploring their culture, people and environment instead. Let’s take a look at the picture below.


(Image Source: jasmine8559)

This picture is a beautiful view of mount Fuji of Japan. This picture has provided sufficient color information and these are the colors extracted from it.

This approach is probably useful when you are working on a government or tourism website for specific countries. Here are a few good examples:

Africa

If you scroll down the page, you will see some of the colors applied in the design are from the country flag; like Green, Red, Black and Yellow.

Visit Korea

Australia Tourism

3. Content and Context

Not working out for you? Time to explore. Generally, websites should have contents to display. There are two primary questions to ask to help identify the proper colors:

  • What is the content about?
  • And, who will most likely read the content?

For example, let’s say you are building a website that will cover everything about babies. So, the content is clearly about infants, but who is going to read it? It is most likely the mothers. After spinning around for a while we can extract some keywords that will guide us to choose the colors, which in this case are: Babies, Mothers, Female, and baby things (Food, Toys, Diapers etc).

At this point, we can then look for the sources and samples for these keywords to extract the colors, whether by looking around your surrounding or Googling sample images.

We have done the job from this example and I think these are the appropriate colors for our case.

The colors are babyish and feminine (pink), yet the combination could also be stronger with the addition of Green, Orange and Purple to complement.

And here are some examples in this case.

Balita Theme

Metariza

Conclusion

Practically, we can apply any of these approaches discussed here for any design cases. In addition, to do the job of color extraction quicker, you can use this tool Photocopa.

Lastly, do you have other useful approaches to add? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comment box below.

Wallpaper Wednesday: Pattern Wallpapers

Posted: 20 Mar 2013 12:34 AM PDT

Pattern is a way or design where shapes and objects are put together to form a pretty composition. Most of the designs may look like mere repetitions of patterns but they are actually carefully thought out to represent the value of the artwork itself.

pattern wallpapers

In this week’s Wallpaper Wednesday we will look at more low-key wallpapers that play with patterns to give you a calm and placid mood to work with, especially when dealing with complicated issues. May these 17 patterned wallpaper lighten your mood for the week ahead.

Folds. Available in the following size(s): 640×960, 1024×640, 1024×768, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1600×1200, 1920×1080, 1920×1200, 2560×1440, 2560×1600. Download zip.

folds

Forest Camo. Available in various sizes. Download zip.

Forest-Camo

Parallel Wallpaper. Available in 2560×1600.

parallel-wallpaper

Clarification Light. Available in the following size(s): 1024×768, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1920x1080x 1920×1200, 2560x1600x 1680×1050. Download zip.

clarification-lights

Unlaundered. Available in the following size(s): 1600×1200, 2560×1440, 2880×1800. Download zip.

unlaundered

Oblong. Available in the following size(s):1280×800, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1820×960, 1920×1080, 1920×1200. Download zip.

oblong

Carbon Pattern. Available in 1920×1200.

carbon-pattern

Hexagonal Grid Wallpaper V0.1. Available in the following size(s): 1024×768, 1366×768, 1280×800, 1600×1200, 1920×1080, 1920×1200, 3360×1050. Download zip.

Hexagonal-Grid-Wallpaper-V0.1

Black Pattern Wallpaper. Available in 1680×1050. Download rar.

black-patern-wallpaper

Neon Snake Skin. Available in the following size(s): 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1920×1080, 1680×1050, 1600×1200, 1920×1200. Download zip.

neon-snake-skin

Random Green Blocks. Available in 2560×1440.

Random Green Blocks

Abstract Yellow Orange Hexagon Pattern. Available in the following size(s): 512×768, 768×768, 1024×768, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1200. 2560×1440. Download zip.

Abstract-Yellow-Orange-Hexagon-Pattern

Blue Wallpaper. Available in the following size(s): 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1600×1200, 1920×1200. Download zip.

blue-wallpaper

Shig. Available in the following size(s): 320×480, 640×960, 1920×1536, 2048,1536, 2560×1440, 2560×1600. Download zip.

shig

Puzzling Pattern. Available in the following size(s): 640×960, 1536×2048, 1280×800, 1280×1024, 1366×768, 1440×900, 1600×1200, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200, 2560×1440. Download zip.

puzzling-pattern

Nanosuit Texture Wallpaper 2. Available in 1680×1050.

nanosuit-texture-wallpaper-2

In Stiches. Available in the following size(s): 115×720, 1280×800, 1366×768, 1440×900, 1680×1050, 1920×1080, 1920×1200, 2560×1440, 2560×1600, 3840×2400. Download zip.

in-stiches

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