November 2011

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Now’s your chance! NASA is hiring! Hiring Astronauts! To go into space!

Its not something you can expect to hear very often, if ever again. NASA is hiring 9-15 astronauts to help out on the International Space Station.

Getting this job is no walk in the park. After reading the job requirements, I don’t think I know anyone even remotely qualified (sorry guys). Besides needing a degree in Engineering, Math, Physical Science, or Biological Science, you also have to have either… logged 1,000 hours piloting a jet plane, have a doctorate in any of the above mentioned fields, or have 3 years under your belt as an astronaut, or something very similar to already being an astronaut. And that’s not to mention the physical tests and training required. Oh, and you can’t be shorter than 5’2″ or taller than 6’3″.

It would take a life time to prepare for this once in a lifetime opportunity. And now for those few people who stuck with it, it might just pay off.

If you’re one of those people, you probably already know where to apply, and have probably already started on it (the posting just went up yesterday). But for anyone else who’s curious, here’s the link to the application…

http://www.usajobs.gov/GetJob/ViewDetails/302967000

All applications must be turned in by January 27th, 2012.

If there was ever a moment in a person’s life where they wish they maybe hadn’t given up on that childhood dream…oh well, back to loitering around the Planetarium.

Good luck to all the applicants!

-k

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Forget the endless internal debate about your next tattoo. Let soap and water save you money and future shame.  Tatt.ly, “a temporary tattoo store for design-minded kids and kids-at-heart,” offers you the chance to get an interesting and provocative temporary tattoo with out sacrificing your dignity.

I particularly love the sets they put together.

For the photographers:

For the printers (ahem!):

If you are really determined to make bad decisions/terrify your parents:

Save your skin, people, buy fake!

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File this one under “things that make your life easier”.

The name, Copy Paste Character, pretty much sums it up, but in the words of makers Konst & Teknik & Martin:

“[Copy Paste Character is] A web and iPhone application for copying the ‘hidden’ characters that comes with the computer’s typefaces, to be pasted into emails, tweets, text documents, forums and whatever else you might need to spice up with an extra ♔, ฿ or, ❒.”

They even have an iPhone app ($0.99).

So far, my favorites are:

⸚ ⟿ ☠ ⊗ ⍤♨

That’s right loyal readers, the 11880 has been restored to health.  Bring on the (really) wide format printing.*

If you were wondering, the cleaning assembly was replaced. This is what it looked like before:

*Up to 64″ wide on select substrates

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Heidi Norton, Untitled, 2010

Heidi Norton, SAIC faculty member and longtime friend of the Bureau, has a guest post up on Bad at Sports! For the blog she chose to interview Barbara Kasten, a Chicago native whose photographs can be found in galleries and museum collections all over the world. For Heidi, Barbara Kasten was an inspiration during her years as a photography student, and her enthusiasm about this interview is palpable. Here is a quote from Heidi’s intro to the interview,

As a photography student of the mid/late 90′s, Barbara Kasten was of great significance to me. I lost track of her during the first decade of the millennium, as the contemporaries of the Becher’s school (Gursky, Ruff, Struth) dominated the art market with their dry, representational Deadpan Photography. Now, as an educator 11 years later, I relish in Kasten’s renaissance. Abstraction is transcendental to me, but above all, I see Kasten as a pioneer of contemporary relevance.

So click HERE and check it out! And while you might have missed Heidi’s show at the North Eastern Illinois University Fine Art Center, keep an eye out for another solo show of hers slated for February 2012 at Johalla Projects. We will try to keep you posted as well

Happy Reading,

-k

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It is what it says it is, and it does a pretty good job. Make a protest poster you can be proud of! Make some t shirts for your band that look like you know someone who knows how to draw! The Online Stencil Generator can make a working stencil out of any image in your database or on the web. The program also gives you a little freedom to edit, with 17 different versions of the image in stencil form, from mostly white to mostly black, and the ability to make a stencil out of either the positive or the negative of the image. Unfortunately the Stencil Generator generates jpegs, not vector art. But you’re two steps away from having a file ready for cutting on the laser cutter or our vinyl cutter!

Happy Making

-k

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