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Control Lightshow Over Dublin Sky From A Webpage

Posted by Hemos on Mon Apr 26, 2004 10:00 AM
from the fun-with-CGI dept.
nev4 writes "Ireland is celebrating their EU presidency for 2004 with an interactive lightshow over Dublin. The project, Vectorial Elevation, allows people to control the 22 searchlights (154,000 watts, can be seen for a 15km radius) shining over Dublin by submitting a design on the project's website. The designs are queued and a new design is displayed every 14 seconds from dusk to dawn (GMT +1). You can see an aerial view of the city and the current design via live webcam or browse snapshots of previous designs. The tool for submitting deisgns also contains a 3D model of the city that you can pan around or "walk-through". Once you submit your design, you can opt to receive an e-mail when it is being displayed; when I submitted mine there was no one in the queue, so it was displayed immediately."
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  • by Winlin (42941) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:01AM (#8972550)
    ...and you have the first lifesize Missile Commander game.
  • Oops (Score:5, Funny)

    by Cipster (623378) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:02AM (#8972561)
    No way this will abused at all... I look forward to seeing goatse in all its glory displayed over Dublin.
  • by paranode (671698) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:03AM (#8972573)
    Residents of Ireland reported seeing lights representing penises and men bending over with apparent gaping holes in the rear over the skies of Dublin. More on this as it becomes available.
  • Astronomy (Score:5, Funny)

    by kevlar (13509) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:04AM (#8972581)
    The local In-House Astronomer at Univ of Dublin must love this thing...
    • There isn't really one.

      There are astronomers working in Dublin (a small number of them anyhow), some of them with connections to Dublin University. However, as with all other cities elsewhere in the world, nobody (to my knowledge) does any observation work from Dublin or its environs any more. They used to, at Dunsink Observatory.

  • by cexshun (770970) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:05AM (#8972584) Homepage
    Here's what my message says in some nice WordArt:

    "We are celebrating our EU presidency for 2004, and all we got is our web cam Slashdotted."

    Poor fellows.
    • Surely its celebrating the accession of 10 new EU members (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Czech Rep., Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, Malta and Cyprus on May 1st) swelling us to the largest organised group of people on the earth after India and China?

      I'm sure our country isn't so egotistic to celebrate a usual (even if rare) event such as the EU presidency.

      Could someone fix the posting?
  • by dwalsh (87765) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:05AM (#8972595)
    So if you would stop pointing it at my flat, that would be appreciated.

    An annoyed Dublin resident.
    • by Linker3000 (626634) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:15AM (#8972692)
      Bullshit - if you are a REAL Dublin resident, you'd either be:

      1) In a pub

      2) Busking outside Bewley's Oriental Tea Rooms

      3) Trying to find a parking space around St. Stephens green

      4) Stuck in road traffic somewhere along the banks of the Liffey

      Sleeping - my ar*e

        • I don't see how having problems with traffic and parking is an Irish stereotype. I have the same problem in the town where I live, and we're populated with elite intellectual types.

          Sounds to me like the parent poster knows something about Dublin, so he either lives there or stayed there long enough to learn about its traffic patterns.

          Also, I'd say hanging around in a pub/bar is average behavior for most guys around the world. Just because there's a huge Irish drinking stereotype doesn't mean that most peo
  • Woo! (Score:3, Funny)

    by Dark Lord Seth (584963) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:09AM (#8972622) Journal

    Can I project my phone number so whole legions hot irish girls will call me, wanting hot passion?

    • Re:Woo! (Score:2, Insightful)

      hot irish girls

      It is true that some Irish girls are totally hot. They are also very free-willed and strong headed, and are likely to tell someone such as yourself to get stuffed, only in more colourful language.
    • Re:Woo! (Score:3, Informative)

      I think it would only work if your phone number is all 1s.

      And that's my phone number.
  • Im in Dublin .. (Score:5, Informative)

    by Fawad (644568) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:09AM (#8972625)
    And I can say they're pretty amazing - the range is much more than 15km (I saw them visiting a friend from Leixlip over 25km away). They make this city beautiful - The messages were uncensored initially, but then the authorities smartned up - to an extent! :) Try submitting something in a different language..
  • by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 26 2004, @10:09AM (#8972629)
    This is not a pleasant sight if you are interested in preserving the night sky.

    Once again the environment suffers to satisfy the vanity of politicians.

    The night sky should be dark as this allows wildlife to not be disturbed, we save energy reducing CO2 emmissions and the next generation of kids might just get interested in astronomy and science in general.

    http://www.dark-skies.org/

    Aside from this - yes of course its pretty - but I'd like it to be limited up to 12 midnight, and only use sodium light which can be filtered out.

    Clear dark and steady skies

    Torcuill
    www.aberdeenastro.btinternet.co.uk
    • Not many people realize the effects of having too many lights in the sky. There are many animals out there that navigate using the night sky.

      I'm from South Carolina, USA, and we get a fair share of sea turtles. They lay their eggs on the beach. Once those eggs hatch, the babies head for the sea using starlight. Unfortunately, they mistook some hotel's parking lot lights as stars and went the wrong way. Many were killed by being run over or just being too far from the ocean. A lot of volunteers spent
  • Can somebody say Bat-signal?
  • SPAM? (Score:5, Funny)

    by maxwell demon (590494) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:10AM (#8972639) Journal
    Wait until the spammers find out. Then you'll see on the sky:

    MAKE MONEY FAST!
    URGENT BUISNESS PROPOSAL
    Buy \/IAGRA!

    And the next spam message will not say any more "AS SEEN ON NATIONAL TV", but "AS SEEN ON NATIONAL SKY".
    • Leela: Didn't you have ads in the 20th century?
      Fry: Well sure, but not in our dreams! Only on TV and radio. And in magazines. And movies. And at ball games, on buses, and milk cartons, and t-shirts, and bananas, and written on the sky. But not in dreams! No sirree.
  • My Message? (Score:4, Funny)

    by Oxy the moron (770724) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:12AM (#8972659)
    "All your searchlights are belong to us"
  • New Site (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 26 2004, @10:13AM (#8972669)
    In order to avoid the impending slashdot effect, Dublin moved the website to its new home: http://www.DriveOurCityInsane.com/ Apparently the lights are just the first feature. In the future they're going to incorporate music that viewers can upload and play across the city, voice synthesizers to read off posted comments and various other things guaranteed to drive residents nuts. Apparently they got the idea from some guy from the midwest's [drivemeinsane.com] home project.
    • Back when I were little, some creative artistic design student designed to create a sonic sculpture in our local park. Essentially, this consisted of a large metal pole with a number of loudspeakers/air-horns attached. Each of these was activated a large jump-switch hidden by green canvas designed to blend in with the rest of the park. To "explore" this system, kids just had to run around and jump onto these switches. Needless to say this wasn't popular with the neighboring residents.
  • my message (Score:3, Funny)

    by boarder (41071) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:14AM (#8972679) Homepage
    Mine would have to be:

    (up arrow) (up arrow) (down arrow) (down arrow) (left arrow) (right arrow) (left arrow) (right arrow) B A Start
  • What is really cool is the 3D model at http://www4.alzado.net/edparticipar.html Could you set this up with Doom or some similar game? I could then reproduce a trip from the Burger King near O'Connell bridge across to the Centra - which I do on the occasional Friday night. Of course in this version I could shoot the person who grabs a taxi I flagged etc. Pow-Pow (Various Gun sounds!!)
  • Units ? (Score:5, Funny)

    by BESTouff (531293) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:26AM (#8972797) Homepage
    (154,000 watts, can be seen for a 15km radius)

    Could some sensitive clod convert these to American Units please ? What does 15km and 154000 watts mean in miles and libraries of congress ?

  • by mykepredko (40154) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:28AM (#8972819) Homepage
    Before going ahead and spending an hour creating your masterpiece, wouldn't it be a good idea that you first check to see what the conditions are like?

    Right now in Toronto (Eastern Daylight Savings Time) it is 11:30 AM and in Dublin it is 4:27:56 PM IST (Irish Standard Time?).

    It might be a good idea to wait a few hours before submitting your project, designed to be intuitively obvious to any extraterrestrial beings that there is intelligent life on Earth...

    myke
      • The articles does say that is runs from dusk till dawn...

        Currently, there is a 10 hour wait, and it's 5pm here. The lights won't start until sometime after 9 when it's dark enough to see the lights.

        Incidently, you get emailed a link to a webpage so that you can see you design from 4 different cameras.

        T.
  • Great Project (Score:4, Informative)

    by bjpirt (251795) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:33AM (#8972856)
    Another version of the original which took place in Mexico for the millennium by Rafael Lozano-Hemmer [telefonica.com]

    This guy does get up to some really interesting stuff.
  • by infolib (618234) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:34AM (#8972872)
    The Irish presidency is now handling the software patent issue. After the EU Commission proposal got blasted by the Parliament (thanks Parliament!), Ireland has now put forth a "compromise" [ffii.org] that's even more pro-swpat than the original Commission one. So why not remind them of the main anti-software-patent organization and the 300'000 signatures by spelling "FFII" across the Dublin sky?
  • by Mechanik (104328) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:37AM (#8972907) Homepage
    when I submitted mine there was no one in the queue, so it was displayed immediately

    Is it just me, or does it seem like they are opening themselves up to trouble by not having some sort of screening program in place for the designs? How long before a giant, vector graphic representation of the goatse.cx guy is seen floating over Dublin?

    Mechanik
  • Speer (Score:4, Informative)

    by Quila (201335) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:41AM (#8972939)
    Too bad Albert Speer isn't still alive. He knew how to arrange a searchlight light show!
  • What better way (Score:3, Flamebait)

    by Richy_T (111409) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:41AM (#8972946)
    of celebrating the astronomical waste of money that is the EU than wasting taxpayers money shining light into the stars?

    Rich

  • by alanxyzzy (666696) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:49AM (#8973022)
    Shining searchlights into the sky is light pollution.
    http://www.darksky.org/ [darksky.org]
    http://spaceweather.com/ [spaceweather.com]
    If you have wake up before dawn this week for work or school, take a pair of binoculars outside and scan the eastern horizon. You might see Comet Bradfield. The comet, which had a close encounter with the sun on April 17th, is now emerging from the sun's glare. Although it's too dim to see with the unaided eye, at least for most people, by all accounts Comet Bradfield is a beautiful sight through binoculars, its long tail stretching 10 degrees above the rosy glow of the rising sun.
  • BlinkenLights (Score:4, Interesting)

    by phlegmgem (633566) on Monday April 26 2004, @11:20AM (#8973304) Journal
    Isn't this similar to the blinkenlights [blinkenlights.de] project?
  • by hoover (3292) on Monday April 26 2004, @11:21AM (#8973312) Homepage
    What an apalling waste of energy. Just think of all the Guinness that could be brewed with that much electricity!
  • Impressive (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Gopher971 (219910) on Monday April 26 2004, @01:21PM (#8974623) Journal
    I have to admit it makes an impressive sight. My apartment is only 200 hundred yards from O'Connell St. The patterns have been getting more intricate in the last 2 nights as users have gotten more adventurous.

    Many are getting all the spotlights to shine on one narrow band of "The Spire" [irish-architecture.com]. It then shines like a lighthouse right into the apartment.

    Expect some good viewing tonight as cloud cover is 100%.
      • by pubjames (468013) on Monday April 26 2004, @10:34AM (#8972868)
        why?

        I expect because he is a Brit.

        You wouldn't believe how biased the press in the UK is with regards to anything European. It really is sad. Most of the British do not have access to impartial information about Europe. And it's not just the "red-top" newspapers, it's so called "quality" papers such as The Times and The Telegraph. They only ever print negative stories about anything European, and some things are so distorted that they amount to lies and propoganda.

        I find it a real shame because I genuinely used to believe that Britain jouralists had a strong sense of integrity and impartiality. Not any more.

        (I'm British too but I travel a lot in Europe and my business involves trade between different EU countries.)
          • You must be a "Sun" reader.

            No. My upbringing was one of "aspiring middle-class", so I used to believe that being an Englishman meant being honest and having integrity. A working-class Sun reader probably won't be so naieve.
      • > Let me guess - you're British!

        I'm Irish actually.

        If you're going to chuck a country out of the EU for blocking European 'progress', then where will it end? I wouldn't be surprised if Britain isn't the only big country to say 'No'. The French only voted 50.5 to 49.5 for the Euro currency.

        The EU is incredibly currupt, financially and morally. They should get their house in order, and prove they deserve our respect before making the EU anything other than a trade bloc.

        Europeans everywhere - read the s
        • I'm Irish actually.

          From the Republic of Ireland? If so then you should know better. You have a great economy at the moment. A lot of that is due to your membership of the European Union. You have hugely successful companies like Ryanair which only exist because of the opening up of the European market and relaxation of rules.

          Look how membership of the EU has helped your country over the past decade, compared to how the relationship you had with Britain has helped you.

          Europeans everywhere - read the sma
            • But the point of a Constitution is to create a new country.

              Not true in this case.

              It is important for everyone to realise that this is nothing to do with economics

              Again, not true. It has everything to do with economics. The point of the consistution is to simplify and bring together many currently existing rules. The change from rotating presidency to fixed-term presidency, for instance, will be great for the economy of Europe, because it we won't have a president with two jobs any more. Do you think i
      • I have often suspected that British policy towards the EU is to try to very hard to get kicked out. Nobody under 30 in this country actually knows how many ounces there are in a pound, pounds in a stone, or inches in a foot, or pints in a gallon -- but it took the British government -- the same government that actually did most of the hard work in creating the SI system -- until the year 2000 just to allow shops to sell goods by the kilo, which coincidentally was the date which we had agreed -- back in the
        • by pubjames (468013) on Monday April 26 2004, @11:18AM (#8973289)
          I have often suspected that British policy towards the EU is to try to very hard to get kicked out.

          Personally I think the UK's relationship with the USA is at the heart of the UK's actions in the EU.

          Some in the administration of the USA have said quite clearly that their policy towards the EU is one of divide and rule. We have seen this working quite clearly recently, when Blair put a lot of effort into developing a relationship with Spain and used that to divide Europe about the Iraq war.

          The USA does not want a strong, united Europe. They like the fact that the UK is always half-in, half-out, because it means that Europe is less united an weaker. Quite what the UK gets out of it I don't know, but the relationship between the UK and USA has always been somewhat murkey, even to us Brits.