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Life-Size Photo of a Blue Whale
Smivs writes "The Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society have posted a navigable life-size photo of a blue whale! It will take a while to look at all of it, but it starts at the eye (which is a great idea). The picture is navigable — there is an insert of the whole picture and you can change the view by moving a cursor around — but if you just let it run, the whale will slowly 'swim' past you. It's a bit like being in a submarine with the whale going past a porthole. Definitely worth a look!"
That was the first useful use for Flash I've seen. I liked how when your cursor went over the "close" icon it says "Think before you close this window. This may be the last life sized blue whale you will ever see".
;)
Kudos to the presenter, and thanks to the submitter. When is Google Earth gong to be life sized?
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
But once you enable JavaScript, and assuming you have Flash, it is actually pretty cool. You can't actually keep the picture on one part (it just keeps floating), but it's a great way to examine the whale.
Oh, and before some idiot says it, yes we all know blue whales aren't being hunted and probably won't be. However, they are threatened by extinction from various other sources, including pollution of various kinds, and too much noise meaning that they can't communicate. (And we all know what happens if you can't communicate, you can't copulate.)
I wank in the shower.
Why don't they have some kind of method to stop the "swimming"? At least I didn't see one. It's kind of annoying to be frank about it.
Dedicated Cthulhu Cultist since 4523 BC.
It's really nice regardless, but it looks more like a high-res CG render.
pollution of various kinds, and too much noise meaning that they can't communicate.
It's not just that it's noisy so they can't communicate. The Navy is maiming whales with it deep sea sonar. Kinda like how a gunshot blast beside your head damages your hearing. They are perfectly aware of this and they don't really care other than the PR problems, but that is being addressed. First they just tried to use bad science to make it OK. And then the blinded whales started beaching themselves. But at least one court isn't fooled by the carte blanc of "national security".
Disclaimer: I grew up in Virgina Beach, VA most of my friends and their families from back home are in the Navy. I want our Navy to be strong and safe, but I don't want to mutilate whales to do it. Good sonar didn't do jack shit for the USS Cole, and I don't think Iraq or Afghanistan has much of a Navy to worry about. How about a new better technology instead of just turning the volume up on the sonar.
We are all just people.