arts

Simplify image editing with PicsArt, a handy mobile phone app

With its nice range of editing options combined with the simplicity of touch-screen controls, PicsArt is a handy photo-editing app.

The main interface is colorful, and the primary options to edit, add effects, access the camera, and create collages are easily accessible. Menus vary by task. In most cases, it only takes a couple of taps to add a border, remove red-eye, or apply one of the numerous effects. Other settings were quickly adjusted with a swipe to move a slider left or right. As the controls were simple and easy to understand, we could really focus on the fun … Read more

Ancient d20 die emerges from the ashes of time

Let's go back in time. Way back. Keep going. OK, stop. You're in the Ptolemaic Period. It's somewhere around 304 to 30 B.C. You're in Egypt. You're playing Dungeons & Dragons. Except back then, it's more like Pyramids & Petsuchos.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art owns what may be the world's oldest d20 die. It's made out of serpentine and looks to be in remarkably good shape for its age. … Read more

Navy SEALs leak classified info to EA for combat game -- report

A handful of U.S. Navy SEALS have been reprimanded for leaking military secrets to video-game maker Electronic Arts while working as paid consultants on the game Medal of Honor: Warfighters, according to a report.

Seven of the SEALs have been disciplined, including one who was involved in the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, and four others are being investigated, according to CBS News.

Medal of Honor: Warfighters is a military combat shooting game that prides itself on being as realistic as possible. Players are involved in real-world scenarios, such as battles in Afghanistan and attacks on Somali pirates. … Read more

Artsy light show reveals a surreal universe

Sometimes, it's nice to just sit back and enjoy yourself as a mind-bending light show and distorted ambient music collide in the name of digital expression.

Throughout October, Belgian artist Romain Tardy displayed a mesmerizing art installation titled "Pagan" on an exterior wall of the Museum of National Antiquities in Toulouse, France.

The light show -- somehow inspired by a bacchanalian head from the third century -- consists of stars, lines, and abstract figures breaking apart and merging back together. Musician Squeaky Lobster provided the eerily calming music for the event, ensuring a total transformation of the senses for most observers. … Read more

Customize your Windows cursors with ArtCursors

"Cursors, foiled again!" There's no need to swirl your cape and twirl your mustache, if you have Aha-soft's ArtCursors program. This shareware cursor creator and manager lets you design your own cursors for Windows. You can build and edit whole libraries of cursors with it. A simple wizard-type process makes it so that almost anyone can use ArtCursors to customize a computer's cursors, and in ways that maybe you haven't even thought of yet!

From ArtCursors' installer we chose between the registered version and the trial version, which is free for 30 days and … Read more

Your Facebook profile pic, shown in the Louvre

Seeking to modernize the staid "Baron Von Sitting Down" and "Madame Miss No Emotion" portrait genre of yore, a couple of London creatives have launched an initiative to get as many Facebook profile pics as possible into the world's leading museums.

"Each one of our profile pics is a statement about who we are," says the video for The Profile Picture Exhibition project, which I won't embed here due to its generous use of a word that starts with the same letter as Facebook does. "It's finally time we claimed our space in art history." … Read more

Crave giveaway: Four custom canvas photo prints from Printcopia

First off, congrats to Kenny L. of Apple Valley, Minn., for winning a Cowon Auto Capsule AC1 dashboard camera in last week's giveaway. I look forward to seeing your dashing dashboard videos, Kenny!

Got some Facebook or Instagram photos that would look phabulous on your walls? Printcopia, a service that prints digital photos onto canvas, acrylic, photo paper, and more, is offering four canvas prints to this week's winner -- two 16x20-inch prints of Facebook shots and two 16x20-inch prints of Instagram pics.

All you have to do is pick the photos you want turned into wall art … Read more

Apple's venue all dressed up for 'little' event on Tuesday

SAN JOSE, Calif. -- Ahead of its much-anticipated news event tomorrow, Apple has already prepared the outside of the venue.

That event, which is widely expected to bring the smaller version of the iPad, is being held here in the California Theatre.

Unlike its events at the Moscone Center or the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in downtown San Francisco, the outside signage here is minimal. Apple has simply put "Apple Special Event" on the outside marquee, along with colorful posters donning the company's logo.

CNET took a field trip to snap a few shots of … Read more

Painter robot turns your sleep into 'art'

Last time I stayed at an Ibis hotel, I had a good experience. Quick service, decent decor, and a great location in central Busan, South Korea. Sadly, it lacked a robot.

The international chain is making up for this shortcoming by offering something no guest can do without: a robot that paints your sleep patterns.

In a decidedly wacky PR stunt being held in Paris, Berlin, and London, Ibis commissioned a robot arm to turn select guests' sleep data into painted canvases.

The Sleep Art project involves an ABB industrial robot and a special mattress equipped with 80 sensors. … Read more

Forecast: Cloudy, with a chance of lightbulbs

What a beautiful sunny week we're having here in San Francisco! There's not a cloud in the sky -- not even a one made from 6,000 lightbulbs.

Calgary, Canada-based artist Caitlind r.c. Brown and collaborator Wayne Garrett created the large-scale interactive sculpture by covering a steel substructure with a cloud of burned-out incandescent bulbs collected from local households, businesses, museums, and eco stations.

The bulbs attach to pull strings that together look a bit like streaming rain. The cords allow viewers to control the illumination of the structure like lightning in the lightbulb cloud, which is lit from within by 250 compact fluorescent bulbs, pulling a total power of approximately 20 amps. … Read more