We all know that drones can safely go where humans cannot, but one other big upside is their potential to (sometimes literally) pave the way for people to follow, by doing things like weaving together physical bridges that can support a person’s weight.

As this video from the RTH Zurich Flying Machine Arena shows, a set of quadcopters can be programmed to braid and knot a sturdy rope bridge in midair. The effect is surprisingly graceful, each drone managing to avoid the other as they swoop back and forth in the room. The low strength-to-weight ratio of the materials deployed makes it possible for lightweight drones to construct surprisingly capable structures.

Motion-capture devices were used to map the space, taking positional measurements around which the drones could then operate. Nothing was left to human hands – even the tie-offs and other connections were completed automatically by drone. While scaffolding was provided in this case, there is no fundamental reason why the same drones could not work with existing supports in nature like rocks or trees. The open question: what will we call the works and processes of this new breed of robotic builders? Droneconstruction sounds a little too much like deconcstruction, but options are still open.

The post Dronestruction: Watch Drones Build a Working Rope Bridge first appeared on Gajitz.

The stories behind the architecture in our cities are ones seldom heard. When structures like the Empire State building or World Trade Center are erected, unbuilt monolithic buildings and scrapped city plans are quickly forgotten. Two designers want to give these concrete ghosts some virtual recognition.

Irene Cheng and Brett Snyder design for their own firm, Cheng + Snyder. They created a mobile media project in the form of a smartphone app called Museum of the Phantom City. It’s a database of unused plans, futuristic structures and hidden stories. Users of the app are directed around Manhattan to specified spots, where they can access pictures that juxtapose the past and future with the present.

According to their website, “typical urban navigation apps like Google Maps and Yelp seek to clarify and make the city more legible,” while the Museum of the Phantom City is “interested in deepening and intensifying urban experience.” It’s a trendy alternative for travelers to explore Manhattan – realized and re-imagined.

The post What Could Have Been: App Shows Alternative Manhattan first appeared on Gajitz.

The magic of the Star Wars galaxy didn’t just come together haphazardly; all six films got their distinct and memorable looks thanks to the tireless work of a huge team of creative types. But have you ever really thought about how those movies came to life? A new book called Star Wars: The Blueprints shows the technical drawings that made all of those detailed sets and amazing characters to life.

Technical drawings lay out the details and specifications of movie components. From the size and shape of a whole planet down to the smallest button inside a vehicle, these drawings are the blueprints of a galaxy far, far away.

The technical drawings of this book are somewhat similar to concept art, but they are far closer to reality than those fantastical renderings. These are actual plans drawn up by draftsmen and used in the construction of sets, characters, vehicles and scenery.

Inside the book are more than 200 drawings and over 500 photographs. Everything from X-Wing and Y-Wing fighters to the Ewok Forest to the Death Star and the Millennium Falcon is laid out in captivating detail – sort of like seeing everything with X-ray vision.

Star Wars: The Blueprints was released in the Fall of 2011. Only 5000 English language copies were printed, and each massive 35-pound book carries a staggering $500 price tag. Needless today, if you ever see this particular book on someone’s coffee table you can assume that person is a through-and-through Star Wars fan.

The post How to Engineer a Galaxy: Incredible Star Wars Blueprints first appeared on Gajitz.

Now that America’s space program is fading into the background for the time being, Japan is taking the lead and doing the awesomest space things. Namely, they’re putting a Domino’s Pizza on the Moon. According to Domino’s they’re totally serious about the project – and we’re pretty happy about it since commercial space flights are getting closer to reality every year.

The Domino’s Moon Branch would consist of a two-story domed building, a plantation for growing pizza ingredients, and a fun-looking game room with questionable gravity properties. We hope this location would pay substantially more than Earth Domino’s restaurants since you would be stuck with your co-workers for long, long stretches of time.

Just building the thing would cost well over $21 billion and require 15 rocket launches, making the project prohibitively expensive. And since there are no pizza-consuming life forms that we know of on the Moon right now, putting a Domino’s up there might be a little pointless. But we have no doubt that once we start colonizing space, Domino’s will be there along with McDonald’s, KFC and all of those other places we wish we could get away from on Earth.

The post 1 Giant Leap for Junk Food: Domino’s Conquering the Moon first appeared on Gajitz.

A slow economy and weak real estate market have led to plenty of abandoned construction projects in recent years. It can be a rather frustrating prospect for architects who continue to have great ideas but no outlet for their creativity. The Netherlands Institute of Architecture has come up with a novel and rather entertaining way to give the public access to the buildings that will never be built: putting the in the palms of our hands.

The Netherlands Institute of Architecture and TNT Post (the Dutch postal service) have teamed up to create a remarkable sheet of stamps. Each stamp is printed with a QR code that puts a virtual 3D building right in the palm of your hand when held up in front of a webcam. Five different buildings are featured on the cool augmented reality stamps that bring to life the architecture that otherwise would never been seen by the public.

As an added bonus, holding the entire sheet of stamps up to a webcam makes the Netherlands Institute of Architecture building appear like magic on your screen. This novel use of QR codes is an excellent way to bring the art of architecture to a public that would otherwise be deprived of certain buildings due to budget constraints or planning conflicts.

The post Stamp-Sized AR Tech Puts Architecture Right in Your Hand first appeared on Gajitz.