Boing Boing tv's embedded robo-combat reporter Xeni Jardin witnesses warfare inside Robogames and Combots at Bay Area Maker Faire 2008, where robots battle until death -- or at least 'til one competitor busts a sprocket.

Next, BB-gun wielding battleships go BOOM!, with the Western Warship Combat Club. Participants painstakingly re-create historic battleships on small scale, and outfit each warboat with actual artillery. He who sinks last wins. The cameraman took a pellet or two in the pants, but the goofy safety goggles kept all eyes intact.

Link to Boing Boing tv post with discussion and downloadable video.

If you dig the robots, you may enjoy the upcoming Robogames. The world's largest robot show takes place Fri, June 13th through Sun, June 15 in San Francisco. Link to tickets.

WillS sez, "The Get Out Clause, an unsigned Manchester band who could not afford a camera crew for their video, 'performed' in front of a load of CCTV cameras, requested the footage from the camera operators under the Freedom of Information Act Data Protection Act and then stitched the results together for their music video." Link (Thanks, WillS!)

This video, made in 2003, was produced to promote Rebel Visions: The Underground Comix Revolution 1963-1975 by Patrick Rosencrantz. The video has interviews with Gilbert Shelton, R. Crumb, Rick Griffin, Spain Rodriguez, Robert Williams and Justin Green. (I reviewed the hardback edition in 2003 for the LA Weekly) Fantagraphics has just released a revised and expanded paperback edition. Link

The internet dumpster-divers over at Fleshbot found a real gem today. Link (NSFW).

Boing Boing Gadgets editor Joel Johnson recently spent a week in the woods with a backpack full of electronics, to see if he could work on the internet in the wild using only solar power and his bare hands. This video reveals to the world, for the very first time, what happened to all those bears.

Link to Boing Boing tv post with discussion and downloadable video.

Chris Tackett of Treehugger.com says: "I recall you doing this post on Isabella Rossellini's bug porn. The videos [called "Green Porno"] are now viewable, so we did a post about that." Link

John Buckman from Magnatune sez,

I'm involved with a film project called "Iron Sky", which released a 2 1/2 minute teaser today: "In 1945 the Nazis fled to the moon. It's 2018, and now they're coming back"

What makes this interesting is that it's the second film by the people who made Star Wreck, which is the most successful feature-length Internet-distributed film of all time. Star Wreck was made by 3000 people, has been download 8 million times, is under a CC by-nd-nc license, and made good money both through DVD sales, and through an eventual deal with Universal.

My role in this is that I provided the seed funding for Iron Sky, and I'm head of the board of wreckamovie.com -- a collaborative film-making web site (also CC based), that was built from the Star Wreck experience (and is being used to make Iron Sky)

Link (Thanks, John!)

Avi sez, "Michael Pollan gives his most practical lecture yet @ Google. Pollan's 12 heuristics have been most helpful during my year shopping for veggies at Berkley Bowl:) I grew up buying fresh produce at atmospheric places like this in Mumbai and do fervently hope that vivacious local markets trump impersonal food-processing corporations."

Pollan's In Defense of Food is a fascinating treatise on eating and food, taking as its central tenet, "Eat food, mostly plants, not too much," and cutting through all the "nutritionism" science that proposes to feed us on individual molecules instead of whole food. Link (Thanks, Avi!)

See also: In Defense of Food: NPR interview with Michael Pollan about "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."

Gord says: "Cory's blogged about Ranjit Bhatnagar before ('Crazy' performance). Here's his latest artbot. I *love* the way this guy's mind works!"

Simple automatic instruments are constructed from local materials and objects on site. The system learns the sounds it can make by trying out its instruments, and then uses its range of sounds to try to reproduce the rhythmic and melodic qualities of sounds such as the voices of visitors. It then loops and alters these imitative sequences into improvised compositions. (That last part's not done yet, so you won't see it in the video.)

In this example, the source audio is a bit of the soundtrack from the movie Citizen Kane, and the noisemakers are a set of found object percussion machines and an electromagnetically fretted electric guitar. Link

The funnyhunters at Nerve have compiled a list of the 50 greatest commercial parody videos of all time. Above, the ecstasy egg. I could not agree more with their number one choice.

Previously: Fifty greatest comedy sketches of all time

Max Silvestri of "Gabe and Max" fame has posted a response to the creepy "Man Stuck in An Elevator For 41 Hours" video that's been floating around the youtubes lately. Here it is on 236.com, or here it is on YT. (thanks, Max!)

Previously on Boing Boing tv: Gabe and Max answer Bing Boing readers.

In today's episode of Boing Boing tv, Xeni visits with John Gaeta, the Academy Award-winning Visual Effects supervisor of the Matrix trilogy, to learn more about his digital craft in the new film Speed Racer. This latest Wachowski brothers project reinterprets the classic 1960s Japanese anime series of the same name, and opens in theaters nationwide on May 9.

Gaeta explains how he used VR "bubbles" and a mysterious team known as the "world unit" to create the film's "poptimistic photo-anime" feel. The live action Speed Racer is saturated in a candy-colored palette so rich, audiences may just leave the theater with a contact sugar high.

Link to Boing Boing tv episode with discussion and downloadable video.

And Gaeta adds a special message for Boing Boing tv viewers, who are already well accustomed to all things digital -- "For optimal viewing experience, see Speed Racer at a digital cinema or IMAX theater." He's not kidding, with a feature like this, analog projection just doesn't do the work justice.

View interactive samples of the digital building blocks behind the movie in a related online feature in VRMAG, "Speed Racer Uncovered."

(Special thanks: John Gaeta; Andy and Larry Wachowski; and David Pescovitz)

Amnesty UK has produced four short films on China's human rights records, released in the runup to this summer's Olympics in Beijing. The first video's online now: Torchure. Link (Thanks, Kristyan!)

Today on Boing Boing tv, Xeni visits TechShop, an open-access public workshop that's kind of like a health club with heavy machinery and sparks instead of treadmills. Tinkerers, inventors, and hackers pay a membership fee, and in turn receive access to professionally-maintained gear, workshops, mentors, and a community of like-minded makers.

Link to Boing Boing tv episode, with discussion and downloadable video.

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Currently there is only one TechShop site in Silicon Valley, and it opened in 2006. But founder Jim Newton (a lifetime maker, veteran BattleBots builder and former MythBuster) plans to open a number of locations around the US -- and eventually, the rest of the world.

John Todd, who you'll meet in this episode, wrote this article about the membership-based machine and fabrication shop in a recent edition of Kevin Kelly's Cool Tools zine. Snip:

I've been a member since before TechShop really even started, back when it was just some guys passing out flyers trying to gauge interest. For $100 a month, members can use any tool in the shop on which they've received training. MUCH cheaper than buying your own gear. The list of equipment is pretty extensive, too, and new items are arriving frequently (like a new hot-wire foam cutter).

John shares an additional note with BBtv about the company's business model:

TechShop is unusual in the way it's funded - community members are the financial backers. To date, TechShop has been funded by taking loans from members and repaying them at a nominal rate. Typically backers contribute $25k and up, and are then paid back over several years. There is an "A" round being raised now to fund the nationwide expansion, and the first funding source again is going to be the community instead of focusing on traditional VC sources. It's an unusual way to keep members excited about what they do at TechShop, and to keep them focused on making the whole experience better. Jim Newton (CEO) and Mark Hatch (COO) are looking for additional interested people who want to become members and funders - contact TechShop for details.

In part two of today's episode, we take a joyride in a three-wheeled electric car.

Here's a video of Gary Panter (wiki), the artist who created the character Jimbo and was the designer of the set for Pee Wee's Playhouse, talking about his new art monograph. Link (Thanks, Coop!)

Today on Boing Boing tv, a sneak peek inside TOKYOLOGY, a new documentary exploring contemporary Japanese pop-culture hosted by Carrie Ann Inaba. Oh, what adventures await: sneak behind the scenes at a Japanese Rock TV show that pretends it's shot in Los Angeles, cruise Harajuku, go clubbing with goth girls in Shinjuku, shop for shoes with Lolitas, experience the madness of the Tokyo Anime Fair, visit a video game company, browse the streets of Akihabara, and meet anime creator Yoshitoshi Abe.

Link to Boing Boing tv post with discussion and downloadable video.

DVDs are available in retail stores and online, tokyology.tv has details. (Special thanks to Tokyology co-producers Felix and Julian Mack of Nightjar.)

Bolus presents YouTube videos of eight songs that elicit a specific kind of bummed-out feeling in the listener. It's like they were all cut from the same bolt of rash-inducing cloth. The songs are:

White Plains -- My Baby Loves Lovin'

Terry Jacks -- Seasons in the Sun

Bo Donaldson & the Heywoods -- Billy Don't Be a Hero

Captain & Tenille -- Muskrat Love

Tony DiFranco & the DiFranco Family -- Heartbeat (It's a Love Beat)

Bobby Goldsboro -- Honey

Sammy Johns -- Chevy Van

Debbie Boone -- You Light Up My Life

In Bolus' comments section, someone said Tony Orlando's "Tie a Yellow Ribbon" belongs on the list, and I agree. Link

UPDATE, 630pm PT: He beat the world record! Still playing. - XJ

UPDATE, 9:00pm PT: Wow, okay, they finally stopped. Much screaming and champagne. - XJ

Following up on the post I made yesterday about a marathon attempt to set a world record for Grand Theft Auto gameplay (it's all happening right next door to Boing Boing tv, at DECA studios) -- bleary-eyed and sleep-depped Bush League GM/Executive Producer Allison Kingsley says, between caffeine slurps...

We're getting close! Jim, our dedicated Bushleaguer, is in his 23rd hour of playing GTA IV for the world record. It was a long, long night but he's nearing the 24th hour. The good news is he's doing surprisingly well, the bad news (in his words) after all this time he's only slept with one hooker.

Other favorite stats:

25.27% of the game completed

34 missions passed

started 23 fires

killed 10 people with bare hands

shot to death 31 times

265.46 is the longest jump distance

1 kill with a molotov cocktail

$50.00 most spent on a date (and although not a big spender he did score 5 times)

38,188 spent on health care

...and the stat he's particularly proud of? 0 times cheated.

Link to ongoing live video and chat; tweets here, G4 just did an interview here. Some quick iphone snaps I took of the ongoing madness are above, below, and here.

Previously on Boing Boing:
* GTA IV world record attempt tonight, next door to BBtv
* Grand Theft Are You Fcking Kidding Me

In this great, short video, Michael Geist systematically rebuts the oft-repeated claims of the Canadian lobby for US-style copyrights -- claims about Canada's supposedly backwards copyright regime, lack of creativity, and so on. It's nice to have all the rebuttals in one neat, tidy bundle. Link

A redemption tale by the prolific religious comic book artist Jack Chick is born again through animation, in a classic short film by Syd Garon and Rodney Ascher.

Link to Boing Boing tv episode with discussion and downloadable video.

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Chick, born in 1924, is the most published comic book author in the world. Over decades, his publishing company has released some 500 million fundamentalist evangelical "Chick tracts" warning of the eternal consequences of a life lived without salvation.

One of these cautionary cartoon gospels, "Somebody Goofed," attracted the attention of animator-directors Syd and Rodney a decade ago -- and they transformed it into the mixed media pastiche Boing Boing tv presents to you, dear viewer, today.

This 8 minute film debuted at the DFILM Digital Film Festival in San Francisco on November 7, 1997. DFILM founder Bart Cheever tells Boing Boing tv:

We showed it all over the world. No other film came close to provoking the kind of intense, gut-level reaction that we saw with Goofed -- people really loved it or really, really hated it. Religious people called it blasphemous and threatened to organize boycotts of our shows. Anti-religious people called it religious propaganda and wrote angry letters to theater owners where we screened the festival.

To me, Goofed was the Birth of a Nation of After Effects films, and was really the aesthetic blueprint for much of what you see on TV today. So many people have copied their cool 2D photo-animations, and their style is used so heavily today on VH1, E, MTV, and so on -- it's easy to forget how groundbreaking the film was. No one had ever really done anything like it before.

I loved the way Goofed is this rich moving collage of newsprint religious tracts, album covers (can you spot Paul's Boutique?), clips from 70's gangster films, cigarette ads from old magazines etc. To me, Goofed represented a whole new way of collaging various forms of media.

UPDATE: We reached out to the filmmakers for some thoughts on this amazing piece of work, 10 years after its creation -- Rodney Ascher tells us...

Making Somebody Goofed was 50% art experiment and 50% self-designed AfterEffects tutorial. It was the first digitally animated project for both of us (I think...). It took at least 6 months to make the thing, maybe close to a year. I was running a Powermac 7500 (Syd's always had a model 1 or 2 levels faster than mine so he was probably behind the wheel of an 8500) and we got a gasp during a Q and A when we explained that rendering some of the QuickTimes took more than a day or two and transporting the uncompressed files demanded about 12 Jaz cartridges!

It was designed to be something of a Rorschach test: we followed the original comic as rigorously as we could, resisted any temptation to change things around (for pacing, content, whatever) and allowed the audience to interpret however they liked. During its premiere at DFilm, the audience was mostly quiet and thoughtful but at a screening at the SFMoMA it played pretty much as a spoof with a lot of appreciative laughter. On the other hand, when it was shown at a screening for the Television Commercial Industry, the awkward, confused, slightly hostile silence was deafening. Happily enough, we've gotten very nice responses from both Chick Publications and The Suicide Girls.

Related posts on Boing Boing:

Photo Fictions: bizarre narrative photo show in L.A.

Rodney Ascher's short film about a freefalling parachutist

Syd and Rodney's "Jack Chick's Titanic" video

Galactus meets Jack Chick

Jack Chick's own Passion

Jack Chick profile

Parody of Jack Chick tract warns against tiki worship.

Hallowe'en, Jack Chick style

(Special thanks to Pesco, and to Syd Garon)

Wall Street Journal reports that Mazda decided to destroy "approximately $100 million worth of factory-new automobiles" that had been shipped on a tanker that tilted on route to the US.

The freighter, the Cougar Ace, spent weeks bobbing on the high seas, listing at a severe 60-degree angle, before finally being righted. The mishap created a dilemma: What to do with the cars? They had remained safely strapped down throughout the ordeal -- but no one knew for sure what damage, if any, might be caused by dangling cars at such a steep angle for so long. Might corrosive fluids seep into chambers where they don't belong? Was the Cougar Ace now full of lemons?

Link

This Czech industrial film from 1957 about the Kitchen of 2000 is a lovely bit of paleofuturism. Infra-red chicken, ingredient spouts, TV shopping (actually, we have most of those!). Link

Update: Treehugger's Chris Tackett sez, "one of our writers knew of a lot more clips of that kitchen, so he made a follow-up."

Tor Books and Expanded Books produced a funny interview/trailer thing for John Scalzi and me in honor of our latest books -- he's bringing out a young adult novel in the Old Man's Warverse in August called Zoe's Tale that I've read a little from and it's dynamite! Link

Vivid Entertainment apparently acquired a 40-year-old sex tape starring Jimi Hendrix and two women. They plan to release it on DVD. Hit the link to IDontLikeYouInThatWay for NSFW? clips.
Link to IDontLikeYouInThatWay, Link to Hendrixsextape.com (Thanks, David Hyman!)

The gem sweater bedazzlements and lyrical besnazzlements of "internet ceWEBrity" Leslie Hall have graced Boing Boing tv before -- but in today's episode, Ms. Hall submits an exclusive tour diary for BBtv viewers, a veritable world exclusive. "With these shoulderpads I have the strength to destroy, villages, homes, and crops," she warns. Her ladyfire is mighty, as all ye who gaze upon this video shall witness.

Ms. Hall was among the internet personalities who participated in the recent ROFLcon gathering in Cambridge, Mass. Her presence there among fellow internet memesters is documented in this Wired gallery, and in a photo set from Scott Beale of Laughing Squid. See also his short video of the Tron Guy talking about geek women. Which brings us back to the 26-year-old Ms. Hall, straight outta Iowa, believed by her many followers to be the fiercest gold-lame-wrapped geek woman on the planet.

Link to Boing Boing tv post with discussion and downloadable video.

Related Boing Boing tv items:
* Leslie Hall: ceWEBrity, gem sweater diva, jammer of jams.
* Leslie Hall iPhone snaps, "Blame the Booty" remix - Boing Boing

Nick denBoer says: "Check out this video I did for the Toronto band, Run With The Kittens."

Slightly better version here: Link

Actor John Cleese went to India to visit a doctor who has started a laughing club. The people meet each morning and do silly things to make each other laugh. Laughter has many health benefits, says the doctor. I believe it.

Previously on Boing Boing:
• Laughter yoga
• Laughing yogi video