Please hold your popcorn: “The Gakken SX-150 is a little analog synthesizer kit that came packaged in a recent issue of a Japanese DIY science magazine.” Awesome, isn’t it?

It has got not that much features, but it is pretty ready to get bend. The parameters are quite standard for some analogue device, with LFO, cutoff, resonance etc. Instead of a mini-keyboard, it has got a ribbon-controller to create legato sounds and things like that. You also have the ability to let music and other sounds run through that device, in order to manipulate the sounds. The build in speaker will be your friend.

The sound seem to be pretty fat. Just take this demonstration to remove any last questions:

Here with a selfmade sequencer controller.

Where can I buy this genius magazine in Germany? (via)

If you have enough of all this bending and messing around, than it’s time for a walk outside. Since the winter season is about to start, I highly recommend getting yourself a warm cap. Like this Megaman-Cap. If you can’t buy it, you have to make it yourself. The good advice: Hey designers, please support us with more small scale shops equipped with your lovely stuff.

Berlin again. I just heard from the Amaze Festival and its small new sister event “Jump and Run”. This is a small, but seems to be a delicious event-series that connects and celebrates games and digital art. The first event will be on the 2. October 2008, featuring also a very nice music lineup, by the Bleepstreet label. They will have live-shows from Goto80, Rolemodel, STU, Computadora and others. If you live in Berlin, it’s worth checking out. More infos on Amaze or this event.

A new artwork collective from Berlin has been established. It is called Pundo3000. Don’t confuse it with our very similar named, constantly improving node3000-network!

First things first: What I like about the works from Pundo3000 is the ability that so many “artists” simply forget about. First, the ability to make people laugh. Second, the ability to make people think. The works are mostly in German and sometimes really absurd, dealing with media, mass media, advertisement and the market.

In their recent work they began auctioning pictures of their unborn child, that was on its way. They just wanted to see, if people are willing to pay for the first pictures of their son, especially because prominent people are sometimes getting thousands and millions of money, just for the first pictures of their childs. The question is: How much is a child worth? They made 2360,00 Euro by the way.

Similar offensive, but far more funny is their work in “Advertisement versus Reality“. The thing is easy, but very effective. They bought lots of products, mostly convenience and instant food. Then they made it fresh and took pictures of the food. And compared it to the food on the packaging. The result is how you expect it to be. But it is really interesting to experience the difference. Packaging – an art for itself.

The netlabel Serein is looking for a talented designer, to brush the design of the netlabel and the artworks a little bit. The netlabel is one of the most beautiful and high quality at the moment, so any designer can be sure to be handled with respect.

Huw write in his newsletter about the mission:

This would mean helping me to develop a house style, and thereafter working with me to produce graphics for releases, as well as the possibility of producing designs for tangible goods. While I wouldn’t be able to offer any pay at this stage as you’re all probably well aware, Serein is a non-commercial venture. It could be a good opportunity for the right person to expand his/her portfolio whilst also working in conjunction with a team of creative people. Exposure would be an extra incentive here, with Serein receiving in access of 100 visitors a day at this time.

Last advice from me: Don’t change too much. I really love the silent Serein poetry style… and even ordered a shirt last year.

Artwork from Konntinent – All Lines Lead In

Try to catch the loop! Glenn Marshall made this beauty completely with processing. The forms and motions… Somehow I find it hard to grasp that whole thing and how the loop fits together. I think it is a very meditative one. Thank you for this work! I also recommend to watch the other works from Glenn Marshall.

A related Processing-work is the Weird Fishes video from Robert Hodgin.

Update: I just found out, that Glen used a self.developed system for his video, he calls “The Zeno”. Get more details about it here.

Phlow-Magazine, our beloved outpost to free Creative-Commons licensed music from the netlabel scene, went one year on Sunday! Phlow writes regularly reviews upon netlabel-releases, and I do also contribute from time to time. The website is run by Moritz – mo. – Sauer, who keeps on caring for netmusic for several years now. The Phlow-Magazine is somehow the spinoff of the German blog Phlow.net, that mo. writes for several years now (and I also contributed lots to it).

The photograph was taken not far away from my apartment, but also a long time ago.

Since the start of the Phlow-Magazine the figures developed well, we almost got 1000 RSS-readers over the last 12 months. Okay, the numbers stuck at about 900, but we are confident to crack the magic one thousand still this year. Read more about it here. Mo. put a compilation out to celebrate the first birthday. Check it out.

Gesundheit ingame-graphics

Get down, game developers… Here comes Matt Hammill. I don’t know if you know him already, but he went straight into my heart as I saw the first sketches of the game Gesundheit, that is so beautiful and original. The kid-book illustrator used hand-drawn methods to make the graphics for the game – even the in-game graphics. On top here served a very cute soundtrack, where he played all this kids instruments like recorder, xylophone, small drums, guitar, voice, etc. It sounds like in a kids music workshop and almost no tones really fit. Very mad and very lovely. You can download it here (and from my own experience I can say, that people will look very surprised if you load and listen to this stuff on your iPod. No really, I mean this serious) or jump to the MySpace of the soundtrack.

The good news is, that Matt wrote about the making of Gesundheit at the Game Developer Career Guide. The game grown out as a student project from illustration class. And did you know, he used the Adventure Game Studio for creating this. Here you can learn to think different! Don’t forget to sometimes ask people that do not come from the gaming scene to help out on a game.

Tigsource digged some extra-loveliness and detected early, unfinished, unreleased works from Matt. Get your cuddle here.