Diversions

Last Sunday at an art fair in Evanston, I happened to see the college professor who was my advisor in grad school. It was the first time I'd seen him in years. He was selling his fractal art, similar to stuff I've posted here, only better. He was telling me about a course he taught last semester in which he had his students reverse engineer mechanical creatures created by Dutch artist Theo Jansen. The reverse engineering was done by looking at video footage of the "strandbeests" in action (click here for video from Jansen's site -- WARNING: large MPEG file!). After completing this task, the students modified the design to give the creature a more optimal gait.

I took a short bike ride along the lakefront Wednesday evening and stopped at the bird sanctuary near Addison. I saw a black-crowned night heron. It's not a terribly rare bird, but it is not common in Chicago. It's the first time I'd ever seen one.