July 6, 2009 @ 2:13 pm
I have never seen this version of the American Flag before, but after reading this short entry about American Flags at MeFi, I have learned that the American Flag never really had any strict standards concerning its design until about 1942 when the Federal Flag Code went into law. Because of this lax design criteria, many people used the 13 stripes (red and blue) in many variations and the stars were laid out in any pattern and shape (so long as there was one star per state).
Anyway, the flag above is called the Whipple Flag, named after its designer Wayne Whipple, and designed sometime in the first decade of the 20th century. The 48 stars seen here are arranged in a “Great Star” pattern with two outer rings of stars — the first of which represents the states added before the centennial and the outter ring with space for any future additions after the centennial.
I actually like this Whipple Flag design very much!
June 25, 2009 @ 12:30 am
Have a look at this spiral of colors above. Do you see the green and blue spirals going toward the center? Well, what you see as green and blue is actually the same exact color (Discover Magazine has RGB proof). The visual trick here occurs because our brains “see” colors based upon the colors that surround it. In this case the spiral is separated by magenta and orange stripes and the magenta stripes don’t actually go into the green spiral and the orange stripes don’t actually go into the “blue” spiral. It is because of the juxtaposing colors that our brain gets a bit confused as to what color is truly there.
If you don’t see it in the image above, Richard Wiseman has posted an alternate version of the same optical illusion where you can better differentiate the magenta, orange, and green lines (note that the blue lines here are actually the same color as the green ones).
December 23, 2008 @ 1:21 am
I really wouldn’t mind my MacBook Pro with this striped cover from iamhuman. Cost: $30.
