Retro Thing

Vintage Electronic Musical Toys

Eric at miniorgan.com has collected over 150 musical toys from the 1950s through the 1980s. This is your chance to explore a virtual museum full of singing calculators, bizarre voice transformers, and dodgy electronic keyboards. There are audio samples of eight of these things, if you dare.

He comments, "I wasn't able to resist these wonderful toys. They have interesting sounds. They are often well-designed and show great box-art. Unfortunately, most of these musical toys haven't fulfilled the dreams they promised."

The one pictured is the Bee Gees Rhythm Machine, which somehow caused the chorus of Staying Alive to bounce around in my head. I'm heading out to find some decent tunes to fix that.

Miniorgan Electronic Musical Toy Collection (via The Red Ferret Journal)

Carfree Cities

   

After seeing what happened in New Orleans in the Hurricane's wake, I've been giving a bit of thought to city design. More specifically, how to build them better. While the people of Louisiana and Mississippi have an enormous job ahead of them to repair and rebuild, the rest of us are going to get a different surprise.

The impact of the storm on gas prices has been immediate - my local gas station is charging almost 20% more than it did a week ago. That's made me think long and hard about how I use my car for nearly everything - a quick trip to the grocery store, a visit to friends, work, or a trip to the movies. Like many in North America I live in a suburban community that's separated from "conveniences" like community centers, libraries, commuter trains, and shopping areas by a two mile ribbon of road.

It doesn't have to be this way. Joel Crawford has created Carfree Cities, a site that encourages people to reconsider the role of cars in urban communities. He proposes a clever synthesis of old-world multi-story districts and modern rapid transit to ensure people are nearly always within walking distance of a train station.

The site is well laid out and the ideas are compelling. Under normal circumstances, I'd encourage you to pick up a copy of Crawford's Carfree book as well, but today I think the money would be better given to help others.

Carfree Cities (carfree.com)
Carfree Cities Book (via Amazon)

Troika Boom Boxen

If you haven't guessed by now, tabletop radios are the Retro thing equivalent of iPod accessories. Many are released into a cold and uncaring world, but only a few capture our hearts.

I hope the $70 Troika Boom Box portable AM/FM Clock Radio sticks around. Created by German Design Firm Troika, these have pretty standard specs: They receive AM & FM radio. They tell time and make loud noises if you're about to be late. They have antennas to suck tiny little radio waves out of the air. And they're available in two shades, helpfully described as "light wood" and "dark wood."

They probably run on electricity, too.

Troika Boom Box

Real Toy Planes

Kids love toy planes. A few kids are lucky enough to buy the real thing when they grow up. That usually means a clunky used Cessna 172 or an old Piper Arrow. But in recent years, a group of wealthy enthusiasts has taken to importing and restoring old Soviet Block aircraft.

This is the Aero Vodochody L-39 "Albatros," built in the Czech Republic as a two seat jet trainer. Over 2,800 were built following its 1972 introduction. Two hundred of them are now in private hands. It's powered by a single Ivchenko AI-25-TL turbofan engine and is capable of hitting a maximum speed of 485 mph (780 km/h). Ceiling altitude is  37,730 ft, so you'll have lots of sky to play in.

Jet Warbird Training Center offers 35 minute introductory flights in the L-39 for $1200. Flight training runs about $1950 per hour, including aircraft, instructor, and jet fuel.  Expect to pay around $300,000 for a ready-to-fly late 1980s version.

Aero Vodochody L-39 Flight Training (Jet Warbird Training Center)
L-39 "for sale" page (Lots of pictures at Pride Aircraft)

Psychedelic Lava Lamp Offspring

Mathmos invented the Lava Lamp in 1963. The idea was based upon an egg timer in which a glob of oil rose to the top when sufficiently warm. These days, Mathmos Lighting UK produces an astounding variety of odd lamps.

The Mathmos Space Projector is an idea that belongs in the flick Barbarella. It conjures "constantly moving chaotic images" on walls and ceilings by shining a 20W spot lamp through a color wheel filled with oil. They're available in violet/red, violet/green, and blue/red combinations to suit the mood of the party.

If you drop by their site, be sure to check out the five current Lava Lamp designs, along with their selection of strange squeezable rubber Bubble lamps.

Never thought I'd find myself posting about squeezable rubber. Sigh.

Space Projector (Mathmos Lighting UK)

Your Own 3D Portrait

Holography was invented by Hungarian physicist Dennis Gabor in 1948. It didn't become a commercially viable technology until the introduction of the laser in 1960. Lasers enabled holographers to capture the phase of light along with its amplitude and wavelength. This additional information enables viewers to see holographic pictures as three-dimensional images.

Spatial Imaging Portraits near London is one of the leading studios specializing in holographic portraits. Their archive includes Queen Elizabeth II, pop group Oasis, and technology whiz Clive Sinclair. These three-dimensional pictures should be hung on a wall and illuminated from above for best effect. I suspect you'll have to fork out quite a bit for their top-notch work.

If your budget is smaller, several companies make affordable do-it-yourself hologram sets such as the $139 Litiholo Hologram Kit, which includes a small laser diode, twenty pieces of "instant" hologram film, plate holder, LED darkroom light, and everything else needed to create your own small images.

Holographic Portraits (Spatial Imaging Portraits)
Litiholo Hologram Kit (Liti Holographics)

Kodachrome Movie Film Returns, Sort Of

I ran a piece about the cancellation of Kodachrome Super 8 movie film in early June. It was officially deleted from the Kodak product catalog in July and is getting hard to find even at specialist retailers. Many amateurs preferred the look of Kodachrome and the ability to project their work.

Wittner Kinotechnik in Hamburg announced this week that they'll be marketing Wittnerchrome 40T, a house-branded version of the classic Kodak stock. Wittner estimates they have enough to meet worldwide demand for at least a year. From the photo, it looks like it will be loaded in genuine Kodak cartridges. There are plans to offer Kodak's Ektachrome 100D film in a similar format. Get it while you can!

Price and availability TBA.

Wittnerchrome 40T Super 8 Movie Film (News page in German, but they'll accept orders in English)

Nutty Automotive Design

[Giles Perkins, our favorite British design nut, sends this crunchy piece] Smart, the European car company, has a world renowned reputation for their stylish compact eco-vehicles. As a sideline, and presumably to keep their designers ticking over, they do a fine line in occasional and very limited edition accessories.

Produced a few years ago these are the Smart Car nutcrackers, half a pound of beautiful cast alloy imagineered to crack the hardest of nuts. Not only are they fully functional, but also feature the cute little car's outline as its crushing surfaces. So the next time you need some nuts on the go, these will do handsomely. Presumably they do lots of miles to the gallon!

[When he's not moonlighting here, Giles runs onSuper8.org, a brilliant Super 8 movie-making site.]

Misguided Kitchen Appliances

[Ed note: Our weekend of silly pseudo-retro gadgets continues...] Sometimes it makes sense to combine appliances. Take the toaster oven, for instance. It toasts and it ovens. Easy to explain, easy to use. The $50-ish Delonghi toaster/radio isn't so easy to explain. It's a rather nice looking 2-slice toaster with a built-in Kenwood FM radio. I suppose it would be handy in a cramped apartment kitchen, but who in their right mind puts fiddly radio knobs right next to a couple of poker-hot electric heating elements? On the other hand, it's the only radio with a slide-out crumb tray.

Delonghi Toaster/Radio (Available at Amazon and probably a zillion other discounters)

Remote Control Calculator Watch

I rarely have time to watch TV. When I do, someone always seems to have absconded with the remote. This inevitably leads to a wasted minute or two spent wandering around the living room like a lost sheep.

Have no fear, Extreme Computing is here. They offer the  SL-2008 remote control watch, which looks like the product of an illicit romance between a car dashboard and a 1980s calculator watch.

Includes an 8-digit calculator and "easily controls" TV, VCR, DVD, VCD and Satellite.

Oodles of fun for only $19.95.

SL-2008 calculator remote watch (Extreme Computing)

Your Chance to Own A Sinclair Z1

Before the famous Sinclair computers and calculators, Sir Clive Sinclair made radios. He still does.

The half-ounce (14 g) Sinclair Z1 Micro AM Radio is the smallest radio I've ever seen. To make things even more compact, the antenna can be removed when used in areas with good reception. It runs for 40 hours on one SR44 button cell, and a key-chain carrying case is included to keep this little widget from getting lost.

Sir Clive released a similar FM ear radio in 1997, although its clip-on design was elephantine in comparison to this.

And now, the best part. They're still available direct from Sinclair Research for a mere £9.95 (approx $18).

Sinclair Z1 Micro AM Radio (Sinclair Research Ltd.)

Friday Afternoon Furniture

My wife doesn't let me buy furniture. I don't know why, because I think I have provocative taste. Check these out and tell me what you think. The £623.00 Two Hand Sofa (above) is advertised as "popular with kids and adults alike." It strikes me as a tad too gropy for all but the most intimate of grown-up visitors. [More after the jump, if you're brave enough]

Souvenirs From The First Moon Landing

The American space program has been struggling lately, but that shouldn't stop us from acknowledging its stunning successes. The highlight was Apollo 11, which put bipedal primates on the moon for the first time. This cleverly designed box set includes 16 replica artifacts from the mission contributed by the crew and Smithsonian archives.

The package offers a short 64 page book that chronicles each day of the mission. The real magic is the extra stuff that's included: a copy of the front page from the July 21, 1969 Washington Post, an Apollo 11 iron-on mission badge, menu, snapshots of Buzz Aldrin's kids, a replica excerpt from Michael Collins' "Solo Book" from his time alone in orbit around the moon, and more.

There should be more clever releases like this. The gift box format adds an element of discovery often missing from traditional books and web sites. Published in August 2003, Apollo 11 Box is now discounted 70% at Chronicle Books.

Apollo 11 Box - $7.49 (Chronicle Books)

Super #1 Robot

Super #1 Robot is a tour de force look at Japanese Super Robot toys between 1972 and 1982. The book offers 22 snappy pages of interesting and informative text by robot toy megafan Matt Alt and collector Robert Duban. The remaining 232 pages are chock-full of brilliant color photography by Houston-based photographer Tim Brisko.

The authors make no attempt to catalog every model released over the decade. Instead, they provide an essential overview of what they see as the best toys of a rocket-fisted, mechanically transforming era. This is five-star eye candy.

Super #1 Robot released July 7, 2005 (timbrisko.com)

Rebirth Of The Nintendo Entertainment System

[Update: The Generation NEX is now shipping and Kotaku reports that it isn't compatible with many original NES games and that color, sound, and gameplay are wonky.]

Messiah Entertainment has started selling small quantities of the Generation NEX console, a brand new clone of the venerable twenty year-old Nintendo NES. Priced at $59.99, this 1.5" high unit features dual cartridge ports to accept either NES or Famicom games (legal copies, right kiddies?)  It ships with a single wired controller but has built-in 2.4 GHz wireless to support up to four untethered control pads. It offers two wired ports that accept all the old NES accessories as well. Interesting to note it offers stereo sound although the original NES was mono. These guys seem to have a secret or two up their sleeve.

Messiah has attempted to duplicate 100% of the original NES functionality with their own custom chipset, but it looks like they're still doing some final testing to confirm full compatibility. They were apparently selling pre-ordered consoles at last weekend's Classic Gaming Expo in San Francisco, but I haven't seen any reviews pop up online. The NEX is slated to ship in quantity sometime in September 2005.

This looks like an interesting unit, although one has to wonder how many people will shell out almost sixty bucks when old NES machines can be found at garage sales for almost nothing. Still, never look a retro horse in the mouth.

Generation NEX Console (Messiah Entertainment Inc.)