Fore-Edge Paintings in 19th Century Books

Fore-edge painting, which is believed to date back as early as the 1650s, is a way of hiding a painting on the edge of a book so that it can only be seen when the pages are fanned out. There are even books that have double fore-edge paintings, where a different image can be seen by flipping the book over and fanning the pages in the opposite direction.

(via This is Colossal)

1920s Mugshots

Originally, I thought these were the headshots for the Mad Men casting call, but their clothes didn’t match the era. Then I was wondering if everyone in the 1920s looks like a movie star (Ralph Fiennes, Peter Sarsgaard, Dennis Quaid, Ron Perlman, Richard Jenkins, etc.).

The Everyday, Zoomed

As fascinating as it is to see normal, everyday objects magnified 1,000x plus, it’s even more enjoyable to distance yourself from their identification and appreciate their texture, palette, composition, and beauty as stand-alone pieces of art.

These photo serve to supplement my William Legoullon’s Microscopic Drinks post from June 2012, and Caren Albert’s Food Photos, from July 2011. The original article was shared with me by sarak8, and discovered on ViralNova. I’ve narrowed them down to my favorite selections which are, like the sharer of this link,  the most breath-taking. Unlike the original article, however, I’m choosing to hide the object of magnification to allow you the enjoyment of them detached from their object of origin. If you’re dying to know, hover over the image for tooltip or scroll to the bottom of the article for a list.

1. postage stamp, 2. banana slice, 3. blood clot, 4, human eyelash, 5. used dental floss, 6. football jersey, 7. guitar string, 8. needle and thread, 9. salt & pepper, 10. instant coffee crystal, 11. stitches on a dog’s skin, 12. toilet paper, 13. velcro, 14. analog audio groove on a vinyl record

Category: Pix

56 Months of Pantone Moods

If you haven’t already checked it out, the Pantone Moods Facebook application that was conceived and created by ERA404, has a history and trends tab. The trends tab shows current mood matches, based on color, mood blurb, gender, date/time of submission, and distance from you. It also compares your current mood color and blurb based on gender, location, color match, word match, and frequency. Lastly, it shows global mood trends with the most active gender (female) and color (21-1-7 C), most active location (São Paulo) and color (21-1-7 C), most popular color now (1-1-6 C) and of all time (21-1-7 C), and most popular words (color, blue, feeling, today, happy) and colors (21-1-7 C, 76-1-7 C, 1-1-6 C, 132-1-4 C).
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Animated Gifs, by Rebecca Mock

Rebecca Mock

A few months ago, the internet was all aflutter about a wonderful illustrated GIF that appeared on a New York Times opinion piece about Amtrak’s Quiet Car– the GIF was a sweet and subtle animation of the train interior with muted scenery flying by in the windows. This GIF magic was drawn by Brooklyn artist Rebecca Mock, who has a particular talent for creating charming illustrations with simple animated effects: in one GIF, the ceiling fan lazily spins above a sleeping couple, and in another, nothing is perceptibly moving besides a sign swinging in the wind and one lone “Don’t Walk” signal blinking alongside.  Read more