Vogue

They really shouldn't allow a veil like this. All the men should rise in a body and make it a law for any woman to be so attractive. It's just a frill of black lace, but it has been attached to the inside fo the hat, just where the crown rests on the head. It really should be stopped - men have a hard enough time in this world as it is.

- Makers of Mystery, Vogue, early December 1917

Yvette Chauviré performs The Dying Swan

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrKoTiMoOMY&feature=channel

Sleeper Effect

The sleeper effect is a psychological phenomenon whereby a highly persuasive message, paired with a discounting cue, causes an individual to be more persuaded by the message (rather than less persuaded) over time.

Figure A: Normal DecayFigure B: Sleeper Effect
When people are normally exposed to a highly persuasive message (such as an engaging or persuasive television ad), their attitudes toward the advocacy of the message display a significant increase. Over time, however, their newly formed attitudes seem to gravitate back toward the position held prior to receiving the message, almost as if they were never exposed to the communication in the first place. This pattern of normal decay in attitudes has been documented as the most frequently observed longitudinal pattern in persuasion research (Eagly & Chaiken, 1993). In contrast, some messages are often accompanied with a discounting cue (e.g., a message disclaimer, a low-credibility source) that would arouse a recipient’s suspicion of the validity of the message and suppress any attitude change that might occur with exposure to the message alone. Furthermore, when people are exposed to a persuasive message followed by a discounting cue, people tend to be more persuaded over time; this is referred to as the sleeper effect (Hovland & Weiss, 1951; Cook & Flay, 1978). For example, in political campaigns during important elections, undecided voters often see negative advertisements about a party or candidate running for office. At the end of the advertisement, they also might notice that the opposing candidate paid for the advertisement. Presumably, this would make voters question the truthfulness of the advertisement, and consequently, they may not be initially persuaded. However, even though the source of the advertisement lacked credibility, voters will be more likely to be persuaded later (and ultimately, vote against the candidate in the advertisement). This pattern of attitude change has puzzled social psychologists for nearly half a century, primarily due to its counter-intuitive nature and for its potential to aid in understanding attitude processes (Eagly & Chaiken, 1993). In addition, it has been the most widely studied phenomenon in persuasion research (Kumkale & Albarracín, 2004; see also Cook & Flay, 1978).

Source: Wikipedia

Cryptomnesia

Cryptomnesia, or inadvertent plagiarism, is a memory bias whereby a person falsely recalls generating a thought, an idea, a song, or a joke, when the thought was actually generated by someone else. In these cases, the person is not deliberately engaging in plagiarism, but is rather experiencing a memory as if it were a new inspiration.
"One of the most disheartening experiences of old age is discovering that a point you just made—so significant, so beautifully expressed—was made by you in something you published long ago."
- B.F. Skinner

Source: Wikipedia

Holography

Holography (from the Greek, holos whole + graphe writing) is the science of producing holograms, an advanced form of photography that allows an image to be recorded in three dimensions.

Holography was invented in 1947 by Hungarian physicist Dennis Gabor (1900-1979), for which he received the Nobel Prize in physics in 1971. The discovery was a chance result of research into improving electron microscopes at the British Thomson-Houston Company, but the field did not really advance until the invention of the laser in 1960.

The difference between holography and photography is best understood by considering what a photograph actually is: it is a point-to-point recording of the intensity of light rays that make up an image. Each point on the photograph records just one thing, the intensity (i.e. the square of the amplitude of the electric field) of the light wave that illuminates that particular point. In the case of a colour photograph, slightly more information is recorded (in effect the image is recorded three times viewed through three different colour filters), which allows a limited reconstruction of the wavelength of the light, and thus its colour.

However, the light which makes up a real scene is not only specified by its amplitude and wavelength, but also by its phase. In a photograph, the phase of the light from the original scene is lost. In a hologram, both the amplitude and the phase of the light (usually at one particular wavelength) are recorded. When reconstructed, the resulting light field is identical to that which emanated from the original scene, giving a perfect three-dimensional image (albeit, in most cases, a monochromatic one, though colour holograms are possible).

To produce a recording of the phase of the light wave at each point in an image, holography uses a reference beam which is combined with the light from the scene or object (the object beam). Optical interference between the reference beam and the object beam, due to the superposition of the light waves, produces a series of intensity fringes that can be recorded on standard photographic film. These fringes form a type of diffraction grating on the film.

Once the film is processed, if illuminated once again with the reference beam, diffraction from the fringe pattern on the film reconstructs the original object beam in both intensity and phase. Because both the phase and intensity are reproduced, the image appears three-dimensional; the viewer can move their viewpoint and see the image rotate exactly as the original object would.

Because of the need for interference between the reference and object beams, holography typically uses a laser to produce them. The light from the laser is split into two beams, one forming the reference beam, and one illuminating the object to form the object beam. A laser is used because the coherence of the beams allows interference to take place, although early holograms were made before the invention of the laser, and used other (much less convenient) coherent light sources such as mercury-arc lamps.

Source: Wikipedia (xoxo)

Viktor & Rolf's new Eau Mega fragrance

(omega, get it?)
The campaign image, Raquel Zimmerman shot by Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin, is based on an old 80's ad that the duo found online of a woman standing over a city and owning it, but not in that power-80's way.

The spritzer is activated by squeezing the big V&R golden seal—or "megamizer," designed by Fabien Baron—while the nozzle is just for show. Apparently that technology took two years to develop.
From Hintmag : )

I vant it dahling *vamp teeth*
And yes, maybe just because of the name.
Always, always, always, judge a book by its cover. Those are the wisest words a woman can say.
We are all so contained. So much more than we know.

Mandrakes

I was reading about Solanium, or nighshades, which intrigued me by their list of participants: Datura (Jimson weed), mandrake, deadly nightshade (belladonna), capsicum (paprika, chili pepper), potato, tobacco, tomato, eggplant and petunia.

Their name comes from Man-dragon.

According to the legend, when the root is dug up it screams and kills all who hear it. Literature includes complex directions for harvesting a mandrake root in relative safety. For example Josephus (c. 37 AD Jerusalem – c. 100) gives the following directions for pulling it up:

A furrow must be dug around the root until its lower part is exposed, then a dog is tied to it, after which the person tying the dog must get away. The dog then endeavours to follow him, and so easily pulls up the root, but dies suddenly instead of his master. After this the root can be handled without fear.

"...Not poppy, nor mandragora,

Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,

Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep

Which thou owedst yesterday."

Shakespeare: Othello III.iii

Salman Rushdie's novel The Enchantress of Florence reads "[...] mythical plant the locals called ayïq otï, otherwise known as the mandrake root. The mandrake – or “man-drag-on” [...] screamed when you pulled them up into the air just as human beings would scream if you buried them alive." Then the novel tells a story of boys trying to grow mandrake using hanged archbishop's semen. The mandrake has very powerful healing powers and is exclusively used to help cure illnesses.