Since it is the wee hours of the first day of the Summer of Oblivion, I thought I’d share a tale of subversion for the better good.

In 1920 the Russian government enlisted the brain power of a young, promising scientist to develop proximity sensors: alarms that sound without touch. The plan was to use them for escaping prisoners or to keep people away from things.

What resulted instead was a musical instrument. Isn’t that just so #ds106? I think so.

Same elements, new perspective, completely different outcome, endless possibilities.

In honor of Léon Theremin, the genius behind the [first] incredible electronic instrument, I present to you an animated GIF of the good Russian himself.

Léon Theremin plays his theremin

Technical details:

I used Handbrake to convert the DVD; MPEG Streamclip to snip the segment I wanted and Photoshop to mask out everything but Léon’s hands.

There are 314 other things I could be doing but I just figured out masks in Photoshop and now I will not rest until I am as good as the BAVA, Timmmyboy, Tom Woodward and the master behind If we don’t, remember me.

Plonk. Handbrake just finished another movie in the queue. There’s room for better, so we’ll see if I can crank out one more before bedtime

Summer of Oblivion, indeed.