Derren Brown's Blog, page 9

In the video below we take a look at the beautiful and rather psychedelic world of intracellular life. These animated images show in stunning detail how molecules containing the genetic instructions that form life, DNA, fold up to form chromosomes (46 compact packages of genetic material) so the cell can divide. Cell division is of course necessary for creatures to grow or to replace older cells in bodies. More importantly we need some of those chromosomes to share our genetic material and to produce a next generation of Derren-loving hairless apes.

In total there is 6 feet (1,8 meters) of DNA in every single one of our 50 trillion or so cells. They would, if you put all of these strands of DNA together in some mad and evil experiment, reach to the sun….and back… for over four times! How's that for some juicy facts to impress a crowd of your choosing?

You'll also see how the DNA is split and copied from one original strand in the first place. In a rather roundabout (literally) way, you will agree.

The video is especially powerful for highlighting some of the more 'random' elements of our inner workings. Amino-acids and proteins move around in a cell like tiny drunken sheep, intoxicated by small atomic forces and just bump in to each other, after which which their unromantic mechanical coupling begins to start the chain reaction leading to folding, replicating and a thousand other functions. No direction, no mind, just a jittery recombination of atoms that complements each other. So stunning and enthralling, we just call it life.

Thanks to It's Okay To Be Smart for pointing out this lovely video. Find a longer version, with more of the stunning animations below:

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There's a very strong likelihood that if you're reading this you're either:

a) a rational skeptic

b) a trojan spiritualist

c) a fan of Derren Brown

Good news then that all three will find something to enjoy in The Debunking Handbook, an Ebook that is free to download courtesy of skepticalscience.com, a website that focuses primarily on explaining what peer-reviewed science has to say about global warming.

They describe it thus:

"Although there is a great deal of psychological research on misinformation, there's no summary of the literature that offers practical guidelines on the most effective ways of reducing the influence of myths.

The Debunking Handbook boils the research down into a short, simple summary, intended as a guide for communicators in all areas (not just climate) who encounter misinformation."

Feel free to go grab your copy of The Debunking Handbook and then come back here to let us know what you think. It shouldn't take you long, it's only seven pages long.

Souce: Lifehacker

(Thanks to DG for the scoop)

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If you follow Derren on Twitter you may be aware by now that he has just passed the one million follower mark.

To celebrate the occasion, DB has devised an ingenious competition with the prize being a trip to The Ivy in London for dinner with Derren.

Watch the video below for full details (Your entry must be made via Twitter, not in the comments below!):

You have until Tuesday 10th January to enter.

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'Michael Sheen' – acrylic on canvas 2011

I have known Michael for a little while, and recently went to see his Hamlet, directed by Ian Rickson and currently running at the New Vic. It's phenomenal. Afterwards we had dinner and Michael spoke at length about what he and Ian had done with the play and why. A couple of weeks later we met again, I cooked an appalling piece of chicken and we asked him about his Passion, a mammoth modern unfurling of the Christ story spread across the streets and beaches of Port Talbot (an industrial port and market town where he grew up, but which has also produced Rob Brydon, Anthony Hopkins and Richard Burton). Michael is deeply energised about his work, and if the formula for success is TALENT  + ENERGY (as noted by my manager, who added wisely that the formal for stardom is SUCCESS + ATTITUDE) then Michael radiates both. He's surely one of the most extraordinary actors of our generation, and possesses a phenomenal creative drive without any of the ego that normally accompanies mere dull ambition.

So, as I tend to paint people that I know and find extraordinary, I asked if he would mind awfully. A bit over a week later, interrupted by Christmas of course, and tweeted in its various stages, the large (it's five foot high) portrait above was completed. For those who do not tweet, or for those who do but who might like to see the sequence together, and above all for those who give a jot because they paint and are interested in the process, I shall set it out as best as I can. Here then, is how it came together:

I prefer to work from photographs, so wherever possible I take my own. I can create a makeshift photographic studio in my painting room, so I took a bunch of Michael to work from. Ultimately I decide on one, tweak it in Lightroom to look its best, and print it out large (I have an A2 printer which does the job very well). He's looking rather shaggy at the moment because of the role which he undertakes every night (a far cry from his shiny Tony Blair), which I knew would make the picture more interesting.

I then began the portrait by sketching directly onto the canvas:

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Next, I block in some colour to set a unifying tone for the picture. Orange is a good one for flesh, but it can be anything, depending on the palette that the photograph suggests. The idea is then to let this blocked colour peep through as the layers of colour are built up. You want to make sure that every inch of the picture is interesting. With a good painting, you can generally make a little tube tim your hand and look through it at tiny, isolated areas of canvas and they will all be interesting. There'll always be stuff going on. The way to do this is by building up layers of colour. So we begin with orange:

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And just enough of the sketch is left showing through to work with as a guide. Black paint does the job better than pencil, but I've kind of gotten used to using pencil. But use black paint to sketch of you're using this method (and obviously white to erase).

Then next I get the shape of the features in, and the areas of light and dark. This is about sculpting the face and also getting down some basic colour – all things which will keep showing through as you add layers. For this reason I paint thinly, or rather with a fairly dry brush. I don't want to lose what's behind the colour I'm adding. Later on I'll use glazes (a small dash of colour with a larger amount of a transparent glazing medium) to the same effect – but for now, thin layers that keep the orange showing:

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And I've started to get some colour into the background too. The orange will provide some unity – you want to make sure that the colours you're using for the subject are also in the background, so the two relate to each other. Otherwise you can sometimes have a figure that fights uncomfortably with what's behind it. The left side of the face (our left as we look at it) has a purply tone, whereas the right side is warmer, so I've started to get those colours in too.

The process is now largely one of alternating between detail and sculpting (and using fairly strong colours and contrasts to do so) and then pulling everything back by going over it all with some fleshy tones (pulled out from what I'm already using) that soften and unify. I also get some colour on the shirt, as I want to include the same colours in all areas. Again, because I'm working with fairly thin paint, it's easy to do this: it's bets to use as few colours as possible on your palette and create others from mixing them: that way you keep a sense of overall unity, which is one of the qualities that will make it feel 'real'. The purple, for example,  that is appearing in his forehead will come to be used on the face, the shirt and the background.

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Next I added some detail around the eyes and threw in a bloody background. I often add the premature detail at this point to trick the eye into thinking it's more complete than it is, and to give me more of a sense of where it is headed. The background was an idea I wanted to try, but I would eventually lose it. At the moment it works OK:

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but I realised that I wanted to create some depth with the image, so the background would have to be less sharp and more muted. So with some glaze and a bit of white I brought the background back a bit and worked on the hair detail to put some distance between the two. I'm also continuing to add detail, and areas of colour, and then bring it all back with some unifying colour brushed over the top. That means that have, say, the purple in the right side of the nose, but still make it sit with the yellowy creaminess of that side by then brushing or glazing over with a flesh tone. The hair is quite fun to do.

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It now has some definition.

Next, I start the shirt. By this point the purple has become very useful (and I could have used that rather than the orange to cover the canvas), so I'm sure to include it in the shirt. I've been mixing the purple with a burnt umber to get the darkest/black shade (you don't want to use flat black, it is lifeless and just looks like a hole in the painting) and some grey mixed in. The result is the basis of a grey shirt, but it still occupies the same tonal world as everything else. I also work more on the hair and am continuing to work on detail. I also soften the nose to make sure that it feels like it's sticking out of the canvas: it would be slightly out of focus (the photo is all rather sharp so I'm exaggerating the depth a little as I paint) so by softening it, it will lift itself a from the face.

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At this point, something is bothering me. It's looking like an illustration rather than a painting. There's something 'drawn' about it. This may be the hair, as whatever frames the face will provide a context for it, and as the hair looks rather cartoony, it's making the whole thing feel less like a proper portrait. There's something else too – the background isn't helping. It it too… distracting(?)… making it all seem like a comic-book graphic rather than a portrait. So I decide to lose the background. I first get some colour blocked onto it…

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And then white thinly over to move towards a light background (but one that will incorporate and reflect the colours of the face for the sake of unity). I've also lost the edges of the hair, which will mean I can re-do them with a softness that will help lose the cartoonish quality I don't want. So now we have this:

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And with the hair added, I'm happier. I'm painting 'background' and 'foreground' hair to get depth. The hair at the back is soft and purply, which blends it into the background a little, and then I pick out some individual, light-catching strands in the front.

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The remaining process is principally now one of softening the background. I use a big brush and a lot of glaze. Here's me working on a bit of hair detail at this point so you can get a sense of the scale.

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Finally, I put a bit more work into the shirt (it was tempting to leave it in an unfinished state to draw more attention to the face) and soften the focus a little where necessary (by losing edges and working the background a little into the parts I want to soften). And there we are. It took about a week, but that's a few hours here and there and stopping for Christmas… difficult to qualify exactly how many hours of painting time were involved, and it's invaluable to leave a painting standing around when yore working on it and come back to it.

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I hope you like it. To answer a few questions about it which came up on Twitter: no, I haven't had any training; I use Liquitex Professional Acrylics (Heavy Body); and no, this isn't for Michael, although I'll do him a nice print if he wants one. Yes, I exhibit: The Rebecca Hossack Gallery in Charlotte St, London, look after my work. Any time I have an exhibition, I publicise it here on the blog and on Twitter.  As I generally get fairly little time to paint, it's normally only one small exhibition a year. But I'll always let you know. A recent post shows a couple of other portraits, and there are some older ones on the main site. There is also a book available of the caricatures I used to paint.

Michael's coming over soon to view it – I'll post a picture of him with it when he does.

There you are. Hope you're all having lovely ones.

db x

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Click the Image to watch a clip

"Channel 4 is to become the first advertiser to take over every digital screen on the London underground with a New Year's Eve campaign featuring 16 stars including Jamie Oliver, Zooey Deschanel and Gordon Ramsay.

The campaign, which showcases next year's Channel 4′s shows, will include three 40-second video clips of its TV stars becoming "increasingly more debauched" over the course of the night.

The "party carriage" video clips – which feature stars including Derren Brown, Alan Carr, Jon Snow and Kirstie Allsopp as "unlikely tube fellows" – aim to mimic a typical commuter using the tube to get to, and from, New Year's Eve parties.

The videos will run from 6am on 31 December until "early morning" on 1 January.

Channel 4 said the first video clip will see its stars travelling on the tube "side by side, minding their own business, on their way to their respective big nights out".

Later on, the scene will change and become "increasingly more debauched featuring Channel 4 stars looking slightly the worse for wear".

Digital poster panels on escalators will appear to show Channel 4 talent travelling alongside commuters to catch the tube."

Read more at The Guardian

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Just a quick post to let you all know that Svengali will be coming to Aylesbury from the 28th May 2012 through to 2nd June 2012.

Tickets go on sale Thursday 22nd Dec.

You can find a list of other 2012 tour dates at http://derrenbrown.co.uk/tour-dates/svengali/

I've been spending a bit of time in my painting studio. I thought I might update you. Twitter followers will have seen a shot of me painting the pianist James Rhodes. Here we are:

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And here's a better shot of the painting itself:

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They're acrylic on canvas. I've also been back and worked on the portrait of my father. Here it is, about the same size (5ft high) as the one of James:

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and, for those who enjoy such things, a bit of detail:

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Next up is actor friend Michael Sheen. I've taken a few shots and I'm about to get started. (I always take my own photographs and work quietly from them in my own time, as I only get a few hours here and there to paint). I'll let you know when it's done. What a great guy to paint. I can't wait.

There are a few more pictures of portraits (including some of the older caricatures of Rufus Wainwright, Tom Waits, Clint Eastwood et al) on the artwork page of the main site. I'll let you know here next time I have an exhibition: should be one next year somewhere.

Right, Merry Christmasses or just Happy Holidays, depending on whatnot. Ta-ta for now.

dx

"While it may not help you learn how to Kung Fu fight or fly a B212 Helicopter, a neurofeedback method of learning is reminiscent of something we might have seen in the movie, The Matrix.

The technique would provide more immediate and long-lasting knowledge in tasks that demand a significant level of visual performance, like hitting a curve ball or learning to play the piano.

Researchers from Boston University (BU) and ATR Computational Neuroscience Laboratories in Kyoto, Japan recently demonstrated that they could induce brain activity patterns to match a targeted state by decoding a person's functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scan of their visual cortex.

In the future, researchers envision a person watching a computer screen and having their brain patterns manipulated to match those of a desired level of task performance, perhaps of an athlete or someone healing from an accident or disease.

Their findings were published in the most recent issue of Science.

"Adult early visual areas are sufficiently plastic to cause visual perceptual learning," lead author and BU neuroscientist Takeo Watanabe said in a National Science Foundation press release.

However, there is one wrinkle in this Matrix-style approach to learning: the method worked on subjects even when they weren't aware of what they were learning.

"We found that subjects were not aware of what was to be learned while behavioral data obtained before and after the neurofeedback training showed that subjects' visual performance improved specifically for the target orientation," Watanabe said.

Fascinating — sure — but this does open up the door to hypnosis and mind control, which Watanabe is keenly aware of.

"We have to be careful," he said, "so that this method is not used in an unethical way." Sounds like a good plot line for the next Matrix movie."

Via Discovery News (Thanks Annette)

"Organizers of Santa Monica's well-known Christmas Nativity scene at Palisades Park are accusing atheists of "hijacking" the tradition.

Atheist groups objected to use of the park by churches to espouse a religious message and applied to the city of Santa Monica for their own spaces.

Officials used a lottery to dole out spots in the prime location along Ocean Avenue. The atheists turned out to be the lucky ones: Of the 21 plots in the park open for displays, they won 18. The Nativity story that once took 14 displays to tell — from the Annunciation, continuing to the manger in Bethlehem and onto infant Jesus' journey to Egypt and back to Nazareth — had to be abridged to three and crammed into two plots.

"A small group of out-of-town atheists is trying to hijack Santa Monica's nearly 60-year-long Christmas tradition," said Hunter Jameson, chairman of the Santa Monica Nativity Scenes Committee, the group that works with more than a dozen churches and civic groups to organize the display.

Jameson said he intends to keep the Nativity tradition many have enjoyed since 1953 from being displaced. Palisades Park, he said, is the "historic home where it really belongs."

"Their goal is getting rid of us, and squelching our 1st Amendment rights," said Jameson, 65, who no longer lives in Santa Monica but still worships at Lighthouse Church of Santa Monica.

Patrick Elliott, a lawyer for the Freedom From Religion Foundation, said tradition is no excuse for violating the boundaries between church and state. "Just because they're long-standing doesn't mean they're right," he said.

Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, said December is a busy time for the organization's attorneys, who challenge the use of public spaces for religious messages.

"It's littering — literally, littering — these spaces," Gaylor said of such displays, which she said are a "territorial attempt by Christians to impose their beliefs in this season.""

Read more at Los Angeles Times (Thanks Roz)

"Street artist Banksy has installed a vandalised sculpture of a priest in a gallery in Liverpool.

Cardinal Sin is a bust with its face sawn off and replaced by blank tiles, designed as a response to the child abuse scandal in the Catholic church.

In a statement, Banksy said: "I'm never sure who deserves to be put on a pedestal or crushed under one."

The sculpture was unveiled at the Walker Art Gallery, where it is sitting alongside 17th Century religious art.

The bathroom tiles have been put in place of the priest's face to create a pixelated effect.

"I love everything about the Walker Gallery – the Old Masters, the contemporary art, the rude girl in the cafe. And when I found out Mr Walker built it with beer money it became my favourite gallery," said Banksy.

"The statue? I guess you could call it a Christmas present. At this time of year it's easy to forget the true meaning of Christianity – the lies, the corruption, the abuse.""

Read more at BBC News (Thanks Annette)