Includes how the studio created an authentic VHS look for some shots by recording comps onto old VHS tapes. The post Watch Storm Studios’ VFX breakdown for ‘The Electric State’ appeared first on befores & afters.

When government officials accidentally included Jeffrey Goldberg, The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief, in a Signal group chat discussing U.S. military plans, all hell broke loose. The Atlantic’s CEO, Nicholas Thompson, joins Rapid Response to discuss the scandal now known as “Signalgate,” revealing insider details about how the story came to be and sharing how the publication thinks about fostering its success as a business while maintaining editorial independence.This is an abridged transcript of an interview from Rapid Response, hosted by Robert Safian, former editor-in-chief of Fast Company. From the team behind the Masters of Scale podcast, Rapid Response features candid conversations with today’s top business leaders navigating real-time challenges. Subscribe to Rapid Response wherever you get your podcasts to ensure you never miss an episode. I have to ask you about one of the biggest news stories of the year: The Atlantic’s editor-in-chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, included in a group chat on Signal by U.S. National Security Adviser Mike Waltz. Other leaders, including the secretary of Defense, are there. Sensitive military plans are discussed. When did this first come to you? Are you consulted in advance by the editorial team on how to approach coverage, or do you read about it once it breaks for the rest of us? I’m not consulted. I don’t know what they’re going to publish today. I don’t know what the next cover of The Atlantic is. For a story like this, I certainly knew that something important was going to be published, because there’s a lot that you have to do as an organization when something like this happens—you have to make sure your comms officials and others are ready to go. So I knew that something was going to happen, but I read it maybe right about when everybody else did. In fact, I believe one of the first five people to read the story was my 11-year-old son because I was with him. So right before it went live on the site, we got to read the story. Even after I read it, I didn’t realize the impact it would have. When we published the second story, and we published the chat transcripts, I was on an airplane when that went live. The second I read that, I knew that was going to be massive because of the texture, the color, and because the administration had spent the previous day saying that what was in the chats was not classified, and that The Atlantic was mischaracterizing it. So, it was very clear that that was incorrect, and that meant the story was going to go wild.I know there’s the story that obviously brought a lot of attention, but the general environment since Trump took office again has been a high degree of turmoil. Is that turmoil good for your business? I mean, your audience is more eager to be part of it. Our business is subscriptions, and clearly more people really respect our brand. They care a lot about trust. They like fact-check journalism. We stand for all those things, and subscriptions are up substantially. Advertising is more complicated, because advertisers don’t want to be around political tension. So there’s some headwinds, right? Our advertising numbers are terrific. They’re up above target, but we’re not crashing our advertising numbers the way we were not long ago. Then the more interesting thing is if you look at the media ecosystem from 2016 to 2020, there’s a real business risk. I haven’t done the analysis, but if you were to do a regression analysis of how much publications leaned into being resistance publications and their long-term economic prospects, I think there’s probably a negative correlation. I think that there’s some deleterious things that happen to your publication if you become a resistance publication, and it affects your brand. It affects your readership. It affects the way social media algorithms work. It tunes your audience in a way that probably isn’t helpful. Now, that’s not a risk for The Atlantic because we are so at our core or founding statements as we are of no party or clique. We would never become a resistance publication, and it’s so counter to the way Jeff Goldberg and the editorial team see the world. They would 100% have published that story about Joe Biden. If Donald Trump does something that they think is amazing, they’ll write a story that says he’s amazing. But as a general media executive perspective, I do think that there’s a temptation. There was a temptation in the first Trump administration. I think there is in the second Trump administration to eat the sugar of anti-Trump coverage, and it’s not healthy in the long run. It’s interesting, too, because a lot of brands, they get positioned or pigeonholed as being either part of the resistance or part of MAGA, sort of one side or the other. I saw some report saying that Trump’s biggest gripe was that Waltz had your editor’s number on his phone. I could see from an editorial point of view, that’s like a badge of honor like, “Yeah, we’re in there.” From a business point of view, does your relationship with the administration get more complicated about who you can reach and what your reputation’s going to be? Well, I don’t think there’s a huge problem for journalists reaching people in the Trump administration. You read Jonathan Lemire’s piece every day. He’s always like, “I talked to five people on the inside of this decision, all of whom requested anonymity, right?” They’re clearly talking to us. It’s no surprise that Goldberg was in Waltz’s phone. Our reporters talk to lots of people in Washington, because people in Washington care what is written about them in places that people read. So, they may denounce us and say, “It’s a horror, The Atlantic,” but God knows they’re all reading it. From a business perspective, there are risks. There are ways the federal government could retaliate against us on a business side. You can imagine certainly with ABC, CBS. They’ve gone after the owners, and you can imagine an administration going after our owner. We’ve tried to game all this out. We’ve tried to see whether there are points of leverage. I don’t think there are any. I don’t think there are any risks, but who knows, right? The Trump administration has proved very adversarial to anybody it perceives as a critic, and who knows what happens. You mentioned advertising dollars earlier. Is that advertising risk higher if you’re seen as hostile to Trump? Different advertisers have different views. Some don’t care. Our readers, we have almost precisely as many Republican readers as Democratic readers. We are reaching influential and affluent and highly read, highly educated people across the political spectrum. They’re a cohort that many advertisers want to reach, and so that’s a huge plus. I do think if there was a chance we were viewed as a resistant publication, that would be very bad for advertising. But I think the actual risk is advertisers think, You really want to buy a fancy watch when you’re reading a story about bombing Yemen? No. Right? You’re in a mood to buy a fancy watch when you’re reading a story about some entrepreneur who’s built something cool or something that puts you in a different emotional mood. So the risk is really if your coverage becomes writing about the chaos, or writing about deportations, writing about El Salvadorian prisons. You want to buy a fancy watch when you’re reading about a prison in El Salvador? No, you do not. So, it’s more of a, What is the perception of what we cover? How many stories do we put of this kind? How many people read those stories? How do you fit the ads in? Again, the interesting thing about The Atlantic is that the business choices are all downstream of the editorial choices. Goldberg could come up here and say, “By the way, hey, Nick, we’re actually only going to be covering torture and pillaging for the next two months.” Then I would just have to figure out how to sell ads. I wouldn’t say, “Hey, can you please write some stories about small businesses?” I would sell ads to companies that want to be around torturing and pillaging. I would just figure it out. So, we’re different from publications that work in the other way. Your aspiration is not to operate it like Jeff Bezos at The Washington Post, and say, “We should cover this.” It’s the exact opposite. That’s why I stay out of the editorial decisions. I never want that. When I knew there was something big coming, I just called Goldberg and I said, “I don’t know what the story is. I don’t want to know what the story is, but I want you to publish it no matter what.” And I said, “I’ll stand behind you no matter what it is, and no matter what happens.”

Suzanne Dean’s illustration is unmatched.

Larger models can pull off a wider variety of feats, but the reduced footprint of smaller models makes them attractive tools.

I’m trying to create a fire effect using a 16x4 flipbook texture in Unity’s Shader Graph, but I’m running into an issue — the image seems to tile horizontally (U direction) instead of animating properly through the frames. I’m using Shader Graph, not code. If anyone has a step-by-step or node-based setup** for flipbook animations like this, I’d really appreciate it!

If you’re a Windows 10 user, you may not want to upgrade to Windows 11. Too bad: Microsoft suggests 7 reasons to switch asap.

Why it matters: The Trump administration has granted a reprieve to global technology manufacturers by exempting smartphones, laptops, CPUs, memory chips, and electronics to make semiconductors from its sweeping tariffs on imports – a move that could ease pressure on companies like Apple and Nvidia while offering relief to consumers. The exclusions, published late Friday by US Customs and Border Protection, narrow the scope of Trump's aggressive trade measures by sparing these products from the 125 percent China-specific tariff and the baseline 10 percent tariff imposed on nearly all other countries. The exemption list includes popular consumer electronics such as smartphones, laptops, hard drives, memory chips, and flat-screen displays – items predominantly manufactured outside the United States. Analysts say this decision marks a significant softening in Trump's ongoing trade conflict with China, which has roiled global markets and triggered a stock selloff. "This is a large hole in the U.S. tariff wall that will spare key firms like Apple and consumers of laptops and phones from sticker shock," Gerard DiPippo, associate director of the Rand China Research Center, told Bloomberg. He noted that the exemptions cover approximately $390 billion in US imports based on 2024 trade data, including more than $101 billion worth of products from China. Smartphones represent the largest category of exempted goods, with imports valued at over $41 billion from China last year – around 9 percent of total imports from the country. Computers and similar devices account for another $36 billion. Altogether, these consumer electronics and semiconductors comprise roughly 22 percent of US imports from China in 2024. // Related Stories The tariff exclusions also extend to semiconductor manufacturing equipment, which is critical for building chip factories. Companies such as ASML in the Netherlands and Tokyo Electron in Japan produce these tools, which are essential for constructing facilities supported by the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act. The exemptions are also expected to benefit companies like TSMC, Samsung, and Intel, all of which are investing heavily in US-based production. However, analysts warn that the reprieve may not last long. The exclusions stem from an initial order designed to prevent cumulative tariffs on specific sectors but may indicate that these products could soon face lower, yet still significant, tariffs. In addition, the Trump administration is reportedly preparing to launch a new investigation into semiconductor imports, which could lead to targeted tariffs on chips and related products within weeks or months. DiPippo cautioned that many other goods from China still face prohibitively high tariffs. "This exemption only covers one segment of the U.S. economy," DiPippo pointed out, emphasizing that broader trade tensions remain unresolved despite this concession. Wedbush Securities analyst Daniel Ives echoed this sentiment in a research note on Saturday that Bloomberg reported. "There is still clear uncertainty and volatility ahead with these China negotiations." As discussions continue, the Trump administration appears poised to impose new sectoral tariffs targeting semiconductors – a move that could further reshape trade dynamics. While previous measures included exemptions for processors crucial to AI development, GPUs and servers powered by AI chips remain largely unaffected by Friday's announcement. For now, technology companies and consumers can breathe a sigh of relief amid fears of skyrocketing prices – but with new investigations looming and trade tensions far from settled, this tariff suspension may prove fleeting.

Buying cloud storage might seem like the modern solution for managing your files, but let’s be honest—it comes with its own set of challenges. Subscription fees stack up over time, and you’re often left wondering about the safety and privacy of your data. For those who prefer a reliable, one-time investment, nothing beats a physical hard drive at home. As it is, the Seagate Portable 4TB external hard drive is available for just $99 on Amazon, down from $124 which is a massive 20% off just ahead of the tariffs hike. See at Amazon Ultra Fast Transfers The Seagate 4TB external HDD is a high-quality storage solution if you’re dealing with large files, whether they’re photos, videos, games or critical documents. With a massive 4TB of storage space, this drive can hold up to 660 five-minute 4K videos or over two million average files. It’s perfect for backing up priceless family videos or for expanding your gaming library without worrying about running out of space. Small and portable, the Seagate drive itself is only 4.54 inches in length and 3.15 inches in width which allows it to fit easily into a bag or even a pocket. Weighing in at only 0.56 lbs, it’s built to be portable without sacrificing durability. Its slim black profile will make it fit easily into any environment, at home or on the road. The drive features USB 3.0 connectivity for transfer speeds up to ten times faster than USB 2.0. This provides fast and effective transfer of large files—like high-definition movies or entire collections of games. For compatibility with older systems, the Seagate drive is also backward compatible with USB 2.0 ports at reduced speeds. Its plug-and-play nature simplifies setup: simply plug it in with the included USB cable, and your PC or Mac will recognize it immediately with no software to install. It is pre-formatted as exFAT and works with Windows and macOS computers right out of the box. This compatibility is great if you work on both operating systems or need an OS-agnostic storage device. Mac users who would like to use Time Machine backups can also reformat the drive to their needs without any issues. Gamers will love this hard drive too as it plugs in flawlessly with Xbox and PlayStation consoles. Whether you’re safeguarding memories or expanding your digital library, this is a great deal! See at Amazon

Nature, Published online: 09 April 2025; doi:10.1038/d41586-025-01076-1People from modern Pakistan imported their musical technology all the way to what is now Oman.

Ramiz Asadullaev presented a 3D Steam Deck model so realistic, he had to specifically clarify it was a render and not a reference photo.Made with Plasticity, Substance 3D, and Marmoset Toolbag: https://80.lv/articles/this-steam-deck-3d-model-looks-so-real-creator-had-to-clarify-it-s-not-a-reference/