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Elon Musks company says it will try again on Monday for the next trip of its Starship prototype, which experienced setbacks during its last three flights.

MacworldIf the rumors are correct, Apple will hold its annual iPhone event in just two weeks, on Tuesday, September 9. Thats nothing new, as Apple always announces a new Phone in the fall, but this years event could be as big as the iPhone X launch in 2017, according to a new Bloomberg report by Mark Gurman.In his latest Power On newsletter, Gurman lays out Apples plans to reinvigorate its flagship phone over the next three years. It starts with the iPhone 17 Air, expected to launch as a new model this year. Rumors have long pointed to the model as a super-skinny replacement for the iPhone 16 Plus with a slightly smaller screen and single rear camera. Gurman also reports that the model will have subpar battery life and use Apples C1 model, which was introduced in the iPhone 16e earlier this year.More importantly, Gurman says the iPhone 17 Airs engineering and components will set the stage for future innovation across the next two generations.First up will be Apples first folding iPhone, due in 2026. Gurman says the handset will feature five cameras (one on the front, one on the inside, and two on the back) and use Touch ID built into the power button instead of Face ID. It will reportedly include the next generation of Apples modem, the C2, with capabilities approaching the latest from Qualcomm, and might only be available in black and white.In 2027, Apple is planning yet another massive redesign to commemorate the iPhones 20th anniversary. Gurman reports that the iPhone 20 will finally break from the squared-off slab weve lived with since 2020 and move to an approach with curved glass edges all around. He provides few details but notes that it will fit nicely with the Liquid Glass redesign coming to iOS 26 next month.Gurman doesnt speculate on the price for these new models, but theyre certain to come in higher than the $1,199 starting price of the Pro Max. Samsungs flagship folding phone starts at $1,999, and analysts expect the folding iPhone to be a bit higher than that, with Gurman noting that the folding iPhone will be hugely popular with Apples legion of consumers who are willing to spend whatever to get the latest and greatest. Altogether, its a very exciting time for the iPhone with new flagship models launching every year. And it looks like the days of the boring iPhone release are over.

As August once again slips away, spare a thought for Apples armies of iPhone engineers, iOS developers and the marketing people who have almost certainly been sweating the details this summer ahead of the next major iPhone launch.With so much at stake, and all eyes on what the company does next with its hardware, its no surprise that word about the companys plans have slipped viaBloombergas usual.We now think we know the company is heading into a three-year span of exciting iPhone re-designs, including one thin one, a fabled future curved-glass device, and at last an iPhone fold. Thats going to keep the companys naming chiefs reaching for a dictionary to dig out all the most relevant words to use for product names that might look good with Apple or iPhone in front of them. Will a curved iPhone be an iPhone Loop? (Probably not.)Names come later, of course. For now, weve just got a gist of what to expect:iPhone 17 rangeWe havealready been teased to expectApple to stagger the iPhone release cycle in the future, with Pro models shipping in September and standard iPhones (presumably including the iPhone e series) scheduled to appear in the Spring. This staged release is not expected to commence until 2026, as Apple is set to introduce four new iPhones next month in its usual way.iPhone AirSet to replace the iPhone Plus, the iPhone Air is just 5.5mm thin and carries a 6.6-in. display. Lighter, it will use AI (Adaptive Power) to help optimize battery life, comes in four colors including sky blue, and might cost around $1,000. (The price is tariff sensitive). There has been speculation the system could use an eSIM, AppleC2 5G modem, and carry a single camera but boast a powerful A19 chip.iPhone FoldBloomberg tells us that thefoldable iPhone (V68, apparently) will be similar in look to Samsungs Z-Fold smartphones,opening out into a small tablet. The latest report claims it will have four cameras (so you can FaceTime in any configuration), will use an eSIM for network connectivity, and might use Touch ID rather than Face ID. The device, which will probably also use an Apple modem, is now scheduled for introduction in Fall 2026, along with the iPhone 18 series an iPhone 18 Air, iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max. The iPhone 18 model then appears in 2027.iPhone Curve (Twentieth Anniversary)Mark Gurman has been evangelizing Apples unshared plans to introduce a curved glass iPhone for months. He says this will make its debut in 2027, marking the devices twentieth anniversary. It will boast curved glass edges all around, and feel like a living sheet of glass too, thanks to Apples Liquid Glass OS, which arrives next month.We can guess at some of the rest, including an A20 processor, more memory, a successor to Face ID with the camera beneath the display, and second-generation contextualApple Intelligence these things wont just look advanced, they will actually be advanced as we drive to peak 21st century technology. (Given eroding water and energy supplies, its questionable what comes next).What comes next?These arent the only exciting product introductions Apple is planning as early as this year, you can expect alower-cost MacBook Air. Equipped with an A-series processor, these systems will pack more than enough punch to compete with cheaper Windows PCs, and ship as Windows users consider the cost and hassle of moving to Windows 11.You can also expect faster M5-based Macs, faster Vision Pro units, M5-powered iPad Pros and powerfullyimproved AirPods Pro with heart monitoring. Thats even before the company introduces new product families and hardware, all built to exploit the upgraded Apple Intelligence the company is developing, leaning into AI partners for the things Apple cant, or wont, do. Apple, it appears, is not done innovating.You can follow me on social media! Join me onBlueSky, LinkedIn, andMastodon.

With F1 teams coming to the end of their scheduled summer break, all eyes are on the second half of the season to see which team and driver will come out on top.The Formula 1 summer shutdown occurs every year, with the FIA mandating a two-week factory closure for every team. This time off offers a reset for everyone involved, with there being no car development, wind tunnels, or late-night simulator runs able to be completed during this period.The full break ends up being three and a half weeks long, with the Dutch Grand Prix being the first welcome back.As we get closer to the return of the open-wheel, single-seater racing sport, were looking at how the odds are standing for the second half of the F1 season.How are the drivers getting ready for the remainder of the season?The shutdown impacts the drivers too, as many take this opportunity to recharge and recover ahead of the remaining races.The seven-time world champion Lewis Champion has posted about being on DND, with a social media post of him outside enjoying nature. Other drivers have taken a similar approach, including Williams driver Carlos Sainz, who has shared images of himself cycling in his spare time and enjoying the shutdown with family.George Russell appears to have enjoyed time away at sea in Italy, with Charles Leclerc, Alex Albon, and Max Verstappen also posting yacht-related images on social media.What has happened in the first half of the F1 25 season?So far, the F1 season has been dominated by McLaren as the British team has won 11 Grand Prix out of the 14 events. It was only in Canada that both papaya drivers failed to make the podium.Lando Norris secured the win five times out of the 14 races, with his worst performance being a DNF and P4. Oscar Piastri, the other McLaren driver, has won six times in the first half of the season. His worst position was P9, which was in his home country of Australia, at the beginning of the season.Red Bulls Max Verstappen, who is a four-time World Champion in the sport and previously won in 2024, has won twice this season. The Mercedes driver, George Russell, has one win under his belt in the 2025 races so far.How many races are in the second half of the season?This is where the Formula 1 season really starts to heat up, as fans have seen how cars are performing and some drivers have started to pull away in the drivers championship points.The races to come are also some of the most gruelling, with high temperatures and humidity in places like Singapore being a tough aspect for drivers to contend with.The second half begins at Circuit Zandvoort in the Netherlands on August 31, with there being just 10 races remaining. The upcoming events are as follows:Dutch Grand Prix, Zandvoort: August 31 2025Italian Grand Prix, Monza: September 7, 2025Azerbaijan Grand Prix, Baku: September 21, 2025Singapore Grand Prix, Street Circuit: October 5, 2025United States Grand Prix, Texas: October 19, 2025Mexican Grand Prix, Mexico City: October 26, 2025Brazilian Grand Prix, So Paulo: November 9, 2025Las Vegas Grand Prix, Street Circuit: November 23, 2025Qatar Grand Prix, Lusail/Qatar: November 30, 2025Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, Yas Marina: December 7, 2025What are the odds for the second half of the F1 season?The second half of the F1 season in 2025 will prove to be the most important as a number of drivers are competing for the championship.Currently, Oddschecker has Australian-born Oscar Piastri as 8/13 to win the Drivers Championship, with British driver Lando Norris at 7/5. Max Verstappen is 100/1, with George Russell at 250/1.These four drivers are at the top of the drivers standings at the moment, with Piastri having 284 points, followed by Norris with 275, Verstappen with 187, and Russell with 172. Although theres no knowing what will happen over the next several races, as the leaderboard could completely change.As for the first race of the season, in the Netherlands, the sports betting website has Oscar Piastri at 6/4 to be the Dutch Grand Prix winner. Lando Norris is 8/5, Max Verstappen is 9/1, and Charles Leclerc is 12/1.Featured Image: Credit to Liauzh on Wikimedia Commons, CC 4.0 licenseThe post Odds revealed as second half of F1 2025 season set to begin appeared first on ReadWrite.

The wildfires that swept through Los Angeles County in January 2025 left an indelible mark on the Southern California landscape. The Eaton and Palisades fires raged for 24 days, killing 29 people and destroying 16,000 structures, with losses estimated at $60 billion. More than 55,000 acres were consumed, and the landscape itself was physically transformed.Researchers are now using lidar (light detection and ranging) technology to precisely measure these changes in the landscapes geometryhelping them understand the effects of climate disasters.Lidar, which measures how long it takes for pulses of laser light to bounce off surfaces and return, has been used in topographic mapping for decades. Today, airborne lidar from planes and drones maps the Earths surface in high detail. Scientists can then diff the datacompare before-and-after snapshots and highlight all the changesto identify more subtle consequences of a disaster, including fault-line shifts, volcanic eruptions, and mudslides.Falko Kuester, an engineering professor at the University of California, San Diego, co-directs ALERTCalifornia, a public safety program that uses real-time remote sensing to help detect wildfires. Kuester says lidar snapshots can tell a story over time.They give us a lay of the land, he says. This is what a particular region has been like at this point in time. Now, if you have consecutive flights at a later time, you can do a difference. Show me what it looked like. Show me what it looks like. Tell me what changed. Was something constructed? Something burned down? Did something fall down? Did vegetation grow?Shortly after the fires were contained in late January 2025, ALERTCalifornia sponsored new lidar flights over the Eaton and Palisades burn areas. NV5, an inspection and engineering firm, conducted the scans, and the US Geological Survey is now hosting the public data sets. Comparing a 2016 lidar snapshot and the January 2025 snapshot, Cassandra Brigham and her team at Arizona State University visualized the elevation changesrevealing the buildings, trees, and structures that had disappeared.We said, what would be a useful product for people to have as quickly as possible, since were doing this a couple weeks after the end of the fires? says Brigham. Her team cleaned and reformatted the older, lower-resolution data and then subtracted the newer data. The resulting visualizations reveal the scale of devastation in ways satellite imagery cant match. Red shows lost elevation (like when a building burns), and blue shows a gain (such as tree growth or new construction).Lidar is helping scientists track the cascading effects of climate-driven disastersfrom the damage to structures and vegetation destroyed by wildfires to the landslides and debris flows that often follow in their wake. For the Eaton and Palisades fires, for example, entire hillsides burned. So all of that vegetation is removed, Kuester says. Now you have an atmospheric river coming in, dumping water. What happens next? You have debris flows, mud flows, landslides.Lidars usefulness for quantifying the costs of climate disasters underscores its value in preparing for future fires, floods, and earthquakes. But as policymakers weigh steep budget cuts to scientific research, these crucial lidar data collection projects could face an uncertain future.Jon Keegan writes about technology and AI, and he publishes Beautiful Public Data (beautifulpublicdata.com), a curated collection of government data sets.

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Top 10 Tips for Mastering 3D Modeling3D modeling is an essential skill in fields ranging from game design and animation to product visualization and architecture. Mastering this art requires a blend of technical proficiency and creative vision. Here are 10 tips to help you enhance your 3D modeling skills and take your creations to the next level.1. Understand the Fundamentals of Geometry and TopologyBefore diving into complex models, its crucial to have a strong grasp of geometry and topology. Understanding how vertices, edges, and faces form the basis of 3D objects will help you create clean, efficient models. Poor topology can result in messy models that are hard to animate or render, so always aim for quads (four-sided polygons) and avoid unnecessary triangles or N-gons.Tip: Regularly practice with primitive shapes (cubes, spheres, etc.) and explore how they combine to form more complex structures.2. Master Your Modeling SoftwareBecoming proficient in your 3D software is key to efficient and effective modeling. Whether youre using Blender, Maya, 3ds Max, or ZBrush, spend time learning the shortcuts, tools, and capabilities of your chosen program.Tip: Watch tutorials, read forums, and explore documentation to stay updated on the latest features and best practices for your software.3. Reference Real-World ObjectsTo create realistic 3D models, study real-world objects. Understanding how objects are constructed in the physical world (their form, structure, and proportions) will enhance the realism of your digital creations. Reference images are invaluable, especially when youre modeling something highly detailed or realistic.Tip: Use online resources like Pinterest, Google Images, or Sketchfab to gather a collection of reference photos before starting a project.4. Block Out Basic Shapes FirstWhen starting a new model, resist the temptation to dive straight into the details. Begin by blocking out the basic shapes of your model. This allows you to establish the proportions and overall form before adding finer details.Tip: Use low-resolution meshes to block out shapes, and only increase the resolution when youre satisfied with the overall structure.5. Pay Attention to Scale and ProportionScale and proportion are critical to creating believable models. Whether youre modeling characters, environments, or objects, ensure they adhere to real-world dimensions, or to consistent in-game scales if youre working in game design.Tip: Use measuring tools within your 3D software to ensure your models are to scale, and compare elements frequently to maintain consistency.6. Master UV Mapping and TexturingTexturing is an essential part of the 3D modeling process, and it requires a solid understanding of UV mapping. UV mapping involves laying out the 3D surface of your model in a 2D space, which allows textures to be applied accurately.Tip: Practice unwrapping UVs efficiently, aiming to reduce seams and minimize stretching. There are many online tutorials that cover this complex topic.7. Practice Efficient Polycount ManagementWhen creating models for games or real-time applications, managing your polycount is critical for optimizing performance. Keep your models as low-poly as possible without sacrificing visual quality.Tip: Use techniques like normal mapping and baking details onto low-poly models to achieve high-quality looks with fewer polygons.8. Learn Sculpting for Organic ModelsWhile traditional modeling is perfect for hard-surface objects like vehicles or buildings, sculpting is a powerful technique for creating organic shapes like characters, creatures, or natural elements. Programs like ZBrush and Blenders Sculpt Mode allow for more fluid and artistic modeling.Tip: Start by sculpting simple organic shapes like rocks or tree trunks to get comfortable with the tools before moving on to more complex anatomy or character models.9. Use Lighting and Rendering to Showcase Your ModelA great model can be underwhelming if not properly showcased. Understanding the basics of lighting and rendering will help you present your model in the best possible way. Proper lighting can emphasize the form, texture, and details of your model, making it stand out.Tip: Experiment with different light setups such as three-point lighting and use HDR environments for realistic reflections and lighting effects.10. Keep Iterating and Refining Your WorkMastering 3D modeling takes time, patience, and lots of practice. Dont be afraid to iterate on your models. Get feedback from peers or online communities, and use critiques to improve your work. Every iteration should bring you closer to a polished, professional model.Tip: Take part in online challenges or contribute to forums like ArtStation, Polycount, or Blender Artists to get valuable feedback and stay motivated.ConclusionMastering 3D modeling requires a combination of technical skill, creativity, and a deep understanding of the tools and techniques available to you. By focusing on fundamentals, refining your workflow, and continuing to learn from real-world objects, youll be well on your way to becoming a proficient 3D artist.Resources for Further LearningBlender Guru: 3D Modeling TutorialsLink: Blender GuruArtStation Learning: 3D Art CoursesLink: ArtStation LearningCG Cookie: Blender and Game Art TutorialsLink: CG CookiePolycount: 3D Modeling ForumLink: Polycount ForumZBrush Central: Sculpting Tutorials and CommunityLink: ZBrush Central