Fantasmagorie

Fantasmagorie is an 1908 French animated film by Émile Cohl (born Émile Eugène Jean Louis Courtet). It is one of the earliest examples of traditional animation, and considered by film historians to be the first animated cartoon. To make this film, Cohl placed each drawing on an illuminated glass plate and then traced the next drawing-with variations-on top of it until he had some 700 drawings.

In 1908, chalkboard caricaturists were common vaudeville attractions and the characters in the film look as though they've been drawn on a chalkboard, but it's an illusion. By filming black lines on paper and then printing in negative Cohl makes his animations appear to be chalk drawings. LINK: The Presurfer, Via: Youtube

Avalanche Cliff Jump with Matthias Giraud

Matthias Giraud and Stefan Laude capture some of the most incredible content seen by GoPro as they hit the Alps like true heroes skiing the French backcountry while escaping a large avalanche on their tails! LINK: Youtube

French Air Force Aerobatic Team Pays Tribute To Asterix

The French Air Force Aerobatic Team 'La Patrouille de France' pays tribute to the most famous of all Gauls on his 50th birthday. LINK: The Presurfer

Frédéric Lebain's real world collages

Over at the Imaginary Foundation blog, amazingly surreal photos by French artist Frédéric Lebain who superimposes his photographs on top of the real world. LINK

French anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss has died

The man widely considered to be the father of modern anthropological study has passed away at 100 years of age. NYT, Bloomberg, Wikipedia, AFP.

"Among the more striking conclusions of his work was the idea that there is no fundamental difference between the belief systems and myths of so-called 'primitive' races and those of modern western societies." LINK, Via: Youtube

Be sure to go to youtube and see the rest of the interview videos.

The Only Woman In The French Foreign Legion

British tennis-playing socialite Susan Travers (23 September 1909–18 December 2003) became the only woman in the French Foreign Legion, leading a daring, wartime, desert escape.

Born in southern England as the daughter of a Royal Navy admiral, but raised as a young tennis-playing socialite in the south of France, Travers was among thousands of women who joined the French Red Cross at the outbreak of the Second World War.

When France fell to the Nazis she made her way to London and signed up with General De Gaulle's Free French and was attached to the 13th Demi-Brigade of the Legion Etrangere, which sailed for Africa. Volunteering as a driver to the brigade's senior officers, she exhibited such nerves of steel in negotiating minefields and enemy attacks that she earned the affectionate nickname 'La Miss' from her thousand male comrades.

(Via: Look At This...) Via: Presurfer

Scooter-Mounted Cannon

After World War II, the French could not afford the most sophisticated military equipment, and so improvised with what they had on hand. Hence their production of scooter-mounted 75mm recoilless rifles. Blogger James R. Rummel offers more information and photographs of this vehicle.

Link, Via: Neatorama

Steampunk chronulator

Emmanuel, a French sculptor, was inspired by the Chronulator DIY clock-kits to make this handsome steampunk clocke out of a tea box and some spare parts:

Steampunk Chronulator, Via: Boingboing