Canadian actor Douglas Rain must have one of the best known voices on the movie screen, and despite a relatively limited career in film, much of his renown comes from voicing HAL, the on board computer of the spacecraft USS Discovery, in 1967's 2001: A Space Odyssey, and the 1984 follow-up 2010: Odyssey Two. Yet what does he look like? I don't recall ... Read full entry

Wendy Carlos explains Stanley Kubrick's use of the Eltro in the production of 2001: A Space Odyssey, to enhance Douglas Rain's voice during his vocal performance as supercomputer HAL. During the scene in which Dave (Keir Dullea) "lobotomizes" HAL, you'll easily hear how the tempo of Rain's voice becomes slowly expanded and pitch-shifted gradually downwards. Actually, his entire performance as HAL has a mild amount of time stretching ... Read full entry

For 2001: A Space Odyssey fans, a photo that apparently has not been previously published, featuring Stanley Kubrick, Keir Dullea, and Gary Lockwood on one of the USS Discovery sets. Via Coudal Partners.

The 4-D echographic images of the baby kind of reminds me of the Star Child from 2001: A Space Odyssey. Not so long ago, you didn't even know the sex of your baby until the day of birth. Today, we'll know just about everything there is to know - especially now that expectant mommies and daddies can gaze upon their progeny with the help of Echographic images 4-D. ... Read full entry

The differences between Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey on 35mm and 70mm film are stark enough, to say nothing of viewing the movie on a small screen format. I've seen 2001 well in excess of 100 times (it is, without peer, the greatest motion picture ever made), in formats as disparate as 70mm, laser disk, VHS, broadcast TV, DVD and even the awful, scratched, discolored 35mm print, complete with ... Read full entry

Author and futurist Arthur C Clarke is credited with predicting the emergence of a number of technologies, including a tablet-like device called a "Newspad", which could serve the latest news stories from electronic versions of newspapers. So far more has been said about comparing the Newspad to PDAs or Tablet PCs, but the Newpad also worked in a very similar way to ... Read full entry

HAL 9000 wallpaper HAL 9000 fans will love this :)

Five science fiction movies that get the science right I'm pleased to see 2001: A Space Odyssey making the top of the list here (though I don't think there was any particular order)... Despite being made before the first moon landing, Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C Clarke's masterpiece is a strikingly realistic depiction of space travel. It envisions interplanetary spaceships that use a variety of techniques to allow people ... Read full entry

Last link of the day/week. While looking for a HAL 9000 link I stumbled across the HAL2001 Hackers at Large website. I'm not quite sure what it's all about, but there is certainly some interesting 2001: A Space Odyssey inspired illustration on the site. I especially like the t-shirt and soft drink can label designs. Out. ... Read full entry

The 2001 Spacesuit Restoration Project Dennis Gilliam is, piece by piece, restoring one of the spacesuits used in Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke's movie classic 2001 : A Space Odyssey. About the only intact piece of the outfit however was the helmet... sans visor. Since the visor in the original red helmet needed replacing, I had to come up with a method for making accurate visors. I built a ... Read full entry