May Monster Madness: Monster Voices with Sulfur Hexafluoride

Image Source: Arthur's Monster Clipart

Have you ever wanted to have a mega-deep, booming monster voice to scare your friends with but been disappointed when you found only helium, which makes it super-squeaky instead? Well, stop being disappointed and get yourself some of the chemical compound sulfur hexafluoride instead! 

Helium is much less dense than air and so allows the vocal chords to vibrate at a higher rate, making your voice sound much higher. Sulfur hexafluoride, however, is approximately 5 - 6 times denser than air at room temperature, which forces vocal chords to vibrate more slowly and in turn makes your voice sound much lower. The effects don't last long, unfortunately, but you can sound like an evil monster overlord for a minute or two at least!

Check out the videos below to see the gas in action:

This post is part of the May Monster Madness blog hop & Science Sunday!

May Monster Madness: Plaseebo at Monster Mayhem

First of all, apologies for our blog link not working earlier today. It's all fixed and fine now :) Anyway, that out of the way, time for some monsters!

Fittingly enough, FOE Store & Gallery in Western Massachusetts are holding an exhibition called 'Monster Mayhem' soon, which features the work of figure makers / customisers from all over the world, all with the terrifically terrifying theme of monsters! Here's what the FOE website has to say about the event:

Monster Mayhem

May 11 - June 3, Opening May 11, 6-9pm 

For the 2nd year monsters from across the US and as far away as Japan descend on the town of Northampton and wreak havoc.   

This year’s roster includes work from:

Brian Mahony, Bob Conge/Plaseebo, Monster Worship, James Groman, Koji Harmon, Elegab, Miles Nielsen, Michael Nordstrom, Ricky Wilson/Velocitron, Martin Ontiveros, Bob Eggleton, Michael Skattum, Eric Talbot, Joe Merrill/Splurrt, Dennis Hamann/Shirahama, Steven Erst, Mark Nagata, Paul Kaiju, Stephen Blickenstaff, Mark Masztal, and Michael Bracco/Spaghetti Kiss

"Braineniac" vinyl with LED unit by Plaseebo

Even if you can make the Monster Mayhem event, the FOE Store & Gallery alone sounds like an intriguing place to visit, with items including: "subculture art, designer toys, kaiju and kawaii. Whether it’s custom-painted monsters or tiny cute things, FOE is curated to inspire". Not only that, but they try to bring creators together for both domestic and international projects / collaborations, so who knows what you might find there!

Take a sneak peak at some more of the monsters contributed to the show by Bob Conge of Plaseebo, after the cut below!

This post is part of the May Monster Madness blog hop!

May Monster Madness: The Wellcome Collection

From May 1st - 7th we're taking part in the May Monster Madness blog hop! It's kindly being organised by Annie Walls, and the goal is to post about something spooky or monster-related every day for seven days. Obviously, that's what we always post about here, but the event is open to bloggers of all genres too!

I'm a little monstered-out today (shocking, I know!), so for the first post I'm going to share some of the spooky and strange exhibits on show at the Wellcome Collection in London! It's a museum filled with tons of unusual and fascinating items relating to medicine over the ages. I hadn't heard of until last year when Kei, of Unfortunately Oh!, suggested we should visit it during a trip to London. It's such an intriguing place and many of the exhibits are interactive, providing yet another layer of interest.

There's much more than just creepy crawlies and oddities - artificial limbs, paintings, glass eyes, masks, folk art, mirror etchings, a table full of all the pills a person takes in their life, exhibits about the human genome and DNA, figurines, torture devices and so much more! They also have temporary exhibits that change every few months as well. However, since this is for May Monster Madness, I'll leave out the other photos this time.) Oh, and did I mention that it's totally free to get in?

The above exhibit was a little larger than life-size (the transparent figure in the background was a cross-section of a real human body) and when you press the buttons on the podium, the part of the body listed next to them lights up on the model. We noticed that compared to all the other parts of anatomy, the brain was not very bright!

There were also a few blocks of shelves filled with anatomical models of assorted human body parts nearby as well (pictured above). 

The above wonderful pair were in one of the displays in the 'End of Life' section of the 'Medicine Man' area. As was the gorgeously intricate sculpture made out of wax and cloth:

And these Egyptian canopic jars (jars used to house the internal organs of the dead being prepared for mummification):

In a different area of the same room there was a Peruvian mummy. There was a drawer you could pull out underneath, with a cast of his hand inside, which you could touch. It was pretty strange really.

Those of you out there among the zombie population might also be pleased to know that they currently have an exhibit running (29th March - 17th June, 2012) called 'Brains: The Mind as Matter'.

"Our major new free exhibition seeks to explore what humans have done to brains in the name of medical intervention, scientific enquiry, cultural meaning and technological change. 

Featuring over 150 artefacts including real brains, artworks, manuscripts, artefacts, videos  and photography, 'Brains' follows the long quest to manipulate and decipher the most unique and mysterious of human organs, whose secrets continue to confound and inspire. 

'Brains' asks not what brains do to us, but what we have done to brains, focusing on the bodily presence of the organ rather than investigating the neuroscience of the mind."

Personally, I would love to see that one too! For now, however, I'll leave you with...the torture chair...

Looks comfy, eh? o.O;

This post is part of the May Monster Madness blog hop!