Filming on Thursday, 4/15/2010 between 3am – 9pm in Dumbo around Adams and Front Street. It looks like a Walgreens ad shoot. Walgreens became the largest drugstore operator in NYC last Friday as the company completed its $623 million buyout of Duane Reade. Walgreens said it plans to keep using the Duane Reade name. Maybe they’re filming in Brooklyn to show how they’ve branched into NYC.

(Photo courtesy of tienmao).

New York Mag published their “Most Livable Neighborhoods in NY” article today. (Might also be the ‘bloggiest’ article since it’s mentioned in many real estate and neighborhood blogs). The list of 50 neighborhoods are a quantitative index of the 50 most satisfying places to live. However, according to Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight, the writer of the article, while they were based on “objective statistical dimensions” and “you’ll find that it’s fairly easy to slot any of 15 or so neighborhoods into the top position, and any of 40 or so of the 60 that we evaluated into the top ten.” Data is based on housing cost, housing quality, transit/proximity, crime, schools, green space, food/restaurants, health and wellness, shopping and services, diversity, “creative capital” and nightlife.

So where’s Dumbo? Dumbo is #19 on the list (paired with downtown Brooklyn) and ranked high in shopping and services (#5), creative capital (#1), transit (#11), and housing quality (#12). In the NYMag piece, he writes: “Dumbo supplies the art galleries and waterfront access but is expensive; Downtown Brooklyn provides the stadium-seating multiplex and public-transit hub, but is high in crime and bereft of nightlife. This area received the highest score of any (95 points) in our creative-capital category: People in the arts constitute about 20 percent of its workforce.” Housing quality is defined as “historic districts, code violations, cockroaches” but it’s difficult to quantify that in an urban center where quality can vary from building to building.

Silver writes on his blog that “Not to encourage gentrification, but if I were buying property as an investment right now, I’d look toward places that are cheap relative to those qualities that take the longest time to upgrade or repair — particularly transit lines, and to a lesser extent greenspace and the quality of the housing stock. That might mean places like Long Island City and Sunnyside (Queens), Prospect Heights and DUMBO (Brooklyn), Washington Heights (Manhattan) and perhaps even some portions of the South Bronx near the train.” Not sure if I would characterize Dumbo as an investment as it avoided the real estate bust (prices are still as high as they were in 2008), but with developments in the Brooklyn Bridge Park and downtown Brooklyn, Dumbo may be an investment in the upcoming years. Do you think the article got it right?

New York is being invaded by 8-bit characters in this short film. Destruction originates in Dumbo, the NY Digital District (naturally). PIXELS is Patrick Jean’s (onemoreproduction) latest short film, shot on location in Dumbo and in New York.

(via Gizmodo)

Sponsored by Invoke @ The Dumbo Loft

Canada’s it-kid interactive agency, Invoke, loves Brooklyn. Since expanding to NYC last year, Invoke has been uber-inspired by the burgeoning tech scene in DUMBO. In gratitude for welcoming them into the community, they want to buy you drinks at Digital DUMBO #14 — and hopes to inspire you too.

Invoke specializes in creating fresh social technologies for clients and agencies. Their peeps love to create methods and spaces for online communication, and then make them happen. The Invoke team is best known for creating the killer social media dashboard, HootSuite.

To RSVP, go to digitaldumbo.eventbrite.com. Follow @digitaldumbo on Twitter.

When: Thursday, March 25, 2010 from 7:00 – 10:00pm
Where: The Dumbo Loft, 155 Water Steet (Corner of Pearl and Water) Brooklyn NY, 11201

Previously:
{DigitalDumbo: Work Hard. Play Hard. Repeat. Win., 26Feb2010}

Crooklyn by Moruf from Adam Saewitz on Vimeo.

Some Friday video fun from 100bestrapsongs.com/moruf-crooklyn-video

HGTV, the home and garden television network, will be filming in Dumbo Brooklyn on Friday, 3/12 from 5am to 11pm on Washington street, Front Street, Water Street. Remember to move your parked cars by 5pm tonight.

Champion eater Takeru Kobayashi (Google Translate) broke the world record of 26 meatballs eaten in 1 minute this afternoon at Fulton Ferry Landing. He finished eating 29 meatballs in one minute. Japanese television Fuji TV covered the event.

Officials from the Guiness Book of World Records were there to make it official. After weighing the meatballs (minimum weight of 14 grams is required per meatball), and stating the rules (must eat one at a time, yes to water, cannot use hands), Kobayashi quickly downed the 29 IKEA meatballs. Kobayashi told us that the world record didn’t seem that much initially, but it’s more than he thought in 60 seconds. “Want to grab pizza?” Says Kobayashi, “No thanks, I’m ok now, but I love NY pizza!”

(Sign behind is translated as “Guiness World Record for Meatball Eating”)

More photos in Flickr set.

The thirteenth Digital Dumbo event, sponsored by HUSH was a full house last night at Galapagos Art Space, despite blizzard conditions. Conceived in Dumbo, birthed in Dumbo, operating daily in Dumbo, (as well as Montreal, Canada), HUSH focuses on telling stories with moving images as they pertain to all things digital. Co-founders Erik Karasyk and David Schwartz (@HushStudios), and Director of Interactive Tim Nolan (@tim_nolan) presented the visual imagery on the big screen and provided a setting that makes Digital Dumbo one of the coolest industry events in NYC. Providing an open bar and free candy (courtesy of Dewey’s Candy) helped fuel the fun too. J Russell Fraze and VJ Dan Savage (somethingsavage.com) provided the perfect music set too.

The Digital Dumbo events bring together the best digital minds of Dumbo and NYC and is a showcase for growing media and technology businesses in Dumbo Brooklyn. While the job market across the country is down, the companies of Digital Dumbo are growing. It’s no mystery that they’re working hard to bridge the online and interactive areas to clients that are looking for nimble and innovative players, but they also know how to play hard. These companies love what they do and where they do it. Says HUSH, “it is totally awesome how we can peel off some time and dedicate it to the idea of giving back to the place we all love, live, and work in.”. The master plan of self proclaimed Digital District of NY to lead, innovate, and exchange ideas is seen when talking with people of ‘@nydd‘.

Watch for more to come in the newly acquired domain name digitaldumbo.com, as announced last night. Great job all!

HUSH (heyhush.com)
68 Jay Street, Suite 208, Brooklyn, NY 11201

Hush Studio Flickr set
DumboNYC Flickr set

Gossip Girl is filming around Washington, Front, and Water Streets in Dumbo Brooklyn on Monday, March 1, 2010 between 6am-10pm. Remember to move your vehicles by Sunday at 8pm.

With the snow storm, not sure if this is still happening, but assume it still is since these signs went up some time last night. Some other photos from the snow this morning:

The Sandpit from Sam O'Hare on Vimeo.

Here’s an amazing video titled The Sandpit by Sam O’Hare includes video of Dumbo using techniques similar to time-lapse tilt shift photography. We previously posted a few tilt shift photos of Dumbo. Some shots were of Brooklyn Bridge Park, a view of the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge Park (From One Brooklyn Bridge Park building), and Pearl Street Triangle (from the Manhattan Bridge), Plymouth Street, and York/Jay Street.

How did Sam do it? He used a Nikon D3 (with Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8 and Sigma 50-150mm f/2.8 lenses) and a series of still photos that totalled over 35,000 photos when put together into the video. Read more about it in detail here. This is amazing Sam!