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Galactica, Evangelion and the value of strong, directed narratives
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Apr. 29th, 2008 @ 01:21 pm
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My TV-watching habits of late have thrown light on two shows in terms of overall conception and execution. Neon Genesis Evangelion, to many watching it for the first time, is criticised for being hard to understand and, to some, seemingly made up as it went along with philosophy and psychology getting in the way of the fun. The new Battlestar Galactica, however, has been regularly praised for being a well conceived show. Even now the press sing its praises despite some fans occasionally having to rinse their eyes in disbelief. Watching these shows, two things are very very clear to me. Eva is a brilliantly written, internally consistent, thought-provoking sci-fi drama and BSG is a mess of inconsistent character writing muddied by increasingly chaotic plot archs with little sense of where it's going or what it wants to say. There's more to it than that of course, so let me talk for a little about my experience of the two shows. ( Battlestar Galactica (very very light spoilers?) )
( Neon Genesis Evangelion (no real spoilers) )Looking at the two shows, the outcome is simple in my mind. BSG, which essentially has free-reign to follow any creative path it desires, is crippled by lack of direction whereas Evangelion, which had numerous obstacles thrown into its path managed again and again to put the characters and the meaning first. I frequently return to Eva: it's always a pleasure and there's always something new for me. It's been maybe 10 years since I first saw Eva, I can't say I'll be watching BSG in 10 years time. If it weren't the last season, I wouldn't be watching it now. |
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dona dona dona dona~
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Apr. 1st, 2008 @ 02:55 pm
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I received my ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) moocards today! They've come out almost exactly as promised, they're really cool. The darker low-contrast images are a bit murky, probably due to the conversion to CMYK but on the whole they're really great.
These are the images I used for them, each a frame from one of my videos with the file name and timecode listed.
http://absolutedestiny.org/pics/thumbnails.php?album=24
Finally I'll have something to give out to fans and academics other than my work business card. |
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Would Sir care for a curry - followed by, perhaps, a little intergalactic domination?
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Mar. 15th, 2008 @ 10:58 am
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While looking for the price of a lamb bhuna, I couldn't help but feel like there was something sinister about this menu...
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Zabet
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Feb. 29th, 2008 @ 11:10 pm
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The news has really hit me for six. Such a loss... a gift to everyone she met.
My heart goes out to her family and friends.
Liz was a joy to be around. She will be forever missed and never forgotten.
(her videos)
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Stage6 to close
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Feb. 25th, 2008 @ 04:52 pm
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Gutted.
There goes the last good particapatory online video service. Maybe more will appear in its place but for now we can but mourn.
A lot of bad news today. This was the best of a bad bunch.
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Thanks Howard!
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Feb. 13th, 2008 @ 02:14 am
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Register? What's that?
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Feb. 2nd, 2008 @ 05:15 pm
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Vividcon registration is for losers. |
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Oct. 30th, 2007 @ 09:41 pm
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Happy birthday, vagabondage - you are completely fucking awesome. |
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Insta Rec: Space Disco podcast episode
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Oct. 17th, 2007 @ 01:11 am
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One of the numerous podcasts I listen to frequently, Radio Clash, posted a new edition today and it's so so so so awesome.
Radio Clash 135 - Discostar Galactica
Mad props to timbearcub for a really great show. Starting off with Magic Fly, you can't lose. Anyway, download it for some cheesy sci-fi disco fun. |
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Oct. 7th, 2007 @ 12:26 pm
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More stage6 experimentation. I've uploaded Deep Kick but labelled it as Adult. On stage6 you can't even see if the video exists without changing the default settings on your profile, so I'm curious as to what happens when you try and embed it. Here goes...
( See the video... perhaps ) |
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New vid: Deep Kick
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Oct. 5th, 2007 @ 03:19 am
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An out-of-con-season video? Just as much a surprise to me, I can assure you. Video: Deep Kick
Footage: 十五(15) [movie, 2003]
Song: "Deep Kick" by The Red Hot Chili Peppers (from One Hot Minute, 1995) 
>> Download the DivX-compatible avi file here. << No streaming version due to violence and nudity, sorry. Large size due to vid length - again, apologies. ( Summary: Teen life and all that that implies. )( Lyrics ) |
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That careers meme thingy that everyone is doing like the sheep we are
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Sep. 14th, 2007 @ 01:01 am
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Everyone's doing it and mine was kind of hilarious, so:
1. Go to http://www.careercruising.com.
2. Put in Username: nycareers, Password: landmark.
3. Take their "Career Matchmaker" questions.
4. Post the top fifteen results.
My results are pretty accurate on the whole but after my recent foray into cosplay the first result is hillarious:
1. Costume Designer!!!!
( and the rest )
That I do several of these in my actual job bodes well for me. I do like my job and I do get to do the things I like doing. Obviously, however, what I really need to get my company to do is more costumes and makeup :D |
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Spun With the Wind
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Aug. 17th, 2007 @ 08:41 pm
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So earlier this week I posted my Gone With the Wind video. I made this video several months ago and it premiered at the Club Vivid show at this year's Vividcon. Reception of the video as a video has been largely positive which, of course, makes me very happy. There is, understandably, a certain amount of hesitation over some of the more politically charged implications of the video from source choices right through to execution. I think there are a lot of interesting ideas that people have been talking about and I want to work through some of them here.
I've not been keeping up to date on all the issues as I've been travelling but I'm hoping what I'll write will touch on a lot of stuff that people have questions about and possibly concerns with.
Let's start with the basic premise of the video. It's a Gone With the Wind (movie) video and it highlights Scarlett O'Hara's life in the South before during and after the American Civil War. In particular, the video's primary concern is how Scarlett uses men for her own gains - rightly or wrongly at various points in time - and how her emotional attachment to Ashley Wilkes becomes her undoing. The source is very shiny, there's excellent cinematography and the actors and their costumes are stunning to look at. Much of the pleasure of the video lies in reaction shots and melodrama, focussing heavily on people's responses to Scarlett and the epic crumbling of the world around her. The idea was to entertain with Scarlett's actions while underpinning them with emotional problems and ending the video on an image of Scarlett having a moment of realisation that for all her gains she has lost something dear. The video is not intended as a total criticism of Scarlett's supposed gold digging, but the voice of the video (the song) certainly approaches from a very particular perspective. Let me talk about that for a moment.
The song choice is potentially controversial on all kinds of levels. One level I was struck with straight away was the misogyny. Throughout the video, the voice of the video (our narrator) is frequently talking trash about our strong-willed Scarlett. Ideally, I'd have liked the voice of the video to have the POV of a specific character but the lyrics of the song prevented this and instead the POV shifts around a little - mostly shifting positions from being Rhett Butler's POV and the general POV of the male dominated society portrayed in the movie. This is intentional, not because I want to glorify the misogyny or attack Scarlett for not being some dainty silent wife who just sits around knitting and making babies - instead I wanted the video to act as a mirror of the society that is being portrayed and, in a sense, connect it to our own society where the issues aren't really all that more clearly addressed. The mashup where a modern song is mixed with classical provided, for me, a way to play around with these themes while hopefully keeping a certain distance from them in terms of my own perspective. You can decide for yourself whether that distancing was in any way successful. Certainly, as an individual, I sympathise more for Scarlett than I do the voice of the video and I'd like to think that despite the video's voice there are some stunning Scarlett moments shown in the video, but this video is about Gone With the Wind, not my own positions on gender roles.
Of course, the song can be controversial for more reasons than misogyny. There is the race problem. The movie, for obvious reasons, has a considerable amount of racial concerns and the majority of them are for the most part trivialised within the movie and set aside. Not being a video directly about race, I decided to not to focus on the race issue per se... this isnt a video that says "I ain't saying shea white supremacist..." Of course, by using hip hop and by using a song that in its original incarnation had repeated use of the word "nigga" there is always going to be a race element in the song that the viewer will have to deal with. Now, I do have to admit, when I first considered the song, I didn't give the race question a lot of thought. I was really just thinking of it as music in the general way that I listen to most music. It was only when I started playing around with the sources that I started to consider how the race issue could influence the reading of the video.
I think it's a very complex problem and honestly I don't think I did a lot in terms of my editing to try and nudge the issue one way or the other, I was after all character focussed rather than looking at the larger themes as a whole. It could be considered incredibly poor taste to combine this song with this source, that's certainly one reaction that I could see from it. Giving these racist characters West's voice and perspective could be seen as quite a slap in the face. It could also be considered a very radical statement on the music itself and the culture described by the music - equating, in a direct way, West's "gold diggers" to Scarlett (a slave owning racist) is a very problematic position and could also be very offensive. On the other hand it could provoke interesting thoughts on how Scarlett's struggle with status in GWTW has a correlation with the struggle for status described in West's song. That reading could suggest that there has been some social progress but not nearly enough - that West's "gold digger" now has the status problem face by Scarlett who was a second class citizen in her society... that's an interesting idea for sure when you consider how far below Scarlett the slaves were. I think that, on the whole, I found the racial implications of this video to be too complex for me to really frame them well so instead I focussed on the character studies in the source and used the music much like I'd used other music pretty much left it at that. I do have some intentional comparisons of racism and misogyny with the hideous "we want pre-nup" men but I don't dwell on the particularities of the race problem. To me it's an economic status video and the race issues add complexity to how we contextualise it ourselves.
I appreciate if people do read this differently, and I do genuinely apologise if I have offended anyone but certainly I am very keen on there being more discussions on how the race issues can manifest themselves in these sources. I'd like to think that despite being a white middle-class male, I can attempt to present a complex and emotional work which depicts misogyny and racism and be able to prod at it critically from a distance and learn from the experiences of those more intimately connected with the issues. If that is presumptuous, then I am sorry.
I find all the implications fascinating but I really don't want to push any one point. I focussed heavily on the movie from its own point of view and added in a modern twist. Along came all kinds of interesting gender and race issues and I'm totally cool with that being talked about. As for some nefarious authorial intention, well, who knows. Perhaps it is impossible for me to escape my own privileged perspective and that is the ultimate downfall of videos like this but I'd like to think that things can be learned from these videos that can expand our understanding of the myriad of problems we face. |
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VVC 2007 Premiere - Rodeohead
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Aug. 17th, 2007 @ 03:58 pm
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This year's vividcon premiere from me and it's a Big Damn Vid. The longest I've edited, though it possibly doesn't feel like it.
Title: Rodeohead
Music by: Hard n Phirm
Footage from: Firefly, Serenity
Downloads: xvid version (59mb), mp4 version (better quality, 65mb)
Streaming versions: tba
The concept here is very simple - this song, in its frantic bouncing through the music of Radiohead, described to me the whole canon of Firefly. This vid is my attempt to recollect Firefly not necessarily as it was but more as I want to remember it, cherishing my favourite parts of the show and ignoring the parts I'd rather not return to.
I felt incredibly rushed finishing this video off, I had so much work to do and the deadline was looming. I still to this day get the vauge feeling that the video might actually be slightly unfinished, that I'd have played around with some of the sections. Though honestly it's unlikely to have been better, just different.
I had a lot of fun making this video and I hope fans of the show get a lot out of this vid. I've posted the lyrics below along with the Radiohead songs they come from in case people are interested in seeing how the originals compare to these bluegrass renditions.
( lyrics ) |
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insert sombre music here...
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Aug. 16th, 2007 @ 08:43 pm
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I'm at O'Hare, waiting for my flight home. It's been a wonderful 10 days and I'm really sad to be leaving all these totally awesome people.
Brain still isn't working and with the added lack of sleep it's going to take some time for me to properly catch up on things. So, while I have some moderate cerebral activity I'm going to write myself a todo list for when I get back.
( Read more... )
OK, gotta fly! |
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VVC Club Vivid 2007 - Beethoven's Fifth Gold Digger
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Aug. 14th, 2007 @ 01:47 pm
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Still in chicago but given that I had this video up already I figured I'd post it. My premieres vid will have to wait as I need to do an online encode and the source files are at home. As it happens, I almost didn't have any videos for club vivid. I started 4 different ideas, this one being the first and ended up just concentrating on finishing this one so I'd have something for the show.
Title: Beethoven's Fifth Gold Digger
Video Source: Gone With the Wind
Audio: Beethoven's Fifth Gold Digger by A Plus D (mashup of Kayne West's Gold Digger and Walter Murphy's Fifth of Betthoven)
Download: (xvid version) other versions and imeem to be added later.
This vid is a not-necessarily-kind character study of Scarlett O'Hara. To one degree highlighting the modernity of her life decisions, the taboo surrounding them and the consequences of her survival instinct. While there are certain issues with using Gold Digger for 'the story of the south', I'm hoping the addition of Beethoven and the fact that this is the radio version will help get around the race conern to a degree.
A very pretty movie to vid with, so that was a lot of fun. Rhett is, of course, totally awesome and I could look at Scarlett all day long. Had a little bit of a problem due to the general lack of footage during the whole Frank Kennedy thing (I think I use every scene he's in in some way). Poor Frank. Anyway, I hope you all enjoy.
( Lyrics: )
Streaming Version:
This is the exact same file but hosted on stage6...
( Embedded Streaming Version: ) |
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Not the smartest urban predators.
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Jul. 28th, 2007 @ 11:27 pm
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I just got attacked today, literally outside my front door!
Well more like an opportunistic attempt to snatch my food but still. Cheeky fuckers.
The basic story is that some very bored-seeming teenagers were hanging around outside my flat. I had to walk around the outside to meet a dumb Dominos delivery guy who couldnt find the correct entrance. About 8 or 9 sixteen to eighteen year olds were clearly looking for something to do, creeping alongside the ground floor windows behind the bushes, that sort of thing. As I trundled back to the apartment block with my pizza in hand, I was not-too-subtly followed. The moment I started entering the code to get in the place some prick tried to snatch the pizza out of my hands. Luckily for me it was a feeble attempt; my quick reactions and knee-jerk response of "WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING" caused the fool to flee from the scene, his friends scattering in all directions like cockroaches. *sigh*
If I were 18 I wouldn't be entertaining myself with petty theft, I'd be trying to shag other 18 year olds. Or at the least play lots of video games, listen to loud music and smoke all sorts of interesting substances. Kids today, I dunno.
The day hasn't been all bad though. I finished putting together my new dvd set.
( cut for piccy )
The clamshells are double-sided holding both discs at once. I'm pretty happy with it. Now I just have to see how many I can burn and print before I fly on the 7th. Not to mention how many I think I can carry with me. I guess we'll see. |
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Me update
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Jul. 23rd, 2007 @ 02:51 pm
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So it looks like I won't be able to go to AWA this year. Work commitments :/ OTOH work = money so um yay?
For that reason I didn't enter the Pro contest this year despite having every intention of doing so. I don't like entering something when I can't attend to see the announcement, or audience reaction for that matter. I *might* enter the video into expo instead but I can make that decision later.
I'm putting together another dvd set, a 2 disc set this time, but I'm having difficulty coming up with a design I like. I need to get it figured out fast as I have a lot of burning to do before vividcon. I'm creatively burned out though, what with work and videos all having recent deadlines. I'll come up with something, I'm sure, but right now my brain isn't helping at all.
On the plus side, I'm vey much looking forward to seeing people and getting drunk in Chicago. Hopefully there will be no politics and I can just relax. It's been a pretty stressful few months for me so I could do with things being much more laid-back. Here's hoping. I have two videos premiering, which is far less than I'd hoped to complete. I'm fairly happy with them, though. I should make a bigger effort to work on stuff more throughout the year rather than close to con deadlines but it never really works out like that. I should definitely finish some of these fragments though because there's some good videos waiting to be made.
Now, though, I need to get to work on the Karaoke show. Anyone going to vividcon who has not yet signed up needs to seriously consider it because it's *fun*! See the announcement post here. It would be really good to have another group of people do a cast ensemble for something.... maybe Stop Watching Anime and Go Outside? I very briefly considered attempting performing Something Fishy but the scat parts would just have me in uncontrollable giggle fits. So I've opted for something only slightly easier to do... um, we'll see how that goes. |
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It's not about actually about you, it's about them.
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Jul. 13th, 2007 @ 05:27 pm
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So I was pretty frustrated last night, in case you didn't notice. I also rather unfairly made almost everyone who has recently submitted a video to vividcon feel bad. I can see how that can happen. Sorry about that.
I never, ever, presume that everyone can submit videos in the perfect form I'd like, that works straight away. I know that everyone would love to be able to do that, so they would if they could. Tech problems and complications can arise from all sorts of places and certainly not always through direct user error. This year is no different from any other in terms of what percentage of videos have complex problems and I certainly hold no ill will to any individual that has suffered from this. With some, the problems were found early and able to be corrected. With others, the problem was more obscure and appeared suddenly just at the point when everything seemed to be going well.
The main difference this year is that there were so many more videos and with the percentages being the same that makes a lot more work. I'd estimate that a video with a technical problem takes at least 10 times more time to deal with than a one without. Ones without are basically no work at all. So it wasnt that these problems were there at all, they always are, but that there were so *many* of them.
The main source of my frustration and the actual cause of the anger last night, was how the rules of the game are still very much analogue when we're quite happily enjoying our so-called digital revolution. When you test and make things on a computer you get very different result than how things are on a tv. Weird shit happens that you just weren't expecting. Nowadays, so much of our content is entirely digitally focussed (from obtaining source to encoding for online distribution) that we forget these other issues that come up. For some people, sending something into a convention like this will be the first time they ever really need to deal with analogue standards at all. Heck, I wish I didn't have to deal with them either. But these are the terms of engagement.
From my point of view, interlacing and frame rates are so intensely antiquated that it's honestly insulting that we still have to deal with these issues in modern video production. The legacy of old television has lasted for longer than I've been alive and unfortunately looks to continue long into the future. If they wanted to, they could have removed interlaced profiles from HDTV altogether... but they didn't. We are stuck with this shit for at least another decade.
That is what really annoys me. The fact that we have to check ourselves against these antiquated systems, the fact that every new era of technology has to carry across some awful legacy support for this outdated methods. Sure, if more people were as conscious of our reliance on the analogue then I'm sure a lot of these problems would have been found before they were sent to me, but the digital age has given us all a false sense of technical security. With everything else being so much easier, why shouldn't that stuff be easy too?
Then, inevitably, when a load of videos are submitted to me with these antiquated problems then I have to do some crazy houdini trick to untie the video from these antique chains. Doing that trick can be fun for a time but when you're dunked under water, short for time and every unlocked chaing presents a new one to deal with, it can get pretty stressful. That's what has happened this week and last night it was near drowning levels. Lots of silly antique chains, limited time.
Of course, I'd love for people to be more aware of the issues because inevitably it's a lot easier to fix these things earlier than it is later and I'm sure it would have helped considerably for people to do checking on a tv. If anything, it can offer them some peace of mind because if it doesnt look like that later on then you know who to blame :) But really it's nobodies fault but these stupid horrible video standards that we have to deal with in order to present what we do. Frankly it's hardly surprising - this stuff is as intensely confusing as it is intensely irritating. |
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Public Service Announcement
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Jul. 12th, 2007 @ 10:19 pm
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Can people who are encoding mpeg2 videos and sending them into cons please, please
TEST YOUR VIDEO OUT ON A TELEVISION FOR FUCKS SAKE
is it really that hard to do? DVD writers a two a penny as is blank media. Everyone has a dvd player. It really isn't very hard and it saves me A LOT OF TIME wasted by having to fix your fuckups at the 11th hour.
Thank you.
ETA: To clarify the point some. For most people, it won't matter. Everything will be fine. The real problem comes when there is a technical flaw that cannot be fixed at my end. The two most obvious mistakes made by people who do not test their videos on a TV are as follows.
1) Credits and other textual information being placed outside the title-safe area of the screen. 20% from the edge, that's as close as you should get before stuff gets cropped. There are a lot of videos that have this problem and if you watched it on a TV you'd see it straight away and would know to fix it.
2) Mixed field orders. If you are editing interlaced footage it is *imperative* that all the footage and the editing software are all using the same field order. Have mismatched field orders and half of your clips will jerk like crazy when anything moves. The only solution is for me to deinterlace (poorly as it's harder to deinterlace when you don't know what order the field need to be in) which is fine except I only get to see the problem by the time *I've* compiled something to a dvd and watched it on a TV. The difference between it being the last thing I do and it being last thing the vid maker does is that the vidmaker can do this before the deadline.
When you have lots and lots of videos even the smallest percentage that reveal these problems become a major *major* hassle. The time fixing them adds up and really these problems are best handled by the original editor anyway. |
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Dreamworks smoke the Shrek 3 viral crackpipe with their ass
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May. 15th, 2007 @ 12:08 pm
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Four years ago, using Poser 5, I made Asuka dance more convincing than this crappy Shrek 3 viral promo:
Dreamworks should be ashamed. (Plus the model designs are crap too... I'm definitely giving this movie a miss) |
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About freakin time
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May. 6th, 2007 @ 01:40 pm
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I've been waiting for this account name to be purged for over 3 years now... LJ have finally gotten off their asses and done some account purging. No more silly 3s in my username! |
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Crap.
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Apr. 23rd, 2007 @ 11:43 am
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The deadline is in two weeks and then I find this:
http://tvinjapan.com/blog/2007/04/24/boys-do-synchronized-swimming/
Is that Club Vivid footage heaven or what? |
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Cho Seung-Hui vs Chan-wook Park vs Finger-pointing Critics
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Apr. 19th, 2007 @ 03:57 pm
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As many of you will most certainly be aware, pictures publicised of barbaric mass-murderer Cho Seung-Hui have drawn comparisons to the movie OldBoy. Here's what Nikki Finke had to say about it:
"Wrote Carina Chocano of the Los Angeles Times: "It says something when you come out of a film as weird and fantastical as Oldboyand feel that you've experienced something truly authentic. I just don't know what. I can't think of anything to compare it to." Well, now we know to compare it to real life, don't we? I just don't understand how critics with even a shred of humanity keep supporting films that celebrate violence in all its awfulness. Makes me nauseous."
I find this to be an obtuse, misguided condemnation of what is an excellent multifaceted movie. I can't see how anyone watching the film with any real critical faculty could see it as being a celebration of violence, given its larger themes. There are, most certainly, plenty of better contenders for that title. Anyway, here is an excellent rebuttal of Nikki's opinion at Film Ick:
"Now we know to compare it to real life? First of all, Nikki, surely we can compare almost all films to real life. Even Eraserhead - just to take one example - is cleary a film associated with real life. Indeed, Eraserhead is more closely linked to David Lynch's experiences with baby Jennifer than Oldboy is to the Virginia Tech shootings - and, yes, this is mainly because it is a film made to relate to this moment in life, and Oldboy was not made to relate to any massacre that hadn't happened yet but - this is the key part - the massacre was not made to relate to the already existing film either."... (read the whole thing for some excellent points) Every time I read one of these "Music/Movie/Video Game was the cause of some horrendous violence" articles, I don't know whether to laugh, cry or just roll my eyes and carry on as normal. I've watched some of the most grotesque works of cinema violence put to film, I've played more violent video games than I can count - in terms of virtual kills I'd put them into the hundreds of thousands - I've listened to music that has been denounced as satanic, corrupt, degenerate... You name it, if it's objectionable media then at some point I've probably consumed it or something like it.
The result? Well, I've been in a real-life fight twice - once when I was 9 and once when I was 14. The former ended up with me crying all the way home and the latter was one of those silly eternal head-lock tussles that was eventually stopped by a teacher. I find guns terrifying and get disturbed by even the presence of a replica. I doubt I'll ever raise my fist in anger ever again in my life and no amount of watching movies like this is going to change that.
Incidentally, one reaction I had to the violence in OldBoy was to make a music video highlighting it, well aware that it was only a part of a greater moral story that I didn't want to tell in music video form (as I couldn't do it justice and I didn't want to spoil the movie). If Cho wanted to make a manual out of OldBoy, maybe The Gentle Art of Making Enemies would be it. The violence is depicted in the music video as the escapist fantasy of a disturbed man. Surprisingly, this video get the most hits on iMeem though I'm not sure it's one of my most popular videos outside of that network. Am I to blame for Cho's actions? Well, is Shakespeare to blame every time somebody chops a person up and puts them in a pie? Of course not. Violence is much older than the artforms depicting it and the issues that lead a person to violence are far more complex than finding out what movies they have seen.
Cho was a mentally disturbed maniac. What he did is beyond horrific and to enjoy such an evil barbaric vicious act is nothing short of demonic. I cannot begin to imagine how terrible it must be for those affected by this and they have my most solemn sympathy. However, the atrocity of this act does not validate blanket finger-pointing: the sooner critics start looking at the emotional triggers for these actions and stop looking at their superficial facets, the closer we will come to understanding how such tragedies come about. Pointing the finger at media like this is far too simplistic. Destroying every violent film, book or artwork in existence will not prevent violence and to do so simply scapegoats an easy target to make up for our own shortcomings as a society. We need to find out why violence is part of the human condition before we can eradicate it. On this regard, OldBoy is a wise informer and should be watched with careful comprehension and reflection. |
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Back from the dead?
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Apr. 18th, 2007 @ 10:30 am
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Dead Like Me greenlit for a movie??
I'm somewhat baffled, to be honest. |
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All of Buffy for $99!!!
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Apr. 17th, 2007 @ 05:50 pm
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Today only at Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000AQ68RI/tvshowsondvdcom
If I didn't have 5/7 seasons already I'd so be getting this! |
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No trophies, no flowers, no flashbulbs, no wine
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Apr. 16th, 2007 @ 05:00 pm
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How long before someone makes a Drive video to The Distance by Cake?
Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if it's already being made.
Until then, enjoy an amv classic by Brad DeMoss
( Non-spoilery reactions to the 2 ep pilot... ) |
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Get down and get with it...
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Apr. 14th, 2007 @ 02:10 pm
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vagabondage recommended that I share this.
How Does it Feel?
Such a great song from a band that were underestimated because of the very thing that made them popular - their gimmicks. They never cracked the US, though they did strongly influence Kiss, for better or worse. |
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Life on Mars Finale
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Apr. 10th, 2007 @ 10:55 pm
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I'm 12 minutes past the end of the end of Life on Mars and my brain is buzzing with so much glee. The way they handled the ending (no spoilers until after the cut) pressed every single button for me and for once a show with a genuinely interesting conceptual problem actually delivers on its conclusion.
For those yet to watch it, I hope you enjoy it. I was stunned and overjoyed and had my heart ripped out and put back in more times than I can count.
( Herein there be spoilers for the entire show )
I take my hat off to a truly wonderful piece of television mastery. Fantastic.
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HULK SMASH!
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Apr. 1st, 2007 @ 12:33 pm
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Sorry! an unexpected error has occurred.
This error has been forwarded to MySpace's technical group.
How the hell did MySpace ever become popular with this many bugs? |
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300 - consistent propaganda or wishful thinking?
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Mar. 29th, 2007 @ 01:27 am
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I've just returned from seeing 300 (it had its UK release on Friday) and I was extremely interested in seeing how some of these criticisms of the film as propaganda would pan out. Inevitably, I found the process of reading the film as US propaganda to be filled with a number of pitfalls that I've not actually read anyone discuss in any kind of detail, so I figured I'd go into brief discussion about my thoughts on the matter here.
There is a long tradition of utilising the action genre as propaganda and certainly a large proportion of the American action films of the 80s (Invasion USA, Rambo III et al) are strong messages of American freedom in the face of communism. One interesting thing about these action films is how the protagonists are frequently shown to be guerilla rebels fighting against superior numbers. This is a common theme in Regan-era cinema and is not only an obvious contradiction of the real position of America as a leading superpower but ironically places America and its brave fighters in the roles of its recent foes - the rag-tag Vietnamese defending their homes, as an example. You only have to look as far as something as sublimely outrageous as Red Dawn to see how this reversal of roles has been placed in order to situate the USA as the underdog in the cold war, a much more sympathetic and indeed cinematic narration of a story. Rambo III is dedicated to the brave people of Afghanistan, fighting for their homes against the Russians.
300 has many similarities - the strong-willed Spartan society, defending their freedom with a small group of brave fighters, holding their own against an immense army wishing to take over the world. Similarly, the stunning spectacle of muscle and gore, matched with the homosexual tensions in the depiction of these men (compare Leonidas and Xerxes to Matrix and Bennet in Commando) connect the film strongly to the representation of action and its heroes in the early to mid 80s. As such, it's easy to read in 300 the same kind of allegory - that the film is some kind of aspirational justification for American foreign policy and condemnation of its foes. It doesn't help that there is a clear tradition in Iran of self-association as Persian. The name alone means that there was always going to be some sort of offence taken in Iran - current tensions nonewithstanding.
However, the arguments citing 300 as propaganda mostly focus on these larger elements - that the brave Spartans fighting for freedom are obviously the Americans and the “ugly, dumb, murderous savages” are the Iranians. If this is true, and this comic book adaptation is really "a thinly-veiled attack on Iranian history and identity" then shouldn't the allegory go further than just "these are glorified therefore Americans" and "Iran associates strongly with Persian history therefore the Persians must be Iranians"? What about the narrative, what about the politics, what about the characterisation and their motivations?
Well, the Persians arrive asking for earth and water, demanding a share of the natural resources. How does that apply to the modern climate? I suppose one could argue that this could be Iran's wish for nuclear development, wanting to have what the west continually deny them. On the other hand, this could equally be equated to Middle Eastern oil - "give us the oil, worship us as your superiors and you will live". That's certainly a different take on the movie than the common propaganda reading... and other than the Iran = Persian literalism, isn't it equally justifiable?
Then we have the depiction of the Persians. Lets not forget that in assuming that this film is propaganda then we also have to assume that the audience are thought to be stupid. If the audience are presumed stupid, are they really going to be able to make the associative connection between the Persians and specifically Iran? Persian in the west invokes thoughts of ancient culture and mysticism very separate from how the west currently sees the Middle East. Xerxes is more of a Goauld than a scruffy khaki-wearing rebel fighter. The Persian leaders in 300 are strongly characterised by their decadence, gluttony and materialism. In addition, they are denounced as godless and chaotic - all of these representations are as diametrically opposed to the shabby fanatically fundamentalist guerilla fighter that is America's perceived enemy. President Ahmadinejad as Xerxes? The suggestion is frankly comical.
Finally we have this idea of Xerxes as the hubris-inflicted God-king who naively drip-feeds soldiers in for the slaughter presuming that his strength in numbers will be sufficient to see this enemy bow to his will. Isn't President Bush often seen just like this - with a naive god-complex and presumption of privilege and superiority? Couldn't the film instead be read as a criticism of US policy in the Middle East where a greedy overzealous leader sent under-prepared masses against a small group of strong-willed fighters defending their country right down to the death of the last man?
I've not seen this reading of the film anywhere (yet... has anyone else?). To me, if you ignore the literal association of Persians and Iranians and the traditional associations of muscle-bound glorified violence, there is just as much evidence that 300 represents the Spartans as brave Middle Eastern freedom fighters and the hordes of Persians as the evil western empire. Heck, the Spartans are the ones with the beards!
So...
Either 300 has enough inherent ambiguity to avoid real denouncement for being the propaganda that it is supposed to be... or in creating a film that is, in no uncertain terms, a piece of Spartan propaganda - mythologised and retold throughout the ages - Snyder has given the viewer free reign to apply almost any world-view that they care to imagine. Yes the film is propaganda - the whole story is told by the victorious Spartans and the storytelling theme is integral to the film. Like all mythologised stories, we add our own readings. The Wizard of Oz is *obviously* about the wicked witch Hitler versus depression era Dorothy America. Why do we think this? Simply because of who made it and when.. actual intentions are another matter entirely. For me, there is too much to be said on either side about 300 for there to be any decisive conclusion about its political statements, allegiances and intentions as propaganda. Perhaps some investigation into the production of the movie would be more conclusive. What little I know of Snyder (his Dawn of the Dead remake) doesn't incline me to assume a pro-American take on his work. Perhaps it's just the way he sees the world that has influenced this political aspect of the film... or maybe it's all in the eyes of the viewer.
Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar and I think that the commentary on 300 says a lot more about perceptions of the US-Iran relations than the film ever could. It's pretty fascinating nonetheless.Current Mood: contemplative |
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Avisynth, Premiere and Memory. What the problem is and what you can do about it.
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Mar. 10th, 2007 @ 09:46 pm
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As it's been something of an issue of late and as I've been explaining the ins and outs of the problem to sockkpuppett, I figured I'd try and extend upon the basic words of wisdom and warning that I wrote on this page of the guide way back when and hopefully offer some insight into this often troublesome problem.
What happens to your memory when you put Avisynth files into Premiere...
( Read more... )
What happens when there is no memory left when it's needed?
( Read more... )
Is there anything that can be done to make this better/not happen?
There are a number of ways to handle this problem, which I will got through one by one and in detail. Most people will want to do a combination of the solutions.
( Read more... )
I hope this goes to some way toward explaining what is going on with this issue and how you can ameliorate the situation. |
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that meme killabeez tagged me with :)
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Mar. 7th, 2007 @ 06:50 pm
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So killabeez asked:
"post a list of your top five favorite fics you've written videos you've made, regardless of source or the reason you love them. This isn't about the BEST things you've made, but what you LOVE most. Then tag five other people to do the same."
I'm very bad at this sort of thing. What I love the most? Well, prioritising this sort of thing is very hard for me, so instead, here are five of my videos that I made without any care as to whether anyone else would like them. Not that I make a lot of videos that I expect to be popularist... anyway. Five videos.
( My five video picks ) |
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Public Service Announcement
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Feb. 18th, 2007 @ 05:52 pm
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Registration for Vividcon starts NOW. Last year it sold out (moved to waiting list) in 5 hours... this year is anyone's guess. Less than 1 hour is likely.
Get a move on! |
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Looking back at old old amv.org forum threads...
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Feb. 13th, 2007 @ 02:23 am
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"I didn't teach myself Premiere in order to make AMVs.
I started to make an AMV in order to teach myself Premiere.
I tend to look more at the grand scheme of things... ^_^"
Quote by me, from the org's old Phorum, over 5 years ago now? It's interesting looking at all these old forum posts (I downloaded some of it from the org database when I was an admin). I'm hoping to collect some of the more interesting bits for people to read for nostalgia.
Here's something - in the first 20 posts the topic of non-anime videos in the database was raised...
( Read more... )
That was certainly a decision that influenced the way the amv community developed. It's impossible to say whether it was a good or bad decision, though I do think it has helped the org stay litigation-free, not having Hollywood and TV broadcasters on its back. *sigh* such innocent days. |
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Medical blog, incredible read
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Jan. 16th, 2007 @ 08:23 pm
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I really don't know what to make of this. The posts in it are filled with so much drama, humour, intrigue and irony that only one of the following can be true:
1) this guy has the most interesting Emergency Medical job ever.
2) all Emergency doctors do this sort of thing, it's just he writes detailed if identity-protected posts about it and has a humorously scathing attitude toward certain patients.
3) It's all a work of medically-accurate fiction with no relationship to real cases at all that's a great read nonetheless.
Whatever the answer is, it's a really good read for a blog. I guess the best tagline I can come up with is that this is "House: The Blog" - read it here: Fingers and Tubes in Every Orifice |
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Lessig amv ftw!!
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Jan. 4th, 2007 @ 12:05 am
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My personal idea hero, Lawrence Lessig, uses amvs in presentation:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7661663613180520595&q=23c3
None of mine though. That would have been far too cool. |
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Bloody amateurs :)
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Dec. 4th, 2006 @ 09:30 pm
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So, imeem are a youtubealike that are being used by many due to the superior video quality.
But really, it could be a lot better if they didn't have muppets writing their server-side video processing scripts. Why?
Their resize scripts are in equal parts laughable and nonsensical.
Permit me to demonstrate... http://www.imeem.com/tag/imeemtest
There we have 4 'videos' encoded by uploading to imeem. All of the videos resulted in 400x300 flv files on imeem (you can hunt around for the source videos to download if you know what you are doing). The only difference is that I made 4 different xvid avi files to upload - all with different resolutions produced by lanczos resizing.
You can see the files I uploaded here http://www.absolutedestiny.org/imeem/imeem.zip
The 800x600 file is the best looking by far. This can only lead me to assume that imeem has a pretty crappy resize script bnecause in theory the 640x480 one should be equally as good if not better.
Can anyone hazard a guess as to why the 800x600 source produces a better looking video? My guess is that their shoddy resizer doesn't exhibit as many problems when it can happily divide by 2 to produce the 400x300 final output. The other guess would be that imeem do 2 resizing passes... to what I've no idea.
Thoughts?
ETA: Actually, it looks like bad deinterlacing, doesn't it? I wonder if they are removing one of the fields and then doing the resize to 400x300? That would explain why 800x600 comes out looking ok but the others all have stepping on the lines.
ANSWER: Yes, it's definitely field removal. Damn. I uploaded a video that had block top fields and white bottom fields and it came out pure black (not even averaged grey) so it ditches the top field of anything you send it. Well, at least we know now.Current Mood: disappointed |
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Are You An AMV Veteran? Meme by outlawedprod
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Nov. 28th, 2006 @ 11:22 pm
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Interesting meme via jingoro
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Nov. 24th, 2006 @ 10:10 am
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1. Open your library (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod, etc)
2. Put it on shuffle
3. Press play
4. For every question, type the song that's playing
5. When you go to a new question, press the next button
6. Don't lie and try to pretend you're cool.
Opening Credits - Me First and the Gimme Gimmes - Runaway
Waking Up - Art Brut - Bad Weekend
First Day at School - Prince - Never Take the Place of Your Man
Breaking Up - Alice in Chains - Over Now
Prom - Pink Floyd - Another Brick in the Wall pt 2
Life's OK - The Cure - High
Driving - Dirty Pretty Things - If You Love a Woman
Flashback - The Bee Gees - Night Fever
Getting Back Together - Reel Big Fish - Where Have You Been?
Wedding Scene - Joy Division - Love Will Tear Us Apart
Birth Scene - Jeff Buckley - So Real
Final Battle - Lightning Blot - Magic Mountain
Death Scene - Belle and Sebastian - Beautiful
End Credits - David Bowie - Oh! You Pretty Things
Pretty good matching for a randomised list. The only thing I did was skip instrumental tracks...Current Mood: awake Current Music: OK Go - Return |
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Birthday yay!
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Nov. 11th, 2006 @ 05:25 pm
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Happy Birthday sweetestdrain!! Have a really great day you super-awesome biomechanoid you!
Current Mood: jubilant Current Music: New Order - Regret |
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Photos Meme Cont - Mystery Solved, Billboards and DVDs
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Sep. 13th, 2006 @ 07:23 pm
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So, I bet you are all anxious to know what that mystery object was, right?
Right?
OK, maybe not. Well, a lot of you were very close... VERY. The answer is, of course, a Macaroon Baller! Or so I am told. You put in the coconutty macaroon mix, twirl it with the thing and it makes them correctly ball-shaped.
Why you can't use your hands is beyond me :)
OK so on with the photos! As usual, click the thumbnail to see the full size photo!
That's all for now, folks - but there are many more to come! |
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Talk about yeteryear's news...
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Sep. 11th, 2006 @ 09:56 pm
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Why is it that t jonesy and killa's vid Closer (a youtubed version) is getting linked everywhere?
I mean, sure, I really like the vid as I do all of their ST:TOS vids, but it's the vidding equivalent of boingboing posting about Kevin Caldwell's Engel.
Yes. We know about it. We've known about it for years. Please do try to keep up :) |
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Photo Meme pt2 - Guess the Mysery Object
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Sep. 10th, 2006 @ 08:45 am
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As requested by jic, it's time to guess the mystery object!
This one had me stumped when I first found it at a friend's house and I had to finally ask what it was.
Download Mystery_Object.avi (about 2mb, xvid encoded) (right click and choose Save As...)
I'm going to screen comments on this post in case someone knows what it is right away. If you get it wrong, your post will be unscreened as soon as I see the post, if you get it right then I will reveal your name and the true answer in a few days once everyone has had a good chance to guess at it. |
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Photo Meme Response Part 1 - a cat, some muffins and a lotta graffiti
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Sep. 8th, 2006 @ 07:57 pm
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Time for the first part of my image meme. Click any of the thumbnails to see a larger image (although even the larger images are scaled down versions of the originals)
So, that's all the photos for now. Next one in a couple of days! |
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Cause all the cool kids are doing it.
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Sep. 8th, 2006 @ 09:02 am
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My Personality
| | Neuroticism | | Extraversion | | Openness To Experience | | Agreeableness | | Conscientiousness | |
No idea how I'm so extraverted. Maybe it's for British values of extraversion. |
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HD death
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Sep. 7th, 2006 @ 02:02 pm
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My my OS HD died. I am using my friend's computer to post this. Will be online irregularly. Lost all the source code for VividEnc. Bah.
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Photo Meme
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Sep. 6th, 2006 @ 05:22 pm
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In a desperate attempt to get back to actually doing things actively online and in order to try out a new camera, I'm going to take some photos and post them here on my LJ. Exactly what I take photos of is up to you!
Post a comment below of something you'd like me to take a picture of with the proviso that it has to be something that you'd be happy doing if you were me. I'll try and take as many of the photos as I can but there's no promises with this. For regional stuff, I live in Oxford (not London) and will be visiting Bristol sometime soon so that's all game. I already have a few requests from sweetestdrain :)
The results will be up either in a few days or early next week (I'm in Bristol over the weekend). |
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Vividcon Report 4/4 - Vid Recs
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Aug. 20th, 2006 @ 11:00 am
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What follows is a list of vids (that I've only just become aware of) that stood out for me at Vividcon this year. Each one comes highly recommended. Huge congrats to all the vidders, there were a lot of great vids this year!
( The vid recs, pretty much in order of appearance ) |
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Vividcon Report 3/4 - People and Gatherings
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Aug. 20th, 2006 @ 11:00 am
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There is no way that I can mention all the wonderful people I met at the con. Everything that follows is just what I could recall late last night and is only the tip of the iceberg. In short, I met some great people and had a really good time.
( Wednesday )
( Thursday )
( Friday! )
( Saturday! )
( Sunday )
( Monday )
( Tuesday ) |
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