Captivating

I came across this video on vimeo. The first time I saw it I was transfixed from beginning to end, I had no idea how long it even was when it was finished, or how long I had been sitting there. Everything about the video fits perfectly to the song. Inspiring.


Peder - Daylight [feat. Signe Marie Schmidt-Jacobsen] from Fake Diamond Records on Vimeo.

2011 Looks like it's going to be a good year

More Deus Ex: Human Revolution Videos

Interesting Interview with Richard Feynman

Karate Vs Boxing

Boxing




Real Martial Arts

Interview with Gina Lomas

Gina, so your interested in editing, where do you plan to go to school?

I dont know if i want to go to university or college. If i were to go to university hopefully i could go to York or Ryerson, and i was going to college I would like to go to either Humber or Sheridan. If i go to university it would be more lessons in theory while college is more handson.


Do you have any projects on the go right now?

I have a whole lot of projects for pre production that aren't in the works yet. Alot of ideas I just need a set and crew - all that jazz.

What do you do for fun other then film related stuff?

I read a lot of literature. I also enjoy being with my family. I don't really have set hobbies, I like to try new activities.


What do you like to read?

Again, I dont really have a set genera.I dont particularly like romantic novels, they make me feel nautious. I do like science and historical fiction.


Is there an author in particular that you really enjoy?

I don't. I enjoy Stephen King, Margaret Atwood, Saint-Claire Ross, D.H. Lawrence, and so many others. I usually have a book on the go.

I know Stephen king just announced the motion picture of his recent novel "cell", however, it is undecided whether they want to go with a horror flick or more of a psychological thriller, what do you think?

It would be more interesting for a psychological thriller, but if they are looking for the big bucks they should probably go for more of a horror.

Bobby Fischer Before and After

     An interesting comparison of Bobby Fischer from when he was young and old.

Inifinity Blade for the IPhone?!

The fact that these graphics are in a game for a hand-held device blows me away. 

Snippet of Musical History: Bob Dylan at Newport Folk Festival, 1965, A Closer Look As To Why People Got Pissed

        It's the 1960's and the church has just banned polyphony because it encouraged devil worship and made a mockery of the unity of God. Parents mainly encouraged classical music and very rarely allowed their children the experience of the dangerous rock and roll. Bob Dylan, a folk singer, was rising quickly in popularity. During one 20 minute set in the 1965 Newport Folk Festival he plugs in an electric guitar.  Many left, many stayed and booed, some loved it, some I imagine were in complete shock. His folk singer reputation was being threatened by his experiment to add an electrick feel to his songs.
        The big question, the one I wish to address, is "why the hell did so many feel so passionately about using an electric guitar?". The chords remained relatively similar (no single song is ever played exactly the same twice by most musicians), the melody remained pretty well similar and the lyrics still held their meaning and didn't change either. Infact, he played the songs exactly like he would with an acoustic, maybe a little more bluesy. Perhaps they felt as though he was descending into a harder playing style, where his hippy style is lost. One fact about changing guitars is that the timbre also changes. The sound produced by an electric guitar versus an acoustic is like the difference between a trumpet and a clarinet. Infact, for an experienced guitar player/listener, the difference between two acoustic guitars is huge. Theoretically, the tone between intruments is different because the overtones caused by the vibrations are different because the instruments are made of a different material or designed to a different shape, this is what seperates a piano from a clarinet when they are both playing the same note. So a ton of people are coming to this show expecting one specific feeling from this performance because they are used to one particular emotion from the timbre of his voice and his acoustic guitar. As we all know, people like to know whats going to happen, and if what they think is going to happen, happens, then they are happy. Therefore, I think Bob Dylan pissed everyone off because he was a good musician and wanted to experiment with a different sound, and gave a bunch of immature listeners something different than the expected.

Written Interview

Interview written and recorded by Chapin Waite and Spencer Jones

When looking back on the past few years, we will always remember the economic downturn that has hit our country. We will remember the havoc, media coverage on this recession, the focus on the politics and the crime. We will remember the pictures of all the houses in the United States for sale, with no one buying them. What we experienced, to us, will always be remembered as the worst possible thing that could happen. We are an egocentric species with the focus only on ourselves. If we compared our present to the past, we would consider ourselves to be lucky. Our recession could have been a depression, but it was not. Let us look back to the 1930's.

The Great Depression was occurring, this was a time period where, in Canada alone, 27% of people were unemployed. This was astonishing. Those with jobs were lucky, and even then, they may not have been making very much money. These times seem to have been forgotten in the midst of the current economical crisis. Robert "Bruce" Gordon, a survivor of the Great Depression and now 80 years old, was interviewed by Reflection Magazine to give the people of today a different viewpoint of how things were in comparison to now and what the recession could have been like.

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In the Great Depression, in terms of finances, what would your family have been considered?

My family during the Depression would have been considered poor. My parents did not work at the time and we lived off of welfare. We did not have very much and made do with what we had. For example, we had meat only once a week. My father had his own vegetable garden and we had a chicken which we used for eggs. We were considered very poor.

Where did you live? What sort of house?

I lived on Curry Avenue in Windsor. Our house was very plain, a simple wooden house. It had no basement. The house was heated with what was called a "Quebec" heater, which was essentially a stove in the living room.

What was the job status on both of your parents? What did they do?

My mother never worked, staying at home to take care of us. My father was unemployed but was trained as a cabinet maker, which is equivalent to today's carpenter. There were no odd jobs for him when he was unemployed. He would do his best to find work, but it was extremely hard. Often, he would pick and peel potatoes for the government and would receive some in compensation. He would do this for our food. For fuel for our house, he would walk along the railroad tracks and pick up fallen coal. The welfare payments were not enough to let us have enough coal, so this was a good way to help us keep warm during the winter.

What did your family have to do to get by with what they had?

We had to "tighten" our belts. We only ate basic meals and spent no money on entertainment. We did not go to the show, or buy pop and ice cream. These were rare treats that we were very excited and grateful for when we received. My mother made clothes for us, and we always repaired them. Our clothes would be patched and we would use things until no longer possible. Everything was passed down. For soap we would take the scraps and melt them together so that no soap was wasted and a new bar could be made. Special times, such as Christmas, was the hardest. Our stockings were filled with fruit and other food items we rarely got. My father, the night before Christmas would steal trees and set them up so that we would always have a Christmas tree.

What sorts of things did your family do for entertainment?

Our only form of entertainment was the radio. All kinds of shows were on the radio. Soap operas were on during the day. They were originally called soap operas because they were sponsored by soap companies like Proctor & Gamble. My mother listened to these during the day. At night there were entertainment shows like Jack Benny and Bob Hope. We listened to kids shows like Little Orphan Annie and the Lone Ranger. On occasion we went to the show, which was 10 cents, but this was very rare.

Did you go to school? Were your friends in the same financial situation as yourself?

The majority of my schoolmates were in the same boat as my family. We were all working class, and therefore had very little. There were always a few that were kids of a lawyer or a doctor, but mostly the kids were in the same boat.

Was there a definite class society in place at the time? Could you not do certain things due to your social and economic status?

No question about it, there was a class society in place at the time. People with money could still live the good life of the twenties. They could go to golf clubs and go to sporting events, places that required money. Us, who were in the working class could not. In terms of payment, for the working class, there were no credit cards. Grocery stores had in place methods where you could set up an account and pay when you got the money. They had to do this, or they themselves would go out of business. For Christmas you could pick an item in advance and pay it off over time, this was called the layaway plan. In terms of class society though, there definitely was one.

What do you think of the current economic situation in the world?

Right now it is bad, but not as bad as the recession. Things are getting better, but it's going slowly. The fear is that some country may try to get out too quickly and we may go into a depression. Another issue is devaluation. There is the paranoia that countries may devalue their money, and race to the bottom. When a country's money is cheap, wages will also go down. Right now , however, things are not near as bad as the depression.

What do you think of today's youth and the debt situation?

The youth of today do not understand the use of money. They feel they need to spend everything they have, and have no limitations to their excesses. They have lived in a time when everything has been given to them. The mental state of mind right now is that they can still live like they are rich. This is how we got in this situation in the first place. The key is to not exceed your means.

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What was hoped to be gained from this interview is that you can never forget the past. We must learn from past mistakes and never make them again. In the present, even though things may seem bleak, times are still good in comparison to what could be and we must strive and discipline ourselves to not let things get to where they were before. After all, the only way the depression ended was through the Second World War.

Butcher by Metric

Singer/synth specialist Emily Haines along with guitarist James Shaw have been writing music together for twelve years as Metric.  Before forming the group Haines had been writing lyrics for some time, while Shaw had been writing instrumentals and chord progressions. When they became musically involved, one of the results when they pieced the two was ‘butcher’. It’s slow, deprived and depressing feel really pulls me in.
            In this song, unlike many of their others (which is a shame), they really take advantage of Haines’ compassionate and mood provoking singing ability. I can feel the deprivation and sadness behind her voice like she’s singing lyrics that have a personal meaning. The song begins with the repetition of two downtempo-unusual sounding chords. At the moment Haines begin to sing, another layer played by a flute begins to play every other note along with the piano. The two combined add a certain harmony to the song and add to the existing meter (hard piano note – flute holds note – piano plays a few notes followed by another hard piano note – flute holds new note etc.). The vocals fall into the pattern of going hard then soft then hard, and at times it sounds like the flute is changing with them as well, although it is hard for me to tell. We get a cool sounding contrast around twenty-four seconds when the vocals temporarily increase in pitch. These subtle but powerful nuances cause this very slow tempo song to keep my attention as a listener. It’s not until a minute into the song when three new layers are introduced; a base guitar, and what sounds like a couple of trumpets (flute ends, piano stops playing filler notes). The new layers, however, follow the same melody of the prior two layers. This is a really cool effect because essentially the melody remains the same but the timbre and mood change. Furthermore, what may attract me to this song is that I love trumpet. When used correctly is adds a new level to any song. Quite a surprise from the New Wave electric band (although they did come from Montreal - notorious for musical diversity).  About half-way through the tempo increases slightly, a drum beat is added and the flute makes another appearance - although I still have not lost the emotional connection to the lyrics and mood about the instrumentals.
            The instrumentals and organization are fantastic, however, this review would not be complete without some lyrical analysis. I feel a lot of emotion and deep feelings were put into them. Who is this song directed to? It appears as though Haines is switching from a first person perspective where she is talking to a lover, "you're so handsome in this light",  to her own thoughts, "If only you'd reject me tonight". The first line, “your so handsome in this light”, speaks to me like “I love you but I want to cut my ties and see what else is out there”, “we’re so boring, we’re so white”. “neglect the flesh to pursue the bone” (such a powerful line) – the character is doing what they truly feel to be right - whatever that may be is up for interpretaion. The characters have had a long, but good relationship that the speaker wishes to end. They reflect on their actions by coming to the resolve; “Learn to bend, learn to butcher, make amends and do it over again”, such a straightforward, compelling, powerful, and deeply emotional line – I absolutely love it.  The speaker relates their current life to white and boring and expresses that they believe they could be brown and homely. Whether Haines is writing from her own experiences I do not know, but I can feel the feeling invested. Having said all this, I can’t make out the sense in the last line, “do it over”, what could she be referring to? The relationship has ended, the protagonist has their reason: maybe it means that they believe all relationships will end boring and white, while they once thought they would feel wholesome and brown, and the final line is them progressing to thinking about life as some dull, ceasless factuality. 
      This song has attracted me to the band, and to a genre I otherwise would not have been interested in. Haines writes poetically and emotionally which makes this a great song to listen to in a quiet space with the headphones on. Her writing ability is equally matched with James Shaw's musical prowess which makes for awesome chemistry in a band.


 

Project 1, I thought I was forgetting something

Hand-Crafted Movie Poster!

Rough Drawing of Movie Poster

The Centre piece that catches the eye is the light house on the rocks
The Light house is going to be situated on 2/3 of the poster
The bottom of the rocks fade to black as 'SHUTTER ISLAND' is boldly put in yellow, Leonardo DiCaprio is also in yellow on the top as well as OCTOBER on the very bottom

Messing Around With The Pathfinder

The Three Photo Changes

Hair Colour Change

Lady Gaga from Blonde to Green!

Poster Review

- Excellent use of the thirds principle

- Conveys a creepy feeling for the movie 

- a little bit to 'busy', there are a lot of faces inside of the rabbit's head which makes the picture hard to concentrate on

- The use of color contrast is excellent, the transparent blue runs well with the black back round. It also seems like a 'stale' color to me, which in context with the creepy picture flows well

- The movie title is not to outstanding and does not take away from the main focus of the poster. When viewing the poster, I want to concentrate on the centre piece then my eye moves down to read the title, its not overdone. 

Jack White and The Dead Weather

Official Video for Die by the Drop
[Review to come]

A quick reflection on North American culture