Fishtank News

What the titles of Tintin should really look like...

2011-10-21T16:19:00.006+01:00

With the release of Steven Spielberg and Peter Jacksons new take on The Adventures of Tintin Designer and animator James Curran decided to have a crack at what he thought the opening titles should be, and i think you'll agree, absolutely nailed it. Using the classic score by Ray Parker and Tom Szczesniak, which reminds me of summer holiday morning TV, it's already a big hit on Vimeo. I suggest you check it out and see how many of Herge's characters you can name. Check out more of his work slimjimstudios.com.

EVA - Sweet Opening Titles!

2011-10-21T16:10:00.001+01:00

Amazing CG opening titles for Spanish film EVA, Created by Spanish company Dvein. Dvein is a 'collaborative project by the directors Fernando Domínguez, Teo Guillem and Carlos Pardo providing direction and art direction for live action and animation' who work out of Barcelona (as well as via London production company Stink in the UK). Invited by Spanish film director Kike Maillo to design and animate the main titles for his first feature film, they concentrated on representing the unique control process that the main character uses to control and programme his robotic creations. The organic nature of the strands and bulbs mixed with the complex glass mechanisms, make for a beautiful and engaging title sequence. Id like these guys to have a crack at the next Bond titles. Follow the link below for the film website where you can watch the full trailer.

Ninja Stop Motion

2011-10-21T15:47:00.003+01:00

Some very slick stop motion animation by Olivier Trudeau, telling the story of 2 Ninjas battling it out, probably to see who gets to wear black to the next Ninja gathering. Using some famous fight scenes from movies such as Phantom Menace and Ninja Scroll as reference for movement, is a clever idea and one that enabled Olivier to deliver an awesome short film with some fantastic movement and some genuine moments of inertia and speed, even though the chick in the black cheated and used throwing stars to the face, which is frankly, not on...

En agosto - Andres Barrientos

2011-08-19T08:12:00.004+01:00

A beautiful short film, written and directed by Andrés Barrientos and Carlos Andrés Reyes, which was 2 years in the making. Blending 2D and 3D animation together to tell a very touching story. If you have 15mins, I urge you to plug in your headphones and absorb the splendour. Really really lovely stuff.

DC Comics 'New 52'

2011-08-18T03:38:00.005+01:00

I've been reading comics for while, OK, longer than that, a long time. I drifted away for a bit when my favourite comic shop closed down (Kathies in Plymouth, you guys rocked!) and I was living in London on a teeny budget. I occasionally grabbed a new graphic novel or picked up a few issues when something caught my eye, but I've not been the comic consumer that I once was for some time.

Then I bought an iPad.

Overnight I was downloading issues (mostly free ones) like some superhero junky, to see how they looked, what the experience was like, was it as enjoyable as flicking through the pages of a freshly bought, still sealed Amazing Spiderman? Apart from the fact that they are missing the almost ubiquitous 'Got Milk' ads, I enjoy the digital comics a lot. Both the Marvel and DC readers are good, in fact I think Comic Zeal is even better, and has a few nice features, but essentially, it looks like I'm back in the market, my girlfriend will be soooooo happy.

Well, i say im back, I may have more expendable cash that the younger me, when I'm not splashing it on various other money eating habits, but I'm not too enamoured with a digital comic costing £2.99. I mean 3 quid? I could almost believe it if it was a paper vsn, wrapped is glistening cellophane with mandatory cardboard back, ripe and ready to slide into the comic box along with with its brothers and sisters. But a digital vsn, though convenient and awesome and modern etc etc should surely be cheaper, shouldn't it? Look at Wired, a digital magazine subscription that I quite frequently treat myself to, at £2.49 for a magazine that you would struggle to read in its entirety in a normal week, with digital video, animated graphics (and ads funnily enough) and more articles than you can shake a stick at. It blows a comice, that lets be honest might last 10 minutes (maybe if you're Ralph from the Simpsons) clean out of the water.

Stephen Lindsay, the independent comic creator who's responsible for 'Jesus Hates Zombies' makes a good point about the type of readers that Marvel & DC have to cater for:

“the comic industry really has three sets of consumer[s]: those inside the industry who buy comics to support one another, the casual reader, and the collector.” He said collectors don’t care about in-app subscriptions because “they always have, and always will, want the printed book” because the “ownership of it means something”

I guess I have moved from collector to the casual reader, but I wont be casual for long at costs like this, because, as Darrell Etherington at gigaom.com, "with individual titles costing between $1 and $3 for about five to 10 minutes of enjoyment, it quickly became a habit too costly to keep up." Surely they have to go the way of subscription? I wouldn't notice £15 a month if i had 15 new (decent sized) new titles appearing on my iPad each month...

Which leads me to the original reason I started this ramble in the first place, DC's new 52 release. Some are saying its a misguided attempt at attracting new, younger readers, by re-inventing their core characters (52 of them if you hadn't guessed). Will making Superman younger and wearing a tight t-shirt, appeal to the teenage masses? Im not sure, lets hope the writing is good, really good, and Jim Lee pulls out the stops like the old days. Marvel got a lot of stick recently by making the new Spiderman Black/Hispanic, but at least its gutsy. Making Wonder Woman wear long leggings is hardly competitive.

There's a very good article here, at Forbidden Planets UK blog, but essential there is a big concern amongst comic fans that DC have 'flipped out' and may not have the depth of talent to cater for 52 new releases. I am hoping that DC take this opportunity to sync up the release of the digital comics (now confirmed) and make the costs a great deal more attractive, after all, if they aiming at a younger market, then the price needs to be compelling, and it's this younger market which will dominiate the digital comics sales figures... OK, with some help from me too.

Phantom Flex and other time based fun

2011-08-17T03:55:00.005+01:00

This week I've been mostly looking at slow mo or time lapse films, as theres a bunch of them online of late, due to the amazing capabilities of low to mid level DSLR's many of which are able to film HD video. At the other end of the spectrum are the new data cameras that folks are getting excited about such as the Phantom Flex, which can shoot up to 10,750 FPS @ 640x480! Below are a few of my highlights:

8 Hours in Brooklyn - by Next Level Pictures

Production company Next Level Pictures has produced a beautiful slo-mo film using the Phantom Flex camera. Directed by Jonathan Bregel, the entirely Brooklyn based short, shot over 8 hours, has some wonderful scenes captured at frame rates approaching 2570 FPS and true 1920x1080. My personal fave clip is the brief but brilliantly wobbly tattoo shot, if i do ever get a tattoo, someone please remind me to pick somewhere really firm on my body. Shot on the Phantom Flex Camera, using a Tokina 11-16 & an Arri 150mm Prime

Claymore Challenge - by Tom Guilmette

Secondly we have a film directed by High Speed Camera fan Tom Guilmette, this is a brilliant short, filmed at the Claymore Challenge which is a freestyle mountain bike competition in New Hampshire. Awesome shots, some utterly bonkers moves played out at ridiculous frame rates, plus the obligatory wipe-outs too. For some really useful tips and advice on how best to use the Phantom Flex, check out Toms website here http://www.tomguilmette.com/archives/2690

Manhattan in Motion - Mindrelic

One of my recent DSLR favourites is 'Manhattan in Motion', by Mindrelic (Josh Owens). Using a combination of Canon 5D & 7D's and a dynamic perception dolly rig, he filmed hours worth of footage from various NY Hotels over the course of the month. Some of the night scenes are EPIC!

A day in California - by Ryan Killackey

Finally, another time-lapse film with some Tilt-Shift thrown in. 'A day in California' by Ryan Killackey is all shot on a Canon Rebel (which is the Canon 550i here in the UK i think) with just a couple of kit lenses and no dolly right. Its really impressive to see what can be achieved with mid level pro-sumer gear, with a little thought and lot of patience. This film is made up from over 10,000 shots, made all the more impressive by the fact that he shot 10,000 photos with a LensBaby adapter on his DSLR, only to discover he hated the results and took them all over again and produced the Tilt Shift effect via After Effects. I doff my cap sir.

Open letter to Steve Jobs

2011-07-05T17:10:00.003+01:00

Dear Steve Jobs

I'm a big fan of Apple, have been for ages. I bought the iPhone 3, then the 3GS then the 4. I shelled out on a MacBook Pro and only recently invested in an iPad2. I love all that stuff, its life changing, without sounding ridiculous, for all the reasons that we know and love (could you do something about iTunes though please?).

As a VFX professional I have often looked at Apple for the alternative ways of doing things. I have designed and installed various depts that are based around your infrastructure, and have gone to great lengths to sing your praises when the bean counters were not so sure.

Well, I'm not sure I can anymore.

Everyone is aware of the problems or issues, that many professional editors and post production houses have with the FCPX release. I wont go into too many of the technical details, many better and more knowledgeable folk than I have picked it apart. But suffice to say, from my point of view, there's a few obvious glaring mishaps, such as no video out (my clients will love that), no audio export, and no backward compatibility. I'm not saying it wont be good, heck, it could be brilliant in a few releases, but that's not the point. Its not the software release as such that I have an issue with, its the attitude that comes with it.

How can you spend so many years, supporting the professional market, with testimonial films on your website, allowing start up companies and VFX studios to build whole departments, yet alone whole businesses that are based entirely on your software & hardware, then take it all away, with no more than a 'we don't do the pro market'. Its ignorant and arrogant and I would love to know what the thinking is behind it, and I don't want to hear the numbers excuse. I don't blame Apple for turning away from the professional market, if you can't be bothered to compete properly with the other guys, better leave them to it, but all I would ask is a little professional courtesy and a heads up that things are changing, so we could at least prepare ourselves.

And I'm not just talking about FCPX, that's just one example.

Last year I designed and built a brand new dept in a very successful, Oscar & BAFTA winning VFX company, of which I proudly still work. I convinced them to let me build it around your hardware (Mac Pros, Apple Server) all hooked up to an XSAN, with Final Cut software, working in tandem with Autodesk's Smoke on Mac. What makes it unique is the way in which we utilise the Final Cut Server software, developing and re-writing scripts to enable us to have a truly tapeless workflow. We celebrate our 1st birthday in 2 weeks.

About 6 months ago, we had a visit from your very own systems engineers, as they had heard we were using the FCS software in an interesting way and they wanted to see for themselves. They spent the afternoon, watching the work flow through the dept (over two physical sites, over a mile apart) and left, all in agreement that they we would have a film about our system put on the Apple website as a testimonial as soon as possible.

Your decisions have an impact on the industry as a whole, you should know that by now, but it's not always positive. By discontinuing Final Cut Server and no longer supporting FCP7, you have taken a workflow that you, Apple, were proud of and about to PR and ripped the heart out of it. What are the chances of you providing me with the code for the front/back end of FCS so I can develop it further as our business grows? What happens when I need a new codec supported for a tapeless camera, but you only provide it for FCPX? Why the hell did no one say 'we aren't releasing vsn 2.0 of FCS, in fact in 6 months, we're killing it, be prepared'.

There are many people out there that say 'stop moaning, its a new way of doing things, embrace it' which is all very well and good, and they can go and download the new FCPX, and be done with it. I like change, I love technology, but I've invested a lot of time and money and effort into my job, and I expect the same from the companies & suppliers that I rely on. Upgrade some software yes, adapt some hardware, of course, but don't just pull the plug on it all.

What will I do - adapt of course, but it wont be with Apple. I've been bitten by the prosumer supplier and I wont go that way again, not unless my clients want to sign off their edits via Facebook. In fact, I'll probably buy Premier 5.5, because you know what, even that's backward compatible with FCP7.

Regards

PS: Please, tell me it was the same team that worked on Mobile Me that did FCPX etc, it would explain a lot.

This letter is a personal opinion and in no way reflects the points of view of my employer

Half Life 2... The (short) Film!

2011-01-30T13:33:00.002Z

Continuing the alien theme, have you ever played Half Life 2? No? Well, frankly I'm disappointed, but if you haven't it's one of the most successful FPS (First Person Shooter) games ever released. It's essentially a sci-fi adventure against alien adversity where you take part in a good old human uprising. It's commonly referenced for its amazing design and general futuristic style, most recently in Karl Erik Rinsh's short film for the Phillips Parallel Lines project; 'The Gift'. Now some plucky fellow called Brian Curtin has taken it to the next step by making a short film based in and around the world of HL2. Filmed on a tiny budget of $1200 and shot on a Canon HV20 Mini DV. The 12 minute short took Brian and his 7 friends 2 years to complete and no doubt a shed load of After Effects filters I expect. It's a fantastic achievement and I for one am intrigued to see what he can produce with a decent camera and twice the budget. Canon should send him a 5D.

Google's Motorola Xoom Tablet

2011-01-30T13:21:00.005Z

This year at the 2011 CES (Consumer Electronics Show) the big hit was the new tablet computer, rumoured to finally be labelled as a genuine threat to Apples iPad. The 10.1 inch uber screened beauty, is running Googles new Android Honeycomb OS, designed specifically for tablet computers. If you have 6 mins spare, have a watch of the demo below, but a few highlights include full 16x9 playback of HD video, widgets such as the new vector based Google maps and a redesigned YouTube app, not to mention it has Flash on it.... I'm in the market for a tablet and was saving all my now defunct smoking cash for an iPad 2, but i may have to grab one of these and have a play.

XBOX Kinect hacked for 3D hologram.... ish.

2010-11-16T23:29:00.006Z

Secondly and on a completely different plane of reality, heres YouTube user Okreylos who has hacked the Microsoft Kinect already, after it only being on the market for a matter of hours, to create a "3D" image by combining the color and depth from the camera's sensors. Essentially he has managed to take what the sensor records and put the image back together.

Obviously, as he says, the camera is only looking in one POV, so the shadowy dark parts of the image are what the sensor cannot pick up. This is just the tip of the iceberg of something that is apparently just $56 dollars worth of parts & that is only a few geek steps away from producing full holographic pictures and real Minority Report moments. The opportunities are endless...

Merapi Volcano - Yogjakarta, Indonesia - Eruption Timelapse

2010-11-15T23:32:00.003Z

My buddy Robin Fenlon, a photographer and current botherer of pro-ladies tennis players, (he films them for the WTA) travelled for 2 days to get to Yogjakarta in Indonesia to film the eruption of the Merapi volcanoe. He had originally planned to do a 4 day time lapse, but due to airport closures he had to resort to car, train and cow. OK. Not cow, but he put the hard miles in and managed a 1 day shoot and boy was it worth it.

Augmented Reality allows you to defend your city from the Empire

2010-11-06T18:30:00.002Z

Heres some impressive test footage of a new game due for release soon on the iPhone 4. Developed by Vertigore Games, the software uses the phones camera and gyroscope to give the impression that the Empire's TIE-Fighters are attacking your city. Quite how this might work when you play it on the tube, I'm not sure, and obviously the bad guys ships aren't interacting with the environment (now that would be worth playing on public transport) but so far as a entertaining aside, its a cool step forward.

Published by THQ Wireless, Star Wars Arcade: Falcon Gunner will hit the Apple Store in mid November for the iPhone 4 and iPod Touch 4th Gen. No support for the ageing 3G as the RAM and memory on that model just isn't up to scratch.

Removing my phones keyboard & 3D mapping for Vimeo

2010-11-06T17:13:00.005Z

I don't class myself as being particularly huge or massive limbed, but i for one struggle to knock out a quick text reply (whilst avoiding obvious yoof speak) on my iPhone, due to my inability to hit the touch screen keys accurately. Replying that i will be 'just 5 minutes' can sometimes take me, 5 minutes or longer.

Saying all that, if someone suggested we remove the keyboard from my phone, much like that awful car on Top Gear that had a joystick instead of steering wheel, i would laugh at them and point mockingly.

This hasn't stopped a company called 8pen, doing just that, by replacing the standard QWERTY keyboard with a large, open space in which letters and phrases are constructed by a series of gesture inputs through specific sectors of the pad. The input free's up a lot of screen space, allowing for bigger Enter, Shift & Delete buttons.

The concept aims to bring back a more simple and fluent technique that better replicates actual handwriting. The video explains it much better than i can in words, so take 4 mins to look through how you might be sending texts and emails in the near future.

8pen is available on handsets running Android 2.2, would love to hear if anyone has used it and how successful it was.

You can read more about it at www.the8pen.com

Secondly and on a much larger scale is this fantastic demo of projection mapping 3D content. To help celebrate the Vimeo awards which in turn was sponsored by Honda, they used the Frank Gehry IAC HQ as a canvas in which to project this impressive light and sound display, created by the guys at Seeper.

My favourite part is @ 1:13 when things go a bit TRON, and yes, you'll have to bare with the slightly infuriating camera work too, i for one would be happy to watch the whole thing on a wide shot without it being over cut by some enthusiastic editor.

Tom Lowe's TimeScapes: Rapture

2010-11-01T14:38:00.003Z

This is a trailer put together from footage shot over the summer for Tom Lowes upcoming film, "TimeScapes A Modern Portrait of the American Southwest. There's some beautiful shots within this trailer, not surprisingly after Tom won the Astronomy Photographer of the Year award for this

You can follow the production of the film at: twitter.com/ timescapes

Between Bears from Eran Hilleli

2010-10-14T16:52:00.005+01:00

Made with a combination of 2d/3d Maya and After Effects, Eran Hilleli produced this wonderful short for his graduation film at Bezalel Academy of Art and Design. The music was by Ori Avni & performed by Ori Avni and Daniela Spector. I would gladly watch a much longer film in the same style, i love the angles and the sharpness to it, from the noses down to the slightly angular way the bigger character walks. I'm also very interested to find out what happens to the Bear at the beginning as he makes quite a radical life decision... Winner of the Vimeo Festival Awards, for Best Animation, You can find out more about Eran here as well as the guys behind the the music here & here. Enjoy.

Between Bears from Eran Hilleli on Vimeo.

Stella Artois - Le Apartomatic

2010-10-12T15:41:00.005+01:00

Smart looking new Stella Artois ad directed by Wes Anderson & Roma Coppola. I don't know heaps about Roman, but you can most definitely see Mr Anderson, all over it. Reminds me a little of the living room that Peter Parker had in his Aunts apartment in the TV show Spiderman & Friends. How Aunt May she missed all that being installed, i shall never know....

Dark Side of The Lense

2010-09-29T16:35:00.003+01:00

Renowned body boarder and photographer Mickey Smith produces his first short film recently called 'The Dark Side of the Lens', shot on a combo of 16mm and the Canon 5D II. Mickey worked with Allan Wilson from Astray Films who was his DOP, as they travelled the coast line from Cornwall to Manchester and over to Mickeys home of Ireland. He's quoted as saying it was meant to be less biographical, but what it most definitely is, is a very close and personal look at why he thinks he does what he does. The most powerful thing about the film, other than the brilliant visuals, is his narration. His voice is strangely endearing and honest, you can almost feel the cold creeping into his wetsuit.

Radium Audio Ltd - Strange Arrangements

2010-09-29T15:24:00.004+01:00

The amazing guys over at Radium Audio Ltd collaborated with Weareseventeen to produce the wonderful Strange Arrangements film that was shown at the onedotzero festival in London, which you can see below. So impressed were they by the visuals that they forced themselves to up their game and create a sound track which included a recording of every thing that is seen within the film. Radium have some serious toys at their disposal & having had the pleasure of meeting them a couple of times and seen their bizarre collection of copper boxes with numerous knobs, switches and antennae (which they refer to as their home-brew hardware) i can imagine the lengths they went to to record the source FX's used. I suggest you take a minute and watch the making of as well (also below), which should go some way to showing the dedication and imagination that Radium put into their projects.

And now the making off:

Thanks to Vimeo and Radium Audio Ltd

Save Herne Hill Velodrome

2010-09-21T11:58:00.005+01:00

I discovered Herne Hill velodrome quite by accident, as I pootled around SE24 discovering my new neighbourhood after moving from Cornwall in 2001. I didn't initially register the importance of the track, as being the last existing 'Finals' venue of the 1948 Olympics, where Reg Harris won the silver medal in the 1000m Sprint.

I've visited the velodrome quite a bit since, mostly for training for long rides and peleton practise, and yeah its a bit run down and greatly affected by the slightest bit of drizzle, but it has heart.

Theres something hugely endearing about turning up, paying my cash and getting a rubber band with a number on, much like it was when i used to go swimming all those years ago. However im not saying it should stay like that, it needs investment and improvement and some serious PR, and more to the point it needs Dulwich Estate to stop being so snooty and let those upgrades happen. Please don't let me read that its been sold off for some more 'desperately needed housing', which will no doubt get bought by bankers looking for a convenient zone 2 flat for their week in town - as im sure Cameron is already thinking (Update - apparently this is unlikely as it may be protected under 'Public Common Ground', phew).

I love the idea of making more of the centre space too, it would be great to see a BMX track (a la Brockwell Park) in the middle, together with some training facilities, how about spin classes and a gym, lets show the posh Tennis club down the road who's boss!

So, if you're in the area, and you too have a special place in your heart for large racing ovals, then make your opinion known, get your lycra clad butts down to the Dulwich College on 6th October @ 7:30pm, and lets persuade Dulwich Estates to give it the shot in the arm it needs, and im not talking EPO either - see you there hopefully.

Lords Pro40 Final - Wickets & Photos

2010-09-20T22:25:00.002+01:00

Lords Pro40 Final, originally uploaded by neile2007.

Somerset V Warickshire on Sat 18th, the Pro40 final, what an ideal day for a game of cricket. Tickets came my way via a colleague which i snapped up in hope that my west country brothers could finally do the right thing in getting to a final and not coming second, or indeed last. It wasn't to be, but it didn't stop me taking multiple photos with the excellent camera on the iPhone4 and glueing them together via AutoStich, an excellent little app that i highly recommend. It doesn't care if the pics aren't in a line or you took them at 3 different times through out the day, which also works wonders i might add.

All good clean fun, just a shame about the 20 run over which let all that hard work slip away, Hunter will remember that for some time.

IBC 2010 - Other Stuff that Caught My Eye

2010-09-16T17:25:00.004+01:00

Trying to do the IBC exhibition justice in 2 days is a challenge. 13 halls of broadcast technology, content distribution and everything in-between. I had planned on doing a wide sweep of the whole place aiming to pick out highlights and then return for more in depth investigation. Due to the sheer amount of exhibitors though, I know i was only able to scrape the surface, so what did you see "i hear you ask" well….

Some people (you know who you are) complain that HD isn't all that, well maybe they should take a look at NHK's Super Hi-Vision. Just a meagre 16x normal HD, with a total of 33 million pixels, the 7680x4320 system, produces pictures of clarity that i have never seen before. When i sat in front of the screen, and watched the short film, i was utterly convinced i was there, the 100 degree view was amazing and the 22.2 channels of 3D audio was the icing on the cake.

Apparently 3D is going to be quite big, so watch out for this one…. I think that nearly every 3rd stand at IBC had some sort of 3D technology, wether it be, 2D/3D conversion, 3D software and plugins, new types of TV's and broadcast workflows, some of which were better than others. Nvidia were demoing glasses that are lenticular but the lenses receive a signal via infra-red or RF and then flicker in time with the image to give a smoother 3D picture. It does not work, but 10 out of 10 for effort. Panasonic were showing off the AG-3DA1 3D Camera, which films with dual lenses and saves left/right footage to individual SD Cards at 24mbps in AVCHD codec. It also has a live 2 channel output allowing for direct to monitor 3D display. Makes for a very simple and effective 3D workflow.

Panasonic also had they're new AG-AF100 Camera on show. The worlds first Micro 4/3's digital single lens camera. Much like a DLSR body, but configured to record without a mirror and onto a sensor not much smaller than the equivalent 35mm. The AF100 will also take the majority of 4/3's lenses and with an adapter, many Prime lenses too. It will also cover off all HD formats and frame rates, but wont go above 1080. Recording at the same bitrate as the 3D camera (25mbps), it wont be replacing 5D, but it will make for a tempting alternative.

And lets not forget Blackmagic, who have managed to work their magic again by buying the DaVinci grading suite which previously retailed for £500K and have released the DaVinci Resolve which can be installed on a Mac Laptop as software only for $995! with an optional $500 upgrade to allow for DNxHD compatibility. And if you want the full control hardware, capture card and a linux box, that will only set you back apron £40K. Amazing, MPC will have to watch out….

And so there it is, just a few highlights, something for everyone i hope, suffice to say technology seems to continue its upwards ride while companies fight to bring the best tech to the consumer/client at reasonable costs.

IBC 2010 - Finding the digital needle in an exhibition haystack.

2010-09-14T22:45:00.003+01:00

Next time I go to IBC I will remember the last 2 days and think carefully about how long I really need to be able to do the Exhibition justice. Arriving early Friday morning and leaving on Sunday meant I very quickly had to condense my visit and attempt to make a plan of attack. 13 halls of various technology and resellers, and I had approximately 14 hours. It seemed not unrealistic to do a quick sweep of the area, make a note of the stands and companies that caught my eye and return to them on the Saturday for more info — simple.

My first port of call was Hall 7, the Post Production Zone. This was for 2 reasons: The first being I'm Head of Ops at the Clipstone office of The Mill in London — which is only 3 months old and entirely tapeless to boot — and I’m rather proud of it. So Post seemed like a good place to start. Secondly, our sister company Beam (formerly Beam.tv) has their stand at IBC in Hall 7, which was rather exciting for all concerned and looked very smart sat in amongst other post giants like Blackmagic and Avid, eagerly demonstrating the Beam retail aspects amongst all the services that it offers.

I began to wade through the free blurb that I was handed at registration (events like this make me feel bad for trees) and attempted to draw up a bit of a hit list, but soon found myself still walking around hall 7 by the early afternoon — my great plan already failing spectacularly.

As well as generally trying to get an idea of what is new and exciting for The Mill, I very much wanted to find that one thing that would intrigue me and allow me to effortlessly blog for Post, talking fluently about its technological advances and how it will no doubt excite the creatives. It wasn't initially easy to pick the wheat from the chaff, many exhibitors I had never heard of, and I found myself making very quick decisions of whether to talk to them, based on the look and feel of their space (again, nice one Beam — you can check out images of their stand at www.beam.tv).

One such company that I perhaps would have initially passed by if it were not for the fact that it had an iPhone and iPad on demo (I'm easily swayed, I'm sorry) is Streambox. Founded in 1999 and based in Seattle, they specialise in a software based platform for live and file based video transport via IP. CNN use their software for video phone reporting for example. Their new toy is AVENIR, an advanced version of one of their standard Streamboxes, designed for video streaming and delivery via bonded 3G/4G networks. A battery powered portable unit that fits on a camera person’s waist and takes in a live HD/SDI feed which is then pushed out over IP, via 8 3G and 4G wireless cards. Through the use of dynamic bandwidth negotiation it can do real-time delivery of HD/SD and near real time file based delivery of the ACT-L3 QuickTime format. The AVENIR has 2 paths on which to transmit so can send live media to a decoder or media player as well transmit the files to a server or data centre for edit and broadcast.

As with all these live stream boxes and devices, I’d very much like to see it in action, but if it does what it says on the tin, then it has effectively rendered OB (Outdoor Broadcast) vans redundant and makes external reporting far more cost effective. From a live TV point of view, your team can now consist of a single reporter/artist and single cameraman, maybe even just the one of them? It goes without saying that cost ramifications would be considerable, however I see it possibly being used in a film or set environment. Beam was initially designed as a quick way of delivering CGI rushes back to Sir Ridley Scott as encoded files while he was filming on set in Malta for the movie "Gladiator," so why not stream the footage from set back to a post house, so they can start work immediately, even if it is rough rotoscoping or prep? It also gives 2nd units, a way of keeping up to date with multiple shoots and the individual sets could (in theory) all be streamed to one place for the editor to work up an offline edit combining all the day’s footage?

This is why I like IBC; it’s not just about the kit that is available, it’s also about what it will lead to. People far more clever than I will glue three of these companies together to create something even more impressive, and that’s when things get really interesting.

Jody Hills 'Swagger Wagon' for Toyota

2010-05-14T12:18:00.014+01:00

Director Jody Hill, creator of TV series, Eastbound & Down (i urge you search it out if you haven't already) and films 'The Foot Fist Way' and 'Observe & Report' has written and directed a series of Toyota ads based around 2 self proclaimed 'greatest parents in the world'.

Below is the 3 min rap which is awesome, and you can find the TV spots here if you're interested.

ACDC Versus Ironman - Courtesy of Rochester Castle

2010-04-23T15:13:00.003+01:00

AWESOME! The front facade of the Great Keep at Rochester Castle, was brought to life using the latest in 3D animation & 3D projection techniques - The Castle collapsed, lit up & exploded in time with the best of ACDC - very cool.

Metropia Movie Trailer

2009-10-01T10:01:00.004+01:00

The new film by film maker Tarik Saleh, has such an individual look, i had to post it. The film premiered recently at Fantastic Fest, and reviews have been encouraging. The budget surprisingly for the Swedish film only cost $4.5 million. Although there is a tiny element of the film that reminds of the adverts for Capri Sun... buts thats being churlish.

Voiced by Vincent Gallo, Roger, a working stiff with no social life who rides his bike in defiance of a massive underground transit system in Europe. It’s 2024 and he's haunted by a voice in his head that seems to be related to a bigger conspiracy. Its very '1984' and 'Brazil', so count me.

Many Ogilvy Hands on Twitter

2009-09-03T15:32:00.000+01:00

There's nothing quite closing the gate once the horse has bolted or indeed the goat, but if you fancy a retrospective look back at the Twitter updates, check out twitter/manyogilvyhands.

Enjoy
N

Uganda - MOH Day 6

2009-09-03T08:29:00.001+01:00

Forgive me if this is a little foggy in places. We had a bit of a BBQ party last night at the local Ogilvy office and although we were all perfectly well behaved, the introduction of alcoholic drinks after a week of healthy living has left me a little worse for wear, thankfully its not punishingly hot this morning in Kampala, as i sit on our tiny balcony overlooking the city.

Yesterday morning we left Buikwei, to head back to the city. Over the course of the 5 days that we had spent at the school, we had met a host of kind and generous people who we had bonded with very quickly. We all became very fond of the area and had quickly settled into a Ugandan-style routine, of hard work and simple pleasures. So it was inevitable that leaving was going to be a sad moment.

We said our goodbyes to the builders, who all came to say fairwell, and David the site manager and soon to be teacher, made a small impromptu speech which touched us all. He said "that even though you are not here in person, you will be here in spirit' which is a wonderful testament to the past few days work, and completely clarifies to me how much positive impact the project has already had.

During the drive back to Kampala, we stopped off at a roadside market so a few of us, could purchase some drums. Some of the group had been lucky enough to be taught some basic drumming skill by Joy, the music teacher at the school and suffice to say, they all now think of themselves as the next African Drum Keith Moon. Several drums were purchased, i think the lady who owned the shop had thought that christmas had come early. We now only have to figure out how to get them all back to the UK. I have suggested disguising ourselves as a touring band, but i fear that would be a lost cause.

In Kampala, we briefly stopped at a craft fair, to pick up some gifts and yes, more drums were bought. The craft stalls are all similar, but worth a nose about, though i was the victim of some rather creative maths when receiving my change after one particular purchase. Lunch was ate at the local Nandos and although everyone was ravenous, we all immediately regretted the culinary choice and began to miss Irenes cooking a lot.

We were driven to our new hotel/hostel, which is at the top of the town, near the catherdral, and before we headed out to the Ogilvy office, we were briefly introduced to Justice. Not i hasten to add in the old fashioned terminology, as in "i shall show you the true meaning of Justice", no, Justice is the big cheese behind the IN projects in Africa, and does a tremendous amount of work for the area. He has just returned from Australia the previous day, where he traveled for 3 weeks, giving presentations, meeting schools/business' etc. Time is short and i feel this is becoming a long rambling post so i shall talk about Justice and the projects separately.

Finally, we make it to the BBQ and met David Case and his team. Its a small operation as you can imagine and there clients and work vary hugely from any London or indeed Western offices. There's a few nuggets of interest to mull over regarding African advertising, but i might wait until a later blog to talk turkey. The BBQ and drinks were excellent and it was great to see that the vast majority of the office was populated by local talent, headed up by David and his Creative Director James. The evening went by rapidly, helped no doubt by the Wariga, or War Gin, we were drinking, dangerous on any night, but especially after our extended break.

We returned to the hotel in high spirits and i spent the next 20 minute trying to take night shots of Kampala (see above) with mixed results, but eventually crawled into my, slightly short bed, and tried to black out the intruding light from the corridor,, with an advanced, lycra short headband (don't ask). Sleep was hard to come by, but we have one more day in the city before we head home, so i must away, will ramble on later.

Uganda - MOH Day 5

2009-09-01T19:14:00.005+01:00

It was to be our final day on site, which seems to have come around far too soon., and we were split into 2 teams for morning/afternoon shift work.

We had been invited by the IN team Paul & Tom to visit some of the other families around the area, some of which are less than fortunate and live far below the nominal Ugandan bread line. Many families are without mothers/fathers due to approximately 15% of the population being HIV positive. Other husbands are polygamists, allowing them to have more than 1 wife (some have 3 or 4) which not only means they are absent from their homes a lot, but the multiple partners plays right into the hands of the virulent HIV virus.

I wasn't visiting until the afternoon, so i made my way up to the site with the others. The sun was beating down but thankfully, we had made such an impact on the building over the past 3 days, that there was less hardcore work to be done and mostly included helping to finish the dividing walls and general tidying up of the site.

It was hard work none the less and to emphasise the workload, I've managed to wear a hole in my leather work gloves - you just cant get the quality these days.

In the afternoon, after another stirling lunch, we took it easy until we were bussed around to visit the families that IN sponsor and therefore enable to get to school. We were guided by Peter, a local social worker, who took us via the village into the jungle, where small pockets of people live in small 2/3 house settlements. The life they lead, truly, makes you aware of the difference between us and them. The vast majority of people we met were happy and very welcoming, but the standard of living is vastly different as you would expect. Children (who are lucky enough to afford the $15 a month) have to walk up to an hour and a half to get to school, for 7:30 in the morning.

We were introduced to 8 different families, one specifically that Peter was very proud of who had successfully been sponsored and had just qualified as a primary school teacher, all she needs now is a school, oh, hang on.....

I could go on and on about the kids and how, despite their circumstances are bright happy and enormously charismatic, not to mention beautiful, you could take photos of them all day every day, and all your pics would be great (massive disclaimer).

Its sad that this part of our trip is already over, as we make our way back to Kampala tomorrow. What is brilliant is that David, the site leader, believes the contribution of work from us, has saved them 5 days, and they were able to start pouring the cement pillars today, a full week ahead of schedule. If that doesn't make me feel warm and fuzzy i don't know what will.

Uganda - MOH Day 4

2009-09-01T06:53:00.002+01:00

Firstly, apologies to any readers of this blog (hello? anyone?) but Day 3's blog is being written on the morning of Day 4 due to some excellent entertaining last night of some local folk and International Needs workers, but more of that later.

Initially though, Day 3 was all about working on the site. The weather was hot and as we made our way from our hostel up the path to the building site, you could sense that whatever we did today was going to be hard work, because of the heat. We set to work straight away to help clear the huge amount of broken bricks that gather around the site as builders either dispose of the oddly shaped cast-outs that don't fit in with the rest of the wall, or simply brake when you pick them up.

They were everywhere.

The group split in smaller groups and formed chains from one side of the building to another, to enable us to quicken the process. We managed to clear an entire side of the site and began to make our way around the building, linking and chucking as we went. Smaller rubble was piled into a wheelbarrow and heaved around to join the rest. 6 wheelbarrows later and i had noticed my load and upgraded from 'small rubble' to the more standard 'bricks' and had gradually become very heavy, but like the frog in the slowly boiling water, i had failed to notice and it was only my aching forearms that were spreading the news.

The best lunch of the week so far (mushy peas!) was followed by the majority of the group helping prepare dinner for our guests later in the day, either by peeling (Stephen nearly losing fingers) or shopping. Meanwhile 3 of us (Myself, Karen and Adrian) returned to the site to learn bricklaying and help to finish off the final few layers on the last wall to be completed. Bricklaying is a bit of an art form, and after some excellent tutorage by David, the site manager of the day, we set about slowly contributing to the wall. My slightlt OCD nature lead to some fairly treacle like progress, but the afternoon passed by quickly and before we knew it the local workers had stopped leaving us 3 to finish off our sand/cement.

Our visitors that i mentioned earlier started to gather at about 6-30, but similar to kids at a school disco, they hugged the perimeter and waited for all their group to gather before making an entrance. We built a campfire and after all helping ourselves to the amazing food on offer (we still don't know how the chef Irene knew exactly how many kilos of food to buy to feed the exact amount of people). It was obviously very well received as there wasn't a bean left. Irene explained that many people wouldn't have eaten meat for a while so the chance to tuck into some beef was too good an opportunity to miss.

It was great to be able to share an evening with everyone, and Adrian our house musician entertained us with an excellent acoustic set, including such its as 'Toxic' and 'Man in the Mirror'. We were thanked for our hospitality and our hard work on the school by Sarah a senior IN worker who looks after this project and it was clear to see on everyones faces what this project means. We were worried that we would be seen as surplus workers or as white people getting in the way, but im in no doubt after the last few days that this is the polar opposite of the truth.

Uganda - MOH Day 3

2009-08-30T19:37:00.005+01:00

Some people might say that a rest day, directly after the initial work day, is a little, lightweight, and frankly, i would have agreed with you before we actually came out here and did anything. However, we were all blessed that today is Sunday, and we couldn't work today, even if our already calloused hands would let us.

This allowed us to spend the day exploring the surrounding area, which started with a 1 hour rally/bus drive to the nearest town of Jinja. Jinja is home to the source of the River Nile as well as the burial site of Ghandi (though no one could quite explain why, answers on a postcard/email/twitter, much appreciated).

A brief boat trip took us up river, where we able to clamber up onto a small island and from there see the water ripple and bubble as it rose quickly out of the ground beneath. Before the river reached its current height, the source was a spring that would rise several feet out of the ground, now though, if you didn't know where to look, you may miss the swirl and negative currents as the Nile continues to grow.

Post river exploration, was followed immediately by a lunch at a local hotel. On Toby's recommendation, we all ordered a Tilapia fish. They are a local delicacy of these here parts and we were all curious to try the kind of fish you can eat 98% off. "Don't eat the lips" we were told by our guide, which raised several questions of A) whether fish actually have lips & B) Whether other parts of its anatomy such as the eyes, are free game (it is by the way, and is a required taste to say the least).

After a hearty meal, we were whisked off to the Jinja Rapids, which is a true force of nature to behold. We rather Britishly kept our distance from the river edge, apart from a few keen photographers, and watched in disbelief as a young guy threw himself in from the top of the rapids, and rode the river down to the calmer waters, all for a princely sum of 2000 shillings (approximately 60p), only aided by what seemed to be an inflatable yellow ball, which he rode expertly through the rocks. Clearly bonkers.

On our way back, we stopped off at Lugazi Market, which is a fantastic amalgamation of fruit stalls, fish mongers, clothes shops and fridge shops and anything else you may want. We mixed in as best you can when you are clearly white, rich and dripping in camera gear (me especially), but gradually we were welcomed by the vast majority of the town and ventured about to take in the various smells and flavours. Mark experimented with some Yam, which i'm fairly sure he wont be doing again.

As the sun began to set over the town, we made our way back to the hostel to another tasty dinner courtesy of our cook Irene who had worked her magic on a chicken that had been given to us by an appreciative local. You don't get fresher than that, not even at Morrisons.

Uganda - MOH Day 2

2009-08-29T20:35:00.005+01:00

Our first full day on the site, has rendered the vast majority of us, utterly shattered. The 9 of us started work at 9am sharp, with mild trepidation that we were simply going to get under foot and generally be the useless 'mzunga; or whiteman.

This theory was quickly despatched as were split into 2 groups and set to work clearing up bricks, organising materials and generally getting stuck in. A few of us were lucky enough to learn some rudimentary brick laying skills. The heat made things particularly tough, especially when i was asked to help collect some more cement, which lived a 10 minute walk away, and required a climb back, up to site, which was exhausting, made worse by the fact that the 15 year old did two turns on the wheelbarrow to my one - i could not hide my envy or mild embarrassment.

We all gradually found our comfort (or non comfort) zone and slogged it out until lunchtime, the highlight of the morning being a small group of very little children, no older than 5/6, joining us to separate and move broken bricks from new. The image of the kids, clambering over piles of rubble, desperately keen to help, is an endearing and lasting one, the video footage and pics are well worth a look, which I shall load up tomorrow (once I've stopped faffing with the photos...).

Lunch was well deserved and some of us decided to enjoy a drumming and dance show, put on by the primary school. Toby and I, returned to the site and helped the remaining workmen, finish off some brick work and helped construct some scaffolding, that would have turned the stomach of any UK health and safety inspector. The work was quick paced and tiring, as the brick layers demanded more cement (delivered up a ladder in 'Wok' like bowls) and additional bricks, that were delicately 'thrown' up to the worker.

By the time 5:30 arrived, i was balancing on some of the aforementioned scaffold, learning to lay bricks, and both Toby and I, felt very chuffed with our work.

As a thank you to the group, the builders offered to take some of us down to the village to watch the Man Utd/Arsenal game. We gathered with most of the male population from the village, in front of a 28" TV, and was in awe of the noise and dancing that surrounded us, when Arsenal scored, i genuinely thought someone had been killed the noise was so shrill, but no, it was but a man, removing his shirt and whooping with joy. Just your standard Saturday night in Buikwe, Uganda.

Uganda MOH - Day 1

2009-08-28T18:14:00.003+01:00

Its been a long, long day, but ultimately hugely agreeable. The flight from Heathrow left on time and fortunately it wasn't fully booked, meaning more room for people to relax, myself included. Thanks to a combination of the new Star Trek movie and 3 free seats, the flight went very quickly and we were soon landing in Entebbe.

Our group was swiftly guided to our mini-vans for the hour long journey to Kampala, where we changed some of the Queens sterling into Ugandan Shillings. We congratulated ourselves for navigating the Ugandan bank system with a strong coffee at the supermarket, where we also collected some vital provisions, including numerous bottles of Cola and M&M's.

We arrived at the village of Buikwe, where we are staying at the local school and were immediately blown away by the surroundings. The countryside is beautiful and not even the 10 minute thunderstorm could dampen our high, but sleepy spirits.

We were guided around the school by Andrew from International Needs and met some children who were in over the holiday to study for their exams. Further exploration lead us to the site of the new building, which has grown considerably since Toby's last visit, but still requires a lot of hard work to complete, which we will start in earnest tomorrow morning.

After a full and tasty chicken dinner, our post cuisine coffees were disturbed by a sizeable and rather hyperactive bat, who insisted on doing laps of the hostel living room, to which all manner of techniques were employed to catch him including some of the worst 'towel bull fighting' i have witnessed together with Toby trying to verbally encourage the bat out of the room..... which did not work.

The bat is still in here as i write this. I am going to bed and I'm closing the door behind me.

Flickr

2009-08-24T16:48:00.001+01:00

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

The Dog & The Butcher - Jonathan Holt

2009-08-03T11:19:00.002+01:00

This is a great little short film, beautifully designed and with some lovely character design, the dog is great and the whole look and feel reminds me slightly of the 60's Tom and Jerry cartoons (when Tom was regularly seen as an evil genius and Jerry had a car.... odd). Thanks to /Film for flagging this up.

The Dog and the Butcher by Jonathan Holt from Jonathan Holt on Vimeo.

Trowbridge Village Pump Festival

2009-08-02T01:23:00.001+01:00

Trowbridge-27, originally uploaded by neile2007.

It was only a week ago that we were huddling from the rain, trying not to spill our 'old rosey' cider on each other. Trowbridge Pump is a brilliant little gathering (well, not quite little) with some fantastic alternative/folk & country bands from all over the place.

Sorry to say i can't remember who this particular band is, but it was fun that much im sure - more picks on my Flickr if you fancy it.

Yellow Bird 6 Camera Video

2009-07-30T16:51:00.005+01:00

Yellowbird were founded only this year in 2009, but the technology has been a few years in the making. Originally launched as a tech to create a still 3D image. The technology evolved into being able to capture moving image, but it was not until Flash 9 was released that enabled them to properly distribute the content and allow the user to scroll around the video enabling a full 360 degree view. Check it out below and go to the niftily titled http://www.yellowbirdsdonthavewingsbuttheyflytomakeyouexperiencea3dreality.com/

Nice

Coldplay - Strawberry Swing - Cracking Video

2009-07-30T16:18:00.009+01:00

Love em or hate em (i happen to be the former), you can always rely on Coldplay to produce a fine music video and this is no exception. Their previous video for 'Life in Technicolor' (directed by Dougal Wilson) was a fantastic puppet based fantasy, and the new video for Strawberry Swing, plays on the slightly childlike theme again, setting a real life (though stop frame animated) Chris Martin against a chalk drawing background.

Advertising Genius, by yours truly...

2009-07-28T17:14:00.000+01:00

THE FIREFLIES RIDE from CYCLEFILM on Vimeo.

TRON Legacy Trailer, nuff said

2009-07-28T14:01:00.004+01:00

At the Comic Con in San Diego this week, Disney unveiled the new 3 min teaser, which is quite wonderful. I love the way they have gone with the design, and its a great combo of nearly full CG animation and live action, the helmets are a great touch.....

Thankfully, after a rethink they seem to have dropped the rather naff sounding TR2N, looks nice, but hard to say....

Augmented Reality - Get your kids outdoors

2009-07-19T15:19:00.004+01:00

The chaps behind 'The Hidden Park' have managed to combine the best of ARG (Alternate Reality Gaming) with Geocaching together with the iPhones ability to accurately pinpoint your location. With the additional Digital Camera as well as the Accelerometer, which is the funky feature that allows the iPhone to respond accordingly to any physical motion.

The adventure begins with a video call from a friendly Troll called 'Trutton' who is asking for your help with the Magical Wildlife Protection Association. He explains that the park he and his friends live in are in danger of being destroyed by greedy developers and that he hopes that you are able to follow his map and collect vital evidence to help prove their existence.

The application built by the Ozzie company 'Bulpadok' has been designed to work with 10 different parks worldwide including Central Park and our own Kensington Gardens, each one following a unique magical map, which as it is followed via the iPhone, brings a collection of riddles to solve and magical beasties to combat in order to save the park.

The ability to document your journey with photos, helps give each adventure a unique twist, especially as the parks mystic inhabitants magically appear in your finished pics.

World Builder by Bruce Branit

2009-07-09T11:24:00.007+01:00

A strange man uses holographic tools to build a world for the woman he loves. This is a short by filmmaker Bruce Branit known also as the co-creator of 405, which i've included below. World Builder was apparently shot in one day and posted over 2 years, very cool indeed. If ever there was an argument for it being all about the operator and not the kit, this is it.

405

Informant Trailer = Funny

2009-07-02T10:21:00.006+01:00

The trailer for Matt Damon & Steven Soderbergh's new movie 'The Informant' is out now and i urge you watch it. I was nervous that it was a heavy, 'Fat Russell Crowe' (i.e. Fat Crowe = Serious Role) type of movie, it appears my fears were unfounded....

Fireflies update.

2009-06-24T13:42:00.001+01:00

So, we're nearing the end of our adventure, just about to cycle into the Palm Beach, just down the road from Cannes. As you can see, we've just been rewarding ourselves with a big old lunch. Here's to an amazing trip, though looking forward to removing the Lycra for a while!

Post From My iPhone

Blogging from my iPhone. . .

2009-03-31T22:36:00.001+01:00

Will it work?

Apparently so.

-- Post From My iPhone

Rory.tv - GOES LIVE!

2009-01-22T14:55:00.003Z

Here at Ogilvy in London, i sometimes have the pleasure of working with Rory Sutherland, who is Vice-Chairman across the group here in the UK. His thoughts, comments and speeches are regularly the highlight of many blogs around the advertising world and beyond, and his personal blog is the only real reason to log into our intranet. So it comes as a great pleasure to announce the launch of Rory.tv, put simply, its Rory, on screen, doing what he does best.

There are 4 episodes that you can select via his TV set, and with more to come i urge you to keep an eye on the site.

So far Rory has covered such hot topics as to why Mass Marketing is the nearest thing to an egalitarian state, and why putting security on your potato patch might not be such a bad idea.

Enjoy.

For more info on Rory click here.

Movie Boy - How interesting can this really get?

2009-01-20T15:44:00.011Z

Firstly, yes, its been a while, i know by now i've had more come backs than Madonna, but i thought this was an appropriate article to blog about as its been done by my pals over at Glue London.

As part of The Suns 'Hollywoods Greats' movie give away, they have seen it fit to lock a poor boy up in a room, to watch movies, back to back.... You can message him, pick his next film and enter a daily competition to win £1000 if you guess the amount of hours watched in total over 7 days.

Most of the recent comments seem to involve, Jamie's rather unfortunate choice of vest, but generally , its built up quite a little following, though i do wonder, who will be watching this by the end of the week. Saying that, i've been logged in since this morning, so....

The free movies that are available won't set many film fans alight, but anything with LA Story and Bill & Ted, has got my vote.

Check out the link for yourself, here.

Fireflies Days Update 1

2008-06-11T18:13:00.010+01:00

Hi everyone, well, i'm still here, alive and kicking. It's been two days and we've encountered some pretty big old mountains.

After arriving on Monday and managing to put our bikes together, we went for little leg-stretcher of 20km, to help prepare us for the next day, i'm glad to say that so far the bike has behaved itself, which is testament to my engineering skills.... either that or the talented Italian men that put it together in the first place.

Tuesday was our first day in the saddle and we were to cover 95km over the course of the day and climb two mountains. The first was 'Les Gets', which was kind enough and involved a climb of 1170M. It all seemed rather pleasant and it appeared the training had paid off.... However the second mountain 'Colombiere' proved a stiffer challenge, with a climb of 1613m over 14km. This was a toughy, but i'm glad to say i made it up to the summit, enabling me to drink in the amazing views and take a stack of photos of everyone who completed the climb, which was 42 of us.

I've loaded all the (decent) photos of Tuesdays summit onto my Flicker account here, there's more to come from Wednesday's 3 (yes, 3) mountains, including the awesome 'Cormet De Roseland', suffice to say, cycling up nearly 2000m over 23km to end up above the snow line is something i shall remember for ever.... I'll keep you posted.

NEil

PS: Yes, i've got the helmet cam, and yes i have some footage, but its proving tricky to edit, i haven't given up, so hopefully i will load something up soon. Watch this space.

Drag and drop video is here, nearly...

2008-05-29T09:37:00.003+01:00

its going to be made available as an application or package, but if you were able to build it into an The DIMP (Direct Manipulation Video Player) software allows you to move through a video timeline, by dragging certain tagged objects within the film itself. Does look pretty neat and seems like it could have quite a few applications, although, if I'm honest i reckon the actual act of using looks like the best thing about it. It's built within C+ and I'm yet to find out as to whetherMPU, that would be very cool indeed.

Check out their website for more info and a cool 1 min teaser film.

Animated John Lennon Interview

2008-05-29T09:16:00.004+01:00

In 1969, a young boy snuck into John Lennon’s hotel room with his tape recorder and persuaded him to do an interview. Good old John, always prepared to talk about peace to anyone who'd listen.

Josh Raskin turned the interview into an animation and it was nominated for the best Short Film at the 2008 Oscars. Check out his website here. The animation was done by an artist called James Braithwaite who you can see more of him here.

Thanks to Fresh Creation for giving me a heads up.

DIY Adverts in Watchmen Movie

2008-05-28T17:05:00.004+01:00

Zak Snyder (director of Dawn of the Dead & 300) has just finished shooting Watchmen, a movie based on one of the best comic books around (Time magazine has it in their top 100 books of all time). The movie is based in an alternate 1985, where super heroes are illegal and the world stands on the edge of nuclear war with Russia. One major company called 'Veidt' seems to be the dominant producer of almost everything from Trainers to Holidays and this is where it gets interesting....

Via YouTube, people can download various product demos and are invited to create a 15/30/60sec advert that if selected, will feature on the numerous televisions that pepper the Watchmen set. The top 20 have a chance of making it, with a few other prizes thrown in for good measure.

I love the idea of giving Watch-Fans a creative input into a movie that is regularly thought of as un-filmable and has a lot of fans very nervous. Plus, it's nice to see that the movie hasn't lost its integrity and tried to shoe horn in real life products, keeping its feet firmly routed in Alan Moores world.

I wonder how much input advertisers have when their clients product is being used in a movie, for example, did AMV have anything to do with the Guinness spot in Minority Report? Or was that driven by Spielberg?

Either way, UGC in a movie is a great idea and gets the thumbs up from me.

Animated Street Art

2008-05-13T14:01:00.008+01:00

MUTO a wall-painted animation by BLU from blu on Vimeo.

This is quite something to behold and i can't imagine how long it took. Blu, a street artist who seems to have painted walls all over the globe, has produced an animated film, set on the streets of Buenos Aires and southwest Germany. Its pretty freaky, some of his images are bonkers and a little disturbing, but they're strangely delicious at the same time.

Check out some of his static wall art at his website, i'm a big fan of the spikey giant in Verona.

Go on, I Dan Dare you...

2008-05-08T13:04:00.009+01:00

The Science Museum in London is currently hosting a temporary exhibition (Wed 30 Apr 2008 - Sun 25 Oct 2009) demonstrating Britain's post war technological boom.

"After 1945, though war-weary and broke, Britain found huge pride in wartime advances such as radar, penicillin and the jet engine. Discoveries like these were now tipped to kick-start world-beating industries, bring prosperity and bankroll the emerging welfare state.

In an age before globalisation, products from rockets to radios sprang from local roots. Together they reveal a fascinating ‘lost world’ of British design and invention – a glimpse of a time when the TV in the corner was a Murphy, not a Sony."

I've been a firm believer in Comics leading the way in technology for sometime (I have my name down for trials of Captain America super soldier serum, still waiting for the phone call), so I'll be right down there, quick smart. Let me know any feedback you might have.

GTA sales hit £40 million

2008-05-07T22:11:00.009+01:00

Frankly i'm surprised. I'd like to think i'm fairly 'finger on the pulse' with tech and stuff, but for GTA IV to hit £40 million, not dollars but pounds, in its first week of sales! Thats staggering, i mean thats movie cash. Take Two, who own Rockstar Games must be pleased as punch and soon they're rumoured to announce it's sold its 6 millionth copy worldwide.

Chart Track issued figures for first day sales for GTA IV saying the title sold 631,000 copies by close of business. This single day figure is almost as much as the previous sales record holder, GTA: San Andreas, managed in its first week - 677,000 units. Seeing as my co-worker was prepared to set his recently sick mother the task of calling every shop in the south london area in search of a copy, i'm not surprised. My dept is rife with the kind of banter you would expect after an episode of Mighty Boosh and frankly i'm curious, but i've caught my flatmate slumped, asleep infront of our widescreen TV, Xbox remote in hand, with the pause screen flashing, at 4am and i know that i dare not that way go.

Sales are apparently split nearly 50% across consoles which i find surprsing, considering the Xbox sales lead, but i guess that its one of the few genuinely awesome titles available for the PS3 (disclaimer) so people have probably been chewing their nails....

It's fascinating to think that Ironman was set to break the $90 million mark for its opening weekend in the US, and you just think how much PR was involved and what it cost to produce. Rockstar's advertising for GTA IV was minimal in comparison and soon they hope to anounce global profits of $500 million off the back of 6 million copies sold.

Impressive.

Wii TV is live and curious...

2008-05-07T21:28:00.011+01:00

Nintendo have finally released their Wii TV channel to the US as of last night, to mostly promising feedback. In Japan, where the channel was released last November, it offers streaming web video with content such as interviews with Wii game designers. In one video feature, Nintendo legend Shigeru Miyamoto describes the company's upcoming exercise game, Wii Fit.

The service has a selection of features that mostly seem to work so far. The channel features promotional videos and an index of Wii and DS games to help the Nintendo nerd make essential purchasing decisions. It also allows demos of DS games to be sent to your handheld. The 8 titles available for temporary download have already been released, which is a bit poor, but i guess it's a start

They haven't supplied an online store for download, but once you select a game you're keen on, it will only provide you with a recommendation of outlet stores such as Amazon or Wal-Mart, which seems a shame. You'd like to think there was an online purchase , but it would seem the amount of memory required (126 blocks of system memory to download, plus another 126 blocks for temporary data storage) to run Nintendo TV, negates the 'click and play option'.

Other features include monitoring what games you play and when, which, before you renegade Orson Wells 1984 style, is optional. This info is stored and used to help suggest titles that you may be interested in, nice to see that you can manually rate games though, prohibiting too much AI forcing your hand.

It also monitors the TV you use, possibly to check who's doing HD tech, and it seems pretty bias towards recommending Nintendo titles, but that's to be expected i guess.

All round though it seems like a good start, and now they've joined forces with the BBC iPlayer, it would seem like Nintendo have moved one more step ahead of the XBox and the lumbering PS3.

CALM attempt to break records and save lives

2008-03-19T15:28:00.006Z

The charity CALM is trying to raise £50,000 by attempting to break a world record, twice. Two young guys have been asked to try to wear a total of 250 T-Shirts each. The current record is 224 you can watch it here on YouTube. The idea behind the 500/100 campaign, which will be supported by local London paper The Metro and MTV amongst others, is to ask companies to pay £100 to have their company logo on one T-Shirt. Hopefully, this will result in CALM reaching their target (500 T-Shirts=£50,000) and be world beaters at the same time. Check out the teaser film below.

GOOD LUCK CALM!

Lego+Batman=Awesome

2008-03-19T12:34:00.002Z

It's quite amazing what you can do if you've got a few weeks and A LOT of spare Danish building bricks.... Kudos to YouTube user 'Keshen8' who has matched the trailer for The Dark Knight trailer shot for shot, watch out for the truck flipping over, its priceless.

How to give yourself hand cramp...

2008-03-19T12:19:00.004Z

I’m currently learning After Effects and I’ve noticed that you can achieve pretty impressive results with even a limited ability but it would never cross my mind to export my movie as an image sequence, print out every single frame (that’s 25 frames per second my friend) cut out all the images by hand and then stitch it back together in the striking way in which Javan Ivey has done.

Pretty awesome.

There's a whole lot of good in those little O's!

2008-03-19T12:02:00.006Z

Otello, is not just a great name for a breakfast cereal, it’s what Vodafone hope to be a revolution in the way we search for content on mobile devices. The idea is that you could see a poster or read something in a national newspaper, photograph it with your camera phone and then search via the captured image. You would then receive related content via MMS.

This is an exciting prospect and could mark a whole new wave of advertising, that the consumer actually chooses to seek out rather than avoid. Sadly the technology is still very much in its infancy.

Still, to end on an optimistic note, some genius has already cracked it with regards to searching for music . A similar application currently comes as standard on Sony Ericsson handsets.

Emulation is the highest form of flattery...

2008-01-23T13:12:00.000Z

...Or so it would seem, as some young scamp has created a SNES emulator for their iPhone. By sneakily coding an ap which allows you to use the bottom part of the touchscreen as a SNES remote, with the top part of the phone in 32,768 glorious colours (a la Gameboy advance) allowing us all to Tiger Uppercut our way home on the tube via Streetfighter 2.

Check out the Beta test video, and thanks to Engadget for the heads up.

Become a 3D genius in minutes!

2008-01-22T09:19:00.000Z

I once tried to teach myself 3D animation, waaaaaaaaay back in University, suffice to say, we didn't get along and i spent the next two and a half years hunched over a light box drawing frame after frame after frame, desperately trying to be the next Matt Groening.

Well now it would seem my months of tracing may finally come in handy. Those crafty antipodeans at ACVT have whipped up some software that allows the user to trace real objects within video footage:

"The user interacts with VideoTrace by tracing the shape of the object to be modelled over one or more frames of the video. By interpreting the sketch drawn by the user in light of 3D information obtained from computer vision techniques, a small number of simple 2D interactions can be used to generate a realistic 3D model."

If it's half as quick as the video demonstrates, then it could really help revolutionise small to medium budget 3D projects. No more painful building in Maya, just film it and rotoscope it, job done!

I'd love to know if anyone has used it, please let me know your thoughts.

Jonathan Harris's Whale Hunt

2008-01-08T10:45:00.000Z

Jonathan Harris is an artist who works out of Brooklyn, New York. He combines anthropology and computer science to tell stories and explore human experiences. He recently went to Alaska to document the hunt of Bowhead Whales by Inupiat Eskimos, by taking photographs at specific times throughout the trip:

"I documented the entire experience with a plodding sequence of 3,214 photographs, beginning with the taxi ride to Newark airport, and ending with the butchering of the second whale, seven days later. The photographs were taken at five-minute intervals, even while sleeping (using a chronometer), establishing a constant “photographic heartbeat”. In moments of high adrenaline, this photographic heartbeat would quicken (to a maximum rate of 37 pictures in five minutes while the first whale was being cut up), mimicking the changing pace of my own heartbeat."

The photos themselves are fantastic, however its the system that he has designed for us to view his trip that is most special. You can choose 3 different ways of navigating the story (the mosaic version is really satisfying as a user) and the timeline that has been put in place manages to heighten the experience.

Go to thewhalehunt.org and a good old look, its really well thought out project and i for one have found myself drifting back more than once. Johnathan also has his own site number27.org which has details of his previous work.

Something for the weekend sir?

2008-01-08T10:08:00.000Z

My crazy Italian friend sent me this first thing yesterday and it wasn't until i obeyed his instructions of "You must listen with headphones" that i understood the slightly unnerving chaotic look in his eye that he gets when he's found something cool.

Over at Gustavo Moura, who from what i gather is a designer/blogger has come across an awesome demonstration of sound design. I couldn't download the audio, so i urge you to pop over to here, and check it out. Its set in a barber shop and uses a host of different sounds to help your brain create a 3D space, its really freaky and i'll give five English pounds to anyone who doesn't either turn around when someone clicks their fingers or doesn't feel slightly odd when the bag goes over your head.... you'll know what i mean.

Its been a while....

2008-01-08T10:06:00.000Z

Welcome back Fishtankers, and firstly, massive apologies for any lack of interesting or indeed dull news, the run up to last year was fairly hectic and my geek-news fest had to be put on the back burner. Anyhoo, hopefully this will be the beginning of more regular updates so lets get started shall we.....

Wiki Videoville - Musicvideo-arama!

2007-11-20T12:51:00.000Z

A friend of mine at work sent me this and at first i wasn't sure what to make of it, a cursory glance left me thinking too many links and not enough 'stuff'. However on my return i dug deeper, to find a brilliant source of video content. As it's a Wiki site, it's open source allows any budding (or indeed 'budded) film maker to display their work together with a generous amount of contact info, website links etc.

Videoville lets you browse the library by a host of different meta data tags, including the obvious 'Director', 'Artist' and 'Video' but also 'Genres', 'Stylists' and even 'Cliches'. Within minutes i'd watched 2 great clips and followed a link to a cool website for up and coming directors in Brooklyn.... I'm not sure why, i don't live in Brooklyn, but it was easy so why not.

The video/sound quality is excellent (so far) and if it doesn't contain a clip, it will send you to the required site. Slightly odd is that the Quicktimes i found seem to be locked even with QT Pro, but yet the site gives info on how to capture them with freeware, not sure how that sits with some of the people involved, but i guess it'll happen anyway, so may as well make it good quality. There are some dead links, leading you to a list of a Bands songs, with no other info, but thats a small criticism.

All in all, very cool indeed. Go, try it, now.

iPod File Share is back, ding ding round 3!

2007-11-20T12:40:00.001Z

Apple are not going to be happy, I on the other hand, plus millions of frustrated iPod users will be if this works like it says it does. It's called the miShare (someone needs to tell people that if you invent a product that works with Apple, the small case first letter thingy is not mandatory) and as the image shows, allows the harmonious connection of 2 iPods, enabling the users to swap tunes, as well as video, pics etc.

Engadget didn't have much info on the company behind it, but we do know that "The unit is actually running a lightweight Linux installation and is using open source tools to access the iPod as a mass storage device and open up the database files" Cool.

File selection is done by playlists, although how that works with Pics I'm not sure. Now all i need is the ability to get back in my computer.

Paul Rand's Free Advice

2007-11-20T12:27:00.000Z

My dutch counter parts have discovered this great video of an interview with Graphic Designer Paul Rand, thats been jazzed up with some groovy animation. It's a great piece of video and worth watching, advice nuggets such as 'Don't try to be original, just try to be good' should be a mantra for any creative business.

Paul Rand by Imaginary forces

Flickr Book anyone?

2007-11-20T11:44:00.000Z

I can't believe someone hasn't come up with this before.

You know the kind of person I'm talking about. They carry their mobile phone around in their hand, finger poised, quivering over the 'record' button, ready for any moment of hilarity that may come around the corner. I've come a cropper thanks to these Mobile-Michael Moore wannabes (mental note to stop doing 'air drums' when i'm drunk) and now it's only a matter of time before I'm able to watch myself in good Victorian Vision in the form of a Flick Book.

Silent Flicks offers the service of turning any video file into a flickbook, which is such an annoyingly simple idea (export as Targa, print, done), but good on em, especially as its probaby run out of some nerdy students bedroom.

They will also make a flickbook from your photos if you wish, and will except a range of graphics files. Someone should create an Ap for Facebook that lets you push photos from your album, that'd be cool or even via Flickr.....

Dark Knight's viral campaign picks up a gear

2007-10-30T18:16:00.000Z

The oddly named website, whysoserious.com has been the home of Warner Brothers Batman; Dark Knight's viral campaign. So far it has included fake campaign posters for one of the characters (District Attorney Harvey Dent aka 'Two Face') which was later deface by graffti, allegedly by The Joker, as well as a Jack O'Lantern Pumpkin with a Batsmile cut out of it, slowly rotting. Some of the site has required interaction, but not quite to the extent that it does now.

The site has instigated a treasure hunt that appears to take in 21 cities across the US. By clicking on the small cuttings (pic 2) you are asked to solve a clue, which requires the user to physically go and hunt the answer down, which is in the form of a letter it would seem. The letters i assume will spell out some Joker based nugget of info.

It's not rocket science, but i like the way in which it needs people from all over the States to get involved and move away from their computer to help solve the riddle. WB started their viral campaign quite some time ago, so anticipation is high and growing, thanks to this kind of thinking.

"I CAN SEE MY AD FROM HERE!"

2007-10-30T11:03:00.000Z

"Up, up in the air, like my beautiful advertising campaign......" It's not quite got the same ring to it, but Ad Air claim to have taken OOH (Out Of Home) advertising one step further by pasting enormous ground posters onto fields that are adjacent to airport runways. The advertisements are approximately 3 times the size of a standard football pitch (about 315x210m) so big then, and as everyone knows, once you've had to turn off your iPod you're pretty much dedicated to trying to spot where your Nan lives out of the window, so all in all, quite a nifty idea. Not cheap though, as the first spot that was launched in Dubai went for a tasty £80,000..... Check out Reuters report (PS: Watch out for the guys suit collars.... )

Augmented Sculpture... (or Tron Cubes as i like to call them)

2007-10-30T10:25:00.000Z

Pablo Valbuena, an artist based in Madrid (i think) has constructed a sculpture that explores space, time and the relationship between the two.... apparently. All i can really say is to watch the video, it's quite hypnotic. I'm not bright enough to discuss whether it does what he thinks it does, but from a design/aesthetic point of view, i think it's wondefull. Check out his sight here, for more info.

My-Skype anyone?

2007-10-18T16:33:00.000+01:00

Not quite breaking news, as I've meant to write this for about a week, but Skype and MySpace are about to combine their services. This November, MySpace (owned by News Corporation) will add Skype (owned by Ebay) to their instant-messenger software, allowing users to text chat with each other. The most recent version of the software will also allow MySpacer's to make free Internet phone calls to anyone on the Skype network.

It sounds like the perfect fit, Skype is really popular with an estimated 220 million users (majority outside of the US) and there is an overlap with 6.7% using both Aps. However MySpace allows a certain amount of anonymity, as well as providing a sense of security (it's on-line, not face to face), so will people be so keen to take that one step closer to their on-line family?

Whatever happens, it's good news for Ebay as they announced only recently that they think they may have paid $1 Billion dollars over the odds for Skype..... oops.

WOW+Second Life=Blue Mars

2007-10-18T14:57:00.000+01:00

I'm no good at sums (that's 'Math' for our stateside readers), however i imagine there have been a few people trying to figure what result you'd get if you put World of Warcraft and Second Life together in a blender.... Well maybe the answer is Blue Mars. No, it's not a limited edition chocolate bar, it's a soon to be released a virtual world, that hopes to combine the on-line games aspect with Second Lifes community/social bonding.

It's made by a company called Avatar Reality (based in Honolulu, nice) who have based the game on a 'Terraformed Mars' enabling folk to live out the sci-fi dreams, meet some aliens and generally play at being the Jetsons. Technically, it's being aimed at the high end PC users who have quad core processors and nuclear powered graphics cards, so no logging in at work then. Theres currently no mention of user generated content and apparently it will have a basic narrative too, so it sounds little more WOW.

Time will tell though, but i think the idea of (virtually) living in the future, which is richly rendered to look like Half-Life, will be very popular, plus the fact that you have to have high end equipment, is going to appeal to the geeks who pride themselves on being that little bit more nerdy than everybody else. An elite virtual world, where only the uber-tech's live? Sounds like a not too distant future if you ask me.....

There will be a preview of Blue Mars at E for ALL in LA over the next couple of days, check the website for further news.

I CAN'T STAND YOU.... now join my group.

2007-10-18T12:15:00.001+01:00

I'm quite mild mannered and normally reserve my distaste for people, for drunken conversations and slightly overzealous slide tackles on a Sunday afternoon, but now, thanks to some devlish Germans, i can generate a Hatebook account and tell the world about my my least favourite folk.

With features including 'Why I'm better than You' and 'Hate Albums', together with other features not included on Facebook such as a geographical locator, courtesy of Google Earth, so you can track down the people you really despise.

One thing to remember before you jump on board and start your vitriolic rants, is that its not private, anyone can see your posts, so a pseudonym may be a good idea....

Adobe takes on Apples iMovie

2007-10-12T11:03:00.000+01:00

Adobe, in all their wonderfulness, have released a light version of Adobe Premier, which is basically what iMovie used to be before Apple decided to take out all the good stuff. It's PC only, which is a slight shame, however Adobe have admitted that Apples own reduced version of Final Cut put them off. However if its popular, I'm sure a MAC version will not be far away. I'm going to write and see if i can get a beta version to test, so i'll keep you posted. Check out a full review over at PC World

The zombies are coming, the zombies are coming!

2007-10-12T10:08:00.000+01:00

The best thing about viral marketing is that if done correctly, the bloggers and their Internet buddies will do the PR for you. Just look at the way that JJ Abrams new film has gone global, before its even been given a proper name. It's currently known as '1-18-08' or 'Clovefield' and has the Internet buzzing with rumours thanks to a cleverly shot trailer followed swiftly by a small website, ripe for analysis by the Internet hordes.

John Frank Rosenblum, executive producer of Alive, is hoping for a bit more than some decent PR, he's after a whole TV series and channel to distribute it too. Epic Level Entertainment decided to avoid the costly business of making a multi million dollar pilot only to see the series canceled before the theme tune kicks in. They shot 3 small viral videos and set up a number of websites, such as Falcon Rock Command and Science Cannot Save You, that helped increase the buzz amongst sci-fi/zombie nuts.

It's the perfect way of presenting your concept or brand by generating a buzz first with your target audience. It's already got people talking on forums, as they explore the videos for clues about the storyline etc. The main website Falcon Rock Command is releasing a full video preview next week, which apparently will answer a lot of questions, but until then, check out their 2nd viral below.

I hope it gets picked up by a network, but if it doesn't i wonder if it would work as a strictly web only series, with enough support behind it i can't see why not.

Toyota goes all WOW

2007-10-08T16:56:00.000+01:00

I imagine a lot of agencies have been scratching their heads about how best to target the 8 million users in World of Warcraft. Now I'm not sure that your average WOW user will be the same kind of person to go and buy a Toyota 4x4 but kudos, for doing something a bit different, even it is a watered down version of the famous Leroy Jenkins clip.... Check out Toyota's effort below

Now here comes Leroy.....

The IT Crowd - Anti Piracy Ad

2007-10-02T15:44:00.001+01:00

Not really related to anything, i just think it's hilarious....

Dove Onslaught

2007-10-02T14:01:00.000+01:00

Ogilvy's follow up to the award winning 'Evolution' was presented by Steve Hayden, vice chairman of Dove agency Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide, during an Advertising Week conference on so-called "Passionistas" (new research sponsored by Yahoo and MediaVest about the empowered consumers who spread information online.... like me). Evolution is a pretty hard act to follow and 'Onslaught' is probably not as clever as it thinks it is, flashing up images of hot girls and uncomfortable pics of plastic surgery, reminds me a little of film scenes where people are 'reprogrammed'. However, it does make a good point very well, you can't argue with that.

Steam Punk offices

2007-10-01T17:20:00.000+01:00

The very talented guys over at Because We Can were asked to design the entire office interior for a games company called Three Rings, who look like they all wish they worked for Captain Nemo. All the desks and features were tailor made and the employees were able to design their own work stations. It might not be to everyone's tastes, but i love the almost toy like aspect to it and it suits the company down to the ground. They also make a flat-pack couch, although how comfy it is I'm not sure.

Check out all the photos here

Drive-by Light Show

2007-09-26T15:16:00.000+01:00

Watch out, the University of Applied Sciences in Berlin, sounds like a the kind of place I'd hate, too much Math(s) and hard thought. However, a chap called Katrin Klimat and his pals have come up with something far more funky. The only description i can come up with is 'drive-by light graffiti' which doesn't do it justice at all. For automotive companies and the like, it would be a killer advertising ap, plus it made me feel a little like i was in Tron.... I'm beginning to show my age i think.

Check out the video below, if i can find any more info on it, I'll keep you posted. I also found this fantastic image of Light Graffiti too. More pics over at colourlovers.com.

Flat Pack Boom Box

2007-09-26T14:55:00.000+01:00

This i love. It's a cardboard Boom Box for your iPod, it comes flat packed, and after 5 mins of folding and glueing, you too can stroll down the 'sidewalk' throwing out some heavy beats, 'Why Don't You' would be proud.

Also available for the more religious of us, is a faux leather Bible case, protecting your iPods screen not only from scratches but the devils music too, i'm sure.

Check out www.suck.uk.com for more of the same.

Like an iPhone would you? That'll be £1000 please.

2007-09-18T17:23:00.000+01:00

According to Times-online, Apple fans had better start saving up if they fancy an iPhone when it's released on Nov 9th this year. The UK price will be a not so tasty £269, £69 more expensive than it is in the states (hands up who's surprised), this plus the fact that you'll have to sign up for an 18 month contract at a minimum of £35, adding up to a hefty total of £899 (£1,259 if you go for the top tariff).

At first glance that's pricey, I'm already cheesed off at constantly being charged more than the yanks, (more to the point, we moan about it and then we pay it anyway....arrrgh), Apple seem to think we're made of cash, their Apple TV is nearly twice the price per download. However, if you consider that you HAVE to pay a monthly tariff, and that you'd pay £100 for a 8 gig Nano, the combined price isn't quite so crazy, even if it is an expensive outlay.

The phone wont be available in 16 gig mode, just the 8 for us jolly old Brits and it wont have 3G either, plus, after the recent price drop in the states (by nearly $200) will the UK consumer be so keen to jump on the iPhone bandwagon?

Mirror mirror on the wall....

2007-09-18T15:14:00.000+01:00

You may or may not have read a recent blog of mine about Aleph's interactive mirror display, made up from car wing mirrors. Well Daniel Rozin has gone one better and made interactive mirrors and displays from anything he can lay his hands on, including rubbish .

'As an interactive artist Rozin creates installations and sculptures that have the unique ability to change and respond to the presence and point of view of the viewer. In many cases the viewer becomes the contents of the piece and in others the viewer is invited to take an active role in the creation of the piece. Even though computers are often used in Rozin's work, they are seldom visible.'

One of Daniels mirrors is made from a collection of discs, each disc has a radial gradient of black and white on it. The display recognises what is in front of it via a digital camera, mapping each pixel of the image onto an individual disc. The discs rotate independently to recreate the dark/light parts of the image, by rotating accordingly. Check out the vid...

Apple customers non plussed at being ripped off...

2007-09-11T13:57:00.000+01:00

Engadget have had a poll running on peoples reactions to Apple reducing the iPhones price by $200 so soon after it's initial release. Bizarrely enough, the ratio of OK vs annoyed is only 48/52, which i find staggering, considering that the most negative comments are coming from people who don't actually own the phone... WEIRD!

I'm not sure how Apple get away with this, what is it that they do, that makes their customers love them so? Maybe i should buy an iPod to find out.

Any thoughts out there...?

How d’ya like them Apples?

2007-09-11T11:05:00.000+01:00

Apple Keynote September 2007

With almost 110 million iPods sold to date, September 5^th 2007 marked Steve Jobs unveiling of a new/ revamped iPod range said to be the best ever. Well they were always going to better their predecessors but to what degree?

Hold up folks, before we get to that, Jobs wants to talk about ringtones for the iPhone. Oh no, Apple’s gone all Jamster. I can’t stand them at the best of times and certainly don’t want to pay an extra 50p on top of the 79p I just shelled out for a track. Not only that but surely the whole concept of buying ringtones is not only established but perhaps more crucially soon to be redundant as many people have turned to creating their own.

With the shuffle having no more than a lick of paint the first in the new range to be announced is the new iPod video or ‘Classic’ as it is now called. This variation on the established video iPod boasts up to an impressive 160GB capacity but not the widescreen display many were hoping for. Fear not for the unveiling of the ‘Touch’ with 1/10th of the Classics storage. Yes ladies and gents that’s 16 GB enabling you to store, well, I suppose a fair bit of your music collection and maybe a couple of episodes of Family Guy. I think they said something about a Safari web browser, Wi-Fi and a nice widescreen display but all I heard was 16 GBs. Looking to replace my 3 year old player I was logically hoping to better not only its looks, but storage too. In short it could prove to be a revolutionary new product but not in its current state.

As for the collaboration between Starbucks and Apple; I’ve already got access to iTunes music store as part of my Wi-Fi enabled iPod Touch, so why then do I need a Starbucks logo to point me in the direction of that McCartney number they have on a loop each and every time I pop in for a chai tea latte? It’s for that very reason I’m listening to my iPod in the first place.

Arguably most tempting of the range is the revised nano which now incorporates video on its dazzling 2 inch screen, an intuitive cover flow interface and according to the Keynote more storage? Long story short, it doesn't, which is a shame.

The presentation concluded with a $200 decrease in the price of the iPhone. Surely this is all good for the consumer, no? Well you try telling that to the million odd people who already shelled out for one in the first two months of sale. Well, funnily enough this is exactly what Steve Jobs has tried to address on the apple website by offering a $100 credit voucher to existing iPhone customers. Albeit a nice gesture it’s one they shouldn't have had to make. Still, did I mention you can get ringtones for these things now?!

M Fowler

Multi Finger Touch Screen

2007-09-11T10:27:00.000+01:00

I like touch screens and not just because they make me feel like I'm in Minority Report. I think that by bypassing a keyboard or remote, the user is far more involved and for technophobes such as my mum, it lets them get to grips with entertainment and services that they may have previously stayed away from.

This new one made by a company called NEXTRAX is multi-finger touch communication tool, meaning it recognises more than one place of contact, allowing for more advanced options and menus etc. As you can see in the film, it's fairly intuitive and allows for a great amount of info to be accessed with ease. The version being used below is a history programme, allowing users to explore an interactive Inuyama Castle. The most interesting part is being able to explore a particular area and overlay current satellite maps over the top to see how it has altered.

Shrink My Tunes - Lets make things small!

2007-09-07T10:24:00.001+01:00

So the new iPod Touch is amazing and touchy and oooh look it's got a big screen, so i can view all my media.... oh wait, i can't cos it's already full.

Apples new POD on the block may look the business and if smearing your grubby fingers all over the same screen that you actually want to watch, floats your boat, I'm sure you'll be joining numerous Apple fans in spending hundreds of your hard earned pounds on another beautifully designed, but essentially flawed piece of kit (read our review of Steve Jobs latest Keynote here).

However, thanks to 'Shrink My Tunes' you can now fit twice as much music (doesn't work on video yet) on to your MP3 player, without apparently any drastic loss in quality. They claim to use 'content sensitive heuristic algorithms' developed by NASA apparently to reduce the file size of your favourite track. The software is small at 2MB and is currently PC only, and offers little in the realms of options with regards to your file encoding, but it seems like a good place to start.

The offer of halving the space taken up on your MP3 player is too good to pass up, unless of course your music ends up sounding like it was recorded in you mums bathroom. According to Wired, it has varying results, and the claim to reduce 5MB songs to 1.5MB only really applies to people willing to listen to 'internet radio quality' music. However, when reduced by 50% the quality was fairly acceptable. Hear for yourself over at Wired, where they've uploaded a couple of trial clips.

Will this make the new iPod Touch a bigger success? I doubt it, i think it'll have more impact on the new improved iPod Nano, which i liked the look off a lot and am much more inclined to purchase.....

Rubbish companies beware, Plebble is here...

2007-09-04T09:32:00.000+01:00

It's our first news breaker here at Fishtank, thanks to a tip off from one of our new readers, Plebble has been set up by Will and James Patterson, as a true 'e-mocracy' allowing anyone to log on and rate any company that they've had the displeasure (or joy) of using. It's ideal for both parties, as companies now have a source by which they see what average people really think of their customer service (watch out Barclays/Metronet...).

Will Paterson, Plebble’s co-founder, said:

“Consumer dissatisfaction is a big problem in the UK today – not just for consumers but for businesses too. By enabling consumers to share information, Plebble.com helps them find the best service out there while at the same time helping businesses give consumers what they want".

It's a great idea, a little like Metacritic, which reviews anything under the sun and takes an average, you too can see the top (and bottom) 10 companies and see their score. It's super new, so get over to Plebble and get rating, the more people who get involved the better and more accurate their figures will be.

Download their press release here: PDF

What the hell is Pecha Kucha?

2007-09-03T15:51:00.000+01:00

Glad you asked actually. Pecha Kucha is the brainchild of Astrid Klein and Mark Dytham and was designed as a way getting more young designers together to share their ideas, as well as getting a few more visitors to their multimedia event in Japan called SuperDeluxe.

The concept is simple, to prevent people from wittering on in their presentations, Pecha Kucha states that the persons Power Point, must only last for 6min's and 40secs and consist of 20 images only. It means people have to be a lot more imaginative, concise and it keeps interest levels up too. Pecha Kucha (which is Japanese for the sound of chatter aparently) has become globally popular, with special events regularly hosted in over 80 different cities.

Some fans are claiming it as a new art form or poetry, with a beat-the-clock competitive edge thrown in for good measure. Personally, i like the idea of forcing people to be more creative, and treating the presentation as part of their work as opposed to a necessary evil.

Photo Globe - MY IDEA FIRST!!

2007-08-29T14:28:00.000+01:00

I have the sketches to prove it, but this is awfully similar to an idea i had for a 'Travel Client' of ours at work. These guys have used 'NextWindow Human Touch' which is, as far i can find out, is similar software to the Microsoft Surface table that was announced recently, only that it's not multi touch. I love the idea of browsing a globe and being able to see photos/videos straight away from the destination on a map, it's a great mash-up of Google Earth and YouTube, no doubt you could chuck in some Flickr albums too.

It looks a little rough around the edges, but i like the concept (not just cos it's mine...)

Zygote - Spherical fun for everyone

2007-08-29T13:59:00.000+01:00

An interaction design agency called Tangible have designed the Zygote, a large 1.5m ball that floats and changes colour depending on the physical interaction within the enviroment. Punching, kicking and throwing it, will make the LED's change colour. It would be great to have them reactive to sound too, but until then, check out the video below. Skip to 2mins in to see the Zygotes being used at a gig.

Check out http://www.tangibleinteraction.com

Cubism on the Wii anyone?

2007-08-28T16:39:00.000+01:00

I like to think of myself as fairly with it, i play video games (when my girlfriend is out) and can handle as many zombies as you throw at me, but i think I'd struggle to play Echochrome. Echochrome is a videogame based on M C Eschers work, which is a fantastic idea, although i have trouble looking at his work normally, so the idea of chasing bad guys around 'Relativity' (see pic) is enough to give me a migraine.

Looking at the trailer though has intrigued me, its as if Escher made the 80's classic 'Chucky Egg'... whilst drunk. It looks like it
could take some practice, but i love the idea of using Art as a basis for Video games, surely it's only a matter of time before we get the 'Scream' version of Resident evil or perhaps even 'Mario's adventures in the Interpretation of Colour'..... OK, maybe not.

Check out the clip below or go to http://www.gametrailers.com/player/22295.html for more of the same.

ADOBE goes Hi-Def in a FLASH

2007-08-21T13:56:00.000+01:00

It's been in the pipeline for a while, and some people said it was inevitable, but ADOBE has announced it's integration of the H.264 video codec in it's Flash player and encoder. H.264 has been around for a couple of years, most commonly known as the base codec from which Quicktime 7 (and the more recent MP4's) are based. It's a cracking watch, as anyone who watches Apples trailers will know, as it allows for 480, 720p and 1080i encoding, the same basic quality as HD-DVD and Blu-Ray.

The Flash player sits on 98% of computers, which would have something to do with the amount of video websites utilising the software, such as YouTube and Dailymotion. It's a big step in the right direction in bringing TV quality video to the small screen on-line, and will further provoke broadcasters to consider the web along with TV/Film at the same time, instead of as a second thought.

The Hi-Def codec will be made available as part of their upgrade to Flash Video 9 this autumn.

Microsoft have meanwhile been busying themselves with Silverlight, a Hi-Def video codec based around Windows Media 9 called VC-1 and they've already got numerous websites signed up such as MLB.com.

Thanks to NY Times and CNET.

BBC iPlayer Review

2007-08-15T16:42:00.000+01:00

The BBC iPlayer has been available for beta test for a couple of weeks, so i signed up and last Thursday was granted access to the their new toy. The software installed without any complications, which is always a fine start, although you do need an up to date copy of Active X. Clicking on the shortcut, opens up the iPlayer library, which lets you check out your downloaded files as well as the progress of any new progs you've ordered. It's pretty simple and gives you all details you'd want about your selected prog, i.e Name (duh) file size, length and guidance rating just in case you've ordered a particularly racy episode of Strictly Dance Factor X or whatever it's called.

The first thing i realised was that you can't browse the BBC library via the ap on your PC, you have to have to be logged in to the iPlayer page on their website, which, coincidentally, is a different log in to the one you have selected to join the iPlayer service..... Arrrgh Faff!

Once you're logged in, you're reminded ( a little late in the day frankly) that you need to be running Windows XP, on Internet Explorer and have an up to date vsn of Windows Media Player. After i'd switched over from Firefox (does anyone else feel like IE7 is the equivalent of your dad trying to be cool?) i made a
beeline for the A-Z search option, you can also browse via categories and a 'last 7 days' option too.

Finding your desired entertainment is pretty easy, but i'd like more info about each episode, i.e name, original broadcast date etc as all the thumbnails are the same, which isn't great. After you've trawled through all the episodes of 'Honey we're killing our Kids' to find the one you want, you hit download, more often than not it will ask you to log in again.... Grrrr.

The file appears in your library instantly, where you can keep an eye on the status of your download. All 3 files i ordered, arrived very quickly, although i think i have my works Internet connection to thank for that. The progs are organised under the series name etc, and the library shows you your files lifespan (between 24/28 days it seems) amongst other facts.

Clicking on the play button, brings up a slightly excessive 'Click to Confirm' warning, which is plain odd. The player is simple but effective, and allows full screen viewing which is OK, considering file size etc. Other options include being able to play it in WMP. Navigating through your episode though is awful and could do with a more accurate point and click method or some chapter points maybe.

If you have a dig around the other preferences, you can choose to alter where your files are stored, alter your proxy settings and parents can activate a PIN service which is nice, and would be essential i should imagine if this was an ITV service considering the amount of dross that's on normally. The files are Windows Media 9, and are a native dimension of 672x384 but i'm sure they vary and seem to be about 150MB for a 30min TV programme. I have yet been able to crack them, but i'll keep you posted.

Frankly, the iPlayer does exactly what it says on the tin, but I'm glad it's only a beta vsn. The browsing is a little clunky and the excessive double username and password is slightly prohibitive to the average user. I was impressed with the download and quality of the progs, and it's interesting to see so many little features stolen from bit torrent, within their library facility (you'll know them when you see them). What i would really like though is the ability to subscribe to a series, similar to Sky Plus, with perhaps the ability to move the files onto a portable player, then again, maybe not, the last thing i need is to be sat next to someone watching Eastenders on the Tube, my commute is bad enough already.

Click on the pics, for bigger vsns.

Interactive Mirror Display by Aleph

2007-08-07T14:05:00.000+01:00

If you've ever sat and wondered what it would be like to look into the eye of a fly, I'm fairly sure that this visual display would come pretty close. It's called Aleph and has been built by two rather clever bods based in Sweden. It's made up of a large collection of motorised mirrors that angle individually, based on whatever is in front of the array. The really snazzy thing is that the movement and visual recognition is automatic. I think the video explains the concept far better than i can.

There's something extremely relaxing about watching the dance of the mirrors, and as the website suggests, this display on a really large scale would be very cool indeed.

Bespoke Digital Advertising courtesy of Costa Rica

2007-08-06T12:04:00.000+01:00

David W. Kenny, the chairman and chief executive of Digitas, the advertising agency in Boston is claiming that "It is only a matter of time until nearly all advertisements around the world are digital." Now, forgive me, i'm not a multi million dollar exec, but i'd kind of come to that assumption a while ago, maybe David's PA wants to nip out and grab him a copy of Wired and new iPod, quickly get him up to speed....

Mr kenny is claiming he's revolutionising the entire Publicis worldwide conglomerate, which contains agencies like Saatchi & Saatchi and Leo Burnett. The plan (and here's where things get clever) is to use cheaper off shore agencies to produce thousands of versions of various ad's and by crunching (a lot of) data will be able to select which spots to show, whenever a person logs onto a media network, be it the net, TV or their mobile.

The Digitas/Publicis partnership, hopes to harvest a bucket load of metadata about peoples viewing history and habits, and to be honest it sounds like a simple enough idea, why use one ad when 4000 individualy tailored ones will do.

Check out: http://www.nytimes.com/pages/business/media/index.html For more info.

Robbie Dingo's "Watch the Worlds"

2007-08-02T16:17:00.000+01:00

I've seen various different Machinima, which tend to range from the 'OK' to the 'Should not of bothered'. I appreciate the technical difficulties of making a short from video games or in world footage, and as a regular user of Snapz i sympathise with anyone who creates anything over 10secs.

But Robbie Dingo has made something enormously impressive, not only with the film itself, but with its source material too. The film documents his recreation of Van Gogh's Starry Night, as a 3D village within Second Life, which is beautifully created on a temporary sim. It's fascinating to watch it grow and develop and a little Don Mclean never hurt anyone either.

For me though, it truly demonstrates what can be achieved in SL if you start thinking outside the box, uber-companies beware, there are folk out there producing stunning projects like this independent of media buyers, planners and 4 hour conference calls....

Check the film below or down load the hi-res vsn from here, it's worth the wait:
http://blip.tv/file/get/RobbieDingo-WatchTheWorlds144.mov

DeLorean is back, for the future!

2007-08-01T11:17:00.000+01:00

I'm soooooo putting my name down on the waiting list, just have to save up a little. I wonder if they'll do a hover conversion model too......

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/6925533.stm

Sky jump into bed with Sony

2007-07-30T17:26:00.000+01:00

If i had this blog about a year ago, it would have been filled with many a moan about Sony's PSP and it's ever changing firmware. The main reason i invested in one was so i could watch my own movies etc on the go, but the Sony bigwigs soon got wind of this and released an essential software upgrade, which in turn mean't you could only watch Sony approved content..... Extremely annoying.

The available UMD's were and still are far too expensive, and i left the faff of hacking the firmware to my uber-geek friends, meaning my nice shiny black PSP has been gathering dust for a while, but hopefully not for much longer.

Sony Europe and Sky have announced plans to make a host of the most popular Sky content available for download for the PSP, ranging from Sky Sports highlights to episodes of Lost. Obviously, this being Sky, i'm positive there'll be a charge and you'll probably have to have Sky at home to access the content, but it could be a new dawn for the little black unit.

“The Joint Venture company, with equal Board level representation from Sky and Sony Computer Entertainment Europe will draw on the unrivalled entertainment aggregation expertise and technical leadership of SKY, and the handheld entertainment knowledge and brand power of PlayStation. The company will establish PSP and the new ground breaking video download service as the natural partners for those seeking the ultimate choice of portable entertainment content.”

Lets just hope that they make the most of it, as the 2.3 million UK PSP owners deserve more, and Sony should really be topping the portable media player market, instead of playing catch up.

Wii-ing in Second Life

2007-07-30T10:02:00.000+01:00

As Nintendo continue to show the big boys of Sony and Microsoft how it's done, it would seem they have started to pick up some friends in high places, such as David E Stone over at MIT. He's a big fan of the Wii remote and see's it as "one of the most significant technology breakthroughs in the history of computer science." Stones big idea, is combining the innovative gryoscopic mouse with the interactive 3D space within Second Life to move away from playing virtual golf and create enviroments within second life to help replicate hands on training for anything from Surgery to Engineering.

It's a interesting idea, that i think could work, expecially if Linden Labs get involved from the get go. The ability to build and create all manner of shapes and tools via the Prims means the applications could be endless as well as the cost ramifications, with companies able to train multiple employees all at a once, in high risk jobs, in the safety of their office, or even their home, from anywhere around the globe.

Check out: http://www.wired.com/gadgets/miscellaneous/news/2007/07/wiimote