May 2005 Archives (17 posts)
Distress Phone
The next time I’m having a stressful day, a problem or even a crisis I’ll just head down to Ashbridges Bay and talk to the friendly people on the Distress Phone. It looks like it might be free too! Bonus!
I took this photo during lunch (I have to say that so the wife thinks I’m not gallavanting around the city taking pictures instead of working) while walking around Ashbridges Bay. I’ll post more a little later on Bombippy Photos.
Posted in Observations at 3:40 PM | Comments (0)
Fashion Trends
Lately I’ve noticed some fashion trends that are, disturbing.
Last week, I actually saw a man with a mullett hair-cut walking along Kingston Road in Scarborough. Didn’t this go out of style with Billy Ray Cyrus? I am no officially embarassed to be living in Scarborough.
Last summer I blogged about women who shouldn’t be wearing tiny t-shirts. Like dandelions in Toronto, this fashion trend seems to be getting out of hand.
I’m happy for all of you ladies that are proud of your bodies but do we really need to see you wearing your daughter’s t-shirts? Do we really need to see your Molson muscle (gut) hanging out of your shorts? Don’t get me wrong. A lot of women can pull of this look but far too many should be putting on another layer before they leave the house. Either that or hit the treadmill for a couple of weeks.
The other fashion trend that has been getting on my nerves lately is the baseball cap with the sunglasses on top. It’s almost like a uniform for some guys. You never see them wearing the sunglasses, they just sit on top of their caps.
I know I’m going to receive some negative feedback for the tiny t-shirt comments. Bring it on! What fashion trends get on your nerves?
Posted in Observations at 1:30 PM | Comments (4)
Revenge of the Sith
Yesterday I went with the boys to see Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005) at Festival Hall. It’s a good thing we went to the 4:20 PM show because the crowds were brutal for the next show.
Any doubts that you may have about George Lucas’ ability to make a decent film can now be put to rest. Revenge of the Sith is a good film. I walked out of the theatre feeling completed satisfied. I was so pumped that I wanted to go home and watch the original Star Wars.
The entire film is rich with detail, incredible special effects and plenty of dazzling action. Gone are the goofy characters like Jar-Jar and the lame attempts to sell toys with cute little Ewoks. This a much more serious movie as far as Star Wars films go.
The transformation of Anakin Skywalker into Darth Vader is awesome. It was also interesting to see how the hair styles became more 70s like near the end of the film. The uniforms worn by the Empire were beginning to look a lot like 1976 all over again at the end of the film. I thought Lucas did a nice job of wrapping up the Star Wars franchise and blending it with the first one.
I will definitely be going back in line to see this one again.
Posted in Movies at 3:01 PM | Comments (3)
They Sold Me Out
Sold me out for a few shekels and divided up my robes
They sold me out
It’s the oldest story that’s ever been told
They sold me out
Didn’t even give it no shred of doubt, no, no
They sold me out
Didn’t even sit down and try to figure it out
They just sold me out
For the few shekels more, they didn’t even think twice
For a few shekels more, another minute in the spotlight
My own people did it to me just ‘cos they could
They sold me out
So beware brother it could happen to you
For the few shekels more, they didn’t even think twice
Just for a few shekels more, another minute of two in the spotlight
My own people did it to me just ‘cos they could
They sold me out
Got to beware brother it just might happen to you
They sold me out
Sold me out for a few shekels and they divided up my robes
They sold me out
It’s the oldest story that’s ever been told
They sold me out
Sold me out for a few shekels and divided out my robes
They sold me out
It’s the oldest story that’s ever been known
They sold me out
They sold me out
They sold me out
They sold me out
— Van Morrison
I’m listening to this song off the new Van Morrison album—Magic Time. The simplicity of the music reminds me of U2’s “In A Little While”. The spriritual tone of the lyrics is pretty clear. It’s the type of song that I can play 10 times in a row and never tire of it.
Posted in Music at 10:45 AM | Comments (6)
Worst pile of crap architecture
You gotta love the Donald. Yesterday, Donald Trump held a press conference at Trump Tower to say that architect, Daniel Liebeskind’s design of the Freedom Tower for the World Trade Center “is the worst pile of crap architecture I’ve ever seen in my life.”
Trump went on to say that the Freedom Tower model “looks like a junkyard, a series of broken-down angles that don’t match each other. And we have to live with this for hundreds of years?”. So what is Donald’s solution? Another set of Twin Towers that are one story taller than the orignial.
I’d have to agree with Trump. New York just doesn’t look like New York without the Twin Towers.
Good luck trying to get people to work on the 70th floor though. Insurance for any space in those buildings will be a tad expensive. And how do you stop a 747 from taking them out again? Do you put a couple of Black Hawk helicopters on the roof of each tower?
It could take years before something gets built at the World Trade Center and I hope Donald uses his “persuasion” to make it happen soon.
Posted in News at 2:03 PM | Comments (13)
New music
A lot of great CDs have been released in the last couple of months. Lately, I’ve been purchasing my music through iTunes Music Store. Yeah, I actually prefer to buy my music rather than steal it. I must be getting old.
I listen to 90% of my music at my desk while I work. iTunes is constantly shuffling through the 19 GB of songs on my G5. So what new music have I been listening to lately?
Magic Time—Van Morrison
I picked this up today at Future Shop. I’m listening to it now and think its great. Van is my favourite musician—a true artist. I started really listening to him in 1990 when he released the album Enlightenment.
The Forgotten Arm—Aimee Mann
I listened to The Forgotten Arm via QuickTime about three times in a row then I went out and bought it. The album is catchy with no filler. The artwork on the CD is beautifully done. I’m glad I bought the disc instead of downloading it.
Guero—Beck
Beck is back. His last album, Sea Change was pretty depressing. This album is a lot of fun, innovative and addictive. Beck refuses to conform to a popstar mold that is predictable and ultimately boring. This is easily the best album of the year in my opinion.
Devils & Dust—Bruce Springsteen
Just Bruce and a guitar. Mellow, great songwriting and moody. The lyrics in “Reno” through me for a loop. I’ll let you figure it out if you don’t know what I’m talking about. Solid album. I never cared much for Springsteen until the last five years. I think the guy is a genius.
Make Believe—Weezer
Catchy. Fun. I wouldn’t say this album is stellar but if you like any of their earlier stuff, you’ll enjoy their latest disc.
Martha Wainwright—Martha Wainwright
I purchased this one on iTunes for Lissa. It grows on you after you listen to a few times. On the mellow side and nice to work to. Track 9 is my favourite.
Hotel—Moby
Not as good as Play but still a good album. The cover of New Order’s “Temptation” is nice. The second disc of instrumental music doesn’t do much for me. I watched the video for “Beautiful” on iTunes the other day and I think the little man with funky glasses has lost it. I still like his music.
Posted in Music at 3:17 PM | Comments (1)
A bunch of dummies
On my way to work the other day I noticed that Birchmount Stadium had a lot of people in the stands. Then I noticed the familiar white movie trucks. The extras didn’t seem to move very much. When I got closer I realized why—they were a bunch of dummies.
ESPN is shooting a TV movie called Four Minutes (2006). It’s a story about Roger Bannister who broke the four minute mile on May 6, 1954. CBC has some great archival footage of the whole race here.
I took some more photos from behind some trees while they were filming—security asked me not to shoot any pictures earlier so I had to be a little more discreet. Below is a shot of some guys crossing the start-finish line.
Posted in Movies at 4:30 PM | Comments (3)
Kill Zone 2 on PS3
Take a look at this trailer for Kill Zone 2 on PS3 and your jaw will drop. This is a camcorder copy of the trailer and it looks unbeliavable.
I might have to find the time to get back into playing video game. It looks like the new PS3 and the XBox 2 are going to make today’s crop of video games look like 1979 all over again. Can’t wait!
Posted in Technology at 2:23 PM | Comments (95)
Must watch more movies
I’m still working 7 days a week and keeping insane hours which means, I haven’t watched a movie in what seems like an eternity. So over the weekend I stayed up until 3 AM on Friday and Saturday to catch up on a few popcorn flicks.
National Treasure 2004 is a dumbed-down version of The DaVinci Code. It’s your basic, over-produced, Bruckheimer popcorn movie. Lots of action, mediocre story and quite predictable.
The Forgotten (2004) made me realize how much I miss the X-Files. Aliens, government conspiracies, abductions, mystery! Another popcorn movie but much more satisfying than National Treasure.
The sound editing in this movie is excellent! This is a DVD you’ll want to turn up and jump out of your seat at certain points. This was the best movie I watched this weekend.
Suspect Zero (2004) is the last movie I watched. I felt like I was watching another version of Seven that was only half as good. This was an average serial killer movie at best. I was hoping for a lot more in Ben Kingsley’s character but was disappointed when it was over.
Posted in Movies at 9:16 PM | Comments (0)
Tablet Macintosh?
The Mac Observer posted a story yesterday that Apple was granted a patent for a tablet Macintosh. This story first appeared last August in the The Register. Now that Apple has a patent for this device, what’s next?
There were rumours back in December of 2003 that Apple was working on a tablet Macintosh, that it was going to be released any day. The latest iMacs could be considered “oversized” tablet Macs perched on aluminum stands. If they can make the iMac a little smaller and a lot lighter you have a tablet Mac.
Combine a tablet Mac with a built-in camera and you have a video phone. Combine it with the new video services from Rogers and Bell and you have a portable TV. Throw in iTunes 5 (which will probably incorporate iPhoto, now that QuickTime video is included in iTunes 4.8) and you have a nice, digital hub.
John Sculley’s vision of the Knowledge Navigator, a tablet Macintosh controlled by voice and a pen, are probably six months away from being a reality. I can remember seeing those videos at York University about 15 years ago. I thought it all looked pretty far-fetched. Today, there is no reason why a Knowledge Navigator shouldn’t exist.
Below are various clips of the Knowledge Navigator videos (QuickTime format).
Navigator — 0:47 (1.7 MB)
Rain Forest 0:48 (1.7 MB)
Knowledge Navigator — 5:57 (14.9 MB)
Posted in Apple at 9:52 AM | Comments (0)
Advanced Exposure Techniques
Somehow I found 3 hours on Friday night to attend a photography course at Henry’s—Advanced Exposure Techniques. Great course.
I’m one of those people that always used the automatic settings on my Canon Rebel SLR film camera until I made the switch to digital—Canon Digital Rebel XT. Being able to review my photos immediately on an LCD screen allows me to be more creative and experiement.
Having a better understanding of exposure mechanics has helped me a great deal in taking better pictures (okay debatable). Finding the time to take photos is my biggest challenge at the moment. The only way I’m going to improve is by taking a lot more photos and learn from my mistakes.
At the moment I can’t get enough of British photography magazines. There seems to be an endless supply of them on the newstands and I’m slowly weeding out the good ones. I’m also reading the owner’s manual for the Rebel XT as if it was the latest Dan Brown novel.
I must have taken a couple of hundred photos over the weekend but have only posted a couple at Bombippy Photos. I’m becoming a lot more selective on what I post these days—quality over quantity. Even then, I know that these aren’t great photos but I’m learning. You get to watch if you like.
Posted in Photography at 11:59 PM | Comments (3)
Finder Slideshows
Just discovered this by accident. If you select a bunch of images in a window and right-click or control-click on them, you can create a slideshow.
The controls within the slideshow are impressive. Click on the “index” button and you’ll see a cool animation that creates an index of all of the images you selected.
There is also a “fit to screen/actual size” button. Click on it to see your image zoom to fill the screen and zoom back down to original size.
The animation in this little applet is gorgeous. Try it out.
Posted in OS X Software at 11:57 PM | Comments (1)
Some Tiger Observations
After using the new version of OS X for a couple of days, I’ve noticed a few minor changes in the way things work.
Safari
- bold text now looks like crap, especially bold white text on a black background
- downloading .zip or .sit archive gives you a warning that the archive could contain a virus (is there a way to turn this off?)
Finder
- emptying the trash plays a crinkled paper sound
- when an application crashes a dial box gives you the option to “Reopen” the application
- screen grabs are now saved as PNG files instead of PDf
- Burn Folders is a great idea for archiving files to CD/DVD
Widgets
- the new Calculator widget is kind of useless if you have to do multiple calculations—open Dashboard, click on calculator, perform calculation, copy number, go back to appliation, paste number, open Dashboard… (I’ll stick with the old Calculator that is nestled in my Dock)
Best reasons to upgrade—RSS feeds in Safari and Automator.
Best reasons not to upgrade—font antialiasing problems and the lack of really useful new features worth $149.00 CDN.
Posted in OS X Software at 3:42 PM | Comments (6)
Canon Digital Rebel XT
I recently took some photos in the RAW format with my new Canon Digital Rebel XT. I discovered that Photoshop won’t open them, yet. I never thought to use Canon’s software—Digital Photo Professional. Neither did David Pogue of the New York Times (see his article titled, A Cumbersome Picture)
Pogue took a bunch of photos in RAW format and couldn’t open them afterward. It turns out that and old shareware application, Graphic Converter can open the Digital Rebel XT’s RAW files. Maybe Adobe should hire them to work on their RAW plug-in support.
If you’re interested in digital photography you may want to read Pogue’s review of digital cameras a from a couple of weeks ago. He has a slideshow comparing images shot with the Canon Digital Rebel XT and the Nikon D70S.
Posted in Photography at 12:39 AM | Comments (0)
A Quick Peek at Longhorn
PCMAG.com has some screenshots of Microsoft’s new operating system (due out sometime in the distant future). Is it just me or is Longhorn looking more Mac OS X-like?
Take a look at Internet Explorer screenshot and tell me that it doesn’t look a lot like Safari. The interface is gray, has rounded edges (no drop shadow yet) and notice the search area in the top right.
From a graphic design perspective, the “new look” is pretty unimpressive. I guess Redmond has been spending more time on developing better security at th OS level? What is going to compel existing XP users to shell out for Longhorn anyway?
Posted in Technology at 12:12 AM | Comments (2)
Metallica: Some Kind of Monster (2004)
Awesome!
My brother gave me this DVD to borrow and I wasn’t expecting much. The reviews for this doc have been great but I still wasn’t dying to see it. For me, Metallica was a band that peaked in the 90s. I thought their last album, St. Anger fell short of the material they released in the past and I never bothered purchasing a copy (or downloading it from Napster).
This documentary has renewed my interest in the band and it’s a great example of the magic in documentary filmmaking. What started out as a doc about the making of an album and group therapy sessions led to a lot of exciting drama—lead singer James Hetfield left the band to go into rehab for almost a year. This was totally unexpected and at the time, left the future of the band and the documentary in question.
The tension after Hetfield’s return is brutal. There are fights, reunions, the hiring of a new bass player, mixing sessions with hip hop artists and more. There are some really great moments captured here that give the audience and fans a glimpse into the lifestyle and struggles of a rock band.
You don’t have to be a Metallica fan to enjoy this documentary. Highly recommended.
Posted in DVD Reviews at 9:47 AM | Comments (1)
CONTACT 2005
CONTACT, the Toronto Photography Festival begins today. Among the many gallerys all over the city that are showing some great work, there are some public installations that you should look out for.
David Byrne, former lead singer of The Talking Heads has several installations along Queen Street West in transit shelters. How cool is that?
Posted in Photography at 4:36 PM | Comments (1)
