Daughter sends first chain email

That’s it!  Our 9.5yo has done it… she has forwarded along her first chain email.  To both Wifey and me.

I read the message and smiled at her innocence.  The message reads:

Money Angel
this is a money angel Pass it to 6 of your good friends, or family and be rich in 4 Days.

I wonder whether she actually thinks she’ll get rich in 4 days. I have tried to train her to not click on popups, but with the odd VBScript virus appearing on our computer once in a while, I don’t think she’s learnt yet.  

Isn’t it weird that I see this as a milestone.   How technology changes and affects our lives.   When I was a kid, this wouldn’t even be a possibility!  No.. hang a sec..  there were those BBS’s that you could dial into…

I better have a talk to our daughter about chainmails and get rich schemes soon.

Or maybe I should wait 4 days just in case

Daddy photographer

There was a beautiful pink sunset with soft high wispy clouds in the sky on Monday evening.  I was thinking that I should’ve gone to the beach to take some shots.  But I didn’t in the end.

Anyways, I was in the car on the way to pick up my 9.5yo daughter from a sleepover.  In the car on the way home, she said that she was out walking with her friend and their dog when she, too, saw the beautiful sky.  She told me that she immediately thought of me because she thought I would like to take a photo of it

Awwww…  am I that much of a photo nerd?

This hobby obviously has sculptured the impression she has of me.   It made me wonder, how have your parents’ hobbies changed you?

RIP Frankie Manning

A sad day for Lindy Hoppers around the world.

Frankie Manning, the “founder” and “ambassador” of Lindyhop, has passed away.  Frankie was about to turn 95, and had still been dancing up until last year.  Yep, in his nineties and STILL dancing…

Lindyhop is a type of jazz partner street dance, that grew in the U.S. in the 1930s.  Lindyhop now doesn’t really refer just to the dance moves, but encompasses the whole culture around the dance in that period – the swing music, the clothing, the reasons behind the dancing itself.

Frankie was a huge element of the lindyhop, credited for creating many of the moves, especially the first aerial/air step.   Frankie gave lindyhop the exciting, energetic, frenetic and acrobatic style.  Lindyhop had a resurgence in the 1980s and has since grown into a worldwide dancing scene, mostly for the 18-30 year old population.   Dancers dress up in “vintage” style, guys wear baggy high pants with a waistcoat and cap, put on two tone shoes that have been sueded, girls wear vintage dresses with vintage hair dos.

Cities around the world regularly host an annual lindyhop “exchange” – basically an excuse for a massive dance party, with nightly dances, live music and classes, usually attracting many out of towners.

I was lucky to meet Frankie on a few occasions.  I will never forget SEAJam, the Singapore Lindyhop Exchange where the Harlem Hotshots performed a show, and invited a 90+ year old Frankie up to the stage to dance Cottontail with them.  Amazing…   Or the lessons where he still exuded so much enthusiasm and spirit…  Or the talks he gave on life in the 30s and 40s and dancing back then…  Or the many stories he saved away in his book…  Or his big smile.

This last weekend, Perth had another of its exchanges, called the Hullabaloo.  I was DJ’ing last night at the last dance and that’s when we found out that Frankie had just passed away.

It was so sad and surreal…   the founder of the dance style that we were all doing last night passing away.  But his legacy, his dance, still living on and being done at the same time…

Instead of a minute silence, we all did the shim sham, a lindyhop line dance, to Tuxedo Junction – the dance that everyone does with Frankie when he travelled around the world to many lindyhop exchanges.  For a dance that is so happy and carefree, I have never felt so sad dancing it…

Frankie, may you Rest In Peace.  May you look upon us all on Earth with a smile on your face as you are living on each day here, through thousands of dancer’s memories, souls and feet…

More information here:

http://www.yehoodi.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=85869

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/28/arts/dance/28manning.html?_r=1

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/arts/2009/04/27/2009-04-27_lindy_hop_great_hospitalized.html

Buffer Overflow on Sony Handycam!

On the weekend, I was assigned to video’ing duties at a friend’s wedding.  No problems – I’ve got a Sony HDR-SR7 High Definition handycam.   I have the amateur gear to capture the pixels.

So, the ceremony happened, signing, photos, speeches and LOTS of food!

With typical Chinese weddings, there was a table by table Yum Seng which was really fun.  I love seeing the expressions on family and friends, who are normally or seemingly conservative, but at the Yum Seng, shout their hearts out.   It came to our table’s Yum Seng.   We were determined to be the loudest – and then…   a Blue Screen of Death on the handycam appeared with the words “Buffer Overflow”…  AAARRGHGHHH!!!   Had I just lost the entire Yum Seng footage?   No wayyyyyy!!

Next, “Recovering Data”, and then “Data Lost”.  NOOOO!!!    I quickly restarted the handycam, pressed the Record button again to keep going.    We all ended up doing a entire combined Yum Seng.   This was awesome – EVERY table on their feet, yelling Yum Seng at the top of their voices.   And then it happened again, “Buffer Overflow”.  I couldn’t believe my eyes.    If I had the time, I would’ve taken a photo and tweeted, but no…   had to get the handycam back recording again.

It left a bad sick feeling in my stomach for the rest of the evening.  I couldn’t wait to get home and analyse the videos on the camera to see if I really had lost the footage.

Got home, started the Handycam Utility, downloaded all the video.

And the Yum Seng footage was there!   *sigh of relief* except for the parts when I got the Blue Screen of Death.   But that was only 2 small parts.   I was soooo relieved.   I’d never had a problem with recording before and have recorded hours and long stretches at once.

A quick Google search shows that it’s probably related to the volume of sound.   Which lines up to my experiences.  Our own table’s Yum Seng when I was shouting away, and also the full room Yum Seng.

I haven’t tried yet, but you can probably reproduce it by shouting/screaming into the handycam.   So, tip for the day – watch out if you’re recording really loud sounds.   But don’t worry – you won’t lose any previous footage you’ve video’d.

Buffer Overflow Error – http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/archive/index.php/t-888712.html

Another Report of Buffer Overflow on loud sounds – http://www.volnation.com/store/index.php?Operation=CustomerReviews&ItemId=B000PQJGFO&ReviewPage=4

YouTube Symphony Orchestra

Well, it’s nearly time for the YouTube Symphony Orchestra concert! 

I’ve noticed a bit of news coverage over the last day or two about it in Australia.   Like this one on the Sydney Morning Hearld website – http://www.smh.com.au/news/technology/web/video-in-symphony/2009/04/14/1239474911896.html.

I did have to re-upload my final Tan Dun video a month or two ago to be potentially used in the video mashup.  I hope my video makes the cut!   That will mean that the video of myself playing the Tan Dun symphony may appear for a split second at Carnegie Hall! 

But.. oh.. I wish I had maybe chosen a different audition piece, like the Brahms Symphony.   It might have increased my chances of getting through (looking at the proportion of finalists who played that as their audition piece).    My lesson learnt – don’t choose the audition piece until you’ve heard and had a play through each one!   Oh well, maybe there’ll be a next time…

Converting music to mp3

How do you encode your CDs into MP3′s?

Lots of people probably use iTunes or Windows Media Player.  You may think that it doesn’t matter – mp3′s are all the same.  The truth is it isn’t.  The quality of the music stored in an mp3 can vary depending on many factors.  Just think of it as this process:

1) Source music material – is the source a CD, tape, radio, etc?  Obviously, the cleaner and better the source, the better sounding mp3 you’ll end up with.

2) Read the source music material – if the source is a CD, is the CD defective or scratched?  There are specific programs for the PC that are better at reading and correcting bad reads from a CD than others. 

3) Encode the source music material – now that we have the source audio in raw format, the computer will need to encode it into an mp3 format.  The quality of mp3 depends on many factors here like the amount of compression (which affects the final output size), compression method (eg. variable bit rate, constant bit rate, etc) and especially the mp3 encoding algorithm.  Also not all mp3 software compressing tools are the same. 

4) Decoding the MP3 – playing back the mp3 means uncompressing the mp3 file and playing it back through your speakers/headphones.  The quality of music at the end will also depend on how the mp3 is uncompressed and processed to sound better.

Enthusiasts (read geeks) on the internet have played around with many mp3 encoding settings and performed many tests over the years to come up with the “best” settings for mp3 encoding.  The “best” settings have also changed over time as new combinations of mp3 encoding settings are found and tested.  (Anyone remember r3mix?).  “Best” of course is also a balance between file size and sound quality.  With large 1 and 2TB drives being common nowadays, there are many people who recommend just using a “lossless” format (basically an identical copy of the original music).  Unfortunately, portable music/media devices don’t have that much space, so compressing to a lossy format is a workaround we’ll need for a while more.

So what should you look out for?

• You may want to change the program you use to encode mp3s to LAME.  It’s not the most user friendly program out there (being a command line utility), but there are other programs that use it, like EAC.
• Use a Variable Bit Rate.   This means that the parts of the music that is more detailed will use space, but the parts of the music that is not so detailed will use less.   It’s also related to the frequencies in the music.   For example, if you’re encoding old recordings that had a limited frequency range, they will take up less space than a constant bit rate encoding.

I’ve been using this set of software and settings recently:

• EAC (Exact Audio Copy) – this program has advanced algorithms to ensure that a CD is read as accurately as possible
• LAME 3.97 – this is the latest recommended mp3 encoder

 

There are quite a few good guides on using these software on the net, but sometimes it’s not easy to find where to start.  Here are some links to start with:

• Recommended LAME settings – http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=LAME
• EAC and LAME – http://wiki.hydrogenaudio.org/index.php?title=EAC_and_Lame
• MP3 Tools – http://www.hydrogenaudio.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=28124

Waking up early for School Holidays

School holidays are finally here!

Our kids have been waiting for ages to just have time to do their “own thing”.  So much so, that today, they woke up early…  actually earlier than they normally would on a school day!   Why is that?   I wonder how their body knows whilst they are sleeping that it’s NOT a school day and that they can wake up early?   If only I can trigger that chemical reaction/brain activity in their bodies/brains on normal school days!

On the way to the bathroom this morning, I peeked in our 9.5yo’s bedroom and saw her working at her desk.

She heard me coming, immediately turned around, covered up her artwork on her desk and warned “Go away!”

I think she’s making Happy Easter cards for all of us    How adorable!

Installing a strap button

I’ve been using a shoestring strap on my Seagull S6+CW acoustic guitar for a while and it just isn’t working for me.   As the shoestring is tied around the headstock of the guitar, it changes the tuning of all the strings as the neck is pulled back and forth when I’m playing.  Not good when playing with fixed pitch instruments like a piano!

I decided that I need to change the type of strap.   But one problem – the Seagull doesn’t come with a strap button on the neck.  Why?!??!  At least Seagull have published some instructions on their site on where to install a strap button.   If you’re thinking of doing this yourself – you MUST read their notes or else you might end up drilling into a bolt.

http://www.seagullguitars.com/strap%20pin%20installation.pdf

And a quick Google shows a few walkthroughs on how to install a strap button onto a Seagull guitar.

http://www.ehow.com/how_4810761_put-strap-seagull-guitar.html

http://www.ehow.com/how_4550192_install-strap-button-seagull-guitar.html

I was definitely NOT looking forward to drilling a hole into the beautiful wooden body, but in the end, it worked out fine.   Here’s my adventure in pictures!

Marked the spot

About to drill

Just drilled the hole

Screwing in the strap button

All done

Hank Marvin at the Ellington

We were pretty tired on Friday last week…. and we so nearly didn’t make it to the Ellington.  The lure of sitting on the couch in home clothes with the girls, watching a DVD with the kids was overpowering!  But we had bought tickets, so we pulled ourselves there and what a wonderful night we had! 

At first, I was skeptical about whether Hank Marvin would be able to pull this off, but I think it worked in the end.  It’s a bit weird, but my parents and my Wifey’s parents were the generation to listen to The Shadows.  As with kids and their parent’s music tastes, Wifey had quite a bit of exposure to Hank’s early days.  Lately, Hank has been dabbling in the gypsy jazz style of guitar that Django Reinhardt is famous for.

From looking around at the average age on Friday night – I’m guessing that there were quite a few Hank Marvin fans there

So..  great atmosphere, nice wine and tapas, friendly service, and great table….  but the stars of the night for me though – Nunzio with his virtuosic accordion solos and Gary Taylor on rhythm guitar who had an amazingly infectious rhythm and was so solid, holding the whole thing together – well done!

The only thing missing from the night – a swing violinist.. hmm..  let’s see – I swing dance.. and play the violin..  although improvising is a whole new game.  I wish!  Anyways, it did inspire me to get out my Minor Swing again.

Head shot photography

On the weekend, our 9.5yo daughter had an audition for a child part in an upcoming Les Miserables production. Wifey had a read through the sheet with instructions about the casting audition and saw that we needed to provide a head shot. I thought “Cool! I’ll get to use my flash setup!”.

So, I set up the light stand, umbrella and the Nikon SB-600 together with my recently purchased flash umbrella swivel adapter, to take a few shots.

I used Nikon’s CLS (Creative Lighting System) to expose the shot and communicate wirelessly between the Nikon D80 body and SB-600 flash. Unfortuately, it seems to rely on using on the on camera flash firing a pre-flash to communicate with the off camera flash, so you end up with 2 flashes in the end. It worked OK on our 9.5yo, but when I took some photos of our 8yo, nearly all the shots had her blinking. She is just more sensitive to the pre-flash and ended up blinking by the time the real flash fired. Hmm.. not good. Maybe I need to invest in a Pocket Wizard or some other wireless flash communication system.

The actual shot taken also seemed to be underexposed. I wonder if the white wall was playing tricks on CLS. Nothing that a bit of post-production can’t fix.

I learnt that this type of shot is called a head shot. A head shot is basically a head only, or head and shoulders shot only, used primarily as a portfolio, casting, audition or advertising function. At first I thought a headshot is not really a creative shot, but primarily more functional. But then I thought – a creative, yet functional shot, might help the applicant stand out from the crowd – especially when a director/producer is scanning through hundreds of people who audition, or if they need to choose between people in a shortlist for a role. Seems like there is much more to it than I initially thought!

Here is the final shot we used and printed out:

Headshot

And here is a more fun shot I snapped when my daughter started playing up

Fun shot

Anyone in Perth need a head shot?    I think I need more practice…