Airborn of CAP

I went on an O-Flight (Orientation flight) from Civil Air Patrol and flew a small light plane. I could get to a favorite national park in ten minutes on that plane. only trouble is that it feels like my brother's car.

Bargain Branded

During many garage sales that I visited I found some interesting things that could be useful for me. Over time, I noticed that the people running the sale randomly let me get for free, despite me asking them if it is a good idea. Some of them say that it is because I am a good boy preparing for life, that it is useful for me to have, and other things along those lines. It does not feel fair.

If there is something being sold that looks good, consider why they (The sellers) are trying to get rid of it. It may only work for a short time, long enough to demonstrate, or they just want to get it off their hands.

There have also been times when the way things that are being sold are wasteful, like buying an iMac and ditching a perfectly good monitor that could be useful, or a perfectly good iPhone 3 for an iPhone 4. That is what most Apple users are like, trying to get the best technology, whereas I am the kind who would use what ever is at hand and use it to its best. It saves money and I know better to just buy a better object than what I already have for a newer model. I sometimes tell people who are selling those sorts of things that it would be better if they kept it because it is still useful. By the way, the person selling the iPhone is the wife of a co-worker of mine in the school district office tech department, so we both are fond of computers.

The day I bought an Xbox 360 secondhand that smelt like cigarettes was the same day I bought six more desktops that I could repair and donate. Why not keep what is working fine and fix what doesn't work and not be so quick to buy a new model for the sake of being up to date? It is like the old saying, "If it is not broken, why fix it?" As I would say, "If it is working well, why replace it?"

The Hairrier Harry: My review of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2

My friend and I saw Harry Potter 7 part 2 in 3D before he left for school. I never saw the first part but I read the whole book. It was one of the best HP films to date and had plenty of cool effects and one-liners.

The story was very much the same with the book (basically) and had to be changed to fit the film. There were times when the film was better than the book, for example the robbing of Gringotts was better in the film (I won't spoil anything about it, even though it was at the beginning and I won't spoil anything else).

The 3D was fuzzy at times, but the story lent itself well to the 3D. The times the film diverged from the book really could have got the same results if the scene was the same as the book. Apart from that, the film was brilliant and deserves 8.7 out of 10 stars.

Desktopping everyone

I collected seven desktops over the summer and am imaging them. In the process, I am learning about the operating systems and hardware.

The first computer that I imaged (at home and not at work) I called "Brie," after Brian, who gave it to me.

Here's some advice to those wiping another's computer: No matter how interesting the files on the computer you are wiping are, do not go probing around his/her hard disc drive(HDD), especially if they have files on them. It is impolite, a violation of his/her privacy, and a good way to open a virus accidentally. I figured this out the easy way, and did not go probing his HDD. Anything of interest, like recipes, he could tell me himself.

Phantom editorials

I heard that George Lucas is planning to convert Star Wars 1 into 3D and I could tell where this is going. I hope he saw the Phantom Edits (which have scenes cut out and some have Jar Jar's silly talking voiced over and subtitled) and knows what to cut out of the final product. He said when he first saw the screening of the film, "I think I might have overdone it in a few places," and continued to overdo it in those places in the following films. Some scenes could benefit from 3D but the story and dialogue certainly won't.

Facebooked

When I go onto Facebook every now and then, I sometimes find myself getting invitations from friend and of events I was never aware of.  In fact, I am getting more invitations than I can attend.

Why I look for graphics in film

I am very fond of 3D computer graphics because I used 3D CAD and animation software in school and own five different copies of 3D graphics programs.  Here is the list of the programs I have at home:
Solidworks Student Version: A Computer-Aided Design (CAD) Program that I learned how to use in school.
Blender: An open-source 3D animation and sculpting program which is becoming more like Maya.
Messiah Studio: Used in a Harry Potter film and is difficult to find modeling tutorials of.  Dad bought it for $40 from Messiah studio as part of a promotion (They must be getting desperate).  It has a built-in stereoscopic rendering feature but everything it can do Blender can do.
Sculptris: A free Sculpting program and is the sister product of ZBrush, used to make the Na'vi in Avatar.

At school we use 3DS Max from Autodesk to make video games and animated videos and we use Solidworks.

Because I know so much about 3D graphics and CGI in modern films, I devote much attention to it.  When I find some CGI in a film it could either ruin the authenticity of the scene, just look cool, or advance the story.  In new films and TV, CGI is so commonplace that no one bothers to spend a cent on storytelling, which I also look for.