Posts from September 2004
September 29, 2004
Next gadget
I want one of these.
September 27, 2004
Damn, if you don't learn something new every day
For some reason this sound geek stuff completely appeals to me...
Lately I've been experimenting with a "near coincident pair" method for placing microphones in a stereo configuration. The one I'm testing these days is called ORTF and is named after the Office de Radiodiffusion-Television Francaise, who figured it out for live broadcasts. Two cardiod microphones are spaced 17 cm (6.7" - which is approximately the distance between a pair of ears) apart and are angled outwards 55deg from each other (110deg total - about the same angle that your ears are angled.)
But the fun stuff comes when you start trying to figure out how to play with the stereo field of vision.
The logic: "If you want to adjust the stereo spread, you change the angle of the microphones. Pointing them farther away from each other centers the signal. Pointing them more toward the center widens the stereo field."
This of course is completely counter-intuitive...
...until you think of the arc covered by the microphones as the range of sounds that will sound centered between the channels.
If you point both microphones near the middle (say 30 degrees), then almost everything to the left is left of the left channel and almost everything to the right is right of the right channel. The stereo field is much wider than the microphone spread.
If you spread the mics wide (say 135 degrees) nearly everything in the stereo field is between the microphones (right of left and left of right) effectively narrowing the stereo field leaving the speakers.
Hmmm, that's pretty geeky.
September 23, 2004
The Mr. Fu, Mr. Lu, and Mr. Shou Hotel
This building is about 40 min east of Beijing, close enough to be considered the suburbs. It is situated in the rear of a concrete housing development, which are situated beside two active nuclear turbines.
The building itself is constructed of concrete and colored tile. It is a hotel, and you can rent the room that looks like the jack-o-lantern.
[From www.badarchitecture.org]
September 21, 2004
Dim the lights for Taiwan Cinema
I thought this pen slogan was very appropriate considering the current state of guo pian [local movies] in Taiwan. I don't know if this is quite what they meant to say on the pen, but the lights are dimming fast for the local industry, that's for sure...
For a more lyrical summation, Willie Nelson sang it best, "Turn out the lights the party's over..."
September 20, 2004
Grab your ass
This video is very educational for all those people who just can't seem to climb up the MRT station steps, and clog the escalators. Maybe if they grabbed their asses it would help.
What happens when I grab my ass?
September 19, 2004
The fruit and the bowl
When I was taking art class it looked like this:
These days it looks like this.
Where is the happenstance?
I'm reading this book on the history of Soul music, and I forgot how much I really like music. As a musician, you'd expect that I liked music, but I'm talking about the drama of music, the art of the idiom, the conspiracies, the chance, the dreams, the addictions, the business, the broken hearts, and the inevitable fall from grace.
Going back to listen to all those hits again from Sam Cooke to Ray Charles to Wilson Pickett to Otis Redding to Sam and Dave, and knowing what actually transpired to bring them alive is very inspiring.
The same moral appears over and over again: You just never know what the hell will happen.
No wonder the modern music industry is falling apart. They've pretty much squeezed all happenstance from the process of creating music.
But it's interesting to see how technology and digital music today is brimming with happenstance, and is kicking the music industry's ass.
BTW, have you tried Emule?
September 14, 2004
I think I'm turning Japanese...
Today begins my foray into turning Japanese.
After speaking Japanese when I was a kid, then forgetting it, then relearning it when I was in college, then forgetting it again, my wife has convinced me to give it another shot. Goal: To be able to speak with my nephews.
My brain feels like it's stuck in mud.
September 11, 2004
Lonely Planet Taiwan
Interesting discussion going on regarding the updated Lonely Planet Taiwan guide over at Forumosa.
Raindrops keep falling on my head...
One picture is worth a thousand words.
September 04, 2004
My geeky happiness
Some people get happiness from money, or sexual conquest, or big face, or shopping, or travel.
My happiness arrived yesterday in the form of a 6 year old used Seagate SCSI hard drive.
Say what?
Yes, a used SCSI HDD made me hilariously happy. Here's why...
September 01, 2004
Not exactly Spiderman
I try to sleep, but this is what happens...
It was night and I was driving a Land Rover through the city. What the hell was that? I slammed into something and careened off onto a different unfamiliar road. The road was in a section of town I hadn't been to before, and was run down, with burnt out cars littering the streets. It came out of nowhere again and spun the car around. I couldn't believe it. It was a giant 3-story tall spider. I gunned the engine, and thought I could out maneuver it. The speed finally got the best of me and I rolled my Land Rover over. A few moments later, I see the hulk of the spider looming over the car. At least I'm safe inside the car I tell myself.
Wrong. The spider slams one it's fangs through the window and sprays me with some horrible poisonous gook. I pass out...
...and awaken in a mechanized and sterile people food processing plant, guarded by armed guards. I'm paralyzed, and dangling 15 feet above the floor from a magnetic disk 12 inches round connected to my ass. It's some sci-fi horror movie come true. People are being processed like a modern meat packing plant. My hands and feet are bound with giant plastic garbage bag style closers, and I'm unable to move. I am very flexible though, and can touch my toes easily. Apparently the poison tenderized me. A long look around and I see hundreds of balls of processed people, bound, and wrapped in some sort of embryonic shrink wrap, stacked up on giant stainless steel trays. A giant modern refrigerator for a giant spider.
The guards speak. "Put him over there. Section C3-7, up there next to Annie." I am hoisted towards a section of people unwrapped, and sitting cross-legged in rows on a giant stainless steel rack. Annie turns out to be a fairly attractive woman about 30, athletic, smart, with dark hair.
She's wearing shorts and a pair of sneakers, and other than the fact that we're all about to be spider food, looks like someone from San Francisco, who can drive a stick shift VW.
They hoist me down, and one of the guards yells up at Annie. "Hey baby, can you wear cut-offs next time? I really like you in cut-offs."
"Oh fuck off," yells Annie.
The guards laugh, and I fall limply to the stainless steel shelf.
"What is this place?" I ask.
"Welcome to hell," Annie says. "We're new arrivals. Fresh meat. Unlike those guys over there." She points towards the shrinked wrapped people. You can vaguely see their features and the clothes they wear under the translucent wrap. They do not move. They look puffy.
"They keep us here until they have more space on that rack. We just sit here. I've been here for 3 months. Ralph, under us here, has been here for a year."
She bangs on the steel flooring, "Hey Ralph, we have a newbie."
"Cool. What's his name?" Ralph yells back.
"Corbett." I tell them. "I was attacked in my car, crashed it, and now am here."
"Weren't we all," sighs Annie. "I used to have a little kid and a husband. Ralph was a doctor. Now we just sit on this fucking steel plate day afer day, waiting to get eaten."
I've never figured out whether it's pronounced "Moe's (like owned by one of three stooges) or Moss (like that guy out of Bonanza), but the one down the hill from me is open until 2am most days, which means that if I get out of the club early enough, I can catch the best burger in town, the muo si la bao or the Spicy Mos Burger. They have lots of jalapenos and 
