Jumping on the Bed!

A number of years ago, a theoretically great idea popped into my head for an Anime Music Video centered around the Miyazaki universe. I’ve kept the video a secret with the exception of a small handful of friends to test the idea. I’ve been feeling inspired, as of late, to be creative so this will mark the beginning of production. I get to teach myself how to use Adobe Premiere Pro CS5 and possibly Adobe After Effects CS5 in the process. Sadly, I may have to touch Adobe SoundBooth. God how I hate that program. I just want Audition (formerly Cool Edit Pro) back. Why they axed Audition for Soundbooth is beyond me. I know I’m not the only one who hates the replacement program but I digress.

Project Ghibli is GO!!!! I’ll be posting snippets up here from time to time to share with everyone so stay tuned!

(“i will not take these things for granted” toad the wet sprocket – fear)

Much to my delight, Microsoft has just released the 4.5 firmware update for their Zune HD lines of portable music players. Of which, I have. They went directly from 4.3 to 4.5. Other than taking about four minutes to update, everything seems to be working fine. Visually the “tilt” effect is more pronounced giving the entire interface a much deeper three dimensional effect. Personally, I rather liked the older more subtle effect (it took me three days of constant use to realize it was doing it). The “swipe to unlock” image also has a larger drop-shadow beneath it giving, again, a greater sense of depth. There is also a nice little fade out when exiting an application.

Speaking of applications… No more stupid advertisements before loading the games! I’m quite happy about that for a couple of reasons. Not the least of which that my 32Gb Zune is already bursting at the seams and I’d rather use that space for more music, not little adverts for the Zion.

As far as features go, the Zune HD now has many of the features that the Zune Desktop software has such as “SmartDJ” and “Marketplace Pics”. It also supports XviD files without having to convert it to whatever video format it uses… m4v I think. Overall the UI seems to be quicker, lighter, deeper, and slightly more animated.

(“touched” vast – visual audio sensory theater)

Pretty simply, I really like this album and nearly as much as I liked In Abstentia. IGN has a much more eloquently written review of it than I could. My brain is still a bit fried after the drive from Kalamazoo back home.

Sabrina gifted me the DTS version of Deadwing and I loved the 5.1 surround mix. Fear of a Blank Planet was also released in two versions, the normal CD, and a Special edition that has the CD, a DVD with 5.1 and enhanced 24bit Stereo recordings, and a booklet. It’s times like these I wish I could plunk myself on the couch, turn up the receiver and zone out for a couple of hours without bothering the people living below me.

I think there are three basic PT camps. Pre-In Abstentia fans, Post-In Abstentia fans, and the one where I set my tent up, All-of-the-above. I love damn near everything PT has released. I enjoy the psychedelic rock segments and find them absolutely grand to program to, rockin’ with my headphones on, coding away. And I really enjoy their more modern progressive rock tracks that sneak into the mix as well.

If you get a chance to sample them at all (not just 30sec clips, but whole albums), I would really recommend giving them a shot. They could be the greatest band you never knew about. I’d never heard about them until I picked up a demo for In Abstentia from work, and I was immediately hooked. Imagine my surprise when I found out they’ve been releasing music since for the past 20 years. So if you like what you hear, there’s quite the library to dig into.