A neat trick for anyone using Flickr this Christmas (which I found via boingboing). Add an image note with the text “ho ho ho hat” or “ho ho ho beard” to get either a hat or beard for your image.
Here is one I made earlier to make Clive look a little more festive.
Take a look at Cliff’s new video – fantastic lyrics! ….no seriously.
Happy Christmas! I am getting in early this year as I had to re-design the site banner and want to get a decent amount of use out of it! After the success of the LED Pumpkin kit I made for Jessica (see her October blog archive) I decided to get a Christmas kit whilst they were selling them cheap at Maplin’s. You can see the finished product in the video below.
Jessica has a 3D Christmas tree soldering kit that she has almost finished – I’l l introduce her to youTube uploading and see if she can feature it in her blog soon.
Video Games Live: Hammersmith Apollo, Saturday 25th November
Everyone I have told about this (so far) has laughed, but last Saturday me and Jessica went to a video games concert. Footage from the games was projected onto a large screen at the back of the stage whilst an orchestra and choir played/sung the accompanying soundtrack, live. There were also lots of flashing lights in time with the music.
The concert opened with a quick jog through retro games and their tunes, all arranged into one piece of music. From Pong through Donkey Kong, Asteroids, Joust and many more – this was a fun opening to a very enjoyable concert.
My favourite orchestral tunes were from Metal Gear Solid and Final Fantasy but the best number of the night was the orchestra’s rendition of a medley of tunes from Sonic the Hedgehog!
They also played a Mario medley, Halo, Zelda, Tomb Raider, Advent Rising, Kingdom Hearts, Head Hunter and some others I can’t remember.
There was a guest performance from “The Internet Pianist” who is apparently world famous. He played some tunes on a keyboard and re-staged the performance that shot him to Internet-stardom (Mario medley played whilst blindfolded).
I really enjoyed it and recommend it to anyone who has owned a games console. If you would like a very low quality impression of what the concert was like try searching youTube for “Video Games Live London”.
Also, there were a few games to look at before the concert and i got a glimpse of the new Nintendo Wii. I didn’t queue up to have a go but those people who got to play (Tennis) seemed to be having a good time. The console itself was just as small as I expected and the players’ movements seemed to be accurately recorded by the Wiimote. I’ll still wait for a PS3 though!
On Wednesday we went so see Bill Bryson talking at the Fairfield Halls in Croydon. I have heard loads of people tell me how good his books are but have never got round to reading one myself. I expected to enjoy the evening but wasn’t certain what I was letting myself in for.
I am pleased to say it was an enjoyable and often funny talk in which he showed some pictures and read some excerpts from his books. In-between readings he told short stories to give some background on the next passage he was about to read. At the end of the evening he bravely asked if there were any questions from the audience.
Mr Bryson spends a fair amount of time encouraging you to be proud of your country and saying how much he loves Britain. During the questions at the end of the performance someone asked what he thought of the “Americanisation” of Britain. Bryson’s view is that everywhere (in the world) is becoming similar, with Western countries (mostly America) exporting their shopping chains etc. Whilst I agree that this is true and it is a bad thing that towns are losing their identity, I cannot claim to be fighting this. I always visit the shops I am familiar with and am less likely to take a risk with an unknown store/food outlet…. perhaps I should.
On a completely unrelated note I thought I would share the latest google map finds that are doing the rounds.
Star
Bomber (not really)
This giant insect will kill us all!
Nice to know
Last night me and Jessica went to Hammersmith Apollo to see Evanescence perform. We turned up 10 minutes before the doors were due to open and joined the end of a very long 400m (guessed from map) queue. 40 minutes later and we managed to get inside the venue.
Thankfully we were in plenty of time to see the support act “Revelation Theory” who were entertaining even though we didn’t know any of their songs. When Evanescence came on they were much louder and had an impressive lighting rig to complement the music (dodgy photo on left). They played a nice range of songs of which approximately 60% were taken from “Fallen” and 40% from “The Open Door”. The lead singer kindly performed “My Immortal” in the encore even though she doesn’t like playing it. There were times when the lead singer needed to have a drink and during those brief breaks the band played openings from other songs. I think (though I am probably wrong) they did one from Korn, one from Slayer and finally a bit of Queen.
Both myself and Jessica really enjoyed ourselves and I really like the Apollo as a venue – the sloped standing area works really well.
In confirming the name of the support act I have just found some sad news. Apparently due to a family emergency the show this evening in Manchester has been cancelled. I hope the emergency is not too serious and sympathise with the fans in the North.
Loads of stuff has been happening this week – so I haven’t been blogging and now require a massive post to cover it all!
It was my birthday this week so me and Jessica took the day off work to do something different. We visited the “Game On” exhibition at the science museum in London before going out for a Thai meal. The exhibition was good fun and me and Jessica competed on a wide range of games from the past few decades. I thought there would be a little more emphasis on game history or design but most of the space was taken up with arcade cabinets or home console systems. I enjoyed the retro games (in their arcade cabinets) with titles such as Donkey Kong and Asteroids featured.
For my birthday Jessica bought me a game called “Gitaroo Man” amongst other things. The aim is to defeat opponents using your Gitaroo which is a guitar type weapon that fires lightning. Currently I am stuck fighting “Mojo King Bee” but I will get him soon I know it! Thanks to everyone for the presents and cards.
The day after my birthday, I went home to see my sister graduate. Congratulations to her on getting her degree.
The annual Children in Need fireworks at work looked like they were going to be a wash-out but the rain let up at the last minute and we were able to enjoy them without getting rain in our eyes. The countdown to the start of the display was conducted by ex-big brother contestant Eugene Sully (a past employee from my work place). Later in the night I talked to him at some length about his extensive home networking plans. If you want to find out what Eugene is doing at the moment you can look here.
Finally, last night we went to see the new Bond film (thanks to Chris for organising). It is the first time I have been to the Leicester Square Odeon and the auditorium was huge. I enjoyed the film but agree that the pace was starting to lag from the middle onwards. The building site chase near the start is fantastic and it is nice to see that Bond is not indestructible. Hopefully everyone else will enjoy the film and they will start work on the next one soon.
There is no doubt – this is the best thing on the internet ever! As usual I have caught onto something several months after everyone else. Have a look at line rider.
Draw a few lines and send the scarf wearing sledger hurtling down your creation. After that use this link and see what is possible* with the game.
* Some poeple have way too much time on their hands!
Recently I bought a widescreen monitor for my PC. I usually use pictures from the camera for my desktop wallpaper and now they are all in the wrong aspect ratio 🙁
I modified the attached image to fit my desktop and decided to share it online (blogger squashes it a bit though) as I know my mum will like it.
Today I was lucky enough to accompany Chris on a flight over the South of England. The weather was really good and there were a lot of other people in the air – in planes, microlites and even hot air balloons. We flew from Redhill, past the office and then over to Guildford. Then we flew down to the south coast to have a look at Brighton, Beachy Head and Eastbourne before going back to Redhill.
We flew in a 4-seater Diamond Star plane with a single propeller. My seat had similar controls to the pilot’s so I was able to have a go at flying once we were safely airborne. The idea was to fix on a point in the distance and to keep an eye on the position of the horizon relative to the top of the “dashboard”. I think I managed O.K. as there were no screams from Chris. Whilst flying down the coast the plane wanted to head out to sea and I needed to do a 30 degree (wing angle) turn. It was the steeper turns that I found more daunting and it was difficult to keep a steady altitude.
Chris did a few 60 degree turns during the flight and during these we experienced about 2G – I tried lifting my arms and they felt really heavy. I took a few photos during the flight and I might put them up on the website soon. I was once again reminded how green England is… and how flat it is “down South”!
Many thanks to Chris for the flight – I owe him at least a pub lunch now!