Leonard Cohen – Hallelujah & on Q TV

Leonard Cohen is a Canadian treasure, here is his beautiful Hallelujah (YouTube video).

Here is Leonard on Q.

Here is a K. D. Lang version.

President Corazon “people power” Aquino dies

From CBC News,

Former Philippines President Corazon Aquino, whose “people power” revolt in 1986 ended the repressive 20-year regime of dictator Ferdinand Marcos, has died. She was 76.

She and her supporters picked yellow in 1986 and tried to make a difference. She may not have been as successful as she and her supporters had hoped but I believe she tried. And at the end of the days, thats what fair minded citizens can ask their elected-politicians to do – try to do their best and try to make a difference.

May she rest in peace. Here is an AP report.

P.S. I don’t know if I have ever talked about this but the letter “R” in the logo “ideas Revolution” uses the same yellow as the Philippines did in 1986 (I sampled the “yellow” from a photo of Aquino taken at the time).

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2 Aug, 2009 Update: Here is an insightful observation from WSJ,

When Corazon Aquino addressed a joint session of the U.S. Congress in 1986, she could have crowed over her role in the Phillipines’ remarkable and peaceful transition to democracy after years of authoritarian rule. Instead she summed up the event this way: “Last year, in an excess of arrogance, the dictatorship called for its doom in a snap election. The people obliged. With over a million signatures they drafted me to challenge the dictatorship. And I obliged.”

Aquino, who died Saturday at age 76 from colon cancer, was a self-described “plain housewife” who never aspired to enter politics. Yet she always believed in that most powerful of political truths: that personal freedom is a moral right.

UK Telegraph obituaries.

Red Panda papa

A super cute little Red Panda was born on June 4th, 2009. (news with photos, news with video).

Here is a video of the cute Red Panda papa。

P.S. For some strange (may be too literal) reason, the Shanghai Zoo translates Red Panda (“小熊貓”) as ”Lesser Panda” instead of using the proper name of (“Red Panda”)

P.P.S. CBC “Calgary Zoo welcomes red panda cub” (with cool video footage of baby),

“Goemans said zoo staff are watching the cub’s five-year-old mother, Malikha, carefully and are keeping veterinary checks as brief as possible to avoid distressing either mom or baby. The public won’t be able to see the panda cub until the end of the summer.

“Once again Malikha is being a very good mother, and while she tolerates me briefly taking the cub for health checks, she grooms her and looks her over as soon as I return her to the nest box,” Goemans said.”

“The Spine” helpers

I love to put a spotlight on young & upcoming student artists (in this case, students from Seneca Animation Arts Centre). The following is a partial list of people that helped in the making of “The Spine“.

If you are one of these Seneca Animation Arts Centre students, please kindly leave me a comment/email me with a link to your personal website. The way I see it, It is never too early to get your names and works out. :)

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** = those who volunteered their time as individuals
# = those who volunteered their time and Graduated from Seneca in 2008.
@ = Students participating via Summer Institute program

Mark Jones (head of Seneca Animation Arts Centre)
Sean Craig (animation director and program coordinator, Seneca AAC)

Students:

Animators
DIANNA BASSO – @
KEN COLLINS – @
MORGAN DE LANGE – @
ANDREW GREGOIRE – @
CHRISTINA KELBERT – @
RUNDEEP KHAIRA – @
SCOTT MACNAB – # + @
AUGUSTO QUIJANO VAZQUEZ – @
LUCAS WRIGHT – @

ANGELO LIBUTTI – ** Volunteer
BIAGIO FIGLIUZZI – @

VFX Artists
TYSON GROTH – @
CANER SALMANLI – ** Volunteer

VFX TD
MARK SCHMIDT – ** Volunteer (Mark teaches at Seneca and offered up all his free time for the project)

Environment / Asset Modelers & Texture Artists
CARLTON BRANCH – #
BIAGIO FIGLIUZZI – ** and @
GABE MUNN MAGILL – #

Shot Finaling Artists
BIAGIO FIGLIUZZI – @
SEAN D’SOUZA – # + @

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Nov 18th, 2009 Update: Thanks to Alexandra Gunter, Production Manager at Core Digital Pictures for flagging the list of helpers with the appropriate annotations.

A chat with Oscar winning animator Chris Landreth about his new film “The Spine”

I first saw and was deeply touched by Chris Landreth’s Oscar-winning animated documentary Ryan and the documentary Alter Egos (a film about Ryan and Chris) in the 2004 Calgary International Film Festival. And I wrote a blog entry in 2007 in memory of Ryan‘s passing.

So it was my great pleasure to chat with Chris to talk about his new film “The Spine”. The following are the three parts of my Skype interview with Chris.

By the way, here is a separate blog entry about the helpers of “The Spine”.

The Interview - Part 1

• How did Chris conceive a story about the seemingly strange relationship between the couple Dan and Mary?
• Explaining what does the term “psycho-realism” mean to him? And how did he apply “psycho-realism” in “The Spine”?
• Three big questions that seem closely related to each others,
  • How does “The Spine” avoid “Uncanny Valley” (the “creepy” effect of making CGI characters too realistic) ?
  • Animators using a Method-acting approach ?
  • Balancing realism and stylization ?

The Interview – Part 2

• All of the animations in “The Spine” were key framed (no motion capture). So “motion capture” seems to be quick and easy. Why don’t Chris like it? What are the trade-offs in Chris’ mind?
• Chris talking about Polar Express, Final Fantasy, and Beowulf.
• The Spine (2009) uses Maya V8.5 for modeling, animation, visual effects and some rendering and Bingo (1998) used Maya V1.0. Chris talks about how he feels about some of the changes over the years.

The Interview - Part 3

• Chris’ experience working with Senaca students in “The Spine”. And how he shared his insights and experiences with these students.
• “The Spine” will have its US premiere on Aug 6th at the 2009 SIGGRAPH. What does screening “The Spine” at SIGGRAPH mean to Chris?
• Chris talks very briefly about his full-length feature film “Lovecraft” based on Hans Rodionoff’s graphic novel “Lovecraft”.
• What insights can Chris share with up & coming animators and filmmakers?

P.S. Here is a story genesis of “The Spine” from the NFB official site. Here is Chris’ “walkabout“.

I found this YouTube of Bingo. Enjoy.

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Sept 23, 2009 Update: The Spine is going to be screened at the 2009 Calgary International Film Festival.

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Nov 17, 2009 Update: The Spine wins in Portugal, “The Festival Internacional de Cinema de Animação, also known as Cinanima, has just awarded its Grand Prize to The Spine!!” Congrats Chris!

Julie, Welcome home!

Julie, Great job! Good to see you home, back on earth! Congrats on a successful STS-127!

The Authentic Julia Child – The French Chef

Knowing the film Julie and Julia is coming to theatres on Aug 9th, 2009, I decided to check out Julia Child‘s TV series The French Chef from the public library again (series 1 & series 2). The show aired from 1963 – 1973, and what I love about Julia’s show is how authentic she was. The shows on potato, chicken, lobster, etc were all classic.

In a world of highly produced everything, sometimes it is more important to be authentic then being perfect on everything and every time.

See film trailer here.

Here is Julia herself.

Here is a six parts interviews of Julia done some years after her retirement.

Santiago Calatrava: Calgary “Peace Bridge” designer

Aug 22, 2010 Update: My new thoughts about the bridge, “War of words over Calgary Peace bridge“

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I admire the artistic vision of the architect Santiago Calatrava, and found his Turning Torso stunningly beautiful as I had the pleasure of watching the 2006 documentary “Socialist, The Architect, and the Twisted Tower“. (Now, the Twisted Tower’s cost is another matter.)

So I consider myself a fan of Santiago Calatrava and it pains me even more to say that it is fiscally irresponsible for the Calgary city hall, the let-them-eat-cake politicians, to agree to a $24.5 million bridge! Are they crazy?

This is a foot bridge. Not an office building nor an art gallery. I have yet to hear someone wanting desperately visit a city because of a footbridge!

While Santiago may be eloquent in this Calgary Herald interview, I am not persuaded of the high price tag when city services are cut and city employees are fired. And reading Vancouver Sun taking time and space to reprint “Calgary’s $24.5M footbridge unveiled to cheers, jeers” just shows how out of touch Calgary City Hall politicians are.

Let me requote Mike at AM770 CHRQ Calgary Today,

“As with most bold architecture, there will be some people who love it and some people who don’t love it. I think it’s beautiful, elegant.” -Alderman Druh Farrell

“Sometimes there are people who vote against sunshine.” – Mayor Dave Bronconnier

Mr. Farrell, at what price?

Mr. Bronconnier, if you have to defend a misuse of millions of city funding with this kind of meaningless point, then you are more out of touch than I think you are.

Mike may have a point in saying, “Despite waves and waves of public backlash and opposition to the bridge, the mayor and other members of council are stubbornly defending this foolishness. Come election time, this may be their bridge to die on.“

P.S. As some CBC commenters pointed out, the bridge does look like a Chinese Finger Trap. And Chinatown is very close to the bridge.

P.P.S. Again, I like Santiago the person and his work but not the price tag and not now! Here is a video of him on Charlie Rose,

repost: ICANN, civil society, and free speech

Take a look of Rebecca MacKinnon’s “ICANN, civil society, and free speech“.

Netflix Prize – The Ensemble interview

There are two teams that beat the 10% improvement goal set by the Netflix Prize – million dollar challenge. Tonight, I had the great pleasure to chat with four members of The Ensemble team. Thanks to Lester Mackey, Joe Sill, Ces Bertino, and Bo Yang for a wonderful chat. (note: links from team bio page)

It will take me some time to process the audio recording, research and write up this interview. I will try to post it soon. Stay tune.

Here is a link to a New York Times article, “Netflix Competitors Learn the Power of Teamwork“

Here is Lester’s recount the “Final Submission Countdown“.

Interviewing Oscar Winner Chris Landreth to chat about “The Spine”

I had a nice in-depth chat with Oscar winning animator Chris Landreth (2004 Ryan, full film on NFB) about his new film “The Spine” yesterday.

I will post my video chat with Chris once I finish processing the video plus research & write the blog entry. Stay tune.

Check out Chris’ blog here.

Netflix Prize Winning Teams

July 29, 2009 Update: Here is “The Ensemble“‘ team official account of their “Final Submission Countdown“. And I am giving up the dangerous business of predicting the winner of the million dollar prize. :)  I better let the people who pay that million decide. :)

Plus I am going to interview team members of “The Ensemble“‘ team and I want to hear from them first hand.

At the end of the day, as I wrote before, both BellKor’s Pragmatic Chaos and The Ensemble are winners to me. I will leave the money decision to Netflix. :)

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Notes & Corrections,

• According to the Netflix Prize Rules, there is only a single one million dollar prize.
• As announced by Netflix, “There are submissions from two teams that meet the minimum requirements for the Grand Prize. We are contacting the lead team and we will report, as soon as possible, when and if we have a verified winner for the Grand Prize.”
• “BellKor’s Pragmatic Chaos” team has been contacted by Netflix and is presumed to be the winner upon verification by Netflix. (Sorry my mistakes to report “The Ensemble” team as the winner.)
• Take a look of the post “By a nose… or is it a hair…” to read an official account of the BellKor’s Pragmatic Chaos team experience.

In some sense, both BellKor’s Pragmatic Chaos and The Ensemble are winners because both teams passed the seemingly impossible test of 10% improvement. And I know I have lots to learn from their experiences and insights.

White House Twitter Mystery

White House explains a Twitter mystery with a link to this article (an interview with White House Deputy Press Secretary Bill Burton).

Netflix Prize winners ! (So close!)

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4:19 pm MST, July 27, 2009 update: I made a mistake in the last update. See my correction here in this new post.

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01:38 UTC, July 27, 2009 update: Looks like we have a winning team. This is unbelievably close! A difference in score by 0.0001. Wow!!! Congrats to both teams for their great effort and The Ensemble for edging the final 0.0001 to win! Wow!

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As a computer geek (this is one of the easiest form of “geek” to translate to Chinese), I am so excited and looking forward to all the insights behind the latest movie recommendation. Only a few more hours until we have a winning team. We can all use better recommendation system (those knowledge and insight gained should be transferable). And yes, it is fun to see some team wins a million dollar, soon after July 26, 2009 18:42:37 UTC. (These two teams are the current qualifiers and leaders.)

There are seven different million dollar prizes to be won. My favourite problem is the NP vs P problem, have a look. There is a million dollar prize and world fame behind it. Check them out. :)

1999 interview with Frank McCourt

An 1999 CBC interview with Frank McCourt. Enjoy.

iQ font

Here is one marketing and advertising campaign that I love and am going to use. Very cool to use a car (Toyota iQ) to help design and make a font! OK, it is an ad that looks and works like a font! :)

Think about the idea, the cool factor, and the utility (and the free ads) behind it all! (news here and here)

Download the font here. Font designer. Thanks nl.Toyota.be

[via BMD]

Moment Factory

Very cool stuff from Montreal-based Moment Factory. [First video via BMD]

T & T sold to Loblaw for $225 million

From CBC,

Grocery retailer Loblaw Companies Ltd. said Friday it is buying T&T Supermarket Inc., Canada’s largest Asian food retailer, for about $225 million.

[...] Sales at T&T hit roughly $514 million in the 12 months leading up to June 30.

“Some of our customers have a nickname for us — the Asian Loblaw. Today we are proud it has become a reality,” said Cindy Lee, CEO of T&T.

More information from this Loblaw 2009 Q2 report.

I know Cindy is good but not this good! Wow! Congrats to the hard work of Cindy and her team at T&T. Here is Cindy on CBC last year.

P.S. I agree very much with this commentator’s view at CBC,

“Kraven213 (posted 2009/07/24)

If they use this to bring some of T&T into Loblaw stores, it’ll be a great thing.

If they use it to bring some of Loblaw to T&T… not so much”

No Honour in “Honour Killing”

The accused are innocent until proven guilty in justice system.

But if it is proven that this is indeed a case of “honour killing”, then we need to punish to the full extend under the law and teach, inform, and instruct our immigrants that there is no “honour” in killing. Killing is murder. And in Canada, women are equal to men.

I am deeply saddened of the tragic death of the four women.

new Final Cut Studio

The new Final Cut Studio looks cool. Now, I just need a good excuse to get a copy. :)