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New JonStout.Net

Jun. 29th, 2009 | 08:28 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: rushed rushed
music: "Against the Wall," Cage the Elephant

Man, finally. After multiple last-minute technical hurtles and a server transfer, the new and improved Jon Stout.net is finally online. It's still pretty rough around the edges - the Video and the About sections are still blank, and the Portfolio section isn't really what I wanted - really, I want to do that section in Flash, but I just don't see me having the time anytime soon to finish that up -- oh, yeah, and I'm still not sure what to do with that whole mess of buttons on the Contact section... but ANYWAY. It's UP, and that's the important thing. Would highly appreciate any comments you might have on what there is so far.

So what else have I been up to? ... Eh. I'm not really ready to talk about that, after all. So that'll have to be a later post.

Next step? Fill in my LinkedIn profile. Get new business cards while picking up equipment at Tri-C on Wednesday. And make flyers. Lots and lots of flyers.

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The Great Firewall of Iran

Jun. 24th, 2009 | 07:33 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: stressed stressed

A Deeper Look at The Iranian Firewall links to a blog post I came across thanks to Slashdot. It provides a look into how exactly the Iranian government is focusing on and how since the election. I notice that a lot of attention seems to be focused on Youtube and Flash video-sharing websites. It seems that what the Iranian government is really focusing on here is keeping people inside Iran from accessing the video that's already out there. Makes sense. They want to keep people from learning about anything that's outside of government-controlled media channels. Well. Have to see if that works.

In other news, why the hell are they blaming Britain? I mean, I guess they have to find some kind of scapegoat, but Britain? It just seems so random...

Oh, wait. Maybe not. Still, reaching a little far back in history there, aren't you, Ayatollah?

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Short Opinion on Hellboy II: The Golden Army

Jun. 17th, 2009 | 04:56 pm
location: The Promenade, Crocker Park, Westlake
mood: awake
music: "Come Together," Beatles

Finally saw Hellboy II: The Golden Army last night (it only came out, what, a year ago?). The short review: basically, I liked the visuals, since man oh man does Guillermo del Toro let his imagination go nuts (he's the same director who did Pan's Labyrinth, for anyone who's interested). As a result, there's some really beautiful, fantastic visual effects, atmosphere and cinematography in the film. I also really liked the central concept of a hidden fae underworld that co-exists with the real world - equal parts Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere and White Wolf's World of Darkness, really.

That said, while there are some good character moments in the film, man, do they need to find an actual screenwriter to handle this franchise, because the script made a whole lot of no sense. (Wait, Liz is mad at Hellboy, then she isn't? And why does everyone quit the shadowy government agency at the end?)

Final notes: Selma Blair is cute. Ron Perlman still rocks. But man, that script...

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(no subject)

Jun. 14th, 2009 | 01:20 am
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: cheerful cheerful

Bit of short dialogue: two characters are seen on a boat, playing cards. Later on, said boat is attacked by raiders. While fighting off the raiders on the deck, amid a massive thunderstorm:

A: (Stabs a raider) Got any fives?
B: (Tosses raider off of the deck) Go fish.

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Still grumphing at Apple, though.

Jun. 11th, 2009 | 11:19 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: pleased with myself pleased with myself

Okay, came up with a solution. For the benefit of anyone else out there in Internets-land who might be interested:

// these need to be global variables
var req;
var reqTwo;
var xmlContainer;

function loadXMLSafari(xmlLoc, xslLoc, myContainer) {
req = new XMLHttpRequest();
reqTwo = new XMLHttpRequest();
xmlContainer = myContainer; // myContainer = object reference to whatever you want to fill
req.onreadystatechange = loadXMLSafariPartTwo;
req.open("GET",xmlLoc,false);
reqTwo.onreadystatechange = loadXMLSafariPartTwo;
reqTwo.open("GET",xslLoc,false);
req.send();
reqTwo.send();
}

function loadXMLSafariPartTwo() {
if (req.readyState != 4 || reqTwo.readyState != 4) {
return;
}
var xml = req.responseXML;
var xsl = reqTwo.responseXML;
xmlContainer.innerHTML = "";
xsltProcessor = new XSLTProcessor();
xsltProcessor.importStylesheet(xsl);
myXML = xsltProcessor.transformToFragment(xml,document);
xmlContainer.appendChild(myXML);
}

Or some variation thereof. You could probably pass myContainer's ID as a string instead, if you prefer, and do a document.getElementById on the line it's assigned to xmlContainer. Whatever.

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Grumph grumph grumph Apple grumph

Jun. 11th, 2009 | 10:08 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: grumph. grumph.

I'm pretty used to dealing with Internet Explorer's miscellaneous issues and deviations from the standard. But Safari and Chrome? Not so much. One would figure, they're just too pretty to have any problems, right?

Today I learned the hard way that neither Safari nor Chrome basically supports importing XML and XSLT stylesheets into a document via JavaScript, the way that Firefox and - yes - even IE7 do. Here's one of the many threads I've come across posted by those who have had the same problem - all apparently working off of the same W3Schools example that I was. I notice with some trepidation that that thread was posted more than a year ago. I'm guessing that it's a feature that comes up so rarely that Apple hasn't bothered fixing it, or at least coming up with something comparable to the load method.

Not sure where to go from here. I may have to combine the XML and the XSLT server-side via PHP, which I've been trying to avoid - I'm trying to avoid refreshing the page in this project. Either that, or I could try one of the code libraries people mentioned in the threads. I also tried figuring out some way to do it with the XMLHttpRequest object, but so far everything I've tried has come up blank.

Grumph. What a nuisance.

Edit: Found a solution. Details here.

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Visual C#.NET: First Impressions

Jun. 10th, 2009 | 02:10 pm
location: CSU Westlake, Westlake, OH
mood: calm calm

Currently sitting in an Intro to Visual C#.NET class at Cleveland State. This is my first real introduction to programming in Microsoft's .NET environment. My impressions so far? While I have mixed feelings in general (which may be more due to my nervousness about getting into more programmy-developery kinds of things than anything else), I'd have to say that on the whole I'm actually pretty impressed. I didn't know before this that Microsoft actually makes a stripped-down version of Visual Studio available for free on their website. I also kind of like the fact that .NET is sort of a one-stop shop as far as application development is concerned. You need to make a Windows application? Or a web application? Bam. You can. In the same language, even.

The only thing I don't like about it so far is how opaque a lot of the system is. The basic thought behind the .NET framework, as I understand is, is that Microsoft sat down one day and thought, "You know, I'm tired of making different code libraries for different projects. Let's just make a bunch of REALLY BIG libraries that can do basically EVERYTHING, and make sure everyone has them, which we can do because we're Microsoft!" Fair enough, but in doing so, they seem to have made tasks that are very simple in other languages very complicated. For instance, during the first class, our instructor was trying to show us how to change the background color on a form element. Problem is, he couldn't just say "set to this color." Nope. We eventually had to do a Google search before we figured out that basic colors are hidden in their own separate little class in a obscure corner of the System library. And the MSDN documentation is nigh-incomprehensible, at least for me, so there's no official, simple, plain English explanation of how to do this stuff. I can't help but think there must be a better and more accessible way to go about these things.

Also, unless I'm mistaken, Macs and Linux computers can't use .NET stuff yet. Which is a problem for me. I like making stuff everyone can use.

That said, do you know that there's someone out there making PHP for .NET? From what I've read so far, it should allow one to use both the PHP and .NET libraries - which I find verrry interesting. Something to keep an eye on, I guess.

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The Tinwatchman Company: Main Site

Jun. 7th, 2009 | 01:27 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: accomplished

So after two years, as part of a general effort on my part to fill out my portfolio a bit in order to gear up to start doing freelance work again, I finally figured out what I wanted to do with the main page for my nascent side project the Tinwatchman Company. Here's a screenshot:

Tinwatchman Company Main Page and Wordpress Theme

Comments and feedback are naturally appreciated. I've also taken the opportunity to run my first little experiment with Google Adsense. Now, according to the agreement I made with Google, I'm not actually supposed to tell anyone to click on the links at the bottom of the page. So I won't. But I'm just saying, every time someone does, theoretically, Google is supposed to pay me for it. Just throwing that out there. (He said hopefully). :)

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Uncertain technology for uncertain times

May. 31st, 2009 | 10:24 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: apathetic apathetic

From CNN.Money: Tech sector has questions, few answers:
Here's how scary the times are in the technology industry: Nobody, not even the visionary, congenitally optimistic smartypants who invent the technological future, has a clue about where we're going next.

The Twitter guys don't know how they're going to make money. AT&T... doesn't know how the ever-increasing universe of smart phone operating systems will consolidate. Yahoo... (still) doesn't know who it is. Even John Malone, the veteran innovator of the communications business, isn't sure how producers of content will get customers to pay them for their wares.
Well, at least now I know for sure that it's not just me...

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Götz von Berlichingen

May. 21st, 2009 | 01:02 am
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: ADD ADD

Goetz Arm

From Wikipedia: The first cyborg in history?

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Sherlock Hound

May. 17th, 2009 | 03:21 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: cheerful cheerful

So as part of its nascent effort to Hulu-ize itself, Youtube has been recently putting up a number of old shows. One entry happens to be Sherlock Hound, an adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle's characters featuring anthropomorphic dogs, steampunk-style technology, and a quite silly Moriarty as a usual villain - several episodes of which happened to have been directed by one Hayao Miyazaki, acknowledged genius of animation. I challenge you all not to be charmed in some way by these two Miyazaki-directed episodes:One thing that I really admire about Miyazaki's stuff is his ability to find small character moments in the simplest of things - the way that one character puts on her shoes, for instance, or one character putting a blanket on another who's fallen asleep. On top of that, he finds some way to make those small moments as fascinating to the audience as they are to him. Maybe it's just his incredible attention to detail. Maybe it's the amount of effort that we're all aware those small things must take in animation. However it works, it's brilliant, and I've never really seen anything like it by any other filmmaker, animated or live-action.

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Zombie, OH Opening

May. 8th, 2009 | 06:55 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: a tad exhausted. Just a tad. a tad exhausted. Just a tad.
music: "Love, Myself," No Compromise

So here's what I've been working on like a feverish monkey these past three weeks:

Thus my post about anime openings a few weeks ago. See? There's a method to my madness after all.

Anyway, currently operating on about three hours of sleep. Managed to get to East Campus and back without getting myself killed, so yay me. In general, feel pretty justified in taking the night off. Have some more photos from the shoot up on Facebook, which an interested person should there be any can find here. Otherwise, g'night, everyone.

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Briefly -

May. 6th, 2009 | 10:53 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: ltitle tired, but okay ltitle tired, but okay

From CNN: Limbaugh to Powell: 'Become a Democrat' - Awww, that's the last straw, Rush. You don't mess with the Old General.

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Makeup tests

Apr. 30th, 2009 | 09:03 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: relaxed relaxed

Zombie makeup, test 1
Zombie makeup, test 1 (on the back of my hand)

Zombie makeup, test 2
Zombie makeup, test 2

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Random babble of the kind I generate at 3 am in the morning

Apr. 30th, 2009 | 02:42 am
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: tired tired

Cleveland Cold Storage Building, photo (c) Jon Stout, 2009

Spent most of today running around Cleveland getting background shots for my big final video project that I'm shooting this weekend (the above being a sample). On my to-do list for tomorrow on that:

  • Need a shot of a large sign, of the kind one might find in a park somewhere. Preferably something that wouldn't be too hard for me to modify with Photoshop.
  • Need to find some kind of wall. As in, a serious wall. At least ten feet tall, one-foot-thick concrete. Question is, where can I find something like that around Cleveland?
  • Need some interior background shots. Not entirely sure where I want to get those, to be honest... or where I can get them. I may just have to go with some kind of placeholder, in the end...
  • Oh, right. And makeup. That's pretty key.
Abandoned warehouse in Cleveland, photo (c) Jon Stout, 2009

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Look at what we have wrought.

Apr. 24th, 2009 | 10:35 pm
location: Cleveland Heights, Ohio
mood: horrified - what have we done? horrified - what have we done?

As I said on my LiveJournal update before this was shot - this is probably the most ridiculous thing I've done in years:

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Some random notes in unordered list format.

Apr. 22nd, 2009 | 03:22 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive

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Anime title sequences

Apr. 16th, 2009 | 09:52 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: critical! critical!

Let's talk about anime title sequences. For a long time, I've been kind of fascinated by these - not only visually, but also from a marketing point of view. Whereas the front credits for most American shows arguably tend to be kind of perfunctory - "here's the characters, here's who plays them, here's some clips from the show okay we're done let's go" - and certain British shows spend even less time on them (though I'll admit there's something kind of nice about their brevity) - most anime I've seen just pours all kinds of effort into their opening sequences. They often include a lot of material that's not included in the show itself. In a lot of ways, Japanese animators treat their front credits the way Hollywood treats trailers - it's the marketing pitch for the show, basically, and the pitch is everything.

I can almost see them all sitting down and saying, "Okay, we've got one minute to get people to watch the rest of the show. What can we show them that'll make them do that?"

It seems to me that most anime title sequences I've seen take either one or (more often) a combination of four possible approaches:
  1. The 'promotional artwork' approach - this kind of title sequence basically says: "Hey, here are our characters, don't they look cool in this shot?" While all anime title sequences usually involve this kind of thinking to a certain extent, the key thing about this category is that there's really no attempt to clue the audience in on who the characters are or what the story is about. The visual spectacle is basically everything. Example. Another example.
  2. The fake fight sequence - fake in that the fight sequence portrayed in the credits never actually takes place in the show. Again, the emphasis is on the characters looking cool, but there's usually some kind of information (even if buried) on what the central conflict of the story is - or - at the very least - why the characters are fighting. Example one. Example two (at least towards the end).
  3. The atmospheric montage - While this variety of title sequence may contain reveal something about the characters and their relationships, the emphasis is mostly on the atmosphere of the show - sort of like trying to communicate a general sense of what the show is or what it's like to the viewer without providing much in the way of context or details. The music can play a pretty big role in these. Example one. Example two.
  4. The thematic montage - This kind of title sequence really tends to focus on the show's story or on one of its major themes. The distinction between this and the atmospheric montage is slight - I guess I would define this kind as really containing at least some specific information about the show's story and/or the show's characters. Said information might not be apparent or make much sense to the viewer upon first watching, but it's there, and may make more sense as the viewer becomes more familiar with the show. From that point of view, come to think of it, you could see these kind of title sequences acting as a kind of "primer" for the show. Example one. Example two.

    (And yes, the characters still look cool. But again, one minute to sell a show to the audience. What else are they going to do?)
So after all of this, there's probably one question I haven't answered: why on earth have I been thinking about this so much? Well, part of the answer is that it's just in my nature to overthink things that other people wouldn't give a second glance. But the other part is that I've often wondered if it's possible to adapt certain techniques or conventions from anime title sequences for live-action productions. And I might just have an excuse to experiment with this a little at some point here in the near future.

Stay tuned, everyone... that's all for now.

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Meet the new face of the twenty-first century.

Apr. 12th, 2009 | 05:36 pm
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: apathetic apathetic

Requires Flash Player 9. You probably also need to click on the SWF above before it'll start taking keyboard input.

Just some noodling around I did in Flash earlier today. Just reminding myself how to do basic animation in ActionScript. Press the arrow keys to move the little guy around.

Speaking of said little guy - anyone have a name for him? Was thinking Watermelon Head myself.

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More with the politics - Oh, come on.

Apr. 11th, 2009 | 09:57 am
location: Tradewinds Drive
mood: disappointed disappointed

From CNN Political Ticker: GOP accuses Obama of ‘groveling’ to Saudi King: Oh, for crying out loud. If you're going to make a mountain out of a molehill, GOP, the least you could do is find a more incriminating-looking photo. All he's doing in the one you've got in the ad is bowing at the waist, Japanese-style. The least you could do is Photoshop his face onto somebody really kowtowing. But this? This just looks lazy.

Sigh. I swear, soon as Rove retires, the whole GOP dirty tricks division goes down the tubes. Whatever happened to craftsmanship?

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