Monthly Archives: August 2009

Tori Amos at the Detroit Opera House

Posted on August 11, 2009 | 1 comment

Tori always has interesting lighting at her concerts. Lots of changes during the show with more to do with the set and lighting (no actual physical changes). I always enjoy it.

The concert was awesome (as Tori always is), had a great seat, row G (on the right side) so it was perfect. As people cleared out I was able to move up front for the last few songs).

Below I’ve got a few low quality photos (my iPhone is great, but in the dark it’s not so great) and a video to illustrate the lighting.

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The video is just a few quick clips so you can see the lighting (I think it’s four clips about seven seconds each).

I’ve never seen this before but if you follow the direct link to YouTube and click on the HQ button at the bottom it makes the movie bigger (like the HD button does). Give it a try.

But I haven’t figured out a way to directly link it to make it the bigger HQ automatically (you can append &fmt22 to force into large HD or &fmt=18 to force into normal HQ but I’m looking for the large HQ answer, anyone?).

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FaceBook purchases FriendFeed

Posted on August 10, 2009 | Leave a comment

Interesting. Mostly because: I blog, I twitter and I try to keep my FriendFeed up-to-date, but there is so much overlap I never know what to how to separate these things and I’ve really been thinking about it lately.

FriendFeed accepts Facebook friend request
We are happy to announce that Facebook has acquired FriendFeed.

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As my mom explained to me, when two companies love each other very much, they form a structured investment vehicle…

[From FriendFeed Blog: FriendFeed accepts Facebook friend request]

I’d recently decided that my blog is my real site, my main personal identity on-line. FaceBook was for my non-geeky friends (I look around comments, repost blogs there and I think it grabs my YouTube stuff). My Twitter was for tweets and I’d also auto-magically repost blog posts (including video blogs from Seesmic and 12Seconds. FriendFeed just kind of has everything aggregate there (blogs, photos, YouTube, Amazon favorites, Flickr).

What I really really don’t like is when have a blog post show up at my blog, Twitter, FriendFeed and FaceBook and I get comments from all four areas that unless someone goes to all four areas you don’t see the comments. I really want the comments at my home, not at some other site; I want my comments in just one location.

So I’m really more than okay if it goes away, I think. I’ve been auto-posting the last few days my blog posts with images trying to make FriendFeed a little more useful to the people who subscribe. But I’m not sure if I want people there, or if I just want them at my Gary Said… blog.

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The Detroit Opera House

Posted on August 10, 2009 | 2 comments

I was at the Detroit Opera House the other night to see Tori Amos in concert (that’s another post) and I really like the building. I’d like to see it in better lighting and take a bunch of pictures with my nice camera to see how good they might really come out.

These were just with my cell hone but I think they came out pretty good.

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I really like the above one with the jagged edges since it shows the ceiling so well.

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These are actually exactly the same photo but just cropped differently. It’s five or six photos stitched together (but they were stitched together using AutoStitch on my cell phone) to make one big photo.

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In Perpetuity – A Face of Boe fan-fiction story

Posted on August 10, 2009 | Leave a comment

If you’re a Doctor Who or Torchwood fan I found a great piece of The Face of Boe fan-fiction. I’m normally not a fan, but this is so well done I wanted to share it.

From The Book of the Face of Boe:
Chapter 12, verse 19:

Doctor Who - 5The Suppliant came and knelt before Him. “Ancient One, what is the greatest sin in the Universe?”

The Face of Boe answered, “Stagnation. Embrace variety, for change is the fundamental virtue of existence.”

“But you have lived for hundreds of millions of years without altering in any aspect.” said The Suppliant. “How can you, out of all living beings, say such a thing?”

The Face of Boe smiled enigmatically. “Perspective.”

If you haven’t watched all the Doctor Who episodes, especially season 3 (with Martha), then you might not know who he really is. Don’t read the story or you’ll get spoilers.

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The Alps IMAX movie

Posted on August 9, 2009 | Leave a comment

So the reason I was at the Detroit Science Center the other day was to see the new IMAX movie The Alps IMAX movie.

The Alps [Blu-ray] Image EntertainmentFirst of all let me tell you why they had the rock climbing wall the other day. It was because it was the science center members preview and the new IMAX movie was about (climbing) the Alps so they had a bunch of “extras” for the evening. They also had swiss chocolate bars for the first 300 people and free snow cones for everyone. Plus, they let us see the movie for free! It was really fun. I will make a point of going to all other members IMAX previews that they promote like this one!

The movie was visually stunning. And it wasn’t all about climbing, it was about the growth and living in the mountains and all sorts of other (educational) stuff. But the plot/premise was this guy and his father was killed climbing one of the mountains and how he needed to climb it (40 years later) to get past it. It was a little crazy in my opinion, but ignoring that, it was really good!

The weird thing is the movie is already out on DVD and Blu-Ray, they even had it for sale at the Detroit Science Center (their web site is down a lot).

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iTunes Application Managment – We really need it…

Posted on August 9, 2009 | Leave a comment

So the rumors this week are that in iTunes 9 that Apple is going to add Application Management. My iPhone would be a lot more useful for me if it had that, I’m always installing and trying apps and it messes with the order of everything. Here’s a concept that someone ut together a few months ago.


View iTunes App Management on Youtube

It’s very Apple-ish but some of it’s pretty complicated for what Apple likes to do.

The above is pretty close to what I’m looking for. But I’d take something way more primitive…

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Unconscious Mutterings #341

Posted on August 9, 2009 | Leave a comment

This week’s word associations are

Death :: Funeral
Identified :: Body
Saturday :: Weekend
Dumped :: Sad
Division :: Multiplication
Stilted :: Jilted (or is that because it rhymes) maybe it’s time for the dictionary?
Crimes of :: Passion
Stumped :: Quiz
Future :: Time Travel
Team :: Go (as in Go Team)

Check out the list every week at Unconscious Mutterings

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Seidio Innocase II Holster Combo for iPhone – Review

Posted on August 7, 2009 | Leave a comment

So I made a plea a few weeks ago looking for a case for my iPhone (zero responses). Just couldn’t find the one for me, I want something not too bulky but I wanted the screen to be protected. I was worried about damaging the screen, I’m not so concerned about scratches to the case (or even around the edge of the screen). Although when you try to take things in for warranty repair, I’ve learned the less damage to the case the better.

Seidio Innocase II Surface Spring Clip Holster Combo for iPhone 3GS, 3G (Black) SeidioSeidio Innocase Holster for iPhone 3G and 3GS - Black SeidioI think this is the case for me, it’s the Seidio Innocase II Surface Spring Clip Holster Combo for iPhone 3GS and 3G. When they say combo it’s really two products in one it’s this holster with a separate form fitting case for the iPhone that fits in the holster. What I really really like about this is that the screen faces in. I loved my cheaper holster but the screen faced out and that made me nervous.

The form fitting case is nice because it’s not too big and it makes the darn iPhone a lot less slippery! It’s easy in and out of the holster. And the holster has a stopper on it so that the phone cannot slide and release the pressure of the spring clip, it pretty much has to be intentionally released to remove it. I love it and since I’ve been using this I’ve stopped looking at other cases for my iPhone.

The case fits so tightly if you’ve got a screen protector on your iPhone make sure it’s on perfect or it’ll hit the case, I had to peel it back (it wasn’t perfect) and trim it back (now it looks bad). And I think it definitely runs a little hotter with the case on.

Here’s the problem: Since I’ve got the case now it doesn’t fit in my car holder and it’s a little tight on my bicycle holder (a future post). And it fits so tightly it takes way too much time to remove.

So if you think this is the type of case you want, it’s definitely worth the extra money and it seems very well built. Just make sure you pick the “combo” so you get the holster and the case; the phone doesn’t fit in the holster without the case.

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