HelloBlog

Blood Sweat Vector

Sun, 16 Nov 2008 05:36:25 GMT

Came across this interesting site for those of us who are into vector artwork. I think it was j3concepts who posted a link about it on his deviantArt blog.

Still its a collection of authors and contributors who specialise inthe vector field. It is well worth a look. The site, I believe, is still quite young but has a huge potential and has definately been added to my favorites.

In other news; I am planning on documenting this semesters' IMD project in a similar way to the Microsoft brief I had last semester. Will post something when I have a bit more to show for it.

Im off for Christmas (urgh, hate saying that - it's WAY to early in the year) coffee with the better half. So ciao for now!

Web3.0 Package

Sat, 08 Nov 2008 13:28:57 GMT

I am currently developing my Web3.0 package of classes. The package is essentially a platform on which to program websites. I'm just posting a blog in an attempt to direct people to it's dedicated site. For more info click the image below.

Highway to the Danger Zone!

Sun, 02 Nov 2008 20:16:32 GMT

Had a flying lesson today. ~~It's dead late so just a short entry just now with some pictures. I'll edit this entry tomorrow. Hopefully.~~

I've always wanted to learn how to fly and I finally redeemed those vouchers that Emma bought me for my 21st last year. Wa shoping to take her with me on the experience but due to various turns of events (and general stupidity on my part) Emam decided she didn't want to go with me. So flatmate Keiran came instead!

The whole experience was fantastic; I've flown before when Iw as an Air Cadet but that was a long time ago. I'm slowly saving up cash to fund my way to a Private Pilot License (PPL) but I imagine that is still a long way off. For the basic package at Dundee Airport we're talking £7000. Ouch.

We took a cruise at 2000 feet along the coast for a while where I had complete control of the aircraft and my pilot explained some of the controls of the aircraft. We flew over Montrose and Forfar and were amazed to see that the Cairngorms have loads and loads of snow at the moment!

Keiran was in charge of photography so have a look for yourself.

iPhone and other happenings.

Mon, 13 Oct 2008 04:30:18 GMT

It's been, um, wow, 6 weeks since I last showed face round here. Jeez-oh.

Anyway, since then I have done a fair bit. Took a week's holiday last minute in Turkey with Emma and Calum where I managed to get the slight definition of a tan; anyone who has been in sunny places with me knows that although I'm a Mexican my body just isn't - I don't tan easily. Calum was also made to do a strip tease in front of the a crowd of hotel guests all in the name of entertainment.

Uni has started back and third year is a toughie. However the IMD module this year is Moli (The Museum of Lost Interactions). Moli requires us to research historic technology and 'restore' an artifact we've found. These restored artifacts never actually existed but the aim is to convince people they could have existed. Last year they focused on chairs whilst the year before was a bit more general. We are looking at hats, novel hats!

The brief isn't set ins tone so we really have been given the scope to take this in whatever direction we feel suits us best after all we are working towards our final degree grades now. I'm going to set up a url to track the developments of this project, most likely it will be http://moli.hellopablo.co.uk or something similar.

On a side note, I emptied my bank account to Apple and finally got myself an iPhone. In a word: awesome. I don't need to go into great detail as I'm sure anyone who's anyone already knows all they need to know about the iPhone - but I feel the need to just tell everyone about my new favorite thing.

Blog Updates

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 11:21:55 GMT

'm updating the blog system to be a bit more expandable. As a result all my old posts are broken. I'm going through them slowly so bear with me!

Hydro Connect Festival

Tue, 02 Sep 2008 05:20:49 GMT

Emma managed to get tickets to go to the Connect festival through her work. Had a good time except that it rained constantly (part of the fun?) and I got food poisoning; and it wasn't even from festival food!

Unfortunately I missed Ladytron as thatw as on the Friday and we didn't get there till Saturday, however managed tog rab a glimpse of Sigur Ros who were awesome. Emma reckons they sound like singing cats.

Good times.

Server Updates

Thu, 28 Aug 2008 10:31:05 GMT

HelloPablo is in the process of being moved server. As a result large chunks of it are missing transit. Over the next couple of days if anyone spots a regular bug then please let me know so I can sort it. Basically on the lookout for dead links or pages showing errors.

The move is a good one though, we've upgraded to PHP5 (we were running PHP4) which emans that I can upgrade all the background code which runs the site. I'm planning on splitting the site into modules (it partly already is) which will mean that I can add, remove, extract or replace parts of the site quickly without affecting other parts - basically I can reduce downtime considerably.

Also means that features of the site are not specific to HelloPablo and can be applied with [relative] ease to other projects. An example of which is the search function - the code behind is OOP which means Ic an apply it to another database easily. So if you like what you see give me a shout and I can maybe hook you up.

Bye for now.

What if architecture were like web-design

Sat, 23 Aug 2008 15:13:46 GMT

Came across this on the interweb. I can relate to thisincredibly well. Original post can be found here

Dear Ms. Architect,

Please design and build me a house. I am not quite sure of what I need, so you should use your discretion. My house should have somewhere between two and forty-five bedrooms. Just make sure the plans are such that the bedrooms can be easily added or deleted. When you bring the blueprints to me, I will make the final decision of what I want. Also, bring me the cost breakdown for each configuration so that I can arbitrarily pick one.

Keep in mind that the house I ultimately choose must cost less than the one I am currently living in. Make sure, however, that you correct all the deficiencies that exist in my current house (the floor of my kitchen vibrates when I walk across it, and the walls don't have nearly enough insulation in them).

As you design, also keep in mind that I want to keep yearly maintenance costs as low as possible. This should mean the incorporation of extra-cost features like aluminum, vinyl, or composite siding. (If you choose not to specify aluminum, be prepared to explain your decision in detail.)

Please take care that modern design practices and the latest materials are used in construction of the house, as I want it to be a showplace for the most up-to-date ideas and methods. Be alerted, however, that kitchen should be designed to accommodate, among other things, my 1952 Gibson refrigerator.

To insure that you are building the correct house for our entire family, make certain that you contact each of our children, and also our in-laws. My mother-in-law will have very strong feelings about how the house should be designed, since she visits us at least once a year. Make sure that you weigh all of these options carefully and come to the right decision. I, however, retain the right to overrule any choices that you make.

Please don't bother me with small details right now. Your job is to develop the overall plans for the house: get the big picture. At this time, for example, it is not appropriate to be choosing the color of the carpet. However, keep in mind that my wife likes blue.

Also, do not worry at this time about acquiring the resources to build the house itself. Your first priority is to develop detailed plans and specifications. Once I approve these plans, however, I would expect the house to be under roof within 48 hours.

While you are designing this house specifically for me, keep in mind that sooner or later I will have to sell it to someone else. It therefore should have appeal to a wide variety of potential buyers. Please make sure before you finalize the plans that there is a consensus of the population in my area that they like the features this house has. I advise you to run up and look at my neighbor's house he constructed last year. We like it a great deal. It has many features that we would also like in our new home, particularly the 75-foot swimming pool. With careful engineering, I believe that you can design this into our new house without impacting the final cost.

Please prepare a complete set of blueprints. It is not necessary at this time to do the real design, since they will be used only for construction bids. Be advised, however, that you will be held accountable for any increase of construction costs as a result of later design changes. You must be thrilled to be working on as an interesting project as this! To be able to use the latest techniques and materials and to be given such freedom in your designs is something that can't happen very often. Contact me as soon as possible with your complete ideas and plans.

-- Mr. Client

PS: My wife has just told me that she disagrees with many of the instructions I've given you in this letter. As architect, it is your responsibility to resolve these differences. I have tried in the past and have been unable to accomplish this. If you can't handle this responsibility, I will have to find another architect.

PPS: Perhaps what I need is not a house at all, but a travel trailer. Please advise me as soon as possible if this is the case.

After said house is completed..

Dear Ms. Architect,

We love the house! Thanks so much for all your hard work! We have just a couple of changes.

Firstly, my wife has decided to start working from home. So it would be great if we could incorporate some sort of storefront, maybe attached to the living room? Also, we'd like to move the house downtown so she can get more foot traffic.

The other day we were in the kitchen, and we noticed we weren't getting enough light. But we couldn't find a way to add a window! We'd hate to have to bother you every time. Maybe you could install some pulleys or something so we can move the walls around, too. That would be so great for entertaining. Same thing with doors. I know you said the stairs had to stay in the same place because they're attached at the top, so can you come over this weekend and show us how to build a new staircase? We want a circular one.

Oh! And I don't think having a path to our neighbor's house was such a good idea. Sometimes people come to see us, and then they go over and hang out with Mary and Carl! I think we need to get rid of all the paths that lead off our property, and probably also the driveway.

Speaking of the driveway, we'd like to have a mime open the gate. He could do a short show for everyone before letting them in. My buddy Jim thinks that would be really fun.

We've made some great friends since moving in, including a bunch of pharmacists who have offered us a business opportunity. (!!!) We need to add paths to all their offices, with big neon signs. My wife finds it kind of tacky, but I've been assured it's a great investment.

We have some more stuff, but it can wait until after our nephew re-does the foundation. (He took a class at the community college since he did the roof, so don't worry.) Can you believe we've been working on this house for over a year?? You architects sure know a thing or two about job security! (j/k)

Thanks again for all your help,
Mr. Client

There is a lot of truth in this even though it is amde out to be a joke. Too often people will pay loads for printing etc but expect to get design for free (or nearly free). Clients often think they know everything; as Jarad Nickerson (aka j3concepts) put it in his recent interview with Behance:

"The customer is always right. Wrong. They are rarely right when it comes to design, that's why they come to you: "the professional." Don't be afraid to tell them so."

True words of wisdom.

IMD 3 Minute movies

Mon, 18 Aug 2008 17:16:51 GMT

I just received an email from Morna Simpson, one of the lecturers on my uni course; Interactive Media Design. She has been organising a competition where by entrants are to produce a 3 minute movie using Artificially Intelligent as their source of inspiration. The grand prize is a whopping £500 worth of green for the winner to spend at their leisure. Unfortunately it's primarily aimed at potential applicants so the current boys and girls of IMD 'aint on the guest list.

Still, I think it's worth publisicing. Two former IMDers produced a demo video. Andrew Cook and Gary Duncan have shot and produced this little number. Enjoy.

As for the competition, if yu are between 15 and 21 years old then why not give it a go? More info can be found at http://imd.dundee.ac.uk/competition

Naked Drawings

Tue, 12 Aug 2008 12:11:49 GMT

I've always enjoyed Life Drawing. I started it bak in my school days and instantly loved it. Once the class had got over their excitement at seeing a naked person we produced some really spectacular work. Since then (and I'm embarrassed to say it was in my 5th year, almost 5 years ago) I have been to a single life drawing session. However, it was a session I really really enjoyed. So I'm eager to get back into my old ways and have people parade around in front of me and my pencil in an attempt to hone my drawing skills.

I have drawn recently but mainly from photographs - not the same. And I can't help but feel I'm copying or imitating others when I look for examples or browse deviantArt to see what other people are producing. Obviously I can draw if I can imitate but I really want to be producing my own stuff. I feel like I'm at some sort of drawing road block. I'd also love to be able to draw, without the use of a model, a character which looks somewhat decent and not like something out of Kimpossible or the like.

So I'm looking into courses at both Dundee Uni and Dundee College. Hopefully get on one of those and start producing. Awesome.

Error 403: Forbidden in MAC OS X Leopard. Sorted!

Thu, 31 Jul 2008 19:25:44 GMT

Ages ago I installed Mac OS X Leopard, since then I have been having issues with a strange Error 403: forbidden error when trying to use my Sites folder. Googling for a fix didn't throw up many suggestions which fixed my problem entirely but this article did get me almost there.

I'm going to summarise the article and highlight what I did different in the hope that someone else might benefit from this (annoyingly simple) fix.

Note: This is all done in the Terminal, use with caution!

Firstly open up Terminal and type the following commands (pressing enter after each line):
cd /etc/apache2/users
If this folder does not exist you can create it and then navigate to it by using the following commands:

mkdir /etc/apache2/users

cd /etc/apache2/users

Now we need to create a user specific .conf file:
sudo pico username.conf
Where username is your username, obviously. You may be asked to type your password, if so type it then hit enter. In this screen type the following, again replacing username with your username:



Options Indexes MultiViews FollowSymLinks

AllowOverride All

Order allow,deny

Allow from all

Hit ctrl + o and then enter to save this file. Next we need to include this file in Apache's httpd.conf
sudo pico /etc/apache2/httpd.conf
Scroll to the very last line and type
Include /etc/apache2/users/*.conf
Hit ctrl + o and then enter to save the file. Finally we need to restart Apache.

sudo apachectl stop

sudo apachectl start

All going well that should be your Sites folder working again. Obviously, this is a quick tutorial how I did things. If you're a computer whizz and think/know that it can be done better please comment.

Microsoft Design Expo 2008

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 17:38:00 GMT

Site live here, ~~more updates imminent, I'm just in a hurry to get to work.~~

The guys are in Seattle at the moment having given their presentation. To my knowledge it has gone well, however their blog hasn't been updated at the time of writing. As far as I go though, the website is online and seems to be holding out. Richard Banks of Microsoft, Cambridge blogged it as 'a really compelling website that summarizes all of their work'.

I really hope that they do well in this competition; they are representing the best of our course. I'm sure they will, Anyway, here's a couple of pictures:

Make sure you check them out at Storymakerstoryteller.com and visit the site I made for the project while you're at it too!

MissApril render featured on deviantArt

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 16:06:10 GMT

Two blogposts in one day, wow I'm crazy. Anyway, just logged into deviantArt for the first time in ages to find that one of my 3D renders was featured in a news article about hyper-realism. Makes me feel dead fuzzy inside.

Read Article

Click above to read the article, I'm near the bottom under 3-dimensional. >: ] Or click here to see the deviation itself.

Let's forget June ever happened

Wed, 02 Jul 2008 14:38:45 GMT

Clearly somebody didn't read my last blog entry entitled Do Not Disturb: holidaying; I was disturbed alright. Lets start from the beginning in describing the month from hell which I hope to never see again...

Having done the thing all the cool kids are doing and writing my car off by demolishing a lamppost and bus shelter* I was somewhat glad to be on the plane to America 5 hours later. I was all snuggled up in the anticipated funness that is holiday. New York went fine; just the odd hiccup and argument here and there - nothing out of the normal. However my troubles really started once Emma and I got to Orlando, Florida.

Lets throw in a positive here first though. Happier times:

Four days into the trip, the day after my last blog entry, we had been out for drinks and were walking home at 2am when a car pulled up and five MASSIVE black guys got out and mugged us. They punched Emma in the face (the FACE!) first before stealing her bag and proceeding to break my nose with their fists. The main issue was that the bag had Emma's passport and all her cards. We were stuck in Florida for the remaining 10 days.

My nose isn't that big really, is it?

Things got from bad to worse. All my bank cards started getting declined so at one point we had 16 cent to our name and hadn't eaten. To top it all off we then got fleas in our bed which gave us stupid numbers of bites.

These are just a few. It went on to plague us.

We eventually managed to get Emma an Emergency Passport tog et her back to London whichw as a relief. However once in London trying to get checked into the Edinburgh flight with only a copy of her passport was an ordeal. Still, we made it.

So here I am in July with a stupid workload, a broken nose and still having to deal with insurance companies all over the joint. Fun times. Still, at least Emma looks funny in this silly hat:

PS. It rained everyday aswell. whoopee

*At least 2 of my friends and friend's friends have also written their cars off this month in Dundee. Oh and it's not cool or clever. Please don't try and crash your car. That's just stupid.

Do Not Disturb: holidaying

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 04:48:45 GMT

Well, here I am in Orlando, Florida. I attempted to use the SMS blogging system I made a while back the other day to post some exciting news however I have just realised that it failed. Boo. So I'll start from the begining...

Having been super organised for our holiday I still managed to leave the Universal tickets in Dundee. So I drove back only to total the car on my way back through. I demolished a lamppost and a bus shelter. This all happened about 5 hours before my flight. Great.

Still that was then. I have been in the states just short of a week now and done loads. The Microse website has been left in the capable hands of Miss Katy Chung and the gang. I don't have a laptop so can't really be of much use [I'm currently piggybacking an internet connection through my mobile to write this]. But I am voicing my opinion when I can...

Anyway, it's late and I have much sleep to catch up on.

Love.

I just crashed

Thu, 12 Jun 2008 00:49:49 GMT

I just totalled my car and demolished a lamppost and bus shelter. I'm Ok though. Details and pictures to come... In other news, AMERICA IN 5 HOURS! *excited much*

Here today, America tomorrow

Wed, 11 Jun 2008 11:43:20 GMT

After months of preparation and working super hard it is roughly 24 hours before we head off into the wilderness. I've spent far too much time stressing out trying to meet deadlines to really get excited, but now that I can relax for a bit I most definitely am excited :D.

In other news, I have been working hard at getting a website done for the Microsoft brief we had last semester. We had wanted it to be workbench with everything set out and, using flash, have the camera move over. That proved harder than expected BUT I managed to get pull together something similar.

http://microsoft.hellopablo.co.uk is the final version of it... notice no content. That's Katy's job. It is hugely actionscript based loading movies all over the joint with a funky new preloader in place. In fact. I'm gonna write a short tutorial on how to make it soon and post it in the labs as it is a nice thing to have in your flash wardrobe.

All my other jobs are on hold for the time being while I go and enjoy myself. Oh yeah.

Hybridisation Vs. Lifestyling: The art of world domination

Sat, 07 Jun 2008 22:42:12 GMT

A few blogposts back in a blog titled 24hrs isn't enough I explained that I was writing an essay. Well, I'm deciding to 'publish' it. So here it is....

Hybridisation Vs. Lifestyling: The art of world domination without you even knowing it

Take a read and let me know what you think. Or if you cite me well tell me too as that'd be dead good.

Been a while.

Thu, 29 May 2008 17:47:32 GMT

My oh my, it has been a while since I last showed face round here. Nothing terribly interesting happening for me just now, but I'd hate to think of the site going stale (although, I am quite aware the folio side of things is).

I'm working on quite a bundle of things at the moment now that all things university related have finished. I'm incredibly low on cash at the moment so am working hard on a few paying projects I have going at the moment. Namely, PJA Media's Model manager, Mill Design's corporate website and, a new entry, a corporate identity for an up and coming new business in Dundee.

On top of that I have also taken on the job (alongside Miss Katy Chung) of producing the exhibition website for our recent Microsoft Project. As the project is going to be put on display to some quite big names I'd really like to have this website be something to be proud of. We're aiming quite high and playing around with ideas but settling on that of a workbench. All the projects we did were very rough and conceptual so we want the website to reflect that. It's gonna be a toughie methinks.

In other news, the DVDs we used in Thailand and Vietnam for the HandyCam have been damaged. I've taken them to be cleaned and salvaged 3 out of 8 discs. I'm going to try cleaning them again. If that doesnt yield any results than I'll be upset. If you know how to lift data off a disc regardless of the disc quality then tell me Please. Pretty please.

Over and out.

The Easter holidays and Final Microsoft Presentations

Tue, 22 Apr 2008 01:06:37 GMT

The Easter holidays have been spent doing many things. I have travelled to Egypt to learn to scuba dive and worked with the group preparing a new version of our concept ready for the Microsoft presentations amongst some freelance jobs and general organisation of my life.

A couple of days ago, however, was a special day. I registered HelloPablo as a business. this means I pay tax! Yeay! We'll see if I break the £5,000 threshold over the next tax year. Regardless, it means that everything is a bit more official and is one step closer to my own successfull business.

In other, very important, news we presented to Richard and Tim from Microsoft today. The morning was spent rehearsing and rehearsing our pitch over and over fine tuning what we wanted to say in order to get it just right. We were aiming high and wanted to impress.

We presented second and I felt that it went well. We had decided to just have two voices this time so Steph and Skelly kept quiet as Calum and I tried to sell our product. Following the presentation we were bombarded with questions which I felt was a positive thing. To me it showed an interest in what we were doing and our answers were an insight into how we had developed our idea.

After everybody's presentations were finished I felt that everybody was as good as each other. Not one group failed to pitch a strong idea however there can only be one winner. The winner was Storymaker, Storyteller with Educake being marked as second place.

Storymaker, Storyteller is a concept revolving around the idea of the stories associated with old fashioned slides. The Storymaker object allows voice recordings to be made and associated with slides which are then sent to the Storyteller which projects them and plays back any recorded stories. A more precise description of the networked object will be available on the project website once it's made.

I was disappointed at not being selected, obviously. I feel that I've missed out on an amazing opportunity to really showcase what it is I do. However I am happy for the guys that get to go - they are a talented bunch. I really want to try and understand where it is we went wrong though, or more positively, how we could improve. I plan on putting this project on my portfolio even though it did not win as I feel that my analysis of the entire brief will really allow me to take as much as I can from it.

The enxt few weeks are dedicated to freelance work now. I am behind schedule and need to catch up. After I have finished the main jobs I'll hopefully be able to get some personal work done and get some fresh new designs and illustrations onto my folio and scout about for more work...

MargeryMail Preparation

Tue, 08 Apr 2008 14:00:23 GMT

Today is the second day I've spent in the IPD studio during the Easter break. IPD got back from Amsterdam last sunday so yesterday and today we have been hard at work trying to salvage our project in time for the Microsoft guys coming to 'judge'. By salvage I mean remake; we are making everything out of wood and sanding everything down.

The group is split as to how to finish the products. some want them both painted white to completely leave from ny suggestion of what material they are made from and to emphasize the intricate interactions involved. Others want them finished to look more or less like how the finished products might look.

The lecturers who were at our crit weren't to keen on the finished products that we presented (I reckon that's because they were poor quality) however I feel that we are no longer presenting to lecturers who have spent weeks with us on the products. We are presenting to Microsoft and I can't help but fear that they might be disappointed in our project if we present to them two striking objects which would have no place in Margery's home.

On a side note, Martin has a mohican now. It is amazing and made me very happy when I arrived in uni this morning.

Some images from today

I swear on the holy bible

Tue, 01 Apr 2008 09:34:56 GMT

I'm going to court today. Not my court case, obviously. I'm going to, um, I'm not sure what to be honest. I think I'm giving evidence, but not entirely sure. anyway, it's regarding the recent break in at my house.

The razzle dazzle (police for those not in the know, ahem) sent me a letter calling me to court.

I'm wearing a black shirt and smart(ish) jeans. I hope that's ok. Not sure what to expect.

EDIT: Stayed in a tiny room for 5 and a half hours and then got told to go home. Gutted.

The Apple Design Process

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 16:51:01 GMT

I was reading through the Design History, Theory and Practice module blog today and came across an entry written by Jonathan Baldwin (lecturer at Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design, Dundee) about the design process which Apple go through when designing products.

The blog post is a summary of a presentation given by Michael Lopp (Apple's Senior Engineering Manager) at SXSW (South by South West).

He mentions 4 stages of their design process which I feel would have benefited our group throughout the Microsoft brief and explains in detail what they do and, more importantly, why they do it:

Pixel Perfect Mockups

Might add more time initially but removes all ambiguity. Definitely something we should have done. communication didn't break down but sometimes ideas were misinterpreted.

10 to 3 to 1

Apple designers come up with 10 good mockups, by good that means 10 mockups, not 7 to make three good. Then narrow that to 3 and then finally to one very strong idea. Brilliant if you have the time. Maybe we should have done more prototypes - we were critiqued for staying with the same idea in our presentations. Ten would have been too many for us (I assume with the time constraint) but a few other ideas in the pot could not have hurt.

Paired Design Meetings

I agree with Jonathan's post that this idea is particularly interesting. The designers hold two meetings each week. The first is for brainstorming; all inhibitions are let go and the guys 'go crazy' with ideas. The second is an equally important and regular meeting, a production meeting. This is where they sit down and work out how their ideas might actually work. for our Microsoft brief we held regular meetings (almost) daily but we didn't ever separate them like this. We tried to justify our ends whilst having ideas. In hindsight this actually held back our creative process.

I'd highly recommend the DHTP blog for designers. It covers all sorts of issues to do with culture, sustainability, design practices or sometimes even just interesting (almost relevant) news articles. It's maintained by Jonathan Baldwin and Mike Press (Head of the School of Design at DoJ).

[Semi] Final Presentations

Mon, 24 Mar 2008 17:06:30 GMT

Today we presented our concept, killer image and networked objects to the panel today. It went ok. In all honesty our presentation was a bit sketchy; we had some ~~last minute~~ last second technical difficulties which put us all on edge and we had to sacrifice the laptops for the studio eMacs. A small blip.

We took it in turns, Calum introduced the project, our ideas, thoughts and aspirations leading on to the rest of us to do a live demonstration. Steph's mechanism failed.

An embarrassing 2 minute wait later we had it working again and continued. I explained the technicalities behind the scanning device and how the data migrated towards the iPhone and ran through a quick demo of the iPhone interface we had developed. Calum took over once again finishing the iPhone demonstration leaving Martin with the hall table and the critical evaluation.

Generally the presentation was taken well. the rationalle was perfect, the iPhone app worked well and our concept was conveyed strongly. We were heavily critiqued on the physical appearance of our networked objects however. We were told that they lacked continuity, that there was no visial language between the three objects. We agreed: one was wood, one was a horribly painted brown door wedge and the thrid was a sleek iPhone. Nevertheless, we were annoyed at the critique due to the fact that we had been told to use cardboard when from the start we had wanted to use wood.

I can see their argument though. We are not furniture designers so designing a piece of furniture in wood and doing a bad job would have looked awful - if we had painted both objects white would their argument have been any different? Regardless, I feel that the crushing critique was a bit unfair. Especially when they marveled at something what resembled a Star Wars blaster (Jon Rogers' words, not mine) .

I'm looking forward to getting this week over and done with. After Friday we have 3 weeks to prepare for Richard Banks of Microsoft coming to view all our stuff. We plan on making some very major changes.

Killer Image

Mon, 24 Mar 2008 01:59:07 GMT

Calum crafted our 'killer image' this evening. It's late so I'll add more detail in a bit, for now, enjoy the image:

24hrs isn't enough.

Sat, 22 Mar 2008 12:40:09 GMT

There just aren't enough hours in the day. And The Nether wants to many of them. I'm only supposed to do 2-3 shifts a week at that pub yet they put me on 4 shifts in a row with a days break followed by another 4. All this whilst being overloaded with work from all my uni modules who incidentally all want their big hand ins on the same week. Real world I guess. I'm not complaining or moaning though as most of the work is done - it's just the couple of (in my opinion) lesser modules require a fair chunk of work.

Nevermind. Starting my DHTP Essay today:

Hybridisation and 'lifestyling' are central to product and interactive design. Why? To what effect?

Got a number of books out on Emotional Branding, Americanisation and one on masculinity and men's lifestyle magazines. Hopefully something relevant will be there to construct some form of argument...

If it's any good maybe I'll publish it here, maybe you'll cite me. That'd be cool. Maybe.

Design Rationale

Mon, 17 Mar 2008 10:32:42 GMT

Calum has published his design rationale for the Microsoft brief.

We reckon we're somewhere on the home run now although we now have to learn Cocoa. Not so happy days. We were planning to fake the experience on the iPhone using complex javascript to try and emulate the arrival of 'mail'; however in order to make use of the iPhone's sensors, in particular the tilt sensor and accelerometer we'll need to program at the base level.

Neither of us have any experience in cocoa and online tutorials are sparse and irrelevant. Calum made a menu bar but now can't find an error it's producing.

Graham today however seemed not to mind too much about this pitfall and was telling us that we would probably find that a compromise somewhere wold be sufficient to provide a realistic experience. We still don't know how we're going to do that though. He also mentioned the fact that we would probably be focusing on one particular aspect of the interaction - that of Margery and her writing tablet; any iPhone programming would be bonus.

What's new?

Mon, 17 Mar 2008 00:31:18 GMT

Late night's are becoming a bit of a habit these days. I am currently juggling a number of freelance jobs while attempting to focus on the Microsoft brief at uni. To be honest, it's difficult. However I am thankful as all of these jobs (like buses) have come at once and at a time when I have fallen out with my bank account for being so empty. The hurdle I need to overcome is how to manage all these projects efficiently so as to please the client by producing work to the high standard expected while at the same time not giving myself an early death.

A brief run-down of my projects (which is probably more beneficial to me than interesting to you):

PJA Media

Paul Atherton is a photographer specialising in female nudes. I reckon that's a pretty pro way of describing his line of work. He\'s a talented guy and as such is looking to start his own subscription only website. He requires an online, searchable tool to keep records of all his models, shoots, clients and so forth. Current status: in progress (finished template engine, working on content management)

Mill Design, LLP

Commercial portfolio for Edinburgh based Architecture group Mill Design, LLP. this is an old project but is getting revamped due to a shift in the company's management. Current status: completed initial site changes, waiting for images to be updated.

Online identity for Hollie Bringhurst

Having started her own Beauty Salon, Hollie approached me to build an online identity for her new business. We're currently in discussion about what angle to take.

Other

Various other little freelance jobs mainly involving logo design and branding. Still in talks.

So, that's the run down. That and the ever approaching IMD Microsoft deadline. Happy days. At least it's St. Patrick's day today. Shame I hate Guinness.

Late night. AGAIN.

Mon, 03 Mar 2008 02:33:35 GMT

Once again I find myself weary eyed at silly o'clock in the morning. I've had a really tough weekend with personal stuff but I won't go into the particulars of that. Calum has really been striving ahead in terms of content. His work is really benefiting the group and helping mould the little intricacies of the project.

His blog really goes into detail about how the networked objects will interact with each other, but more importantly with their respective user, i.e. Margery or myself. He has also used some recent post which has arrived to me from my Granny in hi boards which are all due tomorrow for his individual hand-in.

I have been slowly crafting mock ups of how potential replies [from me] would look once delivered to Margery. We have decided that there should be three different types: Text only, Image + text and web-clipping + text. A whole bundle of attempts can be found on my CrapBook but below are the three finalised mockups.

Text Only, Text + Image and Text + Webclipping

As for me? My individual hand-in was not entirely clear to me. I have roughly assumed that I really need to get to grips with Pure Data and provide something to demonstrate to my team-mates exactly what it is I intend to do. Easier said than done.

All I really wanted to do was create a patch which could take input from a webcam and then save that input to disc at a specified time. No movies, no multiple frames, just one solitary JPEG saved in a specific location.

Getting webcam input was difficult enough. However, after hours of tweaking and swearing I have a working patch. Except it saves as high file-sized TIFFs. Not good, but for the time being it's enough.

00:49 PD efforts and a frizzy hat.

For those interested, I've loaded up my patch. Use it if it will be at all useful for you. I've named it WebCamCapcha and put in funky instructions. things like that happen when you're ~~procrastinating~~ working hard. WebCamCapcha v0.1 - Get it now!

I'm wrapping things up for just now. Once again I leave on the 'I wonder how tomorrow is going to go' note. I'm ~~looking forward to~~ desperately needing the couple of hours sleep I'm going to get now.

Concept Video

Tue, 26 Feb 2008 14:25:25 GMT

Yesterday was the presentation of our concept video for Microsoft. We finished it about an hour before the presentation and are pretty happy with it. We feel that the video conveys the concept of what we want to do reasonably well and at the same time injects an element of Margery's character, humor and interests into the project - something which is well overdue!

The project to date is looking up. I've still not had the chance to take apart a webcam and really have fun with Pd However, there is a workshop this afternoon with the legendary Andrew Cook who will be the answer to all my problems. At least, that's the plan.