Season's greeting, everyone!
My previous ElfYourself videos are HERE and HERE!
Showing posts with label videos. Show all posts
Showing posts with label videos. Show all posts
Saturday, November 13, 2010
Thursday, January 07, 2010
Still waiting it out: Starship Exeter
Still no word on the release of the oft-delayed finale of "The Tressaurian Intersection", the second "Starship Exeter" fanfilm episode, but in the meantime, the underlings had some fun with this:
Starship Exeter: The Night Shift
Meanwhile, here's Episode #1, with a cameo from moi:
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Snowball fight!
Not exactly snowball season Down Under, but great fun.
In 2008, my ElfYourself video had a disco theme:
Today's pic: Pirate theme Jolly Roger flags for the Year 6 farewell.
Wednesday, July 01, 2009
Australia's first astronaut is 50!
"Happy 50th Birthday" to Mr Squiggle.
Mr Squiggle, the man from the moon.
He hasn't aged a day! (Sigh. Unlike moi.) He can draw with his nose. He rides a rocket to the moon every week. He's a marionette friend to talking steam shovels, snails and blackboards. I watched him on TV as a kid, even worked with him (briefly) when we were 21 and 20 respectively, and now we are both past the big 5-0.
I did the kite-making in a 1980 episode of "Mr Squiggle and Friends", entitled "Space Age Kites", directed by Virginia Lumsden. I appeared on the little TV which Gus the Snail wore for a shell, and I had to teach Miss Jane (real-life daughter of actor Willie Fennell) to make sled kites out of beautiful, shimmery, polymer film. (I was taught how to do them by my wonderful teachers college craft lecturer, Klin Sullivan, who is a long-time puppetry colleague of the Hetherington family; Klin recommended me for the gig.)
My episode was made in the January of 1980 but didn't air until the August. It was quite a fluke as to how I became involved. I had stayed in touch with Liz, a prac supervising teacher in my second year at college, and her school kept inviting me back for their end-of-term celebrations. Knowing I was finishing up at Christmas 1979, I was invited to do some volunteer work at the Marrickville kids' drop-in vacation centre - located at Tempe, in the old heritage-listed nunnery by the river. (The students were bussed over every day in a mini-bus, and they were great kids, who were so appreciative of my efforts as a then-fledgling craft teacher.) We did several all-day excursions over four weeks of the school vacation, including Taronga Park Zoo, Channel Seven TV studios and the Festival of Sydney in Hyde Park.
It was at the Festival's hands-on craft exhibit where I bumped into Klin, and she said that if I'd come back on the weekend she'd upskill me to make space-age sled kites for the "Squiggle" show. All I had to provide my own eyelet punch, and fame could be mine! When it came time to tape the episode, the ABC and Miss Jane were able to come to us at Tempe, where we had a ready made child audience - they loved me! - and then we drove to Centennial Park in the afternoon to fly the kites we made for the cameras.
Not a bad opportunity for a 21 year old graduate teacher with no experience.
You know, despite the glorious rainbow vibrancy of Mr Squiggle himself, and the amazing purple and silver sled kites, I've never seen the episode in colour! The week my episode was due to air on TV, there was a lengthy bread strike - I was working in my Dad's independent depot bread shop in Ramsgate. I had to take my portable b/w TV in, and the episode ran for the entertainment of the queue of customers who were lined up to buy their meagre rations of daily bread. Mum and Dad couldn't see the episode at all, since they were back at the Bexley store, serving their own queue of customers. There were no commercial home video machines yet, of course. I had even asked my old college to tape the episode for their archives (and me) - on U-matic video - but something went wrong with their aerial socket that day, and it taped in b/w! (Somewhere around here I have a fairly clear b/w crosstape, but it's probably on Beta. Sigh. Unless I once made a VHS copy.)
Also: a man named Terry Dowling sang a silly song about an alien in the episode - and it was a shock, years later, to meet him in Galaxy Bookshop and realise that Terry Dowling the folk singer was THE Terry Dowling, SF writer - and the husband of Kerry, a fellow ASTREX Star Trek Fan Club member! Small universe!
Mr Squiggle, the man from the moon.
He hasn't aged a day! (Sigh. Unlike moi.) He can draw with his nose. He rides a rocket to the moon every week. He's a marionette friend to talking steam shovels, snails and blackboards. I watched him on TV as a kid, even worked with him (briefly) when we were 21 and 20 respectively, and now we are both past the big 5-0.
I did the kite-making in a 1980 episode of "Mr Squiggle and Friends", entitled "Space Age Kites", directed by Virginia Lumsden. I appeared on the little TV which Gus the Snail wore for a shell, and I had to teach Miss Jane (real-life daughter of actor Willie Fennell) to make sled kites out of beautiful, shimmery, polymer film. (I was taught how to do them by my wonderful teachers college craft lecturer, Klin Sullivan, who is a long-time puppetry colleague of the Hetherington family; Klin recommended me for the gig.)
My episode was made in the January of 1980 but didn't air until the August. It was quite a fluke as to how I became involved. I had stayed in touch with Liz, a prac supervising teacher in my second year at college, and her school kept inviting me back for their end-of-term celebrations. Knowing I was finishing up at Christmas 1979, I was invited to do some volunteer work at the Marrickville kids' drop-in vacation centre - located at Tempe, in the old heritage-listed nunnery by the river. (The students were bussed over every day in a mini-bus, and they were great kids, who were so appreciative of my efforts as a then-fledgling craft teacher.) We did several all-day excursions over four weeks of the school vacation, including Taronga Park Zoo, Channel Seven TV studios and the Festival of Sydney in Hyde Park.
It was at the Festival's hands-on craft exhibit where I bumped into Klin, and she said that if I'd come back on the weekend she'd upskill me to make space-age sled kites for the "Squiggle" show. All I had to provide my own eyelet punch, and fame could be mine! When it came time to tape the episode, the ABC and Miss Jane were able to come to us at Tempe, where we had a ready made child audience - they loved me! - and then we drove to Centennial Park in the afternoon to fly the kites we made for the cameras.
Not a bad opportunity for a 21 year old graduate teacher with no experience.
You know, despite the glorious rainbow vibrancy of Mr Squiggle himself, and the amazing purple and silver sled kites, I've never seen the episode in colour! The week my episode was due to air on TV, there was a lengthy bread strike - I was working in my Dad's independent depot bread shop in Ramsgate. I had to take my portable b/w TV in, and the episode ran for the entertainment of the queue of customers who were lined up to buy their meagre rations of daily bread. Mum and Dad couldn't see the episode at all, since they were back at the Bexley store, serving their own queue of customers. There were no commercial home video machines yet, of course. I had even asked my old college to tape the episode for their archives (and me) - on U-matic video - but something went wrong with their aerial socket that day, and it taped in b/w! (Somewhere around here I have a fairly clear b/w crosstape, but it's probably on Beta. Sigh. Unless I once made a VHS copy.)
Also: a man named Terry Dowling sang a silly song about an alien in the episode - and it was a shock, years later, to meet him in Galaxy Bookshop and realise that Terry Dowling the folk singer was THE Terry Dowling, SF writer - and the husband of Kerry, a fellow ASTREX Star Trek Fan Club member! Small universe!
Saturday, April 05, 2008
Seeing stars? Call a toe truck!
Ouch. I just dropped a boxed set of the first eight "Star Trek" movies on VHS on my foot. Strangely, there was no immediate pain... until I retrieved the heavy giftbox had a closer look at my injury - and saw that the corner of the box had landed right on the edge of the big toe nail on my left foot.
Now there is pain! And blood. I've applied a makeshift tight bandage with an Elastiplast and a piece of material, but I'm really not game to have another look yet.
Guess what was on the shopping list I made this morning, that I will now not be able to complete (until my housemate arrives home from a week's vacation tonight)? Yes, I needed to restock Dettol antiseptic, since the old bottle I tossed a few weeks ago was almost empty, and the last dregs had turned to jelly in the bottom of the bottle. Ick. (Mind you, at this point I'd apply 1998 vintage Dettol jelly if I could guarantee my toe will be infection free as it recovers.
I needed to shop badly. The only food in the house at the moment is a punnet of strawberries I put into a bowl of Boronia marsala this morning. I think I might just drain them now and drink the marinade.
Ouch, ouch, ouch.
I just know I'm gonna lose the nail...
(And stop looking at me that way, Jack. It might be Saturday afternoon, and beautiful weather outside, but no walkies today! For reasons that should be obvious.)
Now there is pain! And blood. I've applied a makeshift tight bandage with an Elastiplast and a piece of material, but I'm really not game to have another look yet.
Guess what was on the shopping list I made this morning, that I will now not be able to complete (until my housemate arrives home from a week's vacation tonight)? Yes, I needed to restock Dettol antiseptic, since the old bottle I tossed a few weeks ago was almost empty, and the last dregs had turned to jelly in the bottom of the bottle. Ick. (Mind you, at this point I'd apply 1998 vintage Dettol jelly if I could guarantee my toe will be infection free as it recovers.
I needed to shop badly. The only food in the house at the moment is a punnet of strawberries I put into a bowl of Boronia marsala this morning. I think I might just drain them now and drink the marinade.
Ouch, ouch, ouch.
I just know I'm gonna lose the nail...
(And stop looking at me that way, Jack. It might be Saturday afternoon, and beautiful weather outside, but no walkies today! For reasons that should be obvious.)
Thursday, November 08, 2007
The road to Adelaide, 1985
Continuing my series of 2D representations of my 3D photograph collection, taken with a Nimslo 3D camera, here's the first photo taken on my December 1985 holiday to Adelaide. First stop, for breakfast, was Goulburn, home of the Big Merino, and also this wonderful King Kong display on a (now long gone) video rental store in the main shopping strip. It was a case of, "Wow! That'll be a great 3D shot! Stop the car!" That's (now-housemate) Steve in the pic; the less hairy one on the far left. ;)
What intrigued me was the possibilty of how 3D would be the reflection of traffic behind me, as viewed in the shop window section of the "TV screen". Although Kong himself was very two-dimensional - even in the 3D image, as I expected - the road and cars turned out to be extremely three-dimensional in the actual Nimslo print when it was processed.
Any time we've passed through Goulburn since, we've tried to identify which shop used to be the Kong shop.
Moving on to Gundagai, here's the famous "dog on the tuckerbox" statue. In the 3D image, the writing on the roof of the souvenir shop is actual quite legible, but the dog looks great in either version. Today, he has a bigger monument built around him.
I'm really liking these pics, and the way they scan.
What intrigued me was the possibilty of how 3D would be the reflection of traffic behind me, as viewed in the shop window section of the "TV screen". Although Kong himself was very two-dimensional - even in the 3D image, as I expected - the road and cars turned out to be extremely three-dimensional in the actual Nimslo print when it was processed.
Any time we've passed through Goulburn since, we've tried to identify which shop used to be the Kong shop.
Moving on to Gundagai, here's the famous "dog on the tuckerbox" statue. In the 3D image, the writing on the roof of the souvenir shop is actual quite legible, but the dog looks great in either version. Today, he has a bigger monument built around him.
I'm really liking these pics, and the way they scan.
Friday, August 03, 2007
Double dipping
The complaints have begun. CBS Consumer products has announced that the first season of the 1960s Star Trek on DVD, with the recently-enhanced special effects via CGI, will have a US recommended retail price of $218. Now, we all know no one will be selling them for that premium price, but that it will also be a dual high definition (HD)/regular release set, with new bonus features.
Many collectors already bought the first versions of the DVD season sets, with 60s effects made on 16mm film stock, run through multiple passes of a SPFX camera. There will be buyer resistance to the new DVDs, with fans are saying they'd prefer just the regular TV sets, but with new CGI FX, be available separately.
There'll also be resistance from people who won't want HD TV as well, but what happens the prices of HD TVs fall so low they can't resist buying one? Then they'll feel a need to buy the HD TOS sets to play on it, but they'll already have the regular version. They'll yell at CBS for "double dipping".
Don't want HD TV? Eventually, when everybody else has had one for a few years, the more stubborn viewers (or technology laggards) will start to notice that their expectations - of what an acceptable level of clarity is - have changed. When colour TV came to Australia in 1975, you know, my paternal grandmother used to say that colour TV hurt her eyes - until we bought her one of her own.
I really don't understand the anger towards companies who "double dip" their DVD releases. That only infers that the producers of all DVDs should make people wait much longer for any DVD to become available for sell-through, as the various studios scramble to make the first (and only) issue of each movie and TV show a once-only double-disk-multi-commentary-100-bonus-extras version, and then promise to never ever release a second version in our lifetimes.
When i hear the complaints, I find myself thinking: divide $218 by the number of episodes in the set, and then contemplate how amazing HD TV is. Deduct the cash you make selling your old set on eBay. Think about the wages of the SPFX guys who've been churning out the new CGI FX sequences for syndicated, repeated TOS episodes on a weekly basis for the past year. And, remembering back to the bad ol' early 80s, I remind them that a double episode of TV TOS on VHS (or Beta!) was over $70 each.
Many collectors already bought the first versions of the DVD season sets, with 60s effects made on 16mm film stock, run through multiple passes of a SPFX camera. There will be buyer resistance to the new DVDs, with fans are saying they'd prefer just the regular TV sets, but with new CGI FX, be available separately.
There'll also be resistance from people who won't want HD TV as well, but what happens the prices of HD TVs fall so low they can't resist buying one? Then they'll feel a need to buy the HD TOS sets to play on it, but they'll already have the regular version. They'll yell at CBS for "double dipping".
Don't want HD TV? Eventually, when everybody else has had one for a few years, the more stubborn viewers (or technology laggards) will start to notice that their expectations - of what an acceptable level of clarity is - have changed. When colour TV came to Australia in 1975, you know, my paternal grandmother used to say that colour TV hurt her eyes - until we bought her one of her own.
I really don't understand the anger towards companies who "double dip" their DVD releases. That only infers that the producers of all DVDs should make people wait much longer for any DVD to become available for sell-through, as the various studios scramble to make the first (and only) issue of each movie and TV show a once-only double-disk-multi-commentary-100-bonus-extras version, and then promise to never ever release a second version in our lifetimes.
When i hear the complaints, I find myself thinking: divide $218 by the number of episodes in the set, and then contemplate how amazing HD TV is. Deduct the cash you make selling your old set on eBay. Think about the wages of the SPFX guys who've been churning out the new CGI FX sequences for syndicated, repeated TOS episodes on a weekly basis for the past year. And, remembering back to the bad ol' early 80s, I remind them that a double episode of TV TOS on VHS (or Beta!) was over $70 each.
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