Robot Chicken. It’s a stop motion animation comedy clip shop, vaguely reminiscent of what Adam and Joe used to do. Most of their stuff is based on stuff from the 80s, toys and computer games (or toys from the 80s and such).

Episode 2 is a good one to start with , so here it is. There is loads more on you tube.

Labels: links, video

I just stumbled across another you tube series that is well worth a watch. Collage Saga.

It’s a pastiche of console RPG games, particularly the Final Fantasy series. Well observed and well produced, lots of laughs. If you have never played a console RPG game you will be wondering what the hell is going on.

Labels: b3ta, I made this, picture

.. it really should do.

Sure, you tube is great of short clips of people falling over or lighting their farts, but when used properly, it shows the potential for internet based video entertainment.

Well producers, funny, made-on-a-shoestring shows are appearing on you tube that should make large production companies ashamed of themselves. At the moment I am watching:

Hope is Emo: This is a series done in the stype of a an Emo girl called hope who keeps some sort of video diary. Its well acted and the script is very tight and clever. Plus it nails the “Emo” type i.e. they don’t really have any problems because the come from comfortable middle class homes, so they have to make up things to get upset about.

Chad Vader, Day Shift Manager: This is… for some reason, the younger brother of Darth Vader… who…. Works in a supermarket, as the day shift manager. An odd idea, but well put tougher. The episodes are short, but there are plenty of star wars based gags. The producers have obviously been to film school, because they have managed to cram in all the stuff that movies are supposed to have ( love interest, conflict, etc…). As I say, its all star wars based, so best if you know what that is about to get the jokes.

Mookie and Sam: This ones a big hit the Missus. The life and times of two Manhattan pooches. Basically, video of two cute little dogs, voice overed in the style of Look Who’s Talking. Well acted, quite funny and always cute. A must see for do lovers.

Ask Ninja: A kind of a stylised talking head of a Ninja who gives his opinion about stuff. I don’t really get this, but it’s the #1 show on You Tube.

Red Vs Blue: While I haven’t watched this is ages, it was the first online series that I got in to. And this was back in 2003, pre dating You Tube by quite a while. It’s a comedy filmed using the computer game Halo, voice overd and edited in to a very funy show that largely takes the piss out of computer games and the internet.

Labels: real world, Review, video

We all love Doom

We love even more that you can play Doom in your web browser.

You will love even more that you can play Doom, in your web browser, in a ZX Spectrum emulator.

That’s right, they released Doom for the Spectrum.

Crazy.

Labels: geek, links

The latest Hollywood blockbuster “300” is about a brave army of 300 white, muscular Spartans who defend themselves from an attack by thousands of Persian warriors.

Iranians are upset about this because it casts them in a bad light, as savages and basically evil. Below is a little exert form the BBC news story about this:

Award winning Iranian blogger and journalist Omid Memarian has been among these voices. He is worried about what he sees as historical discrepancies in the film.

"Not only does it give the wrong outcomes to battles, it grossly misrepresents the Persians and their civilization.

"It is unfortunate that very few curriculum’s in the US cover world history and it is very easy to misdirect the general public on historical facts."

Well, you poor babies, you have been misrepresented by Hollywood in *one* movie. The English (not the British) are always portraid as:

• Bumbling idiots
• Arrogant toffs
• Master villians
  

In fact, I have a long standing theory that there is no Hollywood movie (since the dawn of colour at any rate) where an English actor plays and English role where they are an out-and-out Die Hard style hero, they will fit one of the three profiles above (and no, James Bond doesn’t count, he was born in either Germany or Switzerland and his father was Scottish, and anything that Hugh Grant is in, he plays a bumbling idiot).

Furhter still, If Hollywood want a master villain to be any nationality other then English, they still cast Jeremy Irons or Ben Kingsly, and don’t even bother getting them to effect an accent.

In short English = Evil.

In the movie U571 some "brave US sailors" capture the first Enigma encryption device from a German Uboat, the titular U571. In reality this was captured by the British, a year before the Americans bothered to join the “war in Europe”.

Another good example is form Mel Gibson with “The Patriot”, here is a little about it form the Wikipedia:

• The film has been heavily criticized for its historical inaccuracies, including the invention or exaggeration of British atrocities. Most criticized was a scene depicting the torching of a church containing a town's inhabitants.
• Even supportable atrocities, such as the killing of prisoners are inaccurately depicted, with redcoats sending roving firing squads to dispatch the wounded. In such instances however, the British were known for simply using the bayonet, as powder use in the field had to be controlled due to regular resupply difficulties.
• Also in the film, Martin justifies the described atrocities against the Cherokee in the French and Indian War by stating that the Cherokee broke their treaty with the French. Although at war with the colonies of Carolina and Virginia, the Cherokee never formally allied themselves with the French.
• Although it went generally unnoticed by casual audiences, historians also criticized the depiction of American-owned slaves being freed to serve in the Continental Army. It was actually the Dunmore Proclamation made by the British Army which first announced conditional freedom to slaves who joined them, a fact which is acknowledged by the film when Colonel Tavington tells blacks working for Martin that slaves who fight for "The Crown" will be granted their freedom upon an English victory. The new American government would maintain legalized chattel slavery until the Thirteenth Amendment was ratified in 1865. Although it is true that Blacks fought on both sides in the Revolution, the South Carolina assembly resolutely refused to allow blacks — either slave or free — into the state militia, contrary to what one sees in this film. Here Martin is no slaveholder, but a farmer who employs black workers for a salary, a labor relationship that was very rare in colonial South Carolina.

And some more propergand from Gibson in Braveheart:

• Braveheart's plot includes an affair between William Wallace and the Princess Isabelle, based upon Isabella of France. The film implies she is pregnant at the time of Wallace's execution, carrying the future Edward III of England. Historically, the real Isabella was a child of nine still living in France at this time, meaning she never met Wallace, and furthermore, was never a Princess of Wales, as she married Edward II after he became king - four years after Wallace's death. This idea may have been derived from the play The Wallace by Sydney Goodsir Smith, or it may be derived from a fictional episode in Blind Harry's poem, where Marguerite of France, second wife of Edward I, attempts to seduce Wallace.
• The film depicts Edward I dying at the same time as Wallace was executed. In fact, Wallace's execution took place in 1305 in Westminster, and King Edward died in 1307, two years later, en route to put down a fresh rebellion of the Scots led by Robert the Bruce.
• The film depicts Scots going into battle wearing woad, a practice not known to have existed in the thirteenth century. This has been interpreted variously as an anachronistic use of ancient Pictishsoccer fan's habit of painting his national colours on his face (allegedly pioneered by a Scotland fan). However, in Blind Harry's poem, Wallace does dream that the Virgin Mary paints a saltire on his face, and this is the likely inspiration for the use of warpaint in the film. ^[1] practices or as derived from the modern

So, as you can see, my heart bleeds for the Iranians who have been dealt such an unfair hand by Hollywood.

Labels: *sigh*, real world, soap box

Labels: geek, links

Labels: b3ta, I made this

Labels: geek, links, my life

Labels: real world

SoundBug is a twist on the concept of a travel speaker. It looks a little like a silver computer mouse with a big sucker on it. Plug the headphone jack in to your MP3 and stick the suction cup to any flat surface, twist 90O to lock in to place and whatever you have attached it to becomes a speaker.

My experiments have shown the larger and thinner the surface the better the sound. For instance I got good results sticking it to my kitchen counter better still sticking it to the white board (dry wipe board, apologies to the PC brigade).

The sound bug plays both the left and right channel out of the same unit, but if you have two, you can connect them together and they will automatically sort themselves out as the left and right channels. That way you can turn your kitchen cupboard in to a set of stereo speakers.

The real question is, how does it perform? To be honest, not as well as I would have liked. I have a pair of fairly pikey travel speakers that me and the missus use in the kitchen, with the sound bug attached to the kitchen counter I swapped the MP3 player between the two. Both the sound quality and loudness was better from the travel speakers.

This is not to say that the sound bug is rubbish, far from it. It is still a very cool little device. And for its size (a fraction of the size of the travel speakers) it is loud and clear enough for most situations. I see it as an excellent speaker to take with you when staying in a hotel or similar situations. Its very easy to travel with, you could even have it in your coat pocket. Its found a home in our house stuck to the bedside table taking the place of a set of speakers we had there that where bulky and who’s cables constantly got in the way. I am quite tempted to get a second one at some point to stick to the other bed side table. I want to hear what the stereo effect is like.

SoundBug, £20 from the ever excellent firebox or a lot more from other places.

Oh, and if you are thinking of buying one, but don’t want to spend the money and want to be put off. This should do the trick.

Labels: my life, real world, Review