Lytro: A Revolution of Picture

Shoot first, focus later. (Try playing on the picture below)

That's what Lytro, a technology/camera/picture format/convergence of all is all about.
A very sophisticated matrimony of tech and camera indeed,  once the camera out for sale that is.







The theory behinds it is something called Light Field, whatever that is, which will enable you to alter the focus of your digital shot at your disposal. Some other call it plenoptic camera.

Although I don't know what good that is for the professional camera-slingers a.k.a those who can focus their camera alright before they shoot, even under the danger of death, I certainly belief that it will bring much good to me.

As much as I love all products of photography, from digital to ancient black and white; from art to journalistic; from serious to downright silly, I'm not that good at taking picture...or in it as a matter of fact...

The technology and camera is the brainchild of Mr. Ren Ng, a scientist/entrepreneur/a man who can't focus his camera.

Will it be big? Sure! Judging from the greater proportion of people like me, obviously lacking in photography.skills, compared to those who are adept at shooting things with their camera. This one look promising already

Not to mention all that photo-blogging frenzy which will become even frenzier after this product is released for public.

From all the possibilities Lytro can offer, I literally drooling when imagining what impact it will bring to the field of art. If  toy cameras and the pictures they produce, as in recent years, have become such fertile soil for art, what will plenoptic cameras as such bring to photography art scenes and exhibitions. Upon my soul I swear that this will bring a whole horde of new artists and new field of digital art too...

So thanks to the Ren Ng's friend's daughter, whom he couldn't focus his camera on, which then gave him the idea of "shoot first, focus later," we get a gift, which probably is the next big thing after digital photography itself.

Nirvana: Taking Punk To The Masses

Nirvana: Taking Punk To The Masses is the name of exhibition by Experience Music Project|Science Fiction Museum that will exhibit Nirvana's memorabilia and "rare and unseen pieces from the band, their crews and families".

The exhibition runs from April 16, 2011- April 23, 2013.

As stated in the press release, the exhibition will include, but not limited to:

• Kurt Cobain’s never-before exhibited, high school painting of two aging, Reagan-era punks in the post-apocalypse, informally known as “punk American gothic.”
• The Teac reel-to-reel tape machine owned by Mari Earl, Cobain’s aunt, on which a young Kurt recorded material for his early bands, Organized Confusion and Fecal Matter.
• Cobain’s handwritten lyrics for Nirvana songs including “Spank Thru” and “Floyd the Barber.”
• Numerous instruments, including pieces of the first guitar Cobain destroyed onstage (a Univox Hi-Flyer); Dave Grohl’s Tama Rockstar-Pro drum kit; and Krist Novoselic’s Guild acoustic bass guitar and Buck Owens American acoustic guitar used during the recording of “MTV Unplugged.”
• The yellow cardigan worn often by Cobain between 1991 and 1994.
• The winged angel stage prop featured on Nirvana’s In Utero tour.
• Scores of candid snapshots capturing the band’s early years, from their beginnings in Aberdeen, Washington to the media frenzy that erupted after Nevermind.

As we know, Kurt Cobain died this week, 17 years ago from an alleged suicide, although some people think he was murdered.

You can't separate Kurt from Nirvana and vice versa. Speaking as a die-hard fan, Nirvana had split the world into before and after Nevermind, a status not even U2 or Pearl Jam can achieve (sorry for both band's fans, but that's the truth, man!)

Kurt Cobain. You have to either hate or love this guy. The hair metals, Axl Rose in particular, hated him because he killed their careers with his music. Teenagers love and idolize him to this day for who he was and what he'd done to music. No one would consider your rock band seriously if you don't know Nirvana in some extent and Dave Grohl's drumming in "Smells Like Teen Spirit" is still the most simple-sounded yet most difficult drumming in the history of rock n roll.

Even the most prominent Nirvana haters have to admit that no band with so troubled front man and so short of career span can last these long and  bring so massive a change the world will never be the same again.

Therefore, I guess it is safe to say that Nirvana: Taking Punk To The Masses is a long-awaited homage to Nirvana, to Kurt and to the undying spirit of punk rock and rock n roll.

I'm A Believer By The Monkees

I really like the song and the guy with the tambourine...

Elenin Comet

Sometime also called Elinin (a typo), the comet is a long period comet code-named C/2010 X1 discovered by Leonid Elenin (hence, the name) on December 10, 2010.

It will be most visible from Earth starting on 9th or 10th of September 2011 as it enters its perihelion phase (closest to the Sun) while surfing on its orbit . Recently, Elenin comet has become favorite object of the conspiracy theory lovers.  On numbers of forums, members have sounded their suspicion toward Elenin as "the bringer of disasters and turmoils" of the first trimester of 2011, from the political turmoils in Middle East and North Africa to Japan's 2011 tsunami, including the so called Earth's pole-shifting, whatever that is.

For you who interested though, you can try this link on NASA's web. It is a simulation of Elenin's orbit vis a vis Earth's and the Sun's.  Using the button you find there, try to rewind/fast forward it to 15th-18th March 2011 and 28th November 2011, respectively. You'll find that on those dates, Elinin, Earth and The Sun are in a relatively straight line. Curious, huh?

Nevertheless, I'm not an astronomy expert. So I don't really know whether the formation of a straight line between two or more heavenly bodies is a rare or common phenomena in the universe. If those conspiracy theorists are right (that the presence of the approaching Elenin comet  has somewhat triggered Earth and Earthling's condition), then God better saves us during mid-end of October 2011, where the comet is at its closest proximity to Earth.

Blogger's Dynamic View

Blogger recently has implemented major change to the way your blog can be viewed. You can access the  Dynamic View by simply adding "/view/" (without the ") to the end of the blog's URL.

There are currently 5 viewing options offered:

• Flipcard: available at [blogURL]/view/flipcard

• Mosaic: available at [blogURL]/view/mosaic

• Sidebar: available at [blogURL]/view/sidebar

• Snapshot: available at [blogURL]/view/snapshot

• Timeslide: available at [blogURL]/view/timeslide

I really think this is a cool way to enhance your reader's experience (which was also the major purpose of the Dynamic View anyway). Of course, at this state (being beta and all) there are a lot of room for improvements. Nevertheless, every big achievement started with small, simple steps as these. So, I'm looking forward to what extent Blogger and Google really intend to take these changes in time to come.

Here are examples of Dynamic View for my blog Common Copy:
Common Copy Flipcard
Common Copy Mosaic
Common Copy Sidebar
Common Copy Snapshot
Common Copy Timeslide

I really like the Flipcard and Mosaic.Which one you like the most?

The Lost Beatles Photographs

The Lost Beatles Photographs: The Bob Bonis Archive, 1964-1966

A collection of Beatles' photos during their three US tours.

The Full Moon And Uchiha: An Uncomplete Theory

I believe many of Naruto fans out there have heard about the theory (the term hypothesis will be more suffice since it hadn't been proved yet, but I'll still use "theory" for keyword's sake) of the relation between The Full Moon and Uchiha Clan's power.

Basically, the theory said that The Full Moon somehow heighten the Uchihas fighting prowess (either their ninjutsu, genjutsu, or both).

The theory is based on several shots of incidents that marked the Uchiha Clan's destiny specifically and things that marked major happenings in the Naruto Manga's storyline in more general sense.

Chronologically, that would be:

1. First, the Battle between Uchiha Madara and Hashirama Senju (The Future Shodai-Hokage).
2. The Nine-Tailed Demon Fox's attack on Konoha
3. The Uchiha Clan's Massacre by Uchiha Itachi and Madara.

All happened in Full Moon nights.

There are more shots of minor incidents that further shows Full Moon, one of those is when Sasuke beat  whole lots of Ninja while being supervised by Orochimaru.

Interestingly, the Full Moon seems to affect the Senju clan also, in the same way as, if not more superior than, Uchiha. How come? Well, in cases when these two descendants fight under the full moon, Senju is always the victor, such at these :

• Full Moon was seen in the battle of The Valley Of The End between Hashirama Senju and Uchiha Madara, where the former was the victor.

• Another Full Moon seen in the Kyuubi attack of Konoha. Yondaime (4th Hokage, a Senju) beat Madara.

I guess the most interesting prove of Full Moon effect toward a Senju was Naruto's battle against Pain. Yes, that's a full moon alright.

Kishi yet to explain this to us, but hints are abundant. It even can be traced back to the descendants of the Sage Of the Six Paths (ancestors to both Senju and Uchiha clans). They fought under the full moon in which the younger (ancestor to Senju) became the victor. Coincidence? I don't think so.

Blood Red Shoes

Blood Red Shoes

The White Stripes they ain't, Blood Red Shoes is my most recent favorite band! I mean how can you not knocked head over heels to this Brighton-based two pieces?

Laura-Mary Carter and Steven Ansell formed the Blood Red Shoes, back in 2004 after the break-ups of their previous bands, Lady Muck and Cat On Form, respectively.

They productively released 7" vinyls before they made their first LP, titled Box of Secrets in 2008 and Fire Like This in 2010. By the way, you can read more about the band here

I've gone head over heels after I listened to their "It's Getting Boring By The Sea" which is featured in the OST of Scott Pilgrim Vs The World. I know it's kinda lame way to be introduced to a particular band that way (by means of movie's soundtrack), but hey, it's a revelation, nonetheless, and I'm grateful for it.

Being a washed-up drummer like I am, I must admit that Blood Red Shoes is the band I never had. They got both the sound and attitude of the 90's, which they admit as their influence, without having the slightest obligation to really affiliate themselves with the genre.

I won't make any notion about the way they looks (I can imagine how sick and bored they are with the subject by now). Yes she is cute, and yes he is also (I guess... I've never judge a man's looks before) and they both can switch to modelling any day they want, but that's that.

More important to me is the way they made me feel. Listening to them makes me want to write my music again, listening to them have reminded me of dream long forgotten: to be heard, to inspire, to make some damage through music, for which I eternally indebted.

Nyepi: The Sounds Of Silence

As I stood on a junction in Kerobokan street, a monster passing me by. The crowd cheers, there were more monsters to come, and I've just joined the crowd to cheer at them.

No, I wasn't in horror movie. I was in Bali on the eve of the annual Nyepi day ritual, the Day Of Silence according to Hindu-Balinese's custom, to watch the Ogoh-ogoh, the Monsters Parade, which was a complementary ritual of the former. The monsters made of mixed materials of papers, Styrofoams and fiberglass by each village in one precinct and paraded over the precinct's junctions and main roads. Some monsters were 35 feet tall, while others were small enough to be carried by the local children.

The parade symbolizes the cast-off  of evil spirit before entering the holy state of Nyepi, during which Hindu-Balinese spend 24 hours indoor, practicing silence, restraining themselves from daily activities by fasting and meditating.

The Future Of Internet

Apparently, a lot of Internet experts have agreed that the future of the internet lies in the cloud computing technology. The easiest way to describe cloud computing is to juxtapose it to electricity grid: end-users (that means you and me) don't need to know where it sources from nor how it delivered or how to configure it. As long as you pay, it'll be there. We've seen some of its implementation already. Remote servers on which our blogs ran, online games where people all around the world, not necessarily knowing each other, joint in a single gun-toting futuristic slaughter or teeth bashing medieval blood-bath are some example.

A full implemented cloud computing though, will be as far stretch as to not require you to buy any software installment whatsoever. Because you see, everything happen in your Mac/PC will be done in the network grid in the cloud, hence, the name.

Cool, huh?

How To Change The Fonts On Your Blog Using Google Webfonts

Just recently, Google launched the Google Webfonts (beta).

Google Web Fonts lets you browse all the fonts available via the Google Web Fonts API. All fonts in the directory are available for use on your website under an open source license and are served by Google servers.

Get it? That means you can use them to beautify your blog. It's pretty easy. Here's how.

First go to Google Webfonts. There you will find lists of fonts. Click whichever you want to use. You will be brought to the font's page. Before you do anything else, please read the License of each font to avoid the violation of its corresponding TOS.

There are several tabs about the font in that page. You can check them out by yourself.

To start using it to your blog, click the Use This Font tab. Check the variant of the font you intend to use (Regular/Bold etc). And copy the code beneath it. For example (I use the Droid Sans):

Next, go to your HTML editor in Blogspot, (dont forget to backup it first before you proceed), paste that code somewhere between the head and /head tag. Save it. Note: Don't forget to add the "/" (without quotes) in the closing tag "'/" (without the quotes) (after the type='text/css'>) so that it looks like this: type=text/css'/> or else you won't be able to save your change.. Next, copy the other code, in my case it looks like this:

You only need to copy the font-family part. Next, still in HTML editor, decide on which part you want this font to be (the header, headlines, body etc) search (ctrl+f  in Firefox) that part and look for the default font-family of that part. Replace that default font-family with the one generated in the Google Webfonts. Save your change and voila. You just change the font on your blog.

Middle East Demonstration: What's Going On?

Wave after wave after wave of demonstrations swept Middle East. First it hit Tunisia, then Egypt. Now countries like Algeria, Bahrain, Yemen and Libya follow suit.

Death toll rises too, as the military/pro-government militias seem too trigger-happy to not shoot the protesters. These "shoot first, ask later" attitude reached the worst in Libya where 200 more people reported killed by the armed pro-government. Zoo-wee, mama!

What's going, on? Well, to me, it's just a matter of time, really. People get bored over their leaders, their government and its policies. Individuals like Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and Ghaddafi of Libya to whom the protesters are against has been in 30 years plus in power. It's not the case of freedom like many would suggest. It is simply a case where enough is enough.

Inflation and high-unemployment are also contributing factors to the crisis.

In fact, the combination of a long-reign in power and economy crisis in the same time frame is a death sentence for any government. We've seen government toppled this way, as happened in Indonesia, 1998. The 30 years old regime toppled by the people following the worst economy crisis that hit the country in 1997.

Obviously,  in such recent global economy, more countries will follow.

But the real question would be what will happen next in those protesters-festered countries? Who'll lead them after the status quo step down, and whether it will be an overall better government or in the contrary, a gate-way to never ending chaos? No one knows, not even the protester. We can only hope for the best.

Philippine's Mount Bulusan Erupts

Photo Taken from Posterous

The eruption took place Monday 21 February 2011 morning local time, sending kilo-tons of ash and volcanic materials 2 Km high. Approximately 2000 people evacuated after the eruption.

Mount Bulusan's eruption is the third major volcanic eruption in the South East Asia in the last 6 months, after Mount Merapi in Central Java, Indonesia and the ongoing eruption of East Java's Bromo Mountains, Indonesia.

Adrianne Palicki, The "New" Wonder Woman

Meet the new Wonder Woman, Adrianne Palicki! After much delay: confusing casts (Sophia Bush to Megan Fox), bail out producers and change of writers (Joss Whedon is among them), NBC finally move on with the production of Wonder Woman. Spear-headed by David E. Kelley as writer and directed by Jeffrey Reiner. Continue ►

King Of Limbs, Radiohead's 8th Album

King Of Limbs by Radiohead, is touted to be the World's First Newspaper Album. Sound strange? Maybe. But that's also how these guys' sound, too, right? (Curiously, it is because it offers art sheet of newspaper arts with the album).

Here is what they wrote in the King Of Limbs website:

Newspaper Album - PRESALE

Radiohead's new record, The King Of Limbs, is presented here as the world's first* Newspaper Album, comprising:

• Two clear 10" vinyl records in a purpose-built record sleeve.
• A compact disc.
• Many large sheets of newspaper artwork, 625 tiny pieces of artwork and a full-colour piece of oxo-degradable plastic to hold it all together.
• The Newspaper Album comes with a digital download that is compatible with all good digital media players.
• The Newspaper Album will be shipped on Monday 9th May 2011 you can, however, enjoy the download on Saturday 19th February 2011.
• Shipping is included in the prices shown.
• One lucky owner of the digital version of The King Of Limbs, purchased from this website, will receive a signed 2 track 12" vinyl.

*perhaps

While for the digital version they offer:

• MP3 version is a 320K constant bit rate file.
• WAV version is a full CD quality uncompressed digital audio file.
• This digital download is compatible with all good digital media players.
• One lucky owner of the digital version of The King Of Limbs, purchased from this website, will receive a signed 2 track 12" vinyl.

For unknown reason, the band have abandoned the "pay what you want" method they used in their previous album, In Rainbows. But that's hardly nothing. Can't wait to download it next Saturday (19th February 2011). Continue ►

Machine Of Death

Machine of Death: A Collection of Stories About People Who Know How They Will Die

Machine Of Death, a joint-work of several individuals, head-mastered by Ryan North et al, which is also Amazon’s best seller book is given for free.

Continue ►

Travelling To Bali

It's almost 2 years since I moved, nomad-style, to Bali, the Paradise. An exciting, promising and blessed years actually, because before Bali I was this selfish, jobless, penniless to-hell-with-the-world punk, while now I'm in a business endeavor, a part-time blogger and a husband, living a very productive and lucrative life.

Enough to say that Bali is my personal land of salvation. A place that allowed you to have all the fun while you're at it, too. (For one thing, no rehabs or retreat places do that.)

I believe my view is shared by a lot of people flocking in to Bali each year. Some stay and more coming in, not to mention the "Eat, Pray, Love" pilgrims, from around the world. And to you who haven't visit this literal heaven, I would say, "Welcome!"

Comment On The Silly Website vs Facebook Fan Page Thing

While there seems to be a lot of heist  over which one is better, a website or Facebook fan page in terms of promoting your online business (or whatever you do online), I would say who give a damn?

I'm more surprised that this kind of discussion even emerged in the first place, really. Because, to me, it's not the same case of the typical which one to use, the classic Windows or Apple? Or the more recent,  iPhone or Blackberry type of discussion. I know, some of bloggers out there live off of this kind of discussion, head-to-head-ing two different entities altogether (curse their reviewer's mentality). But, really, why can't you have both? If you can have both iPhone and Blackberry, there's no reason why you can't utilize both website and fan page to promote your business.