Poll test

Let’s give this little technical demo a try. This is a TXT message poll. The question: What do you want to see from the AV Club?

1) More creatively inspiring posts (TXT 50876 to 99503)
2) More of Jared Raffini’s songs (TXT 50877 to 99503)
3) More monome (TXT 50875 to 99503)

This is going to be a hit

Today is PR (Jared Raffini)’s birthday. Unfortunately he doesn’t have a blog and rarely twitters so I’ll have to release his new hit single for him. I don’t know, perhaps with the proper vocal training and some work he’ll be stage ready.

Please enjoy.

If you must fast-forward, at least get to the 4:35 mark (or so) for his big high note.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

(I’m sure there’s a lesson in there somewhere about working within your area of gifting. maybe?)

Tweet A Sound

So, have you been thinking “hey, shouldn’t someone create a mash-up of twitter and sound synthesis?” Well, now somebody at Tweet A Sound has done just that.

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The Gospel, series open

NewSpring’s Easter series is about The Gospel. For the opener, we decided to help define the term The Gospel, which may or may not be obvious to some, and give it context from Perry’s talks over the next several weeks.

The Gospel open from Ken Wilson on Vimeo.

The idea for the opener was inspired by FOX’s current network branding, living in typography and bold statements about the subject matter. We decided to add contrast to Joshua’s clean-line typography style by incorporating a local pastor, shot by Adam on green screen, and mixed some of his improv sermon lines and a script Adam wrote to fit the series topics. In the end, I love the interplay of words, imagery, and music to feel both “old” and “new” school. Thanks to Pastor James Clark from Wilson Calvary Baptist Church here in Anderson, SC, for his help on this piece.

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Teenage Engineering, OP-1

Technosynthesis lust… I’m liking where they’re going with the Teenage Engineering OP-1.

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Eraser – Bent 2008 Minneapolis on Vimeo

What is circuit bending? I can think of no better way to explain it that to watch a fella speak Italian and demonstrate it for us.

Eraser – Bent 2008 Minneapolis from Derek Sajbel on Vimeo.

ECHOLAB, sound design

I love ECHOLAB, creators of wonderful sound design. Not a shabby little promo video, either.

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Blindoldfreak – Alessandro Cortini (and the Buchla 200e)

Enjoy a lovely photoset of Alessandro Cortini (responsible for much of NIN’s synth sounds on Ghosts). That beast he’s playing is a Buchla 200e modular synth. If that sort of thing interests you, here’s a wiki article with more history that anyone really needs to know.

If you’re in the market for a modular, extremely expensive device, you can buy them here. From what I can tell you’re looking at between $10k and $30k depending on your configuration.

Doesn’t look like a hobbist toy. Still, it’s pretty inspiring. This video shows it in action. Also, I highly recommend this demo video, too.

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avclub is back

Sorry for the brief downtime, folks. On a whim I decided to upgrade to WordPress 2.7.1 and didn’t think to deactivate my plugins first. (they’re serious about that step).

Particle motion back

Here’s a little motion experiment I was playing around with the other day. The Vimeo page has the file for download if you like. If you end up using it drop me a comment.

Generated with After Effects CS3, Trapcode Particular, and Math.sin/Math.cos expressions.

Particles from Ken Wilson on Vimeo.

The Foamsheep

Here’s a new material to perform stop motion with. Downright gutsy choice of raw material, soap foam.

The Foamsheep (full) from sodazot on Vimeo.

“but we don’t have the money” – Brad Barbour

I love Brad’s ingenuity and thoughts on this post. I believe he best sums it up in this line:

So quit your complaining and get creative! Maybe if God sees he can trust you with the little, he’ll trust you with more!

Being at NewSpring since the start I remember the days of mobile, of setup and teardown each week. I remember when the dollars to purchase a new projector lamp was a stretch. New computers weren’t an option, and my Duron processor was a 600 MHz. I appreciate reading words like this because they encourage me to never lean on the crutch of “oh we’ll just buy this, or if we could only get that.”

Thanks, Brad, for a great tangible reminder.

Fil 1:21?

Saw this on the road the other day. Can anyone help me to decipher the meaning of Fil 1:21? The only thing Jason and I could figure was that they intended for it to read Phil 1:21. Maybe?

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DIY Lemur / monome

You need just a few pieces, but this video demonstrated how to make your own monome / lemur emulator with a Wii controller and an LED light.

Running visuals

I’ve been running more these days. From where I live I gave east access to Hwy 81 and so that’s typically my route with minimal variations. What’s been interesting is that I start to notice the same random objects along the path each time I run. Here are a few things I notice each time.

1) one single Rainbow sandal.
2) a multitude of cigarette butts.
3) a decayed, complete arm of some road killed creature, nearly dried and preserved.
4) The Mulch Mart sign (slogan rotates weekly)
5) an oblong neon green object I’m scared to attempt to identify.

What about you? Do you run? What do you consistently notice?

Coffee science

For you coffee addicts out there (yes, I’ll be your leader, unless you are driving to Starbucks, then I’ll happily be your follower), here is an article on the science of coffee.

Crowe / Vedder

Is it me, or is Russel Crowe really starting to look like Eddie Vedder?

what is monome?

For those who do not “get” my obsession with monome this may help explain things.

Welcome to Monome from sam_square on Vimeo.

Evernote 2.0

Evernote updates to version 2.0 for the iPhone and includes many new improvements. It’s still free. It’s still a must-have for iPhone users.

Gmail, Happy Birthday

Today marks the 5th anniversary of Gmail. I can remember getting my first account back in April of 2004. I was at an After Effects training class in Tucker, GA. I was uploading some of the notes from our lessons into my blogger account (yes, pre WordPress days) and saw a little icon saying something like “hey there, beloved blogger user, like to try gmail?” When I signed up I received 1-2 invites to give away. My wife got one, and I believe Jared Barden, of our NewSpring IT guys, got the other.

I then wrote this very insightful blog post about my new gmail address.

Five years later I’ve moved every single iota of web email and communication into Google’s hands. My old hotmail account probably still exists out there, untouched, collecting SPAM.

Read more of Gmail’s history in this Wired.com article.