Welcome . . . to a bit of 'Keven Fedirko' on the web.
View my own domain,
to see more photographic content!
[since Oct. 2005]


Within here, you can find out a bit of what makes me "me" - visit the various links for cool stuff, although most of the current stuff is on my domain - as I've been shooting a lot!

Always available for new freelance projects and assignments - Call me for weddings in digital or film. Request a digital portfolio (dual-format mac/pc CD-R) - - lots more material than I can fit online, including a motion-reel with sound [Oct 4, 2004]. Motion reel also available in the antiquated VHS format, and a tight web-edit squeezed down to 10.3MB online. [April 05] My rez [128k] with active web-links is also available (as a .pdf) for the curious types.


Blogesque-N E W S:
Added 10.6.3, then patched it to 10.6.4 - seems a fair bit zippier, and will suss out various snags, some old programs are a bit flaky now, but long overdue for a fresh version anyhow I think [June26] :: Got a bunch of new tools the past couple days, but it's taking awhile to install and set them all up - Magic Mouse (needed a wireless patch for 10.5.8), got that working now, Snow Leopard (not installed yet), Aperture 3 (took an entire day to redo the library, now taking another day to crunch all the face recognition stuff - I can only imagine what it might be doing as it didn't ask me to specify anything) - I will wait until its' done, then install the 3.0.3 patch that is available, read-up on the new features, and see how it performs, then try to upgrade to 10.6 after that... [June24] :: Had to order in a Sony PCM recorder (D-50) from Vancouver a few days ago - came in Wednesday, and tried it out at a Boston Pizza jam with some great players in attendance - Kelly Timleck (b), Carla Rawlyck (vg), Peter Fischer (s), Christine Davis (v) and Terry Lecroix (b) / then have been giving it a workout recording a plethora of new guitar ideas, pretty rad recorder and sleek super-responsive interface [June23] :: Someone swiped my Zoom H2 unit at the very end of my photography exibit at Art Spot ... sux! [Apr20] :: Upgraded my WD-TV firmware to 1.03.01 (vs 1.02.07 i think it said), and set the menu option to "normal" instead of wide screen - completely backwards in my mind, but that keeps HD ratio stuff with the proper empty space at the top of the frame on a SD TV. So, I'm happy. [Feb01] :: Broadened my view of what is beautiful and what is sexy tonight after a funky party [Jan31] :: My "fitz" regular headphone adapter for my 2G iPhone started to go (left channel cutting out), 'cause the wire in the cord is so thin - so in frustration I've ground down the aluminum casing so my pro Sony (MDR-7506) headphones will fit in there. Kinda looks like shit (grinding flaws jumping around), but now it just works, and no goofy adapter - should have done it from the start :: Fido let me have a new 3GS (32GB white version) contract (moving over the Nokia I got a few days back) [Jan29] :: Picked out some new frames from a company called "SALT." - handmade stuff. Now to wait 2 agonizing weeks for the Zeiss glass to be made and come back... :: might be the "Flannery" model - didn't know they had names nor came in other colors, or the "Caspain Tortoise" :: got another Nokia phone, so I can ditch Virgin, as they raised their rates again on me awhile back, and after a bit of research it seems that Bell bought them out - goofs / got the 1661 on the Fido network, and will hopefully transition to a newer iPhone shortly with a decent plan [Jan21] :: Note to self - just do everything myself [Jan17] :: Got a Western Digital TV HD Media Player to use at the hospital, and more specifically at my jam space, to watch 720 and 1080p video files inbetween recording sessions [Jan16] :: The new album by Tegan and Sara (Sainthood) - released Oct 27, 2009, is ... by far - their worst album, this one really sux, if you must give it a whirl, try the following out "Arrow", "Northshore" and "Night Watch", the rest is a big waste of space and time, wish I could get that 36m and 57 seconds back - BLECH! :: Tried a 40MB/s SanDisk (Extreme IV) and a Lexar 45MB/s (both in 8GB flavors) cards in comparison to my 15MB/s SanDisk Ultra II (also 8GB), and ... they were all very close to 2 seconds to display the picture on the back of the a900 - not what I was hoping for, 2s is an eternity. Even changing the file size from 24MP to 13MP to 6MP - no difference, as it has to downsample the output? - the search continues - might try and find a 60 or 90MB/s card at some point [Jan14] :: Solved "world boredom" - simple solution, now to work on the implementation [Jan13] :: Finished re-reading "The Art of Kissing", which I'd bought back early on in Montreal around 1991 - pretty interesting book, seems like there is a second edition out back in 2004, which I haven't seen yet [Jan12] :: Got Tethering to work on my a900, trying out some new flash gear tonight [Jan06] :: Off to a guitar players house for a new years jam (NYE party spot I didn't make it to), last night was fun - two full drum kits and a Marshall stack in the living room, but pretty brutal cold (-20, then tack on wind chill) - got to use my vacuum tube iPhone clock for the group shout out count-down which was v.cool :: Again, for those keeping track of all things obsolete - you can recycle some old calendars that match 2010 - 1999, 1993, 1982, 1971, 1965, 1954, 1943, 1937, 1926, 1915, 1909, 1897, 1886, 1875, 1869, 1858, 1847, 1841, 1830, 1819, 1813 and 1802 - wow, that's a LOT this year - go ahead, check your attic - don't be shy [Jan01] ::

:: 2010 ::

Nice revelation - just keep my H2 recorder "on" during my entire editing session(s) in my studio, and then my guitar ideas are quicker to get to (powering up the device is a snore) [Dec29] :: Found a new secret weapon (works pretty killer on skin most of the time, when my Aperture tricks far short) - turned the "impossible" into a piece of flawless magic - probably had something to do with 30s of mucking about and reading a bit of the book "Blink" that same day - amazing that 30s of pre-production was so damn useful [Dec28] :: Christmas hot tub - who would have figured an outdoor hot tub in -15 or -20 would be such a wonderful experience - thanks Jane - you're a true find [Dec24] :: Cripes - a 25m nap turned into a 12hr coma, yet still not enough, back to sleep for me [Nov29] :: Got a second SONY flash (HVL-F58AM), so I can do wireless stuff on the a900 [Nov20] :: Got my a700 back from Toronto (33 days) - works, sold it off the same day [Nov17] :: Watched the Anne Fontaine film - "The Girl from Monaco" [La fille de Monaco (2008)] in the theater (missed the first few mins tho), with a new friend, quite entertaining, and of course Louise Burgoin is smokin' hot [Nov9] :: Finished watching the Marilyn Monroe film "the Seven Year Itch" restored DVD - wow, she really was stunning looking - interesting how the all-time famous scene [still-image] isn't actually even in the movie at all, and how the filming of that scene ruined the marriage to Joe Dimaggio :: Fixed my vintage SEIKO watch (shimmed the buttons leaf switches internally, and it's back again [Nov7] :: Figured out the Intelligent Preview feature (a900) - stellar, won't be able to live without that now [Nov6] :: Brought a new full frame setup, partly to tide me over while I await my a700 in for repair in Toronto still, and partly to replace the 17-35 zoom that I sold with the 7D - got the totally badass combo of an a900 (pro full frame and 100% viewfinder) and a SONY/ZEISS 24-70/2.8 SSM. Very nice lens, but damn it's heavy :: delivered a partially completed Shinobi upright downtown to a happy customer [Oct30] :: Realized that my iPhone the on/off button doesn't really seem to work after a recent drop to the floor in the bathroom, or is intermittent :: tried the new iMac and Apple Magic Mouse - pretty wild device, and beautiful looking [Oct27] :: Didn't plan on it, but on my excursion to find a sample of the 24-70/2.8 SSM lens to test, ... there was an a850 and a900, so I gave them a whirl - very nice, but heavy (both the lens, and the body) - will need to work-out to use that combo for any length of time in the future. Haven't looked at the samples yet, but impressions from the store - very quick and silent focusing, viewfinder is super clear and bright. The lens being a Zeiss/SONY design works differently than previous Minolta concepts - the min focus range is dampened - so you hit it, but you don't "know" it in the traditional sense, as the lens ring still will continue past that point, but with a bit more resistance - didn't have a lens hood to try with it, or my Gitzopod or a700, so it won't be THAT useful of a test, but fun session non-the-less [Oct26] :: Finished watching a 720p version of Cars (2006) - great movie (saw it the second day it came out in the theatres on my birthday with my girls (the day before was the first day of Canadian release), then awhile later on DVD when that was first released), good tunes, great folly work, touching story, great racing excitement, and wonderful how they give such amazing personality to vehicles - lots of awesome digital cinematography elements throughout, as well as neon rendering [Oct25] :: Had a photographic epiphany this morning - how two different female curves can both exceedingly beautiful or hideous (depending on the arch, camera angle and placement) [Oct23] :: Got my iPhone back from a kind soul - Luke - seems there is hope for humanity yet - awesome! :: penned a deal to sell off my Shinobi cocktail system :: finished watching a 720p version of Cadillac Records (2008) - acting was a little stiff and forced, makeup could have been better, and am not a big fan of Adrien Brody, but the music is pretty great :: worth watching for that, and the blue history lesson [Oct21] :: Sold off my Konica/Minolta 7D body, 17-35/2.8-4 zoom and 5400HS flash and a few accessories to another photographer in need of a kit [Oct20] :: Left my ancient iPhone at a car wash Oct 15th., 2009 about 4:50pm :: Had it setup in timer mode, and forgot to grab it afterwards. Shot some snowmen on my way back home - went back just before 6pm, when I realized I didn't have it, but it was gone. Sniff. 1st generation 8GB iPhone. Not activated (they didn't sell the 1st gen here in Canada - as there was no service plan in place anywhere else on the planet, only the USA). The touch sensitivity near the bottom is botched up, so it's not really of much use to anyone. Would be nice to see it returned. TIA. [Oct15] :: Shot the first two songs of Jay-Z at the Saddledome, but my a700 is glitched up, and I couldn't get it to AF, looks like I'll be taking it into SONY in the morning - noticed the loss of AF at the very tail end of the evening at Seven Lounge (Oct 10), but didn't look into it further, been too busy editing and writing CD reviews [Oct14] :: Updated my H2 firmware from 1.40 to 1.50 [Aug15] :: Noticed some blurry vision again in my left eye, and traced it back to some capers that I had with some salmon - Doh! [Aug14] :: Watched a 720p version of one of my favorite french films Amélie [Le fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain] (2001) - would be in my top 4 french films as reason enough to learn that language [to really appreciate them] - what a wonderful, arty, romantic, uplifting, quirky, touching, amazing film - so playful, a must see! [July19] :: Got my friend setup tonight w/the 15.4", 2.66GHz, 320GB drive, a firewire cord, one-to-one, iwork - so he can edit video now [July8] :: Unpacked my NexStar MX dual 3.5" SATA HDD Enclosure, and it seems to work. The fans are a bit louder than I've been used to (no fans), but I think the case will come in quite handy for pulling pictures or music data out of my on-line storage, and kept off-line/on-line in this method for the time being [July6] :: Well, went for a walk tonight, and the cheap mp3 player quit - ran out of juice with the stupid single AAA again as I was a few blocks from the house. / Sick of swapping them out, and it's kinda wasteful - so I thought I'd see if I had a double holder or triple holder in my stash (had a triple) - it was wired for flip-flop, so I just turned one of the batteries backwards, and that let me do it in sequential order. Not sure it would work, or if it's a good idea, but it powers the device. / Made a AAA piece out of dowel (wood), and used some torx size #8 to attach the wired leads - then dremelled out the lid, and top case to let the small wires through. Wouldn't want to show it to the Queen, but it's a functional hack. [June22] :: Finally got Novii Remote Deluxe running on my m125 palm and the SONY TV..., looks kinda lame, but some of it works so far [June19] :: Took me 10 days (9 actual recording days) to completely fill up the 8GB card with 2-channel 24/96k recordings - seems to want to take 2hrs to transfer the data to my ProTower. Used one complete set of batteries up, and put in a second set [June8] :: Pulled off a whole bunch of stuff with RescuePro from the un-recognized drive, took a long time, but I whittled it down to 155GB of potential keeper material, now to figure out what I need, and which DVD-R discs to grab to piece the data back together [June7] :: Picked up an 8GB SanDisk Ultra II SDHC memory card (100x, 15MB/s) - which seems to be recognized (formatted in the H2 device), and says it will record 3hrs, 49min, 42s in 96kHz/24bit :: 11hrs, 29min, 09s in 48kHz/16bit :: 8hrs, 20min, 3s in 44.1kHz/24bit :: 12hrs, 30min, 6s in 44.1kHz/16bit :: 55hrs, 8min, 3s in MP3 (320kbps) :: 137hrs, 50min, 8s in MP3 (VBR kbps) 68hrs, 55min, 4s in MP3 (256kbps) 367hrs, 33min, 46s in MP3 (48kbps) - we'll give it a nice run thru this evening at the 48kHz/16bit setting to match up with my 3CCD DV camera [May31] :: Got a Zoom H2 unit finally - to record some live audio, sick of people not having anything to record live or off the board for posterity, will give it a whirl on the 31st :: bought another 1.5TB to hopefully transfer data from the 1TB Seagate that just died on me this past week ... grrrr (only about 9 months old) [May30] :: Just saw the effects on uploading my own downsampled pictures to the iPhone - on some images there is noticable banding (grey seamless backgrounds) and what looks like GIF dithering - just figured it was a limitation of the bit depth on the display itself, but now that I've had a hard drive crash, I'm painstakingly offloading images I had loaded on the iPhone, and re-assembling them into the proper galleries. Anyone know what the bit depth crunch down is? Photoshop and GraphicConverter both say that the image is 24 bit, but I know that's not true... [May29] :: Bought my first round of free and 99c iPhone apps today - Remote, WordPress, NearPics, Snapture, QuickShot (not so quick really - but gives screen touch), craigsphone and QuickVoice lite :: EsaClock, GothPix and GrayCard were 99c each - look foward to seeing some very cool stuff out of GothPix [May22] :: Well, finally listened to the whole Chinese Democracy album (Guns N' Roses), and ... doesn't really sound much like GNR, except for his trademarked voice. The odd thing is that, the trademark is rarely there - it's been replaced with an amalgamation of Queensryche, and Dream Theater - both in vocal rendition and musically speaking. I'll have to give it another couple listens to see if it grows on me at all. Solid album, but ... nothing to rush out and buy tho either [May8] :: At the end of my McDonald's ghost session, I setup a vertical tripod shot of window lettering shadows, and the a700 dropped off the tripod head to the ground - must have horse shoes up my butt, don't think it got even a scratch, and it landed on/near my camera satchel, seems fine, but I took it as a sign to wrap things up and venture home, got some deadly images of a vintage manhole cover that evening [Apr20] :: Got an Lastolite Ezybox Hot Shoe 60cm x 60cm (24' x 24') today, but it's only got a cold shoe, so I need to look thru my stuff to see if I have the right adapter ... [Apr9] :: Researching the Discussion groups on GarageBand, I've gleaned enough to write some Quickeys macros to give me a zoom out, and zoom normal function - yeah! :: also created a 3 second pause, a podcast marker and record function - should streamline the post production process a fair bit for my next jam session - I'm stoked! [March18] :: Been watching "Being Erica" - great new CBC show [March17] :: Been watching the first and second season of Californication lately, and writing all kinds of new stuff - awesome series - S2.E10 - yowza - heavy - damn. Sold off a few macs, and moved out a bit-torrent machine to a buddies pad, so dusted off a mac previously made for my lead guitar player to record guitar and vocals, but he never used it as such - turned that into a glorified iPod next to the stereo in my studio (G3/350 iMac). Took quite awhile, but installed different ram, and beefed it up to 768MB, and managed to get 10.4.11 installed on it over USB 1.1 ports and an external DVD drive in my old Firewire/USB2 case - pretty good for a system designed to run OS8.6, and max out at 10.3.9, and 512MB of ram (!!!) :: color corrected the monitor, and it does an admirable job at displaying my photographs - it will be my bit-torrent box for the interim. [Feb23] :: Wrote two more killer tunes tonight - destined to be classics "Crispy Makiato" and "Beast Within" if those titles end up sticking :: Watched a 1080p version of Get Smart (2008) - looks awesome, and a fun flick. Didn't know that Mel Brooks and Buck Henry had stuff to do with the original show (they get some credit for this one as well) [Feb19] :: Finally got a new[er] powersupply for my ancient G4/350 tower (it's power supply died, but I wasn't 100 percent positive that was the problem until now), and it works again, so it can resume it's server duties, except that in the interim I'd found a G4/1.25GHz eMac instead, which will kick it's ass, so ... not sure what I'll end up doing with it / might move it to a friends pad, and have it do stuff over there actually [Feb16] :: Received my a700 back from Toronto, seems to work, so I'll give it a whirl at Dickens Pub [field day is playing] [Feb6] :: Came to the end of my little MP3 player that I received in my xmas stocking, and decided to search again online for some script that will sync a playlist to it (only a 1GB player) - and finally found something that works "itunemywalkman" - wish I didn't sell off my two real iPods in 2008 - don't know how much you miss something until they are gone it seems [Feb4] :: chipped away at the snow and ice remnants on the driveway and street - got up to plus 9 today (?) - beautiful - street still looks like crazyass hard-packed lemon meringue pie - never seen street like this before [Jan 30] :: Again, for those keeping track of all things obsolete - you can recycle some old calendars that match 2009 - 1998, 1987, 1981, 1970, 1959, 1953, 1942, 1931, 1925, 1914, 1903, 1891, 1885, 1874, 1863, 1857, 1846, 1835, 1829, 1818, 1807 and 1801 - wow, that's a LOT this year - go ahead, check your attic - don't be shy [Jan01] ::

:: 2009 ::

Wiped out on the sidewalk, bruised my left knee (to the side and left front-ish), and landed on both hands - turned out okay, but the knee will probably hurt for weeks to come - missed the Bond 009 fashion bit at Tangerine, but got to hang with some model friends of mine, then went for breakfast until 6am - couldn't get my new flash to send the red bounce light, to focus in the dark, so didn't get that many shots that evening [Dec31] :: My a700 died during the end of a fashion shoot with Cody at the Guitar Connection - can see a bent piece under the mirror. DOH! :: Wacom tech support (Tom) helped me sort out the tablet driver funk I was having - stylin' again - whoo hoo! [Dec30] :: Watched a 720p version of Almost Famous (2000) BluRay - great movie, even better on a second viewing - first was probably on regular DVD [Dec29] :: Watched a 720p version of The 40 Year Old Virgin - pretty damn funny [Dec27] :: Came up with a new move to bring up a corner piece from the bottom in an elegant fashion on the regular rubix cube [Dec8] :: Watched the DVD of Michael Clayton (2007) - pretty good, gripping flick / one of the vary rare films where the deleted scenes are worth watching :: shoveled a LOT of snow today - huge dump [Dec7] :: Had a great dinner, and got a Time Capsule up and running (500GB version) for them - kinda cool - has 802.11n and gigabit ethernet, so it's a router, and wireless hub [Dec1] :: Watched Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story (720p version) - good tunes, and pretty funny! [Nov26] :: Watched Step Brothers Unrated - pretty damn funny! [Nov25] :: Watched Casino Royale (2006) - a 1080p BluRay x264 .mkv rip of it (12.3GB) - looks pretty fabulous - much better viewing experience than the theatrical (35mm) showing of Quantum of Solace - and I think QoS is a better movie overall after watching them both in fairly quick succession :: Eva Green looks pretty ravishing in a number of scenes - Caterina Murino also pretty amazing [Nov24] :: Ram and SATA enclosure arrived - fricken finally - customs crud - only GST to pay / wrote a few new tunes (started off w/my Bond-flavored version, and went from there / watched the 3rd segment in Zeitgeist - whoa [Nov11] :: Got a pass from BeatRoute to review Quantum of Solace - nice ride, still need to see Casino Royale ('06) for it to make a bit more sense tho [Nov10] :: Finally feeling like I'm lifting myself out of the quagmire (Tiesto's track Ten seconds before sunrise from his Elements of Life disc, could also help that a tad) - this new 8-core is awesome, still awaiting the ram shipment from Chicago ... [Nov05] :: Astounded at how fast the mini is for bit-torrent downloads, perhaps that combined with a new revamping of the Vuse software (4.0.0.4) - getting often close to 300K/s thru-put - damn exciting [Nov04] :: Picked up a NexStar MX Dual SATA enclosure - to see how it will be to store seldom used files on (USB-2.0 interface) - has fans in it, haven't hooked it up [yet] [Nov03] :: Got an old Mac-Mini G4/1.5GHz off a guy today - seems to run GarageBand 2, and recognize my Firepod, so I'm in the midst of installing Tiger back on there (Leopard installed and upgraded fine) at the moment, then to put GarageBand 4 on both flavors to see which runs better for recording multi-track audio... / did a zero-pass on the whole drive before partitioning it, just to ensure everything is zippy clean [Oct29] :: Flipped my ProTower Quad for a ProTower Octo today - very nice, will be screaming when my extra 12GB of ram shows up from the US - already posted it for sale - would be even nicer to get the 3 or 3.2 processors instead, but my pockets are only so deep - gashed my pinky finger pulling out the optical bay to re-install my second dual layer DVD burner, sux - not sure how I feel about these new extra slim keyboards, I'll see if it grows on me [Oct28] :: Added a second lid lock to the Targ cocktail tonight - and modified the system to fit inside the case, now to extend the power supply cabling, and then tie all the components down [Oct07] :: Bought another 1TB SATA drive yesterday - price dropped to 130 bucks! - sweet - decided [regrettably] to install the 10.5.5 update on my ProTower, then it would not find the boot drive. A couple rounds of attempts with a Leopard installer disk, and Disk Utility runs (repair, and permissions repair) seemed to have done the trick [Oct02] :: Shot a very nice townhouse in the Garrison Woods area for a Real estate agent - great location [Oct01] :: Bought an old G4/350 tower, but couldn't get it setup before the DV jam - thought the power supply died on me after only having it a few hours - in the end, it seems alright (brought it home Sept 29) - I've thoroughly tested ram in it (in OS9), and installed iLife '08 on it - recorded some guitar thru it, and while slow, could be alright with that - Oct 4, I hope to try doing a 5-track recording with it, so we'll see if it has enough horsepower to do 24-bit recording with that load [Sept26] :: Finished watching Ratatouille - what a brilliant film - 'nother great piece out of Pixar and Brad Bird [Sept23] :: Worked some more on my Targ cocktail - got the second player, coins and P1/P2 buttons hooked up now, and had a couple games of Ms.Pac-man and Galaga - wicked sore throat today tho, ugh [Sept22] :: Did a palm-chat, and finally resolved my m125 issues with crashing and not syncing, pain in the ass, but resolved - on to the rest of the pile :) [Aug26] :: Finished watching Falling Down - loved it when it came out, and have owned it for a couple years on DVD, but only cracked the seal last night - way more things to relate to - since my first viewing in 1993 - basically a guy on the verge of a nervous breakdown, which I think oddly everyone can probably relate to [Aug26] :: Finished watching Robots (DVD version) - wow, what an awesome film, killer character, color design, voice talents - this will probably be one of the first that I'll buy on BluRay [Aug18] :: Got another old iMac (G3/350) last night, so once again searched for a multi-track recorder that works under OS9, found a few new programs (to me), but the links were stale, so that was a no-go. It did spur me on, to re-install an old Pro Tools LE (v5.0.1) circa 1999/2000, and after a bit of fiddling, I'm happy to say that I did a 4-track (test) - 2 live, and then a single 3rd over dub, and a 4th over dub. WORKS! So there is useful life for an old piece of hardware besides gaming (for me). This will become a handy system for recording my acoustic jams, which I've had no easy way to setup - with my fancy multi-track hardware semi-permanently up at the Deviating Vapors jam space [Aug13] :: Defrosted my folks deep freeze - quite a chore! [July19] :: Working on a large Aperture project (with photoshop work), I decided to tackle the daunting task of re-learning Quickeys - gleaned enough on this go-round of the manual, that has erased a large stumbling block from the past three years of use - namely regaining access to F1 thru F4 for undo, cut, copy and paste - using the "scope" all applications, and using the keystroke to replicate the action, instead of specifying the actual pull-down menu, seems to have worked in a whole bunch of applications that I normally bounce between (the stumbling block is applications now-a-days update the menu for undo for instance, so undo is now undo (exactly what you did), which is now different to the program [insert heavy sigh here] - back to business! [July15] :: copying data off a 250GB IDE drive to flip [July5] :: Bought a 1TB Seagate drive (SATA) for my tower, and formatted it [July3] :: Sold off my beloved MacBookPro, and looking for something to replace it with [June20] :: Returned from a photo-gig trip to Vancouver, BC, celebrated two family birthdays, and got in some very cool conversations and jam sessions [June17] :: Had Andy and Mike fix up an old Mann Les Paul Copy (Red sunburst), but w/a bolt on neck - apparently from the 70s, might have been made in Japan by Ibanez for the Canadian market, and sold for cheap - seems like a Gibson Les Paul Custom-like replica, as it's got similar pearl inlay in the frets. Missing one tone knob, and the pickup switch knob - took some shots after cleaning it up (mostly). Plugged it into Garage Band, and ... ended up riffing for over 3 hours! - broke the 5th string, but replaced it with an old vintage one - man, my fingers are sore!!! Came up with about 12 new ideas, and worked on variants of a number of them - 20 tracks in all [May29/30] :: Got Tethering to work! Seems the answer is in "aperture hot folder" I think the script, in conjunction with the Sony supplied (comes on the disc with the a700) Remote Camera Control, the supplied cable, and setting the a700 to "Remote PC" ... and now I'm happy! :: Auto rotated images pop into Aperture 2.1 full screen about 7 seconds after firing the shutter [either on the camera, or from the Remote Camera Control program]. And my semi-old 5400HS now has a use again! [May25] :: Tried the tethering option, but couldn't get the a700 to fire - the "Sony Image Data Suite" stuff (Remote Camera Control / Image Data Lightbox SR) worked for saving picture files directly to my desktop system, will have to do some more tests, and see if I can get the 7D as well to perform the same thing - will see if the 5400HS can be used for bounce studio-type work (bouncing the flash, plus reflectors) :: setup my rack gear at the DV jam space, and a dual monitor - much nicer to set recording levels [May24] :: Got my Aperture 2.1 upgrade from a local shoppe - in a word - WOW. Rockin' my world [May23] :: My mother got out of the rehab center [yah!] - 146 days or so away, damn... [May] :: Finished watching Blade Runner - The Final Cut (2007) DVD - double disc set - The 3.5 hr Dangerous Days: Making Blade Runner is also pretty exceptional and informative, necessary watching for anyone working in film, or a fan of this piece and gritty sci-fi in general [Apr27] :: Found at least two flaws in the Rubik's Revenge steps - pretty frustrating, but it worked - now, to absorb all those steps into my own brain... [Apr23] :: Did another search and came across an interesting solution to the Rubik's Revenge cube. Seemed to be working until the very last steps. Grrrr. [Apr22] :: Met Jariot Lezz Paul out front of the second "The Cult" show here in Calgary - that guy rocks (The Dirty Roses front man, and also in a heavy cover band Huxley) [Apr06] :: Finished watching the Black Snake Moan DVD - really good, would have been close to perfect if that Justin Timberlake wasn't in there - pretty touching movie actually, and some great blues tracks - and as I predicted back in the days of The Addams Family, she would grow up to be a heart-breaker - I'm disappointed tho that they didn't use the poster image for the DVD cover, it was cheese-cake hot/seductive/suggestive - probably had people up in arms, but they replaced it with something more sinister and creepy, with a hint of smash'em up action movie for some reason , oh well, check it out! [Mar14] :: Have been working on a Deviating Vapors cover (environmental) logo/cover treatments all March, some of my strongest work so far in the past two days - very exciting! - the a700 is coming into it's own - really shines from iso 100 to about 640 in daylight / the headphone glue test failed miserably - will have to come up with something more serious/severe [Mar12] :: Had a pretty damn good jam session, but in the process, I broke my beloved headphones (trying to re-listen to last weeks new riff), which I bought (and starved for 3-weeks) to own - not bad I guess, about 20 years worth of faithful service - I'll see if they can be epoxy'ed together again for another few rounds [Mar07] :: Ohhh, after much searching, I think I've found a solution to automagically making edited tracks from GarageBand output (aiff files) - using a sub-program in Toast 8 (CD Spin Doctor) opening an aiff file, and then selecting the magic wand. Created a Quickeys function to name a sequence of the said 1 hour file, then presto! - well, once I listen to the first test, I'll be really excited... [Mar7] :: My Sony a700 body showed up - nice [Feb11] :: Showed some of my arcade collection to another enthusiast today :: tweaked the Robotron bezel today - the control panel now had a bit of play, since the plexi bezel I guess is thinner than the glass bezel was - pretty snug now, so had a few rounds of Robotron - nice! [Feb03] :: Deviating Vapors jam session - went well, wrote two new tunes [Feb02] :: Setup a recording station tonight for my lead guitar player to kuck out ideas on [Jan24] :: Scored a pair of gutted G5 towers today, pretty cool - not sure what to do w/them, but I'll mull it over [Jan20] :: Watched Blow - finally came across a copy of the DVD, so I bought it - hard to pass up a Johnny Depp flick - nice, bit disappointed w/the Cruz scenes, but her role is small :: Wow - wrote about an hours worth of cool new material, and figured that probably indeed the Digitech DSP 128+ rack processor has a failing battery (said BATT tonight on the display), after almost 20 years - was getting some Core Audio errors (disk not fast enough) errors along the way as well - not sure what's up w/that, but perhaps it's the Firewire cable or connections - insane as I was only recording one track from the FirePod, often it's 4 or 8, no problem... [Jan16] :: Had a DV jam session - re-worked a few covers (from Dec), and worked on a few songs I wrote Jan 8/9 - then made up a few new ones on the spot - quite a successful session! - listened to a few songs from hour 2 on the trip back home, yummy! [Jan11] :: Setup my adjustable rack system finally, then tried to lay down some grooves I made up on my Classical acoustic over the x-mas break, don't think I could remember the rhythms, but I got some other cool stuff recorded that I'm proud of :: watched a bit of Underworld [Jan08] :: Watched Spider-man 3 - great jazz piano scene, and Blades of Glory (pretty funny stuff) [Jan07] :: Watched Ella Enchanted (2004) with the girls, been meaning to see the pixie dust effects for a bunch of years, and it was actually a pretty decent film :: Mom is still heavily sedated, but came through the two operations [Jan03] :: Again, for those keeping track of all things obsolete - you can recycle some old calendars that match 2008 - 1980, 1952, 1924, 1884, 1856 and 1828 - seems like a rare leap year, next one is not until 2036 - go ahead, check your attic - don't be shy [Jan02] :: Moved my Tetris, and Popeye machines today, so I can finish restoring them, took Sera and Taysia on an adventure with an old buddy around town, found out my mother is slated for surgery on Wednesday (Jan 2) [Jan01] ::

:: 2008 ::

Watched Agent Cody Banks with the girls on the 20 inch cinema display, hooked up the stereo and the Wharfedale speakers - fun flick [Dec28] :: Added the Braze Space Invaders upgrade kit, played a round of each new game, seems the Lunar Rescue is much harder than the Escape From Mars upright that I have, but it's pretty cool to play it with the moonscape and semi-silvered mirror gameplay [Dec25] :: Re-cleaned, and installed the NOS Space Invaders control panel overlay - looks extra sweet! [Dec24] :: Took some pictures finally of the Megatouch system [Dec23] :: Ordered a batch of 10 3.6v (1/2AA) Lithium batteries for all the macs that I have (from BC) [Dec21] :: Went swimming finally (back therapy), feel better - found an old neon beer sign, kinda cool [Dec19] :: Setup a G3/233 iMac as an analog cassette tape digitizing station, seems to work great for that! [Dec18] :: The Deviating Vapors jam session went pretty well, took awhile to setup all the gear, but we wrote two new cool tracks, and worked on a bunch of covers (w/vocals) - first go-round with the new XLR mics, seem to sound good [Dec15] :: Bought a pair of Shure SM57 microphones, XLR cables, and low boom stands for the Deviating Vapors jam session booked for Sat [Dec14] :: Sparked it up, but no sound (Space Invaders) Grrrr. Oh yeah, the speaker connections were always just holding on by a thread - turfed the broken connections, and soldered them on properly - works great again - but, this game NEEDS sound to give it life [Dec09] :: Brought Space Invaders, Centipede (CT) and Joust back to my studio (my old best-est friend from grade school helped me out with the Joust - was cool to get to gab again w/him) - re-did some of the Joust guts, played a few games then packed it in for the evening [Dec08] :: Retouched my Robotron header (lots of pinholes and a few scratches and scrapes, which I never noticed before - funny what shows up when backlit...) with black, and it made a world of difference, will have to give the rest of the Williams-sized headers I have a go as well [Dec06] :: Reformatted and installed Tiger on my G3/400 iMac DV (lime) machine - added an 80GB drive instead of the stock 10GB - was a drag figuring out which jumper settings were necessary for booting that drive, but worked out in the end - needed to install it with an external device, then add it inside - re-organized my studio space, and hooked it up to Ethernet - now my favorite bit torrent client is chugging away - way faster than the G5 iMac over wireless. Silly people and their wireless fetish... / now my TV fix should be satiated with way less effort [Dec05] :: Not into regular stuff, so tackled the guts of my Robotron cabinet and redid them, got the original speakers hooked up, as well as the florescent lamp, then added a bit of black baffling to keep the light spill from illuminating the bezel glass and control panel (common complaint with Williams cabinets apparently) - got my new highscore on Robotron - 608,075 - nice! - got into the zone listening to some old Green Day [Dec04] :: Went to see "No Country For Old Men" - cool flick, check it out! [Dec01] :: Sold off an iSight (that I got with the iMac G5) to a cool furniture designer here in town :: Finished watching the movie "Fur", which I thought I'd never watch (never liked Diane Arbus's work, and the whole notion of the film seemed ludicris to me), but I noticed it at the local library, so grabbed it - hard to pass up any movie with Nicole Kidman in it - I figured I'd give it a few minutes and then bail on it - but pretty cool film - as soon as the credits popped up, I paused it, and started to create some new music, which I've tentatively called "Swimming Past the End", which I'm quite proud of - still, can't really fathom why someone would create a fake portrait of Diane [Nov30] :: Played a bunch of rounds on : Major Havoc (never even seen this game, let-alone played it) - color Atari vector game, kind cool, but nothing that grips me - then played "The Getaway (High Speed II)" - driving themed Williams Pinball - pretty fun - love any game that has multi-ball really, and finished up with some Hook (Data East pinball) [Nov27] :: Pulled my external firewire case apart, and placed the DVD-dual layered burner in the second optical bay in the Pro Tower, and added a backup IDE drive into the firewire case instead - hopefully it works without a hitch - will be nice to not have to listen to that case fan for audio burns - added a 160GB SATA drive that I pulled from a PC system - formating that as a scratch disc now [Nov25] :: Put together my new leaf blower - gave it a whirl on the fresh snow instead - didn't get a chance yesterday - works, but takes awhile. Does an amazing job tho - removes every last bit of snow - no way you could do that with a shovel - I think next time I'll shovel first, then do a clean pass with the blower :: Snowed at some point this morning - beautiful crystal structures and nice sunshine to light it all up - went out for an expidition [Nov21] :: Digitized and posted a bunch of vintage slide shots from Montreal days on my website, this stuff circa 1995 - got a new [old] piece of gear - copy stand with a geared column, so I setup my light table and got out a macro lens, magnifier and cable release - good times! [Nov20] :: Bought a leaf blower/mulcher/vacuum, so will try that out soon :: Tried to get the second coin mech working in my DKJr upright, and gave up in disgust after about 2 hours, and swapping out two different (fresh) coin switches. cripes. Worked with the coin wire at full length, but when trimmed short enough for the door to close - wouldn't work at all, or would not let the coin drop. Argh!!!! :: cabinet is nice and clean now though, and I applied the fresh game play sticker [Nov19] :: Well, that day was a write-off, missed a show (was over by the time I showed up), and had a super cranky email exchange with a band - downer city [Nov18] :: Painted two monitor bezels the other day, and finished retouching the edges this evening, replaced one in the Robotron cabinet. The back door was shaking w/game play because of the locking mechanism, so I screwed the door shut, and that made a huge difference to the game - nice! [Nov17] :: Voice still messed up, waiting for the bus d/t after work, I noticed a SONY store, and their huge poster for the alpha 700 - so I went to check if they had one in stock. They did. As soon as I saw it, I looked - my bus arrived. Screw it! Loaded one of my memory cards into it, and snapped a bunch of test shots in the store. Wholly crap. Nice. Haven't looked at the files yet, but just from the screen, this is a cool piece of kit... [Nov15] :: After making my way through most of the credits, I decided to write some of my own music, which I did - unfortunately about 15 minutes worth was not recorded, and was pretty magical - only for the delight of my own senses I guess. Very pissed at myself, I tried to re-create some of the major thoughts, which I've tentatively called "Scintillating". Watched the Ridley Scott film "A Good Year" on DVD - wonderful film, and marvelous cinematography [Nov11] :: Had a fabulous scope expanding chat with a friends mother for untold hours after shooting three bands at the Palomino, didn't get home until about 8am, and now have laryngitis, wow, that was some serious chat! [Nov10] :: Cleaned most of the outside pieces, started on the inside, tired - going to sleep [Nov07] :: Got an old Targ cocktail in pretty nice shape off another collector here in town (Mike) - great guy, now to clean it up and get it rockin' again! [Nov06] :: Needed to replace the Ms.Pac-man cocktail monitor that I sold off last month (Oct), not sure what went on it, but back in business now! [Nov04] :: Aperture was acting up on me - crashed a few times (v1.5.6), but after a library rebuild seems to be good :: Got a line on a Targ cocktail - in very nice shape (cabinet converted to JAMMA), should be fun! [Nov01] :: Second snowfall this morning, but the forecast is for upper teens on the weekend. Wacky. [Oct30] :: My arcade parts finally arrived, so I can start to complete my Robotron, DKJr, Asteroids and Ms.Pac-man - also my upgrade kit came for the Space Invaders [whoo hoo!] [Oct29] :: Robotron decided to stop working in between games, replaced a leaf switch for the left input, and it seems all good now [Oct25] :: First snowfall of the season - wacky, as the day was balmy and beautiful, evening brought about 1 or 2 inches of snow [Oct24] :: Moved the Asteroids and Ms.Pac-man/Galaga combo cocktails out tonight, sad to see them go, but now I can get a few other project machines going, so it's all good, kinda into my Robotron tonight, good stress releaser - put the scratched glass on top of the Japanese Space Invaders, and used the dolly from the Asteroids for the Asteroids Deluxe, now it can quickly mold to the room. My mom got out of the hospital this afternoon finally [Oct23] :: Installed the clean buttons on the DKJr. control panel, and put that back together - looks sweet! 15min : Cleaned P2 on #2365, cleaned P1 on 100093 - and got my new hiscore testing it out - 1 hr [Oct22] :: Cleaned P2 side of #2365, and inside the top - looks pretty good, ready for the cleaned buttons - another 1hr :: Cleaned Dismantled the control buttons, cleaned inside and out the control panel, then added cleaned buttons back to the Asteroids Deluxe CP, placed that[P2's] onto P1's side of #2365, and sparked up a few games to test it - dang it's hard, looks good tho, now to clean P2 on that machine :: went to see "The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" - lots of cool intro sequences with caustic and dappled light - nothing like I envisioned the movie would be, but enjoyable - really brought out a lot of emotions [Oct21] :: Swapped the glass tops from Deluxe to Deluxe, about 1hr [Oct20] :: Worked on cleaning the pair of Asteroids Deluxe games this evening - started on the P1 side of #2365 - used Windex, a cloth and a tooth brush on the control panel (removed and washed the buttons last week) and coin slots - what a difference! - then tried to tackle removing the panel. Hmmm, almost had to give up - as removing the carriage bolt nuts from the inside, none of my wrenches or ratchets could a) reach, b) ones that would reach there wasn't enough clearance to get the 7/16 sized piece, as all the tools needed a larger inset to have worked, all I had was the small adapter, then that ruined the clearance. After almost giving up, I noticed that the monitor had some screws which looked like if loosened, you could slide it on a rail system. Sure enough they did, and that gave me just enough space to get my hand inside with some flat wrenches, and a lot of fiddling. Dang - would be nice to find some new overlays [which I've never come across], but gaining access to the panels is just short of a nightmare with the monitors installed - bad maintenance decision on Atari's part for sure. Moved the nicest side [P2 of #100093], will clean that up perhaps this coming evening - installed P1's from #2365 to P2 of #100093, and it looks and plays well now. :: tweaked the linearity of both monitors, and changed the sizing, both are looking close to perfect, but I think #2365 is slightly better all around, so that will be my personal pick in the end - racked up about 3hrs on that tonight [Oct19] :: Vera went to the Emergency again - and still there [Oct16] - putting a wrench in the surprise party I organized for my Dad's surprise 80th birthday [Oct13] :: Got an old MegaTouch touchscreen bartop game - series mega6 :: Solitaire, Four Play, Conquest, Run 21, Pile On, Draw Poker, 11-UP, Phraze Craze, Horses, Quint-Zee, Match-Em-Up, Breakin Bricks, Power Solitaire, Mega Mind, Trip Flip, Royal Flash, Trivia Whiz, Take 2, Tri-Towers, Mem-O-Ree, Sum Fun, Quick Match, Super 7 Stud, Roll The Dice, Trivia Twister, Total of 25 games :: Bought a silent fan for the Ms.Pac-man cocktail, and installed it tonight - what a difference! - it was a 92mm fan rated at only 20 decibles - pretty cool [Oct08] :: Installed some tracklighting and afixed a powerbar to the workbench in the sub-basement workshop, excellent! [Oct07] :: Opened my watch up and modified the contacts on two sets of buttons - works pretty fabulous again [Oct01] :: Received my two new cocktails - a double set of Asteroids Deluxe, thinking that I'll keep one (to replace the regular Asteroids that I'm selling off) and sell the other right away, so let me know if you're interested in one of these - even better game than the original! [Sep29] :: Yeah - my 7D replacement off of eBay finally arrived! - can't believe it took so bloody long, but I'm doing a happy dance now - also FedEx didn't gouge me this time for a broker fee, amazing... [Sep25] :: Heavily reorganized the basement and sub-basement in anticipation for a pair of Asteroids Deluxe cocktail cabinets :: turfed a bunch of old parts and stuff that I wouldn't be using, and did some smart puzzle placement of various bits and pieces, looks great, just too bad that these things take so much time! [Sep24] :: Worked on my Joust for another couple hours, almost completely back together after the move [Sep22] :: Had a great chat with Holly (Ross's wife) - as Ross invited me over, but he went off to another friends by the time I arrived, so we chatted over some tea, and watched the DVD I made from footage I shot at his 35th party :: Removed the busted feet, and replaced them with fresh feet on my Joust - nice to have that proper again! :: Can't believe I've worn out my first Happ microswitch button on the Galaga tonight (3am) - just put it in the other day! Presses weird now in the middle of a game. Could it really be, or the spring is out of alignment? Microswitch is fine, but the button presses like it's stuck. Grrr. Getting much better at Galaga tho, since reading the rule concepts [funny how that is huh?!] [Sep21] :: Got the Galaga mod working in my Ms.Pac-man cocktail, and ironed out the bulk of the remaining internal placement issues [Sep19] :: Did a bunch of Final Cut Pro editing on the Dankon Jones footage I shot on Sunday, and the Clinical Madness footage I shot on Saturday, nice having a dedicated 400GB drive just to DV capture [Sep18] :: Called Sony Canada back, and they will give me a deal on the a700 when that hits the streets (instead of the a100), which will be fantastic. Now, just to wait. :: Wisdom teeth are gone, and an entire achy body has been put in it's place. Yesterday it kinda felt like my head had been turned inside out and used as a punching bag :: well, they were giving me grief, so hopefully things smooth out, and I'll be back to normal in a few days [Sep14] :: Wisdom tooth extraction booked for today (yowza!) :: posted a number of Marquee's from my collection, but more to come, and pictures of them all [Sep13] :: Tried rotating my 20" cinema display with the graphics card in the Pro Tower, and while it worked (vs., didn't on the Radeon card I had before), the tech isn't perfect, and text is not crisp throughout the display [thought it was my eyes for a bit], so I've put it back. Crap! - regained MPEG-2 playback on the Pro Tower, got busted somehow in transition from the G5 [Sep12] :: Grrrr - I curse the bondi iMac designers - tried to seperate the monitor from the CPU. Scarey. Well, sacrificed an iMac to science :: Mmmmm, un-satisfied with the new hole in my workspace [lacking a Ms. Pac-man cocktail], I resurrected an old Taito Space Invaders (Japanese issue) cocktail project that I picked up awhile back (really beat-up - my tech decided to bail on it, so I'm picking up the ball and running with it). Had an Epiphany this morning about it, and tried out some ideas. Shouldn't be that difficult to get that working again, biggest issue is getting a locksmith to re-key it, so the table can be set flat again (keyed open right now) :: Ordered a fresh piece of tempered glass for the Asteroids cocktail, est. 2-3 week turn-around (Doh!) :: Cut a fire button hole, so a few more games can be played in it, like Galaga :: Retouched the Ms. Pac-man cabinet, removed the Scotch, packing and duct tape residues, and cleaned it. Wow. I thought I cleaned the control panel overlays good before - now they look first day fresh (color-wise), gonna hate to part with this baby! [Sep11] :: Almost finished with the Ms.Pac-man cocktail restoration (sale coming up) - 98 percent done on the inside with internal gut placement and wiring tie-downs, etc. Had a great game "ooooh" 122960 and came v.close to my all-time highscore (set on 5 men), close but not there [Sep10] :: Tweaked, installed OSX 10.4.10 on my Grape iMac/400, and pumped it up to 512MB of ram (tested an old stash of PC100 and PC133 memory in the process) - runs pretty sweet now! - boots really fast (vs the 192MB that was in there), and is good at doing screen saver slide shows of my images, so I'll bring it down to the Guitar Connection, so it can be showing images all the time [not just when I'm there w/my laptop] :: Did some more restoration on the Ms.Pac-man cocktail - blackened the monitor bezel, created a second shroud, and patched light leaks in the plastic monitor bezel, won't want to part with this baby when it's finished! (but someone is interested in buying it) :: Sold off some vintage macs to another local enthusiast, and had a good chat - a LCII and a 5260CD Performa all-in-one [Sep 03] :: Finished watching Matrix Reloaded (saw it in the theatre when it came out, but not since) on DVD, nice - started on the extras disc [Sep 01] :: Got back from the Okanagan - visited with Sera and Taysia - good times. Swam up a storm, met up with Sasa, G, Elly, Julia, Jean, Marilyn, Warren, Stew, Hazel, Todd, Sheila and Liam. Whew! [Aug 31] :: Fixed the flouro light in the Tetris marquee :: Space Invaders was botched, but I ended up fixing it. It was exhibiting a bizarre Matrix like pixel shower, and vastly sped-up game play. The left coin slot chute is jammed, need to pull that apart soon. Re-seated the dual boards, and now it looks great again :: Thought my Popeye was completely baked, but I ended up checking the power cord, and it was not making signal through all the wires, so I took it apart with a butter knife, and then redid the wiring ends. Works like a charm now :: got my all-time Centipede HS tonight of 88,004 on the second player side. Rollers are a bit loud on that side, should change them when I get a moment [ooooh yeahhhhh] [Aug 24] :: Moved some games around, and retouched the Escape From Mars cabinet - looks sweet now! [Aug 20] :: Ooooh, sweet - FedEx came through as planned - that's amazing. First time I was actually okay (or happy) with the gouging (broker fees or what-not), instead of waiting another week or so with USPS :: installed the ram, and Aperture is now SWEET! - 5GB - Kev starts to do his happy-dance! [Aug 17] :: Ordered an extra 4GB of ram from OWC in the states, seems it's on the way already [yeah!], used the mac utility "Migration Assistant" to put back all my stuff from the clone I'd made. Relatively seamless so far, but I had to put in a few [but not all] licence codes again. [Aug 16] :: Got a new Apple Pro Tower (2.66GHz) locally, to replace my beloved G5 that I sold off yesterday, and set that up - pretty painless [Aug 15] :: Worked on my Ms.Pac-man cocktail some more - cleaned up the wiring inside - tackled a long nagging snag, proud of myself for coming up with that - a large reason I left it so long. That segment is about 90% done now. Few more details to nail down yet :: Setup my MBP to the 30" - not quite the same experience... :: Well, sold off the G5 - my space is now a bit naked - will go and check out a new tower in the daylight :: The backups took much longer than I figured, [Aug 14] :: Picked up another 500GB Seagate ATA drive - reached a nice price point recently - needed to backup my G5, which should be sold off tomorrow [Aug 14] - took quite awhile for the clone, but that appears to have gone well. Looks like I'll be buying 750GB SATA drives in the near future instead, will be nice in the Pro Tower! [Aug 13] :: Found an Aperture article online that talked about various ways to do slideshows [within, and outside-of], which was cool, because it really is possible to do a Ken Burns effected show by hand (kinda). Lots of work, but you can get exactly what you want (start/end locations per image, time per image, etc.) - still not the same dynamic swoop effect/feel as the OSX slideshow, but closer than I knew was possible before ... [Aug 12] :: Shot a bunch of DV video of New Old Stock [NOS] at Woody's Taphouse, got some good material [Aug 11] :: Sent off my Minolta 7D camera to SONY in Toronto tonight, hopefully they can fix up the stuck A/S mech in it for a reasonable cost :: Ooooh, got lucky, and solved the Rubiks cube in a record 1min 11sec - (usually try and solve it before flaking out for the night) - perhaps today is gonna be a good day! [Aug 08] :: Whew - wow, wrote some cool new songs tonight, after listening to an old test recording I made back in Feb trying out my [then] new FirePod device, and cranking up my Marshall amp - look for versions soon on the Inversely Proportional page - base tracks were called Crunchy Metal Blues & Dank Forest Chase [Aug 04] :: While I was editing shots, I started to listen to last nights personal jam, and ... decided I might as well edit *that* at the same time, so I could give my lead guitarist a version of it, when we meet up on Tuesday night. Some cool ideas happened, so I picked out a segment that I liked the best, and selected a different amp preset then let 'er roll again - wow, nice stuff, which I've called "Star Bliss" - a pretty long composition [clocking in at just over 22min], which perhaps is my own Ode to Joy, after digesting the last Beethoven sequence where he's a boy drifting in a pod looking at the galaxy overhead - great piece to work to for me... [July 31] :: Watched the last bit of Immortal Beloved - wow, crazy that Gary Oldman passed on the roll a couple times - didn't want to paint himself into doing "bio" roles [July 30] :: More Lisa details :: Keely Jade Jackson, 7lbs, 4oz, 20-1/2", blue eyes, dark brown hair (lots), cute :: Watched the first half hour of Immortal Beloved - and the "Testing a new piano" is even more amazing and moving than I remember it - haven't seen this film since it was shown in the theatres in 1994 - bought a DVD copy of it for my birthday this year - but I've forgotten almost the whole thing! [July 25] :: My sister gave birth to a new baby girl - excellent - Finally figured out the problem with my bluetooth graphire tablet - I thought it was gimpy bluetooth stuff, but after talking with the Wacom tech guy (v.nice to get someone with a brain), it seems the pen is toast on it - if I didn't resort to using the pen from my smaller graphire 4 tablet, I would have had a breakdown, so I'll pack it up and send it down to the US :: posted some time-lapse footage from the DV session on the site (via YouTube) - seems like the kickdrum is possessed [July 24] :: Cleaning off my stack of memory cards this evening (well, super early morning for the rest of ya), I found a 2GB card that I thought I'd lost for months at some band shoot. Awesome - turned out to be a time-lapse sequence from my Deviating Vapors session of March 24, 2007 - nice! [July 23] :: Was chatting with the drummer from The Black Halos today, and he showed me this link to two new Halos videos that are on the Much Music site - Tight is very cool, and Darkest Corners is interesting - they've done a "light" tune [July 13] :: Got probably my 2nd highest all-time score on Ms.Pacman on my cocktail version tonight - good game, didn't make it to the 4th set of screens tho - 95,400 - not too shabby... [July 12] :: Went to catch the White Stripes at the Saddledome - great interplay between the stage lighting, and the shadows thrown on the huge red painted stage backdrop. pretty exciting - amazing that I photographed the same guitar that Jack plays at the Guitar Connection that same day - was the last guitar I shot before leaving the store - then, there it was up on the big stage. Cool. Met Cam from the Cripple Creek Fairies in the beer line, and again after the show - then headed over to Broken City, and caught the middle two bands of the evening at the Sled Festival [June 29] :: Went to a private house party, and three acoustic bands were playing in this fabulous house in Mount Royal - great times - Three women started off the evening - Emily, Sue and ? - then Brock Zenam & the Dirty Hands (Brock and Dan Walsh) did a set, and then Dan and Sue did a few songs, as Dan did some work on Sue's forthcoming disc [June 16] :: Got past the 4th set of levels on Ms.Pac-man - wow, trippy - my all-time ever high score of 129,400 - the third act is repeated when finishing the forth level (4x I think) - then it is the 3rd level again, but in a light peach-skin kinda color. Each first wave (3rd, 4th and 5th levels - they give you a break, and the power pellets last for a long time) - Had a pre-birthday dinner at Smugglers Inn - and I had a fabulous meal - Yellowfin Tuna Steak, with Portobello risotto and wilted spinach salad with cherry tomatos - wow! [June 05] :: Went Morel hunting, and my Mom and Dad found 11 - then we went for the most amazing pizza I've ... maybe ever had - out in Bragg Creek - got some cool water and rock shots along the way at Elbow Falls - let me know if you'd like to try it out, I'm down for another visit! [June 04] :: Bought myself a vintage leather jacket - always wanted one - but got an invite to a Pirate themed Stagette party later in June (to photograph), so figured the timing was right - feels good - nice to have someone else break it in! [May 28] :: Went to "The Coup" for the first time (after a recommendation recently) - and it's awesome :: great location, music, food, staff and presentation - vegetarian resto [May 17] :: Shot a bunch of new graffiti at one of my favorite haunts here in town as the sun was going down - good times [May 15] :: Cleaned up some wiring, and properly installed speakers and a power supply in the Ms.Pac-man cocktail [May 14] :: Came across two new Lamborghini's tonight, so stopped for some grab shots - a black one and a yellow one [May 08] :: Moved my new Donkey Kong Jr. into the Guitar Connection - take a peek - monitor was just rebuilt, and it looks incredibly sweet! :: As long as you don't hurt anybody...believe in whatever you want --- Susan King (quoted it on Facebook - in the Religious Views section - I like it!) [May 07] :: Had two tables at the show with Nick from Guitar Connection, and sold off items that I didn't really would sell (old music t-shirts, and some high priced CDs), and other stuff I thought would have been snatched up didn't go anywhere - but I picked up some killer items, so it was all good [May 06] :: Will more than likely have a table or two at the "Rock 'N Roll Memorabilia Show & Sale - The 40th Anniversary of The Summer of Love & The 30th Anniversary of Punk Sunday May 6, 2007" - come down and buy or trade some CDs or DVDs with me! :: With a cool head, I managed to get past the 4th Frogger level - then immediately got squished navigating the road (snake forced me back onto the street!) DOH! - oh well, got my all-time high score of 15470 [May 03] :: Won a double pass to see Year of the Dog - some hilarious moments mixed with depressing moments, rinse, repeat - glad I went, but I can't really recommend it either :: Man - that 4th level of Frogger is H A R D!!! [May 02] :: Just found out :: Centipede Cabaret (mini) cabinets and cocktail units were released with 19-inch monitors and there were also a limited number cocktails built with only 13-inch monitors - which is what I have. [May 01] :: Beautiful day here, and took two walks in amongst finishing up my taxes [ugh!] [Apr 30] :: Website was messed up briefly due to server maintenance - covered the Calgary Comic Expo [Apr 29] :: Looked at a Donkey Kong Jr. upright cabinet (just re-capped) - in pretty nice shape, and a very beat-up Taito Space Invaders (Japanese version) cocktail tonight - as a project-only find - v.cool design to it - ended up having competitions on the DKJr. and ended up getting my all-time highscore, and getting to level 10 or 11 [game not at stock settings tho] - hard to keep track at that point - basically the 3rd screen after the 4th screen level [electronic level] - which is a chain level [super hard!], a vine level - also pretty hard, then a spring-board level - wicked hard!, played a Defender cocktail [never played on one before] - and I haven't played that game ... since it came out in 1980 - still no better at it [Apr 28] :: Acquired a dead Pentium 4 system, so pulled the useful parts out of it - anyone need some PC3200 ram? (2x256MB panels), or a 160GB SATA drive, and media card reader (attaches to the motherboard)? - the most immediate use is the dual-layer DVD burner - so I'm setting up a 10.2 install on an old G3/266 system, until I can find my 10.3 disc - just to use it as a slide-show - or that's the plan, we'll see how it pans out. [Apr 27] :: Had some control panels and marquees professionally cut down to fit my Williams Sinistar cabinet - good times ahead! - itchin' to play Robotron, Stargate and Defender in this puppy! Also cut down a still vibrantly colored Ms.Pac-man header - that someone else had whittled down [v.poorly] that was oddly oversize, and wouldn't fit in my Ms.Pac-man cabinet - looks original, maybe there was a 25" cabinet at some point, or from a 25th anniversary cabinet - made that fit now too, so it will have a useful life, instead of collecting dust on my shelf - thought I'd save it for an original Frogger cabinet, but ... that will have to wait [Apr 24] :: Replaced the 3.6 battery in my Mame system - now it reboots after power's cut again [insert big grin here] - timed both timers - everything works - now to tie everything down properly and make some notes [Apr 22] :: Went to the Social Distortion / Black Halos / concert down at MacEwan Hall was a pretty good show - lighting was pretty creative for both bands - and I thought BH did a better job overall, plus the slam-dance pit was good to watch itself, which didn't exist for SD. IMO - the encore set from SD, was the worst and most boring encore I've ever seen - sorry guys! Bought two BH cds, and had them signed/chatted a bit with Becvare, Zgaljic and Billy Hopeless after the gig - was pretty shocked that SD didn't have any CDs for sale - how stupid is that?! [Apr 21] :: Met up with a cousin (Richard) I haven't seen ... since maybe 1991 - he came to town for a Fireworks convention - excellent! [Apr 19] :: Worked on the dual-timer system for a game - seems to work, but was a pain setting up the timers correctly (analog dials) - I think I need a new battery in that system [Apr 16] :: Decided to work on my site redesign (with CSS), and move the text from the intro into a blog format :: looking good so far - long time in coming // Started to watch Wimbledon - pretty good [Apr 11] :: Watched White Oleander, and then proceeded to create some more cool music - played for about 1.5hrs, until my fingertips couldn't take anymore - actually pushed them much past their limits, so I could capture what I had in my head - will post that a bit later - a new favorite called Speaking Volumes (speaking without words, penned to talk with Sera) - based on some ideas that was one of the first few songs I wrote back in 1985, but couldn't really "realize" until technology caught up with my brain this past year [07] - and then I folded in a bit of new to the mix [Apr 08] :: Created a new "music account" on myspace, so I could add my own solo material - kinda lame that you can't upload personal music without having a specific music account tho - isn't it? - anyhow, added one song on there under the name "Inversely Proportional" [Apr 04] :: Went down to The Hifi Club to see Whitey Houston, but they were a pair of babies, and decided that the roads sucked too bad to drive down from Edmonton, Priestess was pretty good tho - bought a T-shirt and CD, will give it a proper spin tomorrow. The drums and bass came through nicely, but the vocals were completely buried - doesn't anyone do a sound check anymore? // Bought my first 400GB drive today (they were all out of the 320's) - should be nice. // Excellent - managed to not run into one April Fools joke - probably a first that's ever happened (hate that day, and all that crap). Listening to my MP3 archive tonight, I got to an AIFF file that I still hadn't edited called Dark Jam, which I recorded on Jan 13th., 2007 - awesome track that was almost 20 minutes long. Well, now it's in 8 sections and clocks in at 15:19. I'll give that a listen later, on the car stereo - my personal favorite now is Out-running The Darkness (part1) [Apr 02] :: Modified my monitor placement and levels, re-wired the lighting in the Ms.Pac-man cocktail - now all the lights work again! (coin door, and the two bulbs on each player side) - they were all burnt out before, but replacing the bulbs didn't help back when I tested it on location - must have been some flaky connection or wire somewhere - looks cool! - used 151 bulbs, as the 555's were too bright, and might melt the bulb housings [Mar 26] :: Pac-man Plus - the second double-bread level, the ghosts only turn for a single blip after eating a power-pellet - dang! // Jammed with Frank, Rory and CJ yesterday in the NW - first time in ages - and as usual laid down some tasty tracks - also had some homebrewed hooch, that tasted (and smelled) like nice tequila - good times! - on the way home tho, some bird or owl [said the cops] turfed into the windshield - and smashed it good - I'm alright, but the creature is most likely toast [Mar 25] :: Ram seems peachy-keen! [Mar 24] :: Received my replacement RAM this afternoon - will try that out again // Got past the double-Galaxian level on Pac-man Plus - it's slices of bread! (?!?) [Mar 21] :: Felt like crap about an hour after waking, so went back to sleep - awoke, and took my guitar from it's case - came up with a good riff, and then proceeded to wear out the three fingertips on my left hand jamming with myself and GarageBand3 - excellent material to come for that session [Mar 20] :: Got a 90MB Bernoulli drive, so I should be able to do conversions for people from those carts now too [Mar 16] :: Finished watching Roman Holiday (1953) - what a fun beautiful romp - man what a looker she was [Mar 15] :: Cripes, that took all day, but I've got the cocktail wired up both sides and it accepts coins - a few more refinements in the daylight and it will be ready for prime time! - drop by for a game of Ms.Pac-man, Pac-man, Pac-man Plus, Jr. Pac-man, Lady Bug or Frogger... [Mar 12] :: Traded off the Ms.Pac-man cocktail monitor today to a local collector for some side-art - now I can get busy adding in another monitor [excellent!] [Mar 11] :: Moved my Centipede cocktail down to Varsity Pizza - looks good in there with a fresh piece of glass - please use a coaster! - reset the highscore table, so try and get your name on there! (only the top 3 scores are kept after a power-down) - set to "super value" - 50c for one credit, or put in a buck, and get 3 credits! :: Designed more cards, sent back the 4GB of ram to OWC [Mar 07] :: Designed some simpler cards up for a Landscaping firm - to compliment the photo cards I did up last month [Mar 06] :: Cleaned and installed underlay graphics beneath a fresh piece of custom made tempered glass to my Centipede cocktail - wow - what a treat to see a fresh unscratched surface - almost seems wrong some how... [Mar 05] :: Gonna bail on the RAM - and send it back - bummer - getting my ARoD machine re-capped this week - then went to the Rose and Crown for a few pints of Guinness with buddies - was a good scene there, but I needed to see The Black Halos - they were playing down at The Underground - made the show, and it was great - talked with the drummer for a bit after the show, so hopefully I will make their next appearance and shoot 'em in April - bought a cool white and hot pink T-Shirt on black - looks pretty cool - tried to get a CD after the set was up - but they'd sold out already. DOH! [Mar 03] :: Got two new Firewire 800 drives and two sticks of fresh 2GB ram panels (4GB) yesterday - makes a nice addition to my G5 - cranked up to 7GBs now, we'll see how that rocks now... [Mar 01] :: Picked up my recently acquired DKJr board from my tech, and he said it worked fine in his Mario Bros cabinet (it and my Popeye PCB) - so I'll have to give it another go-round in the Popeye cocktail... (which didn't work) [Feb 28] :: Added an intro page, and revamped the header graphics on my vintage coin-op site [Feb 21] :: The trackball needed some cleaning of the optical elements, but works pretty good. Had a few quick games of Centipede, Crystal Castles and Missile Command - excellent! [Feb 19] :: Scored a USB trackball tonight - excellent [Feb 18] :: Cripes it's COLD OUTSIDE! (-22 °C tonight) [Feb 14] :: G5 didn't want to wake up this afternoon - must have gone into a coma - odd, it's been so damn stable // Read about this Kodachrome Project tonight, and thought I'd add a link to it - one of my favorite films, but unfortunately have not had a decent chance to shoot a single frame of it myself in a few years now [Feb 12] :: Bought an Epson R260 recently (just tried it out tonight) to replace an older R200 which I couldn't get to print on disc surfaces before..., well with my first test on TDK printable DVD-R media, I am pretty impressed for a first go-round. Near perfect registration (slightly off left to right), but the smooth resolution looks amazing even on small text. Thanks Epson, you've renewed my faith! - also thanks to David Burren for his posting and photoshop template - saved me a lot of trial and error headaches [Feb 11] :: Shot some cool bands at "The Den" - event was also covered by MuchMusic - I think it will be aired on March 11th, 2007 (?!) [Feb 10] :: Came across a nice Rampart cabinet tonight, which I took some parts, but unfortunately it will probably just get destroyed (the rest of it) ... [Feb 02] :: Tried to solve my Rubik's Revenge tonight ... got pretty close, but gave up after maybe half an hour. Did my regular cube tho tonight in only 1min 21sec! - as I've come up with a way to combine (or cut down on superfluous moves) [Feb 01] :: Sold off the Chevy S10, will delve into a new strategy now [Jan 31] :: Shot one of my all-time favorite heavy bands [The Headpins] tonight at Broken City - was a very good performance, and got lots of killer shots of them in action [Jan 30] :: Well, I've mostly absorbed the cube stuff into my brain, and so far, the fastest solve time has been 1min 49sec. Time to silicon spray it up now I guess - body is slowly mending back too [Jan 19] :: Just added Sound Jam MP onto an old all-in-one mac (2600CD), and it actually plays back 320 kbps audio files from CD-R. Hmmmm. [Jan 18] :: A heavily used copy of a solution book [Rubik's cube] I used to have showed up in the mail (off eBay), so I got to read through it in my fever haze - was an interesting ride un-earthing various synapses from 25 years ago [Jan 16] :: My vintage Hungarian made Rubiks Cube arrived this morning (off eBay) in one piece - excellent! [Jan 10] :: Created some more killer riffs jamming with myself this morning, awesome - wore out my fingertips though! [Jan 09] :: Made up some new vintage coin-op photo cards - they look much cooler than the translucent ones I was handing out before [Jan 08] :: Created some killer riffing with Garage Band this morning (in the wee hours), very exciting, I'll have to post a sample of it [Jan 07] :: Took my girls to the airport and sent them back to Vancouver - was their first trip flying solo - v.brave of them - was a fantastic visit, thank you! [Jan 05] :: Tried the bootleg Popeye board in my original Popeye cocktail, and the edge connectors are different / The Hunchback board connector fit, but the metal bracket didn't mate with the wooden dual slots. I tried plugging it in without it mounted inside the machine, but no video raster displayed - so not sure what's up with that - will have to try it in the Donkey Kong Jr. cocktail that it came with some day soon [Jan 04] :: Rewired my Robotron cabinet (long overdue), some other games play in there now [Jan 01, 2007] ::

:: 2007 ::

Hung out with the kids, lit off some sparklers and fireworks and then watched a Pink Panter Anthology on DVD [Dec 31] :: Joined a few old friends (and made a couple) at a fabulous lounge called "Bungalow" on 17th Ave - good tunes, atmosphere, lighting, decor, clientel, spirit selection and bartenders. Also checked out Tequila for a bit down the street, but that was not my scene at all - was great to hang out with my new drummer there [Dec 23] :: Well, pretty maddening (the journey), but got my vintage Pac-man control panel rewired and working again. Most excellent! [Dec 20] :: Got to see my cousins, and a new set of twins born this year // Decided I really don't like Sinistar after all, so I'm bailing on the project - the cabinet, 49-way leaf joystick, glass bezel art (some paint was removed because of a cabinet conversion, but it still looks very good) and marquee are up for sale..., take it off my hands before I come to my senses [Dec 19] :: Checked out a Chevy S10 (1993) truck with my guitarist today, and after giving it a test run, decided to take the plunge - nothing photo worthy that's for sure, but will fit the bill for moving the full-sized games around in a more timely fashion [Dec 17] :: Cleaned and retouched the Asteroids cocktail before it goes back out [Dec 15] :: Found some Power Squids locally - bought all they had :: Finished the majority of the paint work for now on the Missile Command - looks pretty awesome! - I'll have to post before/after on the control panel in particular [Dec 14] :: Retouched most of the cabinet - many parts look close to mint now - pretty exciting! :: Replaced the dead coin bulbs in my Missile Command :: Trying to find some pictures online [and failing] to illustrate a silhouette concept to the NOS dudes in preparation for their promo shots today, I started to flip through a few photography books, and came across a very interesting page showing exactly what happens to your precious negatives when you take them to a cheap lab [one of the downfalls - which is drastically used up chemicals, since they usually only replace them when they notice that something is wrong, not long before when they should be] which people have often asked me about in the past - especially wedding photography, so I'll transcribe the text here :: A mistake that many photographers make is overworking developer or fixer solutions. The consequences, as shown here, can be serious. A good negative, properly exposed and developed, can be damaged or completely ruined because the chemicals in the solutions are used up. // An overworked developer produces underdeveloped negatives (top row); there is just not enough developing agent left to build up density. With partially exhausted developer, details, particularly in shadow areas—the model's sleeve—grow dim (center); in extreme cases the image is all but lost (far right). Damage may be worse than that caused by underdevelopment because impurities in exhausted solution may stain the negative. Development may be patchy and uneven, and remedial treatment that might ordinarily have helped (pages 82-83) will be of no avail. // An overworked fixer produces negatives that seem overdeveloped compared to a normal one (bottom row). The solution is so overloaded with silver bromide dissolved from earlier negatives that it cannot take up more unexposed crystals from the negative. These leftover grains turn dark and cause the negative to grow denser. As highlight areas—the model's forehead—darken, the overall image grows flatter (center). Such details as strands of hair are obscured, and a grayish density extends like a pall of smoke over the entire negative, even clouding unexposed borders (far right). // Preventing these problems is easy enough. Developer and fixer manufactures specify how much film may be processed per quart of solution and this limit should never be exceeded. // taken from page 72 of the book called "The Print / LIFE library of Photography" The book was originally published in 1970 - I've got the 1975 reprint [Dec 12] :: Got ahold of an old bondi-charcoal grey top / violet bottom iMac keyboard tonight, so I'll test out my bondi iMac with MAME [Dec 11] :: Setup the channel markers, recorded and then edited a bunch of programming - pretty nifty. It's a Miglia box that uses Elgato's EyeTV 2.3.2 software - got that over the EyeTV 250, since this one allowed custom settings for the encoding and was the same price. The editing stuff is very cool - designed to make it easy to hack out commercials, but of course Mr. swims-up-stream uses it to keep the commercials. Caught Deepak Chopra [while channel surfing] being interviewed on CBC about his new book : Life After Death. Excellent piece (but missed the intro) - saved the last 12 minutes if anyone wants to view it. Speaking of which, now that I have the power, I can make DVDs and/or iPod sized clips of any normal cable material. Drop by with some beer, or give me a fiver and a heads up with the channel number and exact times... TV looks best on an interlace monitor, so I'll keep my eyes out for a nice S-Video input monitor to put next to my system [Dec 10] :: Shot the mac tv box the other day, and hooked it up, but haven't put it thru any paces yet [Dec 08] :: Had another mondo chat with my brother, ironed out some major cool ideas [Dec 06] :: Sold off my mac mini to a bassist / Got my new graphics card plugged in, so should be rockin' with the pictures a little harder from now on / picked up a Firepod today as well, hopefully it will do what I figured. [Dec 05] :: Cleaned up the Escape from Mars / Cleaned up the Popeye cocktail, and replaced the table top art with reproductions - looks way better (the materials on there before were hand-made and all faded and/or water damaged super bad!) [Dec 04] :: Jammed with my lead guitarist, and came up with some good new material - bassist was too busy to make it this round / recorded it to two track tape, did a session of :30s time lapse, and on miniDV, so will be nice to share some of that with the other band members, and family [Dec 02] :: Bought some fresh Sony MDR-V7 Ear Pads off a guy on eBay, [was going to dole out some big cash for a new set, but I put it off for a decade - because the speakers in them are still great - and doing research on my old pair, I found a few people that mentioned they'd replaced the pads a few times on them - and everyone I asked over the years said it couldn't be done...] and installed them this morning - wow - tricky getting the old ones off, and the new set on, but wow! Can't remember back to when they felt like this. Rock on! :: setup some lights and shot my new games before I clean 'em up [Dec 01] :: Got my Asteroids cocktail back (all tweaked, fixed board wiring, and moved the on/off switch, etc.), and two new fresh acquisitions - a Nintendo Popeye cocktail (needs various bits, but the monitor is amazing, and plays well - I'll give my Hunch Back board a go-round soon again), and an ancient Escape From Mars upright - should be fun to get my hands on them when they are thawed out tomorrow. [Nov 30] :: Added 50c markers to the coin door at Varsity Pizza // Well, in a serendipitous way, I stumbled upon a half decent Rubiks Cube solution page, so I put my head to it, and after 3 or 4 failed attempts, I got it to work. Not as smart or simple as the solution I still can't find [and have long since forgotten ... grrrr], but I guess it's a good stop-gap. Now to only add it to my overfilled brain and impress people at parties when I run out of charm... [Nov 28] :: Labeled the Arkanoid cabinet at Varsity Pizza tonight (that it's 50c), and set the game to be a little easier for them. Man it's cold out there! [-24 °C] / Shot the MC cabinet before retouching, and tweaked the locks [Nov 27] :: Tried my hand at recording audio on my MBP with GB3 and a PreSonus Firepod at the jam space, so didn't shoot as much as usual. Busy pouring over the materials... The PA feed we added half-way is out of sync slightly - not sure if it's a latency issue, or I bumped the whole track off. I'll see how the second batch comes out... [Nov 21] :: Picked up my Asteroids CT machine and brought it to my tech guru - we'll see if he can massage it, and went to visit with a buddy to yak about GarageBand - stay tuned! [Nov 19] :: Added in a new +5v voltage regulator to the MC, and now it's back! Excellent! [Nov 18] :: Brought my Missile Command board back to my guru for a second go-round, and had a bunch of pinball games, and played some MAME stuff too, spun some crazy vinyl, CDs, tapes and iPod tunes ta boot - good times / bought a set of book darts - and feel whole again [Nov 17] :: Ordered a new (fresh on the market) X1900 Radeon video card, which will hopefully arrive in two weeks time (yeah!) [Nov 13] :: Shot an old Gibson (1981) of Andy's, as a test to see how we might light and shoot his collection of cool vintage guitars [Nov 12] :: Shot at the Soda Lounge - 3 bands played, and I showed the stuff on the TV monitors and laptop while the event was unfolding. Hooked up with some interesting people at the end of the night, so some lucrative photographic possibilities could ensue later. [Nov 11] :: Shot Ellen McIlwaine playing with Cassius Khan on tabla - was a good show, and great acoustics at the Engineered Air Theatre d/t - had her sign the cover of one of my CDs. After that, I ran off to the Bret Michaels show at Cowboys - good crowd, but I still don't care for that Poison stuff - met four people I knew at the event, so that was all good. [Nov 10] :: Took in the David Lee Roth show at Cowboys, and the show was pretty damn good. Didn't see any other "said" photographers covering the event, but lots of cheesy P&S cameras snapping all evening. Could have captured some wicked ass shit - as Dave was in a nice white spot light almost all evening, and doing leg kicks over his head. He did Van Halen tunes all night, with a few Jeff Beck numbers thrown in for segue's (to give the rest of the band a break). Did talk with Brenda again so ... it was all good. Tried to find DLR at Ceili's, afterwards, but didn't see him. Caught the Villains last set tho, which was great on the 2nd. floor [Nov 06] :: Setup an articulated arm I got before the LA trip with the 20" LCD, and ... it's nice now that I've reconfigured the whole desk (placed it on the left side) // Well, ripped the G5 apart, only to find that it [as I figured] doesn't have any AGP slots - they are all PCI-Extreme [major-heavy-sigh] - cripes!!! [Nov 04] :: Got an ATI Radeon X800XT card yesterday, but only the 256MB version (and I requested the 512MB...), so double checked with the shop, and it appears I can't get the 512, so I'll try this one out when I wake up. Couldn't get the dead semi-conductor part, so I've ordered it (a TIP32) hopefully just a few days ... / the Aperture 1.5.1 update seems a bit zippier in it's core graphics redraws, and updates when using CS2 with it, so that's all good. [Nov 03] :: Got a buddy to trouble-shoot a few of my vintage games this afternoon, so the Dig Dug is back in business again (the problem was what I figured as well), and the Missile Command I'll fetch a fresh part for tomorrow - the ailing Ms. Pac-man cocktail tho will need a bit more... [Nov 01] :: Finally got my 20" cinema display back from Alaska Airlines (they had it for some reason - didn't come up on my West Jet flight back in mid August) - seems to work, I'll put it through some paces tomorrow. Met up with my old Physics 10/20 instructor, and we talked for quite awhile about art and guitar stuff - was a really good time - he looks the same. [Oct 25] :: Acquired an old color 40GB iPod this evening, we'll see if that changes my life in any way - actually it's pretty cool / added in some of my old shoe work for Peter Fox Shoes (photos and pencil drawings) - some weblinks were broken, from the last time I viewed the material, so perhaps I'll look for screen grab I must have done. [Oct 16] :: Went to my first wine tasting event ever [it was here in Calgary, AB] The Rocky Mountain Wine & Food festival - was a real blast, will be doing that again for sure - met a lot of great people there, and sampled some amazing products - my favorite non-wine was PAMA Pomegranate Liqueur, and the Hpnotiq was also pretty interesting, although my buddy thought it was awful. Had some Van Gogh vodka - but didn't like it - too many nice wines to remember or harvest details. I'll be putting on a Martini party at my friends pad in the next couple weeks, so drop me a note if you'd like an invite - should be a great evening / sync-d up the palm, and ... life was good again / got more clear envelopes for 4x6 prints [Oct 14] :: Well, got stood up again by Ashley for a portrait shoot - what a drag - could have been my best work yet - the most stunning woman I've ever seen in person. Oh well, I guess it was not meant to be. Took some foliage shots at Stanley Park - beautiful fall day. Been busy shooting and editing in Calgary - after a two week stint in Edmonton - see my domain for photos / got my hair snipped so it will have a chance to normalize before the reunion, and got another palm (Z22), since the stuff I ordered off of ebay has not materialized, and [I need all the help I can get sometimes to manage my hectic life] [Oct 13] :: Went to the wave pool to fix my back after that move - was fun, and did a pretty good job of my back - anyone know how the hell those waves get generated? I can't figure it out myself [Sep 21] :: Moved my upright Asteroids, and the Donkey Kong Jr. cocktail into the busiest SuperStore today - man stairs suck! - but the games were well received by the employees, so hopefully it was worth it [Sep 20] :: Finished watching the compete first season of Desperate Housewives - wow, what a great show - is the second season out yet on DVD? [Sep 20] :: Had a great time at the Henry Wise Wood 20th reunion, and was spurned on to do the same for the high school I graduated from, so I put that in the works that night. [Sep 16] :: Worked on a whole batch of new awesome business cards, ask for some (kids, cars, music) [Sep 15] :: Shot a 1973 Pantera with a model - in black and white - good times up in Edmonton, AB [Sep 4] :: Finally did a google search and found a script to extract the CD-TEXT data out of a disc and into iTunes - pretty foolish it's not built into the app! [Aug 24] :: Dropped in again on NOS rehearsing [Aug 22] :: Back in Calgary from the LA trip [Aug 16] :: Got to see and shoot my all-time favorite Hard Rock band Y&T outside of San Francisco - very cool - yes, I know you've never heard of them, but that's not my fault! [Aug 11] :: Went to see a band from Amsterdam called Vanngunn at the Troubadour - good show here in Hollywood, CA, then went for some great Japanese food at a place called Musha in Santa Monica, CA - wonderful staff and presentation. Downloaded and viewed shots from the set while we ate - pretty cool! [July 10] :: Moved the Arkanoid - Revenge of Doh cocktail into Varsity Pizza - works great - go down and visit - only 50c a game! / Played Arkanoid 2 after getting it ready for prime-time - used the play-thru option to get past a number of v.hard levels, and started to make some notes. v.creative game. Level 16 (R after L15) had nothing but unbreakable gold bricks, and you have to find the ones that move side to side when you hit them enough times - there are multiple open quadrants, and it has to get through them at the proper angle, and then up to the top, so you can grab a powerup. Shesh! [July 06] :: Left my electric razor plugged in for a few minutes a couple days back (which made it slow again - as the rechargeable batteries have been toast for a long time - and running it completely dry still didn't fix the slowness) - so I took it apart today - and found out why they wanted so much to change them in Vancouver [they are fused to a bracket, and crimped and then soldered to a circuit board] plus you need #8 Torx screw drivers to open the case] - but removing [the now] corroded batteries completely out of the electrical loop - plugged straight into the wall it works fantastic again! [June 29] :: Shot some of my buddies kids at their local water park - awesome material! [June 27] :: Uploaded and added a link to the texture library layout I made for my CD-R portfolio, but for some reason never added it online [June 23] :: Gave my Speedy Pac a whirl tonight (always panned it, as a cheap cheat) - but man, that's hard and fun! - got up to the key level - ordered high-speed for Sera today (21st) [June 22] :: Tried out my first video conference, and had some snags. Was very cool, but the connection kept dying I think due to Sera's side being only wireless. [June 21] :: Back from Vancouver, now to get back to all the things I need to do. Had a great jam session with Dean Kujala, awesome time with the kids, shot a lot of good stuff, and had some mind expanding chats - especially with Kara - thanks! Saw the Pixar Cars film with the kids on my birthday - too bad that some bastard decided to break into our car and theeve the brand new stereo tho [that day] - just to remind me why I left that town so many years ago perhaps [June 18] :: Jaunted off to Vancouver for 10 days [June 07] :: Got an iSight camera, and a MacBook (has a camera in it), so will be doing video conferencing now with my kids - anyone else out there have the capabilities to try it out?! [June 05] :: Took a break to play ARoD - and to see [well, try to see] if/how the screens are different depending on which route you take after completing each level. Very hard to shoot and play at the same time - really need someone else to do that! Some screens are especially hard/frustrating, so if would be a boon if I could figure out which side not to go to some day. Doesn't seem to be anything online about it. [June 03] :: Got a new bearing for the Missile Command - works much better! / re-wired the Ms. Pac-man for some test switches to the board, and added proper threaded holes for the marquee [May 30] :: Shot the Calgary stop in the Bif Naked tour (SuperBeautifulMonstour) - turned out amazing - very, very proud of these images! [May 24] :: Setup and used my Canon Pixma iP6600D this evening. After wasting a fair bit of ink I messed around with a bunch of settings, and this little puppy puts out some pretty nice stuff, and fast. Doesn't match the screen output (bit darker, and looses some saturation), but mostly if I try and disregard how "it should be" - I'm pretty damn happy with the 4x6 prints [and that's saying quite a bit from me!]. Setup my bluetooth graphire tablet tonight. We'll see how it fairs. Weird getting used to a 6x8 again after a year of the 4x5 version. [May 21] :: Jammed again with Frank and Rory - came up with some stellar material! - except that the best track will only live on in our memory - as part way through I ran out of tape (DOH!) [May 19] :: Started to clean the Missile Command trackball - what a behemoth! - one of the roller bearings was rusted shut, so that will need a replacement. Looked at other photoprinters today, so my brain is full. Time for a DVD. [May 11] :: Racked up some better scores after reading the game-play basics in the manual. Still really hard. Took a look at the trackballs today - as they worked quite a bit better when it wasn't in a cold garage, but still not great. Player 1 side is pretty good, except didn't want to go down [depended on trackball speed]. I took it apart, cleaned it, and gave a bit of oil [the manual said two drops] to a set of bearings that didn't sound as smooth as the other two. Put it together, and the controls were all gimped! Seemed like they were backwards, but not quite fully backwards. Took them apart, and kept turning it around until they were logical - then put them all back - works like a charm now. The rollers do have quite a bit of wear on them - but I'll probably order some more anyhow for the future when these go south. I did come across how much wear is "too much" in my reading awhile back [maybe on BR's site], but I've never had a working trackball apart to know. Cleaned all the parts that I was taking apart, and swapped in fresh leafs for the fire buttons, and then gave it a fresh 3-prong end. [May 07] :: Got a Centipede (cocktail), a Missile Command and a Gals Panic (in an original Ms. Pac-man cabinet) - and spent the entire rest of the day cleaning them up, and playing with them - my friend was in some desperate need of some space - was happy to oblige, and take these key items away to make room for his new 50" game and a dual 25" setup. Evidently worth trading a nice pinball and a 30" MAME system for. Need new coin switches in the Ms.P, the Centipede needs trackball roller work and new glass (completely missing - must have gotten broken), and the Missile Command needs white overspray removeal. Oh yeah, C/MC need ground plugs. Well, it's all fun! This Centipede is awesome, even with a semi flaky roller. So got a good deal on them (because they all need some work) [May 05] :: Finally found the monitor brightness knob on the Asteroids UR - different knob and location than the cocktail - looks much better now! [May 04] :: Have been very busy getting at my backlog of images with the G5 - awesome - check out my real website for updates on that side of things [May 03] :: Did a fun jam/practice shoot of the band NOS [May 02] :: G5 came in, and I've set it up tonight - Well, not quite sure if the monitor indeed is "too big" - or not, but it's too big for the desk (as it's laid-out). I'll need to drop the monitor lower - as it's too high (remove the shelf) - which would entail coming up with a completely different scenario for how to layout my power bars, and internet stack - might have to buy some whole new desk idea - don't wanna have to think about that now tho. Worked on a bunch of Photoshop images from another band shoot I did on Feb. 4th - definately quicker to retouch with, with less scrolling. [Apr 18] :: Almost finished the edit on the Cowboys show (4am) - hope to post the pile later today [Apr 12] :: Well, the display arrived but nothing to plug it into [Apr 11] :: Moved the spinner on Arkanoid 2 - and repositioned the fire/release button to make it ambidextrous [Apr 09] :: Ordered a G5 and a 30" display from apple online to help me get caught up on my backlog of pictures [Apr 08] :: Fixed the sound issue on SI - just disconnected wires! [Mar 31] :: Space Invaders is almost totally back again - one small part got fried - which made the boards stop getting "-5v", but still no sound. [Mar 29] :: Got my Arkanoid Revenge of Doh working again, thanks to my local tech buddy again - was a flaky power supply. Swapped out a spare I had, and it's back! Love this game! now to finish cleaning it up and checking it all over. [Mar 28] :: Shuffled the 1943 game from The Guitar Connection to the SuperStore in the NW, should do much better there, and my other Asteroids (cocktail) was requested by a store in the NE - game-on guys! [Mar 27] :: Posted some images from my Cowboys - Battle of the Bands shoot - great local bands - and great crowd there as well [Mar 17] :: Well, I feel much better - my watch had been giving me grief for many months now - and the other night I just couldn't stand it (needed to get percentages for some ebay auctions, so had to use my palm pilot instead - pure drudgery! - the light/% button hasn't worked right - so I braved it, and pulled it apart. Got hit in the head with a spring, and figured I lost a piece for the watch band. Groan. Cleaned up and found the missing item. Turned out that the button simply wasn't making contact - all these years I thought it was getting dirty or broken. Shit. Well, hopefully it will work for another 22 years with a few more batteries. Cut and folded some aluminum foil to make-up the missing thickness. So again for those keeping track of all things obsolete - you can recycle some old calendars that match 2006 - 1995, 1989, 1978, 1967, 1961, 1950, 1933, 1922, 1911, 1905, 1899, 1893, 1882, 1871, 1865. Go ahead, check your attic - don't be shy [Mar 13] :: Did a great interior architecture day-shoot for a local Interior Designer [Jaime Gould] - will post some of the shoot soon, and then in the Spring we'll do a follow-up shoot of the exterior - there was lots of amazing Millwork in the two houses [Mar 11] :: Got my Sinistar joystick working (wired), but need a new ball for the tip - cool game with a 49-way stick! [Mar 08] :: Replaced the power plug, and cleaned the leaf buttons (pulled them apart and set them for a dishwasher cycle = pretty good!) - didn't know they came apart before (a lot less work LMTY!), then got my new highscore on it - the space ships are way more accurate on this version! [rev 2 vs rev 5 board on my CT] [Mar 02] :: Installed a new flouro fixture and threaded receptacles for the marquee in the Tetris, retouched the cabinet - looks great now! / Installed a new lock and retouched the Asteroids (UR) cabinet - looks awesome! - seems that the cabinet being slightly not level where I placed it, was hanging up some quarters from going down the chute [Mar 01] :: Got a local guru to fix up my Arkanoid - Revenge Of Doh cocktail - works pretty great - wow - trippy game play, very inventive version - even cooler than Arkanoid - like being stoned with no extra substances! - doesn't have an Ambidextrous fire/release button, so I'll have to add one soon [Feb 26] :: Cleaned up the Asteroids upright - plays nice! but it's harder than my cocktail, must check to see which board rev it is. . ., that or the screen size/orientation difference [Feb 25] :: Tracked down the Asteroids trouble - turned out to be a rogue ground wire touching a switch contact - grrr - metal crimps - crazy! [Feb 23] :: Received my Asteroids upright, and Space Invaders uprights - both were working great, until I turned my back and the Asteroids popped the breaker in the garage. Changed the blown fuses in the game, but power-up blew the 7A right away. Crap! - well, the SI is very fun to play. Gotta fix up the bottom in the morning (all the leg-levelers are missing and/or broken posts) - but you have just got to see this backlit and reflected display - very trippy! [Feb 21] :: Resurrected my Tetris - was a blown or flaky transformer - happy that I had another spare - going out to pickup some Martini glasses and do a happy dance [Feb 17] :: Changed the Joust back to 50 cent play. Should be good now for awhile. Had a game of DD too, man what a rush! Going to part-out my beloved 8500 - my first mac - as I got another USB 1.1 card for it yesterday, and no there is no boot-up chime [Feb 16] :: Asteroids : One word : linearity! - finally found the pot on the video board thanks to ionpool, RGVAC and Tony – I couldn't see them initially, because from the door side, they were hidden behind the glue (well, some kind of rubbery substance) - and the pots look the same as the ones on the PCB. The one farther back I couldn't get all the rubber off [scared to cut into something else important], and the one adjustment got me 95-99 percent there, which ... I'll quit while I'm still ahead. Looks and plays awesome now. The audio volume sometimes gets lower for a bit in game play, but, I'll leave that fix for later. Games ready for the spot light - fun game! [Feb 11] :: Got a new flouro tube for the Tetris, and powered it up - small flash, and then nothing - burned a fuse / go get another / hmm, blown variable power supply? DOH! [Feb 10] :: Found the rouge blown fuse in my Asteroids [whew!] - a 3-amp. 250V 3AG Slow-Blow glass cartridge-type fuse. Now to get a few replacements in the daylight. Finished cleaning the whole cabinet - inside and out - almost ready for prime-time. Reading over my Tetris Kit manual, it mentioned a tweak for noisy monitors - added in a .1 yf 50 volt ceramic capacitor into the ground path, and it took the monitor from complete crud to pretty darn nice! Amazing what a 50 cent part can do in the right place. Pumped! [Feb 8] :: After the final Asteroids cleaning, I played a couple games, and then it crapped out [Doh!] - did some trouble-shooting, and cleaning both sides of the board edge connector seemed to fix it up - P1/P2 flashing problem, which was mentioned here / Fixed a nagging problem that would have made me bonkers - there was a triangle of wood or paper stuck under the table glass, so I fired up my compressor, and finally blew that sucker out of there - wow, I feel better now! [Feb 3] :: Cleaned up the Asteroids, and installed a new lock - looking good! / tested my Street Fighter II Jamma board in my Tetris - works! - so it's up for sale (fighting games aren't my thing) or trade [Jan 31] :: Picked up my Asteroids cocktail cabinet [Jan 30] :: Well, finally tweaked the Dig Dug, and it's working really sweet, just cranked up my high-score to an all-time record (81100 and level 13 whoo hoo!) while testing both sides of the controls [Jan 29] :: Re-wired the Joust, swapped out another monitor – back in commission again! [Jan 23] :: Work progresses on my Robotron project cabinet. Got the controls, coins, sound and lighting all working. Damn - that's a great game! Placed the Donkey Kong Jr. cocktail in the same SuperStore [Jan 19] :: Burnt out a component on the Joust - awaiting parts for a fix. :( [Jan 16] :: Placed the Joust at the SuperStore in the far SE, for access to the staff, with their cut of the funds going towards the Presidents Choice Childrens Charity - excellent! [Jan 15] :: Received my 1982 'Joust' upright finally in December, after sitting a whole week at the shippers, with the weekend, and brokers and such - what a drag - but wow - it's in beautiful condition - definitely the nicest example I've ever seen [in person] - changed the coin mechs to Canadian, rewired a new plug on it, (had the guy install a fresh CPO on it - fabulous job) and cleaned it up a bit on the outside, ready for game-time (now available for rent!) [Jan 10] ::

:: 2006 ::

Put my Arkanoid Revenge of DOH JAMMA board in it as well (into the Tetris cabinet), and that works - but it needs the analogue paddle controls - but at least now I know the board still works, I'll get the cocktail cabinet re-wired - I put my Double Dribble JAMMA board in the Tetris, and it works (board, and monitor) - but I'd need to build another control panel to play that one - needs three buttons, and the Tetris only has one (but double player) / got both coin mechs working as well. [Dec 20] :: Cleaned up the Street Fighter II, and found the marquee - in wonderful shape buried inside the game, and noticed it had a Sinistar back glass [Dec 19] :: Well, the Tetris is missing the JAMMA board, but has a monitor and manual, and the Street Fighter II seems to have a working board, (game sounds, and sounds happen when using the game buttons, but no monitor in there, so things will have to wait on that one. [Dec 12] :: The Donkey Kong Jr. cocktail is all cleaned up and ready to rock - now available for rent. [Dec 11] :: Got a few more new acquisitions - an 1982 'Donkey Kong Jr. cocktail' (stock) that came with a Hunchback PCB and an 'Arkanoid' cocktail style cabinet (needs work, not stock), and two stand-up cabinets that need work - a Tetris, and a Street Fighter II - wow, that should keep me busy! [Dec 10] :: Got another new acquisition - an 1987 '1943 The Battle of Midway' and 'Gals Panic' cocktail style Dynamo cabinet, that also came with a Double Dribble (Konami:1986) PCB, which I might put up for sale at some point. Finished cleaning the 1943, and have that installed here in town - check it out, and have a few games! It's at Guitar Connection right now - and they are on 17th Avenue SW. Say hi to Andy, tell him I sent you... [Dec 1] :: Got a new acquisition - an 1982 Atari 'Dig Dug' cocktail style cabinet, that's been shopped out by a local guy - very clean inside and out. Should keep me busy here for awhile - haven't played this one since the early 80s. [Nov 19] :: Currently in Calgary, and restoring vintage arcade cabinets [Oct 31] :: Added a few new galleries to my site, and upgraded my mini ram to 1GB - much better. [Oct 12] :: Was in LA, for a month before we sold our house. Here are a couple of mine from the front - the offer went the distance [Aug 23] :: My mac mini came in (1.42 w/512 ram), a day before Tiger was released, but the shoppe upgraded it a few days later for me - slowly getting into Tiger and InDesign again [Apr 28] :: Got a new dSLR body today to fit with the rest of my favorite gear, so no shoot is too small! [Apr 14] :: Had some fun with the kids Crayola Crayon Maker tonight - unfortunately I found the instruction sheet at the bottom of the box (after scratching my head and foundering through it without) - so the first go round we didn't tilt the crayons wet (14 minutes in), but left it until the timer was done, and they were hard - so I re-heated it about half-way. Not quite enough. Our second crayon looked the coolest - dark blues, red and dark purple - the tiger one was the best in liquid, but dry, not too exciting - we'll see how it is to use them in the morning. If you've got any crayon bits - bring 'em on by! [Apr 09] :: A buddy brought over a new Philips DVD player [DVP642/37] that can play-back divx and avi files, so I'll try and make some of my own discs when my mac-mini 1.42 back-order comes in - Watched some amazing Ghibli shorts he downloaded from various anime sites - cool work that studio does! [Apr 03] :: Bought the new Incredibles DVD (widescreen double disc) - and played it for the first time (virgin disc - no dust, no scratches). The disc stopped the first four times trying to play the start of the movie from the root screen (APEX AD-600A DVD player) with an "invalid entry" error. Selecting the first scene from the chapter section worked fine tho (thankfully!) - but I did notice two hiccups in play during one of the scenes (saving the cat?) - only watched the first eight so far - more later, but pulling power from the deck did seem to allow me to play it from the play icon [Mar 25] - after pulling power for about ten minutes, it seemed to play through fine :: Did a theatrical shoot for a theatre group here in South Surrey - the production was called Seussical the Musical, and played for two weekends at the Wheelhouse Theatre. Great cast, costumes, lighting - a really wonderful group of young kids, see my site for the latest images from that session - too bad that they [Susan Pendleton] reneged on our agreement - so I'm out a serious whack of cash - hopefully the parents will come through and buy enough prints to recoup the costs. [Mar 17] :: Did an industrial shoot for Wesgar in Port Coquitlam - keep posted for images from that [Feb 04] :: Well, had a good time for new-years in Vernon - and need to back-date my watch again - so for those keeping track of all things obsolete - you can recycle some old calendars that match 2005 - 1994, 1983, 1977, 1966, 1955, 1949, 1938, 1927, 1921, 1910, 1898, 1887, 1881, 1870, 1859. Go ahead, check your attic - don't be shy [Jan 01] ::

:: 2005 ::

Managed to buy a ticket from a guy out front of the sold-out Headpins concert here in White Rock, BC of all places - great, great show - got to talk with Darby and Ab after, and got them both to sign my old Headpins jacket - very cool indeed. Thanks to you both for the chat, and to Ab for giving me some very interesting back-story on your evolution. I hope you can find some time to get in the studio together and make some more magic. The segueys you did tonight with Tony would be a good starting point I'd say! [Nov 12 '04] :: Shot some digi-stills in Vancouver for a new game pitch [late-Oct '04] if the game gets picked up, then I'll post some of the graphics :: My main system went down on Sept 27, and again in October - turned out my main drive went south - grrrr. / I've made some new color and B&W wedding promo materials - ask for a sample! [June 04] :: Did some 3d-compositing (2.5d After Effects stuff) for a show called Kids World Sports. [Jan/March 04] :: I restyled a "nice-guy & White Rock-local 'Bouncy Castle' website" recently Angels Bouncy Castles [Jan 25] :: New hair-cut - pretty radical, so you might have to look a number of times to realize it's "me" [Nov 24] :: Our mini-van, was found almost six months later [Apr 13]. Stolen right out of our driveway while we were home ta boot! [Oct 26, '03] :: I Made some new color promo materials - ask for a sample! :: I was doing some digital ink and paint work for a Mercury Filmworks on the Yvon of the Yukon show (episodes 43 thru 47) with USAnimation [Aug/Sept '03] :: Doing some Art Design & Production work for the Miracle News - a local newspaper [Aug '03-Jan '05] and a sister publication out of Seattle called Runta :: Did a funky shoot for Fathers Day (grade 1 classmates) - 18 from the series online [Nov '03] :: Did a small job with my wife - colored and airbrushed a T-shirt design - image added to my reel (July '03) :: Shot new cars with air deflectors for Glas-Aire in Richmond (September '02 – shoot) - nice to be outside all day scoping out new locations too. Site finally went live (January '03) - shot on 35mm and medium format transparency stock, except the interiors were shot on neg [the company is not no longer, but the great design company Infinite Bang has thoughtfully added a link] :: Finished an animated :32 second segment opener for a super-16 film in Montreal - delivered mid August, 2002. :: The last major project I worked on was doing Motion Graphics work for the National Film Board (Vancouver, BC). The piece was on "Joe Fortes" and we wrapped up the graphics October-2001 - sound edit and picture edit finished September, 2002 [Final length with credits: 8 minutes 51 seconds.] - won best animated sound at the Leos in 2003 :: If you've got any commissioned photography, After Effects/Motion Graphics work, jobs/leads or a project of your own drop me a line.

G r a d - l i s t:
Started [Dec '04] to blow the dust off my "grad-list" again and have sent out twelve so far - please email me changes or new stuff before it gets sent out to you! A preliminary .pdf version is now available (1.8MB) - ask for it!

C u r r e n t  W o r k:
Take a gander at what I've been working on lately:
: : Barbie photography - 4 new galleries on display: 1, 2, 3, 4 [Jun '06].
: : fimo photography - two new galleries on display [Aug '05].
: : theatre photography - a selection of the series on display [Mar '05].
: : kids photography - a selection of the series [18] on display [Nov '03].
: : wedding page was moved to my domain and includes three new sections (12, 14 and 17) [Jan '05].
: : architecture photography [July '03].
: : Added some Character Design work for the Little LuLu show my wife [Sherann] worked on. [Jan '03] Layed out an alphabet book that she created November ['02] - also has posted a small version of her last animation work. [Nov '02]
: : deaviating vapors page has a few sound-bites on it, and new pricing [June '02].
: : Panoramic page was moved to my site [Mar '04].

.\ b a c k g r o u n d .. o n .. m e /. Traditional: airbrushing (background painting, figure modelling, lettering, mural work, etc.), calligraphy (display, wedding invitations, etc.), fabric painting (jean jackets, T-shirts), pencil illustration (realistic rendering, technical, etc.), photography (fashion, live music, cars, macro, multiple-exposures, light painting, scenic's, children, wedding : specializing in candid B+W & natural light portraiture as well as digital, architecture), oils (canvas, board, wall murals) :: knife sharpening (and I even make house-calls) - get your fine blades back in shape, you will be amazed!
Digital: Aperture editing and workflow - have even done post-production magic on amature travel photos - impressed myself what I could make better - ask for a CD-R sample, After Effects (green/blue-screen removal [keying], rostrum moves, secondary character animation, invisible f/x work, type-treatments, effects work, animation compositing), Photoshop (light retouching - spotting/scratches, type effects, color correction, animation coloring), Painter (serious image retouching/reconstruction/modifications), Aperture (light, to fairly impressive retouching that is non-destructive), web graphics (basic graphics, and pixel tweaking, jpg optimizing for fast downloads), Final Cut Pro (DV editing), DVD creation (with motion menus and chapters), Flash (animation, layout), Cleaner (web and CD compression), InDesign/Quark (layout, typographic finesse), Illustrator (line-art and greyscale imagery).
Macintosh: System tweaking, tutoring and personal coaching (35/hr), consulting and troubleshooting. I can usually get a system running so much faster, you'll think you just got a processor upgrade! Data backup to CD-R, DVD-R (plus and dash) as well as dual-layered burns, Audio duplication, 8-Track cassette tape to CD-R duping, MP3 ripping/archiving - nice for keeping your favorite discs or tracks, flatbed scanning (line-art), Digital File Recovery (lost files on your memory cards? - I've recovered files even after filling up a card multiple times with multiple formats inbetween), videograbs (VHS, Hi8, ED-Beta, DVD, miniDV) and defragmentation services too. Offering full-quality* DVD-R recordings of television shows - let me know the time and station, and I'll set it up. 5.00/show, or come by for a visit with some beer. Commercials can be left in, or taken out too for an extra buck - just ask. *4.1GB/hour MPEG-2, 9.5Mbps VBR (11.9 Mbps max), 720x480, 29.97 fps, audio 48.0 kHz, 384 kbps. Can also make iPod-sized material from that source footage. Same price for digitizing any tape source - if I don't have the right deck, bring yours along!

There's another group of pages describing my seamless texture library.

Other items: Perhaps you're just needin' a good quote to lift your spirits? ~~~ No? need some original blues-rock music? . . . then check out my band page. ~~~ wedding photography for brides looking for a reserved photojournalist point of view. ~~~ Panoramic Photography 35mm, medium and digital format(s).. ~~~ ECCAD grads can look here. ~~~ Items 4Sale or trade. ~~~ Beta is better. ~~~ Hardwood Flooring re-finishing and installation. ~~~ :: ~~~ note my name is often misspelled with an 'i' - i.e., Kevin Fedirko – even by people that have known me for most of my life – c'est la vie!

 

Keven Fedirko - Image Merchant
ex-SOFTIMAGE
ex-National Film Board
Reach me at the following coordinates: