Some of you might know of William Orbit from his Grammy Award winning production of Madonna’s, Ray of Light album. Others may know of him from his work with Seal, Prince, All Saints, Sugababes, Pink, Finlay Quaye, and U2. He’s certainly prolific!

If you’re new to his music, here’s my list of must have albums / tracks are:

As artist / producer:

• The Best of Strange Cargos
• Strang Cargo – Hinterland
• William Orbit – Pieces in a modern style

As producer:

• Ray of Light – Madonna
• Pure Shores – All Saints
• Electrical Storm (William Orbit mix) – U2
• Black (William Orbit mix) – Sarah McLachlan
• Faith will carry – Beth Orton
• Beautiful Stranger – Madonna (from Austin Powers: Spy who shagged me)
• Be careful – Ricky Martin & Madonna

I’m in the process of buying all his music

The track below is called ‘Spiral’, from the album “Hello Waveforms” — available as a free download from William’s blog

Let me just say this up front… Avatar is amazing! It’s no wonder that Wired magazine said that this movie will change film forever.

When James Cameron first conceived Avatar, 15 years ago, the technology did not exist to make his dream a reality. He spent time developing the technology, even going as far as having to convince cinemas to upgrade their projectors to be able to screen the movie!

Plot summary

Jake Sully, former first recon marine now confined to a wheelchair, is sent to Pandora – a human outpost being mined for a rare mineral which is the key to solving Earth’s energy crisis. His mission: infiltrate the Na’vi, an humanoid race who have become an obstacle to mining the precious ore.

Because the atmosphere on Pandora is toxic to humans, they have created the Avatar Program, in which human “drivers” have their consciousness linked to an avatar – a remotely-controlled biological body that can survive the lethal air.

In Avator form, Jake can walk again. As Jake learns more about the Na’vi, he has to face conflicting emotions -- loyalty to the marine corp over a sympathy towards the Na’vi.

The plot reminded me of Pocahontas and Fern Gully.

Production notes

After 4 years of production, it’s finally hitting movie screens in both 2D and 3D. If you have the choice, I’d recommend seeing the 3D version. After all, that’s what all the fuss is about.

The movie was shot using the same Fusion 3-D camera system first used in Cameron’s IMAX feature Ghost of the Abyss in 2003.

Gone are the cheap cardboard glasses with red and green lenses -- the bane of anyone who wore ‘normal’ glasses for seeing. Cameron developed the digital 3-D stereoscopic technology that uses polarised lenses activated by infrared. The glasses handed out fitted nicely over my ’seeing’ glasses, which I must admit, are quite small. If your fashion sense tends towards the giant bug-eye look, you might want to wear contact lenses.

Stunning 3D CGI

The film itself combines live-action and CGI imagery to create a visually stunning experience. To achieve that seamless integration, he came up with something called “Simulcam” – a revolutionary new camera able to superimpose CGI images over live images being filmed in real-time.

“We turned the set on the soundstage into a capture volume and turned the physical camera into a capture virtual camera, so we were able to integrate CG characters and environments into our live action.” [Cameron said…] “We have people in flying vehicles, and I can see what is outside the window, fed in, in real time.”

Hopefully the experience will be the same at home on blu-ray. The Blu-ray Disc Association has announced that the specifications for 3D Blu-ray have been finalised. I say “hopefully” because using the technology will require hardware upgrades for most people. Specifically, new HDTVs (that support stereoscopic 3D) and Blu-ray hardware and glasses for the whole family.

Also, apart from Avatar, there are few compelling 3D movies available right now.

All that aside, Avatar is definitely worth seeing -- for all ages. There is no gratuitous violence, at least, no more than any of the Star Wars films.

Here’s the trailer:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9ceBgWV8io

Some links for further reading:

• Official Avatar website
• Avatar page on IMDB
• James Cameron’s New 3-D Epic Could Change Film Forever -- Wired
• The Crazy Tech Behind James Cameron’s Avatar

Update: Jan 4 2010 – I received this response from Stephen Conroy today.

Senator Stephen Conroy, the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy announced that the Federal government would go ahead with plans to filter internet access for all Australians.

It has yet to pass caucus. So it’s not too late to do something about it.

Apart from the whole “police state” mentality this brings, the whole scheme is simply not going to work. It will NOT protect children from unwanted net predators.

Here’s a copy of the letter I wrote using the campaign on GetUp:

Dear Mr Conroy

As a web-savvy parent of 2 children. I urge you to re-think your strategy for tackling “net threats” to children.

The answer lies in educating parents and children.

Making the filter mandatory is an infringement of our personal freedom and clearly the wrong choice from a technology perspective.

You said there would be a public consultation process, now is your change to listen to the people.

A quick search in the internet shows the vast majority of Australians do NOT want their internet filtered. The same search shows how easy the proposed filter can be bypassed.

I realise it’s difficult for the government to admit it’s made the wrong decision. This is a great opportunity to show strength and do the right thing.

Thanks for listening.

Some links for further reading:

• ISP filtering pilot results on the DBCDE website
• Why the Internet filter is not the solution we wish it was (Penny Sharpe MLC)
• Net censorship move a smokescreen: expert (SMH)
• Bypassing Australia’s Net Filter
• Do these people have no idea? — the folly of the Internet Filter
• My thoughts on the mandatory Internet filter – Lauren Cochrane

What you can do

Write to the government and put your name down.

• No Clean Feed website
• GetUp Campaign

The last thing we want is to end up with our freedom controlled by an ill-informed government.

You may not be her first, her last, or her only. She loved before she may love again. But if she loves you now, what else matters? She’s not perfect – you aren’t either and the two of you may never be perfect together but if she can make you laugh, cause you to think twice and admit to being human and making mistakes, hold onto her and give her the most you can.

She may not be thinking about you every second of the day, but she will give you a part of her that she knows you can break – her heart. So don’t hurt her, don’t change her, don’t analyze and don’t expect more than she can give. Smile when she makes you happy, let her know when she makes you mad, and miss her when she’s not there

- Bob Marley

Been a while since I last posted, due to a change in work and lifestyle.

Right now I’m juggling web and film projects. Interestingly, my experience with project managing website development has benefitted the film projects. Sure, there are different considerations but the big picture things are similar – resources available, time needed and budget constraints.

At the heart of all these activities is the undeniable importance of diligent planning.

Don’t start any projects – web or film, without sitting down and mapping out your ideas.

One of the most interesting aspects of working on these projects is meeting really creative people driven by passion. It’s inspiring.

Check out the skate stunt:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/16567160

I haven’t posted in a while, been busy with work but this was too good to not share.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCq6E6tnQKg

via GeekAdvancement

There’s no doubt social media is experiencing unprecedented growth. Twitter is a micro-blogging service that has genuine business uses as well as personal.

Here are some links to help you get started.

Twitter use explodes

Twitter growing 3 times faster than Facebook

Put Twitter to work

Twitter Flies into the Enterprise

Connect to Customers with Twitter

Got Twitter?

Battle of the multicolumn Twitter clients

I’ve just installed BlogWriter Lite to test the app. It let’s me blog from anywhere using my iPhone!

Stay tuned for more! Subscribe via RSS

This dramatic, one-off spectacle was created using the worlds biggest water screen projector.

The water screen, moored especially for this occasion in the middle of the Thames between the London Eye and The Shell Building, created an enormous vertical screen of water that extended to 72 feet in height and 100 feet across.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=XT_Yqj7PVyo

via: RubberRepublic