Enriching Day

I had a real enriching day today. I got a chance to meet Sumi, a Director from India. He gave me some pointers to take note when directing or scriptwriting. 1) Accalaimed directors often use the idea of layering their storyline, or screenplay. the 1st layer is for general audience, the 2nd layer for a more seasoned, or targeted audience, 3rd layer, for those in the film industry.. Of course the layers can differ. Examples of Films with clear layers are Poltergeist, E.T. Going deeper into this idea, if we take E.T, the first layer is that the story is about an alien.. The second layer is actually prevalent if you see the storyline being about the untouchables, or unreachables.

2) Always develop a charachter profile. This involves giving your artistes the profile, including biodata and birthdate of the charachters, so that the artistes are able to do some research themselves about the charachters, like the star signs, and the general charachters. This will give depth to the charachters, as well as increase inolvement of the artistes. It was indeed an eye-opener session for me. Only when you speak to people who know things that you don't, you begin to realise how little you know...until then, you are in the dangerous situation of assuming that you know the best. Looking forward to more such sessions.

The Myth - Unreal

Went to watch JC's new flick, The Myth yesterday. I won't miss a Jackie movie for anything at all. I know I was guaranteed a 2+ hour entertainement, the moment I purchased the tickets, and I wasn't disappointed. Jack (Jackie Chan) is a dreamer, and often has the same type of dream, involving him as a ancient dynasty warrior general, and having to save the Concubine of his state and so on. In real life he is an archealogist. The rest of the movie is quite cliche, about how he goes to India in search of a certain myth about some floating coffin of an Indian prince, and in the process, realises that the dream he has been having is bouts of memories of his previous life. The movie is full of illusions, and after some time, I got sick of all those effects and flying and stuff, and it totally mystical and mythical. You can't find a drop of truth in it anymore. But it was totally entertaining nevertheless. Mallika, the Indian beauty, just comes as a glamour queen. Jackie speaks abit of Malayalam in the movie, to the Temple guards, and err...good try. For those who have watched the movie, feel free to comment. For those who have not...watch it and comment. For those Jackie fans out there, you might love his boxers in the movie. I did.

C.A.N Cafe

Dhinesh, Mel and myself visited this real cool cafe at Liang Seah Street last night. (Liang Seah Street is behind Bugis Junction. It is a small street directly opposite the Swensen's at Bugis). Liang Seah Street holds some real good places actually, including the famous Amiran's Cafe. C.A.N Cafe is the name of the place we visited, but funny enough, I can't find any reviews of the place or its website on the net. I would have taken pics of its exterior if I had known. Anyway, I think I will visit the place soon. I didn't really have any real food there, just a drink and an Ice-cream topped Cheese Cake. The Cheese Cake was good, but was forzen hard, so I had to wait for it to thaw before indulging in it. Dhinesh and Mel had ordered some Calamari Rings and Garlic Bread before I met them there so by the time I joined them, the food had turned cold and hard, so I think it would be pretty unappropriate to comment on that. The ambience was real cosy, they had nice big sofas to relax, and it seems you could get a place there any time you visit. Thats good, because I hate crowded, noisy places. Talking about noise, the cafe does not really play those jamming rock songs, but more lighter stuff, but then again, I was there for barely an hour, so i can't comment on that. Well I hope to visit C.A.N cafe again, so when I do, I will update you guys with more pictures. Cheers.

blog search

Now this is real cool. I just found out about this new feature that Google has from R.L Narayan's blog, it is the GOOGLE BLOG SEARCH.

How cool is that? Just type in the name of the person, whose blog you will like to find...provided the person has used his/her name in the blog, or type in something that interests you, and there you have it... Results matching your entry, search powered by GOOGLE.

Thil in the Heart

'Thil Thil Manathil' essentially means Courage in the Heart. That is the title of the programme I am currently Assistant Producer for. Thought that I should add some info about the programme to my blog because it is a project that I take real pride in doing. Doing a programme is not easy; once someone told me that it is actually like going through a labour. Whether it is true, each project is definitely your baby, when you know you have worked for it. The programme is sponsored by the Singapore Indian Association (SINDA), which is a Self-Help group in Singapore. We focus on individuals who are successul in life, who have inspiring tales to tell and who have gone pass many hurdles. I love this programme also because of all those real life stories I could listen to. We believe in teaching through entertainment, so 'Thil Thil Manathil' holds many Tamil movie scenes to support its messages; an element to strike off your visualisation skills.

ZEN Technology

The Wonder of Zen Nano Plus

Feel Your Music, Not Your Player The Creative Zen Nano Plus is the sleekest new flash ultra-portable MP3/WMA player from Creative. Incredibly thin in design, it is packed with the latest features to meet all your needs. Enjoy the amazing, skip free, audio quality when you're listening to your MP3 and WMA music.

The Zen Nano Plus comes complete with a FM tuner, Voice/FM recording, and Line-In encoding for direct connection and recording from any audio source. Directly record your music from a CD player - no computers needed!

Transfer audio and data files in seconds with the Drag-and-Drop feature and USB 2.0 support. In addition, Auto Synchronization makes it easy to transfer your favorite songs and albums from CDs through the line-in connector.

Experience uninterrupted listening pleasure with its 18-hour battery life². Hold it in the palm of your hand or slip it into your pocket. Start feeling your music, not your player!

The Zen Nano Plus comes in 10 fun, vibrant colors and is available in 512MB³ of flash memory to store up to 250 songs¹ and 1GB³ of flash memory to store up to 500 songs¹.

CREATIVE has been indeed very creative recently. You would have seen one of their booths in my previous COMEX 2005 entry. CREATIVE targets using simplicity and colour. Why Zen? What is Zen? Well Zen might be a form of philosophy or religion; let's not go into that. But it is simple, and effective. That seems to be the uniformity behind creative's ZEN range. With the wide variety of colours to choose from, I'm sure these fellows will make a fashion statement.

mazhai - varsham remake

hahaha... when I did my previous post on 'Varsham', I didn't know that it was going to be remade into tamil...but yeah..here it is...'Varsham' in tamil, re-titled to 'Mazhai' (Rain) Music is still by Devi Sri Prasad. Thats good news...but not as if I am going to tap my feet to the tamil version of the song 'Nuvvostanante', translated into 'Nee Varum Podhu, Naan Maraivenaa' (When you decide to come, will I disappeear). The tamil hero will be 'Jeyam' Ravi, another upcoming new face. He did some tamil movies before, all were super hit. In fact, his first entry into tamil was through another Telugu remake, 'Jeyam' in tamil, thus the referance before his name. Since 'Varsham' has the potential to hit box offices in Tamil, we can expect another victory for Ravi. The heroine in the tamil version was supposed to be Trisha too, but it turned out in the end to be Shreya, and I don't mind that, because I thought Shreya was a very beautiful girl, since I spotted her, and her performance in 'Sada Mela Sevalo', but I am not sure how the Tamil audience will recieve her. Anyway, I've always thought that she looked like a cross between actresses Meena and Vijayashanthi, both successful actresses in tamil, and Vijayashanthi being a Telugu by birth. We''ll see if 'Mazhai' gets some awards in the next CineFest. Good Luck to 'Mazhai'.

Final Cut Pro 5

The first choice for multicamera and native HDV editing.

Make videos and movies in any format with Final Cut Pro 5, a major upgrade to Apple's award-winning video editing application. It features powerful new multicamera editing, native HDV support, precision editing tools, scalable real-time effects processing, advanced real-time color correction and image manipulation filters and audio control surface support.

Edit anything.

Whatever video format you choose, Final Cut Pro 5 is up to the task. Edit everything from DV and SD to DVCPRO HD and fully uncompressed 10-bit high-definition video. Or work with new formats like native HDV (long-GOP MPEG2) and 50Mbps IMX. Capture and output video accurately using professional decks, or go tapeless with new Panasonic P2 media support.

Wait for nothing.

From precision editing tools to its amazing real-time multistream effects architecture, Final Cut Pro 5 is built for speed with new support for real-time effects on fully uncompressed HD video. Use Dynamic RT to maximize real-time performance by automatically adjusting video quality and frame-rate during playback. Simultaneously view and cut from multiple sources in real time using powerful new multicamera editing tools that support up to 128 cameras.

Work together.

Deep integration with Apple's Motion, Soundtrack Pro, DVD Studio Pro and Shake lets editors seamlessly move from one creative task to the next. And when Final Cut Pro 5 is paired with Xsan, you can capture once, save time and share media with multiple editors.

Well..what do you thing??? Isn't this fellow real cool. Also includes Multi-cam editing, RT Extreme, Multi channel audio, and improved X-scan support. I'm moving from AVID.

Power Mac G5

Professionals need superior tools to produce designs, music, high-definition video or the next scientific breakthrough. The new Power Mac G5 line extends as far as you require. Two 64-bit G5 processors reaching top speeds of 2.7GHz, room for up to 8GB of main memory, pro performance graphics cards and ultrahigh-bandwidth system architecture will give you more results than systems costing twice as much. Dual processing starts at $1999.

Supersonic Speed

The Power Mac G5 offers 2.0GHz, 2.3GHz and 2.7GHz dual-processor models with a speed boost at the top of the line. The dual 2.7GHz system packs so much power into tight quarters that Apple designed a liquid cooling system for it, resulting in a cool tower that runs Photoshop nearly two times faster than a Pentium 4-based system. In fact, for most creative endeavors, the Power Mac G5 simply has no competition in its class.

Exquisitely Advanced Technology

With 64-bit power and high-bandwidth architecture, the Power Mac G5 alleviates the limitations and bottlenecks of the traditional PC — opening up a wealth of possibilities for 2D and 3D designers, video and audio producers, scientists, researchers and game developers and players. A dual-independent frontside bus architecture, an advanced system controller and high-speed, high-capacity memory combine to make the Power Mac G5 one of the fastest PCs ever built.

Choose Wisely

The Power Mac G5 product line comes in dual 2.0GHz, dual 2.3GHz and dual 2.7GHz configurations to support your creative endeavors. They all feature a 16x SuperDrive (DVD+R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW) as standard equipment across the line. And of course they come with one FireWire 800 port, two FireWire 400 ports, three PCI-X or PCI expansion slots, three USB 2.0 ports, analog audio in, analog audio out, optical S/PDIF in, optical S/PDIF out, front headphone and speaker jack and built-in Gigabit Ethernet — all as standard equipment. All models are AirPort Extreme-ready and feature an optional internal Bluetooth module.

We have just touched the tip of the Apple Power Mac G5. Added with the double layer drive, High performance graphics, but a much quieter operation than other machines with a similar calibre. The G5 is a silent monster. A truly exquisite investment, to love and marvel at. Extremely intricate curves, and strong and hardy looking aluminium casing. Forget that beauty is only skin deep, because the G5, comes with beautifully engineered interior to precision.

comex 2005

Billed as the No.1 Digital, IT and Consumer Electronics Event in the calendar year, COMEX 2005 is all set and ready to twist you with an extensive line-up of products & services from participating market leading Vendors such as Acer, Canon, Epson, Apple Computers, Aztech, Sony, HP, Nikon, Benq, Casio, Olympus, Samsung, Iomega, Fujitsu, Fujifilm, Fuji Xerox, Microsoft, Sharp, Imation, Palm, Microtek, MSI, Twinhead, SanDisk, Altec Lansing, Lexmark, Sigma, Targus, Mitac, Singnet, Creative, Hitachi, Viewsonic, Panasonic, O2, LG, Toshiba, Inke, Nokia, Logitech, Cisco-Linksys, Konica Minotla, SMC, Transcend, Asus, NEC, Pentax, iRiver, Pioneer, TDK, OKI, Kyocera, Ricoh, Yashica, Kingston, Philips, IBM, Compaq, Starhub, Brother, Pacific Internet, Kodak and many more... I just visited this the COMEX 2005. Not a bad event...i had to console myself by going to this event, for missing the Broadcast Asia 2005. I am not going to miss Broadcast Asia 2006. There were alot of stuff in the market. Apple products looked cool..but I decided to invest in a Konica Minolta DiMAGE D600. I took some photos of the event using the camera. This was the Photo and Imaging Asia 2005 exhibition, held outside the COMEX. It had displays of many local, talented photographers. Amongst the many exhibitors, we had our very own CREATIVE exhibiting some cool gadgets in very lively, and colourful booths, attracting large audiences. They had interesting presentations, and gave away valuable goodies. One of their most popular products was their ZEN range.