
![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-28-learning-after-effects/1.jpg)I've been playing around lately in After Effects, which is more or less "Photoshop for Video". After Apple's dumbing down of iMovie (Apple dumbed something down? Imagine that!) last year, it's refreshing to get back to editing videos with an actual timeline and keyframes.

Our little primate specimen decided that everyone should be up and active at 7:30 AM every day this week, so I've seen every sunrise so far. Monday's was beautiful, but I just enjoyed it without recording it. On Tuesday, I actually got out the camera and recorded the area of the horizon where the sun appears. And on Wednesday and today the sky was gray and boring for the sunrise. What's interesting is that I recorded two sets of five-seconds-apart shots, stopping the intervalometer for about 45 minutes when the sky turned gray. What's cool is that I was able to blend between the earlier footage and the later footage in an almost unnoticeable way.

Some of the features of this video that I did not know how to do until I created it:

- Text that follows a curved path
- Animated text that disappears when it leaves a feathered mask area
- Creating a timelapse solely in After Effects (It's as hard as dragging in a folder containing the jpegs.)
- Panning and zooming within a timelapse video
- A seamless blend between two shots
- Adding a soundtrack in After Effects

The video is _frustratingly_ short at about 12 seconds, but it was just for practice, as I said. It could be the start of a cool video, though. [Here it is in 1080p](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zpr4xiZS614&fmt=37) if you have some bandwidth to kill and a hankering for high quality.


Learning After Effects


[![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-taxed-for-listening-to-the-radio/3534921972_eac2c0461a_t.jpg)](http://www.flickr.com/photos/pennacook/3534921972/)There's a [big hubbub](http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jan/19/hairdressers-spain-music-protest-catalan) lately in Spain because the _Sociedad General de Autores y Editores_ (SGAE), the Spanish equivalent of the RIAA, are beginning to enforce a silly law that has existed for a while: that it's illegal to play the radio in a hair salon without paying royalties for the songs. Not CDs, _THE RADIO!!_ This is quite possibly the most ridiculous Intellectual Property argument I've heard, and there are some doozies!  The radio station is already paying for the rights to broadcast the music. And any one barber shop client is allowed to have a personal radio with them to receive and consume the broadcast. But when a business plays the radio for their clients – music that has already been paid for and that the clients are legally allowed to consume – the business owner is breaking the law? C'mon! Really?

The SGAE is charging the hair salons (and all businesses, I suppose) 70€/year to have a radio playing. Ludicrous!

This is the same organization that has already placed a tax on blank media (cassette tapes, CDs, DVDs, etc.) with the logic that they will surely be used to violate artists' intellectual property rights, so the artists deserve some money from the blank media purchase.


Taxed for listening to the radio


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  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4307738264_7d65d43d99_t.jpg" alt="Ten Month Birthday Party"/>
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Nora turned ten months old on Sunday. Her grandparents and aunt came to have lunch. After breaking the hamburger rhythm with her previous month birthday on Christmas Eve, I decided to make a hamburger pie (aka. [Cottage Pie](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cottage_pie)) instead. It was delicious, of course. Most importantly, we had cake!  <a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4306508823_91a24dc6b4_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Ten Month Birthday Party">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4306508823_20a3e866cb_b.jpg" alt="Ten Month Birthday Party"/>
</a>

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  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4307300398_586d6ec26c_b.jpg" alt="Ten Month Birthday Party"/>
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 Birthday girl's eye view.

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  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4306566287_e15edaf985.jpg" alt="Ten Month Birthday Party"/>
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 She really never looked away from the flame until we removed the candle.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4306967141_b9234d08c7_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Ten Month Birthday Party">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4306967141_dd8fedd753.jpg" alt="Ten Month Birthday Party"/>
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 With grandparents.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4307012035_5780d13b2d_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Ten Month Birthday Party">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4307012035_dce38f2fa1.jpg" alt="Ten Month Birthday Party"/>
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 Playing with a horrible-knockoff-of-Winnie-the-Pooh toy she got.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4307324544_7bd728212f_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Ten Month Birthday Party">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4307324544_048b0dffe6.jpg" alt="Ten Month Birthday Party"/>
</a>

 Playing with Aunt Belén.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4307738264_04ab46f367_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Ten Month Birthday Party">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-27-ten-months-old/4307738264_7d65d43d99.jpg" alt="Ten Month Birthday Party"/>
</a>

 Happy birthday, kiddo! I can't believe you've almost made it all the way around the sun!


Ten Months Old


![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-22-guitar-lessons/3.jpg)My guitar playing has dropped off significantly in the past year or two, downgraded from "enough to not forget any songs" to "enough to barely keep finger calluses". Occasionally when Nora is upset about something or generally demanding to be entertained, I'll pull out the ol' six-string and strum a bit for her. To her, I think the guitar is a big sound-making box that amuses her for no more than ten minutes. Last night, I played a bit for her and let her touch the strings. I think she enjoyed how the strummed strings felt on her hand.  The first few chords I play are from [Angel from Montgomery](/2007/12/27/angel-from-montgomery/). The rest are improvised randomly...which means they often don't flow very well musically.

She's good at muting strings. Now we just have to do some strumming and fretboard work.


Guitar Lessons


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  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-22-synchronicity/531892688_e01401e83f_t.jpg" alt="Corner Flag"/>
</a>

The other day I noticed an interesting article in Spain's sports newspaper, [MARCA](http://www.marca.com/). The article starts something like this like this:

> [Yeste](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francisco_Yeste) walks towards the corner flag for a corner kick after two attacks on goal by Athletic Bilbao. He hasn't yet set the ball down when a shout is heard from the far end of the bar: _Gooooooal!!!_ Seconds afterwards, Yeste kicks the ball, which deflects off [Lass](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lassana_Diarra) in the first row, and [Llorente](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Llorente) scores the goal.

All the excitement of watching a soccer match has been ruined. What just happened? The article is about a growing problem among bar-going soccer fans in Spain, specifically the lag time between sports radio broadcasts and the digital television signals displaying the events. Due to the nature of digital television, the analog signal has to be encoded on one end, and then decoded on the other, resulting in a lag time of up to 30 seconds. Where as old analog radio signals are just as fast as they've always been. Not to mention that once Spain gets off its ass and starts broadcasting television in HD, the added information might double the lag time up to a minute. So you're at the bar watching the game with the boys and the old pensioner in the corner with ye olde transistor radio is experiencing the excitement well before you are.

And you'll never guess what the proposed solution is...

[AudioFutbol.com](http://audiofutbol.com/) is selling radios with a _retardador_, an audio buffer like anti-skip CD players have so that you can _add delay to the radio until it synchronizes with the television!_ How crazy is that?

Such are the problems of the digital age.

Strangely, the same day I read this article, I saw [an episode of _Leverage_](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1481064/synopsis) where a mark is conned into betting on a basketball game on a pub television where the signal has been delayed so someone can feed the conman information about what's about to happen in the game through an ear piece.


Synchronicity


![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-21-crawling-is-hard/2.jpg)Nora, for these first ten months, you have always been sort of lazy, choosing the path that involves the least amount of work. When it was time for you to breast feed, you opted to have the [milk extracted for you](/2009/03/28/sucking-at-sucking/) and, first syringed [drop by drop into your mouth](/2009/04/02/hitting-the-bottle/), and eventually placed in a bottle. At the moment you're at least a month behind your contemporaries (our friends' early 2009 babies) in the area of locomotion. It probably hasn't helped your progress that you have _never_ liked being on your stomach. Especially ever since you [learned to roll over](/2009/11/09/how-to-roll-over-a-tutorial-for-babies/), we barely even have time to snap back-fastening your pajamas closed sometimes.

In my search to rationalize your shortcomings, I've come up with a theory:

> Babies raised in an environment with pets learn to crawl sooner.

It seems to me that if we had a dog or cat, we'd put you on the floor more with it, and it would also provide a target for you to strive to touch. Only recently have I been spending time on the floor with you holding books and toys just out of your reach in attempts to motivate you to _actually do something_. The minute I stand up from the floor your entertainment level passes below your annoyance of being face down threshold and you flip over onto your back.

So far your training is going well. Once you actually got your rear end into the sky and up on both knees, but there was no way you could get your face off the ground then. And you're pretty good at pushing your chest off the floor, but then the legs are immobilized. The phrase "Baby steps...baby steps..." is ironically appropriate here.

In this video, amidst the general whining and complaining, you learn an invaluable lesson: **Don't lick the floor!**

Oh, and watching this video makes you cry. I think you feel sympathy for the poor face down baby in the video.


Crawling is Hard


![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-20-modified-blanket-face/3.jpg)The old favorite game of [Blanket Face](/2009/05/28/blanket-face/) continues to be a success. It's particularly more fun now that Nora knows how to remove the blanket or other cloth item from her face herself. The sheer relief of being able to see and breathe again delights her to no end.

Yes, this seems to have turned into a video blog lately. This is mainly because a certain someone won't let me leave her alone for more than two seconds in the mornings these days. Oh well. If a picture is worth a thousand words, a 24 frames-per-second video should be plenty, right? Sorry about the shakiness. It's hard to hold the camera and toss the pajamas at the same time. Rather than try to smooth it out, I decided to hone my title tracking skills a little more.


Modified Blanket Face


![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-19-wild-arms/2.jpg)Just like she's particularly sweet [after her breakfast in the morning](/2010/01/15/interview-with-a-nine-month-old/), Nora's pretty cute after her dinner in the evening and before bed. Her sleepiness gives her a [drunken wildness](/2010/01/08/pre-bedtime-silliness/) that's very funny. This video was recorded on January 5, 2010. \[Have you noticed how hard it is not to hit that zero key twice in a row when typing the year?\] The pair of green pajamas you see here, which I call her Space Monkey Suit, has now been retired, as it is now too small and she's worn a hole in one heel from kicking the floor so much.


Wild Arms


![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-15-interview-with-a-nine-month-old/2.jpg)Right after breakfast, Nora is most attentive and generally content with life. So I decided to interview her one morning. She's not a big talker. Frankly, I don't think even Jack Bauer could get any information out of her. But she does exhibit her two latest tricks in this video. The first is the tongue clicking, which we jokingly refer to as "calling a donkey". The second is shaking her head from side to side, as if to say "No". The latter ability is endless fun for the adults around her, who can pose all sorts of yes/no questions, to which she will surely answer in the negative, as she does not yet know how to nod.


Interview With A Nine-Month-Old


![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-14-50-for-a-link/255px-Series2004NoteFront_50.jpg)The other day I received an email asking me to link one word in one of my posts to a website. In exchange, they offered me $50 _per year_. Now, my ad revenue from Google AdSense is about $7/month or $84/year. If someone (not you, Mr. SEO Marketer!) offered me $50/year to put a large bold ad on every page, I might consider it. But one ad hyperlink on one word on one post? No problem!

To be honest, I was a little doubtful, but I added the link and replied that I would remove it if I didn't receive $50 in my PayPal account within 24 hours. Sure enough, the next day, there was a big fat [Ulysses](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_fifty-dollar_bill) sitting in my PayPal account. Awesome. What I did not expect was to later find, in my blog stats, a referrer back to [a Google Spreadsheet that was publicly viewable](https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0Ah-09s1GtgtudFRnUG9ReGZZbGtkRWw3UkhzU216N1E&hl=en) (I'm row 302 of the "LA" sheet). This is the document where the Search Engine Optimization company is keeping track of websites where they see the word in question and are willing to offer money. It seems that offers range from $25 to $100 per year. It makes me wonder if I could have demanded more. Anyway, I was pleased to note that one of my row neighbors in the spreadsheet is none other than [Zoí« Keating](/2009/12/03/zoe-keating-is-awesome/).

Anyway, it seems pretty amateurish for an SEO company to A) click on links in your online spreadsheet without disabling referrer information in your browser, and B) allow public access to your spreadsheet so anyone, particularly those that you may not have negotiated a deal with yet, can see how much you're offering to others.

UPDATE (2010-Jan-19): I've donated my Ulysses to [Non-Believers Giving Aid](http://givingaid.richarddawkins.net/) to be split 50/50 between Doctors Without Borders and the International Red Cross for use in Haiti. I can't think of a better place for the money of this incompetent SEO company to go.


$50 for a link


![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-14-cameraphagy/3.jpg)What you are about to see is a first person view of what happens to most objects in our home. First they get noticed, then they get tasted. Of course if it's an object like a remote control, a mobile phone, or a camera that Daddy is holding and staring into the viewfinder, the interest is piqued even quicker. Luckily she didn't manage to lick the actual lens, but she got close. So if you ever wondered what it's like to get eaten by a 9-month-old, here it is...[in HD](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqYGn0zi3kg&fmt=22)!  You're encouraged to hum the ominous _Jaws_ music as you watch it. I was too lazy to add the soundtrack.


Cameraphagy


![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-13-bored-on-the-couch/3.jpg)What follows is a video I recorded on December 5, 2009, which would make Nora 8 months and 11 days old. It's rather a boring video, and, to be honest, if it was your kid, I probably wouldn't watch it all the way through. But it's very representative of what it's been like to spend time with Nora over the last month. She sits up, looks around, looks for things to play with, sometimes gets tired and lies down, babbles, complains, and is generally as cute as a button. I have recorded and posted it mostly for my future self to be able to look back and remember exactly how she was at 8 months old.  The opening outtake where I accidentally pressed the record button twice is one of the cutest moments, so you should at least watch that. The rest is optional.


Bored on the Couch


<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266333065_230a24c118_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image post-thumb" title="Bishops and Pawns (crop)">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266333065_fefbffe5de_t.jpg" alt="Bishops and Pawns (crop)"/>
</a>

 by erikrasmussen, on Flickr")After [my recent splash](/2010/01/08/shuttle-tilting/) back into the tilt-shifting pool, my Photoshop muse has been working on ways to focus a photograph viewer's attention to a particular part of the photograph using, well, focus. While what follows are technically fake tilt-shift effects, the aim in choosing the photographs and choosing the focal depth of each image was not only to make the subjects look miniature, but to draw your attention. All the photographs are mine, plucked from my photo library. I highly recommend viewing them all larger than they appear here, as they are much more impressive large.  <a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266976372_4b97020821_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Rockefeller Center Tilt-Shift">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266976372_c3f0f344ba.jpg" alt="Rockefeller Center Tilt-Shift"/>
</a>

 **Rockefeller Skater** - [View large](http://www.flickr.com/photos/erikrasmussen/4266976372/sizes/l/). Original photo from [this post](/2006/10/16/empire-state-building/).

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266981928_1edccf5d40_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Eighth Hole">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266981928_0f9ab2300b.jpg" alt="Eighth Hole"/>
</a>

 **Eighth Hole** - [View large](http://www.flickr.com/photos/erikrasmussen/4266981928/sizes/l/). This is probably my least favorite of this bunch.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266232351_fffcbe3385_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Bishops and Pawns">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266232351_8204c56c74.jpg" alt="Bishops and Pawns"/>
</a>

 **Bishops and Pawns** - [View large](http://www.flickr.com/photos/erikrasmussen/4266232351/sizes/l/). I love this one. Original photo from [this post](/2006/08/28/the-in-laws-go-to-bilbao/).

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266986334_bfc1f42e8f_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Pot Bunker Blues">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266986334_7793b58928.jpg" alt="Pot Bunker Blues"/>
</a>

 **Pot Bunker Blues** - [View large](http://www.flickr.com/photos/erikrasmussen/4266986334/sizes/l/). I like this one because the effect is so subtle. This is my miniature friend, Jeff, in a pot bunker on The Old Course in St. Andrews, Scotland.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266240847_ab834b3f0e_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="SCOTUS Tourist">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266240847_56100699cd.jpg" alt="SCOTUS Tourist"/>
</a>

 **SCOTUS Tourist** - [View large](http://www.flickr.com/photos/erikrasmussen/4266240847/sizes/l/). Me in front of the Supreme Court of the United States.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266241609_2e2fca81a2_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Pool Dog">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-12-focusing-your-attention/4266241609_ee351864e7.jpg" alt="Pool Dog"/>
</a>

 **Pool Dog** - [View large](http://www.flickr.com/photos/erikrasmussen/4266241609/sizes/o/). My parents' dog, Sam.

Vote for your favorite in the comments!


Focusing Your Attention


<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-11-drop-shadow-fail/4265197675_f496a30d3d_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image post-thumb" title="Drop Shadow Fail">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-11-drop-shadow-fail/4265197675_a3fdcb49b6_t.jpg" alt="Drop Shadow Fail"/>
</a>

My little town has two photographer shops and two framing shops. In both, the shop windows are filled with examples of their work that has recently been finished and is waiting to be picked up. The main frame (computer joke) shop is right downtown and I walk by there every day. Usually they have certificates, caricatures, cross-stitched scenes, puzzles, and occasionally a painting or two. Yesterday, as I was glancing at what my fellow townspeople were having framed that day, my brain registered that there was something _very_ wrong about one particular certificate. The text reads, "Second prize, shop window competition, 2009". See if you can spot what's wrong.  <a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-11-drop-shadow-fail/4265197675_f496a30d3d_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Drop Shadow Fail">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-11-drop-shadow-fail/4265197675_a3fdcb49b6.jpg" alt="Drop Shadow Fail"/>
</a>

Normally, when you're creating a drop shadow for text in Photoshop, you add your text to the document in its own layer, and then you apply a drop shadow "layer style" to that layer. What's nice about this is that, as long as you don't rasterize the layer, you can go back and edit the text, and your drop shadow will be edited as well.

Another way to make a drop shadow, particularly for objects and rarely for text, is to make a copy of the layer you want to shadow, fill it with black, apply a Gaussian blur, lower the opacity, and move it a bit away from the original object. This has the downside that, if you go back and edit your original object or text, the drop shadow will not change.

The problem with this certificate is that the text reads:

> 2o Premio Concurso de Escaparates 2009

but the drop shadow reads

> 2o Premio Concurso de Escapares 2009

So clearly they mistyped it, leaving out the "at" in _escaparates_ (shop windows), then copied the text to make the drop shadow, and only _then_ noticed the misspelling. What really killed it was that, once they added those two extra letters, they had to change the wrapping to include _de_ on the second line, thus making the error glaring. D'oh!


Drop Shadow Fail


<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-11-it-snowed-kind-of/4265378987_7ee549186c_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image post-thumb" title="Snowy Colindres">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-11-it-snowed-kind-of/4265378987_a344b205a1_t.jpg" alt="Snowy Colindres"/>
</a>

The evening news lately, with footage from all over Europe, has resembled the [_March of the Penguins_](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0428803/) or [_Never Cry Wolf_](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086005/). In other words, I always end up feeling colder after I watch the news than before it starts. Down here at sea level, we almost never get any snow, but on Saturday night we finally did. When I woke up on Sunday morning, this is the view that I beheld upon opening the blinds.  <a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-11-it-snowed-kind-of/4265378987_7ee549186c_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Snowy Colindres">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-11-it-snowed-kind-of/4265378987_a344b205a1.jpg" alt="Snowy Colindres"/>
</a>

 There was maybe an inch on cold surfaces like car roofs, and a light dusting on the roofs of the buildings.

There was a little ice on the ground in the shadows, enough to make me realize how helpful it is to be pushing a stroller when you're walking over an icy patch. Later in the morning, when Marga, Nora and I went for a long walk around town, I delighted in noticing the ice in the shadows of benches and lamp posts. There was ice in the shadow, and just to the west side of the shadow, where the shadow had just been.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-11-it-snowed-kind-of/4265938394_363f15e92f_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Crane in a Puddle">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-11-it-snowed-kind-of/4265938394_f0e23b0166.jpg" alt="Crane in a Puddle"/>
</a>

 By the afternoon there were large puddles in their usual places around town.

By now the snow is right where I want it: not underfoot, but visible up in the mountains. The storm has made me appreciate having mountains to the south in the winter, because the snow on their north faces lasts longer and makes them more picturesque.


It snowed. Kind of.


![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-08-pre-bedtime-silliness/2.jpg)Normally Nora is at her most adorable right after waking up _and having her breakfast bottle_, but sometimes, just before bed, she gets a drunken silliness about her that makes it a blast to be around her. The video that follows was shot on December 16th, the last night that [my parents were visiting](/2009/12/23/visiting-colindres-in-december/). I'm hardly unbiased, but I think it's pretty cute, especially the giggle around 1:27. She was like this for at least a half hour that night.


Pre-Bedtime Silliness


<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-08-shuttle-tilting/4256544825_cd4d41f9df_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image post-thumb" title="Endeavor Tilt-Shift (crop)">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-08-shuttle-tilting/4256544825_46d1c2d61d_t.jpg" alt="Endeavor Tilt-Shift (crop)"/>
</a>

 by erikrasmussen, on Flickr")I've always been fond of photographs of the space shuttle. There's something truly magnificent about a space-bound rocket sitting on the launch pad. It saddens me that the shuttle era will come to and end this year. I just hope its successor doesn't take too long to get off the ground, so to speak. When I saw some photos of the roll-out of STS-130 yesterday, I selected a couple as good tilt-shifting candidates. Below I present to you the results.  <a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-08-shuttle-tilting/4257275532_a32d08f336_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Endeavor Tilt-Shift">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-08-shuttle-tilting/4257275532_5f59af95e5.jpg" alt="Endeavor Tilt-Shift"/>
</a>

 The tilt-shift miniaturization effect doesn't work too well when the subject is so far away.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-08-shuttle-tilting/4256517325_a36d340155_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Endeavor Tilt-Shift">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-08-shuttle-tilting/4256517325_e2448bbc0f.jpg" alt="Endeavor Tilt-Shift"/>
</a>

 This one is much better, and looks particularly good [large](http://www.flickr.com/photos/erikrasmussen/4256517325/sizes/l/).


Shuttle Tilting


<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-07-optimizing-picture-to-border-ratio/4254123232_8764dbe503_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image post-thumb" title="Frame Geometry Diagram">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-07-optimizing-picture-to-border-ratio/4254123232_eec618941b_t.jpg" alt="Frame Geometry Diagram"/>
</a>

The other day I was looking at a framed photo in my house and wondering how the area of the border around the picture (called a mat board in the framing industry) compared to the area of the picture itself. Immediately I remembered the master of all aesthetic ratios, the golden ratio, Phi! 1.61803398874989... I thought, "I bet if the ratio of the area of the picture to the border was Phi, it would look good!" So I set off on an algebraic quest to find the answer...  The geometry is simple enough. You've got whatever the length and width of your picture is, plus a border around it with a width of x/2.

![Frame Geometry Diagram](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-07-optimizing-picture-to-border-ratio/4254123232_8764dbe503_o.jpg)

If we write down the equation for the ratio of the picture area to the border area (the full frame size - the picture's area), we get this:

![Ratio Equation](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-07-optimizing-picture-to-border-ratio/4253356937_d1f4dc3c5d_o.gif)

If we set our ratio to Phi and solve the equation, using the quadratic formula, we get that our doubled border width, x, is:

![Border Equation](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-07-optimizing-picture-to-border-ratio/4254122982_605cf2f0bf_o.gif)

What does this give us? Now, for any length and width of picture, we can calculate how wide to make the border around it such that the ratio of the area of the picture to the area of the border is Phi...or any number for that matter!

## Picture Border Ratio Calculator

Using the calculator below, if you input the length and width of your picture, and the area ratio (picture / border), it will tell you how large to make your border. And below the calculator is a rendering of the values you enter. Note that the default values in the calculator are for a [golden rectangle](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_rectangle) and an area ratio of Phi. Looks pretty nice, doesn't it? Go ahead, try out other picture sizes!

#picInputs { margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto; margin-bottom:15px; width:450px; padding:10px; } #picInputs table { margin-left:auto; margin-right:auto; } #picInputs th { text-align:right; } #picInputs input { margin-left:10px; width:120px; text-align:right; } #picLoadImage { background-color: #ccc; border: 1px outset #333; cursor: pointer; padding:5px; } #picLoadImage:hover { background-color: #eee; } #picLoadImage:active { border: 1px inset #333; }

Picture Length

Picture Width

Area Ratio

Border Width

Or you can use an image from the internet!

Image URL

Use Image

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/prototype/1.6.1.0/prototype.js"></script>

<script type="text/javascript">document.observe('dom:loaded', function() { var phi = 1.61803398874989; var max = 503; var elements = { length: $('picLength'), width: $('picWidth'), ratio: $('picRatio'), border: $('picBorder'), frame: $('picFrame'), picture: $('picPicture'), url: $('picUrl'), loadImage: $('picLoadImage') }; elements.length.value = 161; elements.width.value = 100; elements.ratio.value = phi; var f = function(l, w, r) { return (Math.sqrt(((l + w) * (l + w)) + (4 * l * w) / r) - l - w) / 2; }; var getVal = function(name) { var v = elements[name].value; if (!v) throw name + ' is required'; if (isNaN(v)) throw name + ' is not a number'; if (v > 0) return new Number(v); else throw name + ' must be greater than zero'; }; var calculate = function(event, img) { try { var l = getVal('length'); var w = getVal('width'); var r = getVal('ratio'); var x = f(l, w, r); elements.border.value = x / 2; var landscape = l > w; var frameL = landscape ? max : max / (w + x) * (l + x); var frameW = landscape ? max / (l + x) * (w + x) : max; var actualX = x / (l+x) * frameL; Element.setStyle(elements.frame, { width:Math.round(frameL) + 'px', height:Math.round(frameW) + 'px'}); Element.setStyle(elements.picture, { width:Math.round(frameL - actualX) + 'px', height:Math.round(frameW - actualX) + 'px', left:Math.round(actualX/2) + 'px', top:Math.round(actualX/2) + 'px'}); elements.picture.innerHTML = ''; if(img) { img.width = Math.round(frameL - actualX); img.height = Math.round(frameW - actualX); Element.setStyle(img, { width: Math.round(frameL - actualX) + 'px', height: Math.round(frameW - actualX) + 'px', padding: 0, border:'none' }); elements.picture.appendChild(img); } } catch(e) { elements.border.value = 'ERROR: ' + e; } }; elements.length.observe('keyup', calculate); elements.width.observe('keyup', calculate); elements.ratio.observe('keyup', calculate); calculate(); elements.loadImage.observe('click', function() { var img = new Image(); img.observe('load', function() { elements.length.value = img.width; elements.width.value = img.height; calculate(null, img); elements.loadImage.innerHTML = 'Use Image'; }); elements.loadImage.innerHTML = 'Loading...'; img.src = elements.url.value; }); });</script>


Optimizing Picture To Border Ratio With Phi


<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-06-polishing-shoes/4248354077_e3142dd4b6_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image post-thumb" title="Shoes out for Wise Men to fill with gifts">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-06-polishing-shoes/4248354077_1b9fa7fa05_t.jpg" alt="Shoes out for Wise Men to fill with gifts"/>
</a>

According to Spanish tradition, on the night before January 6th, the same three wise men who visited Jesus when he was born fly around Spain on their three camels, land on the roofs of houses, rappel down to each balcony, break in, and leave gifts for the little girls and boys who have been good all year long. They especially make sure to fill the shoes that the little children have left out for that purpose. Does this sound at all familiar to my American audience?

I learned a lot of this last night as it was being explained to my daughter why her shoes needed to be polished. Apparently first impressions are important in this arena. So we each set out our shoes last night for the Wise Men to find and fill with goodies. <a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-06-polishing-shoes/4249097450_259cbe6511_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Cleaning shoes before Wise Men come">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-06-polishing-shoes/4249097450_02c1fea3a8.jpg" alt="Cleaning shoes before Wise Men come"/>
</a>

 Cleaning our shoes is fun!

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-06-polishing-shoes/4249105092_08e60364f5_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Cleaning shoes before Wise Men come">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-06-polishing-shoes/4249105092_5535d1e6a8.jpg" alt="Cleaning shoes before Wise Men come"/>
</a>

 But not as fun as waving your arms in the air while someone else cleans your shoes for you!

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-06-polishing-shoes/4248354077_e3142dd4b6_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Shoes out for Wise Men to fill with gifts">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-06-polishing-shoes/4248354077_1b9fa7fa05.jpg" alt="Shoes out for Wise Men to fill with gifts"/>
</a>

 Can you tell who each of these shoes belongs to?

And the next morning...

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-06-polishing-shoes/4250575997_3fbf933306_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Present from the Wise Men!">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-06-polishing-shoes/4250575997_9f6618fb8c.jpg" alt="Present from the Wise Men!"/>
</a>

 Woohoo! A present came!

We weren't sure which shoe it was closest to, so we opened it together. It was a nice doll with a shirt that makes crinkly noises. We decided that, since Nora was the only one that polished her shoes, she probably deserved the present more than the grownups did.


Polishing Shoes


![thumb](https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-05-new-sounds/1.jpg)It's curious to watch Nora, who is now nine months old, learn to make new sounds with her mouth. She regularly says "Papapapapa", "Mamamama", and "Dadadada", although I remain unconvinced that she assigns any significance to these utterances. Just before Christmas she learned to "[blow a raspberry](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blowing_a_raspberry)", a skill she uses with higher frequency when moving in her stroller or in the car. I like to think that she's imitating a motor, but so far she hasn't learned to switch gears. On one particular walk over the Christmas holidays, I had to wipe her chin about every fifteen meters because it was soaked with saliva expelled during said sonic production; that is when I shot the video you see below. Her vocal creativity is positively correlated with boredom, so if you talk to her or give her attention in any way (like pointing a video camera at her), she immediately stops. It's only in moments of inattention that she feels the need to entertain herself.  

Over the New Year's holiday she learned to click her tongue. Immediately causing her grandparents and parents to do the same trying to get her to repeat it. "How do we call the donkey? \[sht-ick!\]" It was pretty adorable. We did it so much I half expected a herd (assload?) of donkeys to show up at the door. Yesterday morning she was clicking away like she was raised by Bushmen.

I wonder what sounds she'll be making next?


New Sounds


<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-04-europe-home-of-leonardo-and-michelangelo-uses-stick-figures-for-coin-art/4244171784_0047028daa_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image post-thumb" title="Europe, home of Da Vinci and Michelangelo, uses stick figures for coin art">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-04-europe-home-of-leonardo-and-michelangelo-uses-stick-figures-for-coin-art/4244171784_4b5741f985_t.jpg" alt="Europe, home of Da Vinci and Michelangelo, uses stick figures for coin art"/>
</a>

Yesterday, as I was digging through my coins to pay for a cool European lager, I happened to glance at the artwork on the heads (Or tails? Who can tell anymore?) side of the coin. At first I thought it was some kind of joke currency or [bizarre token](/2009/03/03/eurocoin/) that someone had slipped me in mistake or trickery. So I saved it, pretty sure it couldn't be real. But lo and behold, it's a special [2009 commemorative 2€ coin](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E2%82%AC2_commemorative_coins#2009_commonly_issued_coin). To quote the [Official Journal of the European Union](http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/site/en/oj/2008/c_315/c_31520081210en00080011.pdf) (PDF): 

> The centre of the coin shows a stylised human figure whose left arm is prolonged by the euro symbol. The initials Î“Î£ of the artist appear below the euro symbol. The name(s) of the issuing country in the national language(s) appear(s) at the top, while the indication 1999-2009 and the acronym EMU translated into the national language(s) appear at the bottom.

These coins are to commemorate ten years of economic monetary union. And to show unity, this stupid, stupid design that looks like it was drawn, badly, by a four-year-old is going to be used on the national side (the side where union countries normally celebrate their unique identities) _across all countries using the Euro_. Ugh.

Interestingly, in Luxembourg, their national law prohibits the minting of any coins without their Grand Duke's portrait, so, using ridges so you can see two different images depending on how the coin is tilted, their version of this 2€ coin will show both the silly stick figure and The Duke. Those crazy 'bourgers! If their country was any larger, their wacky laws wouldn't be so darned cute.

<a href="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-04-europe-home-of-leonardo-and-michelangelo-uses-stick-figures-for-coin-art/4244171784_0047028daa_o_d.jpg" target="_blank" class="flickr-image" title="Europe, home of Da Vinci and Michelangelo, uses stick figures for coin art">
  <img src="https://d1js6qm6cshi0v.cloudfront.net/oldblog/2010-01-04-europe-home-of-leonardo-and-michelangelo-uses-stick-figures-for-coin-art/4244171784_4b5741f985.jpg" alt="Europe, home of Da Vinci and Michelangelo, uses stick figures for coin art"/>
</a>


Europe, home of Leonardo and Michelangelo, uses stick figures for coin art


Today I stumbled on [this awesome speech](http://www.crichton-official.com/speech-whyspeculate.html) written and given by Michael Crichton back in 2002 about speculation, and how the media – which he defines as movies, television, internet, books, newspapers, and magazines – is, to a large extent, a gurgling blob of useless drivel. It's a shame that he probably didn't get to watch much of the farcical climax of vacuous speculation that was the 2008 US presidential election, as he [died on the day Obama got elected](/2008/11/05/michael-crichton-was-one-of-my-favorite-authors/). My favorite part of the article is how he talks about the fallacy that we all commit (a recent favorite topic of mine) when we read the newspaper, or receive information from any news source for that matter.

> Media carries with it a credibility that is totally undeserved. You have all experienced this, in what I call the Murray Gell-Mann Amnesia effect. (I call it by this name because I once discussed it with Murray Gell-Mann, and by dropping a famous name I imply greater importance to myself, and to the effect, than it would otherwise have.)
> 
> Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect works as follows. You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. In Murray's case, physics. In mine, show business. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward-reversing cause and effect. I call these the "wet streets cause rain" stories. Paper's full of them.
> 
> In any case, you read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story-and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read with renewed interest as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about far-off Palestine than it was about the story you just read. You turn the page, and forget what you know.
> 
> That is the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect. I'd point out it does not operate in other arenas of life. In ordinary life, if somebody consistently exaggerates or lies to you, you soon discount everything they say. In court, there is the legal doctrine of _falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus_, which means untruthful in one part, untruthful in all.
> 
> But when it comes to the media, we believe against evidence that it is probably worth our time to read other parts of the paper. When, in fact, it almost certainly isn't. The only possible explanation for our behavior is amnesia.


22 posts from January, 2010