Posts Tagged ‘free’

Last weekend I took myself to London to throw myself round a series of exhibitions. One of the highlights was going to see the 2011 Pavilion at the Serpentine Gallery in Kensington Gardens by Peter Zumthor. I’d only seen shots of the outside and have to admit I was a bit concerned it was going to be a rather boring black box. Fortunately while from the outside it appears to be a plain black box punctured by rectangular openings on two sides it has a more interesting interior.

Going through one of the entrances you find yourself in a passageway that runs around the entire outside of the Pavilion openings into the interior staggered from the exterior lead into a rectangular courtyard.

The outer edge of the courtyard, below the buildings inward sloping roof, has continual bench seating broken only by the entrances. Simple chairs and tables are arranged around the edges. At the heart of the courtyard is a long thin bed planted densely with a variety of plants of different heights and colours.

I managed to get to see the gallery on two trips to the park. It reminds me of a cloister but as though designed for monks who have a very modernist, minimalist aesthetic taste. With its inward sloping roof I’d have been interested to see what the interior is like during a heavy rainstorm. I imagine that water races off the roofs, especially at the corners.

This years Pavilion will be at the Serpentine Gallery in Kensington Gardens London from July to October and entry is free.

Google may want to organise the Web – I just want to organise my website.  So since I had a couple of freebies for Vue floating around on Too Many Ideas without a proper home and I think I may have some more on the way I’ve made a new home for Free Vue Objects downloads.

I’ve been exchanging emails with Paul, a Vue user, who was having difficulty visualising how big objects should be in Vue. He uses real world measurements but his pictures didn’t look right because he was struggling to get the objects to be the right size and making the distances between them realistic. That was messing up the quality of the lighting and making things look a bit weird. He mentioned the Father Ted episode with the Cows…

“Now concentrate this time, Dougal. These (Father Ted points to some plastic cows on the table) are very small; those (he points at some cows out of the window) are far away…”

I’d suggested he use a cube and make it about the right size for a real world object and then size the model to match. Similarly using a cube sized to a distance to help lay out things. He wasn’t really comfortable with that. It was helping but it was slowing him down.

Then I realised he was a football fan so to help him get a sense of scale in his scenes I made him a quick football pitch model. Nothing fancy just two squashed cubes. He knows how big a football pitch should look and can size and space objects using it as a guide. Once he’s happy he can delete it and render the scene.

Since it worked for him I’ve expanded the set to include thirty-four sports grounds and pitches and posted them here tonight for anyone to download. I’ve made a page for them Vue Scaling Objects.

If there is interest I’ll do some more packs: vehicles, people, plants, buildings, planets and animals all strike me as possibly being useful. Leave a comment if you’d like any of those or something else saying which one(s) you’d find helpful…

I’ve added a set of 10 leafless, winter tree gel materials for Vue to my free stuff pages today. Tested in Vue 7 Pioneer, Vue 7.5 Infinite and Vue 8 Infinite.

• DIY, cleaning and gardening done. Now for something less boring instead… #
• RT @guardiantech The clock cannot be turned back | Peter Thompson http://bit.ly/FbCBs #
• RT @CameronCollie How To Lose a Job Via Facebook via @jearle and @markhughes3000 #
• @richeym Good to see the FA's Respect programme has really been taken to heart at footballs highest levels in reply to richeym #
• @jearle Do you need a rumour starting that tw3.it is under threat? I can start it for you if you want. My rates are reasonable. in reply to jearle #
• @jearle http://tw3.it to be bought by someotherurlshortneruvneverheardof.com. Will that do? I can get it out there for £1m (or nothing) in reply to jearle #
• RT @fieldusThe King, the Moor and the Sheriff. Amusing: http://tinyurl.com/kqqu34 #henrylouisgates #
• impworksRT @fieldus The King, the Moor and the Sheriff. Amusing: http://tinyurl.com/kqqu34 #henrylouisgates #
• Having a quick look at Juitter http://bit.ly/51xSk before heading home #
• RT @lbutlr: http://bit.ly/2bIxya NO BABBYS INZ SHREDDERS!!! via @jearle #
• RT @WeAreConnect Five things to know about Google Caffeine http://tinyurl.com/kpsku2 #
• Awful Library Books http://bit.ly/lm9lI (found via the guardian who didn't think we needed the URL) #
• 2 Sites updated to RT wordpressWordPress 2.8.4 #
• RT @jearle This Fox News report (YouTube) on NHS Terrorists is the single most disgusting piece of propaganda to date: http://tw3.it/MT #
• RT @KimKnox RT: @McKelvie: Graham Linehan's Channel 4 interview on #welovethenhs countering anti-NHS US Right rhetoric #
• Rare eye complaint a few years ago: From GP to Nurses to Consultant and treated in less than 3 hours for free #welovethenhs #
• Wondering how many people can't claim their blog because #technorati normalise urls and doesn't cope with redirects? #

• RT @wordpress: WordPress 2.8.2: http://bit.ly/12nm2b #
• Just added myself to the http://wefollow.com twitter directory under: #writer #vue #rpg #
• @SJGames Superfluous O! http://bit.ly/pEDf just after I read the Two Ronnies missing hose http://bit.ly/1p9Wp4 Conspiracy or coincidence lol #
• @DanDiplo lol and incomplete XSLT parsers used to make them very (how can I put it politely) interesting. And variables that don't vary… in reply to DanDiplo #
• A new John Lewis stock pot of slow cooked spicy black-eye beans ment dinner plans were easy http://bit.ly/XpcCS #recipe #food #
• 2 Sites updated without a hitch RT @wordpress WordPress 2.8.2: http://bit.ly/12nm2b #
• @KimKnox They're working hard analysing this to death. A fashion expert focuses on the boots not being done up right has too much spare time in reply to KimKnox #
• @KimKnox Better Paul than Joe who gave me a harsh stare at the deli shelf in M&S on two Sats. I've better things to do than stalk him. in reply to KimKnox #
• @KimKnox lol He was disguised by a forest of facial hair. I guess for a role: would have been a fire hazard on masterchef in reply to KimKnox #
• And Serif Software call me again. At least this time they handled my lack of interest and my not playing along with their script OK. #
• @AlphaComplex Enjoyed the posts but Posting way too often = No follow No more #
• Anyone know if there's a thesaurus of hashtags that are in use? #
• Posted a bit from an old, funny Valkyrie article on how #rpg characters go through doors http://bit.ly/9mmUs #
• @very_true_thing You're right – a few of those games are post Valkyrie I just keep adding to it if I think of a good new one #
• RT @severdia: #joomla 1.5.13 released – upgrade immediately http://bit.ly/25blLU #
• RT @MonteJCook Here's another game site that I enjoy: http://www.gnomestew.com/ #
• @jearle it may be arbitrary but if it make you happy who am I to knock it lol. Congratulations on 1000 followers in reply to jearle #
• @jearle I miss Valkyrie, with all its odd little production difficulties, sometimes. Always sad I never got to do a SLA Industries piece. in reply to jearle #
• @jearle Not really a surprise. It wasn't just Nightfall: Jay told me the slush pile of SLA fan articles could have filled its own mag in reply to jearle #
• @jearle Your stuff every time – helped yours were lots better lol. in reply to jearle #
• @jearle Jay used to worry about being seen as the official SLA rag with an article an issue. He'd email me for funny, grit free articles. in reply to jearle #
• @KimKnox Gratz. 9/10 for cover cheese picture although at least its not Casu Marzu in reply to KimKnox #
• @alyankovic Polka Your Eyes Out but a medley could be even better… #
• Yeh. Vue 8 Announced. Well it will be soon. #

Spicy Black-eye Beans

This is one of my favourit recipes, so much so that I went and bought a 7 litre stock pot from John Lewis a couple of weeks back so I can cook a double quantity for freezing. Ideally it should be cooked a couple of days in advance and allowed to sit so the deep, rich flavour of the sauce can mature and permeate into the beans.

• 350g Black-eye beans soaked overnight in water
• 2 medium Onions, chopped
• 1 tbsp Vegetable oil
• 500ml Vegetable stock
• 1 tbsp Clear honey
• 2 tbsp Treacle (molasses)
• 4 tbsp Dark Soy Sauce
• 4 tbsp Tomato Puree
• 1 tsp Dry Mustard Powder
• 1 Bay leaf
• 1 tsp Dried Rosemary
• 1 tsp Dried Thyme
• 1 tsp Dried Sage
• Pepper
• 1 small Orange
• 1 tbsp Cornflour
• 2 Red Bell Peppers, deseeded and chopped into slices

1. Rinse and drain the beans.
2. Place in a saucepan and cover with water. Bring to the boil and boil rapidly for 10 minutes.
3. Drain and place in an ovenproof casserole dish.
4. Fry the onions in the oil in a frying pan for 5 minutes, then add to the beans and mix well.
5. Put the Vegetable stock, Honey, Treacle, Soy Sauce, Tomato Puree, Mustard Powder, Rosemary, Thyme, Sage and Pepper in a jug and mix well then pour into the casserole.
6. Add the bay leaf at the side of the pot so it will be easy to remove later. Peel three strips of orange rind from the orange and put on top of the beans.
7. Cover the casserole and bake for 1 hour at 150ºC / Gas Mark 2.
8. Extract the orange juice and mix into the cornflour to form a paste. Add the peppers and paste to the beans and mix well.
9. Return to the oven and cook for another hour.
10. Discard the bay leaf and serve with either rice or wraps.

Catching up on Vue related stuff: nearly 2200 alerts (which may have up to ten possible web pages in each alert) to possible Vue content checked of which a grand total of 3 pages made it into the Vue News Blog. The hit rate is normally higher but there were a lot of Vue 7 Pioneer press release hits that probably explain that. Some that didn’t make it were a smattering of Vue UFO posts (I find it hard to believe some conspiracy theorists have kept this one smoldering along for so many months). Also a couple of amateur reviews where the reviewer just didn’t get what Vue is – when they spend the entire review on Vue not having modeling feature X or something else that just isn’t part of what Vue does they don’t get listed. Maybe its just me but the world needs another modeler as much as it needs integration between Vue and my microwave oven.

I’ve also scanned the usual forums. Now I may have missed something someone else thinks is important. If I have my appologies and feel free to drop me an e-mail.

So based on part I of Burn Up I think we can take it Bradley Whitford felt it was time to show he can play an American capitalist pig. Does he know something about Morgan Freeman’s availability because I thought he had those movie roles sown up…

And as a fan of David Calder’s work since Star Cops could he for once make it all the way through a piece without being killed off. Spooks, Between the Lines, The World Is Not Enough and now Burn Up. I’d not put any bets on him lasting long in The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor either.

Short spoiler free review: only go and see this if you can live with an action picture entirely lacking a heart or soul which justifies its existance by lashing itself to a far too cool barrel before throwing itself into a river above a waterfall. Which isn’t a good thing TM.

So I went to see Wanted tonight. More on that later…

I also bought a crab to have for my dinner tonight. Stick with me through this, hopefully I’ll make some sense at the end. I bought a crab because I remember having crab in the hotel we used to go to on holiday when I was little. I had one of the crab shells for years. I had a memory of crab as some sort of exotic, cool experience. Somewhere along the way the crab shell was broken and found its way into a bin. I still had the memory though.

So back to Wanted. I have a liking for escapist action films. The Matrix, Hard Boiled, The Killer, Under Siege, Hot Fuzz… the list just goes on and on. Each in its own way has a certain cool quality. Wanted does cool. It has cool special effects (the curving bullets), it has some cool cast members (Morgan Freeman, Angelina Jolie, Terence Stamp), there were some cool ideas and some well constructed action scenes (for the last two you can watch the film). The problem was it left me feeling like I felt after I’d eaten the crab: unfulfilled.

The problem with the crab was it smelt like the memory and it looked like the memory but it didn’t taste like the memory. It just tasted of crab.

Wanted did cool like The Matrix. It did body count like Hard Boiled or The Killer. Unfortunately it left out heart and soul entirely – instead it had a by the numbers plot woven together by a committee who forgot to read the instructions on how to use a loom. It had some mystical mumbo jumbo spun in a loose knit pattern to try to justify wholesale slaughter and the death of innocent bystanders in a nihilistic aberration (I was tempted to say train wreck but that was just one reference too many) that placed no sign of any value being placed on human life. It cynically tried to press buttons: the assassins have a code. The death of a few, chosen by some higher power, saves the many and stops bad things happening to nice people so they don’t end up as assassins.

You may ask “Isn’t that true of all the films you mentioned earlier” – I’d disagree. Under Siege – Stop bad people stealing weapons of mass destruction. The Matrix – save humanity from aliens who have taken over the world. The Killer – he only kills bad people. Hot Fuzz – for laughs. Sorry let me try that again: Hot Fuzz – to satirize action films by showing how silly they are when placed in an incongruous setting. Yes and but also because its funny to see a whole older generation of Britain’s finest actors in a shoot out that isn’t embarrassing to watch. So the grammars a bit ropey at the start of that last sentence – its like the plot of Wanted.

Fortunately, unlike the crab, the next action film I see hopefully wont mistake cool for at least some sort of moral structure. No matter how flimsy.

That’s where I ought to finish. I should at this point not write anything else. Anything more is just me messing up my central thesis and sounding even more pompous than I already have. After all its just an action film that like 99% of its relations will be consigned to late night TV, three quid DVDs in the sales a year from now and taking up space on some film archive shelf and being added to lists of action films kept by people who keep such lists. No where near the top 100 I hope.

However a few parting thoughts that flitted through my mind…

David O’Hara – wasted in more than the literal sense at the start of the film.
Marc Warren – no picture on IMDB? Actually Marc Warren – why did he do this film? To say he’d worked with the cool people or because he gets a gun fired inside his head for part of an action sequence? Thousand Year Old Cult of Assassins – except the Hashshashins didn’t come into being until around 1090 so that would be a rounding error of sorts? OK I’m just being picky but if they predate the group the word comes from wouldn’t this be a film about something called something else. I know I’m losing it somehow here. I really should give up. Sorry I’ve more…

Weavers who a thousand years ago could convert binary found in the cloth produced by a loom and discover that it was a list of names of people to bump off (I did say there were spoilers) – yes the ancient Indian writer Pingala knew about binary some time BC. However we have to wait to 1605 for Francis Bacon for a mention of a system to use binary to encode letters of the alphabet. Six hundred years after our order of killers has been bumping people off. Even then if (whatever mystical force is directing the appearance of binary in the cloth) hasn’t sent a cypher key how do they know that they are bumping off the right people? Plus back when names were more flexible (as little as a couple of hundred years ago) how did they know they were bumping the right people off. Sorry I shouldn’t pick apart the fluff. Except when the fluff is used to justify so much violence someone should have made certain the weft hold the rest of the plot together.