Hatsune Miku - the 16 year old blue haired twintailed virtual idol, the perfect otaku idol! She is more that just popular. She has become a symbol. She is a star. She is a diva. She is a piece of computer software! (that we all adore)
Ever since her birth on the 31st of August 2007 (and yes she is eternally 16), she has become one of the most popular idols in japan and got well known around the world as well. And the best part about her: she is not subjected to all the gossip and other dirt that real idols have. She is a pure maiden who is made entirely by her fans. The people make Miku - Miku! The people make the songs, and then the people listen to them. Here are some of my favorites:
Today me and my good friends from the Anime@UTS club, Sebastian and Gina, went to Cockatoo island to see the contemporary visual arts exhibition.
The plan was to leave early and finish early to make it to the screening, but unfortunately we didn’t manage to catch the first ferry to the island because of the huge number of people that wanted to go there.
When we got there, we were given a map so we diced not to follow its directions and just wandered around the island the whole time. The artworks that were displayed there, were pretty amazing. There was this big piece of machinery with chains on it, but the chains were made out of foam. Then there was this dark room with lights hanging from the ceiling, and when you touch them, or just bring your hand close to them, the lights turn on. Then there was this place with things dangling from the ceiling. And there was this tunnel with bucket robots which looked like the minions from Despicable Me.
At first the weather was awesome, but then it started pouring. We were very lucky to make it in the boat before it started pouring like crazy.
Overall it was a lot of fun. Thank you Seb and Gina for spending this awesome day with me. Without you guys there, this wouldn’t have been such an epic adventure.
Walk -> Boat -> Island -> Walk around -> Boat -> Walk -> Food -> Anime
Blizzard has just released the official cinematic for the upcoming World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria. First impression: WOOOOOWWW that looks amazing, and funny!
Ever since Warcraft III Blizzard has been making the most epic game cinematics I have ever seen. Ill just list all of them right here:
Ever since I started living in Australia, I had some pretty cool/crazy stuff happen to me, but nothing compared to what went down yesterday. Imagine this, my friend Maria comes back from work at 6pm, opens her door (she lives on the 15th floor) and sees a Rainbow Lorikeet flying in her room.
She freaks out and calls urbanest (place where we live) reception, and reception calls me. This lorikeet flew into her open window sometime during the day and stayed there until she came back. The bird was very friendly, it loved sitting on our shoulders and was very tame. We called the RSPCA (organisation that provides shelter for animals) and asked them what to do. They advised us to drop him of at one of their locations on Sunday (the next day). So we were stuck with him for the night…
We decided that I would take care of him and leave him in some sort of cage in my kitchen for the night. When we transported him to my room, he just sat there on my shoulder while I was mopping the floor and ironing my clothes. I felt like a pirate, Arrrrghhhh! Then I skyped with some of my friends to show them my awesome pet (for one night) and he just sat there on my shoulder, sometimes moving to the other shoulder. When it was time for bed, we put him under a laundry basket, making it his cage. Of course we gave him some fruit and left hime a bowl of water for the night.
This morning Nishi and Wilmer took him to one of the locations where they take care of animals. So now he is gone. But I did get some pictures:
Yesterday I saw this very interesting TED Talk about copyright and remixing. It was made to give the idea of why most copyright and patent laws are dumb and the Apple vs Samsung & Android case is a bit too much
Are you people familiar with the art of Stop Motion video?
Stop Motion is an animation technique to make physical objets seem to move on their own. The objects are moved little by little and then a photo is captured of them in a particular pose. Then after being moved a bit again, another photo is captured. This is repeated until the end of the movement and then the when the photos are put one after another at 20 or so frames per second, a relatively smooth video is made.
Inspired by MysteryGuitarMan me and my friends back home in Latvia made our own stop motion video. Photos were taken by my best friend back home Gexgrino. Our video is nothing compared to MysteryGuitarMan, but we tried and actually made something!
Making the video was a lot of fun, and maybe I might do something similar again in the future.
Due to my busy life at uni I wasn’t able to post this news when it actually happened, and I apologize for that.
The Nasa Mars rover “Curiosity” has safely landed on mars and has sent us back some pictures.
When the whole world is glued to their TVs watching the olympics in London, we geeks were watching the live stream of the Curiosity Mars landing. Unfortunately I didn’t get to se the live stream, but I get to see the pictures of the hype that was at Nasa headquarters.
Please note the number of Mac Books in the room… Take that all you Apple haters!
Here is a picture of the Curiosity Rover and the location of all its cameras. Up until now we have only seen a few images of Mars, and most of them were a bit blurry. This is because the cameras are not yet ready to take good photos.
This video has been all over the internets. Its a K-Pop song by the artist PSY called GANGNAM STYLE. One can say thats its almost as awesome as PON PON PON, on second thought no! Its not :P It resembles Party Rock Anthem more, with its own recognizable dance and stuff. Here is the vid, enjoy:
Tatami Galaxy (四畳半神話大系) - an anime worthy of being called a classic! It is hard to describe the genre for this particular anime, but I’m guessing it would fall under the random / life / mystery. Even though it was only 11 episodes long, it is definitely a must watch for all anime lovers.
If you wish to continue reading, be warned that a lot of SPOILERS await!
The story is about a college dropout (he has no name, he just refers to himself as Watashi (me in japanese) during the whole series, cause he is the narrator), who, after meeting a certain person at a ramen shop, has to re-live his 2-3 years of college in various manifestations. In each “dimension” he joins a different club (circle) in uni and therefore the way he interacts with the other characters alters episode by episode. But in every variation he is destined to meet Ozu, a sly looking fellow who was always seeking to cause trouble. The MC (main character) a Ozu always end up becoming good friends, even though MC hates Ozus guts. There are other characters like Ozus master Higuchi, the doll lover Jougasaki, the fortune teller which raises the price for giving advice to MC in every episode (starting at 1000Yen and hoing up to 9000Yen), and of course the lovely Akashi, who MC is head over heals for (in most dimensions).
Oh yea, this is a romance story! Riiiiight, I almost forgot about that… THe romance between MC and Akashi is obvious yet hidden. When all the dimensions come clashing in the end they do get their happy end though.
It reminded me a lot of the Endless Eight from Haruhi. But unlike that, the episodes in Tatami Galaxy had more differences in the story/characters involved. In the end it was all worth it. The last 2 episodes were pure epic. The whole series, all the different dimensions were building up to the last to episodes.
Overall this series had solid characters, a very interesting plot, unique art style and awesome OP and ED (they are in my top AniSong playlist).
