2010-08-17 - car fire in stanley park

On the way back from Stanley Park after tonights show, we saw a bunch of people jumping up and down looking across Pipeline Road and a firetruck turning. Woah...

requiring no introduction...

my twin brother friends Tony and Jack both received their iPhone4s ordered from the Apple Online store. shiny!

Rain at Fireworks 2010-07-31

We had some pretty crazy weather just before the final fireworks show this year. A few clasps of thunder (which could have been mistaken for test shots that are usually fired earlier during the evening) sounded as we crossed the Burrard Street Bridge. As we headed towards English Bay a few droplets of rain quickly turned into a downpour. Luckily we brought a tarp and improvised a human tent (4 people, one being each corner) and arrived on the beach relatively dry (compared to the majority of people on the beach without umbrellas or other forms of cover).

Luckily the rain was extremely brief, and the rest of the night was clear. The sudden turn of weather created some interesting patterns in the clouds, such as:

I took a time-lapse of the actual fireworks show, and am currently figuring out the music to put for it. In the mean time, here is the silent version:

bike co-op beach day #2! 2010-07-29

Another ridiculously gorgeous day at the beach. This time we went to the dog beach at Spanish Banks. The food was one-upped from last time with the addition of whipped cream, blueberries, and Reese's cups. Skinny dipping may or may not have commenced after dark.

One of those moments...... :

Fireworks, 2010-07-29

The Team Mexico performance for the 2010 season. Caught it on the Burrard Bridge on my way back after the show from Stanley Park. Didn't have a radio nearby so no music unfortunately.

The spot wasn't ideal due to the tree that blocked the barge which meant most of the lower effects weren't visible. The good spots of the bridge (near the centre) were full by the time I got there, and lined up with heavy tripods and fancy DSLRs :).

DiVA AURA recording 2010-07-26

The linguistics part of our project involves the study of how performers learn to speak using DiVA and as such, recordings are made at the linguistics lab at certain points during the learning/practicing process. During these recordings, the performer is verbally given a target phrase. They then have to say the phrase, and then attempt to "say" it again using the DiVA.

The recorded data includes:

- The performer's own voice repeating the target phrase

- Voice from the DiVA

- Head position (using an OptiTrack)

- Video frame of the performer's upper body

The data is then analysed by the linguistics folk. (Details mostly beyond my realm of knowledge ;)

Here we see one of our musicians, Erica, in front of the green screen in the ISRL lab calibrating the video frame.

Thanks Cam for bringing the DSLR :)

Stanley Park Open 2010-07-24

Had a bit of time before the musical to see the Chu brothers play in the semi-finals of the Stanley Park Open. An intense match that got more intense after I had to go :(

The day we (didn't) go sailing 2010-07-21

On the first HSBC Celebration of Light evenings, we planned to go sailing. There was no wind, so we hung out on the roof patio instead.

Richmond Night Market 2010-07-17

Try to go there at least once a year. The crowds are huge on weekends, and the food is (imho) often hit and miss. This year the one of the new-and-gimmicky foods seem to be the Hurricane Potato Skewer - basically, as my friend Gabe tried to downplay - fries on a stick. Nevertheless, the potato lover that is me really wanted to try it. The ridiculously long lines prevented me from doing so.

Things that were good:

- Popcorn (sweet + salty + delicious)

- Crispy Chicken (very well made, verified by my TW friends)

Things that were meh:

- Rice "hamburger" (meat too salty; rice too dry)

- Lamb kabobs (an authentic Chinese lamb kabob usually has smaller bits of meat and lots of seasoning... the ones I tried was more like chunks of steak. some might like that)

Big Dummy @ the Beach 2010-07-15

Friends + Bikes + Music + Beer + Wine + Food = awesome.

The Big Dummy made the transportation of my ErHu, wine, strawberries, cheese, naan bread, chilli-hummus and pepperoni from UBC to Spanish Banks a breeze. (The downhill also helped).

We hope to repeat this on as many Thursdays as possible this summer...

Singin' in the Rain Opening Night - 2010-07-14

This is my 2nd year working with TUTS. We're doing the classic, Singin' in the Rain. Needless to say its an absolute blast - this show is much more challenging in a number of aspects compared to last year, but totally worth it! Come check it out if you can! The show runs from July 14 until August 21, every other night.

BBQ at Robin's - 2010-07-11

To say summer arrived late in Vancouver this year would be a gross understatement. However, considering the similar patterns we had in the last few years, I'm beginning to sound less confident when telling visitors "it's not usually like this here" during a rainy day in mid June. Therefore, it was with much appreciation (and overdue anticipation) that the warm sunny weather finally arrived in early July. At the end of a great week, Robin hosted a wonderful BBQ.

Art display? 2010-06-20

While in Sydney, Australia, I went to the habour area with my uncle. One of the things recommended by others was to take a ferry ride, and someone mentioned Cockatoo Island at one point... so off we went. I wasn't quite sure why exactly... As so it happens, it was the location for the 17th Biennale of Syndey, a contemporary art festival. The island housed a quarry, some industrial warehouses, a prison, and also a dry dock during WWII. It was quite an interesting setting for many of the art pieces on display. I don't consider myself knowledgeable with visual art, but it was not too difficult to imagine old, abandoned warehouses and rusty machinery to be a suitable setting for a modern piece of sorts.

Personally, the most striking thing I saw on the island, however, was not any of the art pieces. Instead, it was the campground. As follows:

I thought it was one of the pieces on display... but it was not :-)

Other pictures from that day, including some of the other art works: here.

NIME presentations 2010-06-16

This was the main presentation room at the University of Technology Sydney for NIME2010.

The particular talk was a comparison between the open source monome and the Yamaha Tenori-on - two quite similar devices technology-wise, but presented under different business models. The gist of the presentation was that an open source project allows people to constantly modify and update a device according to the whims of the user/developer, while a close sourced one (obviously) does not. As such the monome has undergone hundreds of firmware versions, while the Yamaha has maybe a handful. However, as one of my professors on the trip, Bob Pritchard, pointed out: as a musical instrument, are such quick changes (even if they are improvements) always a good thing?

Aside, have you noticed that identical images from two identical projectors placed side by side never look identical? :P

North Head, Sydney 2010-06-14

An awesome day of sightseeing: View from North Head of downtown Sydney.

The three awesome people I stayed with for the first part of the trip, before the conference started: James, Anna and Maria.

Blue Mountains, NSW 2010-06-13

A breathtakingly beautiful place... (and a pretty good hike to boot - Grouse Grind eat your heart out :)

The hike took around 4 hours, with quite a bit of ups and downs. gpx track here.

Climbing the Sydney Harbour Bridge 2010-06-11

First day in Sydney; Anna and James took me to the habour area, and I took some obligatory pictures of the you-know-what :P. One of the more interesting things I noticed was they had a special tour that involved walking up the Habour Bridge. Looks like fun, but not $200 fun.

Flight from YVR to LAX 2010-06-10

Postal Service is awesome. Moreso when flying down the California coast.

"I watch the patchwork farms' slow fade into the ocean's arms
And from here they can't see me stare

The stale taste of recycled air"

~Postal Service

Work setup 2010-05-16

This is what my desk at the MAGIC lab looks like. The green on one monitor is due to... actually I'm not entirely sure. The mess on the bench in the background has since been cleaned up, and the small monitor points the other way now on Cam's desk :)

I thought the number of monitors was amusing considering that, for my other job, it looks like:

its like the analog equivalent of having a multi-monitor setup :)

Above you see the girls practicing for the number "Beautiful Girls" in Singin' in the Rain. There is an overhead camera pointed down on the circle and the video is projected onto a screen that is used for other effects during the show. Unfortunately I never got to see what that image looks like, since after the show is put together us orchestra members will be confined to the pit underneath the stage...

This Spot Near UBC.... 2009-12-25

I've been eying this spot on SW Marine Drive on every bus ride home from UBC for the past few weeks. On reasonably clear winter evenings, the colours in the sky and water is absolutely amazing. On the bus you can see this for about 2 seconds and after each glimpse, I think to myself that its definitely worthwhile to make a trip for it some day. That day ended up being Christmas Day, 2009.

Diva video shoot 2010-12-14

We booked a studio on Granville Island for two days to do a video shoot for the DiVA project. Once the system is up and running (and stable), there wasn't much to do except look for photo opportunities. Thanks Cam for letting me use his D50.