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Finally, I get to post pictures from Sunny Side of the Doc. Last year, I posted from the stand. This year was a bit anti-climactic. A big part of that was the location. La Rochelle may be pretty, but it just can't compare to Marseilles. It was fun, though, and I'm glad to have been there.
Anyhow, on with the pictures!
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La Rochelle at Night
The Baltic doesn't have tides. What a change here! And a lovely picture. |
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Beautiful La Rochelle
One of the prettiest pics I ever did take! |
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Ridin'
There is a very deep significance to this picture, which few if anybody who reads this will know. |
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The Reception
The whole point of this trip was, of course, Sunny Side of the Doc. And one of the main points of Sunny Side was our reception - with drinks. We'd printed Edelweiss t-shirts beforehand. Too bad I was the only one wearing one. |
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LOOKS'es
There's the three of us - Martina, myself & Gunnar. And our stand, with drinks & food. |
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Le French Police
It's difficult to take seriously a police force who drive around in tiny little Renaults. Strange, they don't punish parking offenders or people driving where they shouldn't. But if you're riding a motorcycle without a license, look out! |
Current Mood:  cheerful
Current Music: "Gadajace Glowny" - Republika
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Congratulations on LOOKS Film + TV making the realscreen Global 100, just published in our April/May edition. I wanted you to be among the first to know!
The realscreen Global 100 is a list of the most influential production companies in non-fiction entertainment today, selected from around the world. These are the international leaders of both our art and our industry. They are the ones that others in the industry say they look to for inspiration. They demonstrate leadership and innovation in art, business, or both.
The final list, whittled down from some 300 companies that were nominated, represents peer ratings among fellow producers, the opinions of programmers and distributors, and the perspective of our own editorial team. A full explanation of eligibility and the selection process can be found in the issue and on our Web site.
Print copies of the April/May issue are now in the mail and will also be distributed at MIPDOC, MIP-TV, and Hot Docs. Electronic versions of the full issue are available at our website www.realscreen.com. We have also set up a special interactive page on our web site for the Global 100 specifically, which you can view now at www.realscreen.com/global100.
While there’s bound to be controversy over who was included and who was not, we think that this is a great starting point and our intention is to publish an updated list every year. In compiling this list, we solicited plenty of industry feedback regarding both the criteria to be applied and who should be included within those criteria. Now that it’s out, I would very much welcome your feedback.
Best regards,
Jim
James Shenkman
President, Brunico Communications Inc.
Executive Publisher, realscreen magazineI'm now officially head of development for one of the top 100 nonfictional film production companies in the world! SA-WEET!Current Mood:  bouncy
Current Music: "Am I to be the one" - Dead Brothers
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Islam used to be the shining beacon, the shimmering pearl of humankind. In a time when Europe descended into dark ages unparalleled in almost two thousand years, Islamic scholars kept alive and improved upon the knowledge of the ancients. Islam spread as an empire of faith, built upon trade and tolerance.
When Europeans were praying to the bones of their saints to cure their sick, Islamic doctors realized that diseases were caused by tiny, often airborne organisms that interfere with the human body. They created the world's first hospitals, with separate wards for different illnesses.
When Islamic religion encountered the faiths of Judaism and Christianity, they were regarded with respect, and allowed to worship as they saw fit. They were not infidels, they were the "people of the book", who adhered to the messages of prophets come before Mohammed - Abraham, Moses, Jesus and uncounted others.
The day the Islamic army of Saladin took back Jerusalem from the Crusader Knights, a mass was celebrated at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, just like any other day.
...
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Oh Allah, what happened to your people?
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So, for everyone who didn't see this in ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) exoticism's journal, I nearly killed myself yesterday morning. I had what I guess you'd call a body building accident. I was doing my Good Morning's when, as I was bent over, I lost my balance and fell forward, hitting my head square on a 2"x2" metal rod protruding from my gym station. Can you picture it? I bet you can... It's silly, I wasn't even pushing that much weight. It was on the 2nd rep (of 10) with 40kgs on my barbell. It was the set in between warmups and heavier weights. I'd done it a thousand times. I have no idea how it happened. I could have cracked my head. I could have easily broken my neck. I should at the very least have a bad concussion. I went to a surgeon, was rushed to the hospital, x-rayed about a dozen times. They found nothing. Absolutely nothing, except for a cut on my forehead which didn't even require stitches. They did keep me at the hospital overnight, just to make sure I didn't die of a hemorrhage in my sleep. Today then, they suddenly said they wanted to keep me for three days, not just two. I asked why, since I had no symptoms (no dizziness, fainting, passing out, under-eye circles, throwing up, sickness... nothing save for a very mild headache) and the x-rays were all negative. And since yesterday a different doctor had told me one night was fine, just as a precaution. Well, they didn't object too much, especially seeing as to how I have a plane to catch tomorrow morning. So I'm out of the hospital, and continuously applying vitamin E to my cut and bruise in order for it to heal faster. I hope I look somewhat presentable by Saturday. So, overall, no worries! I'm fine, and my travel plans remain unchanged.
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The LARK Program
A person wrote a letter to the White House complaining about the treatment of a captive taken during the Afghanistan war. Below is a copy of the response.
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, D.C.
Dear Concerned Citizen:
Thank you for your recent letter criticizing our treatment of the Taliban and Al Qaeda detainees currently held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. The administration takes these matters seriously, and your opinion was heard loud and clear here in Washington. You'll be pleased to learn that thanks to the concerns of citizens like you, we are creating a Terrorist Retraining Program, to be called the "Liberals Accept Responsibility for Killers" program, or LARK for short. In accordance with the guidelines of this new program, we have decided to place one terrorist under your personal care.
Your detainee has been selected and scheduled for transportation to your residence next Monday. Ali Mohammed Ahmed bin Mahmud is to be cared for pursuant to the standards you personally demanded in your letter of admonishment. We will conduct weekly inspections to ensure that your standards of care for Ahmed are commensurate with those you so strongly recommended in your letter. Although Ahmed is sociopathic and extremely violent, we hope that your sensitivity to what you described as his "attitudinal problem" will help him overcome this character flaw. Perhaps you are correct in describing these problems as mere "cultural differences."
Your adopted terrorist is extremely proficient in hand-to-hand combat and can extinguish human life with such simple items as a pencil or nail clippers. He is also expert at making a wide variety of explosive devices from common household products, so you may wish to keep those items locked up, unless you feel that this might offend him.
Ahmed will not wish to interact with your wife or daughters since he views females as a subhuman form of property. This is a particularly sensitive subject for him. He has been known to show violent tendencies around women who fail to comply with the dress code that he considers appropriate, but I'm sure that over time they will come to enjoy the anonymity offered by the burqa. Just remind them that it is all part of respecting his culture and his religious beliefs.
Thanks again for your letter. We truly appreciate it when folks like you inform us of the proper way to do our job. Take good care of Ahmed and good luck!
Cordially,
Donald Rumsfeld Tags: politics
Current Mood:  snarky
Current Music: "Reunited" (Westbam Remix) - Wu-Tang Clan
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My mp3 player needs upgrading. I currently own this 256mByte flash memory player:
It works well for what I use it for, it's tiny and all, but I'm wanting something more. So, I'm in the market for something in the 20 to 30 gig area. I was getting used to the idea of shelling out my money for an iPod Photo, which is available at a nice local reseller along with plentiful accessories, until I walked into said reseller today (to buy new speakers for exoticism) and saw the Cowon iAudio X5, which, in the reviews I read about it, seems to be doing as well or besting the iPod Photo.
PROS:
- stylysh, scratch resistent, small, lightweight
- supports .WMA as well as all other important formats
- plays video
- plays .m3u playlists
CONS:
- no TV out
- can't view images & listen to music at the same time
- 10gigs less than the iPod
- no sorting by ID3 tag
PROS:
- can view images while listening to music
- bigger screen & better photo viewing abilities
- 10gigs more for 10 bucks more than the iAudio
- superb accessories
CONS:
- cannot synch with Windows Media Player (I very much like my WMP, after having experimented with Winamp and iTunes, they just don't do it for me)
- doesn't support .WMA (obviously, but still not good, since I only ever rip music as .WMA) or .m3u lists (the staple of my music organization so far)
- quite a bit bigger & heavier than the iAudio
- doesn't play videos
So, I'm hoping for some experienced input here. I know there's a few iPodphiles on here, so I know I have that side covered. Not sure if anybody here has tried the iAudio. But still, gimme some input, people. Those who do own iPods - how often have you plugged them into TVs and the like? Do you actually view images while listening to music a lot? Anything I missed here other than that? Tags: music
Current Mood:  torn
Current Music: "Crystalline Green" - Goldfrapp
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Well, I did promise a post. So here it comes. It's political. Skip it, unless you care. Moving back to Germany has been most difficult for me because of the level of socialism encountered here. Government regulates everything for you. People no longer need to think for themselves. What's worse, they relish the chance to trade in freedom for security. Me, I could never do that. I value freedom above all else and see the human purpose in living as free a life as one can. It is because I am an ardent fighter for freedom that I am an ardent enemy of socialism. The concepts of freedom and socialism are mutually exclusive. Where freedom is, there can be no socialism and where socialism is there can be no freedom. This is as true for nation states as a whole as it is true for every human being. For socialism as a concept, an ideology, reaches much farther than "just" an economic model and means a lot more than "the ideology that will succeed capitalism and develop into communism." The struggle between socialism and freedom is in every one of us, fought anew every day. Bold statement? You betcha. Well, I'm known for those. Back it up, you say? Well then, I will. First, let's examine the root of (modern) socialism. While people such as Marx, Engels and Müntefehring are certainly important in the history of socialism, it is Jean-Jacques Rousseau who laid its foundations. In his "The Social Contract", he writes that in order to live in society, human beings agree to an implicit social contract, which gives them certain rights in return for giving up certain freedoms they would have in a state of nature. Thus, the rights (and responsibilities) of individuals are the terms of the social contract, and the state is the entity created for the purpose of enforcing that contract. This contract, therefore, declares that all those living in a society follow what he calls a "general will". This will is, in fact, the common interest people have; it is what all people would decide on if given a choice. Individuals must submit to this will, which can never be wrong. Anybody in violation of this will is not fit to live in socitety and has no right to live. Rousseau's fallacy - which to this day has cost more than 100,000,000 people their lives - is his claim that citizens constrained to obey the general will are thereby rendered free. Precisely the opposite holds true. By lumping together what people have in common and discarding - under pain of punishment - what they do not, Rousseau de facto robs them of individuality. A person who has no individuality is automatically devoid of freedom. For the essence of freedom is the right to choose against everything - against those who would force one to agree, against "common sense". Reducing human beings to a social contract bound by the general will, Rousseau de facto presumes that humans will become ant colonies. As bleak an outlook as this may seem on socialism, it has proven true in every incarnation this abominable ideology has spawned to this day. Every socialist society has relied on robbing its subjects of individuality, suppressing (not resolving) differences between people, and forcing them to work like cattle to achieve the social contract. Ask anybody who has lived in a suppressive socialist society - ask anybody who relishes freedom, that is - and they will confirm the truth of this. Hell, ask me. I grew up behind the wall. So, how do I go from that to proclaiming the fight of socialism and freedom within each of us? Rousseau's general will has made it into every facet of society. Politicians of all degrees wish for us to agree on their social contracts. We face the choice of obeying or disobeying today's abominations of Rousseau's general will. I, for one, will strive to never obey the general will where I encounter it. Masses of people agreeing on one thing - that's never yet produced anything good. Current Mood: content
Current Music: "The Downward Spiral" - NIN
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Dancing, piping, and fiddling are very popular on Saint Patrick's Day. The dance music is called céilí or ceillidh (pronounced KAY-lee), and consists of fast tempo music called jigs and reels. Damhsa claimh is when male dancers stand close together and hit the ground with sharp clicks of their feet in prearranged patterns, and the female dancers weave between them. Other dances are hornpipes, flings, marches, slow airs, sets, step-dancing, etc. Current Mood: tired
Current Music: "Emerge" - Fisherspooner
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So... I've long been pondering what project to tackle after finishing Archie Hobb (which is currently in rough cut form & being edited, it should be done-done in about May). I know I'll need something to jump into to be able to let go. So, between Sebastien, exoticism and stefan_schoof I've been pondering quite some ideas. So far, all thoughts have been rather artsy and really cool. Considering the production value I have access to through LOOKS and ROK-TV (multiple cameras, panther crane, lights, grip equipment, you name it) this should be really cool. And then it hit me. All that's been pondered fits perfectly for a music video. So, in pursuing this idea further, I'm now looking for a band to make a music video with/for. Sound wise, I'm thinking somewhere between Collide and NIN, between Nightwish and Blind Guardian. But I'm definitely open for all suggestions.I have some specific ideas for what I want to do, but would love to have lyrics & a song to work to. The scope of the project depends on what the band wants to do - from low-budget short done between us & edited on my computer, to something larger involving LOOKS directly, especially their post-production capabilities. So I need a band that wants to work on such a mutually beneficial endeavor. Any suggestions? I'm especially looking at you vote_moneyshot, stefan_schoof, replicant6, mi_chi_jung, adrena_lynn! But of course anybody else too... Current Mood: creative
Current Music: "Emerge" - Fisherspooner
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When the sun rises over the Serengeti, and the gazelle wakes up, it knows that today, like every other day, it will have to run faster than the fastest lion, or it will get eaten.
When the sun rises over the Serengeti, and the lion wakes up, it knows that today, like every other day, it will have to run faster than the slowest gazelle, or it will starve to death.
It doesn't matter whether you're a gazelle or a lion. When the sun rises over the Serengeti, you'd better be running...
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Odi et amo. Quare id faciam, fortasse requeris?
Nescio. Sed fieri sentio et excrucior. |
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