September 13, 2008

Apparently Photoshop is now too easy to use

This poster was featured in a post on the Photoshop Disasters website. It turns out that Dane Cook has a few issues with the movie poster for his upcoming movie, My Best Friend’s Girl.

Now before you head on over there to read the whole story, take a minute to watch this trailer to get familiar with the movie’s premise. That way you can see how the poster doesn’t live up to the concept.

Here are a few things that truly blow about my upcoming movie poster to promote the release of the film opening on September 19th…

1. Graphics:
Whoever photoshopped our poster must have done so at taser point with 3 minutes to fulfill their hostage takers deranged obligations. They should have called Donnie Hoyle and had him give a tutorial using “You Suck at Photoshop” templates. This is so glossy it makes Entertainment Weekly look wooden.

PS - “Its funny what love can make you do.” I just threw up all over this awful poster.
Wow, wait … it looks better.

HT: Kristi Mantoni of The Winchester Mantoni’s

posted to General Ranting, Watch This! @ 6:37 pm

Palin is bringing sexy back

First, a word on extremism.

John Cleese makes some very relevant points about extremism in the party political broadcast he did in 1987 for the SDP/Liberal Alliance (who got slaughtered in the election and went on to become the Liberal Democrats)

As an extremist, “You can be as nasty as you like and yet feel your behavior is morally justified. So you can strut around abusing [or torturing] people and telling them you could eat them for breakfast and still think of yourself as a champion of truth, a fighter for the greater good. And not the rather sad paranoid schizoid you really are.”

“Attacking our enemies always makes us feel good, and excited. In fact, just about the only disadvantage to extremism is that it can never solve problems…Solving problems involves frustrating things like listening to people with different views and learning from them.”

There was a lot of confusion generated on the internet when Google searches for “Governor Palin” resulted in websites related to former Monty Python regular Michael Palin.

Having graduated from Oxford University in 1965 with ambitions to be a writer and performer of comedy, Michael Palin (born Michael Edward Palin in Sheffield on 5 May 1943) made his first television appearance as the rather unlikely sounding host of a regionally-produced pop show for children, Now (Television Wales and West, 1965-66).

Palin appeared in some of the most famous Python sketches, including “The Dead Parrot”, “The Lumberjack Song”, “The Spanish Inquisition” and “Spam”. Palin continued to work with Jones, co-writing Ripping Yarns. He has also appeared in several films directed by fellow Python Terry Gilliam and made notable appearances in other films such as A Fish Called Wanda, for which he won the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role.

After Python, he began a new career as a travel writer. His journeys have taken him across the world, the North and South Poles, the Sahara desert, the Himalayas and most recently, Eastern Europe. In 2000 Palin became a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) for his services to television.

And now, Palin brings sexy back…

posted to Watch This! @ 10:14 am

September 12, 2008

Is spam made from sharks?

I was in a recent email conversation with someone and they were telling me that they think they got an email from me but it was marked spam and before they realized it, they deleted it. Turns out it wasn’t me but my dad’s email.

Ripley's Aquarium

Ripley’s Aquarium

Anyway, in the course of the conversation I mentioned that since it happened twice it’s probably because archshrk looks like a spam address. You know, a bunch of random letters that gets shut down and thrown away quicker than it was set up. That’s when they asked

What does [archshrk] stand for?

ARCHitecture and SHaRKs = ARCHSHRK
two of my early passions.

Maybe I should start a website called Sharkitecture.
Too late! Sharchitecture’s taken too. Oh well.

posted to Misc-Stuff @ 11:46 am

September 11, 2008

Don’t Let’s Start

Can’t sleep. Somewhere nearby is a smoke detector that needs a new battery.

This is unrelated but I thought I would share it anyway. As you know, I’m a big fan of TMBG so here’s a classic from They Might Be Giants (with lyrics to sing along with)

Don’t, don’t, don’t let’s start
This is the worst part
Could believe for all the world
That you’re my precious little girl
But don’t, don’t, don’t let’s start
I’ve got a weak heart
And I don’t get around how you get around

Don't Let's Start

Don’t Let’s Start

When you are alone
You are the cat, you are the phone
You are an animal
The words I’m singing now
Mean nothing more than “meow”
To an animal
Wake up and smell the cat food
In your bank account
Don’t try to stop the tail
That wags the hound

D, world destruction
Over an overture
N, do I need
Apostrophe T, need this torture?

Don’t, don’t, don’t let’s start
This is the worst part
Could believe for all the world
That you’re my precious little girl
But don’t, don’t, don’t let’s start
I’ve got a weak heart
And I don’t get around how you get around

They Might Be Giants

They Might Be Giants

No one in the world
Ever gets what they want
And that is beautiful
Everybody dies
Frustrated and sad
And that is beautiful
They want what they’re not
And I wish they would stop
Saying Deputy Dawg dog a ding dang depadepa
Deputy Dawg dog a ding dang depadepa

D, world destruction
Over an overture
N, do I need
Apostrophe T, need this torture?

Don’t, don’t, don’t let’s start
This is the worst part
Could believe for all the world
That you’re my precious little girl
But don’t, don’t, don’t let’s start
I’ve got a weak heart
And I don’t get around how you get around

I don’t want to live in this world anymore
I don’t want to live in this world

Don’t, don’t, don’t let’s start
This is the worst part
Could believe for all the world
That you’re my precious little girl
But don’t, don’t, don’t let’s start
I’ve got a weak heart
And I don’t get around how you get around.

posted to Watch This! @ 4:08 am

September 10, 2008

Kathi Burg is back

Kathi Burg has released a new album which I’m looking forward to very much. It’s titled Sun In Rain and you can listen to it on her MySpace page.

I first fell in love with Kathi’s music a few years ago when she performed at The Courtyard as The Kathi Burg Band. Her new album is a solo project but still has the haunting sounds of Natalie Merchant’s Tiger Lily and the heart convicting lyrics of her previous albums. Look for a full review once I get my hands on my own copy.

In the mean time, visit her MySpace page to listen to samples and check out this review for “Making of Easy”, her last album.

posted to Misc-Stuff @ 7:06 am

September 9, 2008

Tweaking your WordPress Website

I’m constantly making changes to my website in ways you probably don’t notice. Like when I changed my site so that, from a code point of view, both sidebars come after the content. On the surface, there was no difference for you, but if you were visually impaired and were using page reading software (reads the text out loud) you would have to listen to all my sidebar stuff before getting to the posts.

Another way I’ve made subtle changes is with various plugins. Most make it easier to add or manage little items like my RSS feed, comments and site statistics.

Today, I want to point out a couple of head-smacking tips that you may want to consider using. First, if you use images in your post, make sure you always link to the page (default is the image itself). Be sure to include some text to help the site advertisement widgets have something to relate to. No words = no ads.

Second, optimize your image page and gallery. Sarah has some very useful information on Theming Your WordPress Gallery which I’ve used to improve the user experience, and the search engine results.

One issue was people find my site by using image searches. Great, but once they find the image, how do they get to the original article? Simple, follow Sarah’s tips.

Another big area which is something you will see and appreciate is improved search. WordPress default search kinda sucks. It sorts the results by date, newest first, and interface wise it doesn’t have any of the cool things we’re used to when we search in for instance Google.

posted to World's Bestest SEO @ 2:57 pm

September 8, 2008

The World, Brave New or End of

The other day, Gil, from the InkTank forums shared something he found on the LHC (Large Hadron Collider). If your not familiar with what that is, here’s the basics:

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is a gigantic scientific instrument near Geneva, where it spans the border between Switzerland and France about 100 m underground. It is a particle accelerator used by physicists to study the smallest known particles – the fundamental building blocks of all things.

Two beams of subatomic particles called ‘hadrons’ – either protons or lead ions – will travel in opposite directions inside the circular accelerator, gaining energy with every lap. Physicists will use the LHC to recreate the conditions just after the Big Bang, by colliding the two beams head-on at very high energy. Teams of physicists from around the world will analyse the particles created in the collisions using special detectors in a number of experiments dedicated to the LHC.

I wasn’t concerned until I saw this photo.

They’re waiting for you Gordon, in the test chamber.

Until its debut in September, and possibly for the entire lifespan of the LHC, rumors of its doomsday potential are likely to persist, fueled by reports of its unprecedented power and potential. Physicists have pointed out that the microscopic black holes the collider could generate would disappear almost instantly, without wreaking any havoc on the accelerator or the rest of world. But for anyone convinced that the LHC’s impending activation is a countdown to doomsday, the hand-wringing should commence this weekend, when the accelerator will host its first actual particle beam.

posted to Misc-Stuff, Watch This!, World's Bestest SEO @ 1:03 pm

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