#also star coordinates rely a lot on specific dates and times

[whatyoutaughtwasfear]

I swear to god there's something here with Victor including stars in his drawings, the Star hotel sign missing, this image in the bottom of victor's coordinates map. Something to do with star coordinates and the trees moving. But i think i'm too stupid to figure it out

[lovelyirony]

fic title: I’m falling and the sun is blinding me to your faults

i wanted to do an au of this one, so presenting: tony and rhodey, but make it villainous. i think it’d be fun! 

James Rhodes is two things, first and foremost being that he is a businessman. 

People call him a villain. He doesn’t really think he’s that villainous. 

After all, he only took over New York. He left all the other states alone, so that has to mean something. He was gracious! 

He also wouldn’t consider himself a villain because everyone who works under him gets health insurance. They don’t complain that much, although he’s gotten some about the quality of the buffet on Fridays. 

Catering companies. Hit-or-miss, you know? 

There have been a couple of companies who try to stop him. Rivals that hate that his products are better and employees are happier, for one. Those are easy to dismiss. 

SHIELD is one company who tries, and fails. Repeatedly. It would be embarrassing, but Rhodes has respect for Agents Romanov and Hill, who have been the closest to breaking into his personal office. 

- 

The player that isn’t registering on the field is Tony Stark. Perhaps because he isn’t so much of a player on the field as an existing person who just happens to be on a field. Or a building. However you would like to imagine it. 

In other universes, he walks like he owns the world because he could buy up everything and still have money left over to get ice cream at the end of the day. 

In this universe, his father kicked him out of his house for various things, the most prominent being that Tony is rather partial to kissing guys and ladies, and that just simply won’t do. 

(Tony also stole enough money out of his bank account to buy a house and also start his own business without his knowledge, but in the grand scheme of things, that’s just a small drop in the ocean.) 

Tony made his own tech start-up business. He’s invented a few new things that hit the market discreetly, and he’s building up more and more clientele. He’s about to open another shop, and in all honesty he’s not worried about getting noticed. 

This is until Rhodes comes across an employee bragging about a new repair guy who makes computers run twice as fast, charges less than most repair shops, and looks mighty fine in a tank top.

The last reason is reason enough to visit. 

But also, to see who’s been fixing up Rhodes tech and can make it faster. He doesn’t know why he wouldn’t have just applied for a job. 

Tony is not expecting Rhodes to enter into his building. He has people who are walk-ins, but usually you would expect a villain to make an appointment. Or not, they are villains. 

“I heard that you’ve been improving my phones,” James says. He leans into Tony’s space. He smells quite nice, has a well-tailored suit, and Tony is trying very hard not to find him attractive. That’s not the sort of thing you could be focusing on. 

“You gonna sue me or something?” 

“No, I want to hire you.” 

Tony blinks. 

“Oh. No thank you.” 

Rhodes pulls back. 

“Why ‘no’?” 

“I like my shop just fine. And you have things well-handled.” 

“Could I consult you?” 

“You can’t afford me.” 

Rhodes grins. 

“Are you sure about that?” 

“Of course I am. Can I get anything for you today, or did you just want to beg me to come work for you?” 

“Most people would never be this bold.” 

"What would they be? Terrified in your presence?” 

“More or less, yes. It’s what I prefer.” 

"I don’t cater to people’s preferences, it’s a character flaw and strength,” Tony quips. 

Rhodes smiles. 

It’s terrifyingly beautiful, really. Tony is at a loss for words. 

“I think I’m liking you, Stark.” 

“Tony. You don’t call me Stark. I don’t do the last name dynamic.” 

“Sweetheart, then. Not your last name.” 

“Pet names, seriously?” 

“Oh you got it, honey.” 

“Then go on, platypus,” Tony throws back. 

“Platypus? Really?” 

"Pet names are on the menu, honey bunch. Just try me.” 

Rhodes smiles, turning to exit. 

“I’ll be in touch, darling.” 

Tony leans against his desk, legs shaking underneath. 

There are two problems that he’s not sure how to solve. Here they are: 

1.) Rhodes now has Tony on his radar, which is probably bad because Tony will absolutely be used for world domination or whatever. 

2.) Tony doesn’t really mind as long as he gets to see Rhodes because goddamn. That man could get so many things, and he probably has. And Tony wouldn’t mind being one of those things if he played his cards right. 

But for now, Tony just wants to fix computers and maybe just buy a new brand of tea, but he’s honestly not sure. 

- 

Rhodes makes an appointment to meet. 

Of Fucking Course. 

Tony is not impressed, and is also not impressed that he comes in with a very expensive custom-made designer suit, whereas Tony is not sure the last time his pair of jeans got washed, and an old t-shirt that’s advertising an ice cream shop that is closed now. 

“You love to make an entrance all the time?” Tony asks. “What can I legally do for you?” 

“You’re assuming I’m making you do illegal things, babe?” 

“Yes, Rhodey.” 

“It’s Rhodes.” 

“Hm, maybe. But not to me. Rhodey. I wanna ruin your business impression.” 

Pepper snorts besides Rhodes, who is suitably impressed that Tony doesn’t give one flying fuck about the fact that he could destroy him at any point. 

“I’m ordering that on your next business card deal.” 

“I’ll fire you.” 

“You can’t find someone as competent as me, don’t even joke.” 

“I came here for an opportunity for you. You’ve managed to get some people’s computers to speed up so much. And I want you to do it with all of my employee’s computers.” 

“What, you couldn’t reverse-engineer it? See what I did for yourself?” 

Rhodey grins. 

“I never question a handsome man’s work, darling.” 

Tony turns red. 

“You’re really bad with professionalism, honeysop.” 

“What the hell is that?” 

“What, never heard about romance in the fifteenth century? Boring.” 

“Will you do the job or not?” 

“What are the terms, the conditions, and how much are you paying?” 

Pepper steps forward, a sizable stack of paperwork in her hands. 

The work would pay off the building. It would pay off his mortgage on his house. Hell, it would help a lot. He’d have extra to mess around and maybe go on a vacation. 

The downside is that he’s helping a villain get faster speed and better battery life with laptops. This could also mean he’d die, but honestly he was kind of expecting an early death. 

Rhodey assures him that he won’t die. 

“If anyone touches you, then they feel my wrath,” he says. His teeth glint underneath the lights. “And honey, no one ever likes feeling that.” 

“What, it isn’t all feather-light tickles?” 

“Touches a bit more than that.” 

There’s an unspoken story there. Rhodey’s grin goes from tight and eyes empty to refocusing on Tony and turning soft, genuine. 

“We can discuss the official plans over dinner.” 

“Dinner won’t work for me, I got plans tonight.” 

“A hot date?” 

"A special movie screening,” Tony says. “Can’t miss it. Maybe next time, or the next three times.” 

Rhodey smiles. 

“Maybe sometime.” 

“Maybe.” 

- 

Holy fuck.

Rhodes International has a local coffee shop on the lobby. A barista is a cheerful girl who has neon yellow hair greets him and asks if he wants a complimentary drink. 

“You...know who I am?” 

“Not in the slightest!” she says cheerily. “I have a memory thing where I remember everyone I ever meet and who I don’t meet. What kind of coffee guy are you?” 

“Um...you guys have mint syrup?” 

“Yup!” 

“Then I guess a peppermint latte?” 

“Coming right up!” 

So here is this girl humming what sounds suspiciously like the Winnie the Pooh song as she makes a drink, and that drink is amazing. 

Also, people are wearing, it seems, whatever outfit they want. There are some people talking, and two look to be dressed in professional business clothing, but the third guy they’re talking to is wearing ripped jeans and a tank top has the phrase of “I’m Just Existing on a Manifestation of Reality” emblazoned. 

It’s odd. 

“So glad you could make it, Tones,” Rhodey says. 

“Tones?” 

“What, too much?” 

“Tones sounds like you know me.” 

“And I don’t?” 

“What’s my favorite jam?” 

“Why jam?” 

“If you know someone well, you know their favorite type of jam.” 

“Orange marmalade?” 

“What the fuck do I look like, Paddington?” 

“You’re right, Paddington’s not near as sexy.” 

“This counts as harassment, right? This counts as harassment.” 

“Don’t have him sue us already, he’ll win,” Pepper says, breezing to their sides. God, she’s gorgeous. Casually dressed in a pencil skirt and a blouse and acting like she doesn’t look like a goddess. Must be exhausting. “Tony, great to have you. Let me show you who you’re working with.” 

He has his own fancy office, a team that knows what they’re doing, and catered lunch. 

Catered lunch. It’s not even a Friday. 

“Friday’s are questionable,” Rhodey says. “Weird selection.” 

“You don’t wanna know,” says Intern Joe. 

That’s literally on his ID card. 

- 

Tony starts work. It’s not bad, not at all. He works in the mornings on the weekends and Mondays as well as Thursdays, and then sometimes does work from his own office. 

Rhodey is...nice. 

This is a bit unsettling, because Rhodey literally just threatened the president over an environmental bill not being accepted and currently all employees are only slightly scared. 

“This is just like three months ago,” says Janice The Badass. (Also on her ID card.) “Don’t worry, the government can’t do anything. They rely on us too heavily.” 

“For what?” 

“For safety.” 

“Not asking.” 

“Good, I’m not going to answer.” 

“Okay?” 

- 

It’s also weird that Rhodey checks in on him. He brings him coffee how he likes it, and he makes him sit down and try new foods with him. 

He’s not bad at conversational topics either. Tony’s used to talking, and he’s used to bad-talking on dates. This doesn’t come close. 

No, they talk about the differences of Star Trek and how much Tony hates specific brands of pens, and how Rhodey is a disaster when it comes to coordination of ties. 

“I don’t like ties,” he scowls. 

“Then why wear one?” 

“Pepper says they look nice.” 

“Why do you need to look nice?” 

“Most things are all about presentation.” 

“Ah, need to be taken seriously.” 

“Only at times when I’m facing government officials or weird corporate bosses.” 

“Aren’t you a corporate boss?” 

“I’m a corporate boss who is also an enemy of fellow corporate bosses. Weird thing.” 

“That’s...intriguing.” 

“How so?” 

“Well, how does that work?” Tony asks, popping a couple blueberries into his mouth. “How are you both the same and an enemy?” 

“Watch and learn, sugar. Watch and learn.” 

Tony is allowed on the next business meeting. Which, coincidentally, his old Uncle Obadiah is part of. 

This leads to rather undesired complications. 

-

“You’re working for a supervillain?” Obie practically yells. 

“Well, it’s a bit more complicated than that,” Tony says. “I just work with computers.” 

“Besides if he wanted to work for a real supervillain, wouldn’t he be working for you?” Rhodey asks. 

He’s sitting in one of those rolling-chairs, and despite that, he made it his throne. He’s relaxed in it, perfectly at peace with the situation. All eyes are on him. 

“I’m not the one that the government is after.” 

“And yet I’m the one who’s successfully paid taxes. Where have yours gone, hm? Strip club in Vegas? Weapon sales in Afghanistan?” 

Obie freezes. 

Tony knows that when you freeze, it is your worst tell. 

“Does dad know?” 

This time, Rhodey turns towards him. He’s surprised. 

“We’ll discuss that later. But does Howard know, Obadiah?” 

“Howard is none of your concern.” 

“Oh my god, he is,” Rhodey says grinning. “You haven’t told him about your little back-door escapades. I wonder what would happen if I told him.” 

“You don’t want me as an enemy,” Obadiah says, shaking. He looks at Tony. “And you, boy, you just earned yourself a death sentence.” 

“Funny, Howard said the same thing when he kicked me out of the house,” Tony says as he’s checking his nails. Rhodey thinks he is in love. 

“Go ahead and try to get me as an enemy, see how well it works for you,” Rhodey says, pearly whites on display. “I took over the entire state of New York, leaving everyone in power allied with me. Plus, Tony hasn’t pushed his legacy from what I’ve seen, but what would happen if I just...let him talk? At the next press conference, perhaps.” 

Tony grins, and it’s dangerous. 

“Yeah Obie, what if I talked? I’m sure Howard’s disastrous attempt at fatherhood would be a real uptick in stock points.” 

“You wouldn’t.” 

“Just watch. Just fucking watch,” Tony says. “I still know how to smile for the press, and I still remember all of my lessons for how to make sure anything is believable.” 

He shakes. 

Rhodey gets security. 

Tony visibly relaxes as Stane is led out of the building, and Rhodey smiles over at him. 

“What?” 

“You wanna grab dinner with me?” 

“Like as a casual dinner, or a date-dinner?” 

“How about both?” 

“Thank god, I can’t remember where my nice shoes are.” 

- 

Tony supposes it is odd to be out to dinner with one of the most-feared men in all of New York. 

But it was hard to fear him when he was currently trying to lick ice cream off the tip of his nose with no such luck. 

Or when Rhodey kisses him senseless on his doorstep and makes fun of the little gnome that he’s put outside, and Tony giggles and watches him leave in his fancy car, still leaning on his door. 

Oh, he’s got it bad. 

But he doesn’t mind. 

[phantom-le6]

Episode Reviews - Star Trek: The Next Generation Season 4 (6 of 6)

To round of my look into season 4 of Star Trek: The Next Generation, here are my reviews of that season’s last two episodes.

Episode 25: In Theory

Plot (as adapted from Wikipedia):

Lt. Commander Data and Lt. Jenna D'Sora are in the torpedo room configuring several probes with which the Enterprise will explore a nearby nebula. D'Sora explains that her ex who she just split up with has asked her to dinner, prompting Data to remind her why they broke up as part of a standing agreement between the pair of them. Later they play together in a chamber concert along with Keiko O'Brien. D'Sora complains of her abilities as a musician, but Data insists that he could not hear anything wrong.

 Later, on the bridge, Data is reviewing the information from the probes sent into the nebula. He theorises that life might have evolved differently in the nebula because of the volume of dark matter detected. Captain Picard orders the ship to the nearest planet within the nebula. Data and Jenna configure further probes, when she kisses him on the cheek and then on the lips, before leaving the room. Data seeks the opinion of his friends, specifically Picard, Guinan, Geordi La Forge, Commander Riker, Counsellor Troi and Lt. Worf. Data decides to pursue the relationship and goes to Jenna's cabin with a bunch of flowers, where he informs her that he created a romantic subroutine for the relationship.

 Meanwhile, the Enterprise is approaching an M-class planet within the nebula. Picard enters his ready room and finds his belongings scattered on the floor. He calls in Worf, who cannot explain their displacement. Jenna arrives at Data's cabin where he is painting. She tells him to continue, but is then annoyed when he does so, causing him some confusion. The ship arrives at the coordinates for the planet but finds nothing there. Then it suddenly appears as the ship's computer warns of a depressurization in the observation lounge. The crew investigate and find all the furniture piled in one corner of the room.

 Data visits Jenna, but she seems unhappy and he is acting erratically in order to find an appropriate response to make her happy. It becomes evident to the crew that the nebula is causing distortions in space; Picard orders the ship into warp to leave the nebula as quickly as possible but this speeds up the distortions. Whilst investigating them, Lieutenant Van Mayter is killed when a distortion embeds her into the deck. Data discovers that dark matter is causing the distortions. The ship can detect the pockets at short range, but not in enough time to move out of the way. Worf proposes using a shuttle to lead the Enterprise out, and Picard insists on piloting it alone.

 Picard pilots the shuttle through the field of distortion pockets; he is initially successful, but the shuttle is damaged near the perimeter of the nebula. Chief Miles O'Brien transports the Captain back to the ship before the shuttle is destroyed. However, the Enterprise is now near enough to the edge of the nebula to no longer need the shuttle to scout ahead, and they quickly depart. Afterwards, Jenna reveals to Data in his quarters that she broke up with her boyfriend because he was emotionally unavailable and then pursued Date because he was the same. Data realises that she is breaking up with him and explains that he will delete the subroutine. Jenna departs and Data is seemingly unperturbed, although his cat, Spot, jumps into his lap as if to comfort him.

Review:

This episode was Patrick Stewart’s directorial debut on the show, following on the heels of fellow cast member Jonathan Frakes taking a shot at directing during the previous season.  Like Frakes, Stewart was handed a Data episode to do, and in some respects it’s a good episode.  In others, it’s less brilliant, specifically having a techno-babble B-plot thrown in because TNG was very much enslaved to the idea that the character always had to have an enemy or an anomaly putting them at risk, regardless of whatever else might be going on.  This plot doesn’t inter-connect with the A-plot except for both things happening in the same episode, and it includes Picard playing shuttle pilot when he’s not really the TNG character of note by way of piloting skills.  In fact, TNG and DS9 never really had a definitive helm officer in the way that the original series had Sulu and Voyager had Tom Paris, which when you have to do an episode with this kind of B-plot is a bit of a must.

 However, the meat of the episode is Data making forays into the world of romantic relationships, and to some degree I appreciate how some of his behaviours in this area are quite autistic.  His asking around the majority of the main cast and Guinan for advice, his inability to pick up relationship skills ‘on the fly’, and his emulation of stereotypical romantic interactions rather than just being himself are all things I can see someone on the spectrum doing.  Hell, I’ve done them all in my own unique way, and I can’t help but cringe a little reflecting on that.

 However, Data is only able to go so far both with his relationship and with his representation of the autistic mindset in this scenario because he lacks emotion.  I understand that this was meant to be the point; according to Memory Alpha, a lot of original series fan mail for Spock was from women who felt they could reach the character’s suppressed emotional core.  This episode was born of a fascination with this aspect of fandom, only it was written to see if a romantic relationship could work with a being who was hard-wired not to feel any emotion, to really explore the ‘ghost in the machine’ concept through Data.

 This, for me, is where the episode’s main plot really loses efficacy, because by definition a romantic relationship requires emotion, and as such Data was never going to succeed.  Frankly, I’d rather have seen them hold this plot off until the films when Data is finally given license to have emotions.  It would have been great to see Data have a romantic relationship then, because it would have been a more complete, well-rounded exploration of his status as an autism metaphor within the world of Trek.  As it is, characters like Voyager’s Doctor and Seven of Nine end up serving better in this capacity.

 It’s also disappointing to see that, not unlike some of my own early experiences in romance, Data isn’t being approached out of a genuine romantic interest on the part of Jenna.  To her, he’s basically a re-bound fling; she’s struggling with being single again, keeps having to be reminded why this is so, and tries to make something happen with Data to ‘fill the void’.  It’s not unlike how some girls used to pretend to go out with me to test, and mock, my gullibility, and for me it’s right up there with people who go out with someone just to avoid being single (done that), or to get something else like a roof over their head or cash.  To my mind, no one should ever do anything like this; if you want a romantic relationship with someone, it should be real romance or nothing.

 If you want a fling, a rebound or anything similar, then you seek out something more casual like friends-with-benefits, and you say that’s what you want up-front.  Leading people on is never ok, and it seems to me it only happens because of neurotypical selfishness and unwillingness to talk about you want before anything happens. The model of discussion-first-action-second is something that already exists within certain forms of sex play, and it’s probably going to gain wider and wider use over time for consent in general, and it’s exactly the kind of thing that would not only make all relationships more autism-friendly, but it would also vastly reduce the potential for being misled.

 What would have improved this episode, aside from Data actually having emotions, would have been to see the female guest character seek him out just from general attraction with no recent ex being mentioned, and perhaps having the B-Plot put the A-Plot characters in danger more directly.  That would have helped the B-Plot gain some additional worth and would have created a dramatic scene that would have more conclusively answered the ‘ghost in the machine’ question around Data.  As it is, it’s a middling episode and a poor showing for something Data-centric; I give it 5 out of 10.

Episode 26: Redemption (Part 1)

Plot (as adapted from Wikipedia):

Captain Picard and the Enterprise are asked to attend the installation of Gowron as the Leader of the Klingon High Council, as it is Picard’s final duty as the Arbiter of Succession. Gowron intercepts the Enterprise en route and informs Picard that the House of Duras will challenge Gowron's position, which may lead to a Klingon civil war. Picard states he cannot intervene beyond his role as arbiter, and asks Worf to escort Gowron to the transporter room. There, Worf informs Gowron of the truth about his discommendation; Gowron thanks Worf for killing Duras, but explains that he cannot clear Worf’s name because he needs the support of the council, many of whom are loyal to Duras. Worf then requests a leave of absence from Picard to visit his brother, Kurn, who controls a small fleet of Birds of Prey, and to urges him to back Gowron. Worf plans to use this support as leverage so that once installed as the Leader, Gowron can reinstate their family name.

 Interrupting the ceremony, the Duras sisters present their deceased brother's illegitimate son, Toral, who has the lineage to challenge Gowron. Picard is called on to determine Toral's candidacy. Relying on Klingon law, Picard comes to the conclusion that Toral is too inexperienced to be Leader, and secures Gowron's candidacy. This, however, prompts a majority of the council members to abandon Gowron. Gowron returns to his ship to meet with Worf, who offers his brother's fleet's support in exchange for the return of his family name to honor. Gowron initially refuses, but they are attacked by two ships loyal to the House of Duras. Worf and the arrival of Kurn's fleet dispatch the attackers. Picard completes the rite and installs Gowron as Leader; Gowron restores Worf's family honor.

Gowron and the Enterprise crew learn that the Duras sisters are assembling a fleet to incite a civil war. As the Federation cannot get involved in internal affairs of the Klingon Empire, Worf resigns his commission from Starfleet to assist Gowron and Kurn. As the Enterprise evacuates the area before fighting begins, Toral and the Duras sisters consider Picard a coward, but their Romulan ally, a woman bearing an uncanny resemblance to the late Tasha Yar, emerges from the shadows and warns them that Picard may return.

Review:

Apparently, this episode was originally planned as the season 3 cliff-hanger finale, but had to be delayed because those working on the show who wanted this episode really had to fight for it.  Apparently, Gene Roddenberry didn’t want to do any kind of war stories, even if that war was internal to the Klingons and not something the Federation got involved in.  Granted, I don’t think this episode could be as good as it is without everything leading up to it, and part of that groundwork lays here in the fourth season as well as the third and second.  Nevertheless, it seems that once again Roddenberry was taking his idealism one step too far, and I’m guessing him having to step back from production of the show due to increasingly ill health around this time was the only reason we got this episode.

 Being only one part of a larger story, of course, the episode loses out a little for not being quite as self-contained as it otherwise would be as a one-part episode.  However, it delivers a lot for part 1 of a two-part narrative; we finally see Worf get his discommendation lifted and Gowron take command of the Klingon Empire, only to then see Worf resign his commission when Picard won’t wade into the civil war, even though we all know by now Picard should realise it’s not even remotely an all-Klingon affair.  Picard and Worf are well aware that the Duras family are thick as thieves with the Romulans, and they’ve had the recent events of ‘The Mind’s Eye’ to illustrate to them that dividing the Federation and Klingon Empire is high on their agenda.  Surely Picard should have been able to put 2 and 2 together in this part and sided with Gowron outright, rather than appearing to cling to the Prime Directive.

 This is where TNG, and Trek as a whole, falls down a little; it can’t seem to come up with a consistent approach to the Prime Directive.  Some episodes it gets broken, others it gets adhered to, and at times you’ll get a non-adherence for a situation that in a later or earlier episode saw the rule being upheld. Back in season 1, Picard was willing to dare the wrath of the Edo’s ‘god’ to save Wesley Crusher from execution, but in this episode, Picard won’t act to save Worf when Gowron’s ship gets fired upon. Both times someone from the Enterprise was in danger, so surely Picard should take the same actions, but he doesn’t. I can’t tell if this meant to be a follow-on from ‘The Drumhead’ and they stupidly cut out some exposition where Picard says ‘we have to be extra careful now to avoid another Satie-style witch-hunt’, or if it’s just a lack of attention to continuity.

 For me, this episode really relies on Worf and Gowron to carry it, as Picard’s so-called ‘tightrope walking’ just makes him look decidedly unheroic and not a little ruthless.  Honestly, this episode would have benefited from a more Kirk-ian/Sisko-esque style of captain.  Overall, I give it 7 out of 10.

[supershanzykhan]

Checklist of successful holding of a | conference Comprehensive guide to holding seminars and conferences

Event Training

If you decide to hold a conference, you must start planning at least 6 months before the conference starts. (For larger conferences, it's best to start planning a year ago.) Don't worry and stay with us, in fact, planning and organizing the conference is something that can be done in a few steps, you're not the first to hold a conference. There is no need to search multiple articles This guide will teach you the tips of holding conferences in a few steps. This paper has been prepared at a very high level and collected with the experiences of Gersha Sound team. In this article, using valuable points, your job is easier to hold a meeting.

Ready to start planning a conference?

Step 1: Specify the meeting topic

Every conference requires a topic. Firstly, you need to determine what the topic of the conference is and what is the keyword that is relevant to the topic? Keyword helps you build relationships between speakers and participants e.g. "hospital management" is better keyword the same as the meeting topic. It is better to create a specific logo for the conference to be used in advertising, posters and banners. And to create meeting-themed hashtags on social media so that participants can connect with each other with that hashtag.

Step 2: Assemble your team

Presumably, you can't organize a full conference on your own. (In fact, if that were the case, we would be shocked). You need a dedicated group to accept responsibilities for various aspects of planning, negotiations and promotion. Your main group will likely include:

Conference Planning Group Duties

Planning Group:

Conference venue, accommodation, activities, reception.

Management Group:

Budgeting, participant registration, ticket sales.

Marketing Department:

Contact the media, create promotional materials, manage websites, blogs and social media activities.

Support group:

Responsible for providing sponsors, applying for donations and fundraising. (Only for conferences that emphasize external financial resources)

Volunteers:

Help with all activities on conference day: door management, ticket scanning, guest list tracking, security, guiding people, etc.

Your main goal is to coordinate the group, set priorities and award your tasks.

Step 3: Prepare the Budget and Business Plan

Whether or not your conference is sponsored is important and you need to combine the funding. You need to know where your money comes from and spent. Having a budget will also help you determine the cost of attending the conference. The most common things you want to use for a budget are:

Conference Venue

Accommodation for guests and speakers

Transportation

Catering

Speakers Cost

Activities

Marketing

Team members

Preparing funds for realistic estimates when searching for locations and speakers will be helpful.

Step 4: Find sponsors and donations [optional]

If you are doing this conference on your own and are not looking for external sources of income, you can take this step safely.

If not, you want to look for sponsors. The key thing to keep in mind is that sponsors and their values should be in line with the theme of your conference. (Find the sponsors who have the most in common between the topic of their activity and the topic of the conference) Decide how much sponsors are involved in how you run your conference. Do you allow your brand and logo to be on ads or conference banners? Will they be able to bring their speakers to the meeting?

Remember: This is a good balance between receiving funds and maintaining the integrity of your conference. You are the judge of where you draw this line.

Step 5: Conference Execution Date

Now is the time to determine the timing of your conference. As mentioned earlier, the scheduled date must be every 6 months to 1 year before the date of the holding. You also need to specify how long the conference will take (how many days it takes)?

Here are some great tips to keep in mind:

Choose a date that doesn't interfere with other major events, such as festivals. There are a wide range of events around the world that make booking flights more expensive or even sometimes ban transportation altogether. In addition, you don't want to trouble your conference due to the big events that take place in the history of your conference. When people tend to travel nowruz and summer holidays, it is better not to hold a conference. Never hold a conference over the weekend. For most participants, attending the conference is part of their job, so put the program throughout the working week. Try to finish the session by the end of the week, so that the participants who traveled to attend the conference have the opportunity to explore. The worst days for a conference are Thursday and Friday.

Step 6: Conference Venue

Once the date has been set, you can start looking for your available locations that meet your needs.

In general, locations may be divided into three categories:

Universities:

Universities are generally suitable for smaller, academic events and are relatively cheap to rent.

Hotels:

Hotels usually have conference and food facilities. And the best choices are among all options as hotels offer accommodation and conference space, as well as the cost of holding conferences at the hotel far outweighs the rest of the options.

Conference Halls:

Many conference halls are suitable for conferences

But the cost of the venue is just one part of the puzzle. Here are a few other factors to consider the right location together.

Size:

Booking a very small place where everyone has to be squeezed in a small room is clearly a bad idea. Or vice versa a very large place for a modest population, not only will it damage your wallet but also make the conference look empty and weak.

Location:

The best choice is a somewhat hotel location so that the conference attendees can be more focused. It is even better to have a peaceful venue and a beautiful environment and a place to relax.

Atmosphere:

It's very important that the venue matches the theme of the meeting you don't want to host a business conference inside a large gym, for example.

Facilities:

Does the venue and conference room style suit your needs? Do it have the necessary facilities such as smaller rooms for meetings?

Stay:

Is the conference venue close to the residence of speakers and attendees?

Food:

Can the venue provide everyone's food? If not. Is there a place for catering companies?

Transportation:

Is it easy for participants to find a public transport vehicle to the venue? Is there enough parking for those who own a vehicle?

Technical aspects:

Does the venue have the right IT, audio and video equipment? You need projector screens or urban TV, microphones, lots of charging sockets for participants, etc.

Quick tip:

If you find a great location that suits your budget, see if you can rent the lounge at a lower cost and with a multi-year contract (if you hold a recurring conference).

Step 7: Catering Type

Typically, catering is very important in conferences. If you have a foreign guest, you should be more careful about choosing the type of reception.

Decide what kind of drink you want to make and serve a few times at the conference. Take an hour for lunch and 15 to 20 minutes for coffee and snacks. Keep in mind: If you have enough funds, it's best to choose other foods for meals instead of sandwiches and fast food.

Be sure to make sure that the catering company can handle the logistics on the day of the event. The best thing to do is to find a local company close to the conference venue to avoid problems and delays related to possible traffic.

Don't forget that the food broker needs to know the number of ultimate employees, menu and each specific diet item.

Make a list of other services you think you may need, such as a decorative service company or IT equipment suppliers, to make your event perfect.

Step 8: Select the Speaker  

This step may be more important than the rest. Your speakers are the stars of your conference. You want to use speakers to attract participants and ensure a professional experience.

One sure way to gain traction in guests is to invite a great speaker for the first time. Someone who has been very exposed to recognition and respect. This strengthens your credibility in the eyes of other potential speakers.

Start looking for thoughtful people who focus on the same topics as your conference. Make a priority list of the capable speakers you want to invite. Then start calling and finding their email.

Here are a few:

Compensation: Does it require a high cost for the speaker?

Support equipment: Does their presentation rely on special equipment?

Special conditions: Do they have a specific diet?

Is there a need for transportation and accommodation for them?

Be sure to work with the list because you need to schedule the time allocated to each speaker.

But wait for the final list! You have a number of backup speakers for the time of cancellation of priorities as Plan B.

You can also consider hiring some local speakers. In this case, you save money on transportation.

Courtesy:Event Planner & Organizer in Lahore

[8586prcaticetobystevenson]

My specialist practice

What is an animated VFX artist?

An animated visual effects artist usually specialises in creating and or manipulating imagery or video using computers then adding them into live action shots to give the illusion that someone or something real is interacting with something else that if done using no technology would be much more difficult to do. Timing and physics also play a crucial role in VFX as they’re required to help achieve the most realistic effect.

Common materials and techniques used in VFX

Software used in VFX often has to have the capability to work with 3D software and multiple layers, these softwares include but are not limited to 3D Max, After Effects, Boujou, Cinema 4D, Maya and Nuke.

Common techniques include green screening where something or someone is filmed performing an action in front of a screen of one colour. Due to the green screen, the action in front of the screen can be put onto its own layer then placed in front of another background. Motion tracking is often used also but for more when someone or something real is to interact with an object, motion tracking can also be used to edit the position, scale, orientation, and overall motion.

Matte painting is used to combine two or more different images/scenes into one such as placing actors into background images. Often used to create the illusion of a setting and is used in almost all live-action films. Matte paintings are now often created in computer programs but originated as actual paintings which were added to photographs. 

Physical simulators are used to create dynamic simulations which are often very hard to pull off and are common amongst big budget movies such as 2012.

Rotoscoping is another technique used by VFX artists where something real is recorded and the artist goes over the object or character to get the correct motion and be able to be as accurate as possible. 

History of VFX and How long it has been practised

VFX first started to be used in films since the late 1800s, although not digital, props were used to change how something appeared, for example, Georges Méliès would use cloth or card to cover part of the camera lens to prevent light reaching areas of the film.

In 1975 Industrial light and magic founded by George Lucas used computers to create VFX in the movie Star Wars. the computers would be used to control the cameras and remember the movements used by the VFX teams. This was done so that a camera not in motion wouldn’t have to be surrounded by moving objects to create the same effect. So far Industrial light and magic have worked on over 300 films which gained them vast amounts of experience to make their VFX look more realistic than before.

In 1982 for the film Tron computer animation was used to help develop the plot and characters. Tron also used an effect called backlit animation which shined light and therefore, creating a glowing light on the characters and the background.

For movies such as planet of the apes and Godzilla, actual people in costumes and sometimes animatronics would be used to form characters as this would still look the most believable at the time. Decades later during the remakes of the movies, full-motion tracking was used to create the character’s appearance.

This method goes far back as 1938 where the voice actors for Snow White would also act out the scenes in front of the animators to give them a better understanding of how certain actions would be carried out.

21st century VFX -

colour grading -

Although colour grading had been used in previous movies for large shots and in some scenes it was during the 2000s that this is when a full movie was colour graded using computers. Now almost all movies have colour grading created digitally to create certain atmospheres and moods.

Water -

Before the 2000s it was near impossible to create water that looked fully believable but during 2000 industrial light magic created a solution to combine the two approaches of calculating particle by particle and considering all of the fluid at once. This required the use of volume calculations for larger portions of the water and droplet type simulation for when they broke down. This technique was first debuted in the 2000 film The Perfect Storm.

Artificial Intelligence -

This method was first used in The Lord Of The Rings to generate large battle sequences instead of hiring thousands of actors. Each character would be randomised with their size, proportions, and outfits all being different. Each character would then be given a range of actions for them to perform in a time frame.

Universal capture -

Multiple 3D scannings of the actor speaking and/or carrying out actions from different angles would be recorded where each different pixel would be motion tracked. This would allow the VFX designers to apply the same face to 3D models.

Live rendering technology -

This technique was first used on the film Avatar which took over 10 years to make, this technique allowed James Cameron to stage his motion-captured actors and in real time watch the simplified CGI performances created from their movements. This technique changed the VFX industry so guessing and measuring weren’t needed as there was real-time feedback.

Avatar was also the first film to involve a motion tracked dummy camera which would be used to control a virtual camera so operators could film scenes and watch them at the same time on their monitors.

How is my specialism practised today?

VFX is used almost all of the time in different media such as games, animation, and most if not all live action films. In films specifically, it’s important that they do well at the box office as it keeps the VFX industry afloat, research reveals that this is not in danger as in the U.S. and Canada alone they earned $11.8 billion in ticket sales for 2017 and in 2018 $11.9 billion. All of the top 10 highest grossing films in the U.S. were either VFX heavy or computer-animated films. Many of the most popular streaming shows also relied heavily on the use of VFX. VFX is being used more and more within movies, to compare the Titanic in 1997 only had a total of around 300 VFX shots and Infinity War in 2018 had over 3000 which has become the standard. This creates more jobs to work on the films and also higher wages for the VFX supervisors as the budget becomes a lot larger and having them supervise more artists.

New technologies are also being created to be used by artists to design virtual reality visuals and general 360 videos so it’s common for artists and coders who also work on the team to learn the new software and use it to their advantage.

The future of the VFX industry -

It’s expected that demand for VFX will increase over time as more movies with higher budgets are made, it’s also thought that the industry will focus more on creating more realistic CG human characters which can replace the actor, the best example of this happening now would be the CG Paul Walker in Furious 7 in 2015. However, as demand increases the technology will also develop causing workers to have to be up to date and learning the new software. A lot of people also do VFX as a second job as the financial intake can be unstable.

The people in the VFX industry

The general income - 

It mainly depends on how much experience one has in the industry and where the workplace is located. Within the first year, it’s expected to be only around £15,000 to £17,000. From one to three years in the industry, the average salary is to be around £27,000. A mid-level artist with four to seven years experience can earn around £38,000. And a senior VFX artist with over seven years could make around £54,000. These numbers are just by experience but there are multiple other factors which can affect the income of an artist such as the role they carry out.

The roles - 

Runner - 

Using VFX to create multiple outcomes for a company is all about teamwork comprised of people at different levels. When first going into the VFX industry it’s likely the person will start off in the “Runner�� role which is an entry-level position. Runners are just general helpers at the studio with duties that may not be technical but can practice and learn from the more experienced VFX artists. This role normally is more common amongst people who may not have a somewhat relevant degree in the industry but have a decent portfolio that portrays their passion and interest for VFX. Runners only tend to make around £15,000 to £17,000 per year until they’re promoted which can take a few months or a few years.

VFX artist - 

The next level is where you would find the artists who carry specify in certain areas such as rotoscoping, matte painting, 3D modelling, compositing artists and prep artists just to name a few. These are the main people behind the actual visuals for a project using their skills either learnt from a degree or taught from the previous artists when runners. At this stage, people would make around the amount of £25,000 to £30,000 depending on the company. 

VFX Director - 

Above the main artists are the directors. There are many different types of directors, for example, a pipeline director uses their coding skills to come up with scripts for the artists to use. A shader development director uses their skills to write codes to describe where and how lighting reflects from 3D objects onto different materials. Some directors specialise in rigging by also possibly creating the textures and muscle structure for certain characters. Another type of director goes by the title “assistant technical director” who maintains tools and scripts as well as helping out the artists when needed, they also render out quick time videos for people in higher stages or clients to review. The average salary of a VFX director varies from £40,000 to £60,000 depending on the role.

Production coordinator -  

The next stage goes by the title of a production coordinator which is a specific role often not carried out by people who have worked in previous lower roles. The production coordinator’s job is to collect data and updates on tasks and feedback to work in progress. They pass along information from the client to the rest of the company and vice versa, this could be the idea of changing deadlines. The average salary of the production coordinator sits around £25,000 to £30,000 which is one of the reasons why this stage is not offered very often to lower roles. 

VFX producer - 

The producer works very closely to the person/people of the highest role to manage the whole VFX production process, defining what sources are needed and hiring new VFX artists and staff. They have to be able to listen to the client requirements and listen to the needs of the artists. The average salary for a VFX producer is between £50,000 and £70,000.

VFX supervisor - 

The supervisors in larger studios take charge over individual departments such as a CG supervisor. Normally there are also supervisors over the whole VFX production who are normally hired by the directors of the TV show or movie or by the VFX company they work for that has been asked to carry out the production. A supervisor will have years upon years of experience with strong artistic, technical, and communication skills. The average salary of a VFX supervisor is between £80,000 and £120,000 depending on multiple things such as the size of the project or actual worth of the supervisor if they have a lot of credit to their name.

VFX pipeline and workflow - 

Stage one, pre-production - 

Research and development -

The first stage is research and development where it’s figured out which software/s and technique/s will be used along with how long it will take so they can estimate a deadline time to tell the client. During this stage, it’s taken into consideration what plugins will have to be used, a lot of plugins for films with a larger budget have to custom built and it’s normally the programmers, artists, mathematicians, and scientists who develop these tools to use for the rest of the project.

Pre-Visualization -

Pre-visualisation is where rough sketches and storyboards are converted into quick low quality 3D animated backgrounds to help give the directors of the project and idea of how the final piece could look.

Stage two, production -

3D modelling -

This process happens during all three stages of the production with different amounts of detail being developed depending on the stage the team are on. Like mentioned previously if the team are on stage one low-quality 3D models will be used and then perhaps built upon from there if the design looks workable.

Matte Painting -

Although most of the background is already 3D modelling, matte paintings are still used for certain aspects in the far distance such as buildings or sky colours. Matte Paintings can also give an idea to the 3D modellers for how the scene could look.

Reference photography - 

During the recording process of the actors, certain VFX members will be on set to take pictures of the stage, props and the actors themselves for reference. These images can be used for the artists to think of possible sizes and textures and see how it can react with the light source/s depending on where it’s coming from.

Stage three, post-production - 

Scene preparation - 

Scene preparation is to prepare the provided footage for elements to be inserted in. This could be done by motion tracking, rotoscoping, keying or colour correcting.

Motion tracking - 

Motion tracking tracks the 3D motion of the footage to simulate the camera movement so objects can be placed into scenes convincingly. Without this VFX that gets implemented whilst the camera is moving wouldn’t look as convincing and wouldn’t look seamless.

Colour correcting - 

Colour correcting is the process of adjusting the light and colour profile on objects. This has to be done per shot to make the effect look consistent. 

Colour grading - 

This is something that’s carried out at the end of the project to also highlight certain areas but as well give the piece a more polished and finished look.

Rigging - 

Rigging is to make the motion look far more realistic, an example of this would be making the limbs of a person rotate around the joints.

Animators - 

Animators are the people who give the motion to the rigged objects to help portray the character's personality.

Polishing effects - 

Effects and simulation - 

The simulations mainly consist of explosions, smoke, and water which are made to be as realistic and believable as possible. Adding these effects requires a good understanding of physics and how certain forces could impact the look.

Texturing - 

This is the step where surface colours and textures to the 3D models are added, this could be to give a certain metallic shine or just the look of human skin.

Final lighting - 

Lighting is one of the most important stages of the whole project as poor lighting could be an easy giveaway that CGI has been used and make the piece look less believable. Because light during the day is much harder to replicate most of the shots where CGI is used is set at night.

Compositing - 

Compositing is the final stage where all the created assets are put into the original recording with the actors by the compositor and the visuals for the project is complete. 

Some key “individuals” in the VFX industry - 

For my first “individual” I have decided to focus more on a company rather than a specific person for my research of as it would be easier to track the process with VFX not generally being carried by just one person.

The company hires more than 1,000 staff from VFX supervisors to Scientists to create the most realistic display, a lot of the VFX supervisors have multiple degrees to have the best understanding of how the industry works and what creates the best effect, for example, Habib Zargarpour has two bachelor’s degrees, one being in applied science and mechanical engineering and the other being for industrial design. Zargarpour was also the main person behind the water look used in The Perfect Storm as already mentioned. 

The process of how one of their films gets created goes as such;

The script gets written

Sets of storyboards are created for each individual shot, if two characters are talking to each other and the camera focuses on one character then the other this would be considered two separate shots, this can cause a film to easily accumulate over 2500 shots. A lot of the time also during this stage very basic 3D animatics are generated carrying out the whole storyline then shown to the director/s to get confirmation that they have the correct ideas before more time is spent developing.

The film team then splits into several groups with one focussing on the designing and construction of the set. Another group starts the research and development process for the elements for the CG shots. Another group starts preparing all the shots for any scenes involving stunts. One group that focuses on the physical aspects such as animatronics to be used in the film. And the last of the groups prepare the cameras, lights, and sound equipment for different shots in the film.

The actual recordings for the film are then carried out.

CG elements and live action elements are added with some of the footage being removed such as cables and lights.

All of the shots and recordings captured are then placed together to create the story.

Possible sound effects are added and exaggerated.

Light and Magic example - 

Key Individual -

For my individual, I have decided to research Joe Letteri born in Pennsylvania, The United States during 1957. Letteri has worked on numerous films such as Avatar with James Cameron, War for the Planet of the Apes, King Kong (2005), as well as multiple Lord of the Rings sequels, for some of these movies and more Letteri has won four Academy Awards, four BAFTA awards and four VES awards.

Joe Letteri would work closely with the director and producer of the film (as a VFX supervisor should) to create the best looking final project. Letteri would sort out which VFX is needed for each shot which would impact how the footage would be recorded. Next, Letteri would then work with his team to create a simple prototype animatic for the director and producers to examine.

Once the ideas of the designs are approved by the director and the producer, Letteri would work with the director to plan every shot during the film, this would require certain footage to be recorded in different ways as it would make the process for the VFX artists much easier.

Letteri would often rotate between set and studio (if not using live render technology as previously mentioned) to make sure that the techniques and technologies are being deployed correctly until the project is complete. 

The role that Letteri fills requires a thorough understanding of 3D animation software and a very good understanding of current filmmaking techniques. Finally, Letteri needs good team leadership skills to be able to supervise a large team effectively with clear communication.

Joe Letteri work example  - 

Example of work from an independent (Samuel VIčan) -

Looking at the three different examples of work it’s clear that it’s more of a long haul task with most of the time multiple people working on one project at once and if being carried out by an individual the quality of the final outcome will generally be lower than that of a team. 

It’s also apparent that lighting, environment and good camera angles are taken into consideration when creating the visuals and play a larger role than I once thought.

General mood board containing different lighting, environments and textures -

Sources -

History of VFX - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tsDdAXKtYAE

21st century VFX - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0cPeEAhzWU

VFX Pipeline - https://myfirstjobinfilm.co.uk/resources/careers-guide/detail?page_id=1

Jobs in VFX - https://www.screenskills.com/careers/job-profiles/animation-games-and-vfx/vfx/

VFX techniques and process - https://www.premiumbeat.com/blog/how-an-average-vfx-pipeline-works/

Light and Magic research - https://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/perfect-storm1.htm

[netunleashed-blog]

No Man's Sky Next Update's Biggest Changes: Multiplayer, Xenomorphs, Freighters, And More

http://www.internetunleashed.co.uk/?p=21942 No Man's Sky Next Update's Biggest Changes: Multiplayer, Xenomorphs, Freighters, And More - http://www.internetunleashed.co.uk/?p=21942 Hello Games has launched the new update for No Man's Sky, called Next. The free update makes massive overhauls to the game by adding multiplayer, character customization, command freighters, and visual upgrades. Next is the fourth major update to No Man's Sky, following Foundation, Pathfinder, and Atlas Rises. However, it is perhaps the most substantial of them all, and we're continuing to find more and more as we spend more time with it.No Man's Sky originally launched on PS4 and PC in August 2016, and was harshly criticized for a perceived lack of content. Although multiple updates have since expanded the number of activities that players can do, Sony management admits the PR strategy "wasn't great" and No Man Sky designer Sean Murray acknowledged that he made "mistakes."Despite the initial backlash at launch, No Man's Sky's updates have slowly earned the game a growing playerbase. "One day I hope to reach a point where I feel No Man's Sky is 'finished,' but luckily there's still so much more we want to do," Murray said.The major changes in No Man's Sky Next are outlined below, but you can read the full patch notes and bug fixes on No Man's Sky's blog. Though it's not in the patch notes, Murray tweeted out that Next also allows players to command their in-game avatar to sit down--a feature that players have been asking for. Perhaps a few more playful secrets are hidden within the game's newest update. We do now that a new patch is already on the way to fix problems that have emerged, as are weekly updates to keep things fresh. We'll keep you updated as we learn about more.Multiplayer And Character CustomizationMultiplayer is the largest change to No Man's Sky. Though it was never confirmed whether multiplayer would be included prior to launch, many players wished to explore the galaxy with their friends however they wanted. Next adds a lot of the mechanics those players wanted, as well as a few more.You can now join up with random strangers, or team up with a small contingent of friends to construct colonies of small shelters, race exocraft, or engage in space battles against other players. You'll be able to team up with friends right from the start, as the multiplayer extends to No Man's Sky's story and tutorial missions.To help differentiate between avatars, Next adds character customization so that everyone can personalize their in-game appearance. You'll be able to switch up your race and change your outfits too. Depending on the species of your character, you'll even be able to change your hairstyle. Next allows players to be a Gek, Vy’keen, Korvax, Traveller, or Anomaly.Not every player you meet is a friendly face, so when you run into another player in the midst of exploring the stars, it's best to be cautious. Although a stranger could be a harmless passerby or a future ally, Next allows players to prey on others to survive. A collection of ships approaching on the horizon might be a crew of players acting as space pirates who rely on the stolen loot of others.You need a javascript enabled browser to watch videos.Getting Ready for No Man's Sky's Next Update Please use a html5 video capable browser to watch videos. This video has an invalid file format. Sorry, but you can't access this content!Please enter your date of birth to view this videoJanuaryFebruaryMarchAprilMayJuneJulyAugustSeptemberOctoberNovemberDecember12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031Year20182017201620152014201320122011201020092008200720062005200420032002200120001999199819971996199519941993199219911990198919881987198619851984198319821981198019791978197719761975197419731972197119701969196819671966196519641963196219611960195919581957195619551954195319521951195019491948194719461945194419431942194119401939193819371936193519341933193219311930192919281927192619251924192319221921192019191918191719161915191419131912191119101909190819071906190519041903190219011900 By clicking 'enter', you agree to GameSpot's Terms of Use and Privacy PolicyenterBuilding And CraftingYou'll be able to invite your friends onto your very own command freighter to tackle challenging multiplayer missions. If you're still having trouble, you'll be able to build and upgrade a whole fleet of frigates, which you can then customize to specialize in combat, exploration, trade, industry, or support.You can use what you've found to build bases, which can now be built anywhere on any planet. You'll even be able to build on top of mountains and beneath the sea. And if you don't like how the terrain is affecting the shape of your base, the improved terrain manipulator allows players to sculpt the planet's surface to their needs. The manipulator can be used to excavate ancient treasures too, which can be sold in the new Space Station Marketplace.There are hundreds of new base parts that allow you to build bases that are larger and more complex so you can construct your perfect hideout. Next also lets players own multiple bases and place teleporters anywhere so travel goes much faster.The resources used to customize your fleet and bases, as well as craft your gear and equipment, have all been reworked and rebalanced. Many of the resources you remember from the original No Man's Sky have received new names and been given completely different uses. Planetary resources have been expanded, and a planet's biome, weather, and classification have a much larger effect on what type of materials you'll find there.To help you excavate the larger amounts of materials you'll discover, the deployable tech used in resource collection can now be easily picked up and carried in your inventory. The improved analysis visor makes it easier to locate terrain resources as well. You can also quickly find your bearings while exploring, thanks to visible latitude and longitude coordinates and the ability to tag points of interest with a marker.MissionsThe opening section of No Man's Sky has been updated with new story elements, as well as a tutorial that teaches you advanced gameplay features. Mission chains help get players started with exploring planets and starting bases.Once past the tutorial, new types of missions are available to complete. Exploring is still at the core of No Man's Sky, but new photography, feeding, freighter attack and defense, archaeology, and hunting missions expand the amount of activities that players can do. Players won't be getting all of their objectives from the same NPC either, as a diverse assortment of random NPCs on different stations offer missions.It Basically Has The Xenomorph From AlienThe update introduces a variety of new enemies to deal with, but perhaps the most terrifying and interesting of the bunch are what it refers to as Biological Horrors. As recounted on Twitter by Xalavier Nelson Jr., this essentially amounts to the Xenomorph from the Alien franchise. It sounds terrifying--and awesome, provided you don't mind dying.There Are Some Drab Planets Out ThereWhile the diversity of the geography you've encountered has changed, and there are many colorful, beautiful planets to explore, the update also adds some that are a bit different--but nonetheless striking. In our time with the update, we came across a planet that was largely devoid of color, almost to the point of being monochrome. You can take a peek at it above. Patch NotesHello Games has released detailed patch notes for Next that outline everything that's changed, including the extreme minutia. Beyond all of the major features above you can see adjustments to controls (like the ability to manually holster the Multi-Tool), the overhaul to space station interiors, bug fixes, and much more.Quality-of-Life ImprovementsWhile something like multiplayer is obviously the big draw of this update, there are smaller but still very appreciated changes and additions that players have been coming across. Case in point: one of the best is a tweak to pulse jumps, which previously would send your ship moving in a straight line. Now, you can use it to follow the curve of the planet you're in the atmosphere of, more or less allowing you to orbit the planet and more easily relocate to a different spot. Galactic AtlasJust prior to the Next update going live, Hello Games launched a new website called the Galactic Atlas. This is essentially a guide to a specific area of the game--the Euclid Galaxy--that Hello seeded but will leave in the hands of players to explore and grow. From the site, you can track the progress of the galaxy, highlight points of interest, and join hubs or factions.New VisualsThe visuals to No Man's Sky have also gotten an overhaul. Terrain generates faster and ground, water, and cloud textures have been upgraded. Ships, NPCs, and buildings have more detail too. No Man's Sky is also now fully playable in both first- and third-person, whether you're walking on the surface of a planet or soaring amongst the stars.Draw distance has been improved so planets appear more dense and a new colour palette paints the forests, oceans, and plains of each world with added vibrancy. The hazardous storms that can spell the doom of smaller aircraft use new biome-specific particle effects to look more dangerous than ever before.Fauna And FloraThe creatures you'll discover on your travels will now act more enthusiastically towards you if you feed them, letting you herd them together. The creatures' AI has also been revamped so they act more intelligently, responding to players they recognize as friendly and fleeing as a group from a perceived danger. Not all of the new animals and plantlife are friendly, however. Keep on the lookout for new hazardous species, as they will kill you if you're not careful.Release Date/TimeNo Man's Sky is available on PS4, PC, and Xbox One. Next is live on all platforms. Source link

[ntrending]

The sun will probably knock out the grid someday

New Post has been published on https://nexcraft.co/the-sun-will-probably-knock-out-the-grid-someday/

The sun will probably knock out the grid someday

Shortly after sunset on June 18, 2013, a woman drove her minivan onto Brighton Street in Belmont, Massachusetts. Her GPS told her to turn right. But the metallic voice, guided by satellite data, steered her wrong: onto a railroad track. She tried to drive off, but the van got stuck. No sooner had she ­unbuckled herself and her two kids and ushered them out than a train crumpled her car into a ball of foil. Not long after, someone sent a news story about the incident to space physicist Tamitha Skov. She didn’t just see a GPS acting up. She saw the sun acting up. While our star looks calm and contained, its ­surface roils: Spots form and darken it like scabs; loops of plasma link its regions; its atmosphere streams farther outward than the star is wide. Solar flares, which are bursts of radiation, and coronal mass ejections, which are bombs of stellar material, disturb both Earth’s magnetic field and upper atmosphere. There, they disrupt devices—like GPS ­receivers—that rely on electricity or radio communication. This interplay between the sun and Earth is called space weather, and it is Skov’s specialty.

At the time, Skov had just begun a Web ­video series that gave space-weather ­forecasts, much like the predictions Al Roker makes on TV for clouds and sunshine. In it, she explained how our nearest star affects Earth. She had a modest but engaged following. Motorists were already starting to tip her off whenever their SiriusXM service cut out, airline and small-craft pilots would tell her when navigation went awry, and taxi drivers would describe routing errors.

A number of these accounts involved drivers rolling, at the behest of their GPS, onto train tracks, or other not-roads, especially near dawn and dusk. At first, Skov blew off these anecdotes.

When the reports kept coming, she ­consulted an atmospheric expert at the ­Aerospace Corporation, a federally funded R&D center where Skov works as a research scientist. “What’s up with this?” Skov asked her colleague. “Is it something?” Yes, the woman replied, the atmosphere is always unstable at sunset and sunrise. Add solar flares to that? “It could definitely make a difference,” the expert said. Skov checked the website of the Lockheed Martin Solar and Astrophysics Laboratory to see if there had, in fact, been a solar flare around the time of the ­woman’s fateful drive. And there it was: a C-class ­outburst, medium strength.

No single small solar event—like this C-class flare—can yet be definitively linked to a specific problem, like a GPS device in a minivan leading its driver onto railroad tracks. Skov nonetheless calls incidents like this one smoking guns, even if scientists can’t conclusively prove the cause. She strives to make people aware that this kind of thing can happen. “I was trying to impress upon people that GPS is extremely susceptible,” she says of the van accident, “and just blindly trusting it is nuts.”

Space weather’s effects can be small or significant. The C-class solar flare was hardly noticeable, even if it did total the woman’s car. But there is also plenty of evidence that humans need to watch out for the sun—­big-time. So Skov dedicated herself to explaining the increasing terrestrial problems that will come from the star that lets us live on Earth in the first place. She became the Space Weather Woman, connecting her viewers to the cosmos and bringing all levels of space weather to all kinds of people.

The last time the sun really made people go uh-oh was on March 10, 1989. Astronomers watched as the star set loose a billion tons of gas at a million miles an hour—a coronal mass ejection—and blasted a solar flare along with it. The radiation, traveling at light-speed, struck Earth eight and a half minutes later. As it collided with the upper atmosphere, it charged up molecules, blocking radio ­communications at Earth’s upper latitudes, including from Europe into Russia, which at the time, listeners took as Cold War interference. The radio-frequency problems mostly affected ground-to-air and ship-to-shore communications, as well as shortwave-radio and amateur radio users.

The real problems came two days later, when a slower-moving swarm of magnetically charged material arrived. It pummeled Earth’s magnetic shield, which protects the globe from everyday radiation. Charged particles whizzed down magnetic-field lines and smashed into atoms in the air, ­producing Northern Lights. Usually those stay, you know, up north. But this time, the show played as far south as Texas. Satellites lost their bearings and tottered as particles bombarded their electronics. The storm stripped the GOES-7 weather satellite of half its solar cells, ­shortening its lifetime by 50 percent.

Earth’s shivering magnetic field also ­created ground currents. Coursing along, they encountered a flaw in Quebec’s power grid. It was easier for the current to flow through the power lines than across the rocky ground, and the extra load caused circuit breakers to trip. Around 3 a.m. on March 13, the whole province went dark.

It’s Quebec: It was cold—5 degrees ­Fahrenheit in some places. There was no heat. Schools and companies closed; public transit and the airport went still. The outage affected 6 million people for up to nine hours.

Today, modern society relies on exactly the devices that such a storm disrupts. A 2017 study in the American Geophysical Union’s Space Weather journal estimated the effect if a solar storm as great as the largest on record—an 1859 shakeup called the Carrington Event—were to strike again. It would cost the United States $42 billion per day. The repercussions could last years, perhaps decades. The power grid could fail. You wouldn’t be able to get money out of a bank. Businesses couldn’t operate. Water pumps wouldn’t work; phones either. Food would go bad. Governments would have a hard time governing. “We have created an incredible vulnerability, unlike any other,” says Bill Murtagh, program coordinator for the Space Weather Prediction Center, the celestial arm of the National ­Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, headquartered in Boulder, Colorado.

Solar disturbances were largely the ­concern of academics until 1994, when the federal government created the National Space Weather Program to support research into the storms. In 1996, scientists held the first space-weather workshop in Boulder. Since 2007, they have been meeting annually to discuss the latest research. Their reports, as well as ones from private industry, eventually alarmed the Obama White House, which in 2014 established a task force to devise a defensive strategy, coordinate government agencies and the private sector, and increase the quality of space-weather predictions.

There is a greater than 10 percent chance that a Carrington-scale event will ­happen within the next decade, according to a ­paper by Pete Riley of Predictive Science, a space-weather research company. That might sound like a small number, but it’s higher than the chance of a major ­earthquake hitting California.

Scientists like Murtagh and Skov follow the sun’s activity daily, so they see how it fiddles with tech in ways most of us fail to register. It is precisely because of that familiarity that they understand how serious even ­another Quebec-size event would be. Skov wants regular citizens to gain the same perspective. That’s why, under the alter ego of the Space Weather Woman, she details for them the ups and downs of the sun’s violent outbursts.

Skov has outfitted a DIY recording studio in her home in the San Fernando ­Valley, just far enough north of Los ­Angeles that you begin to think that maybe you’re somewhere else. At the end of a road steep enough to require using a parking brake, she’s a little closer to the sky than her neighbors. This fall morning, she’s been working on a new video about why people should care about how the sun’s behavior affects humans.

Skov stands in front of a big monitor paused on a frame showing Twitter statistics. We live, she says, in a brave new(ish) world. A solo space physicist can start her own branch of meteorology from a room right off her driveway. And she can also gather information—about aurorae, radio-communication problems, and GPS errors—from a global community.

She moves away from the monitor and ­toward her camera. A green screen hangs from the wall to her right. The room shines with synthetic illumination: A ring light—like a luminous Life Savers candy—encircles the camera; across the room, a warmer bulb beams against a drugstore umbrella spray-painted silver.

“GPS is extremely suscepible, and just blindly trusting it is nuts.”

Tamitha Skov

The studio dates to her grad-school days, when Skov studied space physics at UCLA, was part of a pop alternative rock band, and ran a production company recording other musicians. After she graduated, she kept the studio going as she started work at the Aerospace Corporation, which gives guidance to the military, space agencies, and the private sector on research and development and technology transfer. There, Skov studied space weather’s interactions with satellites. “I was beginning to get this big picture,” she says. “This isn’t ‘space weather’ as a cool term. This is space weather.” Outside her professional life, she pivoted from audio to video production.

All of it spun together in 2012, as she grew concerned about the sun’s threats. She took to Twitter, where people had questions—lots of them. And Skov had answers, sans jargon. “You put three words that are from the space-science field on Twitter, and you already walked all over your character limit,” she says. Soon, she began producing short videos and putting them on YouTube. Then came the nickname and her likeness superimposed on the sun: the Space Weather Woman. The style reads as intense: close-cropped shots of the sun’s flares that make the viewer feel less like it’s a mysterious object 93 million miles away and more like it’s right there with her—and so with them.

Initially, Skov kept her two identities ­separate. She used her married name in her forecasts and her maiden name on scientific papers. She thought the slimmed-down ­science might slam into the research community at the wrong angle. But peers found her anyway after a space physicist discovered her videos and sent them to a researcher listserv. Some scientists pointed out small inaccuracies. Others simply didn’t like her “loosey-goosey” language, which didn’t use their jargon, with its specific but impenetrable meanings. She took the legit criticism—it kept her honest, she says—and left the rest. “I think I’d rather be pelted with olives from scientists than pelted with olives from the public,” she says. Now, researchers too watch her forecasts, along with 27,000 Twitter followers and 11,000 YouTube subscribers. “There is really nothing like it around,” says Christian Moestl, a space-­weather scientist at the Austrian Academy of Sciences. “Her YouTube videos and Twitter feed are watched by both researchers and ­interested public to see what’s going on.”

Skov’s biggest fans are in the amateur-­radio community: people with handsets and ham licenses. Radio operators see space weather scrape across Earth in real time when their broadcasts get blocked or enhanced. Amateur radio operator Tom Crow first found her forecasts on a program called Ham Nation.

“Dr. Skov has a knack for explaining terms in detail without the feeling that it’s been dumbed down.”

Then there are the aurora tourists. Skov’s forecasts tell them where to go when. But that charge flows in both directions: Field reporters also tell Skov where the aurora is showing up. “People started informing each other, and the community began to build,” she says.

Skov believes that understanding how life on Earth is looped inextricably with our star can help people grok the import of the really, really big one. She draws a comparison to more-familiar weather forecasting. Humans grow up hearing about meteorological phenomena great and small. But that doesn’t happen with space weather. “It’s like trying to tell someone who’s never seen rain how dangerous a hurricane is,” she says.

Once people understand, they can ­prepare for extreme space weather as they do for any natural disaster: Have ­water supplies, extra gasoline, and nonperishable food, and make a plan for meeting up even if you can’t communicate. And have some board games, because this might take a while.

As the Space Weather Woman, Skov is at the vanguard of interpreting data from NASA satellites and observatories for regular folks. But when big entities like satellite operators, energy companies, and airlines need to know how the sun’s shine will affect them, they turn to the Space Weather Prediction Center, whose scientists scrutinize the data, looking for activity strong enough to cause friction with earthly objects.

Any time that happens, they send out alerts—categorized from one to five, with five being the highest—to utilities, satellite companies, and others. Toward the end of 2017 they did that around 100 times a month. With a warning, technicians can reroute electricity, reschedule communication, and delay satellite operations.

When the sun carries on in a big way, a subset of the scientists relocates to the High-Activity Room, a sealed-off spot where they talk with major players. There, the ­Federal Emergency Management ­Agency has its own internet-enabled video-­conferencing monitor, labeled like ­leftovers in an office refrigerator. FEMA needs to know what’s coming so it can prepare for the disruption a major power outage would cause, and to coordinate with operatives before a communications blackout occurs.“Communication is life or death,” Murtagh says.

In September, rescue workers got a taste of what it is like when the sun and Earth both create hurricanes. Just as Irma battered land, the sun sent out a series of flares and coronal mass ejections. High-frequency radio ­comms ceased in the storm-battered Caribbean. Hurricane Watch Net, made up of amateur radio operators, reported disruptions.

While this confluence didn’t add to the destruction, it could next time, especially as earthly storms come with more frequency and force, and are thus more likely to line up with a starburst. Just like with a Category 5 hurricane, there’d be no getting around a major solar event. All we could do is see it coming, get a sense of how bad and big it would be, and prepare to hunker down for a while.

Soon the Space Weather Prediction Center will gather the data to make more-precise predictions, with the launch this year of observatories like NASA’s Parker Solar Probe, which will fly closer to the sun than anything so far, and two additions to the sun-and-Earth-watching GOES satellite series in 2018 and 2020. Its scientists have also created a model that will make local space-weather reports possible. “The AccuWeathers of the world can take the information and make a tailored product,” Murtagh says.

Those space AccuWeathers are only in their infancy, but Skov can’t wait for them—and for the broadcasters and predictors and translators who will bring our star down to Earth for people. She’s working with the American Meteorological Society to create a space-weather-broadcast certification. She might be her discipline’s version of Al Roker, but even Al Roker needs local forecasters, standing in front of their own green screens, giving that quotidian space-weather report to a curious audience. “You say, ‘Imagine 10 to 100 times worse than this,’” she says. “And they go, ‘My god.’ It hits them. And they go: ‘I get it. I really get it.’”

Contributing editor Sarah Scoles is the author of Making Contact: Jill Tarter and the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence.

This article was originally published in the January/February 2018 Power issue of Popular Science.

Written By Sarah Scoles