#program: array the conductor

[forthedancingandthethriving]

Array and Scone! She does her best to make sure that everyone feels like that can trust them, because she'd just like the best for everyone.

[boooo0922]

Power Smart Buildings Using Kunliwelding Wire Solutions

When engineers look to balance strength, weight, and conductivity, they often turn to leading China Aluminum Alloy Wire Manufacturers for dependable conductors. These producers refine extrusion and drawing methods to deliver wire that handles bending and vibration without cracking. From electric vehicle frames to architectural lighting systems, projects benefit from materials that combine flexibility with corrosion resistance, ensuring both performance and longevity.

Urban landscapes continue to evolve, with designers specifying aluminum wiring for sleek façades and integrated illumination. Conductors that resist oxidation and maintain conductivity behind glass and steel envelopes help create eye-catching exteriors. Installers appreciate wire that threads smoothly through narrow conduits, reducing labor and preserving finish integrity when temperatures and building movements cause expansion.

In the electric mobility sector, weight savings are critical. Lightweight harnesses fabricated from fine-gauge aluminum strands improve efficiency and handling. Technicians report fewer clogs in wire-feeding systems when using high-purity conductors. Rapid assembly lines maintain pace as spools deliver consistent diameters, supporting lightweight battery enclosures and chassis components without sacrificing joint strength.

Renewable energy projects also rely on adjustable wiring solutions. Solar tracker arrays and microgrid controllers demand conductors that endure temperature swings and UV exposure. Flexible aluminum wire simplifies rooftop installations and tower hookups, enabling field crews to secure panels quickly. Strong resistance to weathering minimizes maintenance visits, making remote renewables more reliable over extended service lives.

Offshore and marine applications present unique challenges, as salt spray and vibration threaten joints. Corrosion-resistant aluminum wiring tailored for maritime use supports navigation aids, deck lighting, and dockside power pedestals. By specifying treated conductors, yards extend replacement intervals and improve operational safety in harsh sea environments, where durability can halt unforeseen downtime.

Automation facilities benefit from uniform conductor quality. Robotic feeders programmed for repetitive welds require wire that feeds without interruption. High-precision spools eliminate jams, reducing scrap and downtime. Production managers rely on steady arcs and predictable fusion to maintain tight tolerances on electronics enclosures and heavy machinery frames.

Educational workshops training the next generation of technicians integrate professional-grade wire into lab exercises. Students practice bending, crimping, and terminating conductors using materials they will encounter in the field. By familiarizing apprentices with reliable products, trainers lay the foundation for skilled work on global fabrication platforms and critical infrastructure projects.

Specialty fabricators restoring vintage vehicles and custom architectural elements choose aluminum wiring that blends performance with appearance. Conductors that deliver smooth beads and low-profile joins reduce finishing work. Antique frames and modern art installations alike benefit from wiring that enhances both structural integrity and visual appeal.

Whether powering smart city kiosks, electric buses, or renewable installations, organizations that partner with reputable China Aluminum Alloy Wire Manufacturers gain access to versatile conductors that support innovation. For a comprehensive selection tailored to your unique requirements, visit www.kunliwelding.com/product/ .

[hyphencables1212]

Leading Aerial Bunched Cable Manufacturers – Hyphen Cables

In the rapidly evolving power distribution sector, Aerial Bunched Cables Manufacturers have emerged as a safer, more reliable alternative to conventional overhead lines. Among the leading names in this domain, Hyphen Cables has carved a niche for itself through its commitment to quality, innovation, and customer-centric solutions.

What Are Aerial Bunched Cables?

Aerial Bunched Cables are overhead power lines where multiple conductors, including a neutral messenger, are bundled and insulated. This configuration significantly reduces the risk of electrical faults, power theft, and system failures, making ABCs an ideal choice for urban and rural power distribution.

Why Choose Hyphen Cables?

As a top-tier Aerial Bunched Cable manufacturer, Hyphen Cables brings years of expertise and technical excellence to the table. Here’s what sets them apart:

1. Advanced Manufacturing Facilities

Hyphen Cables operates with state-of-the-art equipment and rigorous quality control protocols. Their ABCs are engineered to withstand harsh environmental conditions, ensuring long-term reliability and safety.

2. Compliance with Industry Standards

Each product manufactured by Hyphen complies with national and international standards, including IS 7098 and IEC norms. This guarantees performance and safety in critical infrastructure applications.

3. Customizable Solutions

Understanding that every power network has unique needs, Hyphen offers customizable ABC solutions tailored for utilities, urban infrastructure projects, and industrial setups.

4. Sustainability and Cost-Efficiency

ABCs from Hyphen not only reduce transmission losses but also minimize maintenance costs and environmental impact. Their design helps in reducing the right-of-way and tree-cutting requirements, making them eco-friendly.

Industries We Serve

Hyphen Cables supplies ABCs to a wide array of sectors, including:

Power distribution companies

Real estate and infrastructure developers

Government electrification projects

Renewable energy installations

Trusted Across Regions

With a growing footprint across India and international markets, Hyphen Cables has become a preferred partner for reliable power transmission. Their ABCs are trusted by top power utilities and government electrification programs.

Final Thoughts

Choosing the right Aerial Bunched Cable manufacturer can greatly impact the efficiency and safety of your power distribution system. With Hyphen Cables, you get more than just cables—you get a partner committed to powering progress with precision and quality. Whether you're upgrading existing networks or building from the ground up, Hyphen is your go-to solution for robust, high-performance ABCs.

Visit:- https://www.hyphencables.com/aerial-bunch-cables.html

[ramyasrigyb]

Voltek Transformers: Leading the Charge as 3 Phase Distribution Transformer Manufacturers in Andhra Pradesh

In today’s power-driven world, where industries, urban infrastructure, and even daily life rely heavily on uninterrupted electricity, the importance of transformers cannot be overstated. From power generation plants to homes and businesses, transformers play a key role in ensuring the smooth transmission and distribution of electricity across the grid.

Among the many players in the Indian electrical equipment industry, Voltek Transformers has emerged as one of the most trusted 3 phase distribution transformer manufacturers in Andhra Pradesh. The company is well known for its engineering excellence, customer-focused approach, and wide range of high-performance products.

The Role of 3 Phase Distribution Transformers in Power Networks

Transformers are devices that transfer electrical energy between circuits using electromagnetic induction. A 3 phase distribution transformer is a type of transformer specifically designed to step down high voltage electricity from transmission lines to lower levels, making it suitable for use in residential, commercial, and industrial setups.

Three-phase systems are more efficient for high-load applications and long-distance power transmission. These transformers are capable of supplying balanced power, reducing conductor size and energy loss, and improving the overall efficiency of the electrical system.

Because of their ability to handle large power loads, 3 phase distribution transformers are the backbone of modern power infrastructure — from urban high-rise buildings to manufacturing plants and utility substations.

Voltek Transformers: A Name You Can Trust

Voltek Transformers stands out as a leading 3 phase distribution transformer supplier in Andhra Pradesh. With years of experience and a customer-centric vision, Voltek has consistently delivered high-quality, durable, and energy-efficient transformers that meet and exceed industry standards.

Voltek’s state-of-the-art manufacturing facility, located in Andhra Pradesh, is equipped with the latest technology for transformer design, core assembly, coil winding, tank fabrication, and oil filtration. Every transformer manufactured undergoes rigorous quality checks, including impulse testing, temperature rise tests, and dielectric strength evaluations.

Their engineering team uses advanced software and design tools to ensure precision, and the company complies with IS 1180, IEC, and BIS standards for every product.

Comprehensive Supply and Distribution Network

Voltek’s strength is not limited to manufacturing. It also ranks among the top 3 phase distribution transformer dealers in Andhra Pradesh, offering a well-integrated supply chain and logistics network. The company maintains inventory across multiple locations, allowing it to serve its customers quickly and efficiently, even in time-sensitive projects.

Whether you are a public sector utility, a private developer, or an EPC contractor, Voltek ensures that the right transformer reaches you on time and with complete technical support. The company also acts as the most responsive 3 phase distribution transformer traders in Andhra Pradesh, facilitating both bulk orders and custom project requirements through flexible trade policies.

Voltek also supports its dealers and distributors with training programs, marketing support, and technical assistance, ensuring seamless service delivery across the board.

Product Range and Features

Voltek offers a wide array of 3 phase distribution transformers tailored for different applications and voltage requirements. Key features include:

Rating: 25 KVA to 2500 KVA

Voltage Classes: 11 kV, 22 kV, 33 kV

Cooling Types: ONAN (Oil Natural Air Natural), ONAF (Oil Natural Air Forced)

Standards: IS 1180 Part 1, BIS Level 1 / 2 / 3 loss ratings

Construction: Copper wound, CRGO core, hermetically sealed tanks

Protection: Equipped with Buchholz relay, pressure relief devices, surge arresters, and thermostats

These transformers are extensively used in sectors like power utilities, real estate, metro rail projects, educational institutions, hospitals, and large industrial plants.

Customer Support and Service Excellence

As a customer-focused company, Voltek goes beyond just delivering quality equipment. It offers complete lifecycle services, including installation, commissioning, AMC (Annual Maintenance Contracts), spare part availability, and emergency response services.

Voltek’s field engineers are well-trained and capable of addressing installation challenges, technical queries, and on-site testing. This level of support has strengthened Voltek’s reputation not only as a top-tier 3 phase distribution transformer manufacturer in Andhra Pradesh, but also as a long-term partner for customers across sectors.

Sustainability and Innovation at the Core

Voltek is committed to energy efficiency and environmental responsibility. All products are designed to minimize losses and comply with eco-friendly manufacturing practices. The use of recyclable materials, energy-saving designs, and green procurement has positioned Voltek as a responsible player in the transformer industry.

The company invests in R&D to develop smart transformer systems that align with the future of smart grids and IoT-enabled infrastructure, paving the way for more connected and efficient power systems.

Future Outlook: Expanding Horizons

Looking ahead, Voltek Transformers plans to expand its footprint not only within Andhra Pradesh but across other states in South India and select overseas markets. With a strong base of operations and a growing network of dealers, suppliers, and traders, Voltek is set to become a national leader in power distribution solutions.

Through continuous innovation, customer engagement, and unwavering quality standards, Voltek is well-equipped to meet the growing demands of India's rapidly evolving power sector.

Conclusion

In the dynamic world of power distribution, Voltek Transformers continues to lead the way as one of the most reliable 3 phase distribution transformer manufacturers in Andhra Pradesh. With a complete ecosystem that includes being one of the top suppliers, dealers, and traders, Voltek is a one-stop solution for all your transformer needs.

Whether you’re planning a large-scale infrastructure project or looking for dependable transformer solutions, Voltek’s expertise, service, and quality products make them the ideal partner for powering progress.

[lighthousenewsnetwork]

PYONGYANG, DPRK - In a move that has left the world community scrambling for earplugs, North Korea unveiled its newest weapon of mass...entertainment? During a grandiose, fireworks-laden ceremony broadcasted live on state television, Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un proudly presented the "Juche Philharmonic," a ballistic missile so colossal it could launch a full symphony orchestra into the stratosphere. "This magnificent marvel of modern engineering," declared Dr. Kim Il-Sung Jr. (no relation, probably), a leading scientist in the North Korean missile program, "stands as a testament to our nation's unwavering commitment to both musical excellence and, you know, the complete annihilation of our enemies." The Juche Philharmonic, a towering behemoth resembling a chrome Christmas ornament, boasts a payload capacity exceeding 120 musicians and their instruments. State media claims the missile features a revolutionary "self-tuning" guidance system that seamlessly adjusts course based on the conductor's interpretation of the score. Additionally, the missile's sleek, chrome exterior reportedly comes equipped with a mood-lighting system capable of displaying a dazzling array of calming blues and purples, "perfect for putting enemy nations at ease before, you know, the big finale." World leaders, naturally, were quick to express their "grave concerns" about the Juche Philharmonic. President Biden, struggling to remember which Korean leader owns which missile, released a statement reassuring the American public that "our nation's top defense contractors are working diligently to develop a countermeasure that involves lasers and, uh, maybe some interpretive dance?" South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol, meanwhile, expressed his frustration with his neighbor's flamboyant weaponry. "Look," he sighed to reporters, "we get it, you have missiles. Can we please move on to something else? Maybe a giant karaoke machine? Anything less apocalyptic would be nice." Despite international anxieties, North Korean officials remain undeterred. In a follow-up press conference held amidst a gaggle of enthusiastic marching bands, Dr. Kim Il-Sung Jr. unveiled plans for future missile iterations. "The Juche Philharmonic is just the beginning," he declared, brandishing a blueprint featuring a missile shaped like a giant grand piano. "We envision a whole symphony of missiles, each capable of delivering a unique musical experience to any corner of the globe." Defense analysts are already speculating on the potential uses of these "musical missiles." Some posit they could be employed for high-brow cultural exchange programs, forcing enemy nations to endure endless renditions of "Arirang" until complete cultural assimilation. Others believe the missiles could be adapted for a more practical purpose - pizza delivery. "Think about it," one analyst mused, "who wouldn't want a piping hot calzone delivered straight from the heavens? Plus, the sonic boom would preheat your apartment." The Juche Philharmonic has sparked a frenzy on social media, with netizens worldwide creating satirical memes and viral videos. One popular TikTok trend involves users attempting to play the North Korean national anthem on kazoos while wearing gas masks. Meanwhile, a group of enterprising musicians have launched a Kickstarter campaign to develop a portable "missile shelter concert hall" for those unfortunate enough to be targeted by a North Korean musical performance. While the Juche Philharmonic may seem like a comical escalation in North Korea's missile program, it serves as a stark reminder of the absurdity of our current geopolitical climate. Here we are, in the 21st century, facing down a world leader who believes the best deterrent against aggression is a colossal, chrome missile that plays Beethoven. Perhaps, instead of investing in bigger and badder bombs, nations should consider investing in a little more laughter – before the joke's on all of us. Call to Action: In an effort to promote international

harmony and a healthy appreciation for non-explosive music, we urge readers to donate to your local music school or symphony orchestra. Let's drown out the sounds of war with the beautiful melodies of peace (and hopefully avoid getting serenaded by a rogue North Korean missile in the process).

[pyrotechworkspacesolution]

The Science Behind Pyrotech: Innovations in Control Room Design

In the realm of pyrotechnics, where precision and safety are paramount, the control room stands as the nerve center of every spectacular display. It's here that technology intertwines with artistry to orchestrate breathtaking fireworks shows that leave audiences in awe. Control room design in pyrotechnics is not just about functionality; it's about crafting an environment where creativity can flourish while ensuring the utmost safety measures are in place. Let's delve into the intricate world of pyrotech and explore how control room design plays a pivotal role in this explosive industry.

The Fusion of Art and Technology

At its core, pyrotechnics is an art form, requiring a keen understanding of chemistry, physics, and design aesthetics. However, behind the scenes, it's a symphony of technology that brings these visions to life. The control room serves as the conductor's podium, where skilled technicians harness the power of specialized software, sophisticated hardware, and real-time data to choreograph dazzling displays.

Precision Planning with Advanced Software

Control room design begins long before the first firework is ignited. It starts with meticulous planning and scripting using advanced software tailored for pyrotechnic professionals. These programs allow designers to visualize the display, synchronize effects to music, and simulate the entire show in a virtual environment. By leveraging technology, designers can fine-tune every aspect of the performance, ensuring seamless transitions and breathtaking sequences.

Safety First: Redundancy and Monitoring Systems

In pyrotech, safety is non-negotiable. Control rooms are equipped with redundant systems and rigorous safety protocols to mitigate risks and ensure the well-being of both performers and spectators. From fail-safe mechanisms to real-time monitoring of environmental conditions, every precaution is taken to prevent accidents and maintain control over the display.

Integration of Pyrotechnic Hardware

Behind the scenes, the control room houses an array of specialized hardware designed specifically for pyrotechnic operations. This includes firing systems, igniters, and remote-controlled launchers, all seamlessly integrated into the control infrastructure. Modern advancements have led to the development of wireless firing systems, allowing technicians to trigger fireworks with pinpoint accuracy from a safe distance.

Adaptability and Flexibility

In the world of pyrotechnics, no two shows are ever the same. Control room design must account for the inherent variability of live events, offering flexibility to adapt to changing conditions on the fly. Whether it's adjusting timing cues to accommodate unexpected delays or improvising new effects to captivate the audience, control room operators must be prepared to think on their feet while maintaining composure under pressure.

Pushing the Boundaries of Creativity

While technology forms the backbone of control room design, creativity remains at the heart of pyrotechnic artistry. The control room serves as a creative laboratory where designers experiment with new techniques, push the boundaries of what's possible, and strive to evoke emotion through breathtaking visual spectacles. It's here that innovation thrives, driving the evolution of pyrotechnics as an art form.

Conclusion

Control room design lies at the intersection of art and technology in the world of pyrotechnics. From precision planning and advanced software to rigorous safety measures and creative innovation, every aspect of Control Room Design plays a vital role in orchestrating unforgettable fireworks displays. As technology continues to evolve, so too will the art of pyrotechnics, pushing the boundaries of what's possible and captivating audiences around the world with its explosive beauty.

[rocketplay-casino]

Unveiling the Symphony of Passive Income: A Guide to Financial Harmony

There's a melodious tune in the world of financial orchestration that's known as passive income. Passive income embodies the art of making money smoothly, creating a symphony of financial independence, much like a harmonious arrangement. As Julie Andrews once crooned, "Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start." With that, let's set out to discover the mysteries of generating passive income, with Rocketplay Casino standing as a bright light among the multitude of options.

Understanding the Overture: What is Passive Income?

When you walk away from the conductor's platform, passive income is essentially the music that keeps playing. It's the harmonious sweetness that effortlessly fills your pockets without demanding your whole attention or active involvement. With passive income, you can continue to benefit from your initial efforts long after the workday is over, in contrast to the usual nine-to-five grind.

Melodic Strategies for Earning Passive Income

Investing in Dividend-Paying Stocks: Picture yourself as the composer of your financial future, selecting the finest instruments to create a masterpiece. Dividend-paying stocks are akin to the strings and woodwinds of your symphony, offering regular payouts to investors based on the company's profits. Example: Investing in established companies like Coca-Cola or Johnson & Johnson, known for their consistent dividend payments, can provide a steady stream of passive income.

Real Estate Ventures: Just as a conductor orchestrates various sections of an orchestra, real estate investments conduct the flow of passive income through rental properties or real estate crowdfunding. Owning a piece of property can yield rent payments that crescendo into a lucrative stream of income. Example: Purchasing residential properties in high-demand areas or investing in Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) offers the potential for passive income through rental yields or dividends.

Creating Digital Assets: In the modern symphony of passive income, digital assets sing a melodious tune. Whether it's writing e-books, developing mobile apps, or producing online courses, digital creations have the power to generate income while you slumber. Example: Launching a YouTube channel and monetizing it through advertising revenue, sponsorships, and affiliate marketing can transform your passion for content creation into a profitable venture.

Peer-to-Peer Lending: Imagine yourself as the conductor of a financial ensemble, directing the flow of capital from lenders to borrowers. Peer-to-peer lending platforms facilitate this melodious exchange, allowing individuals to earn interest on their investments. Example: Platforms like Prosper or Lending Club enable investors to lend money to individuals or small businesses in exchange for interest payments, diversifying their passive income streams.

Rocketplay Casino: A Crescendo in Passive Income Opportunities

Amidst the symphony of passive income opportunities, Rocketplay Casino emerges as a resounding crescendo, offering a unique blend of entertainment and financial reward. Much like a captivating melody that lingers in the mind, Rocketplay Casino provides an immersive gaming experience while simultaneously presenting opportunities for passive income generation.

Rocketplay Casino operates at the intersection of technology and entertainment, leveraging the growing popularity of online gaming to create a platform where players can indulge in their favorite casino games from the comfort of their homes. From classic slot machines to thrilling table games, Rocketplay Casino offers a diverse array of options to suit every player's preferences.

What sets Rocketplay Casino apart is its innovative approach to passive income generation through its affiliate program. By becoming an affiliate partner, individuals can harness the power of referral marketing to earn commissions on the players they refer to the platform. This passive income stream allows affiliates to reap the rewards of their marketing efforts as players engage with the games offered by Rocketplay Casino.

Moreover, Rocketplay Casino's affiliate program provides individuals with the flexibility to earn passive income on their own terms. Whether through website promotions, social media marketing, or email campaigns, affiliates have the freedom to choose the strategies that best align with their strengths and interests. This flexibility ensures that individuals can leverage their unique talents to maximize their earnings potential through the Rocketplay Casino affiliate program.

In addition to its affiliate program, Rocketplay Casino offers a range of bonuses and rewards to both players and affiliates alike. From welcome bonuses for new players to ongoing promotions and loyalty rewards, Rocketplay Casino ensures that individuals are incentivized to engage with the platform, creating a symbiotic relationship between player enjoyment and affiliate earnings.

As the conductor of your financial symphony, Rocketplay Casino provides the perfect crescendo, combining entertainment with passive income generation in a harmonious blend. Whether you're a seasoned affiliate marketer or a casual gamer looking to explore new opportunities, Rocketplay Casino offers a symphony of possibilities for financial success.

The Coda: Embracing the Symphony of Passive Income

In the grand finale of our symphonic journey, let us embrace the melody of passive income and conduct our financial futures with grace and precision. From dividend-paying stocks to real estate ventures and digital creations, the world is brimming with opportunities to earn money effortlessly.

And amidst this symphony of possibilities, Rocketplay Casino stands as a shining example of innovation and opportunity, offering a unique avenue for individuals to earn passive income while enjoying the thrill of online gaming. So, let us raise our batons high and orchestrate our financial futures with confidence and clarity, for the symphony of passive income awaits, ready to serenade us with its sweet melody of financial freedom.

[ingridolsentrades]

Mastering Forex Trading with DecodeEx: Understanding the Impact of Central Bank Policies in 2024

Hej (Hello) to my dear friends and fellow trading enthusiasts! As a trader embodying the Scandinavian ethos of exploration and innovation, I am thrilled to take you on a journey into the dynamic world of Forex trading in 2024. Today, we shall dive deep into the pivotal role played by central bank policies in shaping the Forex landscape for this year. Our reliable companion on this voyage is DecodeEx, a treasure trove of Forex insights.

The Central Bank Orchestra

Central banks are the conductors of the Forex symphony, wielding their policies like batons to influence currency values and market dynamics. Their decisions on interest rates, monetary policies, and economic stability reverberate through the Forex arena. Join me as we explore how central bank policies are orchestrating the Forex market in 2024:

DecodeEx: Your Forex Navigation Guide

DecodeEx recognizes the importance of staying abreast of central bank policies. It provides comprehensive coverage, real-time updates, and expert analyses to keep traders well-informed and ahead of the curve.

The Dance of Monetary Policy

In 2024, central banks worldwide are choreographing a diverse array of monetary policies to address unique economic challenges. This divergence in policies can set the stage for significant Forex market movements:

Interest Rate Pas de Deux

Keep a watchful eye on central banks’ decisions regarding interest rates. Higher interest rates tend to attract foreign capital, fortifying the respective currency’s position on the dance floor.

Quantitative Easing (QE) Ballet

The implementation or cessation of QE programs can send currency values pirouetting. An increase in QE may lead to currency depreciation, while tapering can enhance its stability.

The Influence of Geopolitical Tango

Geopolitical events and tensions often twirl in harmony with central bank policies. Keep a keen eye on developments such as trade negotiations, conflicts, and international agreements, as they can sway currency pairs in a dramatic tango.

The Currency Correlation Waltz

Central bank policies of major economies can lead to a choreographed dance of correlated currency pairs. Understanding these correlations is essential for risk management and strategy development:

EUR/USD and USD/JPY Pas de Deux

Diverging policies between the European Central Bank (ECB) and the Bank of Japan (BoJ) can result in intriguing dynamics between these pairs.

Commodity-Linked Currency Rumba

Commodity prices and central bank policies in countries like Australia and Canada perform a synchronized dance. Changes in policy can prompt the AUD/USD and USD/CAD pairs to dance their own rumba.

The Forward Guidance Minuet

Central banks often provide forward guidance, offering insights into their future policy intentions. Attend their statements and press conferences, as they provide valuable cues for your Forex trading choreography.

In Closing

In the intricate world of Forex trading, central bank policies are akin to the currents in the sea, influencing the direction of currency pairs. With DecodeEx as our guiding compass, we navigate these waters with confidence, remaining well-informed about central bank decisions and their impact on the market.

As a trader, I epitomize adaptability and innovation. Let’s continue to explore the ever-evolving Forex landscape, leveraging our knowledge of central bank policies to choreograph well-informed and profitable trades. Here’s to a successful year of trading in 2024! Skål (Cheers) to prosperous trades and informed decisions!

[forthedancingandthethriving]

(Context: Array was mentioned here.)

Array is an old, very old Program. From the days where worship of the Gods was every day, where Programs irrationally feared Death, where things were not as regulated as they are now.

She doesn't have many ambitions, really. She's content with what she does; running her train, keeping the stickmen happy, and getting her passengers to their destination.

She made the Codespace Train herself, when times were easier and codes trusted each other easier. Now, she wonders, how hard is it to trust someone with all the chaos in their world as of late?

She remembers, a time ago, when she had to take in a young Moderator. He was a frightened thing. Didn't speak much, kept his head down always. "His old Admin expiermented on him," they told her, "so it's hard to say if he'll trust you."

Array understood. She met many lost souls, and she always had the same ideal; they stay on her Train as long as they need to. Be it days, months, years, she doesn't care. Whatever it takes for someone to feel like they've finally found themselves.

Array tutored the Moderator. She read about him. Learned what made him.. him. He was an excellent marksman. She'd never seen someone who could shoot so well. She helped him become even better, learn how to make his bullets easier.

She'd read his files in the downtimes. Whenever she'd sit in the conductor's area and just read. Read and read and feel her heart just ache for this poor soul who never once knew kindness since he formed.

Array didn't know when she came to feel that he was her son. Perhaps the fourth year, or the fifth. But at some point, she began feeling that overwhelming sense that this was her boy. She wanted to see him grow and to flourish.

It ached her heart when it was finally time for him to go. He'd hugged her so tight that day when he got the offer to work in the Adminspace. She'd never been more proud. All of her stickmen had hugged him, too. Every single one had, waving goodbye when he disembarked off at the stop. It'd been so bittersweet, but she knew he would fare well.

The Codespace Train felt oddly empty when he was gone. His small smiles, chuckles, all of it. He'd send her messages, yes, but it wasn't the same as seeing him face to face. She got to meet his lover. He spoke of his friends.

Oh, her boy, her boy. Array missed him so dearly. She'd seen him so few lately.

She couldn't ever leave the train. It needed her to run.

But sometimes she'd wonder. Was he okay?

Array got her answer some time ago. A customary message from the Adminspace Council. Her boy..

CPU was missing.

Array sat in the car, staring at the data pad. She read the message over and over again, staring down at the message. The most senior stickman, an orange one with blue swirls named Scone, sat on her shoulder.

The data pad clattered to the ground as she punched her nose. Scone's nub gently rested on her shoulder on solidarity.

She knew they probably weren't trying hard. The department he was a part of..

The conductor took off her cap and ran a hand through her hair. She stared at the controls.

Scone, gently, patted her shoulder in comfort.

"I hate those bastards sometimes. They hardly care," she whispers, and all Scone could do was nod as the gentle rumble of the train continued.

[softgridcomputer]

The Art of Full Stack Development: Balancing Frontend and Backend

In the ever-evolving landscape of web development, the role of a full stack developer has become increasingly crucial. Full stack developers are the Renaissance men and women of the tech world, possessing a unique blend of skills that bridge the gap between the frontend and backend of web applications. This dual expertise empowers them to create fully functional and responsive web solutions. In this article, we'll explore the art of full stack development and how developers balance the complexities of both frontend and backend development.

What is Full Stack Development?

Before we delve into the art of full stack development, let's define what it is. A full stack developer is someone who can work on both the frontend and backend of a web application. This means they have the skills to build the part of a web application that users interact with (the frontend) and the server-side logic that powers the application (the backend).

The full stack developer's role is akin to that of a conductor in an orchestra, seamlessly coordinating the frontend and backend components to create a harmonious user experience. This unique skill set often includes expertise in various programming languages, frameworks, and libraries, enabling them to tackle a wide array of challenges.

The Dual Nature of Full Stack Development

Full stack development is like a double-edged sword, with one edge being the frontend and the other being the backend. To excel in this domain, developers must navigate the complexities of both sides while ensuring they're in sync.

Mastering the Frontend:

The frontend is the user's gateway to a web application. It's where the visual elements, user interfaces, and user experiences are crafted. To master the frontend, a full stack developer needs to be proficient in a variety of technologies, including:

HTML/CSS: These are the building blocks of web design. HTML defines the structure, while CSS controls the presentation. Full stack developers need to create clean, responsive, and visually appealing web pages using these technologies.

JavaScript: JavaScript is the programming language of the web. It's the engine behind interactivity, animations, and dynamic content. Full stack developers must understand JavaScript deeply, including modern frameworks like React, Angular, or Vue.js, which streamline the development process.

UI/UX Design: Understanding user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) design principles is essential for creating intuitive and user-friendly web applications. Full stack developers often collaborate with designers to ensure their applications are visually appealing and easy to navigate.

Mastery of the Backend:

While the frontend focuses on what users see and interact with, the backend is responsible for the application's core functionality, data processing, and server-side operations. Here are some of the key technologies and concepts that full stack developers must be proficient in for the backend:

Server-Side Languages: Languages like Python, Ruby, Node.js, Java, or C# are commonly used for building server-side logic. Developers must choose the right language based on the specific project requirements.

Databases: Full stack developers need to understand database management systems (DBMS) such as MySQL, PostgreSQL, MongoDB, and more. This knowledge is crucial for storing and retrieving data efficiently.

APIs (Application Programming Interfaces): The backend is often responsible for providing data to the frontend through APIs. Full stack developers should be adept at designing and implementing APIs that enable seamless communication between the frontend and backend.

Security: Security is a critical aspect of backend development. Full stack developers must be aware of common security threats and best practices to protect user data and the application as a whole.

The Balancing Act

The art of full stack development lies in the ability to balance the demands of both frontend and backend development. Here are some key principles and strategies that full stack developers use to maintain this equilibrium:

Divide and Conquer:

One way to manage the workload is to break the project into smaller tasks. For instance, you can focus on frontend development in one sprint and then switch to backend tasks in the next. This approach helps you stay focused and ensures that you are not overwhelmed by the complexity of both sides simultaneously.

Continuous Learning:

The tech world is constantly evolving, and full stack developers need to stay updated with the latest trends and technologies on both the frontend and backend. Engaging in lifelong learning through courses, tutorials, and books is crucial for maintaining expertise.

Leverage Frameworks:

Using frontend and backend frameworks can streamline development and reduce the burden of writing code from scratch. For example, using React on the frontend and Express.js on the backend can provide a solid foundation for your projects.

Collaboration:

Working as a full stack developer doesn't mean you have to do everything on your own. Collaborate with designers, frontend developers, and backend developers when necessary. Effective collaboration can lead to better results and a more efficient division of labor.

Prioritize:

Not all projects require an equal emphasis on frontend and backend development. Understanding the project's specific needs and prioritizing tasks accordingly can help you allocate your time and resources effectively.

Time Management:

Balancing frontend and backend tasks requires effective time management. Consider using project management tools and techniques to keep your workflow organized and efficient.

Automation:

Leverage automation tools and practices where possible. For example, CI/CD (Continuous Integration/Continuous Deployment) pipelines can automate the deployment of your application, saving time and reducing the potential for human error.

Testing:

Thoroughly test both the frontend and backend components of your application. Automated testing can help you identify and fix issues early in the development process.

Debugging and Troubleshooting:

Be prepared to spend time debugging and troubleshooting issues that arise in both frontend and backend development. Strong problem-solving skills are a must for full stack developers.

Challenges and Rewards

Full stack development is a challenging and demanding field, but it also offers substantial rewards. Here are some of the challenges and benefits that come with the territory:

Challenges:

Complexity: The breadth of knowledge required in full stack development can be overwhelming. You need to constantly learn and adapt to new technologies.

Time-Consuming: Developing both the frontend and backend takes time, so project timelines may be longer compared to having separate frontend and backend developers.

Burnout: The pressure of juggling both sides can lead to burnout if you don't manage your workload effectively.

Staying Current: Staying up-to-date with the latest trends and technologies on both sides can be a significant challenge.

Rewards:

Versatility: Full stack developers have a versatile skill set that allows them to work on a wide range of projects, from web applications to mobile apps and beyond.

Independence: Full stack developers can take on projects solo, which can be a great advantage if you're looking to work independently or start your own projects.

Understanding the Full Picture: Full stack developers gain a deep understanding of how a web application functions from end to end, which can be immensely valuable.

Problem-Solving Skills: Juggling both frontend and backend development hones your problem-solving skills and fosters a creative mindset.

Conclusion

Balancing frontend and backend development is the art of full stack development. Full stack developers are the architects of the web, seamlessly connecting the user-facing interface with the underlying server-side logic. They are the bridge builders, ensuring that the user experience is both visually appealing and functionally robust.

While mastering both sides of the web development spectrum can be challenging, it's a journey worth embarking on. The ability to wield a diverse set of skills on both the frontend and backend empowers full stack developers to create innovative, efficient, and dynamic web solutions.

The world of full stack development is a demanding yet rewarding one, offering opportunities to work on diverse projects and contribute to the ever-evolving digital landscape. Whether you're a seasoned full stack developer or just starting your journey, the art of balancing frontend and backend development is a skill that will continue to be in high demand, shaping the web for years to come.

[dweemeister]

Movie Odyssey Retrospective

Fantasia (1940)

With production on Bambi postponed, Walt Disney dedicated himself to Pinocchio (1940) and a film featuring animated segments accompanying classical music. Walt’s demands for innovation saw Pinocchio’s budget skyrocket, and the film left Walt Disney Productions (today called Walt Disney Animation Studios) on unstable financial grounds. This laid impossible financial expectations for the latter film – tentatively entitled The Concert Feature – to meet. War halted the possibility of cross-Atlantic distribution as Walt continued to emphasize innovation for each of his features and workplace tensions rose among his animators. What was planned as a glorified Mickey Mouse short set to Paul Dukas’ The Sorcerer’s Apprentice – Mickey’s popularity was flagging by the mid-1930s, trailing other Disney counterparts and Fleischer Studios/Paramount’s Popeye the Sailor – grew to include seven other segments. The film that became known as Fantasia remains the studio’s most audacious work. Though it built off the visual precedents of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), the volume of artistry for artistry’s sake contained in Fantasia, eighty years later, remains unsurpassed.

After the Philadelphia Orchestra’s conductor/music director Leopold Stokowski offered to record The Sorcerer’s Apprentice for free (he did so with a collection of Hollywood musicians; the English-Polish conductor, a rare conductor who spurned the baton, was among the best of his day), cost overruns on The Sorcerer’s Apprentice led to its expansion as a feature. To provide commentary as Fantasia’s Master of Ceremonies, the studio sought composer and music critic Deems Taylor – who came to Disney and Stokowski’s attention in his role as intermission commentator for radio broadcasts of New York Philharmonic concerts. But both Disney and Stokowski were too busy during the summer of 1938 to brief Taylor on their plans. Stokowski spent that summer in Europe seeking permission for the rights to use certain pieces from various composers’ families (this included visits to Claude Debussy’s widow and Maurice Ravel’s brother); Disney was occupied with the construction of the Burbank studio. After Stokowski returned from Europe in September, Disney asked Taylor to come to Los Angeles to formally discuss Fantasia. Taylor agreed, arriving one day after Stokowski and Disney began their meetings, staying in Southern California for a month.

Over several weeks that September, Disney, Stokowski, and Taylor made the final selections for pieces – suggested by story directors Joe Grant and Dick Huemer (both worked on 1941’s Dumbo and 1951’s Alice in Wonderland) – to be featured in Fantasia. Hours were spent listening to classical music recordings, followed by brainstorming potential visualizations. The meetings were recorded by stenographers, with transcripts (housed at the Walt Disney Archives in Burbank) provided to all three participants. During these meetings, Walt mostly listened to Stokowski and Taylor consider every suggestion by Grant and Huemer:

DISNEY: Look, I really don’t know beans about music. TAYLOR: That’s all right, Walt. When I first started, I thought Bach wrote love stuff – like Romeo and Juliet. You know, I thought maybe Toccata was in love with Fugue.

During these meetings, an admiring Walt – in addition to gifting a potential last hurrah for Mickey Mouse and to create a film unrestrained by commercial demands – realized he wanted to create a gateway to classical music for those who might not otherwise give such music a chance. Always leading his writing staff in developing stories, Walt felt relieved that he could share this responsibility with Stokowski and Taylor. Free of the storytelling stresses plaguing the Pinocchio and Bambi productions at the time, these tripartite meetings were not beholden to narrative cohesion, allowing the participants to suggest anything that their imaginations conjured. Without the constraints of narrative logic or predictions about what an audience wanted to see, Fantasia became the center of Walt Disney’s passion until its completion.

Nine selections were made by the trio, with one piece later being dropped entirely (Gabriel Pierné’s Cydalise and the Satyr) and another being replaced after its completion. A completed segment for Debussy’s Clair de Lune* was substituted out for Ludwig van Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6 (the mythological scenario Walt envisioned for the Pierné reverted to the Beethoven, but more on this later). Over the next few years, Disney’s animators would complete the artwork; Stokowski would study, arrange, and record the selections with the Philadelphia Orchestra (except for The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, which had already been recorded); Taylor would write his introductions to be filmed at the Disney studios.

In almost all of cinema, music accompanies and strengthens dramatic or comedic visuals. Fantasia is the reverse of this relationship. The animation provides greater emotional power to the music – an arrangement that may be startling to viewers unfamiliar with or disinclined to classical music or cinematic abstraction. Fantasia’s opening scenes and piece introductions feature the affable Taylor, who outlines the film’s conceits:

TAYLOR: Now there are three kinds of music on this Fantasia program. First, there’s the kind that tells a definite story. Then there’s the kind that, while it has no specific plot, does paint a series of more or less definite pictures. And then there’s a third kind, music that exists simply for its own sake.

That last kind, also known as “absolute music”, opens Fantasia with Johann Sebastian Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor, an organ piece arranged for orchestra (“Toccata” and “Fugue” refer to the musical forms of the piece’s two halves). As James Wong Howe’s (1934’s The Thin Man, 1963’s Hud) gorgeous live-action cinematography of the orchestra (the Toccata) transitions to animation (the Fugue), the audience witnesses Walt Disney Animation’s first, and arguably only, foray into abstract animation – as opposed to abstract stylizations to bolster a macro-narrative – for a feature film. The Toccata and Fugue is a pure visualization of listening to music, as if the animation was improvised. The sequence involves, among other things, string instrument bridges and bows flying in indeterminate space, figures and lines rolling across the screen, and beams of light and obscured shapes timed to Bach’s piece. In these opening minutes, Fantasia announces itself as a bold hybrid of artistic expression in atypical fashion for Disney’s animators.

Next is The Nutcracker Suite by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, which is subdivided into six dances (“Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy”, “Chinese Dance”, “Arabian Dance”, “Trepak”, “Dance of the Reed Flutes”, “Waltz of the Flowers” – these dances are placed out of order, and the “Miniature Overture” and “Marche” which open the suite are not present). Disney, Stokowski, and Taylor made this selection decades before Tchaikovsky’s now-most famous ballet became a Christmas cliché in the United States – it was barely performed in the early twentieth century and is usually regarded, among classical music experts and by the composer himself, as a lesser Tchaikovsky ballet.

History aside, this animated treatment of The Nutcracker utilizes an astonishing array of different animation techniques across all six dances. With The Nutcracker, the Disney animators, for the first time, take a piece with a preexisting story, animate sequences adhering to the music’s essence, yet producing images that have nothing to do with the original material. In Fantasia, The Nutcracker remains a ballet – the sugar plum fairies, racially insensitive mushrooms, fish, and flowers move as if they are on a ballet stage. But there is nothing, in the sense of a narrative through line, to connect all six dances. Set to the changing of the seasons, The Nutcracker contains gorgeously-animated fairies and intricate fish (Cleo from Pinocchio was a testing run for the “Arabian Dance”), climaxing with fractal flurries that look like an antique Christmas card brought to life. Even the racist “Chinese Dance” exemplifies masterful character design – simplicity does not preclude expressiveness. The Nutcracker’s spectacular inclusion improved Tchaikovsky’s standing and his least acclaimed ballet among casual classical music fans.

Based on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s poem of the same, Paul Dukas’ The Sorcerer’s Apprentice ushers in the Mickey Mouse short that overshadows all others. With the animators’ adaptation closely following Goethe’s poem, Dukas’ original piece is impossible to listen to without imagining Mickey, rogue anthropomorphic broomsticks, and thousands of gallons of water. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice marked the cinematic debut of Mickey Mouse with pupils, as designed by Fred Moore (the dwarfs on Snow White, the mermaids in 1953’s Peter Pan) – Mickey was first drawn with pupils on a program to an infamous, booze-filled party Walt Disney threw in 1938. With pupils, Mickey’s gaze provides a sense of direction that black ovals make ambiguous. The additional personality – not to say Mickey Mouse’s original character design lacked personality – thanks to the pupils strengthens Mickey’s expressions of jollity, shock, submissiveness. A lanky, stern sorcerer is Mickey’s brilliant foil. Their physical differences and reactions imbue The Sorcerer’s Apprentice with a troublemaking charm recalling Mickey’s earliest short films, sans the slapstick that defined those appearances. These decisions heralded a new era for how the Walt Disney Studios’ mascot would be animated and portrayed in his upcoming shorts.

This segment’s chiaroscuro sets a pensive atmosphere, enclosing Mickey in a black and brown gloom as he – a nominal apprentice – is tasked with menial duties, not magic. The indefinite shape of the sorcerer’s chambers owes to German Expressionism (as does the penultimate piece in Fantasia), with its impossibly curved angles and architectural fantasy hiding secrets that no sorcerer’s apprentice assigned to carry buckets of water could understand. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice tonal shifts always feel justified, rooted in the sequence’s character and production design – although, in this regard, the sequence is surpassed later in Fantasia.

Immediately following a mutual congratulations between Mickey (voiced by Disney) and Stokowski is Igor Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring. Stravinsky’s brief one-act ballet/piece debuted in 1913 to an audience riot because of its musical radicalism – The Rite of Spring liberally partakes in polytonality (using two or more key signatures simultaneously), polyrhythms, constant meter changes, unorthodox accenting of offbeats, chromaticism, and piercing dissonance. Concert hall attendees had heard nothing like The Rite of Spring before and, even in 1940, Stravinsky’s composition divided audiences. The Rite of Spring – precipitating the concert hall’s philosophical battles of the late twentieth and twenty-first century over whether melody and coherent rhythm still has a role to play in contemporary classical music – is a gutsy choice to present to general audiences.

At fifty-eight years old when Fantasia was released, the Russian-born, French-naturalized (and soon-to-be American citizen) Stravinsky is the only composer to have lived to see one of his pieces adapted for a Fantasia movie. Stravinsky despised Stokowski’s interpretation and cutting of his music (all musical cuts were Stokowski’s decisions, reasoning that an audience of classical music neophytes might not be comfortable in a theater for too long during Fantasia), but applauded the animated interpretation of his work. As a ballet, The Rite of Spring is about primitivism. The Disney animators sheared the piece of its human element to liberate themselves from the ballet’s narrative (and believers of creationism). Instead of portraying primitive humans, they elected to depict an account of Earth’s early natural history – its primeval violence, the beginning of life, the reign and extinction of the dinosaurs. Astronomer Edwin Hubble, English biologist Julian Huxley, and paleontologist Barnum Brown served as scientific consultants on The Rite of Spring, imparting to the animators the most widely-accepted theories within their respective scientific fields at the time.

As the camera moves towards the young Earth, Stravinsky’s piece clangs with orchestral hits emboldened by the volcanic violence on-screen – the animated flow of the lava and realistic bubble effects (studied by the animators using high-speed photography on oatmeal, mud, and coffee bubbles inflated by air hoses) are technical masterstrokes. Giving way to single-celled organisms and later the dinosaurs, the camera’s perspective keeps low, emphasizing the height of these prehistoric creatures. The suggestion of weight to the dinosaurs distinguish them from comic, cartoonish depictions in American animation up to that point. The Rite of Spring is the only Fantasia segment where I can imagine viewers unversed in classical music, but making an honest attempt to appreciate the music, being repelled for the entire passage because of the music itself. Otherwise, so ends Fantasia’s immaculate first half.

After the intermission, we meet the Soundtrack, a visual representation of the standard optical soundtrack, with Deems Taylor. It is an entertaining diversion before Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6 (“The Pastoral Symphony”) – accompanied by scenes of winged horses, centaurs, pans, and gods from classical mythology. These characters and backgrounds, and clear story were intended for Pierné’s Cydalise and the Satyr before its deletion from the program. Seeking a replacement piece, Disney chose Beethoven’s Pastoral over Stokowski’s objections. Stokowski, who largely dismissed potential criticisms from diehard classical music fans and encouraged Walt’s experimentation in their meetings, noted that Symphony No. 6 – the unidentical twin of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5; both were composed simultaneously and debuted to the public on the same evening in 1808 – was Beethoven’s tribute to the Viennese countryside and that, according to Beethoven’s program notes from that 1808 concert, represented, “more an expression of feeling than painting.” Beethoven’s long summer walks amid babbling brooks, verdant forests, and wildlife provided solace from his increasing deafness. Deems Taylor, acknowledging Stokowski’s citations of the symphony’s history, thought the decision a brilliant one. By simple majority, Walt’s repurposed idea for the mythological setting for the Pastoral was produced.

For the entirety of the Pastoral’s second movement, we see cupids assisting in centaur courtship. These hackneyed scenes are glacially paced, overly dependent on Fred Moore’s risqué good girl art. Fantasia’s most objectionable content also appears in the second movement in the form of crude racial caricatures of black women – though the worst example will almost certainly not be in any available modern print of Fantasia, as the Walt Disney Company has consistently cut the footage and essentially denies it ever existed. The story’s tone almost trivializes Beethoven’s Pastoral, making the seond movement a tiresome Silly Symphony. Arguably the weakest of the original Fantasia numbers (Stokowski’s criticisms justified by the final product), the Pastoral nevertheless contains an eye-catching palate of color that makes it unmissable. Encouraged by the supervising animators on the Pastoral to use as much color as possible, the throngs of artists assigned to this were up to the task. Rarely does Technicolor, in full saturation, look brighter than when the young flying horses take to the sky, centaurs and centaurettes partake in mating rituals, and an ever-inebriated Bacchus stumbles into the centaurs’ party.

From the closing ballet of Act III of Amilcare Ponichelli’s opera La Gioconda, the Dance of the Hours is the penultimate piece in Fantasia. Dance of the Hours suffers from its placement in the film. After Bacchus’ simpleminded, jolly antics in the Pastoral, this whole segment is the one that most resembles Disney’s Silly Symphony short films. Presented as a comic ballet with ostriches, elephants, hippopotamuses, and alligators, the Dance of the Hours has the ideal supervising animators assigned to it – caricaturist “T.” (Thornton) Hee and Pluto/Big Bad Wolf animator Norm Ferguson. Dancer Marge Champion (the model for Snow White’s dancing), ballerina Tatiana Riabouchinska and her husband David Lichine served as models for the balletic motions, endowing the segment with choreographic – though perhaps not biological – accuracy. As long as the viewer basks in the Dance of the Hours’ unadulterated silliness and does not mind the fact it is the least innovative piece in terms of its animation, it is an enjoyable several minutes of Fantasia.

Fantasia concludes with a staggering pairing: Modest Mussorgsky’s‡ tone poem Night on Bald Mountain (partial cuts) and Franz Schubert’s Ave Maria (with English lyrics). After an inconsistent second half to Fantasia, the film ends with two selections so remarkably contrasting in musical form and texture and animation. Night on Bald Mountain, like Dance of the Hours, is the responsibility of an ideal supervising animator in Wilfred Jackson (1937’s The Old Mill, Alice in Wonderland) and one of the finest character animators in Bill Tytla (Stromboli in Pinocchio, Dumbo in Dumbo). Using Mussorgsky’s written descriptions for the piece, the animators closely adhere to the composer’s imagined narrative. On Walpurgisnacht, a towering demon atop a mountain unfurls his wings and summons an infernal procession from the earthly and watery graves below. This demon, the Slavic deity Chernabog, is Tytla’s greatest triumph as a character animator and for all animated cinema. With movements modeled by Béla Lugosi of Dracula (1931) fame – one could not ask for a better model – and Jackson himself, Tytla captures Chernabog’s enormity, the torso’s muscular details, and graceful arm and hand movements that never falter frame-by-frame. Chernabog moves more realistically than any Disney character – in shorts and features, Rotoscoped or not – and would retain that distinction until the advent of computerized animation. In Tytla’s mastery, one forgets that Chernabog is nothing but dark paints.

Jackson’s use of contrasting styles to demarcate Chernabog from the ghosts and spirits summoned to the mountain’s summit further contributes to Night on Bald Mountain’s satanic atmosphere. The shades answering Chernabog’s call appear as either rough white pencil sketches that one might expect in a concept drawing or translucent, wavy figures animated with rippling effects that required a curved tin to complete. That rippling, wafting effect – lasting only several seconds in Night on Bald Mountain – was among the most labor-intensive parts of Fantasia, requiring animators to be present at work in multiple shifts across twenty-four hours to photograph the movements for each frame. The Walt Disney Animation Studios would not delve into such darkness again until The Black Cauldron (1985).

Night on Bald Mountain benefits from being followed immediately – without a Deems Taylor introduction (he introduces both pieces prior to the Mussorgsky) – by Schubert’s Ave Maria, and vice versa. As Chernabog and the spirits romp, an Angelus bell tolls just before the dawn, signalling the end of their nocturnal merriment. Stokowski arranged Night on Bald Mountain’s final bars to fade away as a vocalizing chorus precedes the beginning of the Ave Maria. Where Night on Bald Mountain incorporated numerous styles in a disorderly frolic, the Ave Maria is rigid and structured by design (the camera only moves horizontally from left to right or zooms forward). In twos, robed monks walk through a forest bearing torches – their figures obscured behind trees, their reflections gleaming in the water. As the camera zooms forward for the first time, darkness envelops the screen. Using English lyrics by Rachel Field that do not adapt Schubert’s German lyrics, soprano Julietta Novis sings the final stanza of the Ave Maria (Field’s first two stanzas were unused) as the multiplane camera gradually glides through a still bower. The Ave Maria features some of the smallest individually-animated pieces (the monks) ever brought to screen. And with the multiplane camera (when the monks are onscreen, the multiplane camera – which was created to provide depth to animated backgrounds – is utilized, for the first time in its existence, to evoke flatness), it also contains what may be the longest uncut sequence in animation history.

The Ave Maria’s beauty sharpens the contrast between itself and Night on Bald Mountain – the sacred and the profane. Their spiritual and musical pairing is cinematic transcendence. Yet, the Ave Maria was almost cut entirely from the film at the last moment, as it was spliced into the final cut four hours before Fantasia’s world premiere – all thanks to an earthquake that struck Southern California a few days earlier. How fortunate for those worked on the segment, the preceding Night on Bald Mountain, for Fantasia, and cinema that the Ave Maria was included in the end.

Some of the pieces considered by Disney, Stokowski, and Taylor that did not make the final cut appeared in Fantasia 2000 – most notably Igor Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite (1919 version), which Walt initially preferred over The Rite of Spring until convinced by Taylor otherwise. In contrast to his company’s contemporary attitude, Walt Disney himself was disapproving towards proposing sequels, with Fantasia proving the only exception. Walt imagined sequels to Fantasia to be released every several years, with newer Fantasia sequences starring alongside one or two reruns. Other pieces Disney, Stokowski, and Taylor (who wrote additional introductions in anticipation of future Fantasia films; I am looking into whether these introductions still exist) contemplated remain unadapted as Fantasia segments. The notes and preliminary sketches of some of these proposed segments – including a fascinating consideration to adapt selections from Richard Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen (the Ring cycle) to J.R.R. Tolkien’s then-newly-published children’s book The Hobbit – most likely reside in the Walt Disney Archives for reference if and when the company’s executives approve a third Fantasia movie.

Walt Disney’s dream of Fantasia sequels was quickly dashed. His proposal to add Fantasound – the studio’s prototypical variant of a stereo sound system – proved extravagantly expensive for all but a dozen movie theaters in the United States. Released as a roadshow (a limited national tour of major American cities followed by a general release), the inflated ticket prices due to the roadshow’s Fantasound system harmed Fantasia’s box office. Though a vast majority of film critics and some within classical music circles hailed Fantasia, the vocal and vehement division was inescapable. Some cultural and film critics, citing solely that Walt Disney had bothered to touch classical music, castigated Walt and Fantasia as pretentious (classical music’s negative reputation of being dated, inaccessible, and snobby was not nearly as widespread in the 1940s as it is today; musical appreciation and education has receded in the U.S. in the last several decades). Intransigent classical music purists – usually noting Stokowski’s frequent cutting of the music – lambasted Fantasia as debasing the compositions (I dislike Stokowski’s cutting, certain stretches of the Bach and Stravinsky recordings, and much of the Pastoral’s story, but this is a reactionary overreach). The negativity from both spheres stole the headlines, eroding interest from North American audiences. With the European box office non-existent, Pinocchio and Fantasia stood no chance of turning a profit on their initial releases. Their combined commercial failure sent the studio in a financial tailspin – a crisis that a comparatively low-budget Dumbo single-handedly averted.

Rankled by the criticism directed towards Fantasia, Walt Disney’s anger turned inwards, fostering a personal and corporate disdain of intellectuals that marked the rest of his career. One sees it in his irritation towards critics decrying the handling of race in Song of the South (1946); it is also there in his dismissive treatment of P.L. Travers over an adaptation of her novel Mary Poppins. 

Mounting tension among Disney’s animators over credits, favoritism towards veteran animators over the studio’s pay scale and workplace amenities, the announcement of future layoffs due to the studio’s financial crisis, the unionization of animators at all of Disney’s rival studios, and Walt’s political naïveté in heeding the words of Gunther Lessing (the studio’s anti-communist legal counsel) threatened to explode into public view. On May 28, 1941, unionized Disney animators began what is known – and downplayed to this day by the Walt Disney Company – as the Disney animators’ strike. The strike, which lasted for two months, shredded friendships between strikers and non-strikers. Walt Disney, who surveyed the striking animators and filed away names in his deep memory, is said to have repeatedly referred to the strikers as, “commie sons of bitches”. More than once at the studio’s entrance, Walt slammed on his car’s accelerator towards the strikers and hit the brakes before making contact.

Under pressure from lenders, Walt recognized the union in late July but nevertheless fired numerous striking (and non-striking) animators in the months afterwards. Many of those terminated by Disney joined cross-Hollywood rivals or founded the upstart United Productions of America (UPA; Mr. Magoo series, 1962’s Gay Purr-ee). An embittered Walt would never again feel the sense of family among his studio’s staff as he did in the 1920s and ‘30s at the Hyperion studio, despite his public persona and statements to the contrary.

A wonder of filmmaking, Fantasia arrived in movie theaters as Disney’s Golden Age began to fracture. If not for war or Walt Disney’s obstinance, this era might have lasted longer.  In the decades since, the contemptuous responses to Fantasia from classical music elites have cooled – for classical music lovers with not nearly as much institutional power, Fantasia has indeed become a beloved gateway into the genre. Its irrepressible beauty, invention, and bravery as a visual concert cannot be overstated.

My rating: 10/10

^ Based on my personal imdb rating.

This is the sixteenth Movie Odyssey Retrospective. Movie Odyssey Retrospectives are reviews on films I had seen in their entirety before this blog’s creation or films I failed to give a full-length write-up to following the blog’s creation. Previous Retrospectives include The Wizard of Oz (1939), Dumbo (1941), and Godzilla (1954).

For more of my reviews, check out the “My Movie Odyssey” tag on my blog.

* The completed Clair de Lune segment was re-edited and integrated into Make Mine Music (1946).

‡ Mussorgsky’s original score for Night on Bald Mountain – which was not performed again during his lifetime following the piece’s premiere – went missing after his death in 1881. In 1886, fellow composer and colleague Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, controversially began editing Mussorgsky’s partially missing scores using his “musical conscience” (including the opera Boris Godunov). Rimsky-Korsakov wanted to preserve and retain his colleague’s music among aficionados of Russian classical music. The version of Night on Bald Mountain heard in Fantasia is Rimsky-Korsakov’s arrangement of the piece. Mussorgsky’s original score to Night on Bald Mountain was found in 1968, but the Rimsky-Korsakov arrangement is more frequently performed today.

[la-luthien]

Tea and Piano Keys

Bucky Barnes x Reader

Summary: Bucky is the principal cello player for his orchestra. The glittering guest pianist catches his eye, and to his delight (and somewhat mortification), his best friend Steve introduces them.

Warnings: none? Unless you want to count slight musical jargon.

A/N: Written for @star-spangled-man-with-a-plan’s Multi Fandom Follower Celebration. My prompt was Band/Musician AU. Thank you so much for this opportunity and congratulations! I hope that you enjoy. Also, it is not required but Rachmaninoff’s third piano concerto is the unofficial soundtrack of this. I tried to make it look pretty with a gif, but the internet was not having it

 An early morning rehearsal, the aromatic scent of roasted coffee wafting through the air, the sound of instruments tuning all at once. Bucky breathed deeply as he pulled out his rosin to reapply it to his bow. His trusty and beloved cello lay within its case still, and he was itching to pull it out and get the rehearsal started.

Bucky had been playing cello ever since he had joined the specialist music program when he was attending high school. He had taken to the instrument quickly, albeit with much dedication and practice, and now he was fulfilling his dreams of joining the conservatory. He was now the principal cello player.

His orchestra was preparing for their performance of Rachmaninoff’s third piano concerto, and were anxiously awaiting the arrival of the guest pianist. The rehearsal was set to start in ten minutes, and everyone was setting up their instruments, organising endless sheets of music, and taking their last sips of coffee.  

“How much would I have to pay you to lick your rosin?” a voice asked, sniggering slightly. Bucky whirled around and glared at his best friend, Steve Rogers, who had his hands shoved deep into the pocket of his faded jeans.

“Don’t be an imbecile,” Bucky replied, turning back to his cello and pulling it out of its case, “I thought we were past such immaturity.” He began fiddling with the pegs and tuning it, his tuner lay in front of him on his case.

Steve grinned and sat down next to him, grabbing Bucky’s coffee and pulling a face after draining the last of it. “I forgot you had milk and cream in your coffee!”

“It’s only you who likes to drink yours black, and that will teach you not to steal my coffee again!” Just as Bucky had finished speaking, there came a loud bang from the general vicinity of the grand concert piano that sat in the middle of the room. Bucky turned to face the piano, only to find a woman sprawled across the floor, piles of sheet music flung around her, grinning madly as she clutched what looked like a reusable cup in her hands. Clearly she had saved her drink from spilling, at the expense of her music folder.

“Miss L/N! Are you alright?” the concert master, Sam Wilson, asked, crouching down to help you pick up your music. You nodded, and set your cup down, refusing to make eye contact with the man helping you, embarrassed at your accident and drawing such attention to yourself.

“Who’s that?” Bucky asked, intrigued by the new face.

Steve hummed, stirred out of his thought, “Oh, that’s just Y/N, the guest pianist. I’ve got to get back to my section, my fellow horns are waiting!” He patted Bucky on the back and headed back to his seat.

Bucky looked back to you as you settled down in front of the piano, occasionally sipping from your cup whilst you arrayed the sheet music in front of you. He watched closely as you began rolling back the sleeves of your oversized sweater to your elbows, revealing bright blue polish which adorned your nails. Seemingly satisfied with yourself, you slouched into the piano stool, eyes wandering around the practice room. Bucky found his eyes following your every movement, until he accidentally made eye contact, and turned away, flushing at having been caught staring.

Shaking his head, Bucky resolved himself to the next few hours of the rehearsal, strictly telling himself that he could not, and would not, spend the entire time watching you. The rest of his section were depending on him.

  It had been a long and gruelling rehearsal, the conductor was not at all pleased with the percussion section who had seemed more interested in giggling about some joke, and had missed quite a few of their cues. Luckily, she’d had no problems with cellos, so Bucky could sigh in relief that his preoccupation with your playing went unnoticed.

He’d spent the majority of the rehearsal stealing quick glances at you, cataloguing all the small details about you. The way you bit your lip slightly when you began a particularly challenging series of runs, or how your hair began to fall loose from its ponytail and wisped about your neck. The colour of your eyes, just discernible from his position across from the piano.

“Well you seemed distracted today,” Steve remarked as he and Bucky made their way to the coffee shop across the road from the conservatory, instrument cases still in their hands as they pushed the door opened. A bell tinkled brightly to announce their arrival, and the two joined the growing line in front of the counter.

“You noticed?” Bucky asked, cringing and pretending to read the menu prices above the counter which he already had committed to memory.

“It was pretty obvious,” Steve replied, “You’re lucky that your section made minimal mistakes and the conductor let it slide.”

The door opened again behind them, signalling the entry of another customer. Bucky considered ignoring his friend, reaching into the back pocket of his jeans to pull out his wallet, when Steve laughed and patted him on the back.

“Looks like your new fasciation is here,” he said, directing Bucky’s gaze to you who had just walked in and was lining up behind them. You smiled brightly, the sleeves of your sweater still rolled up, clutching your music folder to your chest.

“Hey Steve!” you said, tucking your folder under your arm so that you could give him a hug. The two of you pulled way, Steve laughing at the astonishment on Bucky’s face.

“Meet my friend from university, Y/N,” Steve introduced, eyes trained on Bucky, smirking as his friend stuttered and introduced himself.

“Oh, I’m, um, I’m Bucky,” he said lamely, sticking his hand out to shake your already pre-offered one.

“Pleasure to meet you Bucky,” you replied, your smile directed solely at him now. Bucky found his breath caught in his throat as he smiled back. Up close he could see the way the corners of your eyes crinkled as you smiled. You had a very pretty voice as well, and he decided that it suited you nicely.

“Uh Buck, it’s your turn to order,” Steve said, tapping his friend on the shoulder. Bucky flushed and turned to cashier who stood patiently waiting for him to place his order. He could hardly stutter out his order, and he shoved the crumpled note from his wallet into the hand of the surprised cashier, before he turned away to wait with Steve.

“How do you know her?” Bucky hissed, “I went to the same university as you!”

“There was a few tutorials that she was in and you weren’t,” Steve replied, shrugging. He smirked as you walked over towards them, having placed your order. Steve clearly didn’t miss the way Bucky blushed again. He also didn’t miss Bucky’s name being called out to collect his order, nudging his friend towards the counter and smirking.

“Would you like to join us in the park?” Steve asked you, ignoring the swift glare sent his way by Bucky.

“Of course! I’d love to!”

Once the orders had been collected, the three of you made your way outside to the park near the conservatory. Bucky held the steaming take-away coffee cup between his hands, breathing in the rich and creamy aroma that drifted up into his face. You found a wooden bench large enough that the three of you could sit comfortably on. There was a slight bite to the crisp air, a sign that autumn was steadily progressing. Bucky watched a few leaves dance around the grass, tuning out the antics of the two musicians sitting beside him.

“Wait, you’re in a jazz band as well?” Steve’s voice interrupted Bucky’s thoughts. Bucky’s head snapped up, now staring intently at you as you giggled nervously.

“Well, I was part of one in high school,” you replied, “I love the classic 20’s and 30’s jazz, give me Glenn Miller any day.”

“Wow, traitor,” Steve muttered, taking a sip from his coffee cup. You laughed in response, causing Bucky to smile as well.

“There’s something so freeing above improvised solos!” You countered, catching Bucky’s eye over the rim of your cup. The second tea of the day, you’d complained about your addiction whilst in the coffee shop, but that didn’t seem to stop you from enjoying it.

He smiled nervously at you, cursing inside that you made his confidence melt until he was fourteen again and sneaking glances at his childhood crush. He was royally screwed if he wouldn’t be able to get over his nerves about being around you. There was going to be a long road to performance night.

  Steve had left the rehearsal straight after it finished, claiming that he had a date he was late to. That left Bucky alone in the coffee shop, staring at the menu before settling on his usual choice. He had already ordered when the bell above the door tinkled and you walked in. You were balancing your purse perilously on top of your music folder. He waited for you to order, rocking back on his heels and trying to look at anything but you.

“Bucky!” you called from the counter, ignoring the cashier who simply sighed and took your bank card from your outstretched hand. Order paid for, you made your way over to him, almost forgetting to take your card back in the process.

“How did you find the rehearsal?” you asked.

“It seems to be coming together,” he replied, his face and ears warming under your bright smile, “Your playing was lovely.”

“Thank you! I thought you were wonderful too.”

Bucky knew we was definitely blushing now, and he missed his name being called out to collect his order. You tapped him on the shoulder, pointing at the cup that sat on the counter with his name on it.

“Shall we sit in the park again?” You asked, collecting your order as well, taking the lid off to inspect the steaming liquid inside. He nodded and followed you out of the store, giddy at his luck.

You sat on the same bench, sipping at your hot drinks and exchanging small talk about the rehearsal and your musical training. Bucky felt his insides warming in a way that was not just from his coffee.

“What made you stick to piano?” he asked after you relayed your lament over your parents refusing to allow you to play the flute.

“I guess it became a part of me,” you replied, eyes fixed solely on Bucky, “I grew to love it. There’s something so satisfying and freeing about being able to play so many styles on one instrument.”

He decided that piano suited you, such an understated and yet grand instrument. He knew  that most people started with it, and yet, you had taken it and made it your own. Capable of such rich colours, so many tones and emotions that his own cello didn’t quite capture on its own.

The rolled up knits, tea flasks, chipped nail polish, ivory keys. It was all so you. He was heady with it, caught up in some spell you had cast over him. Butterflies tumbled in his stomach as he sat beside you, listening to the way you so tenderly explained your love of the piano.

He didn’t need Steve to roll his eyes and nudge him in the side to realise on his own that he liked you. Liked you in a way he hadn’t liked anyone for a long time. You were refreshing, a breath of fresh air even though he knew that you were an old soul. Perhaps joining the orchestra really was the best decision he had ever made.

How he couldn’t wait until the performance night, to watch you in your element.

  Bucky tried to concentrate on the sheet music in front of him, tried to focus on the conductor, tried to blend in with his fellow cellists. It was no use; his eyes were drawn ever to you. There was something ethereal about you, illuminated by the stage lights, and the contented, yet focused, expression on your face as you sat behind the grand piano in the centre of the stage. A living angel, born and breathed from the music that swelled about you. You glittered in the black dress that you wore, a vision of exquisite elegance as your fingers danced lightly across the keys.

And dance they did, for the numerous runs that permeated Rachmaninoff’s third piano concerto demanded it. It didn’t seem to matter that this was one of the most difficult piano concertos to play. You played it perfectly, from memory. He marvelled at your technical brilliance and musical expression. There was a tenderness in the way you caressed the keys, gently coaxing the notes from the instrument before you.

Cursing that his vantage point prevented him from being able to see the side of the piano where the keys were, he firmly fixed his eyes on the next passage of notes, but once again it did not take long for his eyes to search out your form. You were a seductress; your music played with the strings of his heart.

  “Steve, I’ll be right there,” Bucky sighed, gently tucking his beloved cello back into its case.

“Hurry up,” Steve cried, “We can’t be late for after performance drinks” He had already packed away his French horn and was impatiently waiting for his friend to finish. “It’s our tradition.”

“I won’t be long,” Bucky replied, shutting the case and standing up. He ran his fingers through his hair, pulling it down from the neat bun it had been in for the performance. “Besides, I want to catch Y/N before she leaves.”

Steve seemed to understand then, and he picked up his case with a wink, leaving to find Sam and congratulate him on a fantastic performance.

Bucky caught you just as you were preparing to leave the concert hall, music folder tucked into a bag, and for once, not a single tea flask in sight. He wiped his palms on the legs of his suit pants, taking a deep breath and clearing his throat. You turned around, smiling brightly when you saw that it was him.

“Hey Bucky! Good job tonight!” The breath caught in his throat as you set your bag down on the floor and pulled him into a hug.

“You were amazing,” he replied breathlessly, “The cadenza was magnificent.” You laughed in response, tucking the stray hair behind your ears. Bucky felt his heart pounding, beating wildly in his chest. His ears were roaring. This was it.

“Y/N,” he asked, almost astonished that he had managed to choke out the words, “Would you like to, um, go out with me on a date some time?” He held his breath, mind racing with every possible way you could refuse him.

He needn’t to have worried. If it was any possible, your smile grew wider, eyes bright as you nodded, “I would love to.”

Bucky hadn’t planned on it. In fact, he was astonished at how his body moved without his permission. Perhaps it was the memory of you glowing in your dress behind the piano, or the crinkles in the corners of your eyes, or his excitement at your affirmative response. He stooped down and kissed you, and to his immense joy, you kissed back.

Exhilaration coursed through his veins as he pulled away, took your hand in his own, and the two of you walked out of the hall. Steve was waiting outside, a high five saved for his friend as you all piled into his car. Celebratory drinks were long overdue.

All Bucky could concentrate on for the rest of the night was you. Your laugh, your smile, the way you leaned across to occasionally whisper in his ear. He flushed each time you took his hand in yours. He almost couldn’t believe that it was real, that this was truly happening. Surely it was all just some wonderful dream that had ensnared him.

But the way you squeezed his hand grounded him, reminding him that you really were there.

[sciencenewsforstudents]

A new type of computing chip could be a game-changer. That’s because its transistors are not made of silicon. Transistors are tiny electronic switches that together perform calculations. A new prototype uses carbon nanotubes. It is not yet as speedy or as small as the silicon devices found in today’s computers, phones and more. But these new computer chips may one day give rise to electronics that are faster and use less energy.

Researchers describe their advance in the August 29 Nature.

This is “a very important milestone in the development of this technology,” observes Qing Cao. He’s a materials scientist at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He was not involved in the work.

The heart of every transistor is a semiconductor component. It’s usually made of silicon. This element can act like an electrical conductor. It also can act like an insulator. This lets a transistor have an “on” and an “off” state. When on, current flows through the semiconductor; when off, it doesn’t. And this on/off state is what encodes the 1s and 0s of digital computer data.

Max Shulaker is an electrical engineer. He works at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. “We used to get exponential gains in computing every single year,” he says. Computer engineers were able to do so by building smaller and faster silicon transistors. But now, he says, “performance gains have started to level off.” Silicon transistors can’t get much smaller and more efficient than they already are.

Carbon nanotubes, though, are almost as thin as an atom. And they ferry electricity well. As a result, they make better semiconductors than silicon. In principle, carbon nanotube processors could run three times faster than silicon ones. And they would consume about one-third as much energy as silicon processors, Shulaker says. But until now, carbon nanotubes have proved too finicky to use in complex computing systems.

Carbon computing

One issue comes when a network of carbon nanotubes is deposited onto a computer chip wafer. At that point, the tubes tend to bunch into lumps. This prevents the transistor from working. It’s “like trying to build a brick patio, with a giant boulder in the middle of it,” Shulaker says. His team solved that problem. They spread nanotubes on a chip. Then they used vibrations to gently shake unwanted bundles off the layer of nanotubes.

A new kind of computer chip (array of chips on the wafer pictured above) contains thousands of transistors made from carbon nanotubes, not silicon. The prototypes can't yet compete with silicon chips for size or speed. But carbon-nanotube-based computing promises to usher in a new era of electronics that are faster and more energy efficient. CREDIT: G. Hills et al/Nature 2019

The team also faced another problem. Each batch of carbon nanotubes contains about 0.01 percent metallic nanotubes. Metallic nanotubes can’t properly flip between conductive and insulating. So these tubes can muddle a transistor’s readout.

Shulaker and colleagues searched for a workaround. To perform different kinds of operations on bits of data, transistors can be configured in various ways. The researchers looked at how metallic nanotubes affected different configurations. They found that defective nanotubes affected the function of some configurations more than others. This is similar to the way a missing letter can make some words illegible, but leave others mostly readable. So the researchers carefully designed the circuitry of their microprocessor. They avoided configurations that were most confused by metallic-nanotube glitches.

“One of the biggest things that impressed me about this paper was the cleverness of that circuit design,” says Michael Arnold. He’s a materials scientist at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. He was not involved in the work.

The resulting chip has more than 14,000 carbon-nanotube transistors. It executed a simple program to write the message, “Hello, world!” This is the first program that many newbie computer programmers learn to write.

The new chips are not yet ready to unseat silicon ones in modern electronics. Each carbon transistor is about a millionth of a meter across. Current silicon transistors are smaller. They are tens of billionths of a meter across. Each carbon-nanotube transistor in this prototype can flip on and off about a million times a second. Silicon transistors can flicker billions of times per second. That puts nanotube transistors on a par with silicon transistors of the 1980s.

Shrinking the nanotube transistors would help electricity zip through them with less resistance. That would allow the devices to switch on and off faster, Arnold says. They could also align the nanotubes in parallel, rather than using a randomly oriented mesh. This could increase the electric current through the transistors. That would further boost processing speeds.

[jcherrybct]

10&11/3/20

In our 3rd ICT session, we took a look into the history of creative technologists. Although the machinery etc. has changed drastically, the principles are still the same and we can learn from looking into the past despite being part of a fluid movement moulded by potential futures.

 We also looked at how our families and experience have shaped our creative abilities so far in our lives, from being labelled, ‘creative’ to having a vast array of experiences to call upon, enabling learning of knowledge from different cultures even if it is subconscious learning.

I found the next part of our session interesting: 

This timeline shows us of the amount of change and fluidity our plans and ideas take from the first thought through to the finished article. It’s reassuring to think that we can be massively changing ideas and that sometimes to move forward you have to accept you were wrong and take steps backwards. This was then emphasised by the analogy that concepts are birthed not thought up. Despite the initial conception to growing for a considerable period of time. Upon birth the idea becomes property of more than just you, it is aided and grown by many others. Finally the idea still needs to be raised to become something ‘desirable’. This analogy really tells of the length and effort goes into growing an idea. It is also important to note that at any point without help, much like the baby in this scenario, if help is not given on any part of the process, the idea will cease to move forward, either stay in its current state and waste potential or even cease to become something physical.

Branching out with concepts, we began to look at early videos of heads of large corporations (Apple & Segway) watching the videos it is apparent that the thought process is the same, exciting & ambitious even though there are definite differences in success. It costs nothing to be ambitious, and you never know what might come from it! For out course it is also extremely important for us to create our own concepts and story. ‘Borrowing’ from the internet or past ideas will not aid our creative journey and more so not be worth getting a degree for ... 

There is much more to add to what we have done, I have a few videos to watch and passages to read. However I also got a few assignments to complete and for that reason am attempting to keep this blog short. I will be posting the final results of my Vlog (which we spent a large amount of the session talking about) once complete. I am currently trying to fine tune my storyboard/script and will complete the assignment over the weekend hopefully!

In our studio session, we begun by presenting the audio we made from natural materials. I haven’t yet documented any progress made through this project, and will attempt to quickly fill in the gaps. We have made the decision to create a storm sound, giving the impression that you were inside a house. At first creating a calm sensation and emotion, however when you add more sounds you will then have a heavier storm and creating a more dangerous scared set of emotions. We used natural conductors to represent the sounds we collected, water was used to represent rain & mint to represent the cool feeling wind creates. All the sounds we used were collected by group members, from standing outside in the rain during the week recording the noise, visiting the wharf during a windy day to a homemade rain maker. We believe that the presentation was well received, however we potentially focused overly on capturing and editing the sounds and our interface and overall user experience suffered because of it. Next time I will try to manage my time better enabling an attempt to enhance all aspects of our project.

Today we once again built on iconography and emoticons. This time with gestures. From how we use gestures in our day to day to how we can potentially use them as a form of way finding or involve them in our makey makey projects. We looked next at a Theremin, a musical instrument that uses an electromagnetic field and gestures of a human (creating resistance) to create both a different volume and pitch of sounds. This was very interesting because there is a possibility to use several variable instruments such as light/motion sensors, to create an instrument. This could be a very interesting project however for now I don’t believe I have the programming capabilities.

After attempting to create a large chain of people to activate the makey makey, we were told our brief for next week. We are to create a performance. I believe that we are to try and include multiple people on a larger scale than what we have been for the last few weeks. And for this I thought it would be fun if we could remove buttons all together and try and create some form of game show. We have a lot of thinking to do on how to make this work, and I will attempt to keep this blog updated as much as possible.

After lunch we had our induction into many of the different labs which was really cool, with such incredible equipment and help available to us a whole new avenue of possibilities opens up. My only worry is the cost of materials, I am already finding the living cost on top of international fees to be particularly strenuous as I am only currently able to work for money one day in the week. I hope this doesn’t hold back my potential learning!

I apologise for the lack of images in this post however I do not have them to hand and will potentially post tomorrow!

[chubbyooo]

Blurred Lines: Cursed Past Chapter 44 - Dress Sense

so the spinoff is finished and as a result we’re back to the main story and headin back to Gacen and Ash 

Gacen and Ash do a favour for Amy and talk about their situation

Ash was confused Gacen had said they were going shopping but as far as she could tell they were still floating in space, he’d been gone for a few hours normally she would go find him but she wasn’t looking forward to the gala so didn’t mind if he was distracted. She no longer had her military ranking so couldn’t use being a soldier as an excuse to not dress up, she didn’t know the first thing about it and didn’t really want to. But it was necessary to fit in especially considering Amy’s mission, Ash thought back to the galas the republic used to throw hopefully this gala wouldn’t be as interrupted. The gala was being thrown on some rich persons planet called Cantonica no doubt the target was some bigwig executive or business man. 

From outside the door she heard some shuffling “Ok Ash are you ready” Ash frowned did he already have his outfit. “I SAID are you ready?” 

Ash walked up to the door turning on the lock “sure I’m ready” promptly she heard a wumph as Gacen crashed into the closed door

Ash couldn’t help but grin “oh very funny Ash come on open the door” Ash chuckled to herself unlocking the door.

A few seconds later Gacen came prancing through the door, he was wearing a ridiculous red suit with tailcoats and a black and red top hat. He twirled into an elegant pose “soooo what do you think” Ash frowned at him trying to stifle laughter

Ash raised her eyebrow “I think you look like a nexu tamer” Gacen scrunched up his face “is that seriously your outfit?” he glowered at her nodding

Gacen brought a box into the room “I guess not everyone has my impeccable taste” he put the box down

Ash frowned “what’s this” she had a hunch she knew but was hoping it wasn’t that

Gacen gave a devious smile as he lifted the lid “it’s dresses of course this is what I meant when I said shopping” Ash peered into the box which was full of dresses

Ash chuckled “dare I even ask why you have this” there was certainly a wide array of options to choose from

Gacen laughed “ah well that’s a good story me and Risha took a job to smuggle these to some crime family but oh no we ‘lost the shipment’” Ash sighed of course “needless to say Risha liked a lot of the dresses so we created a clever lie and I won many boyfriend points it was a win win” Risha certainly seemed eccentric 

Ash rubbed her forehead “and I have to wear one of these?” Gacen frowned he seemed at least sympathetic

“well not if you really don’t want to but it’d help you fit in, it’s just those Risha didn’t take so the selection isn’t perfect” Ash appreciated his concern but he was right she’d stick out like a sore thumb without it and their job was to blend in

Ash looked away “I uh I’ve just never done this sort of thing before I don’t wanna embarrass myself” Gacen chuckled 

he gestured to himself “Ash first of all you really have nothing to be embarrassed about but also you’re gonna be next to this I don’t think anyone will think you’re the one embarrassing yourself” Ash chuckled that was fair

Ash smiled “yes I was wondering where Gacen went Marching band conductor do you know?” Gacen chuckled good he did know how ridiculous he looked

Gacen began rooting around in the box “okeeey let’s see what would you look good in ooo what about” he pulled out a big poofy pink dress and raised an eyebrow “this?” 

Ash glowered at him “I’d sooner see you in that than me” Gacen grinned

he looked at the dress “I bet I could pull it off” he began rooting around again “ok that was my one joke serious now how do you feel about golds and silvers?” Ash sighed in no universe did she want to sparkle

Ash rubbed her forehead “no part of me wants to shimmer Gacen” Gacen nodded continuing to root around

Gacen turned to look at her “uh short or long?” Ash eyes widened why did she have to choose she didn’t wanna look exposed

Ash blushed “uh I guess long” Gacen nodded rooting around a little more before he stopped 

Gacen nodded “here we are” he pulled out an elegant white dress that went over one shoulder “I think you would look amazing in white” Ash looked at the dress it didn’t look awful

Ash held her arm “uh I dunno Gacen are you sure” Gacen frowned at her he seemed to be losing patience

Gacen brought the dress over “ok it’s this or the pink one take your pick” Ash’s eyes widened, she quickly took the dress and headed to change fine she would wear it.

She held it up in front of her it didn’t look so bad to be honest Gacen was definitely right about the colour. It looked a little small though she chuckled it’s probably not built for athletic people still it seemed better than the other options. She put the dress on and looked in the mirror she felt very awkward but she looked ok not awful and to be honest that’s all she needed. It was a little tight but still fitted the only real problem was the bottom of her legs sticking out but still could be worse. 

She put her jacket back on and walked back out to Gacen, she walked in and he gave a clap beaming at her.

Gacen grinned “told ya it wouldn’t be so bad you look awesome, girls better watch out Ash you’d knock em dead” Ash folded her arms she appreciated him being nice but still felt weird

Ash looked away “well uh thanks but let’s just get this over with” Gacen nodded gesturing for her to take his arm, Ash gave him a long glare so Gacen relinquished the gesture.

later...

They arrived outside the event in good time Ash looked at the other guests, a lot of their outfits were either a lot less ‘elegant’ seeming kind of low budget or way too elegant with frills and side bits she’d never understand this culture. She could see Amy waiting near the entrance wearing a red jumpsuit dress and waved as they walked over.

Amy smiled “well well well you two certainly made an effort it’s nice to see you looking so pretty Ash” Ash felt herself blush as Amy turned to Gacen “and I wasn’t aware you knew the leader of the local carnival” Gacen sighed

he folded his arms “you guys are just jealous of how good I look” Ash had to admit Gacen certainly fit in wether or not that was a good or bad thing was yet to be seen.

Amy raised her eyebrow “uh huh” Ash couldn’t help but chuckle “as I told you just blend in and if anyone asks I’m uh on the can” they both nodded at least this wasn’t complicated. 

They made their way into the event and Amy quickly broke off from them to do her ‘business’. Ash turned to Gacen “So what now failed magician we just wait around” Gacen seemed to brush off the comment

Gacen smiled “well I know where I’m going I’m heading to the buffet table galas always have them” Ash followed him to the buffet table and was suddenly hit with a huge wave of deja vu looking down at Gacen filling his plate had she done this before?

Ash chuckled “woah Gacen I’m getting crazy deja vu right now” Gacen smiled at her seemingly understanding what she meant

Gacen chuckled “well this is like the mirror image of when we first met” Ash’s eyes widened it totally was “I remember you thought I was an ass and that the smuggler program was a waste of time” Ash frowned that did sound right

Ash folded her arms “and you thought I was an uptight soldier yeah I remember” Gacen chuckled as he began to eat

Gacen frowned “then cipher nine totally crashed the party the prick” Ash chuckled that was certainly correct “over 7 years later and we’re doing the same, well with a few differences” Gacen seemed to sway slightly as he talked

Ash smiled “yeah more things change more they stay the same right?” Gacen nodded “what did change though I used to hate you” Gacen raised his eyebrow

“same as most people Ash I badgered you until you opened up to me and ya know broke you out of that uptight soldier shell” Ash nodded that seemed accurate she had to admit having a good laugh was useful and the old her wasn’t the sort of person she wanted to be again.

Ash surveyed the room “I guess you’re right” she turned to Gacen who was taking a swig of alcohol “ya know I heard Darth Nox was part of the team that crashed that party” Gacen spat out the alcohol coughing for a few seconds

he tried his best to compose himself “oh yeah? that’s interesting” Ash frowned maybe she shouldn’t have pushed that she had said she’d wait until they found Risha Ash just wanted to be sure.

That spit take was pretty much proof “um yeah just interesting it was so high profile, you ok there Gacen?” Gacen continued to cough for a couple more seconds

Gacen hit his chest “yeah I’m good just some booze went down the wrong pipe don’t uh worry” he took a few deep breaths “uh um you know that gala was my first date with Risha” Ash wracked her brain she did remember seeing Gacen with a woman that day clearly she hadn’t committed it to memory properly through.

Ash smiled “huh no kidding” Gacen nodded eating more of his giant plate “how are you feeling about uh all this then?” Gacen frowned 

“I uh I’m feeling ok about it I’m not so confident in the uh leads but it’s like you said it’s better to get it done and know than worry about it any more” Ash nodded this must be tough especially considering his dependancy but she was glad he wanted closure.

Ash hesitated “and uh how’s the well booze situation” Gacen sighed looking at Ash seriously

“well it’s a little better but it’s not something that’s gonna be ‘fixed’ I’ve always drank in moderation but normally I had something to hold me back but after Belsavis I well I didn’t that’s I think why things got so bad” Ash nodded she understood somewhat but it did genuinely seem like she was getting her friend back so who was she to judge his methods “shit the only thing that stopped me from drinking myself to death was the threat of you leaving, I uh really couldn’t lose anything else so thanks for setting me on the right path” Ash smiled she was glad her meddling hadn’t been too destructive “but I dunno maybe if we find Risha things will get better who’s to say” Gacen smiled Ash didn’t want to push him anymore and it seemed like her trust was somewhat working, the distraction of the Risha mystery also helped. Gacen grinned “but for now I have seafood tray with my name on and I want me some king prawns” Ash chuckled she felt she could go for seafood too. 

As they made their way over Ash saw Amy shuffle over to them quickly “Ok guys did anyone ask about me?” Ash completely forgot about that luckily no one had asked.

Gacen slapped his forehead “oh yeah that’s what we were here for” Amy frowned at him

she sighed “great thanks guys” Amy looked around frantically “well on my cue we’re leaving” Gacen gasped looking upset

“but I was about to get some seafood” Amy gave him a puzzled look “fine what’s the signal” Ash saw Gacen begin putting seafood into a bag of course he brought a bag.

suddenly the lights all dimmed and flickered off Ash heard from the darkness “THAT” from Amy as she felt her grab Ash’s hand. They quickly dashed out of the gala, Ash wasn’t gonna even ask how a power cut helped her kill her target bounty hunters always had their methods.

Soon they were at the spaceport as Amy caught her breath “awesome that went off without a hitch thanks guys” Gacen smiled 

He picked some seafood out of his bag “hey we got free food out of it not too bad if you ask me we should do this more often” they both chuckled while Ash folded her arms

Amy smiled “it’s certainly been fun thanks eccentric clown and Ash you were great too” Ash nodded Amy was certainly something but she somehow hoped it’d be a while until they met again. “alright see ya” Amy headed off leaving Ash and Gacen in the spaceport

Gacen turned to Ash “sooo back to the hunt for my wife” Ash nodded she hoped that’d somehow be less weird than this

Ash smiled “sure thing” Gacen began eating more seafood “did you have to bring a bag?” Gacen chuckled as he stuffed his face

he grinned “would it really have been like me if I didn’t” he had a point not a good one but a point...

[withastolenlantern]

The detective was taken aback at the cavernous space they entered. A central corridor led from the door straight through to the far side of the fab, with various machines whirring and thumping to either side of her off into the horizon. She noticed that the corridor and spaces between the machines were lined in multi-colored LED stripes pulsing in time, and overhead she saw several heavy drones flitting about hauling various pieces and parts. The cacophony of production was overwhelming, almost symphonic in its rhythm, as if an unseen conductor was directing a post-modern orchestra in an oddly tempoed concerto. “Fuck me,” she gasped breathlessly. 

“Yeah, it sure is a thing,” Santomas replied with a smile that quickly devolved into a look of concern. “Problem is, none of this stuff is supposed to be, uh… on.”

She followed Santomas down the central alleyway, between rows of heavy equipment. “How often do you visit one?” she asked, almost yelling above the din. 

“Me? Not frequently. We have local guys in most regions that handle all the preventative maintenance. Not that there’s really a lot; most of it can be resolved remotely, especially process-related stuff. We have some telepresence drones too, for more manual tasks.” He gestured to the far side of the floor, where threel skeletal machines were lined against the wall in some kind of charging apparatus. “The programming is sufficient to get them roughly in place, and then the fine manipulators have a haptic interface for more delicate tasks.”

Chatham was somewhat familiar with these; she’d once had an ordnance disposal unit called in to investigate potential IEDs in southern Kathiawar. But the drone they’d used was small and waddled almost like a turtle on awkward legs, and had a singular arm and crude manipulator with a gripping claw and basic cutters. The units Santomas was pointing out were nearly the size of a small man, with six segmented wheels at the base, a hydraulic “torso” and individual articulated digits at the end of two long interface arms. They looked imposing, even deactivated in their charging creche, all angular steel and plastic, like the villain from a late-century slasher B-movie. 

They continued on into what appeared to be the center of the cavernous fab, where a tower of sorts rose ten or so meters above the main production floor. She followed Santomas up a flight of rickety stairs around the perimeter and into some kind of control room. The door shut behind them, and the roar of the machinery was dimmed to a low yet persistent hum.

Santomas sat on a formed plastic bench before an enormous control console, not dissimilar from the one in his office in Wales. “This is the main control center,” the engineer explained as he powered on the terminal and the various holos flickered to life. “The various sub-systems are routed to the main process PLCs here, and then up to the comms array on the roof. I can supervise the entire production queue from this terminal, execute scripts, manually command individual machines, et cetera. It’s really fascinating when you think about it, how the automation protocols have advanced in the last thirty years...” 

“While the facility tour has been highly interesting,” Chatham interrupted, “I might remind you that we’re here to investigate a possible crime.”.

“Right, right, we’re getting to it.” He keyed several commands into the console, and a process flow diagram appeared on the holoscreen. 

The detective wasn’t sure what she was looking at, but it didn’t appear to be chemical in nature. “Help me understand what I’m seeing here.”

“Well, for starters, clearly the status link is working.”

“I could see that the moment we walked in,” she countered.

“Right, but that’s the thing. The external command status for this entire fab is set to shutdown. It basically terminated all line operations and told all the machinery to power down. Nothing’s supposed to be running, which is why we were seeing the red flag back in my office. But somehow the production queue got restarted; I don’t know if it was done locally, from here, or somehow else, but the lines are obviously running. And, well,” Santomas scratched at the back of his head, a sheepish look on his face. “We never really planned for a conflict like this.”

“How so?”

“Just because I can control things from this terminal doesn’t mean we ever intended to. The status flag fed back to the office is strictly report-only. Once the line starts up it closes the contact on output relay which sends the status signal out. So there’s a conflict: the last external value was set for shutdown, which its reporting. But I don’t think anyone ever anticipated a scenario where the fab would still also be running production, so we’re getting both statuses. The system didn’t know what to report, so it just reported everything.” 

Chatham closed in behind him, her hand resting on his shoulder, as she lowered her face in towards the holo. “I thought you said the batch files-”

“Recipes.”

“Right, the recipes, are only uploaded over your secure link,” she finished.

The engineer nodded in assent. “Correct.”

“Well can you determine who uploaded this particular recipe file?” Chatham asked.

“Should be able to. Hold on,” Santomas said, typing furiously at the terminal. The holo flashed as he cycled through the screens and windows. He frowned, flipping his glasses up onto his forehead as he narrowed his eyes at the projection. “Okay, now, that’s real weird.”

“Don’t keep me in suspense Mister Santomas,” the detective demanded.

“So, I can’t figure out who ran this recipe,” he said. Chatham’s eyebrows raised in concern, but he waved her off. “That’s not even the weirdest part.”

She cocked her head slightly in frustration, rolling her eyes as she motioned him on. 

“I’m looking at the execution instructions for this recipe and it’s missing the authorization code.” 

“English, please,” she pleaded. “We haven’t all day here.”

He pointed toward the holo. “You see here, at the top of this recipe file? This is the program header: it’s not really any different from your average code file, where the programmer will put a bunch of identifying information. Revision number, code author, notes, etc. Well, in the case of our recipe files, there’s also supposed to be an authorization code - when the recipe goes into execution, the first thing the PLCs are supposed to do is confirm the authorization code. We, by which I mean, The Consortium, add it to every recipe. It’s part of our regulatory review process, and it also prevents user recipes from running without our knowledge.”

“So you’re telling me that not only should this facility not be active, you can’t tell me who activated, and how?”