#this is the most complex pixel thing ive made

[jonphaedrus]

2022 fic year in review

2022 was a weird year. i pulled an all-nighter on feb 16 and i was possessed by the ghost of prfr past and an opera only i care about and then i woke up ten months later (kidding. i have not woken up at all) nearly a million words later and with my entire life in slight disarray and an unbreakable obsession with pokémon villain from baby jrpg fake france

anyway let's do the breakdown. im gonna take some questions from the overall ao3 wrapped lists going around, and then do the greatest hits/thoughs of all my fav fics from every month of the year (by posted date, including if it was adjusted for reveals; im not taking into account when things were "actually" written, but also neither will ongoing wips still unfinished count)

total word count in 2022: i waited to post this until id posted my final fics of the year and got the final count and cant stop staring at that 780k total. wtf. some of this is wips from across multiple years updated in 2022 (and much of it is roleswap which is going to get bumped into 2023...) but it's the most i've ever written on my own, ever. multiple past years combined. i stuggled so much with writing from 2018-2021 and i thought i'd never find it as easy or relaxing again and to have found joy in my words makes me so happy. LOOK HOW MUCH I WROTE! WHAT THE FUCK!!!!

fav fic i wrote this year: not counting ongoing wips (sorry roleswap. otherwise roleswap would be like the #1 thing on every answer), "tomorrow you must love me" is the best thing ive ever written (before roleswap) and it was such a joy and struggle to work on. i was so nervous and scared writing every bit of it but it came out exactly the way i wanted to. learning how to write longfic (for me) has been such a beautiful experience and it's made me so happy to share with others!

fav fic i read this year: "do let the old enmity be" by sam (my favorite gift anyone has ever given me on ao3 i cant—i cant even handle it i melt i explode i climb onto the rooftop to holler across the atlantic ocean), both fics in sam's mutual pining series (i have read both of these fics so many times... my favorite sam fics. or close to my favorite sam fics. we met because of mp1... these two STUPID, STUPID FUCKING FISH!!!!) and "mira vs. sasha cant" which might not have been written for me but it was written to infiltrate my brain and give me strength beyond imagining. oh, my god, it's so good, please read it. I AM NO LONGER ASKING.

fav series i read this year: royals having a nice time by ba_lailah. if you like polyamory, gender, sex (both the kind you do with other people and the bits attached to the body), pregnancy, family, parenthood, developing relationships, realism and worldbuilding, kids, the complexity of monarchy and the realities of rule, really REALLY REALLY hot porn, and some of the best bdsm ive ever read, treat yourself and go read rhant. there's a 250k novel coming this year. it's incredible. worth your time. go. read it.

fav exchange this year: fic in a box. the chance to play around with mediums and stylesheets and the exchange community around fiab was lovely. all the pinch hits i wrote were so much fun—i literally don't think i saw a single prompt i didnt adore!—and the mods were fabulous and i got LITERALLY THE BEST GIFT EVER. fiab is honestly a ton of fun. if you're new to exchanges and you want to try something a little out of left field, i really recommend fiab! the signups can be sort of esoteric but don't let the mediums or the complexity of the rulesets scare you off (they almost scared me off but sam coaxed me through it like a nervous small mammal) or the 10k minimum. you can break that up in so many ways (vids, art, cross stitch or knitting patterns, pixel art, voxel art, interactive fiction, asw remixes, comics, poetry, drabbles, standard fic, social media...) that it's really accessible and encourages so much thinking out of the box. i am SO EXCITED for next year.

fav ship i wrote for: GEE, I FUCKING WONDER.

fav character pov to write: you might think "prfr, either half" but no. it's shauna, actually. i love writing her and her perspective on things. she's so relatable and i just. i love her. her voice comes so easily to me, i cant wait to write her more in 2023

fav scene i wrote: a three-way tie between "as you treated him, so shall i treat you" which is just one scene but it set me on such an unexpected and amazing path to meeting some of my best friends and the most important people in my life and improving my craft and becoming so much happier on every axis ALL BECAUSE I DIDNT SLEEP AND I WAS MAD NOBODY ELSE HAD WRITTEN LYSANDRE GETTING STEPPED ON.... the scene with shauna and augustine in the grass in "with tenderness and pretty words it is easy to conquer good girls' hearts" which was a lot of catharsis for me as well as augustine and shauna, and a very specific chapter late in roleswap. i'm not saying which one. that's for me to know and you to find out.

wip i finally finished: inspired by the ficwip server, i've been working (slowly) on some of my old wips, and finally finished starry heavens, which was meant to be done like eight years ago. it's character studies of every major character in tales of symphonia, and getting to see it in full and my growth as an author over the better part of the last decadeis a little humbling. ive come so far! writing is great actually!

wip i've yet to finish: roleswap. 2023. we will do it. it will be done. as soon as my fffx is draft complete, roleswap is my heart and soul.

most read fic: it is (a little unsurprisingly given how long it is...) roleswap! which makes me so, so happy. sam and i have worked so hard

longest fic (completed in 2022): "tomorrow you must love me" at 57k

shortest fic: apparently it was "in which the author reaches the end of his rope" at 193 words. i didnt even remember writing this so jkhlkdfjhglsdhkfg

fav fic title used: "RÉEL FIBSHING: LUMIOSE CITY EDITION" which is twine-style interactive fiction about magikarp jump, set in sam's "as the night the day" universe which i wholeheartedly adore and you should go read it.

biggest surprise while writing: how much easier it is for me to do multi-chapter and longform works! i've always really struggled in the past to stay committed and complete things, but this year i've really started to move into the realm of being able to just... write longfic! that's very exciting to me.

fav comment received: shout out to ao3 users yelp, who is an absolute delight in exchanges. like, seriously, yelp is such a sweetheart. omg. i would write for them in an exchange again in a heartbeat and their comments are so sweet.... and also every other comment i got. thank you ;;v;; they make me so happy... i hardly ever even know what to say

fav fic author i read: i wonder who that ao3 user samifer is. what a guy. in all seriousness, this year my favorite authors were my friends. they helped me out, gave me advice, and made me feel so full of love i can't even begin to say how much. i'm so lucky to know these amazing people and i can't encourage you to read everything by sam, kay, neku, lailah, or sushi enough. theyre all amazing fabulous authors and fantastic people and i love them so much. you should go love them too!!!!!

total fics/chapters uploaded: 174. i said that aloud and my husband said "holy crap babe" from the other room. what the actual fuck

what am i most looking forward to next year: FINISHING ROLESWAP IM SO EXCITED ITS ALL IM THINKING ABOUT!!! IM SO READY AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

ok and finally under the cut my favorite fic from each month of 2022!

JANUARY 2022 -- SINCE THE DARK (owain & l'arachel, gen)

i've been doing nagamas since the very first year and it's still one of my favorite exchanges. getting to play around with a narrator as fun as owain and contrasting him with l'arachel was great and seeing their crossover interactions was so good. nagamas gr9 actually. 10/10 exchange will always participate again

FEBRUARY 2022 -- AS YOU TREATED HIM, SO SHALL I TREAT YOU (prfr, m)

what else, lol? i didnt sleep i listened to an entire opera, i blacked out, i woke up ten months later and discovered i'd moved in and written like four novels. i am never moving back out. i love everyone in this house. especially sam.

MARCH 2022 -- IN EVERY PLACE, AT EVERY TIME (prfr, e)

inspired by sam prompting for phone sex and mutual pining, playing around with academia and conferences and giving this the most #onbrand title/chapter title/summary combo i could come up with this also led to me meeting new dear friends!!

APRIL 2022 -- TOMORROW YOU MUST LOVE ME (prfr, e)

im so stupid proud of this fic. setting up a plot this complex with so many moving pieces and multiple povs and multiple mediums and dealing with so many real life issues was a lot of moving pieces but it was so, so worth it. it was worth all of the work because it's one of the best things ive ever written and it came out just how i wanted to and it helped me make my friends happy and aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa i just love prfr and writing c/c/c has been just amazing and I WILL KEEP GOING NEXT YEAR!! THIS YEAR WHATEVER IT'S 2023 NOW BUT WHATEVER ITS STILL 5783

MAY 2022 -- WHO COULD USE FORCE AGAINST A HEART LIKE HIS (IV) (prfr, e)

sam prompted me for using bdsm as therapy and i wanted to write cnc and it spiralled very out of control. one of the questions someone asked early on with c/c/c was what happened at The Incident and i'd intended to write that and playing with vanilla sex and safewording and cnc and trust was really difficult and i've struggled off and on for most of the year with this series of 5+1 but every one as i've finished it has been such an accomplishment even when it's been hard. especially when it's been hard.

JUNE 2022 -- 'TIS NOT LONG BEFORE THEY FEEL THEIR FEEBLE SOULS BEGIN TO REEL

how, HOW, HOW??? WAS I THE FIRST PERSON TO (APPARENTLY??) WRITE T4T SEX POLLEN FIC ON AO3? anyway it was fun and the result is sexy sexy sex

JULY 2022 -- AS THOUGH IT WERE POSSIBLE TO COMMAND LOVE

sam asked for prfr one bed and then FIFTY THOUSAND FUCKING WORDS LATER they finally made it to the bed and fucked in it. good for them.

AUGUST 2022 -- SILKEN DALLIANCE

the entire writer's month challenge was an experience (writing that much every day for a month... im glad i did it but im not doing it again i dont think dfkjhgkdfhg) but of all the fics i wrote i think this was my favorite. i really struggled with this prompt and i wasn't all that happy with it as i was writing it/right after but as time has passed i've been more and more proud of it.

SEPTEMBER 2022 -- TIRED OF THIS BODY

i dont really have anything insightful to say here. uh. getting into new and slightly unexpected kinks is character growth?

OCTOBER 2022 -- ONE CANDLE IN THE RAIN

something something if i had a nickel for every trans serial killer au i've written id have two nickels which is a weird number of nickels to have for something this specific and niche. anyway getting into new and slightly unexpected kinks (and then getting your friends into new and slightly unexpected kinks) is character growth

NOVEMBER 2022 -- WHO COULD USE FORCE AGAINST A HEART LIKE HIS (V)

i stuill have mixed feelings about this fic. i think this was like... my fifth or sixth attempt at writing it, and it honestly still didnt turn out exactly how i wanted it to and im a little bit frustrated by that, but as much as i tell people it doesn't have to be perfect it just has to be done, i struggle with "done, not perfect" and "done, not perfect" here meant i finished this and it made me happy. ive learned a lot this year and one of the things i learned was to let go of perfection and finish stories and be happy with the growth from them. this grew out of so many ideas and the way it ended up is just right just the way it is.

DECEMBER 2022 -- AZURE AS ANTEDILUVIAN SONG or RÉEL FIBSHING: LUMIOSE CITY EDITION

fiab was such a good exchange ;__; i had so much fun and i can't wait to do it again next year. pinch hitting and treating and getting to write for some of my best friends and trying out new mediums was so much fun and i definitely feel like i grew a lot as a writer in the process. writing interactive fiction was a new one for me (i've never written anything even like a choose your own adventure even just for friends before as a kid or anything) and it definitely was a new experience, especially playing around with 2nd person like that, and twine had a learning curve, but it was a fun learning curve c: azure as antediluvian song came out of me all in one go based on a prompt without even intending to write it. kazuha is my favorite genshin character and i loved this au concept and getting to play around with ayato was unexpectedly enjoyable! genshin lore good.

[wurmeatworld]

As an artist, I think ai art is a very complex issue. Yes it can be used as a tool to advance creativity, but capitalism ultimately twists it so that it is not used ethically.

I like some ai generated memes. Its really funny to watch Joe Biden banter with Leon S Kennedy, or watch deepfakes of Preminger singing Lady Gaga. But I feel like the same humor could be achieved without the use of ai. You could splice together lines ala ytp or animate Preminger singing. It just requires more time and skill, and thats really the draw of ai. Ai helps a greater pool of people do things they normally couldnt do because it cuts out the work.

The capability to expand what people can do and create is good! I once followed a disabled person on tumblr who made ai art for personal use because his disability meant he couldn't draw. Ive also used ai art generators in the past, back when the results were super uncanny and whacky, to generate funny images or interesting eldritch horror-y art. If ai art wasn't built upon so much stolen art, that'd be a completely beautiful thing. Id love to donate my art to an ai program that only trains on explicitly donated work. I think thatd be really cool. But most people Ive seen making ai art and ai art generators are tech bros who only care about end results and money instead of appreciating the intent, technique, and artistry that artists pour into their work. And of course, not giving two shits about us getting paid.

Ive seen people make ai to intentionally copy the works of particular artists. It's almost indistinguishable from their art style, and to me, that feels insulting. These artists put so much work into their art, only for someone to churn out much more art in their style, and faster. Copying art you like has always been a thing among artists, to pay homage to creators and to learn new things by studying, but these ai art pieces that explicity train on an artists work and replicate their style feel... really hollow. Wheras among most artists, their replication comes from a place of respect and admiration, and requires truly learning and following the techniques an artist used, ai art just pulls from already existing assets with no real direction to guide it except a simple prompt. Theres no respect for the artist here, just someone who wants more of an artists work but doesnt actually care about the artist themself.

The amount of labor you need to create ai art vs regular art, and how ai art steals work from artists, is a discussion all on its own. This doesnt really have an easy black and white solution because of capitalism. In a world where we wouldnt need money to survive, it wouldnt really matter that ai art takes less effort to make because it wouldnt infringe on artists livlihoods. But as it is, and especially in our "quantity and familiarity over quality" consumerist culture, the attention it takes from artists can cause loss of revenue, and people offering ai art commissions only hurt artists more. The most popular areas of the internet already arent great platforms for artists, even though were forced to use them. Our culture doesnt really value our work, and most artists offer their work for ridiculously low prices just to sell anything at all. My pixel art commissions are $9. $9 for hours of sitting at my computer, working and shaping and reworking the pixels until theyre just right. Color, position, everything has a lot of time, care, and skill put into it. I wish I could charge double what I pay, but I have an extremely small platform, so Im forced to charge barely anything at all. If we did not need money to survive, it wouldnt be that big of a deal. But we do. So it is.

And as things stand, even disregarding the problem of capitalism, theres just too many harmful ways ai can be exploited because theres barely any regulation. The deepfaked nudes, the easy misinformation, etc. I personally dont think regulation will be enough bc the base problem is caused by capitalism, and tbh I think media literacy plays a huge part, but there still needs to be. Its just an incredibly dangerous technology as it stands right now.

Also worth noting, is how algorithms can easily lead to radicalization. A study came out showing that new tiktok users who watch certain "gateway" content will gradually be shown more and more extremist stuff. (Source: x *) Especially on social media sites, which are designed to promote controversial posts because theres more engagement, this can lead to someone potentially becoming part of a hate group. I bet theres ways algorithms could be written to prevent this, but everyone wants money, so its probably not gonna change anytime soon. Consumerism is a bitch.

Also, algorithms promote the most commonly accepted ideas, which causes bias and can cause social and scientific progress to become stagnant at best, and actively harmful at worst.

Basically, ai needs to be better regulated, capitalism sucks, and ai art is a whole can of worms. I feel like humanity needs to keep ai art on the highest shelf until we can work out the ethical dilemmas we already have.

(This was originally a comment I left on this video, but I put a lot of thought into it so I thought I'd repost it here. Please watch the video, it brings up more ideas on ai and is just a fun watch)

*Its a youtube video and the info is compressed and presented quickly, but sources are all linked.

[womenrocket35]

The Largest Problem In Massage Comes All The Way Down To This Word That Starts With "W"

I imagine that Massage can develop into a software that can allow you to come back more into touch with your individual body's health and nicely being. The mom informed one health visitor the 'little one most well-liked dad', 'hated it when the baby cried, couldn't cope, (and) typically left (the youngster) alone to cry in its cot'. One thing's for positive: you cannot accuse Samsung of being inconsistent. After recent developments from opponents just like the iPhone thirteen and Pixel 6, Samsung is now playing catchup to Apple and Google in the digital camera division. Networks in the modern age have grown to such an extent that they have now begun to resemble self-governing dwelling entities. As we have seen the child Internet develop by means of its adolescence right into a strapping teenager, we now have experienced and are experiencing a lot of its development pangs and tantrums. 07 Electronic thermal effects are seldom included in lots of-body calculations. Most ab-initio calculations within the literature of condensed matter digital construction are primarily based in the bottom state quantum Monte Carlo calculations of the homogeneous electron gasceperley80 which made attainable the primary approximations of DFT.

The ensuing basis can be also used to speed up the calculation of the ground or excited states with Quantum Monte Carlo. We show that the subspace spanned by the small foundation systematically converges towards the subspace spanned by the bottom energy eigenstates. 84 ; onida02 ; filippi09 Monte Carlo strategies used to calculate excitation energiesfilippi09 shall be accelerated with foundation that retain the physics on the related energies. On the other hand, the opposite two strategies consult with conspicuous recovery of mechanical properties of the harm materials as shown in experimental investigations. The standard of the wave perform and its nodes will be improved with several methods inside a variational Monte Carlo (VMC) context, mfoulkesrmp2001 ; ortiz95 ; jones97 ; guclu05 ; umrigar07 ; toulouse08 ; petruzielo12 ; rios06 or on the DMC degree. 12 Finite temperatures benchmarks of a top quality comparable to Ref. The rest of the paper is organized as follows: In Section II we describe the general formalism; a few of the formulae developed in Ref. Finally, we describe the main points: basic formulae and numerical strategy.

In Section IV we describe the outcomes for a model calculation; and finally, in Section V we discuss the potential functions and summarize. This paper additionally has three appendices: A describes how one can go beyond the locality and local-time approximations; B describes how one can benefit from the eigenstates when they are advanced; Finally, C describes how you can work with eigenstate pairs to attenuate the variance of the weights of the walkers whereas conserving the wave operate complex. Within this customary approximation, electrons are at zero temperature while the ions can move with kinetic energies that always exceed the electronic excitations. We believe that this outage is indicative of the unprecedented complexity of trendy pc systems: we're approaching scales of billions of components. The discussion above present that SVs in a graphene are moderately cell defects, which may migrate and coalesce with different single vacancy forming a DV or with other polyvacancies even at temperatures slight higher than that of a room temperature.

At the transition saddle factors, when some chemical bonds are damaged and new ones are formed, the spacing of the corresponding electronic eigenenergies is minimum, or even zero on the conical intersections. Where ever you're in your life at present, as you read this, I wish you an excellent Friday and a blessed Easter/Passover. 1인샵건마 is a good way to begin. An alternative approach that would start from the zero temperature restrict could be fascinating. The magnetic excitations energies steadily go to zero in the lengthy wave limit. QTS In metals there's a significant variety of excitations with vanishing energy. There have been current disruption of companies in networks such as Google, Twitter, Facebook and Skype. POSTSUBSCRIPT inactive. Note that at any step, if there isn't a lively node, the exploration course of terminates. The shared node turns into a bridge node, i.e., a non-free node in that time step. So as to permit the evolution in imaginary time to describe the density matrix, we take away the fastened-node restriction utilizing complex antisymmetric guiding wave capabilities.

[nako-doodles]

content creator year in review

--- tagged by @suggable @taemaknae @userjiminie @jinvant @jimimon @lifegoesmon @honsool @everythingoes @flipthatjacketjiminie @yoongi-BTS @hobibestboy @jiminslight @kimtaehyunq @taee ✨✨

i only started “”regularly”” making content this year bc of lockdown and i needed something to distract me before i went absolutely insane....i didnt realize i would get so much love and support for it so thank you. thank you for being there bringing laughter, light, love, life into this truly dark and difficult year. thank you for being my moot, my friend, my emotional support, my much needed safe harbor when life was being too much. i love you all such much and i hope y’all have a healthy, happy, fantastic, superb 2021 💖 cheers🥂✨

♡ first creation and most recent creation of 2020:

the inaugural: this moon/tonight inspired thing

the latest: bangtan welcoming the new year

the noticeable improvement aoejgioeagra let this be a lesson for everyone that “talent” is really just a skill honed from a lot of practice

♡  a new style you’re proud of:

this whole pixel art thing is something really new for me and im super happy that all of y’all are coming along w this journey w me. it pushed me a lot out of my comfort zone bc i havent serious giffed in y e a r s for a different era and fandom of tumblr and ive never done digital art before much less an art style so confined and well known and represented. color me slightly narcissistic and impressed w myself

♡ a creation you’re really proud of:

this one i made for jin’s bday! his houndstooth beluti jacket was the ABSOLUTE BANE OF MY EXISTENCE my LORD. unlike most of the things i draw i only had like...3 nonpotato reference photos of jin in it so i tracked down the jacket and figure out what the stupid pattern was. his eyes also made me want to punch my laptop and chuck it out the window bc i couldnt get his hamster face to read “jin” after like 320849032 iterations and erasing one pixel here and adding another pixel of a slightly different color there. i finished the entire thing within minutes of needing to post it in time for his bday even though i started more than a month earlier aojgiroeajgiior

♡ a creation that took you forever:

by jove this most recent one of bangtan dancing from their chilsung ads. i started this back in september/november thinking it would take like 2 weeks at most HA! i barely finished it in time to harken the new year 🤣🤣 animating it was especially challenging because i had to draw and animate the first half going forward, and then last half going backwards so it would loop right and THEN i replayed and rechecked all 60 some frames to make sure there weren't any glaring colour or continuity issues the fortnight before posting it bc things weren't lining up. for a first attempt, i think it looks good......if you dont like....look at it too closely

this one of their pj party bts run one also took me 2 months to finish afjgioraejgio i didnt think i was able to finish it tbh im glad it turned out well. it was my first attempt in animating complex motion and perspective and i think it turned out well. you can barely hear past me phantom screaming about it.

♡ a creation from 2020 that received the most notes:

this rollercoaster derby one from bts week on whichever late night show it was. it just made me really happy seeing tannies zoom by like that and im glad most of you agree

♡ a creation you think deserved more notes:

rather than “deserve” i think we as a fandom should do a better job in reblogging and support your content creators you feel?

♡ a new fandom you joined and a creation you made for it:

i was planning on doing that ‘top 20 songs of 2020′ tag so I made a lil thing for sunmi, day6, lee hi, and ha:tfelt, but i ran out of time and motivation and decisiveness to finish all 20 (sorry dreamcatcher and apink for abandoning you midway aoijgriojgrao)

♡ a creation you made that breaks your heart:

idk something about this shot of jk tilting his head in the life goes on mv makes me....懐かしい? i tried to encapsulate the Feeling™️ 

♡ a ‘simple’ creation that you really love:

this ly photoshoot one of jin and the professor jin whistling one. theres not too many unique frames but they make me really happy looking at them

♡ a creation that was inspired by another one:

this yoongi daechwita one was inspired by my dash losing its mind at this iconic shot and the colouring was inspired by @lifegoesyoon

♡ a favourite creation created by someone else:

god everyone made such incredible work im going to try my best to not forget anyone:

-- @yoongikook and the art movement gifsets truly the galaxy mindedness of everything im in awe

-- @syubb and these gfx???? truly what in the ever living fuck do mortal limits mean nothing to you?

-- @jsuga and these insane gfx Jesus Christ spare talent pls? *shakes her empty beanie*

-- @everythingoes and her 100 days of joon; thank you for personally curing my myopia one joon gif at a time

-- @seoksjin and all her jin content is what saved my entire year tbh thank you ellie

-- @agustdfeatrm and this happy series seriously cured my depression

-- @minhope and this uNREAL ability to make such gorgeous gfx god im planning a museum heist and hoarding all of these like a dragon hoards gold

-- @jungshiii and their gorgeous art museum gfx and this ‘how's quarantine goin’

-- I am in love w everything @bangtanger colours

-- @hobibestboy and @eternalbulletproof and their crystal clear gifs that gave me Enhanced Vision even vision is jealous

-- @slipped-away and all of these goodies

-- @thebtsprint and their posters and gfx w o w

-- @bigswigofmilk their art style is so iconic and cute!!!!

♡ some of your favourite content creators from the year:

im ngl but im having that O M G SENPAIS NOTICED ME moment rn like everyone who tagged me I was like *amber ruffin voice* WWHHHHAAAAATTTTT like wow the talent in this fandom really be UNREAL so everyone who was tagged above as well as:

@chaylani @wabisaba @soie @hopekidoki @seokjinite @houseofarmanto @j-sope @yoongiandthebiaswreckers @joenkook @hosnack @jellyseul @jiminslight @jung-koook @joenns @hixtapes @hobeah @kkulmoon @lucid-jjin @bwijoon @jiminswn @shinhye @varietae @jintae @dearbangtansonyeondan @syuga @ynki @yibiart @samwol @kimnamtaejin @seokjinyoongis @introtae @jhoper @jinstaehyung @himbojoon @jhopetodream @eternal-bangtan @jcngkooks @faerieth @taejoon @jimint @jjoon & @/jinv (*sends a bottled message into the metaphorical ocean w my love bc ocean pollution is a no-go*)✨🌸✨💖✨

♡ and for good measure, another couple more creations of yours that you love:

drop by seokjin’s and have a milkshake🧋you deserve it after reading this entire thing

♡ tagging: everyone above who hasnt done this as well as anyone who wants to 💖💖💖 have a lovely 2021🌸

[beneaththetangles]

Josh’s Top Ten Video Games OF ALL TIME

These days I don’t have much time for video games, and I wonder at times if I’ll hold on to the hobby in the years to come. So I thought that now would be a good time to throw together a top ten list reminding myself of why I loved this medium in the first place.

My only rule was a simple, but painful one: to have only one entry per franchise. This was necessary in order to prevent it from getting gummed down by Final Fantasies. I also tried to put an emphasis on replayability: there are a lot of mindblowing games that I have no desire to return to, and that’s just a tad too ephemeral for this kind of list.

Anyway, throwing together this list has driven home how I’m increasingly a man of narrow tastes these days: I like my RPGs and my platformers.

-----

10. Sonic Mania (PagodaWest Games/Headcannon, 2017)

2017 may have been my favourite year in gaming yet. I don’t think there’s ever been a year where so many games that could easily make my top-ten list were just popping off the shelves.

A case in point: Sonic Mania is, as far as I am concerned the definitive 2D Sonic experience, the one that so eloquently sums up everything which made the little blue guy great in his Sega Genesis heyday while pushing ahead to even greater heights.

Which means that it’s a completely ludicrous, overstuffed and borderline incoherent platformer. But when I play Sonic, I’m not looking for eloquent perfection, I’m looking for a wild ride and a killer soundtrack. And Sonic Mania delivers just that; it is, as the kids these days say “extra.”

9. Hollow Knight (Team Cherry, 2017)

Another case in point: Hollow Knight is the best Metroidvania I have played since Super Metroid. It’s also a Dark Souls homage that I like more than Dark Souls. It distilled everything I loved about those two titles and added cute, grotesque bugs on top. A real winner.

8. Star Fox 64 (Nintendo, 1997)

Not that this one needs much introduction, but I remember how revolutionary the idea of a rumbling controller seemed at the time to a kid like me – such verisimilitude!  Of course, there are many other games that more accurately simulate the experience of flying a plane, and there are shoot-em-ups which are a great deal more challenging and strategic, but are there any which are just this much……fun (I actually don’t know, given that I never played too many of these games)? And if we were to judge solely by replayability, Star Fox 64 would have to take the top slot: you can clear it in under an hour, but so much effort on Nintendo’s part went towards making it an increased pleasure to return to again and again.

And over two decades later, it still is.

7. Mega Man X (Capcom, 1993)

There are other Mega Man titles that could be here, but this is the one I’ve been playing since my childhood; this is the one which made me a connoisseur of angsty anime robots. And, honestly, I think it nails the classic Mega Man formula better than the original series did, though the X sequels failed to maintain the same consistency in quality that the original has always had.

6. Chrono Cross (Squaresoft, 1999)

This will probably be my most controversial decision. I picked Chrono Cross over its beloved predecessor, Chrono Trigger.

Now, I don’t deny that Trigger is the better game – it more or less brought the old-school JRPG approach to near perfection, whereas Cross has janky gameplay and a story which never really gels into a coherent narrative. But Cross is a game which is more interested in being experimental and ambitious than it is in being perfect, and what it achieves in that regard is something which is unlike any other RPG I’ve come across. It is a weird, mind-bending, atmospheric game where you have playable characters like an undead clown, a luchador priest and a space alien (to name a few), and something about that just speaks to me, y’know?

5. Bangai-O Spirits (Treasure, 2008)

Speaking of weird games, Bangai-O Spirits lets you play its levels in any order you like; the entirety of its story is contained within the tutorial; you pilot a giant robot, but wind up fighting things like ants and baseball players; framerate slowdown is a key gameplay mechanic; it has a level editor, and you can share your homebrewed levels with other players via soundwaves (no, really); there’s an ample amount of collectible fruit. 10/10.

4. Super Metroid (Nintendo, 1994)

There’s no accounting for nostalgia: Super Metroid was one of my earliest gaming experiences, and certainly the first complex one which I needed to sink my teeth into over a long period of time. It was the first game which gave me a sense of discovery and awe in playing it. The dang thing’s so well-known that I don’t know what else I could add.

3. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Nintendo, 2017)

Truly, Breath of the Wild is an overhyped game. And like other overhyped games, I suspect its future will go something like this: as more and more people become aware of its flaws and become bored with its oversaturation in gaming culture, a backlash will form, declaring it to be “actually terrible” and some other entry to be the “best” Zelda game. Then, some time after that, people will come around and be like, “hey, it’ may not be perfect, but it’s still really great, guys.”

So let’s get the bad stuff out of the way: if you’ve done one Divine Beast dungeon, you’ve kinda done them all, a lot of those combat shrines are copy-paste design, and some of the sidequests are just busywork.

But still, but still: Breath of the Wild is a great summation of the entire 3D action-adventure thing that Zelda kicked off way back with Ocarina of Time. It may or may not be the best Zelda, but it’s my personal favourite.

(It does have the best soundtrack, though)

2. Cave Story (Studio Pixel, 2004)

Cave Story isn’t the best indie Metroidvania out these days – I mean, Hollow Knight is sitting right over there – but it has a certain…je ne sais quois which no other 2D platformer has for me. There’s something about its goofy, childlike world which touches my heart. A something which makes me want to rank it even higher than Super Metroid itself. I can’t quite put my finger on it.

Is it the jet-pack?

1. Final Fantasy VI (Squaresoft, 1994)

This probably isn’t a surprise. Final Fantasy is my favourite video game franchise. The difficulty, though, is that a lot of the entries could easily vie for the number 1 slot. So I had to think hard about which one could truly be the most representative and special for me. I-IV were a little before my time, while X-XV are all a little too different and flawed to be definitive. V-IX all fall in that nostalgic, Goldilocks zone.

From then on, I whittled it further. IX is lovely, but the combat is just a tad too creaky. VIII is deeply innovative, but never succeeds in selling the epic love story at its core. V may be the most consistent FF of them all, but I’ve played it the least out of the V-IX crew.

That leaves us with VI and VII, which I’ve always thought of as siblings: they do share a lot of ideas in common, and have a similar feel to the rhythms of their gameplay. What it then boils down to is this: Terra, Locke, Celes & co. have, over the years, been a more fun cast of characters to return to than Cloud, Tifa and whathaveyou.

But from the opening sting on its soundtrack to its spectacular final boss fight, Final Fantasy VI is just such a complete adventure. Its individual ingredients have all been done better elsewhere, but never have they been cooked together just so.

So if I can only have one Final Fantasy here, then I’m sorry, VII but I have some Espers to collect.

[abangtech]

The ultimate smartphone camera buying guide – AndroidPIT

According to Statista, between 2010 and 2020, smartphone sales figures rose from under 300 million to over 1.5 billion devices per year. During the same period, the digital camera market collapsed dramatically. CIPA claimed: Once, over 120 million units were sold annually, where there is only approximately one-tenth of the volume today, with user theimpossiblesalad summarising this on Reddit via an impressive graph.

Having a camera is simply not the same as a good camera. We’ll show you what features you should consider when buying a smartphone should you want to pick up a handset that delivers good picture quality – and possibly even put your old digital camera to rest sooner rather than later.

Always look for the best camera

/ © AndroidPIT

Contents:

Image Sensor

Size matters

Megapixel and pixel size

Pixel cluster, autofocus & others

ISO Sensitivity

Lenses

From wide-angle to tele

F-stop

Focal length

Zoom

Lens elements

Special Cameras

Time of flight

Bokeh camera

Macro camera

Software

Reviews

Buying tips

For each important point, we would like to give you a rough overview in this article. What does this characteristic actually mean? And is it important to have that in order for a smartphone to be equipped with a good camera? For the more complex topics, you will be able to read up on them in separate articles in their respective sections.

1. Image sensors

The image sensor is one of the most important parts of a smartphone camera – and is decisive for the image quality. If there is one factor in a cell phone’s datasheet that indicates a good camera, it is the built-in sensor.

1.1 Size matters

Out of all the characteristics of a sensor, size is the most important when it comes to delivering stunning image quality. A large sensor is capable of capturing a lot of light. The more light that it captures, the more data is made available to the sensor. Additional data translates to more accurate results and fewer errors, which are particularly noticeable in the form of image noise.

When it comes to low light conditions, having a sufficient sensor area is important to be able to generate noise-free images. We are all familiar with noisy low-light images. But how do you even compare two sensors with each other – especially in view of the lack of information in smartphone specification sheets?

Various sensor sizes commonly used in smartphone cameras in a true-to-scale comparison: the difference is clear. / © AndroidPIT

The smaller the number below the fraction, the larger the sensor. 1/1.33 inch is larger than 1/2.3 inch, which in turn is larger than 1/4.4 inch. The largest sensors are used by the manufacturers in the main cameras, as these tend to be the most commonly used.

Comparison of different cameras

Camera Image sensor Sensor format Sensor area Realme X3 Superzoom – macro camera unknown approx. 1/5 inch 6-7 mm2 Realme X3 Superzoom – Tele camera OmniVision OV08A10 1/4.4 inch 8.3 mm2 Google Pixel 4 – Main camera Sony IMX363 1/2.55 inch 23 mm2 Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra – Tele camera Sony IMX586 1/2.0 inch 31 mm2 Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra – main camera Samsung Isocell HM1 1/1.33 inch 76 mm2 Canon EOS 5D Mark IV unknown Full size 860 mm2

In recent years, the algorithms of smartphone manufacturers have improved dramatically. The Google Pixel 4, for example, has been able to keep up while using the comparatively outdated and small Sony IMX363. Read the following article to find out where the inane measurement specifications for image sensors come from and other details about image sensors.

1.2 Megapixels and pixel size

Another advantage of large sensors is this: They have a lot of space to store many pixels. One thing is for sure though: 100-megapixels does not necessarily translate to a superior image compared to 10-megapixels. However, under ideal conditions, a 100-megapixel photo has of course, more details than a 10-megapixel photo. In order to be able to estimate now whether a certain resolution is reasonable, taking a look at the pixel size helps.

Pixel sizes of different cameras in comparison

Camera Resolution Sensor format Pixel size Pixel area Google Pixel 4 – Main Camera 12.2 megapixels 1/2.55 inch 1.4 µm 1.96 µm2 Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra – Main camera 108 megapixels 1/1,33 inch 0,8 µm 0.64 µm2 Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra – main camera1 12 megapixels 1/1,33 inch 2.4 µm 5,76 µm2 Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra – Tele camera 48 megapixels 1/2.0 inch 0,8 µm 0.64 µm2 Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra – Tele camera2 12 megapixels 1/2.0 inch 1.6 µm 2.56 µm2 Realme X3 Superzoom – Tele camera 8 megapixels 1/4.4 inch 1.0 µm 1.00 µm2 Realme X3 Superzoom – Macro camera 2 megapixels approx. 1/5 inch 1.75 µm 3.06 µm2 Canon EOS 5D Mark IV 31.7 megapixels Full size 5.4 µm 29.2 µm2

1In 12-megapixel mode (“Nonacell”) 2In 12-megapixel mode (“QuadPixel”)

As a rule of thumb, however, in the year 2020:

The full resolution up to about 1.0-micron size can be used in daylight for the best results. The really presentable photos tend to happen only in smaller formats. You can forget about capturing night shots with this.

From 1,4 micron size or larger, you can use the full resolution in daylight. Night shots are usually only useful in smaller formats and require special night modes that are only suitable for still subjects.

Dynamic shots in the low-light range require a different order of magnitude, starting with the 3 to 4 microns that you find in large-sensor dedicated cameras.

Of course, the boundaries are fluid, and as already mentioned, algorithms play an enormously important role. But we will come back to this later in the software section. However, many modern sensors with their enormous pixel numbers have more tricks up their sleeve than just throwing in additional details. This brings us to the next segment in 1.3.

1.3 Pixel cluster, autofocus & others

Apart from the potential for minute details at the right size, extremely high-resolution sensors have an even more exciting feature: the many pixels on the sensor are clustered. With Sony this is called quad pixel, with Samsung it is called Tetracell (four) or Nonacell (nine), depending on the cluster size.

In each case four pixels become one superpixel: Here Akis Evangelidis from OnePlus talks about the IMX586 in the OnePlus 7. As can be seen in the graphic in the background, the sensor combines 16 pixels into four pixels. / © AndroidPIT

While quad-pixel or Tetracell sensors actually have as many light sensors as pixels, the number of color filters in the Bayer matrix above the sensor is reduced by a factor of four. So the common Sony IMX586 with its 48-megapixels has only 12 “colored” megapixels (and even those only by demosaicing). This may be a disadvantage in color resolution, but in practice, it doesn’t play such a big role.

By “interconnecting” these adjacent pixels, their area now becomes larger – and the “quality” per pixel increases. The 48-megapixel sensor in 12-megapixel mode thus achieves a respectable 1.6-micron pixel size. Samsung’s Isocell HM1 even condenses 108- to 12-megapixels.

Colour resolution is not as important as resolution brightness. Or would you have noticed that the image (2) in the middle combines the brightness values from the left image (1) and the color values from the right image (3)? Only the edge of the head is noticeable. / © AndroidPIT

So why this trick? On the one hand, more megapixels on the datasheet sound really great. On the other hand, there are exciting tricks that involve the autofocus feature. Some sensors not only have several pixels under a color filter, but also under a microlens, which Sony calls 2×1-OCL or 2×2-OCL, depending on whether two or four pixels are under one lens.

2×2-OCL sensors from Sony not only has a Bayer color filter, but also only one microlens per four pixels. This trick turns every pixel on the sensor into an autofocus sensor. / © Sony

This trick turns every single pixel on the sensor into a PDAF autofocus sensor. The result is impressive, and the IMX689 in the Oppo Find X2 Pro really knocked my socks off in our camera review.

The first PDAF autofocus systems integrated into image sensors still required special pixels, which were then only responsible for the autofocus. The blind spots thus created in the sensor had to be filled up by the image processing of the smartphone.

TL;DR: It’s worth taking a look at sensor technology: often great features like the incredibly fast autofocus in the Oppo Find X2 Pro are stashed away here. You can always find such details in our reviews.

1.4 ISO sensitivity

After various manufacturers have in recent years started to proudly list down particularly high ISO sensitivities in their specification sheets, there is only one thing to be said here: This is pure hogwash.

Simply put, the ISO sensitivity of a camera can be compared to a brightness control whose upper end can be set arbitrarily. The meaningfulness of this is approximately the same as the maximum speed on the speedometer scale in your car. Even a 360 km/h speedometer does not make a VW Golf a Bugatti.

Wish and reality: No, the Golf doesn’t get faster as a result. / © Volkswagen, From: AndroidPIT

TLl;DR: You can safely ignore information about ISO sensitivity when buying a smartphone

2. Lenses

The lens of a camera ensures that the light reaches the sensor in the first place. Like the size of the sensor, the lens determines how much light the camera system can capture. In addition, the lenses are responsible for the angle of view, zoom & others, which we would like to take a closer look at here as well.

2.1 From Ultra-Wide-Angle to Telezoom

As an introduction, a rough classification of focal lengths and designations:

Ultra wide-angle (“0.5x”): The ultra-wide-angle describes focal lengths below 20 millimeters for smartphones – or angles of view above 90 degrees. The ultra-wide-angle is perfect for panoramic photos.

Wide-angle (“1x”): This is the range of the main camera of your smartphone, which typically has a focal length of about 25 millimeters. You all know what that looks like.

Telephoto zoom camera ( 2x and more): Everything from 50 millimeters falls into the “Telezoom” range. Several smartphones now have several telephoto zoom cameras to increase flexibility.

A lot of flexibility, but the results are not always useful. Modern smartphones like the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra promise a lot, but they can’t keep their promises, at least not at extremely high zoom levels. / © AndroidPIT

2.2 Focal length

The focal length in the 35 mm equivalent is a size comparable across all cameras to describe a certain magnification. In most cases, the addition “in 35mm equivalent” is omitted in specification sheets in favor of readability. A KB focal length always correlates to a certain angle of view.

Focal lengths and their angles of view

35mm equivalent focal length Angle of view in diagonal measurement 12 millimeters 122.0 degrees 24 millimeters 84.1 degrees 50 millimeters 46.8 degrees 85 millimeters 28.6 degrees 105 millimeters 23.3 degrees

For you as a prospective customer, this means one thing: You know exactly what magnification you get when you buy a smartphone with a 120-degree ultra-wide-angle. At least, that is what you should get if the manufacturer doesn’t cheat, right Oppo?

In order to be able to make something that jives with the values, some practical experience is helpful. 120 degrees or 12 millimeters are extremely wide-angle figures. 24 millimeters is what you are familiar with from the main cameras of your smartphones. 50 millimeters is about the same as your regular vision and is good for portraits – just like 85 millimeters. Everything else above this is considered as luxury, ensuring that you do not get cheated when you are considering your next purchase.

Also, ensure that there are no big holes between the different focal lengths in your smartphone – because between the optical available focal lengths that your phone has to zoom digitally, which translates to a certain loss of quality.

Basically: If you want to take good photos at a certain magnification, your smartphone should support this magnification as well as possible with a camera module of the corresponding focal length. There are exceptions to this rule which can be read in our article about the 100x zoom fairy tale in the link below.

2.3 Zoom

Don’t be blinded by fantasy values like 100x, 60x or 30x. These values do not have a physical basis to stand on in smartphones, but were at best something conjured up by marketing and product managers. The decisive factor for the image quality of a smartphone at high focal lengths is the telephoto camera. Here you have to look at the real focal length on the one hand, and at the sensor on the other. For example:

The telephoto camera in the Galaxy S20 Ultra has a focal length of 102 millimeters. Since Samsung uses a large 1/2-inch sensor here, the image quality will be pretty good at this magnification. The digital zoom also has additional mileage courtesy of the 48-megapixel resolution.

The Xiaomi Mi Note 10, on the other hand, has a 1/4.4-inch sensor with just a quarter of the surface area for a similar focal length. The 8-megapixels offer little bang when it comes to digital zoom.

It’s no surprise then that the two smartphones end up with vastly differing quality when it comes to telephoto zoom image quality.

The Galaxy S20 Ultra performs better in telephoto zoom than the Mi Note 10, and I would have expected an even more significant difference given the hardware. / © AndroidPIT

Everything that manufacturers flog to the masses with terms such as Hybrid Zoom, Hybrid Optical Zoom, or something similar is at the end of the day, nothing but regular digital zoom. The current state of affairs is still as valid today:

TL;DR: You can ignore zoom specifications like “100x”. Instead, take a look at the image sensors and lenses or focal lengths of the various camera modules.

2.4 Aperture

F2.2, F1.8, F1.5 – the aperture has been a popular marketing tool in recent years. This went so far that Samsung massively sacrificed image quality in favor of the lowest possible F-number. But that’s the way it is: The physics are common, and fast lenses place extremely high demands on processing and construction quality if the final image quality is not to suffer.

Under normal circumstances, a mechanical aperture on the Galaxy S9 finally reduced the aperture ratio from F1.5 to F2.4 in favor of the image quality. The edge of the lens, which is responsible for the higher light intensity and the loss of image quality, was covered by a piece of plastic, but the main thing is that you can write F1.5 on the specifications sheet.

Whether a smartphone has a maximum aperture ratio of F1.5 or F1.8 is not so relevant with regard to the amount of light. Between F1.5 and F1.8 there is about half an aperture, which is not even 50% more light. As a reminder, a 1/1.33-inch sensor has more than twice the area size of a 1/2-inch sensor. So the leverage here is much bigger.

Galaxy S9+: The competition for the largest aperture has already borne bizarre results. / © AndroidPIT

But where the aperture plays an important role is with telephoto cameras. At high focal lengths, it is extremely difficult to achieve large apertures – and so you often find low-light lenses with f-stops of F3.5 or higher. In this order of magnitude, a drop in luminous intensity certainly plays a role. At F3.5 there is only half as much light left as at F2.5. In connection with the mostly tiny image sensors of telephoto cameras, it is almost always inevitable to end up with bad image quality.

If you want to read more about the aperture in the smartphone cameras, I recommend the following linked article.

2.5 Lens elements

The number of lens elements (and lens groups) appears sporadically from time to time in connection with smartphones, but has not yet established itself in specification sheets. Nevertheless, I would like to mention them briefly. The number of lens elements and lens groups says about as much as the number of gearwheels in a transmission. Having more does not necessarily translate to better performance.

TL;DR: You can ignore information about lens elements (and lens groups).

3. Special cameras

From ToF and LiDAR, to Bokeh and Macro: Smartphones have all kinds of special cameras. What do you really need? Read all about it in the following paragraphs.

3.1 Time-of-Flight (ToF)

Whether they are called Time-of-Flight or ToF like most Android smartphones or LiDAR like Apple devices: Active depth cameras are found on more and more smartphones and tablets. While manufacturers usually advertise the exotic camera modules with revolutionary AR features or better bokeh effects, the actual, noticeable advantages are still rather small.

ToF prototype from Infineon on a Samsung smartphone: Cool effects, but it has yet to find a practical use for it. / © AndroidPIT

Our recommendation is, therefore: Do not base your purchase decision on the presence of ToF or LiDAR sensors. We have been waiting for the breakthrough since Google Tango, and not much has happened yet. You can read more about the technology in our article with video concerning the ToF camera in the Lenovo Phab 2 Pro, the first smartphone with a time-of-flight camera at the time.

3.2 Bokeh camera

Bokeh or depth sensors are particularly popular in mid-range and entry-level smartphones. This is understandable, because for manufacturers, they happen to be a cheap way to “upgrade” a smartphone by throwing in additional cameras. The most used 2-megapixel sensors are available for free by China-branded smartphones. And hey, isn’t having quad cameras better than triple?

Why not just use the 8-megapixel ultra-wide-angle camera installed right next to the lame 2-megapixel bokeh sensor? Not a popular question in interviews, you can safely ignore bokeh sensors. If there’s anything on the planet they do better, it’s the manufacturers’ specification sheets.

With mid-range smartphones, there are often sensors that are actually superfluous. / © AndroidPIT

3.3 Macro camera

Macro cameras have been another trend in the past few months. However, the foundation is similarly shaky as that of bokeh sensors. The 2-megapixel mini-sensors with their notoriously low resolution are rarely superior in terms of image quality to the results that can be obtained from a reasonable main camera using digital zoom.

In the left picture, you can see a 2-megapixel and a 64-megapixel image from the Realme X3 Superzoom in size comparison. A crop does not necessarily give much worse results than the macro camera. This is especially true if you are more careful with the focus than I was with this photo. / © AndroidPIT

In contrast to the bokeh sensor, macro cameras actually have an advantage. The notoriously tiny sensors have quite a large depth of field, so that you don’t have to be so careful when taking pictures. And the separately available macro mode in corresponding smartphones invites you to discover the world around in greater detail.

TL;DR: All the macro cameras I know of are at best, a nice gimmick. If a manufacturer installs a large-sensor macro camera with high resolution, I might change my mind.

4. Software

Whether it is image processing algorithms or the camera app itself: the software plays an important role in a good smartphone camera.

Point one is user-friendliness. The camera apps of some manufacturers are kept very simple, while others offer countless functions and setting options. What is the right one for you? The only thing that helps here: Try it out for yourself!

The same applies to the various special modes: If you take a lot of pictures in the dark, you should choose a smartphone with good night mode. Some phones like the Google Pixel 4 or the Realme X3 Superzoom even offer a star mode. Other devices offer soft water, light painting, or super slow motion modes.

The Samsung Galaxy S10 also benefits from Google’s algorithms. The photo on the left was taken with the Galaxy S10 and Google’s camera app, on the right Samsung’s own app is used. / © AndroidPIT

Point two is, the algorithms that capture a photo and work with the sensor data. Here, an interesting development took shape when Google presented its first Pixel smartphone. From that point on, Google decoupled the camera app from Android – and every manufacturer was forced to develop its own camera app.

For big manufacturers like Samsung, Apple, or Huawei, this was not a problem. Within a few months, Google’s camera team had more or less caught up with their rivals’ lead. But for smaller manufacturers such as HTC, OnePlus, or LG, they had to struggle quite a bit to develop their own camera apps, at least at the beginning.

TL;DR: Large manufacturers with large development capacities not only find it easier to incorporate a wide range of functions in their camera apps, but can also afford better algorithms. The differences in quality are especially noticeable in the various night modes.

5. Review reports

On pretty much every website about smartphones you can find reviews of their cameras – and this is also the case here with us. But what actually makes a good review?

For every ten smartphone testers out there, there are probably 15 opinions about which review method is the right one. Lab? Or rather, practice? Comparisons? At this point, I would simply like to share my experiences.

I have reviewed smartphones and also “real” cameras in test labs of former employers and photographed endless review charts. Yes: The results are exciting, for example to precisely quantify the loss of resolution during digital zoom or to check improvements through updates.

Double spray on the Xiaomi Mi Note 10: In a laboratory test, such errors are unlikely to occur. / © AndroidPIT

But a lot of things fall through the cracks in laboratory tests. The very obvious image processing errors found in the first smartphones with Samsung’s 108-megapixel sensors, for example, do not occur at all in static motifs. Even annoying shutter delays or regular crashes of the camera app only become apparent after extensive practical testing.

It is important for a good review report to be as varied as possible. Smartphones nowadays have an enormous number of different cameras and settings. Have the most important ones been tested – and under different conditions? And most importantly, can you always follow the reviewer’s findings with sample shots?

A great way to eliminate the reviewers and their opinions as unknowns from the equation is to perform comparative tests. Here, you can directly judge how a certain smartphone compares to another device – maybe even to a smartphone that you know and use yourself. This makes it easier for you to judge the picture quality really well.

My main goal with this article – and the included links – is that you can form your own opinion. Understand the specification sheets and the technology behind the cameras. What is the difference between marketing fluff and what is truly important? And learn to judge for yourself: How meaningful is a review, also for my daily use situations?

6. Buying tips

Last but not least, I would like to take this opportunity to draw your attention to our best camera smartphones list. Here, we list the camera smartphones that certainly left a positive impression upon us in reviews.

Now it’s your turn: What else do you want to know about smartphone cameras? Have we forgotten a topic or a particular area? I look forward to your feedback!

Source

The post The ultimate smartphone camera buying guide – AndroidPIT appeared first on abangtech.

from abangtech https://abangtech.com/the-ultimate-smartphone-camera-buying-guide-androidpit/

[enterinit]

New Xbox One Games for May 12 to 15

New Xbox One Games for May 12 to 15.

Huntdown – May 12

Crime doesn’t pay – Unless you’re a bounty hunter! In the mayhem-filled streets of the future where criminal gangs rule and cops fear to tread, only the bounty hunters can free the city from the corrupt fist of felony. Lay waste to the criminal underworld and make a killing in this hard boiled action comedy arcade shooter. Key Features: Hunt solo or give suppressive fire and advance on the enemy together in co-op as you run, jump, and take cover in the neon soaked, graffiti strewn 80s inspired cityscapes. Hand painted 16-bit pixel art graphics and hand-drawn animations combined with fluid action-packed 60-FPS gameplay and an epic synthesized soundtrack. Huntdown everything from feral punks to organised hockey hooligans, this game is riddled with 16-bit bad guys and crime bosses, each with their own stomping ground to reclaim, and arsenal of weapons to confiscate.

Deep Rock Galactic 1.0 – May 13

Deep Rock Galactic is a co-op-first sci-fi FPS featuring badass space Dwarves, 100% destructible environments, procedurally-generated caves, and endless hordes of alien monsters. Hoxxes IV has the highest concentration of valuable minerals ever discovered; however, everything on the planet from the creatures to the fauna is extremely hostile. Good thing Deep Rock Galactic employs the best space miners in the universe: Dwarves! Combining two things Dwarves love most - mining and killing monsters - Hoxxes is the perfect job for any proud, space-faring Dwarf. *** 4-player Co-Op *** Work together as a team to dig, explore, and fight your way through a massive cave system filled with hordes of deadly enemies and valuable resources. You will need to rely on your teammates if you want to survive the most hostile cave systems in the galaxy! *** 4 Unique Classes *** Pick the right class for the job. Mow through enemies as the Gunner, scout ahead and light up the caves as the Scout, chew through solid rock as the Driller, or support the team with defensive structures and turrets as the Engineer. *** Fully Destructible Environments *** Destroy everything around you to reach your goal. There is no set path so you can complete your mission your way. Drill straight down to your objective or build an intricate network of paths to explore your surroundings -- the choice is yours. But proceed with caution, you don’t want to stumble into an alien swarm unprepared! *** Procedurally Generated Cave Network *** Explore a network of procedurally generated cave systems filled with enemies to fight and riches to collect. There’s always something new to discover and no two playthroughs are alike. *** High-Tech Gadgets and Weapons *** Dwarves know what they need to bring to get the job done. This means the most powerful weapons and the most advanced gadgets around - flamethrowers, gatling guns, portable platform launchers, and much, much more. *** Light Your Path *** The underground caves are dark and full of terrors. You will need to bring your own lights if you want to illuminate these pitch-black caverns.

Island Saver: Dinosaur Island – May 13

Prehistoric Dinosaur Adventure! Dust off your trusty Trash Blaster and get ready for a new super-sized adventure! Another Savvy Island needs your help! And this one’s filled with fearsome dinosaur bankimals! Meet Newton, Pigby’s inventor friend, and use your money sense to help him escape his debt. Features: 14 dinosaur bankimals to save!Roar around on a Tyrannosaurus Rex!Soar through the sky on a Pteranodon!Collect lost fossils and help a friend in debt!

Potata: Fairy Flower – May 13

This adventure platformer tells a story of a young witch exploring fairy forests to find herself and save her home. Join her quest now! Immerse yourself into a picture-perfect fantasy - solve numerous puzzles, fight enemies, reveal all the secrets… and don’t forget to save the world! Features: Wonderful worldRelax gameplaySeveral ways of passing a locationsAmazing puzzles with several solutionsBossesExciting story and funny characters

Super Mega Baseball 3 – May 13

Super Mega Baseball 3 refines the series’ formula with the deepest on-field simulation yet, comprehensive online and offline game modes including a brand new Franchise mode, and vastly improved graphics. New content includes revamped UI plus tons of new audio, team/character content, and stadiums with variable lighting conditions. Features: • Challenge your hand-eye coordination or relax and hit dingers with fluid gameplay that scales seamlessly from novice to beyond-expert levels of difficulty. • Apply and refine your baseball instincts with a sophisticated baseball simulation featuring new pickoff and stealing mechanics, wild pitches/passed balls, designated hitters, and situational player traits. • Take in the sights and sounds of 14 richly detailed ballparks, each featuring unique day, night and alternate lighting conditions. • Guide an evolving team to greatness over multiple seasons in the all new Franchise mode featuring player development, aging, retirement and signing/releasing of free agents (1vCPU, 2vCPU, local or online). • Compete online to win pennants and climb to higher divisions in the cross-platform Pennant Race mode (1v1, online only). • Create your ideal league with a comprehensive customization suite that includes season length/structure, team names/uniforms/logos, and player names/appearance/attributes. • Play or simulate any combination of games/teams in customized Seasons and Elimination brackets, solo or with friends (1vCPU, 2vCPU, 1v1, 2v1, 2v2, CPUvCPU, local or online). • Skip customization and compete for top leaderboard scores with standardized teams and settings (locked player attributes) in Standard Season and Standard Elimination modes (1vCPU, 2vCPU, local or online).

Thy Sword – May 13

Thy Sword is a retro inspired hack and slash roguelike with procedural generated levels. Pick from different hero types like the Barbarian and Valkyrie to break the tyranny of the Dark Overlord! Pick from three different difficulty modes to suit your playstyle. New to adventuring? Then select apprentice mode to have infinite credits or if you’re a heroic veteran, choose hero mode where you only have one credit. Unlock additional heroes throughout your journey! Bring along a friend in 2 player cooperative mode to save the land from the Dark Overlord. Can you collect all of the crystals? Features: Fast paced, strategic sword and bow combatPlay solo or cooperatively locallyChoose from multiple heroes and unlock new onesPick from 3 different difficulty options to suit your playstyle

Ion Fury – May 14

Shelly “Bombshell” Harrison takes on a quest to slay evil transhumanist mastermind Dr. Jadus Heskel in the streets of Neo DC. She leaves a trail of carnage throughout huge, multi-path levels filled with gigantic explosions, more secret areas than we can count, and inhuman foes behind every corner. There’s no regenerating health here; stop taking cover and start running and gunning. Shelly’s crusade to take down Heskel’s army will see her leave destruction in her wake with a wide arsenal of weapons, complete with alternate fire modes and different ammo types. Ion Fury laughs at the idea of mandatory checkpoints and straight paths through shooting galleries. But, just because this is a true old-school first-person shooter doesn’t mean we've ignored all the good new stuff the last two decades have brought. Headshots? Hell yeah. More physics and interactivity? You betcha. 3DRealms, Voidpoint and 1C Entertainment have taken the best of both worlds and cooked it all into a bloody stew. Features: • The true successor to classic shooters such as Duke Nukem 3D, Shadow Warrior, and Blood. • Experience the original BUILD engine on steroids, pumped up and ready to rock again after 20 years! • Duck, jump, climb, swim, and blast your way through 7 exciting zones packed with multiple levels of mayhem! • A beautiful game world assembled from thousands of hand-crafted textures and sprites • An awe-inspiring arsenal of devastating weapons, including multiple ammo types and alternate fire modes. Tri-barreled revolvers, grenade launchers, and heat-seeking smart bombs are your best friends! • The classic '90s FPS action you love, meshed with modern inventions like locational damage and seamless level transitions • ZERO PROCEDURAL GENERATION. All levels are hand made and full of multiple paths, cool effects, and complex set pieces! • Thumping soundtrack comprised of true tracked module music, in authentic FastTracker 2 format

Emma: Lost in Memories – May 15

Poetic, surrealistic and melancholic, EMMA: Lost in Memories offers a unique experience in a strange and dangerous world where walls fade away as you touch them. The main character, Emma, is young, vibrant and intriguing: she leaves her home following an owl, and soon loses herself in a world which she slowly finds more and more dangerous. Features: One fast and simple mechanic: all the platforms and walls start disappearing when you touch them!The character runs automatically at a fixed speed! Control her special abilities (double jump, dash and climb) and do your best to react at the correct time.Minimalistic 2D artistic style completely drawn by hand.Dynamic gameplay in a poetic and eccentric world.Single-screen levels which combine skill and ingenuity with planification and strategy.Two game modes: Main Story and Memory Chest. Complete the Main Story first to enjoy the levels in the Memory Chest!Delicate reflexion on memory loss.

Tacticool Champs – May 15

Tacticool Champs combines the best features of shooter and arcade game, where up to four players fight with each other in a closed arena. Quick matches, wide variety of weapons and unlimited ways to eliminate the opponents are waiting for you! Choose your hero from ten available characters, fight in one of ten unique environments, select from sixty pre-defined scenes or create your own with an in game scene creator! Compete with friends in couch multiplayer, improve your skills playing against computer controlled characters and when you are ready, show the players from around the world who is the real Champ during online battles. Read the full article

[cheezlogerratum]

A Persuasive Essay

☼

           The two duos of half-plastic half-rubber wheels have remained, for the past thirty seconds or so, at rest. Kurtis Spottiswoode, preferably to him Kurt, the owner of the pack, has been repeatedly, over and over, scanning a sign off to the side of the asphalt path. In yellow, it's been telling him:

ATHLETIC EVENT

... with an appropriate arrow pointing to the left. Still, in that same spot, he stands. He can't necessarily tell whether he's trying to understand something he's missing or if he's just spacing out, knowingly looking like a moron, but too afraid to break out of what he believes is a commitment. Even still. Eventually, Mr. Spottiswoode catches onto the fact that the sun has long been set and that there are no "ATHLETIC EVENT"'s in session at this time. His feet succumb to the decline and start stepping across into the parking garage wondering if the sign was placed for a past "ATHLETIC EVENT" or a future one? This is all he seems to think about in the structure, the halides buzzing above and the rumble of the little wheels on his backpack don't even register in his mind. He unlocks and enters his used Camry automatically and realizes he's driving, somehow unable to shake the image burned into his eyes or maybe his head:

ATHLETIC EVENT

←

           Mr. Spottiswoode arrived at his apartment complex at around 9:23pm, around a minute or two later than he usually remembers, and follows the rut path up to his apartment on the second floor. The residents on the first were shrieking, almost with no words, but it soon shifted into laughter and niceties he couldn't quite make out. He went to the bathroom, where he unzipped and went about his business looking at himself blankly in the mirror mysteriously installed right above, maybe a little crooked, the toilet. Kurt had small beady eyes and a large forehead mapped out by rows of remnants of brow folds and a receding hairline, brown and faint. The rest of his torso was adorned by a sport coat and a wrinkly plaid shirt, the rest is invisible. It was a lingering revelation in Mr. Spottiswoode's mind that he was wasting away, not really doing much, but he never wanted to address it head on in fear of possible sadness... but, as he undresses getting ready for bed, he wasn't feeling much now? Just sort of following what he'd always been doing and doing at as succinctly as he can, probably to occupy his mind from that "possible sadness".

☼

           Kurt was traversing through the input and output population of students in flux all around him, talking into headphones and trading glances back and forth, when he realized—the sign was still up! "ATHLETIC EVENT". He felt a minuscule rush inside of him, slightly increasing the speed of his pace, and making him aware of his breath, of his life. He looked around with his head at anything and everything of interest, impulsively, excited. ECSTATIC! He thought he might be forcing this adrenaline onto himself, but he told himself to shut up. Shut up! He was loving it, and would remain loving it all the way to class, his wheels rumbling at a higher pitch.

           Höffus Hall, room 488, was unlocked, dark, cold, and alone for the past thirteen hours or so. Mr. Spottiswoode, with his newfound motivation to live, flicked on the lights and plopped his computer bag onto the table offset at the front of class. He thought of himself as a bearer of life to the once dead or perhaps unborn room, mentally patting himself on the back as students came in at different intervals of time and frequency, totally unaware of their professor's enthusiasm. He unzipped his bag and brought out his old Dell laptop, gray and void of any personal touch. He logged in and fired up Microsoft Outlook, twiddling his fingers as more students populated the room. Outlook revealed itself, updated its folders, and notified the user of an "important message" he received. WOW! Kurt clicked the alert and he was brought to an e-mail sent by an unfamiliar address containing the following:

dear professor,

ive been thinking about alot of things like the paper we were made to write a few weeks ago. i know i haven't finished it and i bet its too late to turn it in now for any grade and i know im failing the class, but i cant fail this class and i think this paper is the only thing that will save me. i hope you understand. ill have the essay done by the start of class on thursday but if you dont accept it or give me a high enough grade to pass the class im going to kill you. i dont want to kill you but i also dont want to fail. i hope you understand.

best, your student

           Kurt Spottiswoode read the message over a few more times, just to make sure, again, not knowing what he was feeling, but whatever it was it wasn't exciting. Before he even had the chance to reply, or give the message a sixth reading, or to think about what the hell, just what the hell he was going to do? he looked at the clock in the bottom right and saw it change from 11:13 AM to 11:14 AM right before his eyes, four minutes late. He looked up with a buzzy sharp air behind his eyes, at a loss of what to even do. What to say? Most importantly, WHAT?

           "Uhhh," Spottiswoode emitted, "who was it that sent me an e-mail this morning?"

           Blank. The look on the students' faces suggested that he had said absolutely nothing. Instead of reading the students for any kind of response, he started to read for any clues, any telling thing coming from any of their persons that might inform him of the presence of a possible murderous psychopath enrolled in his class. There were only 19 students on the registrar but only, after doing the math with his eyeballs for a few seconds, 11 students present. Both the fear of the anonymous student's absence and the regret of not making attendance mandatory via a sign-in sheet and a significant percentage allotted to "Attendance" in the final grade struck him like headlights he wasn't aware he was invading the path of. He quietly surveyed those present in class and what he knew of them. To his knowledge, only 3 students were failing the class, and one of them, Mehi Georgensen, was present, but he knew for a fact she turned in the last assignment. The prompt, by the way, was to write a persuasive essay supporting their opinion on the scientific studies surrounding the spike in American crime rates in the 1970s and 1980s and how experts believe that the trace amounts of lead found in gasoline sold during this time is directly related to the uptick in violence and aggression in people who are exposed to automobiles on a regular basis if not daily. Mehi's essay was roughly 85% blockquotes, 5% topic and concluding sentences, and another 10% dedicated to an enlarged, pixelated image of a red, turned dark gray by the printer, gasoline jug. No, Kurt thought, it can't be her. The other two names failing the class were Eloy Hewitt and Harold Skouras III, both with zeros in the gradebook, but that's all they were to Mr. Spottiswoode. He tried forcing himself to remember who these boys were, what they looked like, who the sick culprit could be. He started to sweat and realized so when a droplet fell from his nose and onto his knuckle belonging to his right hand cupping his mouth out of a side effect of vigorous thought, if you could even call it that. It was now 11:19 AM and Kurt stood back up, hands at his side, eyes open, looking again trying to recognize anyone. He knew who some of the kids were but couldn't remember others because of, what he thought was, a lack of in-class participation. He did, however, recognize Kevin, hands clasped together resting on the table up front, good posture, beaming at Mr. Spottiswoode. Kevin, politely responding to Kurt's gaze, cracked open a smile, unimaginably ready to learn. What a good egg Kurt thought, and looking at this kid, this bright and utterly innocent young man smiling undoubtedly at him, his spirits were lifted by a fraction of security, but that was enough. Kurt breathed in through his nose and out through his mouth, clearing his throat, coughing, and began the day's belated lesson.

           Sitting in his assigned corner of office room number 528, populated by a desk, a shelf, a disconnected phone with the cord bunched up, various handbooks on MLA, APA, and Chicago format, yesterday's ¾ eaten Subway sandwich, a stack of filled manila folders, a photo of Bruce Springsteen printed out on an 8.5 x 11 inch sheet of paper taped to the wall, and a lamp—Mr. Spottiswoode sat leaned back in his office chair borrowed from the downstairs supply closet, staring, arms crossed, eyes serious, at his computer screen. The e-mail shone through the screen, he couldn't stop thinking. He followed a tangent marveling at the screen itself and its thousands of little pixels made by three columns, red, blue, green, each flickering at him performing as one chunk of some incomplete illusion, creating the image of something that is anything but. Kurt, at a loss, followed multiple tangents like that, perhaps, in a kind of unconscious fashion, trying to find some external excuse or explanation for all this. Surely, surely, it can't be real right? It made no sense, absolutely, completely, totally no sense whatsoever, that this array of pixels that have orchestrated themselves in varying degrees of dimness onto his laptop screen could spell out so plainly and absent of reality his own eventual fate. Well, it doesn't have to come true, does it? Kurt Spottiswoode couldn't believe that he didn't just think of giving in and offering the perp the grade he so desired. Yes. Yes! That was it! He didn't even take into account the circumstance of his academic honor, he had his life! Once again, "LIFE!" He was up, his fists were in the air, his legs were spread apart, and his breathing had escalated into a pant. Yu Quoque, or Professor Quoque as she vehemently prefers, in the opposite corner saw him and witnessing this side of Kurt she had never seen before, she stared, on the phone, mouth slightly agape.

           "Where are you," over the phone, "what was...?"

           "Nothing," Yu whispered, "just work."

☼

           It was Wednesday, the next day, game day! Kurt missed whatever athletic event that happened the day before due to the fact that he was fearing for his life, but now, having found out what to do about the whole situation, he decided to treat himself to a nice, relaxing, athletic event, which happens to be a weeklong championship. Mr. Spottiswoode arrived at the makeshift ticket booth, which was a plastic table with a print out of ticket prices taped to the front side and a cheap cash box guarded by two girls, both with one earbud in whatever ear was facing away from each other, and inquired, "Hello! One ticket for the athletic event and please!"

           "Eight dollars please," the girls in unison, almost in harmony.

           Kurt immediately took to his various pockets in his coat, pants, and satchel, where he finally found a dilapidated ten-dollar bill with a frowny face drawn on Hamilton's face. The girl on the right snatched it, the girl on the left gave him the ticket, and the girl on the right gave him one dollar in change, but he was so ecstatic and overwhelmed by the butterflies in his stomach that he didn't even realize. He wobbled right up to the bleachers taking it all in, smiling, just like Kevin, and started down the steps. The sun was blaring but the air was freezing, a paradox Kurt pondered on fairly often before, but not today, game day! He found a nice spot just above half way down and sat down next to an incredibly buff guy with, who Kurt assumed was, the man's son wearing a black hoodie and buggy glasses. "Isn't this just great," Kurt broke the ice, "this is just... agh! It! You know?"

           "I don't."

           "What's your name?"

           "What's your name?"

           "... I'm Kurt! Err, Professor Kurt to you though, haha!"

           "Goodbye Kurt."

           And the big man got up, even more ginormous than he... holy shit—walked down the bleachers, stomping between other attendees and their picnics, to another spot. Kurt stared a while at the man and thought of his nerve, how someone can be so mean and... rude? but he caught himself in the act of negativity and tried to snap out of it, clamping his eyes shut as a reset mechanism of sorts. Upon opening them, he saw the faded green field, but the longer he looked, the more green it got. He started getting the hang of it and tried it on the trees, the bleachers, and even the jumbo man. The spark of an auxiliary cord boomed through the stadium and was shortly followed by T.I.'s "Bring Em Out" featuring Jay Z. "BRING EM OUT BRING EM OUT" The players jogged onto the field and started warming up, running around preset patterns of cones over and over. Just beneath the song blaring throughout the entire area, echoing off the apartments just next door, Kurt heard a voice, "What's today." Kurt felt it to his left and realized the voice was coming from the kid in the hoodie, still sitting where he first saw him.

           "Wednesday?"

           "And tomorrow?"

           "... Thursday."

The kid hadn't even turned his head to Kurt, in fact, Kurt hadn't even seen the kids' lips, only his eyes bulging out of the edge of his hood. "I need you to proofread something for me," the glasses said.

           "Do I know you?" Kurt inquired.

           "It's important, it's my life's work."

           "I can give you my office hou-"

           "I feel twisty, I can't move correctly... I'd appreciate this greatly."

           "... Ha ha, come on now, let's just enjoy the game?"

           "It's only if I express what I mean and get my point across in a certain perfect way and if I have a clear thesis and purpose to the essay and I make myself believable to the reader that I will get an A."

           "... Harold?"

           "I just need a professional opinion."

           "Eloy!?"

           "It's not done yet I'm sorry."

           And the glasses dropped 8 loose sheets of what Kurt can already make out as a poorly formatted essay and strode his way up the bleachers as swiftly as possible. The sheets were lifted by the wind and flew up down left right forward back, all directly away from Mr. Spottiswoode. Kurt scrambled to follow all of the sheets at once while the image of that hood and those lenses and his voice seared into his mind, playing in a loop, all floating in a superposition playing at the same time, over and over and over again. Kurt caught one of the pages, repeating, "one, one" and so on in his head, adding to the jumble, now worried, now realizing, all at once, that death was way too near. "Two, two two two" but what? He felt silly again, remembering he had a plan, a master one you could call it, but he still felt petrified, sad, wasting away, stumbling over people at an athletic event reaching desperately for pages of an essay a kid is threatening his life over. He lost track of all the remaining pages, looked around, drenched, and saw a page in the middle of the field. He ran down the steps, head bobbing, eyes on the sheet, feeling utterly lightheaded, and sprinted into the field, tunnelvisioned, and bonked heads with a girl swerving out of a row of cones. The audience's collective shocked, "Ooooohh" and a girl nearby's inhaling hissing sound of pain only made everything worse, and he felt like a kid. Mr. Spottiswoode reluctantly opened his eyes and looked at the girl rubbing her head and only thought of himself, how he looked, how people must think of him now, and, somewhat noticing, his stomach sunk. He tried, "I didn't... I'm sorry I'm sorry," under his breath. He grabbed the piece of paper, now grass stained, and made his way up the stairs, eyes down, only wanting to leave, only wanting to go home, and as the girl got up, ready to rumble, the audience broke out in applause.

←

           Kurt couldn't even look at Sally Pilckner and her glasses without shuttering somewhat, or feeling some sharp sweat incoming, so for the remainder of her presentation, he looked down at her converse pretending to be following along when really, truly, he's completely lost. He had already taken attendance to no avail, had sort of thumbed through the essay, but hasn't been able to read it, not even knowing if he should or not. So here he is, Kurt, sat, in the back of a classroom, looking at shoes and contemplating his chances of life or death. The ginormous mega man played in his head over and over, torturing himself somehow just for fun, relatively. "Observe," he remembered "Listen, yes!" So he tried, forcing his brain to latch onto everything happening in the room, which—well, he didn't know—wasn't working. He attempted to consciously meditate on the PowerPoint slide stricken on the pull down screen, bleeding off to the edges onto the whiteboard, infuriatingly so, and thought about the words without reading them:

           HUMANOID.

           CORN.

           BC.

           And he just thought, tried to imagine. He pictured a humanoid in his head and saw wiggles and a form blinking, on and off. The harder he tried the faster it disappeared. Okay uhh, the corn! He saw a kernel, a nugget, perfectly formed, so well imagined he was impressed with himself. Mr. Spottiswoode sat with that little kernel suspended in his mind, projecting it in front of his eyes, over the words, bouncing it around the room, putting it over Sally's face. "UuuaAAAGGHHHCHOOOO!!"

           "Bless you," in unison, harmonious monotone.

           Kurt, looking at the culprit's face a bit too long finally realized the kernel had been erased from his mind. The panic struck him and the sweat kicked back in, trying and trying, squinting and bubbling his mouth. Mr. Spottiswoode needed a plan B, so he remembered:

           BC.

           Okay, this can do. He chugged into his noggin the image of rocks... rocks? And monkeys, for some reason, a wheel? He was doing his best, breathing in and out. "Knowing what uh... how corn was the main commodity in indigenous cultures, what would the world look like right now if we used corn for money?" Dead flat silence, but Sally didn't seem to mind. The class willingly sat in the hoisted dead noise of the room, adding to it every millisecond, everyone thinking someone else will talk, they have to, why aren't they? Why is everyone doing this? And Pilckner, Sally stood face to face to the excruciating silence, swaying, hands clasped behind her back, sniffling, heard a cough, grounding the silence to the utmost potency of bad participation skills. Kurt felt himself walking but didn't remember doing so, and somehow decided to stop right beside Sally, too close, she steps back, and those monkeys are still in his mind, swinging and hooting until they come across a kernel, a big one, glowing in the shattered sun shooting through the tall grass, or the banana leaves, either or? staring at this weird yellow coconut. It's here that they stop moving, their personalities and characteristics put on hold, freeze framed, with the class waiting and peeking under the rim of the table trying to be sneaky superimposed atop the scene before Christ, now at the same time, both immobile, not moving, freeze framed and dead. Kurt stood there until the clock struck 11:58 AM, close enough, and the irresistible sound of ruffling papers and backpack zippers filled the room, sparking some kind of Pavlovian response in the students telling them, "it's time to go", which was probably for the best.

           Kurt Spottiswoode decided to keep on driving tonight, not a clear decision but merely allowing himself to do so. Millbrae now, by the BART station, the monumental Chase Bank shining blue up the columns, credit card slots blinking and egging him on, that Peter's Café across the street, still open, still not much business... but boy, oh boy... Kurt took a leap of faith and pulled an illegal U-turn across the yellow line, the toast in his sights. He parked haphazardly and sat for a minute or two, looking at the fog grow on his windows, and waited for it to completely shell his car. He was now encased, in his own little world he thought, free of anything and everything except him and the essay, now sort of dead within the new realm of his. It was only paper, just neatly formed, digitally stamped stains of ink on a page, saying nothing in particular. He wanted to marinate in this, get the feeling then go, and he went. The wet chill struck him as he left the stratosphere he created, and, with the essay in hand, walked into the snoozy joint.

           A song he couldn't recognize right away was wrapping itself up, and right when he thought he knew the song, "HI welcome to Pete's Café!" She popped up from right behind the circular bar, knowing he was going to be there somehow. She slapped down the menu, the cocktail menu, and a freshly laminated dessert menu. "Freshly laminated!"

           "Yep," Kurt sniffed the menu, "That's fresh for sure, hahahaha!" laughing more for himself than her.

           "What can I start you off with tonight?"

           "Just toast, please."

           "Sweetie, just toast?"

           "Yep just toast."

           The look on her face spelled imminent harm, then immediately transformed into unconditional hospitality. "Vikas! Toast! Sure thing sweetie," snatching the menus in one swoop.

           "Thanks uhh," trying to read her name tag but only caught a V.

           He looked around the place, at the lighting hung in trios across the sloped ceiling, the booths hidden by CLINK... Kurt looked down and saw a plastic tumbler, blue and chipped, filled with water and weak ice cubes, but no V in sight. Noticing this, he noticed everything, which wasn't much, just a diner open for business, no patrons. He sat tapping his fingers in a kind of rhythm when "Is That All There Is?" by Peggy Lee jumps on the overhead speakers.

I remember when I was a very little girl, our house caught on fire I'll never forget the look on my father's face as he gathered me up in his arms and raced through the burning building out to the pavement I stood there shivering in my pajamas and watched the whole world go up in flames And when it was all over I said to myself, is that all there is to a fire

Is that all there is, is that all there is If that's all there is my friends, then let's keep dancing...

           Once that chorus kicked in he was humming along, eyes closed and drinking out of the mini cup. He opened his eyes and there before him was the essay, off to the side, right where he left it. He was lost in looking, only thinking about reading it, telling himself he wasn't afraid, and then the glasses appeared again, knowing that they belonged to the student, that the student typed this and printed it out, touched it, the net total of his movements to that moment of delivery resulted in the crimps and creases in the pages, the same on every page, again and again.

Let's break out the booze and have a ball If that's all there is...

           His hand shot out at the pages and smacked them once, not knowing what to expect, just a release? Kurt looked up and saw V staring at him before she broke out into strides in his direction. He grabbed the paper and started reading it vigorously.

professor Spottiwoods

Rough Draft

Pedagogyy is the study of how tot each a class in school, anywehere, like elementary school or college. I have been in school for almost all of my life and I feel like I have a big say in how I should be taught in school. There has been much discusssion on what progressive pedagogy might look like, but it has always been discussed and taught in regressive pedagogical systems, which is something liek a paradox isn;t it? we seem to think education is the greatest good, it keeps us young, that's what Aristotle thought, but these systems are old, the teachers are old, and theyf ail to realize that they they are only apart of an institu

           "SPOTTISWOODE?" Kurt froze in the middle of that word he knew was going to be 'institution', maybe spelled wrong, but couldn't help but feel several shots of adrenaline pumping through his body, his heart trying to compensate. "PROFESSOR SUPERWOOD IN THE FLESH!!"

           Mr. Spottiswoode craned his shoulders around to see Zip Baltgalvis—he thinks? —and can only widen his eyes. Zip skips over to Kurt's seat lugging what might be three backpacks at full capacity while Kurt creeps back at the paper, wide eyed, blank, stuck on the same word. Zip spins into the seat next to Kurt's and side hugs him, not responding. "Duuude what's good Spurt? ... It's me!" Kurt turns his head, zonked out, to Zip, frozen in a smile with his fingers turned inwards into his chest. "Zip..." Kurt emitted.

           "Ziiiff!" exasperated, "Ziff Baltgalvis! Twenty-fourtee-" leaning in closer for the whisper-shout, "Twenty-fourteen man! Duude! You're here!!"

           "I'm... here."

           "Yes! Yes!"

           "Hey where's my toast..." slurring and directed in the direction of unseen employees.

           Ziff looked down at the essay through the blonde frizz hanging in front of his face. "State huh? State huuuhh!!? MAN in the flesh! Front and center, late night!! You know, I've been working on things..."

           "Things."

           "Things mmhm... some futuristic things," nodding slowly almost to hypnotize Kurt.

           "What things..."

           "I've been thinking about those things, like to help the future out. Man, Kurt, your mind will be buhlown."

           "Uhh... toast," again at the ghost place.

           "Yeaaah man toast! You're brain'll fry man right on!"

           "What do you mean?"

           "Oh you just gotta come and see."

           "See what Zip?"

           A plate of burnt toast lands and swivels down onto the table in front of Kurt, on top of the essay.

           "The future man..." nodding.

☼

           Kurt Spottiswoode didn't even know he was fast asleep until his own drool cooled by the leather returned to his cheek, sliding his face into consciousness. Wriggling his fingers, cracking them, still on his side, his arm slept along with him. He was awake, but only with his eyeballs. Everything else was testing the waters. Every few seconds the interior would illuminate, sometimes yellow but most times teal-ish, and Kurt was in it and apart of it, an honorary component of the car. Kurt inched his head up off the seat to get a better look at the LED clock up front. It was 12:02, most likely AM. He plopped his head back down, scrunching his mouth to avoid the drool as he tried making sense of the situation he was in. This wasn't his car, he wasn't driving, he wasn't tied up, he was stagnant yet rumbling across asphalt barely any more than two feet from his wet cheek, as the crow flies. Mr. Spottiswoode liked it here, liking the most being able to pretend to be invisible, or to transcend the state everyone thinks you're in, knowing something no one else in the world knows. It was also the quiet of the interior which implied a disappearance of everything outside and anything in the future, just being able to lay... wait... future...

           "COCKADOODLEDOO TEACH! Un-conked?"

           "Muh... Zip,"

           "Hahyeah,"

           "Zi-," stuck on a clog in his throat.

           "Honest man, be honest,"

           "Where are we going?"

           "Dude, you remember this!"

           "I...?"

           "You can think it man, you can access this,"

           "Why was I..."

           "If you just reaaally think,"

           "Is it... Thursday?"

           "Unrelated inquiry, unrelated inquiry,"

           "Zip come on-"

           "Patience is a virtue,"

           "This is fuckin-"

           "Woah, woah,"

           "This is frankly, fucking stupid Zip!"

           "WOOOAH WOOAH,"

           "I wanna know! Where am I going? Where am I being taken to?"

           "I w-"

           "ZIP my foot is down it's being put down right now you got to tell me,"

           Ziff looked back over his shoulder at Kurt, now up in his seat drenched in sweat, eyes locked and loaded. The light outside illuminates the car in red for a split second, distant honking. Ziff looks back and forth hoping he isn't seeing and hearing correctly.

           "I don't like the way you look right now man,"

           "Zip,"

           "I don't friggin' appreciate those looks man!"

           Ziff is nearly done pulling the car over to the side of the road into the grassy overflow of an empty lot next to them once he says this. The back of Ziff's head jerks about, trying to put the car in park while storming out of the car at the same time. "Jesus... ZIP!! ZIP!" Kurt yells at Ziff with the foggy passenger window in the way, trying to unbuckle himself. "ZIIIIIP!!" It was Thursday, it was without a doubt Thursday, and it all came crashing into Mr. Spottiswoode's stomach. Kurt didn't even consciously think these thoughts, but he knew somehow by the way his neurons scrambled to ignite, scrambling together as one, but the buckle is jammed. Kurt sits back and processes the vagueness of himself at this moment, unconsciously looking around, widening his eyes, tuning out everything in order to tune out himself, and the door closes. He looks up and sees the long hair splitting out from Ziff's head. "Zip, where are we,"

           "Mr. Spottiswoode, it'd be really sick if you said sorry,"

           "I'm sorry, now-"

           "For what?"

           "For yelling at yo-"

           "And?"

           "And?"

           Ziff turned his head around to look through the gap under the headrest, eyes worn and wet.

           "And."

           "..."

           "Ziff."

           "No, no no, slip of the tongu- er the mind. I'm sorry. My-"

           "I really wanted you to see what I made Mr. Spottiswoode,"

           "Sure-"

           "When I saw you at Pete's tonight I thought that it was like fate, like that dramatic shit... right?"

           "Sure yea-"

           "I thought 'Hey Kurt's here, I bet he'd like to hang with me' you know? See me..."

           "Yeah,"

           "I thought you were gonna be like the guy who pretends he didn't make eye contact or something, and I was bummed out Mr. Spottiswoode. You were like the first guy... to uh... like really, you know, get me stoked on learning shit. And you were eating and I knew that it was like that fate happening maybe, like the universe collapsed on itself for that one time right?"

           "Sure,"

           "Do you get the same emotions too?"

           "Maybe, I don't really know,"

           "Cause like, the universe likes us...? Like it doesn't stop turning. It's like it keeps wanting us to know something, like..."

           And Ziff stopped, seemingly lost in that universe that led him to what he thought was right now, but Kurt, on the other hand, was back on the paper. "Ziff, I need to sleep I'm sorry."

           Ziff dug into one of the three backpacks he dropped in front of his front door to fish out the keys. Kurt was keeping his distance considerable out in the middle of a parking lot, by the car. Ziff tumbled the keys into the lock and cracked open the door, creaky to the point of filing a complaint with whatever de facto powers that be. The place was lit by strung lights around every edge, ceiling, doorway, floor, but only out of necessity of upholding the common courtesy to the household. Ziff lifted his arms in introduction of the place, "Uh, you can crash on the couch probably."

           Pots and pans brought Kurt back to the waking world, seamlessly too. What amazed Kurt's brain, the first thought in his head this morning, was how shrill these utensils ringing off each other were and how, somehow, that comforted him. He rubbed the sleep off his eyes and got up to mull. He scuffled towards the kitchen a few feet away and stood in the doorway, drawing a blank at the kid with pleasingly messy hair, jammies, bare feet, flipping a piece of bread with a hole in the middle occupied by an egg. The kid felt his presence and gave a half-nod half-smile, what Kurt came to hypothesize as a newly evolved human instinct. Kurt leaned on this doorway, scanning the room for a clock or any other furnishing that might give him a clue of some kind. A group of kids passed by him, recalling, "...ea and his brother was a raccoon in the firs..." and further down the hall a burst of "pffff" and laughter bounced back to him as he tried logging the series of events in his brain. Looking, still standing, invisible again, superposed in this doorway and periodically thrusting his body off enough to fall back onto the wall. A printer fired up in a room somewhere reciting its rhythm of obeying the data it's been fed, music to his ears but merely instinct to itself. But now the printer was approaching...? It was getting louder and louder, its rhythms becoming more complex, fading into Kurt's range of comprehension, but the closer it got the less he knew, the more it wasn't printing anything. Kurt leaned his torso over to peer through the commons area and into the main hallway, footsteps thrown into the mix now too. An upright arrangement of plastic and spinning metal emerged from behind the opening to the room, then a rubber foot inched down onto the wood floor, and the robot was now recognized by Kurt alone. It continued forward, stopped, made minor adjustments to the placement of its feet, and made way straight towards Kurt. His stomach sank and kicked into some kind of action backwards and to his left feeling his way towards some cover of sorts. Kurt crouched behind the side of the fridge, peering out at the rest of the kitchen. The whirring got louder, again, and the robot emerged, again, stopped, repositioned, continued in Kurt's direction. Kurt stayed put this time only because he couldn't think of anything else other than the fact there was a fucking robot walking straight towards him. The robots innards became clearer and clearer as it approached, stopped, repositioned, and reached for the fridge handle, and pulled it, pinching Kurt's fingers. He freaked out for a split second but didn't want to make any sounds in an effort to preserve the invisibility thing that the robot may or may not have seen right through. The door closed and revealed a jug of soylent in the robot's plastic nubs, repositioning away, and inching back out of the kitchen. Kurt stood up and stared at the robot, mouth wide open, sweat flowing, trying to think of its thoughts and what it must be conscious of to do what it does, where it's stored, what it means to it, does it feel what Kurt feels, does it know? A poke arrived on Kurt's left shoulder and he spun around clockwise to whoever it must be, who turned out to be... "Sorry,"

           "Nono I'm sorry," Kurt rattled out.

           "Just getting the uh," she reached up to the cabinet above Kurt's head, which he dodged as it swung open.

           "Woo heheh,"

           "Wanna sit?"

           "Wuh,"

           "Down?"

           "Well okay yeah sure heheh,"

           And he looked underneath and around himself and settled on sitting on the tile, criss-cross applesauce. "Do you go here?" she asked, eyes on the readymade pancake mix.

           "A- me? No I uhhh... I don't, no. I uh don't. Do you?"

           "Yes I go here."

           "Pretty cool, pretty cool uhmm... for what?"

           "Literature, but I'm thinking of changing,"

           "To uhh... ?" shrugging, nervously laughing.

           "Electrical engineering,"

           "And uh, why's that?"

           "I'm working on a project of my own right now with a team of people so I sort of just want time to work on it and E.E. offers independent study in their labs so,"

           "What's the something?"

           "I've been studying the stichomythia of reading common literature. Technically it isn't stichomythia, but it sounds nice to me for some reason and for what I do. So I study that stuff, the ups and down of laughter, contagious at moments and absent the next. Could you read a book or get its sense and flow from the mere knowledge of the progression of chuckles? Or guffaws? What does a 'guffaw' suggest in a story? This depends on the reader, though, which makes my job complicated. There's a flaw in studying and observing these things with people, who read and re-read, the speed increases and decreases, and this warps and distorts the nature of my work, the laughs and chuckles. Me and my team are now looking at developing a system which reads a book at an average pace, its text, and pinpoints or detects the humorous areas to give us a controlled, concise, perfect result of this landscape, the musicality that might be objective to itself and its language that the common subjective emotional someone simply lacks the capability of experiencing. This is what I do,"

           Teams? Landscapes, chuckles, this was all he could pick up on knowing the robot was walking around the place with soylent in its hands. He tried to be interested, but his mind was firing on other cylinders and sputtering out in the process. He was looking at the pan, sometimes focusing in on his periphera and the figures wearing mute colors walking in and out and past in silence—but what was silence to him, Kurt Spottiswoode thought, might have been a universal language to them that he was left out of. "What do you think of that?" He forgot.

           "Sounds pretty cool to me!" looking for something to catch his attention.

           "Do you read?"

           "I uh read lots of things every day yep,"

           "Enjoy it while you can,"

           "Well, you too heh! I'll uh see you around," offering a small wave and some kind of mouth movement he hoped would come off as normal. As he shuffled his way out, she started to mumble and hum the words to a song, loud and proud, making pancakes. He didn't know, he couldn't know if this was just himself projecting, but it sounded like she was humming the words to "Is That All There Is?", pushing himself away now, embarking himself into the house keeping his ears out for the bot. He stepped softly in hopes of the robot not hearing him, and he waddled and peered around and down the halls, doors open, now releasing lots of machine noise, almost every room. He walked up the stairs with his eyes locked on the chandelier which was smothered in webs and dust blocking the way of any light that might be wanting to pass through and offer itself. He was feeling his way upwards, and at the top he saw another commons area with a few couches riddled in no pattern whatsoever, and on one sat the robot, with its soylent in hand. Kurt sleuthed his way by way of his back to the wall down the hallway, soft stepping. "GOOOOOOD MOOORNIIING PALO ALTOOO," Kurt's body scrunched and searched for Ziff's whereabouts, leaning, dodging nothing, and finally finding it, papers and clutter reaching the ceiling and Ziff sitting in it all like a throne with his soylent in hand. "Where ya been buddy?"

           "Ziff listen I have a lot of papers to-"

           "Next on the program we have none other than English Composition extraordinaire-"

           "Ziff,"

           "Bonafide rager-maestro and chug champ 2000,"

           "Ziff that rob-"

           "AND honorary member of the fun boys themselves, Kurt 'Spurt' Spottiswoode!" as he started clapping by himself, clapping rang out from the rest of the second floor. He wheeled himself on his rolly-chair, stood up, and took Kurt by the shoulder leading him back down the hall. "We are utterly stoked to have you on this morning,"

           "Heh I-"

           "Mup, I'm asking the questions, I'm the teach... what is the future to you?" holding the air-mike up to Kurt's mouth.

           "It's soon,"

           "Would you say it's now?"

           "No cause... now's the present?"

           "But the now always changes right?"

           "I guess, but-"

           "Have you ever seen the future?"

           "No,"

           Ziff was now jogging over into the commons area, Kurt already knowing what the punchline would be. "Would you-"

           "Ziff, I need to go home,"

           "I gotta introdu-," taking the soylent out of the robot's hands.

           "Ziff. I'm going," backing down the stairs.

           "Kuuurt... Dude..."

           And everything seemed to fade out, leaving only Kurt's mind reeling in place. He got out onto the street and started following it wherever it went, freezing cold outside. He replayed that robot in his mind a long while and kept zooming in on its soylent trying to find a semblance of a clue that would lead him to some peace of mind, but he couldn't, just stuck in replay. Whatever direction Mr. Spottiswoode was heading in, there were trains.

           Kurt was staring while his mind rambled out the window. The train, he thought, was way too quiet, an environment that discouraged the cocoon of isolation he loved putting himself into. The tracks might as well have been non-existent, leaving Kurt the sole pleasure of listening to his own ears, ringing to themselves to avoid insanity, an instinct. For a moment, Kurt believed that the window his head was leaning on was nothing but another screen, extremely high definition, millions of pixels perfectly and spectacularly calibrated to fool passengers of any scenic route that might have been perceived. It had to be a conspiracy against the senses. What if the screen was hiding something grim and evil? Like an unforgivable violation of human's rights? Dwindling shacks, bodies slogging around awaiting their doom—if his eyes were to penetrate this screen, he wondered, maybe his eyes would meet someone else's, and maybe he would see something rapturous and impossible there in the shared misery, if that's what it was, only to witness it being cloaked by the train's comfy encasing, vanishing behind perspective.

           The corridors of Höffus Hall, human activity simmering down to bathroom breaks and "bathroom breaks", stood in preparation of fulfilling its intended purpose. Direction, visibility, transportation, criss-cross applesauce. Kurt lunged himself up through the stairwell, leaning into the curves of the railing for momentum, his rolly-backpack skipping on the steps, and jumped at the last step for the 4th floor, expecting another. He nearly jogged down the hallway mouthing, "Thursday Thursday, this," as he exhaled every other step. He kept his eyes on his door, erasing anything else from his perception to maximize efficiency. The door opened and out came, rushing, faceless, a slew of students escaping Room 488, breaking off into different directions, unsure if their rut is scheduled correctly or not. The students walking towards Mr. Spottiswoode passed with no regard, purposeful or not, either being plausible he thought. His legs and tiny wheels kept on chugging, though, traversing the hallway renewed with activity indifferent to its origin. Kurt swung open the door and immediately saw Kevin hunched over, shuffling with something. Mr. Spottiswoode moved into position at the front of class, behind his tabletop podium, faux-mahogany desk, and in front of the broken projector screen hanging askew, whiteboard neglected by former courses teeming with information, and sat down in his plastic mold desk chair, which let out a rubbery whine as he landed. Kevin turned around revealing his backpack, filled with five 2" wide binders and what sounded like a load of pencils Kurt assumed were infused with varying increments of graphite intensity, pooling underneath the organization. Kevin became pale as he met Kurt's eyeballs, both of them caught in the act of something untold, implied. The kid, his face tense and vulnerable, who Kurt couldn't believe was the same one who beamed joyous respect at him every single day of class, a scholarly constant, dislodged the frog in his throat.

           "Thank you for the semester Professor Spottiswoode. I wrote you a reflection highlighting how this course improved my ability to critically think about the world and how it presents itself to us and how I can express my personal perception of it through concrete argumentation and healthy sentence structure," digging into one of his binders from the top, sniffling, "I learned that writing a good essay will help you throughout the rest of your life, establishing pathos, logos, and ethos in order to engage the reader is key to allowing anyone to take what you say seriously, perhaps because deep down these elements and rules that go into a well written essay, like relevant topic sentences, presentation of evidence, and analysis of that evidence..." wobbling exasperation, "perhaps these are the fundamentals of life itself and why we love one another and why we make the decisions we make, even our mistakes. It's all one cosmic engaging, insightful, organized essay that we just can't read quite yet," carefully placing the quarter-inch thick packet on the table, "I learned that from you, and it's something I hope to pass onto my children and their children, and I hope to pursue a Master's so I can teach this truth to the next generation of students like you have. This is a part of my essay, I know it and can't control it, I can only proofread it," he picks up and rushes out the door, teary and red-faced, "You're the best teacher ever!" tripping on the door-stop, his sobs bouncing down the hallway in every direction, the most emotional energy this building has ever experienced, undoubtedly seeping into the firmament of the place, dormant and undisturbed, stored in a feedback loop.

           The clock nailed into the wall above the doorway rotated into 11:29 AM, followed close behind by the internal clock in Mr. Spottiswoode's laptop, tucked away in sleep mode inside of Kurt's rolly-backpack. Kurt unzipped the biggest pocket and logged into his laptop, Outlook opening on its own, following orders. The inbox updated and there, waiting, was an e-mail from Ziff with the subject line, "vid of my creation!!!! ;D" Kurt Spottiswoode sat and waited, leaving the e-mail unopened, watching the screen, hand curled into a fist at rest supporting his head, eyes forward. Had he been paying attention, he would've heard the uproar of footsteps outside, vague murmuring, screeching chairs and tables in neighboring rooms to the left, right, upstairs, downstairs, the beeping of high-powered turbo-toasters, motorized longboards whizzing by, trucks backing up, something custodial collapsing, honking, keys jangling to each step, someone quietly running late to class, electrical cars humming, mysterious whooping, and a burst of applause amplified by the valley of dorms just outside the classroom window. Both clocks hit 12:00 PM at almost the same time. Kurt dragged his finger across the trackpad to click the refresh button. Nothing. He hit refresh again. Nothing. He hit refresh. Over and over and over.

←

[spicynbachili1]

A chat with Sega’s first lady of RPGs, Rieko Kodama

Phoenix Power

In an industry that does basically nothing to preserve the past, Sega has been an outlier. On basically any platform imaginable, you can obtain a decent chunk of Sega’s first-party output from the Genesis and a few select games from other platforms. It seems like every time a new console generation rolls around, a new Sega compilation is in the works.

Nintendo’s popular Switch is no exception. The Switch is receiving not just the Sega Genesis Classics collection, but downloadable eShop releases of select Genesis games in the form of the Sega AGES series. Differing from the all-in-one package, these releases add features to Sega’s classic games while also providing regional variants and some light online functionality. Some might balk at the hefty price tag, but AGES could be considered the definitive releases of each title.

Around the time when Sonic the Hedgehog and Lightening Force were hitting the Switch, I was given a chance to ask Sega’s Rieko Kodama about her work on Sega AGES and her history with Sega. For those unaware, Kodama-san is recognized as one of the first successful woman game designers in the industry. She is known for her work as a graphic designer on Alex Kidd and Sonic the Hedgehog and as the main artist for Phantasy Star on the Master System. She now is the lead producer on the Sega AGES releases for Switch.

There are many stories around the internet of how Kodama-san got into the games industry. Seeing as how I didn’t want to repeat previously known information, I figured I would take a different path with my questions. To start off, I asked what piqued her interest in video games, in general. She told me:

“I was still in grade school, and I would play the arcade games like Space Invaders, Pac-Man, and Xevious. At the time, my family ran a kissaten [a tea shop]. Our shop was like a cross between a café and bar, serving alcohol in the evenings. You could say that games were very close to my heart.” She gravitated towards films and literature with sci-fi themes, which also spilled over into her choice of games.

During her time in high school, she found an interest in advertising. She had envisioned designing marketing material for products, which fueled her desire for art. In her college years, she initially was stuck between pursuing graphic design and archaeology (she had a fondness for Egyptology). This led to her flunking out of college but quickly deciding to fully go into her passion for art. After enrolling in a trade school, she soon discovered she enjoyed graphic design and saw the burgeoning video game industry as a chance to push her talents.

Through connections with one of her colleagues, she was hired by Sega in 1984. While there, she learned how to create sprite work under Yoshiki Kawasaki, the sprite artist on Sega’s Flicky. After a few years, she got the chance to work on Alex Kidd Miracle World and the original Phantasy Star. This kick-started her career to eventually becoming a director and producer on future Sega titles.

During that time period, employees at Sega weren’t allowed to use their actual names during a game’s credits. As such, she went by the pseudonym of “Phoenix Rie.” While I still haven’t uncovered the true secret of the name, she did tell me, “It’s based on the name of a manga character I liked at the time.” In other interviews, she has stated she is too embarrassed to divulge anything more, so we’re a little bit closer to understanding the true meaning.

As for how involved she was with Sonic the Hedgehog, arguably Sega’s most famous creation, she said, “Mr. Ohshima [lead character designer] designed everything, from the setting to the concept art. I helped express his designs as pixel art.” Her work was more influential in Phantasy Star, which is why she would eventually go on to direct Phantasy Star IV: The End of the Millennium.

That would end up being the last game she directed, though. After the release of that title, she transitioned into the role of producer for such titles as Skies of Arcadia and 7th Dragon. As Kodama-san put it, “I was a director on Magic Knight Rayearth, and I also started working as a producer around that time. I was involved with all aspects of the title, from marketing to sales, so it was a very valuable learning experience.” It seems she was more curious in tackling other aspects of game design instead of locking herself into a single role.

Even with her stepping away from the director’s chair, she doesn’t seem to have given up thinking about more traditional game development. Since she had experience with Sega’s previous mascot, Alex Kidd, I was curious how she would approach a theoretical reboot of the series. She explained, “It’s difficult to come up with a character design, but I think a 3D Alex who freely races around in helicopters or on motorcycles would be appealing. However, modern players may not really take to boss fights where you battle via rock-paper-scissors.”

She even still has Skies of Arcadia on her mind, though more with how pleased she was with the end result. “After the Dreamcast version, we released a GameCube version with additional story and characters, places to explore, and even bug fixes,” Kodama-san recalls. “I feel like we made the game we wanted to make. However, if I had to say one thing, it’s that the two combat systems were somewhat complex, so I do wonder if we couldn’t make that part easier to play.”

With the Sega AGES line, Skies of Arcadia may eventually see a release on Switch. Sega has stated it claims to make a wide selection of its classic titles available on the eShop and she echoed that sentiment. “We want to continue providing retro SEGA titles for the latest hardware,” she described.

“We’ve chosen the Switch, which can be played on a stationary TV set or as a handheld system, because we believe it to be the appropriate console for our retro game archive. It can even be played in a vertical orientation, allowing us to recreate the experience of vertically oriented arcade games such as Gain Ground. I think the different ways players can use the Joy-Con is also an interesting experiment.”

That last bit got me really thinking. I was curious what her thoughts were on Sega’s exit from the hardware business. It may have happened close to 20 years ago, but she had provided work for some of the biggest mascots the company has ever had. “I have precious memories of every platform. I personally don’t feel sad that SEGA is no longer producing hardware,” she stressed, “but I know that there are players who have been asking us to make new hardware. I feel honored and extremely grateful that fans would say that.”

As for now, Kodama-san will continue her work on the Sega AGES line with the next release being Phantasy Star on December 13, 2018, in Japan. Eight more titles have been confirmed for the collection, though there are no release dates lined up. Sega has teased the possibility of Saturn and Dreamcast games, so we could end up seeing a lot of her work get resurrected.

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        from SpicyNBAChili.com http://spicymoviechili.spicynbachili.com/a-chat-with-segas-first-lady-of-rpgs-rieko-kodama/

[view-from-a-warm-place]

011 // Distractions I: Random Map Generator (Part 0)

A Python Implementation of Amit Patel's Polygonal Map Generator

Early last year, I took some time away from my game to work on a random map generator, and not for a first attempt. One of the earliest things I had wanted to create in Python was a map generator, but, lacking any idea of how to do it and anything more than a modest talent for mathematics, it never came to much. And then, last March, I give it a third try, this time based on RedBlob Games' very good tutorial-demonstration essay, constructed in ActionScript. (ActionScript, which I know bits and scraps of but have been away from for years..)

I took about half a year out and worked on creating a Python implementation of that code (borrowing from some other sources as well and leaning on the mathematics knowledge of my brilliant girlfriend), and although I doubt that this code will lend itself to my current game so far, it did prove to be a very constructive learning experience. (If you have arrived here looking for the code itself, I imagine I will post it once I get it to some presentable state, whenever that happens. Please look forward to it!)

Here is a point-form description of how the maps are generated (although the previously-linked essay describes it much better).

The map generation process takes place in three main phases:

- 0. Random point selection and Voronoi diagram generation.

i - Random points selected using Python's random.sample() method.

ii - Diagram setup.

iii - Voronoi diagram and Delaunay triangulation generation by Fortunes algorithm (the steepest part of the learning curve goes here).

iv - Diagram resolution.

v - Lloyd relaxation and diagram regeneration (repeat from (ii) for n steps, using Voronoi cell centroids from current diagram relaxation).

vi - Generate 'noisy' borders.

vii - Resolve cell perimeter points.

- 1. Water body propagation and elevation profile generation

i - Determine land-water cell ratio; diagram border/ocean configuration.

ii - Distribute water to starting ocean and lake cells.

iii - Initial water cells pass surplus water volume to their neighbours (recursive).

iv - Assign basic elevation values to cell vertices (elevation equal to minimum 'hops' to nearest coastal vertex, less distance over lakes).

v - Scale elevations relative to a maximum elevation (preserves relative altitudes; excludes water).

vi - Apply elevation data to cells (based on the elevations of their vertices).

- 2. Meteorology, rivercourses, and biome assignment

i - Determine runoff corners for cells (rainwater accumulates at their lowest perimeter vertex).

ii.a- Determine rivercourses (non-coastal vertices transmit accumulated water to their lowest-elevation adjacent vertex).

ii.b- I did not have to do it but rivers terminate at lakes, and lakes generate output rivers, and it is all far more complex than I can put into a single sentence. Sorry; I will try to explain it properly some other time. :s

iii - Apply rainfall to cells (base per-pixel rainfall multiplied by cell size) (I want to work out some kind of rainshadow thing here but I have not gotten around to it yet).

iv - Assign 'moisture' values to cells based on the volume of water flowing (and standing) around them.

v.a - Assign biome types to cells based on their elevation and moisture parameters.

v.b - Some biomes overlap, and when they do, choose one at random.

v.c - I added some special biomes which also respond to average incline among vertices, volume of adjacent water or sand, salt, and a few others.

v.d - Some biomes can 'spread' to adjacent biomes if conditions are correct. (This took a bit of fine-tuning)

vi - Assign cells to custom groups based on common properties (biome, elevation, relative location on the diagram, et cetera..).

- 3. I also made a thing that renders the map in 3d, since all the data is there already!

There are a few different ideas that the Patel essay includes, which I have not implemented here yet-- Perlin noise looks pretty but I do not know how to make it work in Python (yet). I have not added roads yet either, although it does not seem over-hard compared with the complexity of rivers. I am still experimenting with different map generation geometries, with various degrees of success. The Voronoi diagram generator still has some strange and infrequent flaws I do not know how to resolve (or, in fact, even how to trigger or reproduce), and the noisy-borders math implementation I have set up creates some aesthetic issues here and there (most noticeably on the borders of dart-shaped, rather than kite-shaped, Voronoi cells).

I also have had some ideas about how to illustrate the maps beyond blocks of colour (it might be nice if forests had some depth, or at least did not end abruptly at cell borders) and how to group cells up into geometric or 'political' regions, but the time I have dedicated to it has decreased since I returned to the project I have posted here so far. For what it's worth, I have no plans to abandon it, but I also cannot work on both at once so well..

Anyhow, this is the first post in a potential series to do with this map generator. As I add to it or find additional uses, I will do my best to post them here! See you next week! :y

[exfrenchdorsl4p0a1]

Electronic shutter, rolling shutter and flash: what you need to know

The rolling shutter effect is usually seen as a damaging defect but even this can be used creatively, with enough imagination. Photo by Jim Kasson, Fujifilm GFX 50S

Click! goes the camera and in that fraction of a second the shutter races to end the exposure. But, although it's quick, that process isn't instantaneous. Whether you're syncing a flash, wondering why banding is appearing in your image or deciding whether to use your camera's silent shutter mode, the way your shutter works has a role to play. This article looks at the different types of shutter and what effect they have.

At their most basic, cameras capture light that represents a fragment of time, so it shouldn't be surprising that the mechanism that defines this period of time can play a role in the final outcome. It's not nearly as significant as the exposure duration (usually known as shutter speed or time value), or the size of the aperture but, despite great effort and ingenuity being expended on minimizing it, the shutter behavior has an effect.

Mechanical Shutters

There are two main mechanical shutter technologies: focal plane curtain shutters and leaf shutters. The majority of large sensor cameras and nearly all ILCs use focal plane shutters while the majority of compacts use leaf shutters.

Focal plain shutters

Focal plan curtain shutters are what you probably think of when you think about shutters. At the start of the exposure a series of horizontal blades rises like a Venetian blind and, to end the exposure, a second series of blades rises up to cover the sensor again.

The first curtain lifts to start the exposure, then a second curtain ends the exposure. The shutter's movement is shown as the blue lines on the graph. The time taken to open and close the curtains (red) is defined by the shutter rate, the exposure time is shown in green. 

These blades move quickly but not instantly. We'll call the amount of time it takes the shutter to move across the sensor the shutter rate. This is not the same thing as shutter speed, which is the amount of time that elapses between the bottom of the first curtain lifting and the top of the second curtain passing that same point.

Leaf shutters

Leaf shutters work slightly differently. These are built into the lens, right next to the aperture, and usually feature a series of blades that open out from the center, then snap shut again to end the exposure. Because each blade doesn't have to travel so far, these shutter rate can be much faster.

Leaf shutter still take a small amount time to open and close but they're very fast. And, because they're mounted so close to the aperture, they progressively increase or decrease illumination to the whole sensor, so there's no difference between the slice of time seen by the top and bottom of the sensor.

However, since the same blades that start the exposure also end it, the maximum possible shutter speed is more closely linked to the shutter rate (because you can't end the exposure until the shutter is fully open).

In addition, the distance the shutter blades need to travel depends on the aperture you're shooting at (on some cameras, the shutter acts as the aperture). Consequently, it's not unusual to encounter cameras that can't offer their maximum shutter speed at their widest aperture value.

Electronic shutter

But why do we need mechanical shutters at all? Unlike film, digital sensors can be switched on and off. This reduces the number of moving parts (which both lowers cost and obviates the risk of shutter shock) and means you get a totally silent exposure, so why not use that?

The answer is that you can. However, there is a restriction: while you can start the exposure to the whole sensor simultaneously, you can't end it for the whole sensor at the same time. This is because with CMOS sensors, you end the exposure by reading-out the sensor but, in most designs, this is has to be done one row after another. This means it takes a while to end the exposure.

Fully electronic shutter

This need to read out one row at a time has a knock-on effect: if you have to end your exposure one row at a time, then you have to start the exposure in a similarly staggered manner (otherwise the last row of your sensor would get more exposure than the first).

Electronic shutter tend to be comparatively slow in terms of shutter rate (red), leading to rolling shutter (note that exposure for the top of the sensor has already finished even before the bottom of the sensor has started. This is despite the use of a faster shutter speed (green)

This means that your shutter rate is determined by your sensor's readout speed. Lower pixel count sensors have an advantage in terms of readout: they have fewer rows and each of those rows has fewer pixels in it, both meaning they can be read out faster.

Smaller sensors also have an advantage in this respect: less physical distance to travel means rows can be read-out quicker. This is why we saw 4K video in smartphones, then compacts, then larger sensor cameras and why cameras such as the Canon EOS 5D IV struggle with rolling shutter, even when only using the central region of their sensor. However, newer sensor designs are constantly striving to reduce the read-out time (and consequently increase the shutter rate).

Note from the diagram that even an exaggeratedly slow shutter rate doesn't stop you using fast shutter speeds. In fact, the beginning and end of the exposure can be controlled very precisely, allowing super-high shutter speeds.

However, although each part of the image is only made up from, say, 1/16,000th of a second, the slow shutter rate means each part of the image is made up from different 16,000ths of a second. Essentially, you're capturing the very short slices of time that your shutter speed dictates, but you're capturing many different slices of time. And, if your camera or subject have moved during that time then that distinction becomes apparent. This effect, where the final image is made up from different slices of time as you scan down it is known as the 'rolling shutter' effect.

The same thing happens with any shutter that isn't immediate, which includes focal plane mechanical shutters. However, these tend to be fast enough that the rolling shutter effect isn't usually noticeable.

Electronic first curtain

Electronic first curtain shutter is an increasingly common way for cameras to work. As the name suggests, these work by using the fast mechanical shutter to end the exposure and then syncing the start of the electronic shutter to match its rate.

An electronic first curtain shutter avoids the risk of shake from the first curtain's movement but avoids the downsides of fully electronic shutter.

This requires a mechanical shutter where the second curtain and be operated independently of the first curtain. But, in those circumstances, you get many of the anti-shock benefits of electronic shutter while retaining the speed benefits of a mechanical shutter.

Global electronic shutter

Sensors do exist that can read-out all their rows of pixels simultaneously to give what's called a 'global shutter.' However, while these are great for video, the more complex technologies used to achieve this add both noise and cost. The added sensor noise limits dynamic range, so they are not yet common for those video or stills applications where image quality is critical. 

Find out about flash sync and working under artificial lights

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2rK3ybQ

[grgedoors02142]

Electronic shutter, rolling shutter and flash: what you need to know

The rolling shutter effect is usually seen as a damaging defect but even this can be used creatively, with enough imagination. Photo by Jim Kasson, Fujifilm GFX 50S

Click! goes the camera and in that fraction of a second the shutter races to end the exposure. But, although it's quick, that process isn't instantaneous. Whether you're syncing a flash, wondering why banding is appearing in your image or deciding whether to use your camera's silent shutter mode, the way your shutter works has a role to play. This article looks at the different types of shutter and what effect they have.

At their most basic, cameras capture light that represents a fragment of time, so it shouldn't be surprising that the mechanism that defines this period of time can play a role in the final outcome. It's not nearly as significant as the exposure duration (usually known as shutter speed or time value), or the size of the aperture but, despite great effort and ingenuity being expended on minimizing it, the shutter behavior has an effect.

Mechanical Shutters

There are two main mechanical shutter technologies: focal plane curtain shutters and leaf shutters. The majority of large sensor cameras and nearly all ILCs use focal plane shutters while the majority of compacts use leaf shutters.

Focal plain shutters

Focal plan curtain shutters are what you probably think of when you think about shutters. At the start of the exposure a series of horizontal blades rises like a Venetian blind and, to end the exposure, a second series of blades rises up to cover the sensor again.

The first curtain lifts to start the exposure, then a second curtain ends the exposure. The shutter's movement is shown as the blue lines on the graph. The time taken to open and close the curtains (red) is defined by the shutter rate, the exposure time is shown in green. 

These blades move quickly but not instantly. We'll call the amount of time it takes the shutter to move across the sensor the shutter rate. This is not the same thing as shutter speed, which is the amount of time that elapses between the bottom of the first curtain lifting and the top of the second curtain passing that same point.

Leaf shutters

Leaf shutters work slightly differently. These are built into the lens, right next to the aperture, and usually feature a series of blades that open out from the center, then snap shut again to end the exposure. Because each blade doesn't have to travel so far, these shutter rate can be much faster.

Leaf shutter still take a small amount time to open and close but they're very fast. And, because they're mounted so close to the aperture, they progressively increase or decrease illumination to the whole sensor, so there's no difference between the slice of time seen by the top and bottom of the sensor.

However, since the same blades that start the exposure also end it, the maximum possible shutter speed is more closely linked to the shutter rate (because you can't end the exposure until the shutter is fully open).

In addition, the distance the shutter blades need to travel depends on the aperture you're shooting at (on some cameras, the shutter acts as the aperture). Consequently, it's not unusual to encounter cameras that can't offer their maximum shutter speed at their widest aperture value.

Electronic shutter

But why do we need mechanical shutters at all? Unlike film, digital sensors can be switched on and off. This reduces the number of moving parts (which both lowers cost and obviates the risk of shutter shock) and means you get a totally silent exposure, so why not use that?

The answer is that you can. However, there is a restriction: while you can start the exposure to the whole sensor simultaneously, you can't end it for the whole sensor at the same time. This is because with CMOS sensors, you end the exposure by reading-out the sensor but, in most designs, this is has to be done one row after another. This means it takes a while to end the exposure.

Fully electronic shutter

This need to read out one row at a time has a knock-on effect: if you have to end your exposure one row at a time, then you have to start the exposure in a similarly staggered manner (otherwise the last row of your sensor would get more exposure than the first).

Electronic shutter tend to be comparatively slow in terms of shutter rate (red), leading to rolling shutter (note that exposure for the top of the sensor has already finished even before the bottom of the sensor has started. This is despite the use of a faster shutter speed (green)

This means that your shutter rate is determined by your sensor's readout speed. Lower pixel count sensors have an advantage in terms of readout: they have fewer rows and each of those rows has fewer pixels in it, both meaning they can be read out faster.

Smaller sensors also have an advantage in this respect: less physical distance to travel means rows can be read-out quicker. This is why we saw 4K video in smartphones, then compacts, then larger sensor cameras and why cameras such as the Canon EOS 5D IV struggle with rolling shutter, even when only using the central region of their sensor. However, newer sensor designs are constantly striving to reduce the read-out time (and consequently increase the shutter rate).

Note from the diagram that even an exaggeratedly slow shutter rate doesn't stop you using fast shutter speeds. In fact, the beginning and end of the exposure can be controlled very precisely, allowing super-high shutter speeds.

However, although each part of the image is only made up from, say, 1/16,000th of a second, the slow shutter rate means each part of the image is made up from different 16,000ths of a second. Essentially, you're capturing the very short slices of time that your shutter speed dictates, but you're capturing many different slices of time. And, if your camera or subject have moved during that time then that distinction becomes apparent. This effect, where the final image is made up from different slices of time as you scan down it is known as the 'rolling shutter' effect.

The same thing happens with any shutter that isn't immediate, which includes focal plane mechanical shutters. However, these tend to be fast enough that the rolling shutter effect isn't usually noticeable.

Electronic first curtain

Electronic first curtain shutter is an increasingly common way for cameras to work. As the name suggests, these work by using the fast mechanical shutter to end the exposure and then syncing the start of the electronic shutter to match its rate.

An electronic first curtain shutter avoids the risk of shake from the first curtain's movement but avoids the downsides of fully electronic shutter.

This requires a mechanical shutter where the second curtain and be operated independently of the first curtain. But, in those circumstances, you get many of the anti-shock benefits of electronic shutter while retaining the speed benefits of a mechanical shutter.

Global electronic shutter

Sensors do exist that can read-out all their rows of pixels simultaneously to give what's called a 'global shutter.' However, while these are great for video, the more complex technologies used to achieve this add both noise and cost. The added sensor noise limits dynamic range, so they are not yet common for those video or stills applications where image quality is critical. 

Find out about flash sync and working under artificial lights

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2rK3ybQ

[rtawngs20815]

Electronic shutter, rolling shutter and flash: what you need to know

The rolling shutter effect is usually seen as a damaging defect but even this can be used creatively, with enough imagination. Photo by Jim Kasson, Fujifilm GFX 50S

Click! goes the camera and in that fraction of a second the shutter races to end the exposure. But, although it's quick, that process isn't instantaneous. Whether you're syncing a flash, wondering why banding is appearing in your image or deciding whether to use your camera's silent shutter mode, the way your shutter works has a role to play. This article looks at the different types of shutter and what effect they have.

At their most basic, cameras capture light that represents a fragment of time, so it shouldn't be surprising that the mechanism that defines this period of time can play a role in the final outcome. It's not nearly as significant as the exposure duration (usually known as shutter speed or time value), or the size of the aperture but, despite great effort and ingenuity being expended on minimizing it, the shutter behavior has an effect.

Mechanical Shutters

There are two main mechanical shutter technologies: focal plane curtain shutters and leaf shutters. The majority of large sensor cameras and nearly all ILCs use focal plane shutters while the majority of compacts use leaf shutters.

Focal plain shutters

Focal plan curtain shutters are what you probably think of when you think about shutters. At the start of the exposure a series of horizontal blades rises like a Venetian blind and, to end the exposure, a second series of blades rises up to cover the sensor again.

The first curtain lifts to start the exposure, then a second curtain ends the exposure. The shutter's movement is shown as the blue lines on the graph. The time taken to open and close the curtains (red) is defined by the shutter rate, the exposure time is shown in green. 

These blades move quickly but not instantly. We'll call the amount of time it takes the shutter to move across the sensor the shutter rate. This is not the same thing as shutter speed, which is the amount of time that elapses between the bottom of the first curtain lifting and the top of the second curtain passing that same point.

Leaf shutters

Leaf shutters work slightly differently. These are built into the lens, right next to the aperture, and usually feature a series of blades that open out from the center, then snap shut again to end the exposure. Because each blade doesn't have to travel so far, these shutter rate can be much faster.

Leaf shutter still take a small amount time to open and close but they're very fast. And, because they're mounted so close to the aperture, they progressively increase or decrease illumination to the whole sensor, so there's no difference between the slice of time seen by the top and bottom of the sensor.

However, since the same blades that start the exposure also end it, the maximum possible shutter speed is more closely linked to the shutter rate (because you can't end the exposure until the shutter is fully open).

In addition, the distance the shutter blades need to travel depends on the aperture you're shooting at (on some cameras, the shutter acts as the aperture). Consequently, it's not unusual to encounter cameras that can't offer their maximum shutter speed at their widest aperture value.

Electronic shutter

But why do we need mechanical shutters at all? Unlike film, digital sensors can be switched on and off. This reduces the number of moving parts (which both lowers cost and obviates the risk of shutter shock) and means you get a totally silent exposure, so why not use that?

The answer is that you can. However, there is a restriction: while you can start the exposure to the whole sensor simultaneously, you can't end it for the whole sensor at the same time. This is because with CMOS sensors, you end the exposure by reading-out the sensor but, in most designs, this is has to be done one row after another. This means it takes a while to end the exposure.

Fully electronic shutter

This need to read out one row at a time has a knock-on effect: if you have to end your exposure one row at a time, then you have to start the exposure in a similarly staggered manner (otherwise the last row of your sensor would get more exposure than the first).

Electronic shutter tend to be comparatively slow in terms of shutter rate (red), leading to rolling shutter (note that exposure for the top of the sensor has already finished even before the bottom of the sensor has started. This is despite the use of a faster shutter speed (green)

This means that your shutter rate is determined by your sensor's readout speed. Lower pixel count sensors have an advantage in terms of readout: they have fewer rows and each of those rows has fewer pixels in it, both meaning they can be read out faster.

Smaller sensors also have an advantage in this respect: less physical distance to travel means rows can be read-out quicker. This is why we saw 4K video in smartphones, then compacts, then larger sensor cameras and why cameras such as the Canon EOS 5D IV struggle with rolling shutter, even when only using the central region of their sensor. However, newer sensor designs are constantly striving to reduce the read-out time (and consequently increase the shutter rate).

Note from the diagram that even an exaggeratedly slow shutter rate doesn't stop you using fast shutter speeds. In fact, the beginning and end of the exposure can be controlled very precisely, allowing super-high shutter speeds.

However, although each part of the image is only made up from, say, 1/16,000th of a second, the slow shutter rate means each part of the image is made up from different 16,000ths of a second. Essentially, you're capturing the very short slices of time that your shutter speed dictates, but you're capturing many different slices of time. And, if your camera or subject have moved during that time then that distinction becomes apparent. This effect, where the final image is made up from different slices of time as you scan down it is known as the 'rolling shutter' effect.

The same thing happens with any shutter that isn't immediate, which includes focal plane mechanical shutters. However, these tend to be fast enough that the rolling shutter effect isn't usually noticeable.

Electronic first curtain

Electronic first curtain shutter is an increasingly common way for cameras to work. As the name suggests, these work by using the fast mechanical shutter to end the exposure and then syncing the start of the electronic shutter to match its rate.

An electronic first curtain shutter avoids the risk of shake from the first curtain's movement but avoids the downsides of fully electronic shutter.

This requires a mechanical shutter where the second curtain and be operated independently of the first curtain. But, in those circumstances, you get many of the anti-shock benefits of electronic shutter while retaining the speed benefits of a mechanical shutter.

Global electronic shutter

Sensors do exist that can read-out all their rows of pixels simultaneously to give what's called a 'global shutter.' However, while these are great for video, the more complex technologies used to achieve this add both noise and cost. The added sensor noise limits dynamic range, so they are not yet common for those video or stills applications where image quality is critical. 

Find out about flash sync and working under artificial lights

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2rK3ybQ

[rtscrndr53704]

Electronic shutter, rolling shutter and flash: what you need to know

The rolling shutter effect is usually seen as a damaging defect but even this can be used creatively, with enough imagination. Photo by Jim Kasson, Fujifilm GFX 50S

Click! goes the camera and in that fraction of a second the shutter races to end the exposure. But, although it's quick, that process isn't instantaneous. Whether you're syncing a flash, wondering why banding is appearing in your image or deciding whether to use your camera's silent shutter mode, the way your shutter works has a role to play. This article looks at the different types of shutter and what effect they have.

At their most basic, cameras capture light that represents a fragment of time, so it shouldn't be surprising that the mechanism that defines this period of time can play a role in the final outcome. It's not nearly as significant as the exposure duration (usually known as shutter speed or time value), or the size of the aperture but, despite great effort and ingenuity being expended on minimizing it, the shutter behavior has an effect.

Mechanical Shutters

There are two main mechanical shutter technologies: focal plane curtain shutters and leaf shutters. The majority of large sensor cameras and nearly all ILCs use focal plane shutters while the majority of compacts use leaf shutters.

Focal plain shutters

Focal plan curtain shutters are what you probably think of when you think about shutters. At the start of the exposure a series of horizontal blades rises like a Venetian blind and, to end the exposure, a second series of blades rises up to cover the sensor again.

The first curtain lifts to start the exposure, then a second curtain ends the exposure. The shutter's movement is shown as the blue lines on the graph. The time taken to open and close the curtains (red) is defined by the shutter rate, the exposure time is shown in green. 

These blades move quickly but not instantly. We'll call the amount of time it takes the shutter to move across the sensor the shutter rate. This is not the same thing as shutter speed, which is the amount of time that elapses between the bottom of the first curtain lifting and the top of the second curtain passing that same point.

Leaf shutters

Leaf shutters work slightly differently. These are built into the lens, right next to the aperture, and usually feature a series of blades that open out from the center, then snap shut again to end the exposure. Because each blade doesn't have to travel so far, these shutter rate can be much faster.

Leaf shutter still take a small amount time to open and close but they're very fast. And, because they're mounted so close to the aperture, they progressively increase or decrease illumination to the whole sensor, so there's no difference between the slice of time seen by the top and bottom of the sensor.

However, since the same blades that start the exposure also end it, the maximum possible shutter speed is more closely linked to the shutter rate (because you can't end the exposure until the shutter is fully open).

In addition, the distance the shutter blades need to travel depends on the aperture you're shooting at (on some cameras, the shutter acts as the aperture). Consequently, it's not unusual to encounter cameras that can't offer their maximum shutter speed at their widest aperture value.

Electronic shutter

But why do we need mechanical shutters at all? Unlike film, digital sensors can be switched on and off. This reduces the number of moving parts (which both lowers cost and obviates the risk of shutter shock) and means you get a totally silent exposure, so why not use that?

The answer is that you can. However, there is a restriction: while you can start the exposure to the whole sensor simultaneously, you can't end it for the whole sensor at the same time. This is because with CMOS sensors, you end the exposure by reading-out the sensor but, in most designs, this is has to be done one row after another. This means it takes a while to end the exposure.

Fully electronic shutter

This need to read out one row at a time has a knock-on effect: if you have to end your exposure one row at a time, then you have to start the exposure in a similarly staggered manner (otherwise the last row of your sensor would get more exposure than the first).

Electronic shutter tend to be comparatively slow in terms of shutter rate (red), leading to rolling shutter (note that exposure for the top of the sensor has already finished even before the bottom of the sensor has started. This is despite the use of a faster shutter speed (green)

This means that your shutter rate is determined by your sensor's readout speed. Lower pixel count sensors have an advantage in terms of readout: they have fewer rows and each of those rows has fewer pixels in it, both meaning they can be read out faster.

Smaller sensors also have an advantage in this respect: less physical distance to travel means rows can be read-out quicker. This is why we saw 4K video in smartphones, then compacts, then larger sensor cameras and why cameras such as the Canon EOS 5D IV struggle with rolling shutter, even when only using the central region of their sensor. However, newer sensor designs are constantly striving to reduce the read-out time (and consequently increase the shutter rate).

Note from the diagram that even an exaggeratedly slow shutter rate doesn't stop you using fast shutter speeds. In fact, the beginning and end of the exposure can be controlled very precisely, allowing super-high shutter speeds.

However, although each part of the image is only made up from, say, 1/16,000th of a second, the slow shutter rate means each part of the image is made up from different 16,000ths of a second. Essentially, you're capturing the very short slices of time that your shutter speed dictates, but you're capturing many different slices of time. And, if your camera or subject have moved during that time then that distinction becomes apparent. This effect, where the final image is made up from different slices of time as you scan down it is known as the 'rolling shutter' effect.

The same thing happens with any shutter that isn't immediate, which includes focal plane mechanical shutters. However, these tend to be fast enough that the rolling shutter effect isn't usually noticeable.

Electronic first curtain

Electronic first curtain shutter is an increasingly common way for cameras to work. As the name suggests, these work by using the fast mechanical shutter to end the exposure and then syncing the start of the electronic shutter to match its rate.

An electronic first curtain shutter avoids the risk of shake from the first curtain's movement but avoids the downsides of fully electronic shutter.

This requires a mechanical shutter where the second curtain and be operated independently of the first curtain. But, in those circumstances, you get many of the anti-shock benefits of electronic shutter while retaining the speed benefits of a mechanical shutter.

Global electronic shutter

Sensors do exist that can read-out all their rows of pixels simultaneously to give what's called a 'global shutter.' However, while these are great for video, the more complex technologies used to achieve this add both noise and cost. The added sensor noise limits dynamic range, so they are not yet common for those video or stills applications where image quality is critical. 

Find out about flash sync and working under artificial lights

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2rK3ybQ

[porchenclose10019]

Electronic shutter, rolling shutter and flash: what you need to know

The rolling shutter effect is usually seen as a damaging defect but even this can be used creatively, with enough imagination. Photo by Jim Kasson, Fujifilm GFX 50S

Click! goes the camera and in that fraction of a second the shutter races to end the exposure. But, although it's quick, that process isn't instantaneous. Whether you're syncing a flash, wondering why banding is appearing in your image or deciding whether to use your camera's silent shutter mode, the way your shutter works has a role to play. This article looks at the different types of shutter and what effect they have.

At their most basic, cameras capture light that represents a fragment of time, so it shouldn't be surprising that the mechanism that defines this period of time can play a role in the final outcome. It's not nearly as significant as the exposure duration (usually known as shutter speed or time value), or the size of the aperture but, despite great effort and ingenuity being expended on minimizing it, the shutter behavior has an effect.

Mechanical Shutters

There are two main mechanical shutter technologies: focal plane curtain shutters and leaf shutters. The majority of large sensor cameras and nearly all ILCs use focal plane shutters while the majority of compacts use leaf shutters.

Focal plain shutters

Focal plan curtain shutters are what you probably think of when you think about shutters. At the start of the exposure a series of horizontal blades rises like a Venetian blind and, to end the exposure, a second series of blades rises up to cover the sensor again.

The first curtain lifts to start the exposure, then a second curtain ends the exposure. The shutter's movement is shown as the blue lines on the graph. The time taken to open and close the curtains (red) is defined by the shutter rate, the exposure time is shown in green. 

These blades move quickly but not instantly. We'll call the amount of time it takes the shutter to move across the sensor the shutter rate. This is not the same thing as shutter speed, which is the amount of time that elapses between the bottom of the first curtain lifting and the top of the second curtain passing that same point.

Leaf shutters

Leaf shutters work slightly differently. These are built into the lens, right next to the aperture, and usually feature a series of blades that open out from the center, then snap shut again to end the exposure. Because each blade doesn't have to travel so far, these shutter rate can be much faster.

Leaf shutter still take a small amount time to open and close but they're very fast. And, because they're mounted so close to the aperture, they progressively increase or decrease illumination to the whole sensor, so there's no difference between the slice of time seen by the top and bottom of the sensor.

However, since the same blades that start the exposure also end it, the maximum possible shutter speed is more closely linked to the shutter rate (because you can't end the exposure until the shutter is fully open).

In addition, the distance the shutter blades need to travel depends on the aperture you're shooting at (on some cameras, the shutter acts as the aperture). Consequently, it's not unusual to encounter cameras that can't offer their maximum shutter speed at their widest aperture value.

Electronic shutter

But why do we need mechanical shutters at all? Unlike film, digital sensors can be switched on and off. This reduces the number of moving parts (which both lowers cost and obviates the risk of shutter shock) and means you get a totally silent exposure, so why not use that?

The answer is that you can. However, there is a restriction: while you can start the exposure to the whole sensor simultaneously, you can't end it for the whole sensor at the same time. This is because with CMOS sensors, you end the exposure by reading-out the sensor but, in most designs, this is has to be done one row after another. This means it takes a while to end the exposure.

Fully electronic shutter

This need to read out one row at a time has a knock-on effect: if you have to end your exposure one row at a time, then you have to start the exposure in a similarly staggered manner (otherwise the last row of your sensor would get more exposure than the first).

Electronic shutter tend to be comparatively slow in terms of shutter rate (red), leading to rolling shutter (note that exposure for the top of the sensor has already finished even before the bottom of the sensor has started. This is despite the use of a faster shutter speed (green)

This means that your shutter rate is determined by your sensor's readout speed. Lower pixel count sensors have an advantage in terms of readout: they have fewer rows and each of those rows has fewer pixels in it, both meaning they can be read out faster.

Smaller sensors also have an advantage in this respect: less physical distance to travel means rows can be read-out quicker. This is why we saw 4K video in smartphones, then compacts, then larger sensor cameras and why cameras such as the Canon EOS 5D IV struggle with rolling shutter, even when only using the central region of their sensor. However, newer sensor designs are constantly striving to reduce the read-out time (and consequently increase the shutter rate).

Note from the diagram that even an exaggeratedly slow shutter rate doesn't stop you using fast shutter speeds. In fact, the beginning and end of the exposure can be controlled very precisely, allowing super-high shutter speeds.

However, although each part of the image is only made up from, say, 1/16,000th of a second, the slow shutter rate means each part of the image is made up from different 16,000ths of a second. Essentially, you're capturing the very short slices of time that your shutter speed dictates, but you're capturing many different slices of time. And, if your camera or subject have moved during that time then that distinction becomes apparent. This effect, where the final image is made up from different slices of time as you scan down it is known as the 'rolling shutter' effect.

The same thing happens with any shutter that isn't immediate, which includes focal plane mechanical shutters. However, these tend to be fast enough that the rolling shutter effect isn't usually noticeable.

Electronic first curtain

Electronic first curtain shutter is an increasingly common way for cameras to work. As the name suggests, these work by using the fast mechanical shutter to end the exposure and then syncing the start of the electronic shutter to match its rate.

An electronic first curtain shutter avoids the risk of shake from the first curtain's movement but avoids the downsides of fully electronic shutter.

This requires a mechanical shutter where the second curtain and be operated independently of the first curtain. But, in those circumstances, you get many of the anti-shock benefits of electronic shutter while retaining the speed benefits of a mechanical shutter.

Global electronic shutter

Sensors do exist that can read-out all their rows of pixels simultaneously to give what's called a 'global shutter.' However, while these are great for video, the more complex technologies used to achieve this add both noise and cost. The added sensor noise limits dynamic range, so they are not yet common for those video or stills applications where image quality is critical. 

Find out about flash sync and working under artificial lights

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[pat78701]

Electronic shutter, rolling shutter and flash: what you need to know

The rolling shutter effect is usually seen as a damaging defect but even this can be used creatively, with enough imagination. Photo by Jim Kasson, Fujifilm GFX 50S

Click! goes the camera and in that fraction of a second the shutter races to end the exposure. But, although it's quick, that process isn't instantaneous. Whether you're syncing a flash, wondering why banding is appearing in your image or deciding whether to use your camera's silent shutter mode, the way your shutter works has a role to play. This article looks at the different types of shutter and what effect they have.

At their most basic, cameras capture light that represents a fragment of time, so it shouldn't be surprising that the mechanism that defines this period of time can play a role in the final outcome. It's not nearly as significant as the exposure duration (usually known as shutter speed or time value), or the size of the aperture but, despite great effort and ingenuity being expended on minimizing it, the shutter behavior has an effect.

Mechanical Shutters

There are two main mechanical shutter technologies: focal plane curtain shutters and leaf shutters. The majority of large sensor cameras and nearly all ILCs use focal plane shutters while the majority of compacts use leaf shutters.

Focal plain shutters

Focal plan curtain shutters are what you probably think of when you think about shutters. At the start of the exposure a series of horizontal blades rises like a Venetian blind and, to end the exposure, a second series of blades rises up to cover the sensor again.

The first curtain lifts to start the exposure, then a second curtain ends the exposure. The shutter's movement is shown as the blue lines on the graph. The time taken to open and close the curtains (red) is defined by the shutter rate, the exposure time is shown in green. 

These blades move quickly but not instantly. We'll call the amount of time it takes the shutter to move across the sensor the shutter rate. This is not the same thing as shutter speed, which is the amount of time that elapses between the bottom of the first curtain lifting and the top of the second curtain passing that same point.

Leaf shutters

Leaf shutters work slightly differently. These are built into the lens, right next to the aperture, and usually feature a series of blades that open out from the center, then snap shut again to end the exposure. Because each blade doesn't have to travel so far, these shutter rate can be much faster.

Leaf shutter still take a small amount time to open and close but they're very fast. And, because they're mounted so close to the aperture, they progressively increase or decrease illumination to the whole sensor, so there's no difference between the slice of time seen by the top and bottom of the sensor.

However, since the same blades that start the exposure also end it, the maximum possible shutter speed is more closely linked to the shutter rate (because you can't end the exposure until the shutter is fully open).

In addition, the distance the shutter blades need to travel depends on the aperture you're shooting at (on some cameras, the shutter acts as the aperture). Consequently, it's not unusual to encounter cameras that can't offer their maximum shutter speed at their widest aperture value.

Electronic shutter

But why do we need mechanical shutters at all? Unlike film, digital sensors can be switched on and off. This reduces the number of moving parts (which both lowers cost and obviates the risk of shutter shock) and means you get a totally silent exposure, so why not use that?

The answer is that you can. However, there is a restriction: while you can start the exposure to the whole sensor simultaneously, you can't end it for the whole sensor at the same time. This is because with CMOS sensors, you end the exposure by reading-out the sensor but, in most designs, this is has to be done one row after another. This means it takes a while to end the exposure.

Fully electronic shutter

This need to read out one row at a time has a knock-on effect: if you have to end your exposure one row at a time, then you have to start the exposure in a similarly staggered manner (otherwise the last row of your sensor would get more exposure than the first).

Electronic shutter tend to be comparatively slow in terms of shutter rate (red), leading to rolling shutter (note that exposure for the top of the sensor has already finished even before the bottom of the sensor has started. This is despite the use of a faster shutter speed (green)

This means that your shutter rate is determined by your sensor's readout speed. Lower pixel count sensors have an advantage in terms of readout: they have fewer rows and each of those rows has fewer pixels in it, both meaning they can be read out faster.

Smaller sensors also have an advantage in this respect: less physical distance to travel means rows can be read-out quicker. This is why we saw 4K video in smartphones, then compacts, then larger sensor cameras and why cameras such as the Canon EOS 5D IV struggle with rolling shutter, even when only using the central region of their sensor. However, newer sensor designs are constantly striving to reduce the read-out time (and consequently increase the shutter rate).

Note from the diagram that even an exaggeratedly slow shutter rate doesn't stop you using fast shutter speeds. In fact, the beginning and end of the exposure can be controlled very precisely, allowing super-high shutter speeds.

However, although each part of the image is only made up from, say, 1/16,000th of a second, the slow shutter rate means each part of the image is made up from different 16,000ths of a second. Essentially, you're capturing the very short slices of time that your shutter speed dictates, but you're capturing many different slices of time. And, if your camera or subject have moved during that time then that distinction becomes apparent. This effect, where the final image is made up from different slices of time as you scan down it is known as the 'rolling shutter' effect.

The same thing happens with any shutter that isn't immediate, which includes focal plane mechanical shutters. However, these tend to be fast enough that the rolling shutter effect isn't usually noticeable.

Electronic first curtain

Electronic first curtain shutter is an increasingly common way for cameras to work. As the name suggests, these work by using the fast mechanical shutter to end the exposure and then syncing the start of the electronic shutter to match its rate.

An electronic first curtain shutter avoids the risk of shake from the first curtain's movement but avoids the downsides of fully electronic shutter.

This requires a mechanical shutter where the second curtain and be operated independently of the first curtain. But, in those circumstances, you get many of the anti-shock benefits of electronic shutter while retaining the speed benefits of a mechanical shutter.

Global electronic shutter

Sensors do exist that can read-out all their rows of pixels simultaneously to give what's called a 'global shutter.' However, while these are great for video, the more complex technologies used to achieve this add both noise and cost. The added sensor noise limits dynamic range, so they are not yet common for those video or stills applications where image quality is critical. 

Find out about flash sync and working under artificial lights

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2rK3ybQ