How to make a Monster

This is an exhibition about the art and technology of animatronics from a Queensland company specialising in animatronics for Hollywood. Their credits include Inspector Gadget 2, George of the Jungle 2 and a few others. This is one big showreel. It's interesting nonetheless to see how with a lot of plasticine, silicon and fibreglass you can create really cool monsters and with wheels, cables, bolts and joints, make these animals come alive. A worthwhile exhibition for Sunday at Scienceworks.

Getting to the exhibition was a real pain because it's school holidays and parking was a problematic. After a couple of hours of pulling levers to make the fake animals and monsters come to live, we had our fill. Plus Mad Animator's mind was now full of ideas and he wanted to go to his friend's place to play with other inanimate objects like the computer.

As we headed towards the parking lot, I saw a ball of fluttering feathers. A little sparrow unable to lift its head from the ground. Its right wing was fluttering endlessly, like a clockwork toy that's come up against an obstacle. For the sparrow though, it looked like it was making rings around the tarred surface of the parking lot. I knew something was broken, but it couldn't be fixed with wires, cables or silicon. I picked it up from the tarred surface. If it was going to die, best be on a flower bed. We moved onto the car. As we drove past, the bird had somehow fluttered its way back to the gravel. Cars drove past precariously close. Another sparrow kept it company. Again I picked it up and tucked it deeper onto the flower bed. I drove off - checking through the rearview mirror that it hasn't flutterred back to the road.

And now, whenever I think of animatronics, I see the image of a little sparrow, broken, but still fluttering for life against the canvas of a roughly tarred surface that is the parking lot.

Shut Up Mum

Never Been Kissed is growing up horribly. Yesterday, the school rang - she has lost her work experience at the multimedia place because she was caught chatting on Myspace during work time. I tried to talk to her nicely this evening. "Shut up mum!" - venom spewing.

I walked away.

Yesterday after the news I wrote down something to give to her. I held onto it.

You are nearly an adult. It is time for serious thinking.

Everyday, when you wake up, say this:

I am doing something today. Is it going to help me become a better person?


She will never get this message.

Old PC I and II

We have joined the club of people who have too many PCs but refuse to put them in the dumpster bandwagon. .. my PCs join my collection of mobile phones except that it's rather difficult to hang them up on the wall, within a nice frame.

What to do with the old PCs?

The first one, a Pentium (R) with 90MHz processor and 32mb RAM I got when we first came to Australia.

The second one I picked up from the nature strip last hardware disposal day. I also picked up a monitor and a keyboard.

To plan for a super computer, I bought a used monitor and another keyboard for $8 at this PC shop in Vermont South

So I really don't have an excuse not to get them going.

PC II has 2 hard drives and I fiddled so much with the BIOS, the system won't recognise an operating system. Someone left an essay on the Korean War in the pickedup PC. That's at least worth something, and reason enough to revive the HDD.

To be continued.

17 May 2007, Thursday
OK, continued. Yay. I got it running. Here's the story.

My old PC (OPC) has only 75MHZ and 24MB Ram. It has a Gigabyte GA 586AP Award Modular Bios v4.50G. Bios ID: 2A5KBG02-00 Chipset ALi 1449/51/61

So what I did was dug around and found the SIMM ram and plonked them on. Now it's a whopper - nearly 90MB Ram.

Then I decided to plonk in the Ethernet Card Intel Pro 100S - but then I'd have to run a cable from the router to the PC which meant I would need at least 20m of RJ45 cable. Off I went yesterday to Carribbean Gardens. The nice guy and I had a chat. He was selling a PCI USB 2(2 port) card for $10 whereas a 20m CAT5e would cost me $12. I got thinking. I got the card.

Last night, fiddled around for awhile reading up about USB for Windows 95.

I must express thanks to www.usbman.com - lots of insights about installing USB drives on that old OS. http://www.usbman.com/Win95%20USB%20Guide.htm

First thing: make sure your version of windows can take USB. Minimum Windows95B or specifcially 4.00.950B (4.03.1212.1214).

First thing, I was advised: flash bios. Bios is too old probably to be upgraded. I thought about it all the while. Got sidetracked. Most advice is to go on Windows98, but try finding that OS. Then I tried the other Linux distros. Even my ancient can't accept Linux. Sighed. Went ahead anyway. Took the advice, and downloaded the following files: install the USBSUPP.exe file first, reboot and install the other. Don't worry if windows has a question mark next to some devices.

USBSUPP.zip
USBUPD2.zip

Those two files will get Windows 95 to recognise the USB controller. Next, to get it to recognise Flash drives, you have to install this file:

w95usbflash11.zip
from this site: http://toastytech.com/files/cruzerwin95.html
as directed by Annoyances. org

zing. I am on usb. Only problem, it doesn't have that thing on the tool bar that allows me to stop the usb device. Just have to pull it out or shut down.

Objective:
Install extra hard disk from PC (2) and try out my Linksys Wireless Adapter (USB).

Joost

It's all a hype
Until I got my invite
but what misery
my PC hasn't the memory

Anyone wants a Joost invite?

Mad Animator's Powerpoint

So he is given 5 weeks to produce a Powerpoint presentation on Technology. His chosen topic is the light bulb (incandescent light bulb). He thinks PP is utterly boring. I think he has been zinged. Afterall the fancy hypercams, flash animations, and his own claymation projects, this Powerpoint presentation does look rather primitive. How to inspire him?

Road to OS

This is with regards to the old laptop. The Twinhead 9000T. Fabrication date: pre 1997. 120Mhz, 32mb ram and nearly a gig of hard disk space. Haven't really checked the specs because it depresses me how fast time has flown and how over-taken I am by technology. I clearly remember how excited I was that it had 32mb Ram!

So I am trying to figure out what to do with this laptop that is in good working condition, except for the touchpad (synaptics) which I suspect I had fried when I tried to install a Wacom mini drawing pad.

So now I want it to go fast. I am thinking of using this as a kitchen laptop ie. a dedicated web browswer. In my previous attempts, I couldnt install Firefox, or the latest IE because the thing was still running Windows 95. So now looking at what OS would be kind to an old laptop.

Reading FreeDos. I've decided to give Linux a skip because Linux has overdone itself by trying to follow the Windows trail. In MHO, it is trying so hard to one-up Windows with a graphical environment that there's nearly no diff now between Linux and Windows.

I am seriously generalising of course since I am no Linux expert - and I know not all the distributions there are. But I have tried to install Suse, DSL and RedHat to no avail. The library has a copy of an old RedHat (Dummies guide) but the accompanying CD were lost years ago.

Just rambling.

What I Plan - DVD to Old TV

Objective: Plug in high tech DVD to old tech one RF input TV.

Found out that it is do-able but it's a 50/50 thing.

Old TV has combined AV signals into one RF (Antenna) socket.

DVD has split different AV signals so the alternative is to plug DVD via VCR which then combines AV into one RF out.

DVD players have copyright circuitry which means that it may not output correctly resulting in poor picture quality or no picture at all.

Solution: buy a AV (RF) modulator. At Dick Smith it's about $40. At Jaycar the set alone is $20 but it has no power source, and with another power source, I'm looking at total $37.

But I am not going to get a new TV. That defeats the whole purpose

UPDATE :22 APRIL , SUNDAY
So yesterday I went to Dick Smith to check out modulators and found DVD players on sale. I decided to buy a Teac DVD player for $69. It had the latest playable things: include MP4 and WMA. The assistant told me the more "no name" brands, the less the problem of copyright circuitry.

Got it home, connected Audio to Sony Hi-Fi (circa 1990) and connected to National VCR (circa ? at least pre-1990) and connected RF out to Trinitron RF/Antenna In. Switched to AV channel and beaut! Worked like a charm. Needless to say the DVD player doubles as a CD player for my MP3.

This morning, though, the screen decided to show an error message: !PSCAN, with the screen split down the middle.

Finally discovered that the DVD player is doing some kind of progressive scan which my old TV cannot cope with. So went to Settings, selected Video and selected Interlaced, rather than PSCAN. Beaut take 2!

She Threw a Chair at me

So this is about Never Been Kissed. Last night I told her that if she wanted to prepare her folio, the first thing she'd need to do is to practise drawing. I said "I dont ever see you drawing" ... she flew into a rage, and shouted "Why are you and my teachers always putting me DOWN!"... THEN she threw a chair at me. Actually, she was looking for something to throw and the closest thing was a steel backed chair right before her eyes. She has a lot of strength. She picked it up and chucked it on the floor but instead chucked it at me. The back of the steel chair hit the back of my left hand. It bruised a vein. The fingers hurt like hell. Mad Animator got so mad, he took the next closest thing, a cleaning brush and he followed her to her room and wanted to bash her with it. I stopped him before the violence escalated. Muscle salt cream work rather well on bruised veins.

What I Plan

To do today, tomorrow, next week, next month.

• find a way to attach DVD/VCR combo unit to old Sony Trinitron TV with only one UHF outlet
• Put Linux onto old laptop
• Clean up old toasting oven so that Mad Animator can use it to cook his fimo
• Install ABC Amber and reg key so that I can back up my emails
•