Getting to know Connie
Posted by: concon86 on: October 15, 2009
I am currently in my third term of studies at BCIT’s New Media Design and Web Development program, and I felt that this program has prep me to work in the New Media industry. I have gained expertise in a wide range of areas like Photoshop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Flash, Video Shooting and Editing.
Please visit the site: connieho.ca
Here you are able to see the different projects I have done in the time that I was in school and the different aspect of my abilities.
But I am more than a person that will sit in front of my computer all day, I am also a people person, I love being able to talk to people and chatting away, and I do get along with team members and collegues. I am all for making peoples very comfortable and feeling right at home.
I am a team player, but I also work well independently, when I have a quiet space to think and create unique work.
I am a person who is learning, and willing to learn able will love to help others that need my help.
I hope to get a position to help create promotional packages for small and midsize companies and also I would love to code and create websites for companies as this is where my passion lies. But my ultimate passion in life is to travel to different cites in the world and creating websites for companies in different countries.
Photoshop Picture Magic
Posted by: concon86 on: June 26, 2009
I am still consider a newbie to what is called Photoshop and I must say it is truely a great program to use and learn.
Scanning and colour correction
It has been a while since I had Grant’s class of colour correction. Learning to do colour correction can be hectic and slow moving at first but once you get the hang of it, it is very useful. Colour correction can bring images with bad colour cast and make it more natural to the eye.
Steps to colour correct your image:
- Find a picture with bad cast
- Go to level to adjust the white and black points (you can press on option when dragging to invert colours to see more accurately)
- Go to curves to pull the colour the to become brighter or darker
- Go to colour balance to adjust the cast (red offsets cyan, green offsets cyan and blue offsets)
- Go to selective colour to bring out or reduce specific colour
- Use unsharp mask to adjust the clearness of the picture
Creative images
An important part of photoshop is to be able to create sceneries that or very surreal or imaginitive. To me the most important part to creating a manipulative picture is finding a very good picture that you can manipulate. Good sites with stock images are devianart and sxc.hu.
Steps I take to create a manipulative creative picture
- Use masking to take specific part of the pictures you want to use in your product (better than the eraser tool as you can bring parts of image back)
- Use mask edge to make the edge not as jagged
- Put your picture together
- Use blending modes to mix the picture to your liking
- Add filters or blurs to make the picture more cohesive
These steps do not guarantee a good picture but it is the steps I usually use when I manipulate picture. This list is just a general way to create a manipulative picture, but it is not the only way.
My creation for my final photoshop project using the steps above
Flame Wars
Posted by: concon86 on: June 19, 2009
In the book by Virginia Shea named Netiquette, one of her rules was to keep flame wars under control because they waste time and bandwidth. Although flaming is a long-standing tradition in the Internet, it wastes users patience and can get boring quickly. I think it is good to try to stop a flame war before it goes out of control.
Have you ever gone on a forum and in a certain topic there was a flame war going on? I have and let me tell you it is the most annoying thing that can go on the Internet.
Flame war is started when one word or one phrase can be intentionally made or interpreted incorrectly and this sets everybody in the forum off and everybody in the forum is yelling at other person. Making other reading experience miserable.
Flame Wars in action
As a person who loves to read about entertainment and certain celebrities, I know for a fact that you will not make fun of other people’s idol. I have a certain idol Raymond Lam, and flame wars are popular with this idol in forums. I remember looking at one of the flame wars in the SPCNET forum.
One person who is indifference about the actor made a comment that could have been a casual thought of his acting or singing ability. Being in a forum where everybody is this idols fan, one person will interpret it incorrectly and words are passed. One person will say you are wrong and purposely put swear words. Putting in swear words will cause chaos. This is when the user will start using harsh words at each other, making fun of them, making fun of there level of English, yelling at each other. Fonts used will start to get bigger and bigger, reddish font colours will be used and mad fiery emoticons are put in to the mix.
As this point every post on the page is full of fighting. Any new reader coming in to this forum will be turned around because they do not want to get involved in a flame war. Other readers will be mad because it is harder for them to find the information that they are looking for, and it wastes time to scroll through a page of fighting.
Help Keep Flame Wars Under Control
Non fighting users in the forum will all try their best to calm each other down, trying to relax each party and they may or may not get involved in the flame war themselves. If the fight is uncontrollable moderators come in to relax or ban users.
The best way as a user to stop flame wars is to post on the topic like there is no flame war going on by posting fact, news and positive comments like usual. Users who are involved in the flame war should start ignoring and stop writing negative comments, and as time passes the flame war will seize and the forum can go on as usual as there is no oil added to the fire.
Email Marketing
Posted by: concon86 on: June 11, 2009
Metatags: New, technology, Internet, entertainment, growth, media
Subject: Technology growth: Past, Present and the Future
Different Technologies, Different Growth
Have you ever wanted to test out your new cell phone by torturing it, or have you ever had your pictures edited on the Internet?
In a world where we are bombarded with different technologies, it is nice to learn the growth of these technologies and how to use and play around with them.
The Internet, the radio and the TV are such a huge part of our lives that we cannot live without. More than ever it is important to take consideration of technology growth around us.
Looking back in time, there is a huge change in technology from vinyl record music to ITune, from GameBoys to PSP.
Looking at the Internet, there is so much you can do that was not possible a few years back like watching videos online on Youtube or editing your photos online.
In this blog you will get my insight on
• New technologies for different media
• Revolution of technology
• Personal encounters with technology and the Internet
In my new blogs in June I will continue to examine the different type of entertainment technologies that will come out, or has come out and give you my personal insight of these technologies.
Losing my post
Posted by: concon86 on: June 5, 2009
Due to my own stupidity I accidently deleted a post I made in May 1 labellled Love for Video Sites. It was about how much I love Youtube and how it revolutinized how we view our entertainment today. Anyways I tried everything to restore my post to no avail. I wanted to cry, there is no way you can auto recover a post in WordPress. So I tried to Google a solution (which may work for you but did not work for me).
Google cached
What you can do is
- go in the search bar of Google and search for your entry
- you may be able to see it and press on the cached on the Google search
- it will lead you to your post
- copy it and paste it to a blank document
- put it back as a new post
When you do this your pictures or videos will not be uploaded anymore so you have to reupload your picture and search for your video again.
Firefox Cache
Another way you can do it is by using the Firefox cache
- First go on your address bar and type in “about:cache”
- When you press enter you will get to a screen where there is “Memory cache device” as a heading
- Under this heading press “List cached entries”
- Search for your entry
- When you press on the link it will give you a bunch a nonsense text
- Copy and paste it to a notepad document
- erase all the junk except for the html code
- Find the blog entry and copy and paste
- Put it in your blog as a new entry
I personally tried both. I could not find my entry on these two methods so I gave up, but these method may help for you.
Portable Game Consoles
Posted by: concon86 on: June 4, 2009
Gone are the days of carrying around our hulking Gameboys, and in came the days of the Nintendo DS and Playstation Portable. These two invention may have revolutionize how we play portable games giving us better functionalities and better graphics. This year these devices has been upgraded again from Nintendo DS to Nintendo DSi and from PSP to PSP Go.
What’s in a DSi?
The new generation of DSi features
- Two built-in camera back and front with editting capabilities
- Music playback capabilities
- SD card slot along with built-in memory
- Free browser application
- Larger screens at 3.25″ (previously 3″)
- Syncing photos with your Wii
- DSi shop where you download your multimedia with a point system
This console plays all Nintendo DS games but is not compatable with Gameboy Advance games (DS Lite was able to)
What’s in a PSP Go?
This new generation of the PSP features
- a new generation hardware
- built-in flash memory (16gb)
- slider (slide out keypad)
- 3.8″ screen which is slightly smaller than the original PSP at 4.3″
- Bluetooth support
- Digital content without UMD
- Playstation network support
Some titles that will be released with the PSP Go are
- Little Big Planet
- Jak & Daxter
- Metal Gear Solid
- Warhawk
- Gran Turismo PS
This PSP Go will not replace the PSP in the market now, as it will coexist with it. The PSP Go is much smaller than the PSP.
My Opinion
I love the DSi because of all the new features like the camera and the photo editting capabilites and I like the fact that you can listen to music and go on Wifi and download Nintendo games.
I love the design of PSP Go as it is much smaller with a cool slider design and the graphic is slightly better than anything offered in the Nintendo DS.
If I were to choose I would choose the DSi as it is more interactive and has more attracting features (the camera) than the PSP Go. But if I had the money I will definitely purchase both of them.
Cute Booth Pictures
Posted by: concon86 on: May 29, 2009
Have you ever taken pictures in the photobooth that prints your picture as cute little stickers? It’s always fun to pull your friends into these booth and fork out $5 and get the cute pictures taken. Now with the ease of the Internet we can create them online and through our IPod Touch and share it with friends online.
IPOD Touch
We can make these pictures through Puri!Lite which you can download for free through iTunes Apps store.
Here is the steps to create through Puri!Lite
- Press on create
- Select Photo or Take Photo
- Press on Tools
- Go to Templates for the border
- Go to Chops to add pattern
- Go to Text to add written personlized text
- Go to Freehand drawings to add personal drawings
- Press save to save it in your iPod or Export to export it into your computer on export it to Facebook
Computer
To make these pictures on your computer you need to go to the Puricute site and make sure you have Flash installed on your computer. You do not need to login to make this. This is how you create a booth picture:
- Press Create Puricute
- Browse for pictures in your computer
- Resize and move the picture if necessary
- Use the pen tool for custom drawing
- Add a PuriFrame
- Add Puri Stamps
- Soften the image to your liking
- When you are done with your picture go to “I’m Done! Publish Photo”
From there the site will create your picture with flash and will lead you to a page where you can save the picture as a jpeg or publish it in any social networking site. You will also get an option to purchase these sticker for $2.99 from the site.
Final Results
Here is a booth picture I made of my favourite actor Raymond Lam with Puricute.com.
Here he is made with Puri!Lite from my IPod
These tools makes it easier to make the booth pictures without going out and you can edit any picture you want without Adobe Photoshop.
Nokia 5800 MusicXpress
Posted by: concon86 on: May 21, 2009
When we buy a cell phone all we worry about is what kind of specs are on the phone. For example we look for a good camera or a Qwerty pad. I’m not sure how many of us actually consider the durability of a phone.
As I was browsing the internet for cell phones, I came across a person who put their phone through what they called a “stress test” where they put their phone in different condition to see if the phone can survive.
The phone they use is currently unavailable in Canada, it is a Nokia Xpressmusic 5800.
The first thing they did was put the phone through subzero temperature in the snow
and as you can tell the phone is still works in the snow, next they put it in the dryer
then the vacuum
then they dipped it into champagne
the phone still looks good after the champagne, next, they stepped on the phone
they also ran the phone through the tap, and the phone is still okay, except for water seeping in the screen area.
The last thing that they did was run the phone under a car tire 
And as you can see the tire only broke the screen of the phone, but the phone itself remained intact.
In otherwards the Nokia Xpressmusic 5800 phone is a good buy as the phone can go through so much torture and still be usable. So next time when you decide to buy a phone, don’t look for functionality, look for durability and you might just want to do this stress test to see if your phone works in any condition possible.
Colour Picker Pen
Posted by: concon86 on: May 16, 2009
Being in so many scanning and color correction class and graphic and colour class, one thing I learned is that RGB (red , green, blue) is the colour gamut that is used for display and CMYK (cyan, magenta, yellow, black) is used for printing. While leisurely browsing the internet I came upon this cool pen called the “Colour Picker Pen“, a concept produced by Jinsun Park.
Everything in nature has its own colour which can be hard to capture, with this Colour Picker Pen all you do is scan an object with the built in scanner, the pen processes it and creates the unique colour with RGB ink.
In my opinion there is no way that this can happen in RGB, as RGB cannot be in ink form since it is an additive colour of light. RGB needs the addition of light to produce colour thus we see RGB mostly on computers, scanners, tv screen and digital camera.
CMYK is a subtractive colour of light in which we mix these colors on a paper to produce a desired colour (without the presence of light). CMYK is commonly used for printing.
Even though the product has a scanner than can produce RGB light, there is currently no such thing as RGB ink. We have only CMYK ink , as we know, cannot produce the full gamut of RGB colours. If the pens says that it can pick the colour correctly, then it will also need pantone ink to increase the whole spectrum of colours. If the pen has both CMYK ink and pantone ink, this item would be very huge and very expensive.
If we use RGB there is no way to recreate metallic colour as metallic colour is produced from light reflected off pigment in which RGB does not have. If we only use CMYK ink, the colour produced, will not be the one the eyes sees on the object. Both colour gamut only produces the closest colour and not the actual colour defeating the purpose of the pen where it says it can pick the perfect colour out from the object it scans.
So in theory I think it would not work.
The Way Music was played
Posted by: concon86 on: May 8, 2009
As an avid music listener, I have seen quite a revolution in they way music can be listened to. I wasn’t old enough to actually see the use of vinyl used in the original way, my dad had a player but it did not work. But I remember seeing piles of vinyl in their original covers. The cover were thick and had the picture of the artist on it. It is slowly coming back in the party scene as I know there are DJs out there who “spin” these vinyl to make unique sounds (but with the help of a computer).
What was very popular as well and I remember using was casette tapes. I love being able to record things off the radio. I liked using them, but the quality of the sound were horrible. What I really hate about it was that I may have over recorded the casette: in other words I did not know when I may have rewind too much on the tape, and tape over what I wanted to keep. It was frustrating as well as I can not tell if I was at the beginning of a song, I had to stop, play it and rewind until I get to the point that I wanted. Casette is horrible as well because the tape part of the casette can get stuck in the radio and it will ruin the entire casette tape making it unplayable.
From all the music inventions out there, the CD was a very good invention. CD gave the user the opportunity to choose the songs we want or fast forward if we wanted too. It rendered the casette obsolete. The quality of the music was terrific. It was much more convient, and not as easily destructable as the casette tape. And with a cd burner you can burn songs that we have on the computer. Best part of a original artist CD is its cover, lyrics and photo album.
Then there is what I call the Itune revolution. All the music we listen to we download off Itune and transfer into our Ipod or MP3 Player. It is convient for us, it is not hulking as the CD, but it does not give us a cd cover, or photo gallery. But with these music we can embed in our blogs and share with others over the internet. We have the option to download select songs on an album (as we may not like all the song from the specific artist). MP3 player gives us convience as we can listen to it whenever we want to, and depending on the size of your ipod/mp3 player memory it allows us to listen to many albums in one time.
