Arfink: Thread Of Randomness (mk.iii)

[arfink]

I forgot to put up pictures of my finished custom Neo Geo Pocket and Gravis mashup controller. I designed it with only one thing in mind: shmups! (AKA, shoot-em-ups) Those are the games where you fly your plane between waves of brightly colored bullets while blasting everything out of the sky, and are usually known for being punishingly difficult and requiring a high level of precision to play. Well, this controller actually does help with the precision part, because the directional control is very tight, has good tactile feedback, it clicks when you have changed direction so you can instantly know if you're doing the right thing, and it's just super responsive. Some might say too responsive, but not for a shmup. It feels light and even a bit twitchy, which is just perfect.

 

The bluetooth interface is very fast, lagging by only about 30 milliseconds, which is totally imperceptible to normal human reflexes.

 

Playing some DoDonPachi:

 

Wiring in process. The thing on the right with the white plus shaped piece of plastic is the backside of the new joystick.

 

Wiring done. The part in the middle with the red light is the bluetooth module. The silver thing on the left is a 500mAh battery which can power the controller for 12 hours, and charges up in 1 hour.

 

[arfink]

I got a new toy in the mail! It's called a camera lucida, and it's basically an optical drawing aid similar to the ones they invented back as early as the Renaissance. Many famous "great masters" used the camera obscura and camera lucida to make their first-draft sketches before going on to paint. Back in those days, the prisms and mirrors required were cutting edge technology, incredibly difficult to make and extremely expensive. Imagine how much buying a car or a laser engraver would be today, and that's the approximate cost of camera lucida back when it was first invented.
 
I got mine for $45. And in 30 minutes I had learned how to use it well enough to make some scribbley little sketches from life.
 
Here it is:
 

 

 

 
And here are two pictures I made, one of my sister Sarah, and one of my friend Phil. My first two sketches with the camera lucida.
 

 

Edited November 30, 2013 by arfink

[arfink]

For those who are still considering ordering ornaments: keep in mind your order need to be in before December 12. If not, I may not be able to make them and mail them in time for arrival before Christmas!

[arfink]

Getting baptismal certificates from my birth parish, reception hall rental info from a bunch of places, caterers, etc. The madness has begun. Hopefully we can make it all pull together in time! :nervous:

[TheresaThoma]

It will be fine Fink, trust me! There definitely are lots of little details but that is what family is for. I know you can wrangle at least a couple of siblings into "craft time" (aka putting together save the dates/invites/wedding programs)

[AnneLine]

You can also probably pharm out some of it to the phamily as well... We haph your back....

[arfink]

Well the hall we wanted is booked absolutely solid from June to September already. :( Shoot.

[AnneLine]

Yup.  This is the sort of thing we ran into as well.   That's why we ended up having our reception at my university's convention center... but I can understand that you probably don't want yours at the seminary!  :)

 

BUT you might want to see if you are eligible to use any facilities at the affiliated college... we were ASTONISHED by how wonderful the resource was -- beautiful and INEXPENSIVE room for alumni!

 

You can also see if there are any groups like Sons of Italy (Or Sons of the Vikings in your part of the world!) that might have halls available.  There is usually a list if you search your home town and 'halls for rent' or such things...  And sometimes places like museums will let you rent out a space for a few hours... You are a creative guy... you can DO this!!!!

 

Yeah, you will probably have to get the temporal stuff in place and then put the spiritual stuff into the mix... but of course, the mystery of the Advent Season is that the Lord God WANTS to be part of our temporal world.... so ask Him to find you the right venue....

[arfink]

I know my alma mater does this kind of thing but they require you to book it literally years in advance. I'll have to see what else I can find.

[MissyP89]

Check local Moose/Elks clubs, Knights halls, etc. They might ask you to become a member, but it works. My folks got their reception for mad cheap at a Moose hall.

 

Fire halls are another very reasonable option, but you'd need to bring in a caterer and decorate yourself. I'll probably have my bridal shower at the KoC hall down the block.

[arfink]

Well, let's see what's new. Lots of stuff.

 

Dad's '86 Honda Accord is probably breathing it's last gasp before long. This time around the carburetor and choke assemblies have gone, causing the engine to be incapable of idling correctly. This means in the cold the engine is running either way too lean or way too rich, neither of which is any good. The whole thing shakes like it's going to fall apart if you try to run the engine cold. Not cool. If the guys at the shop can even find parts we may be able to eke a few more weeks or months out of it, but I think we need a new car soon.

 

Personally, I feel like it's just as well the thing is dead at the moment, as it's never been a very safe car to operate in snow or ice, and by tomorrow morning it will have been snowing for over a day, and it's not going to stop.

 

The pastor wrote back. He's willing to bend, slightly. We're allowed to pick other days of the week besides Saturday now for the wedding, which should help a lot with making all the dates line up.

 

I've been contacted by a guy setting up a gallery show. He's interested in my work. No idea where this one's going to go, but it's exciting. :bounce:

 

And of course, Christmas ornaments have been going fairly well. Made my second big batch today, they need oil yet, but they will probably go out tomorrow.

[arfink]

I finished all of Neon Genesis Evangelion. So, here are my thoughts on the matter. Keep in mind I am not much of an anime expert, and have also spent a significant portion of my time studying Catholic philosophy and art. I am biased. This will also contain spoilers!

First of all, for those who don't know, Neon Genesis Evangelion, or Eva as it is affectionately known by anime fans, is something of a classic. Everyone who knows anime will tell you that you should probably watch it. From the standpoint of anime, you can't deny that Eva is pretty unique and has reasonably good production values.

The story revolves around a boy named Shinji. He is a 14 year old boy who has spent most of his life as, effectively, an orphan. He was abandoned by his father at a young age following the death of his mother, but is brought back into his father's world because he's needed to pilot what we at first assume is a typical giant robot mecha called an Evangelion.

The story makes an interesting exploration of some very difficult topics, but in the end I do not feel like it did a good job of exploring them well. First, the character of Shinji is extremely unstable. He shows signs of extreme PTSD and also seems to have a kind of self-destructive egoism that is really impossible to easily explain. He's clearly extremely troubled. In the first few episodes the show makes good on the building and exploration of Shinji's psyche as he tumbles out of control after being forced to participate in experiments and military activities which leave him even more insecure, leading ultimately to complete self-loathing and an inability to do anything but harm everyone around him.

The show also builds an interesting world in which human technology begins to fuse with human flesh in ways that would make a Catholic bio-ethicist cringe. The show shows the brutal reality of cloning and human-machine synthesis, showing how ultimately it is unable to produce anything greater than humanity, instead producing only monsters and ultimately, unfathomable destruction and death.

However, the show takes the opposite approach that a Catholic philosophy would embrace. Instead of abhorring death and destruction, the characters ultimately choose to embrace it, seeing in death a release from the suffering they have created for themselves. Ultimately, Shinji and his father reject any notion of hope, seeking only to destroy themselves and everything around them in a feeble attempt to stop their own pain.

I also fault the show for its meaningless and ultimately incoherent use of religious symbolism. The creators of the show used many blatantly Christian symbols throughout, as well as Gnosticism, Kabbalism, Shinto, and possibly Judaism. These are thrown about helter-skelter, never forming a coherent image of any kind. I found that despite the frequent use of these symbols, none of them had any meaning. They are, to put it bluntly, merely aesthetic. I found them distracting and jarring to be used in a series which never explores faith.

The ending of the series is also incredibly jarring and is clearly meant to inspire a kind of breathlessness. But ultimately it is also incoherent. The show folds up all the disparate parts and ties up all the loose ends by literally having the entire world come to an end. The final two episodes and final movie are a veritable orgy of death, replete with nightmarish visuals and narrated with dreamlike monologues on modern philosophy. Strong themes of moral relativism and the exaltation of ego as the ultimate lot of all humanity nearly had me throwing my screen against the wall. The series comes to a screeching halt with the death of all humanity save two human beings, Shinji and his fellow pilot, who he then strangles. Roll the end credits.

My verdict: interesting, yet infuriating. Good aesthetic, but I would not call it great art. Not suggested for people who have difficulty with nudity and violence, and also not suggested for people who are easily disturbed by dark thoughts and images.

[AnneLine]

Good grief, that sounds horrible, compelling yet horrible.

 

Kinda like being stuck in hell.

 

I'm not into anime, but I'm glad it wasn't something I wandered into as a first exposure!

 

It will lead me to praying for all who see it, including you, ARFink!

[arfink]

Yeah Annie, I'm glad I showed you Totoro and Porco Rosso as your first anime. ;)

[AnneLine]

Me too, Sir, me too!   :shiver:

 

That sounds like the anime version of No Exit or something.  Euck.