lost in translation

Memories Just watched Cats last Saturday, August 7. We were...

Mon, 09 Aug 2010 18:39:00 +0800

Memories

Just watched Cats last Saturday, August 7. We were seated beside the Presidential Box. Too bad there was no president there. Haha! I wasn’t feeling well that morning but fortunately, I got back on my feet that afternoon. Anyways, Cats was nice! The story was simple, but the performance was great. Galing talaga ni Lea kumanta. Stunning voice. Non-stop musical and theatrical performance from the cast. I can only imagine how tired they became after their acrobatics-while-singing acts. Uploaded is Lea singing Memories. Sorry for the low volume. I recorded it using only my phone. >.< Still, with the sucky recording, she stills sings the song wonderfully.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

Wed, 07 Jul 2010 21:24:27 +0800

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

"I was meant to tread the water, but now I’ve gotten in too deep."

Sun, 27 Jun 2010 14:12:42 +0800

“I was meant to tread the water, but now I’ve gotten in too deep.”

- James Morrison

Privacy

Fri, 18 Jun 2010 20:52:16 +0800

Long time no post! Due to the curiosity of some of my peers, I decided to write about privacy this week. As the world grows ever smaller, our systems get even more vulnerable to unwanted users, etc. Quite honestly, I’m not one who’s strict when it comes to privacy of my computer. While I don’t really use most of these programs and tips on a day to day basis, they’re still worth trying out, especially if you’re a techie like me.

1. Face Recognition - Luxland Blink! : http://www.luxand.com/download/

I’ve known this program for quite some time now, but I’ve only tried it recently, after seeing another friend use a similar software, included in his laptop. It’s fairly accurate, considering that it’s free. It only works on 32bit Windows though, and somewhat slows down your start up since it loads your camera at login. Make sure you click on Luxland Blink!, and not Luxland FaceSDK or the others, unless you’re thinking of programming your own face recognition software. It’s a pretty cool program for security, but nothing beats typing your password. :)

2. Proxy Shield - Hotspot Shield : http://hotspotshield.com/

Well you all know about hiding behind a proxy so that your web statistics remain, for the most part, anonymous. This program does just that. The difference between this and most proxy programs is that this is WAY easy to use. Simply install the program, and whenever you want to hide under a proxy, just right click then tell it to turn the proxy shield on. Whenever you want it to stop, just right click and tell it to turn the shield off. I’m not one who’d usually use a proxy program, since I’m always suspicious of them, but once I read this program’s article on Wallstreet Journal, and watched the video of CNN talking about it, I decided to try it out. Primarily made for the US, where users are almost always vulnerable to wireless attacks, it also adds some perks to those of us living outside of the US. What might that be? Remember those programs telling you “Our services are not offered in your country” and all that? Well, since this program fools the internet into thinking that you’re living somewhere in the US, once you turn it on, it allows you to access those sites you couldn’t access before because of regional limitations! Listed below are some sites (I can’t remember them all.. xP) that you could access after turning on your proxy shield:

http://www.hulu.com/ : Free Online Video Service
http://www.cwtv.com/ : Free Online Video Service
http://www.pandora.com/ : Creates a playlist from your given Song / Artist

3. Password Generation

Nope, I’m not gonna promote a program which generates a password for you, but instead share a tip i learned before. We all know how hassle it is to think of a password that is both easy to remember and, at the same time, secure. It’s actually quite simple! Just think of something that you would easily remember, like your birthday, and then, when typing it on your keyboard, shift all keys either to the left or to the right, or both. Voila! A complicated password that’s easy to remember! As an example, let’s use “tumblr”. When you type this, shifted to the left, it reads “runvkwe”. Another example would be “junetwelve” which, when shifted to the left, reads “hybwtqwkcw”. Ingenious eh? Add in a few numbers, and you’re good to go!

Hope these privacy stuffs (especially bypassing regional limitations >:)) help. Gahd I hate my busy schedule.

"The best things happen to those who make the best out of the things that happen to them"

Tue, 08 Jun 2010 23:42:06 +0800

“The best things happen to those who make the best out of the things that happen to them”

Sinkhole which opened up in Guatemala City, after typhoon...

Tue, 01 Jun 2010 07:41:19 +0800

Sinkhole which opened up in Guatemala City, after typhoon Agatha.

That is so darn scary.

CNN

Haha! One of my favorite lines, debunked....

Sun, 30 May 2010 16:55:01 +0800

Haha! One of my favorite lines, debunked. xP

http://cowbirdsinlove.com/

Photo

Tue, 25 May 2010 18:20:49 +0800

Auto-Tune

Tue, 25 May 2010 13:24:00 +0800

This week I’ll be talking about how to Auto-tune.

Auto-Tune is a proprietary^[2] audio processor created by Antares Audio Technologies. Auto-Tune uses a phase vocoder to correct pitch in vocal and instrumental performances. It is used to disguise off-key inaccuracies and mistakes, and has allowed singers to perform perfectly tuned vocal tracks without the need of singing in tune. While its main purpose is to slightly bend sung pitches to the nearest true semitone (to the exact pitch of the nearest tone in traditional equal temperament), Auto-Tune can be used as an effect to distort the human voice when pitch is raised/lowered significantly.^[3]

from Wikipedia

A lot of you may have heard electronically-sounding voices in recent music tracks. This technology was created by Andy Hildebrand, an engineer working for Exxon. He realized that the same autocorrelation technique used to find oil could also be used to correct singers’ unruly notes.

First of all, before I go on with teaching how to Autotune, I’ll give my opinion on it. There are a lot of debates going on as to whether Autotune is for the good or not. Because of this technology, even the not-so-vocally-talented people are able to make decent music, minus off-key notes. That’s why quite a number of people do not support Auto-tune or artists who use Autotune. Personally, I don’t think that Autotune or Autotune-using artists are deplorable. I believe that singing is an expression of oneself, and if using Autotune will aid you in that endeavor, then it is a welcome technology. And, like most technologies, it will also bring forth new ideas and styles not thought of before. I think of it as an artistic license. An example would be the Charlie-Bit-Me video that was autotuned, which I think is cute. :)

This method I’m going to show uses the Autotune plugin in Audacity, an audio-editing freeware.

1. Download Audacity 1.3 (Beta) and install it.

2. Download vst-bridge-1.1.exe and install it into the Program Files\Audacity 1.3 Beta (Unicode)\Plug-Ins folder. Take note, when you run the installer, the default installation folder set is Audacity\Plug-Ins without the “1.3 (Beta)”. Make sure you browse and install to the one with the “1.3 (Beta)” as seen in the picture. I’m using a 64bit system, hence it is installed in the x86 Program Files folder.

3. Run Audacity for the first time, and close it after it runs. This is simply a precautionary measure.

4. Download Atune EVO VST.

5. Run Setup.exe and install both the main program and the VST(i) plugin in the \Program Files\Audacity 1.3 Beta (Unicode)\Plug-Ins folder. You should be able to browse and choose the directory where the two will be installed. It might be good to run the setup as administrator, as some drivers would be installed. I didn’t run it as administrator, but it still worked out.

5. Restart your computer.

6. Run Audacity, record your voice or perhaps load an existing sound file.

7. Select the part of the sound wave you wish to Autotune and click on Effect > Antares Audio: Auto-Tune Evo VST

8. Copy the settings in the picture. You can save these settings so you won’t have to set them each time you want to Auto-tune. You can also tweak these settings to have different effects. I just found these settings on the net, which results in a T-Payne effect.

Settings:

key = c
scale = major
retune speed = 0
scale detune = 4 cents, 441.0 hertz
humanize = 0
natural vibrato = 0.0

rate = 0.1
onset delay = 0
variation = 0
onset rate = 0
pitch amount = 0
amplitude amount =.3
formant amount = 1

To be able to export your file into an mp3, you will need to download Lame mp3 Encoder. And that is how you Auto-tune. Hope you enjoyed it. Happy Auto-tuning!

Need I say more? >:)

Mon, 24 May 2010 23:04:23 +0800

Need I say more? >:)

Online sync & backup software

Mon, 24 May 2010 22:58:57 +0800

Online sync & backup software:

Dropbox

I’ve been hearing about this for quite some time now, but I’ve only tried it a few days ago. I didn’t really think of how I’m gonna use it at this point, but since my parents both needed something to help them back up their files online, I decided to try it out. For no cost at all, it gives you 2GB (plus a max of 8GB with referrals), of online space. Syncing between computers is a breeze. You just need to install their software on both computers, and voila!, a folder is created, wherein all files saved in it will be synced across your PCs, laptops, and gadgets (you can also sync to your iTouch using Docs2Go). Anyways, ‘nuff with this, as they already have a good video explaining the technology in their site.

"Cause you, a feeling I can’t deny"

Mon, 24 May 2010 19:36:42 +0800

“Cause you, a feeling I can’t deny”

- We the Kings - Stay Young

Now that there’s Content Aware Fill, Adobe Photoshop Day...

Fri, 21 May 2010 21:54:00 +0800

Now that there’s Content Aware Fill, Adobe Photoshop Day Cream just got better. Haha!

http://giopetsgraphicart.blogspot.com/2010/05/photoshop-day-cream-madonna.html

http://abstrusegoose.com/268

Tue, 18 May 2010 22:12:43 +0800

http://abstrusegoose.com/268

Steganography

Sun, 16 May 2010 09:15:10 +0800

Steganography n. ; (ste-gə-ˈnä-grə-fē,)
the art or practice of concealing a message, image, or file within another message, image, or file

Although there are quite a number of ways to hide files and messages, I’ll focus on Least Significant Bit (LSB) Steganography. This steganography is used in Windows systems. This makes use of a picture (jpg) file to conceal a rar file containing whatever you want. The only drawback I see in this method is that your output picture will take on the file size of both your rar and your old pic, and having a big zip file hidden within a regular picture would take a much larger HD space, and would therefore be quite suspicious. Of course, this won’t be any problem for concealing smaller files. Another thing to note is that this does not work on 64bit Windows 7. I didn’t try it on 64bit Windows XP though. Anyways lets get on with the process:

1. Put all your files in one folder, ie, a jpg picture which will be your front, and a rar file which may contain pretty much anything. For this example, I have compressed an mp3 file and a text file.

2. Click on start and type cmd in your search bar (or you can type run, then type cmd) then press enter.

3. Navigate to the folder where you put your file (in this example, the files were stored in D:\Test) and type the command
copy /b picture.jpg + Test.rar output.jpg
replacing “picture”, “Test”, and “output” with your respective filenames.

4. You will notice that a new file will be created in your folder named output.jpg (or whatever you named it). This is a jpg file, and will act as one, opening in your image viewer, etc.

5. To retrieve your hidden files, you will first have to change your folder options such that known file extensions will still be shown. To do this, click on “Organize”, then “Folder Options”

6. A popup for folder options will appear. Go to the View tab and, under Advanced settings, uncheck “Hide extensions for known file types”. You can recheck this after the whole process.

7. With this, you will be able to see your files’ extensions, and you will be able to edit them with ease. To retrieve your hidden files, simply rename the output.jpg file into output.rar. A dialog box will appear asking if you want to change it. Just click Yes.

8. With this, you can now open output.rar with your archiving program (I use winrar), and be able to extract your hidden files.

This is LSB Steganography. There are other ways to conceal files and messages. Just use the web to search for them.

You can also download Hide-in-Picture to automate this process. The drawback of this program is you need to have this program to be able to extract it as well. In other words, if you’re sending your jpg to a friend, he needs to download and install the program as well.

PHOTOGRAPHY : HDR (High Dynamic Range) Tutorial

Sat, 15 May 2010 22:49:25 +0800

PHOTOGRAPHY : HDR (High Dynamic Range) Tutorial

Photo

Thu, 13 May 2010 06:43:17 +0800

URL redirection

Wed, 05 May 2010 13:04:00 +0800

URL redirection:

tiny.cc [link]

When you get have a URL that’s quite long, and somewhat difficult to remember, you can shorten it using this site. Works wonders especially in making your links easier to remember.

Just upgraded my ram. Bought 2x 2GB 800 MHz Corsair XM2...

Sat, 01 May 2010 20:02:48 +0800

Just upgraded my ram. Bought 2x 2GB 800 MHz Corsair XM2 >:) Coz of this I reformatted my PC and installed x64 bit Win7. Since I had ram to spare, I installed Rainmeter once again. Found a REALLY nice skin, and applied it. This is my current desktop. I’m still figuring out what to do with the right side.

Things I used:
Wallpaper by TheBestIsaac [link]
Rainmeter [link]
Arcs skin included in Rainmeter install
Simplesentence 2 by White Baron [link]

PHOTOGRAPHY : Focus Stacking Tutorial

Thu, 29 Apr 2010 14:14:39 +0800

PHOTOGRAPHY : Focus Stacking Tutorial