arfink Posted March 21, 2014 Author Share Posted March 21, 2014 AugustineA, I've pondering getting into that kind of work. Would you mind sharing how you figured that out? (PM is OK too. :) ) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AugustineA Posted March 21, 2014 Share Posted March 21, 2014 PM sent! :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arfink Posted March 22, 2014 Author Share Posted March 22, 2014 [media]http://youtu.be/0uOrw8zDYns[/media] GRiZ has a new album out. This is probably one of my favorite tracks from it, although the album is so long I haven't even heard it all, and I absolutely needed to share it. This is really nice stuff, but it's hard to explain exactly what it is. I guess you could call it "new wave," but in reality it's much more than that. It has some of the classic elements of hip-hop backing, with lots of vintage vinyl sampling, but also has plenty of glitch electronic and even bro-step "wub" elements. Of course, the whole thing gets drenched in delightfully deep reverb, and the sparse vocals are sampled from very degraded vinyl and made to sound very ethereal. In all, this is the kind of tunes I'd expect a space-age wasteland wanderer would to be listening to. Or if you're into video games, this is the soundtrack that Borderlands should have had. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arfink Posted March 23, 2014 Author Share Posted March 23, 2014 (edited) Tonight I went out to see The Wind Rises. It's from the same mind as My Neighbor Totoro and Spirited Away, and bears the signature markings of a Miyazaki film, but this one seemed especially powerful to me. Those who heard my discernment story know that Totoro was actually part of my inspiration to be a human father rather than a priest. This movie also has an extremely deep impact for me as a man approaching marriage. The movie contained great themes about love and commitment in the face of great hardship, and was really moving. SPOILER ALERT [spoiler] The story is of a young man named Jiro who wishes to build beautiful airplanes. The movie begins with his childhood, showing his dreams of flight. It then moves forward to his very early adult life, setting out for university. He is riding the train when the massive Great Kanto Earthquake strikes. He helps a girl and her maid, who has broken her leg, to get home to their families before rushing on to Tokyo where he joins in firefighting efforts to prevent the fires from destroying the entire city. The girl, her maid, and her family, are clearly impressed with him, but he leaves without even giving them his name. The movie doesn't dwell long on the disaster, as only 2 years later the city seems to have mostly rebuilt. He eventually graduates at the head of his class and is hired by a floundering Mitsubishi where he is hazed by his new boss. His first full day on the job he watches as the plane his division was responsible for crashes during a demonstration for the Japanese Navy, which results in him being immediately reassigned. The company, now shamed, sends him and another engineer to Germany to learn from Dr. Junkers how to build all-metal bomber planes. Japan's alliance with the Axis powers gives Jiro access to top secret facilities where he observes construction which he believes is state of the art but also finds inelegant. He is determined that, rather than allow Japan's airplane designs to follow one step behind the Germans, he is going to build an airplane which surpasses them and takes the lead. His ideas were revolutionary compared to the German designs of the 1930s and absolutely unthinkably advanced for Japan, where Mitsubishi hauled airplanes from the facility manufacturing floor to the test field with an ox-drawn cart. However, he does not have sufficient standing in the company to implement his own designs, and works on pieces from other engineer's ideas. After yet another Mitsubishi design crashes and burns, this time with the death of a pilot, Jiro is sent on retreat to a mountain resort to recover his energy and hone his designs. There he is reunited with the girl he saved after the earthquake, and after what is implied to be a fairly long stay, falls in love and proposes marriage. Before she will accept his proposal she tells him she has tuberculosis and likely will not live very long. She also wants to undergo treatment at a sanatorium before marriage. He is willing to take the risk, and they go forward with the engagement. Jiro is, at this time, living with his boss, who has a sizable estate and extra space for him. Some time passes, and he is given a promotion where he leads a team of designers to design a plane (The A5M) which will eventually be upgraded into the famous A6M Zero fighter plane. His fiancée, fearing she may not have much time left, and feeling as though the sanatorium is doing her no good, sneaks out and goes to Tokyo where they are married rather hastily and simply, their vows being witnessed by Jiro's boss and his wife. They are not married for very long. Jiro and his wife live in tenuous happiness, knowing well that she does not have long to live, but making the most of it anyway. On the day that the completed prototype of the A5M is meant to fly, Jiro says goodbye to his wife, and once he is gone she leaves to return to the sanatorium without telling him. She knows she is going there to die, and does not wish to inconvenience her host or force Jiro to suffer through her passing. While this seems very strange to us in the US today, at the time in Japan it would not have been unheard of. Still, it is implied that Jiro is deeply wounded by this, as she presumably has already died before he can even make it home from a few days of testing. At the end, Jiro has a dream in which he speaks to a famous Italian airplane designer who was his inspiration from childhood, and admits that while he was upset about the death of his wife and later the loss of World War II (implied by his saying that not one of his Zeroes came back) he was still glad that he lived his years well, and intended to live more years in the same manner. [/spoiler] As for the movie as a whole, I was especially impressed with the sound design and the story. The visuals are the usual Miyazaki fare, done with impeccable attention to detail and almost blindingly beautiful landscape art. The sound design was extremely striking though. The film spends a good deal of time flitting between what we assume are depictions of reality, along with obvious dream sequences and half-remembered memories. The sound design is what mainly sets these apart. While dream sequences also have more surreal visuals, the memories of the earthquake and some of the failed airplane tests make use of sound effects which are done by a voice actor just making noises with his mouth, with some electronic modulation. It's extremely effective, especially during the earthquake, where the sounds lend an extremely ominous and hair-raising unfamiliarity and otherworldliness that perfectly conveys the feeling of watching a great city fall. The story was very powerful for me. If you read the spoilers, you'll understand why. As a man looking forward to a wedding in a few months, it's a powerful reminder never to take what Katie and I have now, or what we will have in the future, for granted. Edited March 23, 2014 by arfink Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arfink Posted March 23, 2014 Author Share Posted March 23, 2014 BTW, if you go and read about the life of the real Jiro Horikoshi you will find that the facts of his personal life are completely ignored by Miyazaki, so even if you do read up on it, you won't have any spoilers. ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arfink Posted March 25, 2014 Author Share Posted March 25, 2014 This sketch has placeholder crazy faces, and some approximations of cloth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arfink Posted March 28, 2014 Author Share Posted March 28, 2014 I am so so sick of the snow. More is falling. Blerg. Scientists observing Minnesota as though it were another planet would assert that because of the brutal cold, lack of sun, and lack of liquid water on the surface that our world must be uninhabitable by any life forms except perhaps bacteria. I sure don't feel very alive. :P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnneLine Posted March 28, 2014 Share Posted March 28, 2014 For a bug, you are pretty handsome, Sir! But yes, I've wondered about that... but there seems to be a fair amount of life in the land of frozen tundra.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ploomf Posted March 28, 2014 Share Posted March 28, 2014 Come to Idaho. ;) Weather is very nice here. Or it was yesterday at least. :p Today not so much. But we do have lots of potatoes and fry sauce here which makes up for a lot. ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnneLine Posted March 28, 2014 Share Posted March 28, 2014 come to California. We have sun. We have beach. We have food. We have..... ME! :evil: :brutebeast: :evil: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SilentJoy Posted March 28, 2014 Share Posted March 28, 2014 Its raining in Michigan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arfink Posted March 28, 2014 Author Share Posted March 28, 2014 Of course, given that we have a reputation of being the American Siberia, we'll have a month or so of everything being mud, followed by blistering heat for about 3 months, after which we will experience autumn again, which lasts about 12.84 seconds before winter begins again. Minnesota is so weird. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CrossCuT Posted March 28, 2014 Share Posted March 28, 2014 (edited) Of course, given that we have a reputation of being the American Siberia, we'll have a month or so of everything being mud, followed by blistering heat for about 3 months, after which we will experience autumn again, which lasts about 12.84 seconds before winter begins again. Minnesota is so weird. :cry: We have like....7 months of winter. Edited March 28, 2014 by CrossCuT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AnneLine Posted March 28, 2014 Share Posted March 28, 2014 And you make ice sculptures. And nice people! WE LOVE OUR MINNESOTANS!!!!!!! :cold: :cold: :icey2: :icey2: :crusader: :crusader: :viking: :viking: :icey: :icey: :kiss: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ploomf Posted March 28, 2014 Share Posted March 28, 2014 come to California. We have sun. We have beach. We have food. We have..... ME! :evil: :brutebeast: :evil: You make a persuasive argument. I do love beaches. :evil: :saint2: :evil: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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