Die deutsche Version findest Du hier.
I just want to tell everyone: Enjoy the Fifa World Cup 2010 in South Africa. And as a tribute to South Africa I embed their national anthem in here, which is really great to listen to (I especially like the following version I found on YouTube):
Oh, and I cannot stop listening to K’naan’s song “Wavin’ Flag” especially the version with Nancy Ajram:
Hinweis: Du findest die deutsche Version dieses Postings in meinem deutschen Blog.
I like to create photoshows from different events. Recently based on some days vacation on Wangerooge, Germany. Since some years I am using PhotoStory on CD & DVD by Magix. I take nearly every second version step, so the latest were 5, then 7 and this time I updated to 9. It was a great step forward and a major enhancement.
One of the major enhancements – introduced earlier but now near to perfection – is the generation of paths through an image. You can make a picture alive as if it is a video – at least this is the feedback from audience watching my videos who asked: “Is this really only a photo?”
Today I will tell you about zooming images. One of the things you will use most when you generate your paths through the images manually (that is not using the wizard). You can get a picture to zoom with just a few clicks (mind that I use the German version and have to guess how menu entries are called in English):
That’s all – and you already have a very nice effect. But actually there is a problem when you define a changeover effect like for example fading out: Your zoom will even continue when your image is nearly not visible any longer.
The first simple approach would be to stop zooming before the image fades out. Therefore you just have to move the diamond marker at the end of the zoom just before the dotted line. But: With this you will have a boring freeze image.
The better solution is: Slowing down. This works perfect with Magix PhotoStory on CD & DVD:
Now you can ensure that before the fading starts you have (nearly) the image clipping you wanted to reach – and you still have no boring freeze image while fading.
The following screen shot shows the (German) User Interface of Magix PhotoStory. The blue markers mark the diamonds which control the waypoints. The penultimate waypoint is the one I used for slowing down the zoom. The orange markers mark the time-indices where the crossing over starts/ends. This is automatically shown by Magix Photostory with a dotted line:
Hope you like the tip. And here is the resulting video (with Music from Unheilig “An deiner Seite”):
Hinweis: Du findest die deutsche Version dieses Postings in meinem deutschen Blog.
Already in May I mentioned in my German Blog the Dinosaurs Song by Bernard Derriman. I was not the only one who was wowed by this song, but also Martina and her son. Martina replied to my blog-post about my crafted Emma-Dragon-Costume via mail and told me that she had crafted it, too – in Australia. Here the video we both like that much:
Some time ago I already tried to write down the lyrics. But I failed because I could not identify some words in the song as I am not a native speaker. I was totally happy that Martina helped me and wrote down the lyrics for me. And she allowed me to publish them here in the blog. So here we go:
The Dinosaurs Song
They used to walk
They used to swim
They used to fly with a toothy grin
Some ate plants and
Some ate meat
Some walked around on just 2 feetRefrain:
Oh the Dinosaurs, big as trees
The Dinosaurs, brains like peas
Jaws and claws and teeth and bone
That used to growl and groan and moanSome had feathers
Some had scales
Spikes and clubs and whip like tails
They fought like dragons
The earth sure shook
The volcanoes sizzled and the lava cookedRefrain
Tyrannosaurus was a terrible king
The stegosaurus’ tail could really swing
Brachiosaurus liked to stomp
Trachodon would chew and chompRefrain
They roamed the earth for a 100 million years
Without worries, cares or fears
Then one day, they hit the soil
Now they’re fossils, gas and oil2x Refrain
Hinweis: Du findest die deutsche Version dieses Postings in meinem deutschen Blog.
On Saturday, I was incredibly happy and shared my joy on Twitter (including a typo I made): I received an email from Australia.
In Australia a mother read my craft instructions for a dragon costume for the locomotive Emma (Title: “Happy Birthday, Jim Knopf!”; sorry no English translation available for this blog post). She crafted the costume by herself then. She did not make the costume for the Lego locomotives Thomas or Percy but for the original loco from Lego Duplo. The argument of her son: “She looks more like Emma.” And he's right!
Then I was completely fascinated by the photos that she had sent to me. It feels strange to see how it is that Emma's costume suddenly made it to Australia.
Oh, and a tip she gave me: The dragon costume holds even longer if it is laminated. But I have to add: The two dragon costumes for my kids are still fine, too.
Hinweis: Du findest die deutsche Version dieses Postings in meinem deutschen Blog.
Today we got a call from my wife's parents. They found a guide how to craft a a small rocket. It was that simple that it could be transmitted via a simple phone call. You need:
First, I made a small strip at half height of the film container. I placed and glued this around the rocket, so that it was easy to fix the fins afterwards. When tinkering, It is important that the lid of the film container was closed to fix the fins at the correct height.
Then I had to cut the fins: small triangles with adhesive flaps at the end... equal in height as the previous strip. Recommendation: Cut the previous strip a little longer than needed and then cut the fins from the rest. Fix these fins with the glue to the strip which is already around the rocket's body.
Then the missile nosecone: Cut out a circle (use a cup to draw it) and once cut it toward the middle. Then shape and glue the cone. I made it a little wider than the film container. The remaining width I cut in several times to have small flaps which I bent and glued to the film container.
In the garden, I ensured to have a flat surface on the lawn using a flower plate. Then I poured the baking powder into the rocket. And now I needed three hands. Fortunately, I had the best wife of all to the side, which assisted: She poured three teaspoons full of vinegar (pre-filled in a cup!) into the rocket body. Do not be irritated by the powerful foaming - simple fasten the lid fast, shake the film container and quickly place the rocket to the ground. Seek some safe place.
Even if it started to foam immediately: It still took a few seconds... but then the rocket shot up into an impressive height. I guess about three meters. At least so much that the video only showed the launch of the rocket.
Have fun crafting! You can reuse the rocket some times.
Hinweis: Die deutsche Version dieses Postings findet sich in meinem deutschen Blog.
The last few hours, I have the feeling to experience something really special. Since the elections in Iran on Friday and the announcement unbelievable election results in Iran is seething with rage: Where is my vote?
The accusation: election fraud. And that resonates not only through the streets of Tehran - no, it echoes through the vastness of the Internet with thousands of voices. The echo has a name: “Retweet”. And the medium of the echo is an invention which especially in the past days I would like to call: “revolution of the Internet”.
Twitter is a so-called micro blog. 140 characters to put your thoughts, feelings and expressions in. And who would have thought that such a small amount of characters can awaken so much emotions. For an company internal micro blog called Trillr I once answered the question what Trillr is good for. My answer: You are at the heartbeat of the company. And that's true – true for Trillr and for Twitter.
For some days, Twitter is also constantly mentioned in the news of German television. Isabel Schayanis, Islamic scholar and editor of Monitor – a German telecast, put it very well on June 17th in a commentary in the telecast “Tagesthemen”: “And what are their weapons? They hold their cell phones up into the air!” - Because that's all you need to send 140 characters around the world through Twitter.
To make this all work you need Retweets. That's because your message only goes to all those who said they want to receive updates from you – your followers. Some have 20, others over 1000 followers. But your followers might do some magic: They can retweet – they copy your message, place a “RT <yourname>” in front of it and send your message to their followers. The rest is known as snowball effect.
So Retweets go through the Internet like the waves of an ocean. Some with short messages like “I am on a demonstration right now”, some with links to pictures, some with links to videos like for example in Youtube.
And to ensure that all information can be found, the so-called Tweets are provided with Hashtags. In other areas you would just call them keywords or tag like it is used in social bookmarking services for example. The keywords all begin with a double cross, the “hash”, so that services such as Hashtags.org can filter the messages. The best known Hashtags about Iran-election are:
It's also impressive to see how these hashtags raised in usage counts in the past days – here using the example for the hashtag #iranelection:
For me these short messages from Iran raise a lot of emotions. Of course I don't feel as if I am there, part of the demonstrations – how could I? But I feel with the Iranians who are concerned about their votes which seem to be lost. I really wish that this “Cyberrevolution” - the revolution boosted by the Internet – will be a success. A great success with hopefully not more blood beeing shed – a peaceful revolution with the mobile phone raised to signal the protest!
The newspaper Berliner Morgenpost published a great article on 16.06.2009. One quote is a German word-play is: “Der Iran twittert Morgenluft” - roughly translated as “Iran scents the morning breeze” - translated but loosing the word-play.
The article explains in easy terms what Twitter is and that we might just experience the “revolution of the revolution” with the protests in Iran. Having written this, the article puts in words my deep feelings inside my heart.
Hinweis: Die deutsche Version dieses Postings findet sich in meinem deutschen Blog.
I just have seen one of the most impressive films ever. His name is easy – simply “Home”. The film goes to all of us. It is personally, it is talking about you! You, the wise Homo Sapiens!
After a few minutes of the film, it was clear to me more than ever: Our Earth is beautiful. Nature has created such beautiful things, which never could have been created by man. Nature has paved our way throughout trillions of years, so that we can be here today.
The body is battered. Deep wounds were torn into her body. The elixir of life flows from these wounds. No, she will not die – she won't. But that who have caused these wounds to her. And I am one of them. I am one of those who is causing the earth's wounds every day.
The film is beautiful, it's depressing, it awakens hopes. All in one. The most important sentence for me is: “It's too late to be a pessimist.”
I got pessimistic watching this movie. A desperation grew in me. The desperation is with me every day – but I am successful ignoring it. But the movie won't let you stay in your pessimism. It shows ways out of the crisis, paths which are already taken at some places in the world. But: We must all go them:
“It's up to us to write what happens next - Together!”
Just another quote from the movie. Perhaps efforts like Global Commons are exactly the right way. It is a nice way to connect the people so that together we create what the individual, and even the individual nation is not able to create.
Not a good movie on TV? A little time to sit back? Then you must have a look at this movie and recommend it to your friends. You will learn a lot about the earth, our climate and what can be done.
