Gravity... reversal... problem...!

What is gravity? Yep we know what it does but what is it? One of my little theories is this: Gravity is the effect of matter passing through space (by 'space' I mean whatever space is really made of), I kind of negative pressure across a multidimensional surface.
Illustration: When riding a bike and being passed by a bus, you can feel yourself being drawn towards the bus. As the moving bus cuts through the still air it creates a negative pressure around and behind itself.

Podcast: Fly With Me!

Now this one will get your geek stomach a rumbling! A Podcast which features air crew 'chatter'. I've only heard a few minutes of it but it was pretty interesting, gives a good insight into the undercarriage of air travel. Easiest way to get it? iTunes.

Adobe CS2 Premium

I took delivery of Adobe Creative Suite Version 2 on Friday. Wow! What an awesome collection of design tools. I honestly believe that this is it now, InDesign, Photoshop, Acrobat and Illustrator (perhaps even GoLive) will be the main creative publishing tools for the next 10 years at least. I was already doubtful of Quarks ability to compete anymore--now I'm certain of it. Express 7 will have to be something beyond a simply evolution if they have any chance of survival. So now we have Adobe for creative print and web tasks, and Apple for everything else and in-between. After 15 years in the design industry it finally feels like things have come together. The only area that still feels immature is web design. It's quite surprising that web tools are still so complex, I wonder who will sort this out the soonest Adobe or Apple? Or could it be Microsoft? ;)

This time last year . . .

Looks like a scene from Channel 4's 'Smack The Pony'! Whatever happened to that show anyway?

The Magic Numbers!

They may not look like much kid, but they've got it where it counts. Very simply, very enjoyable music. Pretty much everyone is going to love this stuff.

Moving Mars!

'Moving Mars Main Theme'. Just click on the 'download hi-bitrate' link to listen to my latest tune.
Inspired by the Greg Bear story of the same name, Moving Mars is another ambient tune from The James Reed Network. I truly enjoyed creating this song (all played by me apart from the beat which is a Jam Pack loop). The main melody just kind of appeared as I was messing around on Garageband late one evening. Going through my collection of Garageband material today I realised that I have so much unfinished work. I really must get around to finishing off more of these tunes--it's so nice just to finally get to the point where you can stick them on the iPod as 'completed' songs. I can't wait actually finished a Jam Pack 4 song . . . full orchestras!!!

Afternoon Norah Jones

I was looking for some music to accompany this balmy afternoon (73°), I found Norah, the following songs fit perfectly . . .
One Flight Down, Carnival Town, Come Away With Me, Those Sweet Words and Painter Song. I haven't listened to Norah Jones in quite some time, I think it might because it's just so well suited to slow hazy midsummer afternoons.

Paris

I've been thinking about Paris lately, what a great time we had there last year, looking forward to Paris this year, that kind of thing. I can happily report that I was quite stunned by her beauty last May, it's not hard to see why so many people regard Paris as the centre of Europe and the most beautiful city in the world. The Louvre was perhaps the highlight of our brief trip, I could walk round those huge hallways for weeks on end and not tire of majesty of those thousands of paintings and sculptures. If you've never been to Paris, you really must!

The Convention, 2005

We had a really great weekend! I now feel fully refreshed. The quality of teaching was superb. As for the drama . . . don't get me started, it's was so motivating--probably the best drama I can remember in a long time. Everything went well, the car journey was stress free, the weather was amazing and the lunches were perfect :)

Macro Mode, Nokia 6630

I love macro pictures. Some of my favourite photos of the last 10 years have been taken using macro. I was sat at work the other day looking at my printers eyeglass, (See first picture above) and I thought "I wonder what would happen if I held it in front of the lens of my mobile phone camera". The result was MACRO! (See second picture). Probably not such a big surprise--as my boss said, "So what! You've discovered the lens, big deal!", but the point is, it's such an easy solution!

War of The Worlds!

I wonder . . . can it be done? Can they make a War of The Worlds movie that isn't a load of old rubbish? I think this might just be the one, the pieces are in place--great director, great actors, great musician, great storey, great CGI, what more do you need? Oooooooooooooooolaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!! Ah, now that's more like it! ;) Roll on the 1st of July.
Oh, one thing, I think the whole "They are already here" thing is a bit of a giveaway.

'Fix You', Fixed Me

X&Y is a truly great collection of songs, I'm loving 'Fix You' and 'Till Kingdom Come' at the moment but it's early days yet, I only purchased it from the iTMS yesterday afternoon. Well done boys--job done, I'd say!
Picture taken by me on my Nokia 6630 using my new homemade macro function . . . more later ;)

Barber Blues!

Well, I bumped into my old barber yesterday, he look at me then looked at my hair and his face dropped! Poor man, I wonder if he views his haircuts as creative works of art . . . He had the same look on his face that I must have when a customer of mine brings in some artwork that they've done themselves! :( Not to worry--I worked out the other day that I've saved £240 in the last 4 years :)

'Lighting' never strikes twice. Revisited, again!

Taken with my phone on Sunday, as soon as I saw this composition I thought, "Now that would make a nice picture for the blog, if only I had a camera with me" ;)

Lou's New Phone

Now that's more like it. The SEK750i is the first real camera/phone. It has autofocus, a macro mode, flash and it really does feel just like a digtial camera. I expect this to be a huge success.

Other features besides the nice 2MP camera include; MP3 and AAC player, Video player and recorder, Radio with RDS, a long battery life and a Memory Stick Duo slot which can take 2GB cards.

X&Yes!!!

It's been a long time coming but . . . it's here!!! Hoorah! I pick up the new COLDPLAY CD today, can't wait. :)

Alasdair Rawsthorne! ;)

Is this guy about to change the face of computing? Today could be the day!

Amos Lee

I'm in a real Amos Lee mood today, he's just so smooth.