Author Archives: essiep

The uncanny valley

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22°C, milky, warm v. humid.

The heat is building, hot is coming here next week
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Stay in, relax, read and do some computer graphics. Here is a figure rendered with a normal map, and global illumination.I don’t do that much rendering these day, mostly building objects for the flight sim.Can you guess what a small nuance of a passing thought was when this came out?

MJ RIP: no, it’s never going to happen. Michael Jackson will never be allowed to rest in peace. There will be an endless cycle of conspiracy theories, legal wranglings, court cases, re-issues, writs, biographies, films, documentaries and autopsies. The media will canonise him; in the way that Elvis, Diana, Marc Bolan, Lennon, ML King, the list is long, but perhaps a list of names at surprisingly even intervals in time.

A leg end

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21°C, heavy rain. We missed the electrical storms though

The media are full to the brim with Michael Jackson ‘news’. They all use epithets, the "King Of Pop". It takes me back to my childhood. When Elvis Presly died, I really thought "great, we won’t have to listen to his music any more". How very, very wrong was I?
His musical sales were, it almost goes without saying, enormous. It’s the way that he is perceived by the media and fans that I am interested in. Maybe it tells us something of the world that we live in today.
Who was he: pop-megastar, damaged personality, media-misinformation icon, multi-millionaire, plastic surgery disaster area, musician, dancer,  trans-racial icon, child-molester?

No doubt there will be film companys setting up now to put the story onto the big screen. They’ll have to wait while the CGI animatronics are rendered though. There aren’t any human beings that could fill the role, nor do the morphing from black youth to distorted white mannequin. What is that little button between his eyes and mouth anyway? Could he actually draw air through it?
What really puzzles me is that black commentators don’t seem at all perturbed by a famous black man who has used a chunk of his wealth to surgically remove traces of his racial origins.
The Catholic Church must be looking on with some envy; the public seem to have been paid off when he got away with the child-abuse allegations a few years ago. Will the Pope be able to pull off the same stunt?
Probably.

Speed trap

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25°C, uninterrupted sun, Sth winds

On the commute to work: I went through a speed trap at 34 mph, but it didn’t trigger the camera- no flash. Was the camera’s trigger set just a bit higher- say 35mph, or did I not reflect enough for the radar? Perhaps if I put s length of baking foil up my cycling jersey, then the camera should trip. I’m not a stealth cyclist.

Lost: I lost Rosie tonight.Out for a 40′ walk in the woods and then an hour to search for my missing dog. By the time she came back she was obviously stressed and relieved. And so was I.
She’s back home now, worn-out and thirsty. I blame the rabbits, and they look so innocent too.
Now what has happened to my voice, it’s all hoarse & dry.

Empty legs

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22.5°C, clearing, not like this morning.

That empty-legs feeling: a conversation has confirmed what I suspected was the reason for this. Occasionally, cycle rides need ot be cut short because there just isn’t enough energy in my legs (my whole body really). Now I am willing to air my suspicion. This weekend, I simply haven’t eaten well enough, noodles just aren’t good enough to cycle on. This evening, I had pasta and suddenly the energy game gushing back.

The turning sunset

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16°C, light Clouds, C=37 miles


Rushed out to watch the sunset at the river confluence.The clouds were obliging someone else this day. I like this place, Rosie does too but I fear for her safety there. The railway is not fenced off, so she can trot up to the embankment.

There were jewels in my eyes

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18°C, light clouds, getting lighter

Contact lenses: tried out a trial pair today. They were uncomfortable to put in (the optician did that bit) but no real sensation after that. Seeing was another matter- vision was clear for half of the time but each thing you look at as you go about your day could be blurred or clear. The sens partially flaots in the tears on your eyes, which sometimes lifts the lens, sometimes it aligns true. Sometimes, patches were blurred, others amazingly clear. At best, there was no chromatic aberration and certainly none of that mildly irksome barrel distortion that I get with glasses. However, you just don’t ever know when you glance at something that it will beclear- probably a real nuisance when driving.

I’ll drop the idea of contacts for now.
Tomorrow– longest day of the year, perhaps go somewhere high to watch the sunset at 21.35.
Dating sites: if you are dating and do not ‘love to laugh’, please leave a note to satisfy my curiosity- do you actually exist?

The 48 tree

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23°C, sunshine, SP15, C=73 miles.

Two photos from today’s cycle ride.
Remember that swan nuclear family I posted a few Sundays ago. Well, haven’t they grown?
I got resolutely hissed at by this swan. I don’t blame her, so I backed off.. She was guarding the same number of cygnets that I counted two weeks ago

The 48-tree. Taken from the road overlooking the Staunton Harold estate. Can you see it, or am I just stretching my credibility.

Health & Safety

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21°C. Sun. C20

That Health & Safety meeting was just as good as I’d expected. Didn’t expect the prostate bit though.

That hotel company did the honourable thing and returned my money today. So that is cleared up with no bad feelings, I’m still going to buy a tent though.

Guilty before trial

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18°C, sunshine.

Is this how justice works: See BBC This woman has been charged, her picture published in the media and she’s been attacked on her journey to court by the mob. But hold on a minute- what if.. just what if she’s innocent? It doesn’t seem right to expose her to the mob (newspapers+ chavs) when she could possibly he a victim of mistaken identity. Miscarriages of justice are not rare in England.


A6 sketch, copied from another in my lesson planner.