Awesome Percussion Feature

So, our marching show this year (which will be kicking butt, btw) has a totally rockin' sweet percussion feature half way through. Here's how it works. Please look at the picture. The following actions are all occurring at the same time:

A) These are two brass lines. They shift into "S" shapes, and then shift back.

B) These are two woodwind diagonals. The red dot people stay at a halt while the woodwinds on either side of them dosi-do around them, 8 counts for a full rotation. This is done twice.

C) The center four dots are our two snares and two tenor players. They stand back to back in a circle at a halt. The dots around them are our cymbal players, who face in towards the snares and tenors and rotate counter-clockwise. While rotating they hold their cymbals up vertically in front of their faces for the snares and tenors to play. Thus, the drummers play on a rotating circle of cymbals during their groove.

Now, keep in mind, all of this happens at the same time, making it nearly impossible to catch all of it. It's very neat, one of the coolest things our band has ever done. Now, for the kicker.

After all of that, the cymbals, in order to get to their next set, stick their arms out like wings and "fly" to the next page of drill. They bank a couple of times and actually pretend to fly. Wow, yay for awesome drum breaks!!!!!!!

DS attacks PS3

Sorry I haven't had any posts in a while, but I can't help but feel that that's probably a good thing. I was posting so many times that I was practically spamming my own blog with stuff of very little entertainment value. So, now, after a brief hiatus, I return with a very entertaining snippit from the Tokyo Game Show.

The Tokyo Game Show is a conference in Tokyo where video game companies (Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, and others) go to show off their new lineups and impress people. Well, Sony had a rough time this year.

Sony is releasing the PS3 in mid-November but although some people are really excited, others are horrified at the $600 price and terrible launch game lineup. It appears doomsday is coming for Sony, because if the PS3 tanks then the company, according to analysts, goes under. Yes, Sony will topple. But, this doesn't stop some people from having fun while watching this failure happen.

The president of Sony, Ken Kutaragi, gave his keynote address at the Tokyo Game Show, and although I haven't actually read it or seen it, every single thing I've read says it was the most horrendous, terrible, sucky, *negative adjective* thing ever! The translators couldn't translate all of the technical jargon and the speech wasn't good to begin with. Soooooo, what do the grown men and women reporters in the audience do? They whip out their Nintendo DS's (Nintendo's new gameboy with two screens, one a touch screen) and start picto-chatting with each other.

Picto-chat is a free chat program on the DS that allows people to draw pictures and send stuff to each other. Well, as you will see, the picto-chatting my just foreshadow massive PS3 failure.

Sony Computer Entertainment presents - "You know your division's in trouble when... "- During a keynote address in your home territory, a large portion of the audience is talking amongst themselves using the competition's handheld device.

Some believed that Ken had an ace up his sleeve. . .



Others thought it was beer.



Here's a PS3 cost gripe, yes, definitely 2 "whatever-comes-after-trillion" yen.



A nice play on those little peeing car window stickers, only this time with the Wii dominating. Wii!!!!!!!!!



Poor guy snuck in for the hour long nightmare, only to be laughed at and scorned by the actual reporters. HA!



Yes, it's true, the PS3 is actually just a George Foreman grill, duh!



The Microsoft dragon eating the PS3. . . .mmmmmm.


So, I hope you found those entertaining, I sure did!

Wii 4ever!

Wii Press Conference Last Night at 1 am. I was up for it, watching the live blogging, and here are some of the exciting details really quick before I go to school.

Japan:
$215
December 2nd launch date



Here's the box art!

It's launching with 16 games, the controller and the nunchuck are sold separately. The US press conference is today, more updates later.

Spreadsheet Art

I bought the most recent issue of "Wired" magazine and read a short little blurb about a lady who makes art with spreadsheets. By making all the cells squares and changing the background colors, fabulous mosaics can take shape. I was surprisingly fascinated by this, maybe just because it makes so much sense, so I started fiddling. I'm not to the point of creation, only replication, but I'm still really impressed with the results. My creations have all been Mario, because it's 8-bit and blocky, therefore easy to create. Wanna see? Here are the pictures of my works of art.

KITTY! [UPDATE]

YTMND

I've been hearing about this new craze on the internet called "YTMND" (http://www.ytmnd.com) but had never visited the site. Well, the other day somebody IM'd me a YTMND site and I was intrigued, so today I explored it. I figure I'm an internet g33k, I should be familiar with the goings on in the wide world of the internet. What I've discovered in YTMND is something very different than I'm used to. YTMND is basically one of the stupider things on the internet, but one of the funnest things to talk about (I think?). Basically, take a picture. Then, tile it or stretch it to fit the screen. Add three lines of crappy exploding grey text and a looping audio file in the background and you have a YTMND. Um, yeah, it's different. But, not to be left out, I created my first YTMND. Here it is folks, David Spade and Hermey, right back at ya!

http://davidtheelf.ytmnd.com/

Birthday

So, clarinet section, my 18th birthday is coming up. Here's what I want:

http://www.nerdyshirts.com/product_info.php?gender=1&products_id=33&osCsid=3704eb5d3bc6ad2f4604f88ac724e046

It's a t-shirt and it has this on the front:



Get it? Because it's a legal sized piece of paper? Yes, want.

RIP: Steve Irwin [UPDATE]

The "Crocodile Hunter" died today, September 4th, off the coast of Australia after being stung by a sting ray in the chest. Rest in Peace.

[UPDATE] New Picture

Hot Date

I don't know what all you other guys did this evening, but I had a hot date, so neener neener neener! None of you (all of my "you's" are referencing my section because it seems that only band people read this blog now) know this particular female except for Greg (that should be enough for Greg to guess who). It was a very nice evening, we went to the Great Wall Buffet and ate crab. and cheesecake. STUPID CRAB (we had crab issues).

UH OH! Read my little bio to the right. . . .oops. I'm doing what I said I won't, and I apologize. So, I'll add something else into this entry. . . but what? I know! This is what pops into my head everytime I was in english last year.

College Application Season!

Here it is everybody! The list of the colleges I'm applying to! I've already submitted parts of several of the applications and filled out all of the bio parts, so now it's just down to essays. I'll know by December 15th if I'm in or not. . .it's exciting! The colleges are:

CalTech
MIT
Johns Hopkins
Northwestern
OSU
Stanford

Wish me luck! It's a good thing I like writing essays, I have to write 46 of them! Sheesh! Well, some of them are pretty short, but still, there are so many!!!

Cover

Band people, don't blow my Pacman cover, alright?

PACMAN!

So, who wants to do this with me? I'm thinking some random time during school or during lunch would be good. Just change in the bathroom and then sprint through the school and the halls! If you scream correctly then nobody would know it was you and you could just stash the costumes by the field house at the football field and sneak back into school without anybody knowing it was you! Yes, a great idea, who wants to do it with me?