Mango people

Disclaimer: This is a fictitious and satirical account of a 'person' getting slapped. My intentions are not to offend anyone's sentiments.

Following the motorcade, Fafda slipped through the crowd and ducked just in time as a somnolent man stretched. Fafda’s mission was simple: to greet Kejru—the savior of mango people.

Fafda was barely two feet away when he noticed a man, who was holding a vacuum cleaner, three meters away but steadily advancing towards Kejru. It did appear as if the man—let’s call him Modak—was going to attack Kejru with that or perhaps just wanted to gloat how he possessed the weapon that would help incorrupt all houses. Fafda knew time was short and in all probability, gauging from Modak’s body language, he was out to strike Kejru.

Wasting no time, Fafda jumped over a child and raced towards the motorcade. He pushed passed and was meters away from Kejru, and yelled out to get his attention. The moment had come, and it was now or never. Fafda removed his stash and jumped mid-air. In the middle of his leap, he removed three bananas from his pocket, mashed it mid-air and smeared it on Kejru’s face as he landed with a bang on the jeep’s bonnet.

The next morning, Fafda picked up the morning paper left outside his door. He was surprised to see a picture of him on the first page. The photographer had snapped him leaping mid-air and had managed to grab a terror-struck Kejru’s expression in the same frame, with the onlooking mango people going bananas. Fafda smiled and headed back into his room.

Not far away, Modak planned his attack meticulously. Not to be thwarted this time, he finalized the plan and went into the kitchen to pick his ammunition. He loaded his weapon, which appeared to be a lot like a water-gun, with pomegranate seeds and marched out of his house to greet Kejru.

Beauty in small dimensions.

Beauty does not come in bite-size pieces. It does not come in capsules nor does it come easily. While there is no personal achievement in being born beautiful, it is often acknowledged that Beauty is a welcome guest everywhere.

We are surrounded by beautiful people and they influence our lives a lot more than we acknowledge. We have our families, friends, colleagues, and strangers. Pets and strays too.

Beautiful people can be your sunshine when you're being battered with hail. I had been through a harrowing experience, had made a mistake and had let it tag along for quite a while. When I took steps to rectify it, it came back to bite me in the back. I had a lot at stake and was in a confused state of mind, worried and tired. My friend understood me perfectly and gave me a warm hug, took me for a walk, and let me vent. Once I had vented, I felt a rain cloud being tugged and pulled out of me. I felt it buoying away and I felt lightness. I discussed a lot of things, formulated a plan, and started to work towards it. Over a beef burger, an Arabic salad, and burnt caramel milkshake, I spoke and spoke, cried, and then listened. I spent three hours talking and walking with the most beautiful person I know and let tranquility sink in.

Beauty is relative and may not be appreciated the same everywhere. Yes, you walk into a party and the first thing you pay attention to is one’s appearance.  The first impression you have of a person is derived from the first 5 seconds you observe them ( It is important to dress and groom well ). While an attractive person is more likely to make a positive first impression, it takes a lot more than external appeal to build a lasting impression. Beauty is a reflection of one’s nature, one’s character, and is sometimes a way of life. Even when we are busy with our lives, we must make it a point to appreciate the Beautiful. A smile, a note, or a thank you go a long way and often makes them smile — making them appear more beautiful. 

I have a knack of spotting beautiful qualities in people and occasionally compliment them on the same. Everybody loves Beautiful people— it doesn't take much to appreciate them. It makes them happy, and in turn makes us happy. Happiness is a trait often associated with the Beautiful. 

While beauty doesn't come in bite-size pieces, we can still chew on thoughts and relish the good times. While we can't gulp down a Beauty capsule, we can certainly inject ourselves with happiness. Think of all the Beauty still left around you, and be happy.

Effect with sincerity.

"Well! The buzz from the bees is that the leopards are in a bit of a spot... And the baboons are going ape over this. Of course, the giraffes are acting like they're above it all..."

The Lion King is probably the most popular animated movies of all time. A movie that follows the life of a carefree cub who "can't just wait to be a king" and treads the path of "Hakuna Matata" that teaches him the "Circle of life". Animating quadrapeds was a challenge and Disney pulled it off so well!

More realistic animation techniques have replaced the traditional methods of hand-drawing animated figures. The physics of reality enslaves art and technology to simulate and visualize better, animate better. Computational methods and equations pull off a trade-off that makes a visual look as real to life as possible.

There are primarily three methods to animate a bundle of pixels. One- Breaking the image into discrete elements, Two- Use sample points selected from the sample picture and Three- Beget cells in the sample space. Motion capture is one of the coolest techniques widely used, in which markers are placed on an actor's face. For every expression, the positions of markers are noted and subsequently mapped onto the animated character.

I have been particularly impressed by VFX (Visual Effects- effects that are used to manipulate images to make them look realistic and integrate live-action footage) . I was mindblown by the VFX generated by the team that worked with visuals in X-MEN First Class. A great story line coupled with amazing effects that looked real but quite apparent.

Here's a youtube video of how they created the Beast transformation, the Magneto Yacht destruction scene, Riptide hurricanes and Cerebro destruction.




ICY system helped in rendering light and added a bit of composition. There is a lot more physics and equations involved than I thought there was. Properties of light play an important role. The right amount of illumination and spark can transform a dull scene and make it interesting and gripping.

Tapping reflection and refraction (properties of light) was a way to make Frost's diamond form much more appealing. Also the skin textures could change by changing the illumination and using animation softwares like Voodoo, to make skin look smooth or scaley, depending on the effect desired (in case of Mystique [the one who has shape shifting powers, turns blue on whim and claims she is 'Mutant and proud'] ).

They also used Zbrush for Angel's dragon wings and made the transition of her transformation look super-smooth. The final fight scenes that included a fire fight were rendered by PRman that rendered the fire in three heat ranges, namely blue, green and red. The particles had different shades of opacity and with this, the subsequent effects could be varied and applied.

Another mutant, Havok has special powers of throwing rings of fire. These discs were Computer generated and they appear to be forms of energy that contract and expand and vary in intensity as they are hurled towards the intended offender.

Magneto's attempts to destroy Sebastian Shaw's Yacht were created by using the visual destruction tool called Kali. Kali analyses and creates break points that follows the rules of geometry (particularly center of gravity) and gives a realistic view of how the ship will break and capsize , if it were to, in live footage.

Effects are undoubtedly different for solids and fluids. Much like dynamics for solids and fluids, each of these use different computational algorithms to add credible visual effects and incorporate it with live footage. Various fast fourier transforms can be used to create and obtain various effects on fluids.

Facial animation is a different aspect and quite complex; Usually rendered using motion graphics, innumerable computations and markers. Adding expressions to characters was an important task and a task beautifully done. I believe I enjoyed watching X-Men First Class not just for it being a beautiful prologue to the X-men series but for also having beautiful effects that makes the film viewing experience so much more interesting.

Watching action movies without visual effects is like connoisseuring a tasteless meal. Movies can  ofcourse, be beautifully made sans visual effects. However, visual effects and editing intrigue me and I pay attention to these aspects as well. I love movies and particularly love learning about various techniques that are incorporated while making films. I love the zest and dedication that is put in while making films and most importantly, I love how the effects make things look so illusional yet so real.

If I have 54990 INR to spare, I will buy an iPhone 5...Not !

I am not an 'Apple hater'. I admire the way Apple pays attention to the tiniest aspects. To move forward, it has taken certain risks. No other company has such a loyal fan base as Apple does. Apple comes out with products analysed and predicted by business heads to be a hit with its fan base.

I feel Apple is not targetting the masses but its just focusing on its fan base and loves making the margins they earn with every product (that's a good thing). The user experience is pretty much the same roll out they introduced in 2007. Not much has been done to improve the looks and feel than adding a new row of Apps.

Reasons you might want to exclaim a "iPaid!" :

1) Unreliable Maps.

Apple Maps are not at all reliable.

If travelling and reaching a destination is of utmost importance but getting lost in a city you don't know is an issue then Apple Maps as an App is not something made for you.

2)'Cause You want a bite of the half baked Siri.

3) You want a sleek phone that doesn't look robust, you want a phone that claims the screen is primarily built of aluminium than glass. You want a phone that is light and might not survive a fall from the looks of it.

4) You want the Lightening Connector. For reasons unfathomable to me, you are willing to pay no heed to the fact that this device,iPhone5, is not compatible with industry standard cables. Nor does it have microUSB ports- ports that are a standard way to transfer files.

5)You are ready to compromise on the battery life just so that you will get to use 4G.
Which might not be a concern if you're based in India.

Yes, it does appear that I'm an Apple sympathiser and a Fandroid girl.
I plead guilty on both counts.

To be fair, a few aspects which I really liked about the iPhone 5 , I must enlist below.

High Five, iPhone 5 'cause :

1) You present us handsets with better video compression algorithms. This means we get to compress files yet not degrade quality drastically and have smaller file sizes at the same time.

2)You, Apple, provide us with fantastic resolution and a big screen. You,sir,present me a chance to view pictures and videos better. Yes, it just works!

3)An amazing, fantastic 8 megapixel,front facing camera and video recording capability that extends to 1080 pixels at 30 frames per second.

4)IOS 6: It's a dual core Cortex processor and has fantastic features like Passbook, DND,Facetime over Cellular, a Priority Inbox etc.

5)An improved App Store that satiates your craving for robust Apps. iPhone 5 is a treat if you're an iOS6 developer. It thrills you with Audio and video sampling during playback and you might not escape the flux of Action Sheer.

You can't really ignore the pricetag. You cannot forget that iPhone 5 is nothing but a fantastic update to iPhone 4.

I will not go for an iPhone 5 not just because I am a Fandroid. I also believe I'll get better worth for my money if I invest in an Android phone.

Google has created its own niche in this sector and Android phones are getting increasingly popular than iPhones for a reason. iPhones might target a base audience-its fan base but Android has succeeded appealing to the masses by bringing out better quality phones at affordable,reasonable prices. It also provides better services ( Google Maps! Gtalk ! ).

The reason Google Maps is accurate and reliable is because it initiated the mapping business a decade ago, leased data from other companies, employed 7000 employees at the peak of developing and enhancing Maps and also employed Google StreetView vans that help provide accurate data, which is regularly updated. Apple, in the quest of creating Apple Maps, has acquired data from other sources too but it's lacking in the reliablity and accuracy of maps, disappointing many.

Believing in Apple's "It just works!" might not be enough to shell out on an imported iPhone at this time. If you still want to buy it, wait till November when iPhone 5 comes officially to India, the price then is estimated to be INR 45000.

My choice will be Samsung Galaxy S3 (INR 29000).
SGS3, the Tom Hanks of the current batch of phones, is a phone I will save to splurge on.
(#YesIamaFandroidgirlforlife)

A Happy Sunday

Sundays are good for You. Yeah,you!

I do look forward to the weekend. I want to do so many things throughout the week.. Read a book, watch a movie, catch up with friends and get some me-time but its not always possible due to other commitments.

I reserve my weekends for dedicated hours of preparation for Entrances, fun and the things I really want to do!

My colleague Aarthi suggested I watch 'The Manchurian Candidate'. I watched it this afternoon and loved it.

Denzel Washington is a fabulous actor and makes you feel for him. The Manchurian Candidate is by far one of my favourite movies of Washington, closely followed by 'Remember the Titans'. For co-stars, Meryl Streep is beautiful and unsurpassingly creepy. Liev Schreiber (The guy who plays Wolverine's brother in Xmen), is sleek and conjures up an air of authority and carries off the image of a confident, conniving politician very well. As much as I'd like to type out my thoughts and comment on this beautiful thriller, I'd rather do it after reading the book (on which this movie is based).

So yes, I had a peaceful Sunday, did a little cooking, studied, helped around the house, ran a few errands, made a colourful sketch with felts and wrote CSS for my blog.

Sundays are meant for unwinding and setting in a new week.

I look forward to a good week and hope you do too!

P.S. I want to share with you something I made tonight :