Longtime readers are bored of me talking about the Fallout game series, but I’ve dipped my toes back in after binging the web series on Amazon, which was, remarkably, pretty good. While not sharing quite the expansive feeling the game series did, I thought the character development and careful attention to detail was done exceptionally well, and they nailed the tone of Fallout 4 really well. They’ve already committed to a sequel in the series, which is nice to hear.
I’d already been replaying Fallout 4 for a month or so, having grown tired of the repetitive nature of Starfield, and had grown tired of replaying the same levels in that over again. In a rare moment of clarity I figured I’d check to see if Fallout: New Vegas was available through Game Pass, for which I am paying, and I was surprised to see it was. Loading it up for the first time, it’s really clear that it was released in 2010: the graphics are pretty blocky, the lighting is junk, and it’s easy to see the limitations of the original platform. That being said, it took me about an hour to adjust to that regression, and now I’m enjoying the game. The base mechanics for the later games are there, so it’s a lot like making the jump from Fallout to Starfield, but backwards—the fundamental controls are present minus all the stuff they added later. Apparently this is the best of the whole series, according to the interwebs, so I’m in for a treat.
Apparently Starfield is supposed to get some sort of expansion pack later this year, which would be nice; I’d like to go back to that and do something different, having completed all but the last main quest. And I chortled to read that No Man’s Sky is getting another in a series of updates, which will make a supremely repetitive and boring game…a little less repetitive and boring? I’m shocked anyone is still playing that game.
We’ve been discussing the AI policy (and current lack of one) at work lately, and during a retreat last week we did an exercise on how to use AI for simple tasks. I’ve messed with it before and found it useful for certain things. One of the suggestions in the retreat, however, caught my ear: have AI map out a vacation itinerary. In years past I’ve bought a travel book for that region or city and used it as a guide, with both success and failure, so having a robotic tour guide didn’t sound like a bad idea.
Intrigued, I plugged a couple of questions into ChatGPT and after some tuning, I got a four-day itinerary for Porto, where we’re going to be vacationing later this coming month. I cross-checked the suggestions last night with Google Maps and found that they hold up pretty well; the AI doesn’t have us walking into the Atlantic Ocean to get somewhere, or jumping continents for dinner reservations. I’m now looking at the feasibility of driving to Lisbon and nearby Sintra with a couple of overnights, and I’m going to ask ChatGPT what it recommends doing down there too. For quick suggestions, this is a lot faster and can give us specialized hints, especially if we fine-tune the requests.
About five years ago I went to our local library and checked out a thick graphic novel that spun a hallucinogenic tale of a guy called a “cat master” navigating the underworld of a futuristic city with a ninja cat powered by syringes of super-powered juice. Part noir mystery, part samurai B-movie, part graffiti showcase, it defied all description and I burned through it in one sitting. I returned it and promptly forgot the name. Doing a search for another graphic novel (Tokyo Ghost, another futuristic dystopian romance story I enjoyed immensely) I found this one again: King City. Highly recommended.
At work today, while I was setting up a camera shoot, I overheard a discussion one of the subjects was having about 3D printing, and he mentioned that his local library had 3D printers to rent. Astonished, I filed this away for future reference. While inhaling my lunch at 2:30 (it was a long shoot, and there were surprises) I checked the Baltimore County Library website, and behold! they have 3D printing services. Unfortunately they’re not taking orders right now, but if and when our local branch opens back up—they’ve been remodeling for a year and a half—I’m going to pop in and see if I can get my design printed.
On heavy rotation this week in my brain: Atlas, by Battles. Formed from the ashes of several other like-minded bands, Battles is an experimental math-rock group who has released albums sporadically over the last 20 years. Atlas is a single from their first album in 2007, and it defies description. I originally fell down this rabbit hole when YouTube suggested a video of early math-hardcore band Helmet playing live in 1994; their second album Meantime was on heavy rotation in college, and their original drummer went on to co-found this band. This song and the video are amazing.
So about that pious feeling I had last weekend, the one where I was crowing about getting rid of stuff?
Well, Hazel and I hit a community yard sale at the church down the street and I spied this beautiful leather midcentury chair off to one side. I inquired as to the price and was told it was a donation, and if I wanted to donate to the church, I could take it. That was the easiest decision I’ve made in a while. I’ve always wanted a set of chairs like this but they’ve been priced out of our reach, so this one was a fantastic find. And as it turns out, it originated from the church across the street; it had been in their garage for a while and they wanted to get rid of it quickly. Now it’s taking up space in the living room until we can figure out what we’re doing with it.
And, by the way, everything I did put out at the curb was gone by lunchtime.
I’m at the end of Day Three of the Comms retreat at work, and we’re doing a lot of talking about human-centered stories focusing on people working at the very tip of our spear: the men and women who are making change on the ground through initiatives and programs we’ve founded. Traditionally, we’ve sent people into the field to collect stories: a researcher, local handler, photographer or videography team. Back In The Day this would have been me; I was lucky enough to go to a number of foreign countries to capture footage and interview people, then come home and cut it together into a video.
But that’s expensive, and we’re facing shrinking budgets (while our overall financial health improves, go figure) and fickle audiences who expect different things these days. Vertical self-shot TikTok-style videos get the eyeballs while more polished videos don’t resonate with larger audiences. There are exceptions, and this is a generalization, but with YouTube and Instagram offering vertical reels and LinkedIn close behind, I have to accept that my cinematic way of doing things isn’t the best way anymore.
One of my colleagues, an ex-BBC journalist, showed me an inexpensive camera rig he’s been working with lately: a DJI action camera in a GoPro-style form factor with a ton of slick features I wasn’t aware of. He and I brainstormed the idea of setting up shooting packages for our country offices where we’d put together a camera and sound rig with instructions in a box and ship them to some of the places we want to highlight, and have people on the ground shoot content for us.
I was already looking at upgrading my GoPro rigs (now eight years old) for something easier to set up and use, and the DJI camera features a front and back touchscreen, automatic horizontal/vertical axis sensing, stabilization, and a host of other features (plus a swappable battery, something the GoPro Sessions don’t). I pulled the trigger and bought last year’s model from Amazon to do some testing with my YouTube project, and I’ll see if I can get a rig together that I can recommend for my colleagues in the field.
Hey! It’s not often I get to write about our little state being on the front lines of solid legislation, but here’s an example: Two bills were passed by the state over the weekend that limit companies’ ability to collect data on our kids, and the other limits their ability to get kids to spend more time online through dark patterns (autoplay, time-based awards, or spam). Lobbyists for big tech, of course, are unhappy:
“The bill’s goal is laudable…but its chosen means are unconstitutional by imposing prior restraints on online speech, erecting barriers to sharing and receiving constitutionally-protected speech…”
Big tech always trots out the First Amendment to paper over their predatory behavior; it always pegs the bullshit meter.
I was bummed out to read yesterday that Panera is discontinuing its line of “charged” lemonades because two people died after drinking too much of it. Two years ago, when we were cleaning out my father-in-law’s house, we were hitting the Panera pretty regularly and I was using the strawberry mint lemonade to push through hot summer weekends humping trash into a dumpster. I liked it because it didn’t have the same laxative effect coffee does to my 50-year-old digestive system. Around here they keep it behind the counter and you have to pay for refills, but I’ve been in other stores where you can just go up and refill it yourself. I wonder if they ever considered that from a failure of design vs. a liability standpoint; I guess we’ll never know.
The YouTube channel has now gotten 110 subscribers, which is roughly 1% of what I’d actually need to monetize the thing. I made an introduction video to beef up the channel and have followed some of the Creators advice that has suddenly popped up in my feed to juice up my stats; the low-hanging fruit seems to be working, albeit slowly. The channel is designed mostly as a way to remember what it is I’ve worked on while also practicing filming and editing skills, and testing out some different methods of shooting things, much like this weblog acts as my institutional memory. Which is good, because the details get very fuzzy before COVID.
Speaking of editing, Apple just announced they’re releasing Final Cut Pro 2.0 sometime later this year, which is good news—so long as they don’t move all the furniture around again. I’m going to have the fellas at work give me a crash course in Adobe Premiere sometime soon so that we can trade files back and forth, but my heart will always live with FCP, much like it did with the dearly departed Aperture.
I’m currently feel very proud of myself; walking the dog this morning, I passed a house with a bunch of stuff out front under a big FREE sign. One of the things was a beautiful steel floor-standing cabinet with a beefy handle/lock combination, several built-in shelves and two enclosed drawers. My lizard brain screamed GO GET THE TRUCK RIGHT NOW but the smaller mammalian section counseled me to do a mental map of the interior of the garage, which is completely full. BUT YOU COULD PUT STUFF IN THERE, lizard brain responded. Try as I might, I don’t have any room, nor do I really need a cabinet such as this with the space that I have. So I kept walking.
And on the way home I resolved to put a bunch of crap in the basement out by the curb on Saturday morning under a FREE sign. Let’s make some more room.
Shit. This was a bit of a gut punch this morning. I was never a huge fan of Albini’s music but his stamp on the music I’ve enjoyed over the last 40 years is undeniable. His list of engineering credits (he eschewed the title of producer as well as a producer’s customary percentages, most notably on Nirvana’s In Utero, which would have made him a millionaire) is long and legendary, and his writing on the music industry is just as impactful. He was due to release a new album next month with Shellac, his current band.