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I finally finished watching the documentaries on the Lord of the Rings, The Return of the King Extended Edition DVD. The last two documentaries are by far the best on a personal and emotional level, closely followed by "Editorial: Completing the Trilogy"
The last two are "The End of All Things" and "The Passing of an Age" and as the names indicate, we are definitely on the home straight by this point. A lot of revealing interview footage shows how close the final film came to slipping its deadline. One crew member jokes that someone will be blow drying the prints before they are shipped to the premier, and more seriously, Peter Jackson is very much looking forward to the film's NZ premier because he "hasn't seen it yet".
Elijah Wood's reaction? "That's awesome!". True, but he does tend to say that about everything, except of course, if something is "fucking amazing".
Not to quibble though (I'm only kidding!), this was something I'd waited for a long time. I will probably scribble and scratch some more once I've rewatched the documentaries one more time. The first time through each disc I just like to bathe in it, not enable too many critical faculties.
For now though, I think the highest praise I can give this
entire project is that, for me, there are really some scenes
that are "better in the film than the book".
posted at: 22:43 | path: /tolkien | permanent link to this entry
Equipment preparations for the weekend
I'm going to take a lot of gadgets with me, but probably wont use them all. The critical thing is not to run out of power or tapes during the gig, so I've ordered a big long-life battery for the video camera, a new battery for the Canon S40 digital still camera, and a bunch of tapes. Best place for a lot like that is B&H
Other than that, then, all I need is :-
posted at: 22:39 | path: /moob | permanent link to this entry
I found an iMac on the street today. It's a 450mhz slot-loading dual firewire model in red. If it can be made to work, it's just what I've been looking for as an mp3 server. If I hook up my external firewire drive and get myself a Squeezebox I can banish most of my CDs to boxes and binders and use mp3s over my WiFi network. That's the goal.
When I first spotted this machine, it was sitting proudly on a big pile of trashbags. A doorman at a nearby building volunteered that it works but it just "needs a new case". That's a tall order for an iMac. He does have a point though, as the case is practically trashed (photos later), and the screen has obvious burn-in. My first investment in this project was a cab ride home. The driver gave me advice on fixing the case - apparently epoxy is best because it's strong and transparent.
Unfortunately after finally getting a power cable in, and hooking it up to a USB keyboard and mouse, the power button does nothing, zippo, nada.
I vaguely remembered the access hatch underneath, so I whipped it open and lo and behold, no RAM. So whoever broke the case knew enough to reclaim the ram. Luckily I had a 128MB stick of PC100 SDRAM which fit nicely. I tried it in both slots, but unfortunately, this is not the only problem. Power is still not flowing.
Another broken computer project - just what I needed, my
wife is thrilled.
posted at: 21:55 | path: /rescue | permanent link to this entry