Retro-life
Spent last night up in Oxford with the organiser of Retrovision, which I've mentioned before. I had a great night with them in the end. Nicely drunk, and then given the room where the C64s, Amigas and old Atari 800s are stored to sleep in. Ummm, retro hardware... ;-)
By the sounds of things this event is really going to kick off, so I sincerely hope some good PR goes out and there's a large-ish crowd. Check out the website for the details if you're in the UK early March.
While I'm on the subject, check out Press Play on Tape's Boy Band Video. It's been out for a while, but I'd not actually seen it until today. 27MB of sheer comedy! Especially if you like Martin Galway's Comic Bakery theme tune, or you've still got a soft spot for C64s... ;-)
Code
Not planning on doing anything this week given the faffing I ended up doing for Fluffy Cubes. One good thing came out of it though: I got a random email from someone that downloaded it and checked out my website. He basically expressed an interest in a collaboration to produce a demo for the mac scene. I've been thinking of doing this for a while, and as his GFX and music are *superb* I'm starting to think it might actually be a fairly good idea. It's not like I haven't got enough retro-demo effects lying around and I think it would be kinda fun to knock up an old school demo for Retrovision. Although, given how many coders are likely to be there I'd probably get a right ribbing for the cheese factor, but this particular gent does C64 remixes for fun. Seems like syncronicity to me?
iMovie
Thought I'd check out the video capture stuff on my digital camera, since Radix has been evangalising of late and I was bored this evening. The picture quality is a bit grainy, but I get about 1.5 mins on my current CF card, which is enough for comedy moments or general group hugs. Larger CF card required though, but for now...
This also prompted my first use of iMovie. Now, I'd normally use Premier for anything video related, but as this is free and I'd heard good things I thought I better look before the ilife version is released at the end of the month.
Initial gripes: lack of .mov import (needs to be .dv, which quicktime exports, but, er...) and the fussy nature of the mp3 importing. Needs to pass through iTunes first? Okay... I take it that these problems are addressed by the upcoming version, so I'll ignore it for now.
To be honest, after an hour playing around I have to admit iMovie is kinda cute. I mean, if you had a DV Camera but couldn't use a computer it's great. Comedy titles, fades etc. are all present and correct, and dead simple to use. God help me if Mum ever gets hold of it.
Personally, it felt a bit weird to not have some of the controls I'm used to, but it's fun none the less. In fact, I'm quite looking forward to the new version, just so I can play some more. Free beer does taste kinda good, especially when it's useful.
Tax
Joy. Self assessment tax returns are due, and my accountants seem to think I *still* owe tax from my company. Given it ceased trading a year ago I'm feeling particularly suspicious of their figures. This stinks of IR35 dancing to me, and I'm not happy coughing out more money this late in the game.