The moving finger rants

What are you doing with your free time, pajh? you say. Well, since you asked so nicely, I'll skip the otherwise obligatory free time, what's that joke, and go straight to the incontrovertibly true answer: these days I spend my free time dressing up in skintight Lycra® and wrestling with men I barely know.

I may have mentioned in a previous post that Hollywood-grade motion capture systems create the potential for new narrative paradigms for the 21st century. Well, mostly I mentioned that they allow a specific actor, that actor being me, to hear the single most beautiful phrase ever expressed to an actor. We'll get to new narrative paradigms later. Meantime, there have been a number of very rapid learning experiences while working with thew new tech, not least of which is that I actually don't look totally terrible in skintight Lycra.

Unsurprisingly, most of the research in gyroscopic technologies these days is being done by the ballistics division of the US military and their contractors. Many of my readers may not have a particular interest in the increasingly accurate science of the transformation of alleged insurgents into chargrilled jerky from a distance of many kilometres, but fret not! for those of us so callously disinterested in how to blame friendly fire on technology, there are subsequent benefits for all of us (except for the families of the alleged insurgents, presumably): benefits like the upcoming Wolverine movie, and Skrillex' latest tour. I am, as ever, all about the trickle-down.

Yay us!

Another benefit of the fact that this is all repurposed military technology is that it's all incredibly robust. The suit comes in a case that is waterproof to 500 metres, and also conveniently scaled to comply with most airlines' regulations regarding carry-on luggage. In the event of a terrorist attack on a plane in which such a case was stored, it's more likely to survive than the black box. I dread to speculate on the newspaper headlines once the crash recovery team have spent a week attempting to recover data from it. Apparently the Captain spent twenty minutes trying to have an elaborate fistfight with the first officer, followed by an extended period of merengue dancing, with occasional periods of jazz hands. This presumably contributed to the crash, but exactly how is a question we hope maybe to have answered by next week.

Oh yes, the mocap. The suits are surprisingly accurate and expressive, to a level that I didn't think was possible. And you can play the mocap live in realtime into any 3D world you care to devise. In the following examples, we're going to be using Minecraft, because Minecraft. Also, because Minecraft is incredibly pretty, and it shows you just what you can do with a blocky Steve guy with no facial expressions.

Ye First Video: Meet the Creeper

In this short film I play the Creeper, which while it's not exactly a speaking role, does have the benefit of being in the title.

Took us about five minutes to shoot. About an hour of getting the suits configured first, but that's just teething. On a regular film shoot I spend much more time hanging around waiting, and there are usually fewer copies of Transmetropolitan lying about with which for me to occupy my time. These suits are awesome.

Ye Video the Second: in which pajh does acting

I know I'm a middle-class New Town bastard these days, but I do still pay attention to my acting when I get the chance. I have the most popular text-to-speech voice in the known world, and physical acting is no less an important discipline. I have done courses. I've done the Alexander Technique. I do stretches properly before I perform mocap (judiciously excluding the stretches that are likely to tear the €500 lycra suit, natch). I'm not by any means attempting to put myself up there in Patrick Stewart territory, but I think my research has paid off. In this second video I have more of a starring role.

I showed this to stormsearch and she got about twenty seconds in before she had to pause it and proclaim, oh god. It's you. Something about the way I hold my head slightly to one side, it would seem. And then there are little things, like the fact that apparently I pick my right foot up when I'm considering something. I didn't know that about me until I watched it expressed by a blocky Minecraft Steve.

The level of expressiveness and the subtlety you can get from the tech is quite incredible. I'm quite excited to see where this goes next.

In my Copious Free Time, obviously.

It is now possible to have a mocap system that links directly (and accurately!), in realtime, to a fully realized 3D set. Both the motion-capture system and the set in which it is to be rendered are simultaneously available to a sufficiently skilled technician, who can manipulate elements of same as required while the motion-capture is still continuing, from a single laptop. This might not excite you in the way I've just described it, but what you must consider is the fact that we have these tools available. This in itself has potentially broad-reaching effects about the nature of storytelling in the 21st century. And, which is much more important, as a direct result, tonight was possibly the first time ever that the following phrase has been uttered, honestly and without irony, to an actor:

Don't worry. Stand still and I'll rotate the world around you.

Oh yeah baby. If there were ever a reason why I got myself into acting, it's this.

~

The Muppets do Bohemian Rhapsody. Presented without any further comment. I'm going to have terrible mosh neck when I wake up tomorrow, and it's entirely the fault of Dr Teeth and his Electric Mayhem. Okay, partially their fault and partially the fault of Penelope Spheeris.

(You should follow that last link; I'm giving you a no-honk guarantee.)

~

It transpires that I gots a smartphone app. Some of you should remember the pajh-inna-box of old. Now it has an app. This would be unsurprising in itself were it not for the fact that Googol Play allows user feedback comments, most of which are about how awesome I sound. There's one there from user Jessica Rabbit thus:

I own many, many tts voices but this is the best, yet! [...] this male, u.k. voice is the most natural sounding and also elegant & sophisticated! [...] I can listen to this imaginary Englishman throughout my day helping me with my appointments and such!

I suspect the real Jessica Rabbit would say LOL somewhat less, being a lady who knows what elegant and sophisticated actually means. If this were the real Jessica Rabbit commenting, none of you would see me for dust.

I'm not bad. I just sound that way.

Shitty day, followed by meeting up with stormsearch in a hurry so we can rush to the boot shop before they close and they can refuse to replace the stupid shitty boots they sold her instead of the awesome rockin boots they promised her in the shop the last time. I've had enough. I am in a mood that only spicèd chicken and tequila slammers will shift. Thus, 'twas off to the Mexican restaurant around the corner.

I may have still been in a mood during the ordering process. I was going to ask for some hotter hot sauces. I brush my teeth with that stuff. To his credit, the waiter brought me a bottle of hotter sauce: to my dismay, it was Tabasco. I revised my earlier boast. I brush my teeth with that stuff. The previous stuff is mouthwash. (I own a bottle of it, for stormsearch to use. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.)

Food was okay, although they fucked up the fajitas, which they also fucked up (differently) the last time we were in: my non-fajita item was amazing, however. And there were margaritas. First there were two individual margaritas, because a jug might be too much: then there was a jug as well. In the process, there was a chilli margarita, which was a nice idea poorly executed. A sprinkle of chilli flakes in the glass. Slight hint of warming edge on the finish. Insufficient, I say.

Suitably replete with spicèd chicken and other items, headed home, modulo a brief stop off at the supermarket for ice cubes, because the ice machine isn't working (I may have mentioned that I was having a bad day). For reasons it would be otiose, at best, to rehearse, I have a full bottle and a half of tequila. It is time to infuse dried Arbol chillies into the half bottle.

Based on previous schnappsfabrefaction experience, I was expecting the process to take a couple of days, maybe a week. Just to be sure, I tasted it after two hours and HOLY SHIT yeah okay, that's ready. (I may have been somewhat generous with the chillies.) Hence or otherwise:

Genius Chilli Margarita

• Half a lime, rolled hard and squeezed, and drop the hull into the shaker
• Shot + pony shot Fearsome Chilli Tequila
• Shot + pony shot triple sec
• Top up with ice
• Shake like a bastard
• Double-strain into chilled salt-rimmed margarita glass, or a martini glass if you're slumming it.

Immediately upon tasting it I ran through to stormsearch, who was inconveniently in the bathroom at the time, and demanded BUILD A STATUE TO ME RIGHT NOW. It is simply that good.

Next time: scotch bonnets. The flavour will work brilliantly with the tequila I'm using. I also have plans for a chilli-tequila Vesper, which may yet be utter genius, but I fear it might be the kind of thing that one tries just once.

(While I'm at it: Mexican food for Burns' Nicht. O wee sleekit tim'rous Speedy. Cohiba.)

(ETA: The chilli-tequila Vesper, thus sampled (I ran out of limes for the margaritas), is a work of absolute unadulterated genius. Next time: chilli gin, and half a dash of Peychauds.)

The shirt I'm wearing has gone out at the elbows. That's okay, though, because I wear suits these days. Suit jackets cover up a multitude of sins.

I don't even have to iron any more. You can get away with being reasonably shabby as long as you own a suit while doing so.

~

Last night I was beset by terrible dreams about my time in Iraq. That time we were holed up in a massive stone cathedral when the Americans deployed their terrifying new petrification weapon on a bunch of insurgents. The screams. Being invalided home on a commercial airliner. It took me a good few hours after I woke up before I realized: hang on, I never actually served in Iraq. But it made for a very interesting morning at work. You weren't there, man, you couldn't know. You weren't there.

~

I currently have all the influenzas but I am in the process of defeating them with whisky, soup, a steak this thick, the Cure For The Common Cold (Pat. Pending), and more whisky. I have to be well again by 3pm tomorrow or my duty manager doesn't get to go home. And that would be bad.

Well, 2011 sucked, and 2012 was a marked improvement. Got promoted twice in twelve months (once last October and once again this June). Became a posh New Town bastard. Made the best bolognese known to man. Invented Eggs Cumberbatch, because somebody had to. Invented girrawheening, with help from highlyeccentric. Somebody had to.

Bought a new watch. It has a compass and a thermometer and a tide clock. Bought a new Gore-tex® jacket. Bought an incredible new fixed-length 50mm f/1.4 lens for the camera. Despite two promotions, still have no money. I wonder why.

Politically, swung yet further to the left (while still becoming a posh New Town bastard, yes, it's possible); finally fell off the fence and decided to go full-on for Scottish Independence. So far, I have donated £250 worth of the company's money to the cause (in the form of conference space we weren't otherwise using anyway), and haven't yet signed the Yes Declaration, because I don't like the wording.

Spent far too much time this year concentrating on work. To be fair, there were the two promotions in the space of twelve months, so I had a lot to learn; and now I'm responsible for the livelihoods of nineteen staff, many of whom I consider friends. But I have this down now. In the new year there will be more food, more drinking, and more loving. I was going to add more dancing to that list, but let's be realistic here.

May 2013 bring nothing but loveliness to all who read this; for Cameron, Osborne and DuncanSmith, may your next shit be a hedgehog. 2013 is when everything changes, and we gotta be ready.

The other day I'm sitting in Illegal Jack's eating quesadillas with stormsearch, when my phone goes. Beep beep. It's Bixby Snyder.

The lascivious host of popular televisual entertainment It's Not My Problem expressed to me his readiness to purchase something for up to, but presumably not exceeding, the value of US$1.00. Exactly what it is that he would so purchase was not readily apparent. It took me a few minutes to work it out:

1. The previous evening I had saved a link to an article about the new Robocop film;
2. The following day the autoblogger had pushed that out to my linkdump;
3. Twitterfeed had pushed a snippet of text from the linkdump out to the Twitters;
4. Somebody on the Twitters has a bot that responds to any mention of the word Robocop with Bixby's immortal catchphrase;
5. Seesmic running in the background on my phone had picked up the twit addressed to me, and sent me a notification;
6. My phone vibrates on my belt while I'm trying to get creative with the application of hot sauces to pulled pork.

(I'd given the Masonic handshake and asked for the super-secret special hot sauces from the back. Ended up rather disappointed. It was just the Cholula range, which I already own, and none of them were particularly hot.)

At no stage in this convoluted chain of events had a human being been involved since about 24 hours beforehand, when I'd saved the original link to Delicious. The rest was an automatic, inevitable process, mediated solely by Internet herself. The next day I get a text from a non-existent TV star.

I love this century.

~

Vaguely related: the day before I was walking past a hairdressers which was showing the Gangnam Style video on the TV in the back. I saw about two seconds of it from a great distance as I walked past. And I could swear that I was watching Bixby. There is a certain similarity, no?

Last week I attended the preview screening of the new Doctor Who episode. In front of a packed theatre at the Filmhouse, The Moff Himself got everyone to promise not to release any spoilers.

After the episode, everyone said Well, obviously you all see now why we specifically asked you not to give out spoilers, because mumble. I had no clue what they were talking about, sat there with a blank look on my face: whot?

I am now apparently so unspoilered that I can't even be spoilered for spoilers. Thus have I reached levels of fandom previously attained only by Ian Levine.

Of the new episode I shall say only this: you guys are going to love tonight. SO MUCH.

~

After the episode there was a Q&A session with the Moff. All of the fatter, sweatier types of nerd in the room—of which there were many, and I say this with love—had clearly been researching and honing their question for the last several weeks. Most of the questions involved phrases like character archetype and recontextualize.

And then there was the eight-year-old girl in the pink top, whose question was: Do Cybermen go rusty in the rain?

For those of you who are interested, Word of God on this pressing matter is as follows: no they don't, they're plastic. Everything has to be waterproofed; it's Wales. Anyway, no. Oh wait, there was the rusty one in The Pandorica Opens, and I wrote that, I should know better. So, yes.

Go now and be enlightened.

Oo-wee-oo.

I just

1. listened to the proper version of a song, to clear my head of the shitty remix version they keep playing on Viva Top 40, and
2. abused the guy who made the shitty remix version on the Twitters

Goddamn, I love this century.

Srsly tho, as I believe the kids say these days. Compare and contrast. All he's done is move the pitch-bend slider slightly and set his Fischer-Price® ‘My First Drum Machine’™ onto auto-demo, and in the process has turned an awesome song into a deeply, deeply awful one. It's so rough you can hear the square waves. This is apparently Calvin Harris' full-time job.

(And yes, I'm aware that there isn't really a machine. It's more of a concept.)

Today: suits. I have worked in the New Town for ten years. Every day I walk past the same people. Only in the last couple of weeks, now that I have a suit on, have they started nodding and smiling at me.

Since I have to wear suits all the time now, I thought I'd broaden my range of shirt colours beyond the standard Henry Ford options, the better to avoid the Nineties movie villain look. Got some blue shirts and some grey shirts (no reason to go crazy, now). The shopguy offered me a shirt with a stripe in it, but I gave him a Look. (Baby steps.) When I wear the blue shirt, every one of my staff mention how nice I look. When I wear the grey shirt, everyone asks me if I'm feeling all right. Wonderful: now I have to learn about colour co-ordination. Currently I'm far too busy learning about gross profit margins, which are fascinating, I can tell you.

The suit I'm currently wearing has very capacious trouser pockets. So capacious are they in fact that they've added a second pocket inside the pocket, so that you have a remote chance of ever finding anything that you put in there. Thoughtful, perhaps, but I'm wondering why they didn't just make it properly in the first place.

So, apparently, yesterday some people propelled a ball into a rectangle slightly more frequently than some other people propelled the same ball into a different rectangle. As a result, today thousands and thousands of people gathered in the street, all wearing clothing of a particular colour, to watch a bus go past. The bus had some overpaid teenagers on it. There was singing. Did I miss anything?

We couldn't get that many people out on the street when they dismantled the NHS, ohhh no. But apparently propelling a ball into a rectangle is important.