Monday, March 3, 2008
Thursday, February 14, 2008
It's not just a toque it has ear flaps, it has legs....it moves!
This field trip started early, mighty early because I had to get up at 6:30am to make it to the Oakville Go Train Station. Tim Hortons in hand, I waited for my class to appear. And appear they did.
So on to the Go Train, where Dan, I and the rest of the students made a woman feel so awkward with our Go Train movie trivia that she quickly moved up to the next level. But that's okay, because soon we were in Toronto and on our way to the subway.
One tiny token later and we were on the subway, headed to the Royal Ontario Museum to meet the rest of our class for the field trip of a lifetime.
Apparently we were a little late as half of our class was already there, but our speaker Brain Porter didn't seem to mind too much.
Brian took us into the ROM Digital Gallery, which consists of a giant screen and several different touch screens. As we waited for the show to start, so to speak, Brook and I played with the touch screen in front of us. Through the touch screen interface there was a choice between Ancient Egypt and Canadian Heritage. Into Egypt there are several different artefacts to look at, which can be rotated and zoomed in on with a few touches of the screen. One artefact from that section that I found particularly interesting was a canopic jar of Isis.
In Egyptian mythology Isis is the goddess of fertility and motherhood. She is the daughter of Earth and Sky or Keb and Sky in Eygptian. She is also the sister and wife of Osiris, Egyptian god of the underworld. There is even a neat story of her searching all over Egypt for the body parts of her dismembered husband which she gathered and returned to life.
On the Canadian Heritage side there was a very cool looking pistol and a pair of children's shackles. According to the ROM the shackles are from Georgia, which made me wonder how they were part of Canadian Heritage...but we didn't really get to that part in the video.
But first, Brian Porter introduced himself as the Senior Director of New Media. He spoke a little bit about the improvements he has made at the ROM since he has been working there, such as digital photography, improvements to the website, 3D imaging of objects (as seen in the ROM Digital Gallery). Brian also mentioned that his job it to find new media funding for the ROM, Canada's Largest Museum.
He explained that the ROM is a charity and therefore gets it's funding from a variety of sources: government grants, donations, fundraisers etc. Brian also told us that Museums aren't pioneers, because they are charities, they only use proven technology that has been around for a while, that is reasonably priced. Later on Brian also mentioned how having a broad range of skills is essential in the job market.
Working for a charity myself, Performing Arts Burlington, I completely understand where he was coming from. And it made me wonder if that was the nature of charities as a whole. That everyone needs to be a jack of all trades, since there is never enough funding to go around. I mean, at PAB I'm an event planner, web designer, graphic designer, administrative assistant, membership invoicer, tech support....the list goes on.
After his speech, Brian started a film that the ROM staff had created based on Canadian Heritage and kids interacting with the touch screens. The film wasn't phenomenal, but descent quality based on limited funds. And as Brian put it, "If you were in 5th grade..." I finished his thought with, "...this would blow your mind!".
What blew Brook and my mind was seeing, Carlos Bustamante from YTV as the host/narrator of the movie.
Brian also showed us a touch screen available for the general museum public which scrolled through a list of people and companies that donated to the ROM and gave the history of the museum itself. It allowed users to easily find their name, since patrons want to see their name listed for sizable donations. The wall itself was very elegant and neat looking. Brian told us that he often finds people standing in front of the wall, interacting with it.
Perhaps I don't have enough faith in the average ROM visitor, but I can't see a lot of people touching the wall and interacting with it. No where does it say, "I'm an interactive wall, touch me!" I think that most users would walk by it, or perhaps stop and watch it scroll through, few would actually touch the screen and direct it's output. I mean, interactivity is great but if no one knows how to use it, what good is it?
On to the Dinosaurs!
No trip to the ROM is complete without seeing the Dinosaur exhibit. Brian pointed out the touch screens used in that exhibit but I'm sure, like me, most of the class was more interested in the dinosaur exhibits themselves.
One really cool dinosaur was the Corythosaurus. Cory, of course got a few pictures and Dan got a picture of him and his dinosaur for posterity.
Onwards and upwards to the sound studio to meet Zak, a Sheridan alumni. Zak explained some of the things they do up in the sound studio, podcasting, soundtracks used in the creation of their videos like the one on Canadian Heritage etc. Being at the back of the group I couldn't quite hear everything Zak was talking about or see what he was doing. But he did tell everyone loud and clear that he loves his job and it is the perfect job for him.
And here's where things started going sideways.... Dan said that his friend Steve Mann's workshop was right across the street from the ROM. He was only off by a mile. A mile we ended up having to walk in the slush and snow....the entire class was soaked from the knees down. Except for Barbara and Dwight who were smart enough to drive.
Steve Mann, invited us in, with his famous head gear taking us all in. He was quick to explain that now that the world has moved into the cyborg age, he is no longer interested in being a cyborg himself, instead focusing on more primordial things, like water.
Steve then showed us his new invention, the hydraulophone. Which is an instrument that uses water pumped through it to create sound. It's kinda cool and Steve even let us play with one he had set up in his workshop. Adrian even played chopsticks, which was pretty cool.
Our host explained to us that he had patented several different types of hydraulophones and that he was in talks to get them in several government buildings, city halls etc. Hydraulophones including the Nessie model pictured above, start at about $10,000. Which is quite reasonable if you have a government budget, but as someone pointed out, Steve is missing out on smaller markets like school playgrounds and daycares. But at $10,000 a pop, he might not care.
After 30 minutes Steve had to go to a meeting so the rest of us filed out of his workshop. Next stop, Silver Snail: Comic and Toy shop! Driven by the awesome Dwight...but that's another story....
So when the day was over, I got driven back to my car by Dan, which was nice, and it would have worked out much better had Sheridan not been in lockdown because of a scary looking tripod.
But the day did eventually end, with some warm socks. All and all it wasn't a horrible field trip, although I could have done without the miserable mile long walk. But the real problem was that the day really didn't have any multimedia pioneering in it at all. ROM director Brian Porter told us himself that museums aren't pioneers, that older technology is the best they can afford. Inventor Steve Mann told us that he was through with the cyborg age and was instead going back to his primordial roots. What Steve created could be called pioneering, but it certainly isn't of the multimedia variety.
Two other points of interest:
So on to the Go Train, where Dan, I and the rest of the students made a woman feel so awkward with our Go Train movie trivia that she quickly moved up to the next level. But that's okay, because soon we were in Toronto and on our way to the subway.
One tiny token later and we were on the subway, headed to the Royal Ontario Museum to meet the rest of our class for the field trip of a lifetime.
Apparently we were a little late as half of our class was already there, but our speaker Brain Porter didn't seem to mind too much.
Brian took us into the ROM Digital Gallery, which consists of a giant screen and several different touch screens. As we waited for the show to start, so to speak, Brook and I played with the touch screen in front of us. Through the touch screen interface there was a choice between Ancient Egypt and Canadian Heritage. Into Egypt there are several different artefacts to look at, which can be rotated and zoomed in on with a few touches of the screen. One artefact from that section that I found particularly interesting was a canopic jar of Isis.
In Egyptian mythology Isis is the goddess of fertility and motherhood. She is the daughter of Earth and Sky or Keb and Sky in Eygptian. She is also the sister and wife of Osiris, Egyptian god of the underworld. There is even a neat story of her searching all over Egypt for the body parts of her dismembered husband which she gathered and returned to life.On the Canadian Heritage side there was a very cool looking pistol and a pair of children's shackles. According to the ROM the shackles are from Georgia, which made me wonder how they were part of Canadian Heritage...but we didn't really get to that part in the video.
But first, Brian Porter introduced himself as the Senior Director of New Media. He spoke a little bit about the improvements he has made at the ROM since he has been working there, such as digital photography, improvements to the website, 3D imaging of objects (as seen in the ROM Digital Gallery). Brian also mentioned that his job it to find new media funding for the ROM, Canada's Largest Museum.
He explained that the ROM is a charity and therefore gets it's funding from a variety of sources: government grants, donations, fundraisers etc. Brian also told us that Museums aren't pioneers, because they are charities, they only use proven technology that has been around for a while, that is reasonably priced. Later on Brian also mentioned how having a broad range of skills is essential in the job market.
Working for a charity myself, Performing Arts Burlington, I completely understand where he was coming from. And it made me wonder if that was the nature of charities as a whole. That everyone needs to be a jack of all trades, since there is never enough funding to go around. I mean, at PAB I'm an event planner, web designer, graphic designer, administrative assistant, membership invoicer, tech support....the list goes on.
After his speech, Brian started a film that the ROM staff had created based on Canadian Heritage and kids interacting with the touch screens. The film wasn't phenomenal, but descent quality based on limited funds. And as Brian put it, "If you were in 5th grade..." I finished his thought with, "...this would blow your mind!".
What blew Brook and my mind was seeing, Carlos Bustamante from YTV as the host/narrator of the movie.
Brian also showed us a touch screen available for the general museum public which scrolled through a list of people and companies that donated to the ROM and gave the history of the museum itself. It allowed users to easily find their name, since patrons want to see their name listed for sizable donations. The wall itself was very elegant and neat looking. Brian told us that he often finds people standing in front of the wall, interacting with it.
Perhaps I don't have enough faith in the average ROM visitor, but I can't see a lot of people touching the wall and interacting with it. No where does it say, "I'm an interactive wall, touch me!" I think that most users would walk by it, or perhaps stop and watch it scroll through, few would actually touch the screen and direct it's output. I mean, interactivity is great but if no one knows how to use it, what good is it?
On to the Dinosaurs! 
No trip to the ROM is complete without seeing the Dinosaur exhibit. Brian pointed out the touch screens used in that exhibit but I'm sure, like me, most of the class was more interested in the dinosaur exhibits themselves.
One really cool dinosaur was the Corythosaurus. Cory, of course got a few pictures and Dan got a picture of him and his dinosaur for posterity.
Onwards and upwards to the sound studio to meet Zak, a Sheridan alumni. Zak explained some of the things they do up in the sound studio, podcasting, soundtracks used in the creation of their videos like the one on Canadian Heritage etc. Being at the back of the group I couldn't quite hear everything Zak was talking about or see what he was doing. But he did tell everyone loud and clear that he loves his job and it is the perfect job for him.
And here's where things started going sideways.... Dan said that his friend Steve Mann's workshop was right across the street from the ROM. He was only off by a mile. A mile we ended up having to walk in the slush and snow....the entire class was soaked from the knees down. Except for Barbara and Dwight who were smart enough to drive.
Steve Mann, invited us in, with his famous head gear taking us all in. He was quick to explain that now that the world has moved into the cyborg age, he is no longer interested in being a cyborg himself, instead focusing on more primordial things, like water. Steve then showed us his new invention, the hydraulophone. Which is an instrument that uses water pumped through it to create sound. It's kinda cool and Steve even let us play with one he had set up in his workshop. Adrian even played chopsticks, which was pretty cool.
Our host explained to us that he had patented several different types of hydraulophones and that he was in talks to get them in several government buildings, city halls etc. Hydraulophones including the Nessie model pictured above, start at about $10,000. Which is quite reasonable if you have a government budget, but as someone pointed out, Steve is missing out on smaller markets like school playgrounds and daycares. But at $10,000 a pop, he might not care.
After 30 minutes Steve had to go to a meeting so the rest of us filed out of his workshop. Next stop, Silver Snail: Comic and Toy shop! Driven by the awesome Dwight...but that's another story....
So when the day was over, I got driven back to my car by Dan, which was nice, and it would have worked out much better had Sheridan not been in lockdown because of a scary looking tripod.
But the day did eventually end, with some warm socks. All and all it wasn't a horrible field trip, although I could have done without the miserable mile long walk. But the real problem was that the day really didn't have any multimedia pioneering in it at all. ROM director Brian Porter told us himself that museums aren't pioneers, that older technology is the best they can afford. Inventor Steve Mann told us that he was through with the cyborg age and was instead going back to his primordial roots. What Steve created could be called pioneering, but it certainly isn't of the multimedia variety.
So maybe the field trip wasn't a success on that front, but I still enjoyed myself...in the long run. Although the action figures from Silver Snail really helped.
Two other points of interest:
The title is Dan's response to a kind stranger who pointed out that he had dropped his toque. Jeff and I shared a chuckle over the classic Dan Zen response that was given.
And Brian Porter, while not working hard as a director of new media at the Royal Ontario Museum is actually a Secret Agent Man, according to his phone which plays the 007 theme when it rings. :)
Links for Marks:
Royal Ontario Museum Site: Podcasts made by the Sound Studio
Touch Screen Technology: How it Works
Virtual Musuem of Canada: Can't go to a museum? This is the next best thing.
Steve Mann's Fluid Site
Youtube Video on Hydraulophones: First prototype to installation at the Toronto Science Centre
And Brian Porter, while not working hard as a director of new media at the Royal Ontario Museum is actually a Secret Agent Man, according to his phone which plays the 007 theme when it rings. :)
Links for Marks:
Royal Ontario Museum Site: Podcasts made by the Sound Studio
Touch Screen Technology: How it Works
Virtual Musuem of Canada: Can't go to a museum? This is the next best thing.
Steve Mann's Fluid Site
Youtube Video on Hydraulophones: First prototype to installation at the Toronto Science Centre
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
James Eberhardt and the magical land of SMS
Today in Web Authoring or possibly Multimedia Pioneering, we had a guest speaker named James Eberhardt. James started his presentation with.....well I'm not sure actually because I was late. But I was only late because of my job, which required me to get up super early and proof some print material for our event on Friday, which is called French Quarter Festival btw. Incidentally, it's all that's been on my mind of late and it's even starting to seep into my dreams.
Anyway, back to the presentation.
James taught me some really basic things about cell phones that I didn't know, or didn't think enough about to realize it. Like for instance, SMS stands for Short Message Service. I never knew what it stood for, even though I text message Jeff fairly often. Also that there are three types of messages, person to person, computer to person and person to computer. Which made me think of my E-Commerce days, where we talked about Business to business, business to consumer and the very rare consumer to business.
Our speaker also talked about 2D barcoding, or QR Code or Datamartrix. It's a 2D barcode that allows for way more
information than a traditional barcode, like ones cashiers scan when you purchase products, which are 1D. Once the information is in a barcode format then a barcode reader decodes the information. Apparently this is crazy big in Japan, but I can see it catching on here too. James even showed us a picture of one of these barcodes at Niagara Falls, some place I've actually been to.
How does that relate to mobile/cell phone technology? Well you can have a barcode reader on your cell phone, so when you're at Niagara Falls you can scan/capture an image of, the barcode, decode it and find out all the information available. And Johnson and Johnson is putting these barcodes on their products as well, so their employees at shipping docks/warehouses can scan the barcode and get more information and have it electronic instead of print outs all the time. Saving the environment one barcode at a time. :)
Anyway, the Falls barcode is part of the Semapedia project, which has barcodes placed around the world which decode into wikipedia pages about whatever attraction the barcode is at. Now, they don't have a huge ton of barcodes out there but they do have a map of the world which shows where they are at the moment which is kinda cool.
Quite frankly though, I would worry that someone would think it's vandalization or garbage, and the stickers would be ripped off buildings/sign posts etc. I know where I live there are graffiti artists that put stickers of their art on different things and they are ripped off. How are the uninformed, untechnological masses to know what the barcode is and what it really means?
Well the first start is to get people decoders. Here are some links to decoders for your cell phone: Kaywa Reader (Most phones including a Java Reader) or QuickMark. Plus you can also generate your own QR & Data Matrix codes on these sites.
Side bar: Captial One allows you to use your own images to create a unique credit card. Wouldn't it be cool if you used a 2D barcode as your image. Then you could create a wiki on yourself or whatever. How funny would it be if you credit card got stolen and the thief scanned the barcode and you could give them a message like, "You thief! You're screwing up my credit score!"
James also mentioned that you can make applications for cell phones with html. But if you want to get fancy, you need:
Flash CS3 professional, adobe device central
Testing device, ie. phone (Nokia is recommended)
Connection to the phone: memory stick/bluetooth/cable
But then he said, that action script 3 isn't supported, only action script 2 and they don't support flash lite 3 and that flash 8 would be best. Which I think, means that the technology we're going to use to create cell phone applications won't run on cell phones. AKA, we're too technologically advanced for the new technology we're learning. Sweet.
Another cool thing that James showed us was Adobe Device Central. Which allows you to select a phone to display your program in, and then create the program and run it and you can click on the buttons to see how they interact with the program you created. Plus you can switch between 10 different phones or more to see how the application looks in them, without buying multiple phones to test things out on. Which is very cool. James suggested going to moblie.processing.org which is about java based application development, through JAR files instead of SWF.
Mr. Eberhardt also talked about the future of cell phones. Which is multi-functional phones, which can call people, produce video, take photos, text message, play radio, play mp3s etc. He posed the question to the class is this a good thing?
Yes and No. Yes it's a good thing because you can do much more with your phone than ever before and you can reach people and information you need from nearly where ever you are. No because if you can do all your work, or a large majority from your cell phone where does work end and personal time begin? Another downside is the all in one printer syndrome. All in one or 3 in one printers came on to the scene saying that they could copy, fax, scan (staple, fold, shred too, on some models) and wouldn't it be wonderful to have a machine that took care of all your office needs? It would be. Except that those types of machines rarely work. They can do their main function of copying but everything else is flaky at best. We already have the same problems on cell phones. Sure they can play music but what type of quality do you get verses a stereo or mp3 player or James' turntable? Texting is already super slow at 10 words a minute. Images and videos taken by phones are usually horrible resolution and quality. So what happens when we have more and more applications? Good question.
To sum up: Mobile technology is immature, flash doesn't have wide spread access, java has a lot of bugs and Canadian download fees are insane. But in the future...it's going to be awesome. And it's just one more reason I should be buying an I-Touch or an I-Phone.
Oh and one last thing before we go onto the links section. James Eberhardt's home wireless network is called the batcave. I love that.
Links for Marks:
QR Code or Datamartrix.
Semapedia with their map of the world
Mobile Device Blog - came up in my research which is kinda cool
Kaywa Reader or QuickMark to decode barcodes and create them
Adobe Device Central
Mobile Processing
Anyway, back to the presentation.
James taught me some really basic things about cell phones that I didn't know, or didn't think enough about to realize it. Like for instance, SMS stands for Short Message Service. I never knew what it stood for, even though I text message Jeff fairly often. Also that there are three types of messages, person to person, computer to person and person to computer. Which made me think of my E-Commerce days, where we talked about Business to business, business to consumer and the very rare consumer to business.
Our speaker also talked about 2D barcoding, or QR Code or Datamartrix. It's a 2D barcode that allows for way more
information than a traditional barcode, like ones cashiers scan when you purchase products, which are 1D. Once the information is in a barcode format then a barcode reader decodes the information. Apparently this is crazy big in Japan, but I can see it catching on here too. James even showed us a picture of one of these barcodes at Niagara Falls, some place I've actually been to.How does that relate to mobile/cell phone technology? Well you can have a barcode reader on your cell phone, so when you're at Niagara Falls you can scan/capture an image of, the barcode, decode it and find out all the information available. And Johnson and Johnson is putting these barcodes on their products as well, so their employees at shipping docks/warehouses can scan the barcode and get more information and have it electronic instead of print outs all the time. Saving the environment one barcode at a time. :)
Anyway, the Falls barcode is part of the Semapedia project, which has barcodes placed around the world which decode into wikipedia pages about whatever attraction the barcode is at. Now, they don't have a huge ton of barcodes out there but they do have a map of the world which shows where they are at the moment which is kinda cool.
Quite frankly though, I would worry that someone would think it's vandalization or garbage, and the stickers would be ripped off buildings/sign posts etc. I know where I live there are graffiti artists that put stickers of their art on different things and they are ripped off. How are the uninformed, untechnological masses to know what the barcode is and what it really means?
Well the first start is to get people decoders. Here are some links to decoders for your cell phone: Kaywa Reader (Most phones including a Java Reader) or QuickMark. Plus you can also generate your own QR & Data Matrix codes on these sites.
Side bar: Captial One allows you to use your own images to create a unique credit card. Wouldn't it be cool if you used a 2D barcode as your image. Then you could create a wiki on yourself or whatever. How funny would it be if you credit card got stolen and the thief scanned the barcode and you could give them a message like, "You thief! You're screwing up my credit score!"
James also mentioned that you can make applications for cell phones with html. But if you want to get fancy, you need:
Flash CS3 professional, adobe device central
Testing device, ie. phone (Nokia is recommended)
Connection to the phone: memory stick/bluetooth/cable
But then he said, that action script 3 isn't supported, only action script 2 and they don't support flash lite 3 and that flash 8 would be best. Which I think, means that the technology we're going to use to create cell phone applications won't run on cell phones. AKA, we're too technologically advanced for the new technology we're learning. Sweet.
Another cool thing that James showed us was Adobe Device Central. Which allows you to select a phone to display your program in, and then create the program and run it and you can click on the buttons to see how they interact with the program you created. Plus you can switch between 10 different phones or more to see how the application looks in them, without buying multiple phones to test things out on. Which is very cool. James suggested going to moblie.processing.org which is about java based application development, through JAR files instead of SWF.
Mr. Eberhardt also talked about the future of cell phones. Which is multi-functional phones, which can call people, produce video, take photos, text message, play radio, play mp3s etc. He posed the question to the class is this a good thing?
Yes and No. Yes it's a good thing because you can do much more with your phone than ever before and you can reach people and information you need from nearly where ever you are. No because if you can do all your work, or a large majority from your cell phone where does work end and personal time begin? Another downside is the all in one printer syndrome. All in one or 3 in one printers came on to the scene saying that they could copy, fax, scan (staple, fold, shred too, on some models) and wouldn't it be wonderful to have a machine that took care of all your office needs? It would be. Except that those types of machines rarely work. They can do their main function of copying but everything else is flaky at best. We already have the same problems on cell phones. Sure they can play music but what type of quality do you get verses a stereo or mp3 player or James' turntable? Texting is already super slow at 10 words a minute. Images and videos taken by phones are usually horrible resolution and quality. So what happens when we have more and more applications? Good question.
To sum up: Mobile technology is immature, flash doesn't have wide spread access, java has a lot of bugs and Canadian download fees are insane. But in the future...it's going to be awesome. And it's just one more reason I should be buying an I-Touch or an I-Phone.
Oh and one last thing before we go onto the links section. James Eberhardt's home wireless network is called the batcave. I love that.
Links for Marks:
QR Code or Datamartrix.
Semapedia with their map of the world
Mobile Device Blog - came up in my research which is kinda cool
Kaywa Reader or QuickMark to decode barcodes and create them
Adobe Device Central
Mobile Processing
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