I’ve had numerous experience with dialog boxes and pop-up windows, saying the most bizarre things or having strange coincidental behaviors. I had another one as I was going through a PDF printout of an article I was commenting on. In my attempts to edit the font size of my comment box (by right clicking on the highlighted text), I got this:
Odd!
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Who would have ever thought? Who could ever have imagined? Certainly not I. It’s been fifteen years since I have read a fiction book cover to cover—and enjoyed every bit of it.
Thursday over my lunch break and following my writing class, I purchased the first three books in the Harry Potter series. I started on the first book that night, thinking that it might take me a month to get through a single book. With the way I’ve read in the past, I was astounded to find myself unable to put down The Sorcerer’s Stone, the first of the three books I purchased. In fact, not only was I driven to keep reading the book, I managed to finish all three hundred and nine pages just moments ago.
I can’t wait to start on the next book.
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Who would have thought I could experience the genesis of so much change and so quickly—and within a two-day period. Last of all, it would have been me. I’ve come to expect a gratifying amount of mediocrity in my life and a pacifying amount of apathy—enough to keep me sedated day-to-day, just going through the motions.
If you’re all a fan of PostSecret, you ought to know about the new book that is coming out by the website’s creator, Frank Warren. He’s coming to Minnesota on January 19 at Birchbark Books.
I periodically drop in at the site to see the creative submissions—some funny, some serious, and some just down-right innovative in thought and presentation. Sometimes they can be great sources of design inspiration.
Visit postsecret.blogspot.com for more interesting submissions.
Filed under: Websites
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UPDATED 1/9 AT 5:20 CST WITH NEW VERSION INFO
A colleague of mine with the State of Minnesota asked me if I knew how to do close captioning of video for the web. Admittedly I did not, but that didn’t stop me from looking into it. Within a five minute search of Google, I found a link on the Law, Health Policy & Disability forum at the University of Iowa showing a proof of concept, that you can indeed take a video file and apply some level of close captioning to it using Flash.
To save you some time of hunting all the files down, I’ve put together an instruction page with a demo of how it works. The only grunt work you have to do is: acquire the exact length (in seconds) of your video file and create a close captioning text file based upon the example one I link to. You then just have to modify an XML file and you’re all set to go. See the instructions for details. (Version one had you passing a bunch of variables and it was kinda clunky to work with. In version two you’re able to put everything you need in a single XML file.)
I hope this helps you out. It’ll sure help me out when it comes time to provide close captioned videos for the State.
Filed under: Actionscript, Applications, Development, Websites
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So I’ve been spending a few free moments today on apple.com, gleaning over all the new things they’re releasing, including the new iPhone (which I SO want when they increase the storage capacity) and AppleTV. Very impressive stuff, particularly the iPhone. I can’t wait to some day have an excellent interface such as that—multi-touch sensing screen. How cool!
So I got slightly distracted and caught up on the Apple commercials, and when I decided I had enough, I closed Internet Explorer (don’t ask me why I was using it…I just was) and got this bizarre error message:
Apparently Internet Explorer was jealous with my interactions at apple.com.
Filed under: Applications, Websites
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For a few months now I’ve been doing a podcast with my band Crash Effect and have been having a bit of fun with that. Last week I was invited to participate in a podcast (that was recorded live via a web conference) that centered around various facets of Christian spirituality, including current news and some blog entries that we’ve found interesting.
So that put the bug in me to put together a podcast centered around web design. I’ve been designing websites for nearly twelve years now and consider myself to be one of many leaders within my community, a leader in web design that has been there from the very beginning and continues to evolve in skill and application. I also know and recognize that the world does not look to me for design help—and I’m quite fine with that, believe me. I don’t care to have that kind of pressure. But that said, I do feel that there is still an audience that may find what I have to say helpful.
Last night I put together the first three pilot episodes [they're going to run weekly starting January 14th] to give myself a head start. I still have to design the website that will surround the podcast (and its associated resources), but that won’t take me long.
If you want to get a sneak peak at what the podcast will sound like, you can download the first three episodes here:
episode 001: Noise-Free Design: Value
episode 002: Noise-Free Design: Function
episode 003: Noise-Free Design: Usability
Admittedly this is some pretty high-level information that I have in these first few podcasts, but it’s meant to serve more as an introduction to the components that help make websites successful.
Anyway, give a listen and let me know what you think.
Filed under: Development, General, Photoshop (Adobe)
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Well, like my buddy Jamison, I feel it appropriate to look back on 2006 and reflect on what all happened—even though my most recent fortune cookie said “Forget yesterday: tomorrow will be a golden day for you”. [in bed?] 
For starters, I didn’t really care much for the year as it just seemed like such a downer between Bush & Co™, the insanity of UnitedHealth Group along with various issues concerning the church. But despite that, it did have some brighter moments.
January: Mmmm… Beer
The start of 2006 was marked by brewing beer for the first time and doing fairly well with it, too. Many friends and family have sampled it throughout the year and enjoyed it quite a bit. I can’t seem to keep enough of it on the shelves.
February: The EBC Piece
I had the privilege of creating an engaging marketing piece for the Executive Briefing Center while employed with Uniprise. It had rave reviews within the company and helped reflect the professionalism and sleekness of the meeting room. If you want to see it, head over to uniprise.com/ebc and check it out.
March: Snowy Improv
With a bizarre month of snow storms and unseasonably warm temperatures, I started picking the guitar back up and created a variety of more improv pieces.
April: The Canon Digital Rebel XT
My wife and I bought our new Canon Digital Rebel XT and it unleashed a creative bug in me to be more active in taking good photographs. There are more to be seen here.
May: Change in jobs and seasons
UnitedHealth Group was laying off people left and right and I didn’t care to be one of them. So with some connections and a good portfolio/resume, I landed a job with the Office of Enterprise Technology as their web designer. It also had me looking into considering getting my BA. Not sure if I’ll follow through on that or not.
June: web design is my world
Of course with the new job, web design continues to be my world…but it takes on a new level of focus: changing the face of state government on the web. That also means dealing with the modern world of web design.
July: restoring music in my life
Between polishing up and restoring my vintage 1968 Apollo drum set and cranking up the song writing process, July was a month of returning to my music. Much of that was inspired by a great evening of collaboration that Jamison and I had as he helped me put music to my first new song in a while, “Beauty Queen”. You can hear that track on my band’s forthcoming E.P., “Bomb”.
August: The birth of Crash Effect
It’s official. This is the month Crash Effect was born. Original members: myself, Paul Wichterman and Jamison Stepan. Later in September we added a guitarist and Jamison stepped down to make room for our new bassist, Kris Norberg.
September: a politically and religiously charged month
Between it being the fifth anniversary of 9/11 and the uproar of the muslims to remarks that the Pope made, it was a month of being disgusted all around towards the people of our world and our seeming inability to get along. I just remember this month being extremely disheartening and feeling like there was no hope for our world—no hope for peace, no hope for progress for people of different backgrounds, races and religions to get along peacefully.
October: EA Games and DICE living up to our expectations
October marked the launch of the new Battlefield game, Battlefield: 2142. Of course the game’s launch was marked with bug after bug after bug and infuriating most of those that purchased the game. This was also the month where we brought on our new bass player Kris and reached 2000 friends on myspace (without ever having played a show).
November: Not much to say
I sure didn’t have much to say, but Keith Olbermann pretty much said everything that’s been on my mind concerning the Bush administration. This month also marked the first public performance of Crash Effect on the 11th at Doc’s Landing in White Bear Lake. It was packed wall-to-wall with people!
December: my wish list
December was a busy month for me between projects at work, working on our EP with the band, taking photos and going to numerous family gatherings. But what I remember most is my contemplation of what I wanted most out of the holiday season and being much more aware of how our consumer-driven life affects other people.
I don’t really believe in New Year’s resolutions anymore, but if anything I do have a few resolves. One I do want to get back into a fitness routine and take better care of myself physically. Having a computer/desk job lends itself to anything but a fit physique. The other thing is to make a more concerted effort to find balance in all areas of my life and to continue to foster the creative arts within me. I don’t spend nearly enough time building upon my photography skills and song writing. I would love to develop those areas of my life.
I hope to make 2007 a year much more worth remembering.
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