13'37" hasn't changed much in a long time. I reached my practical limit as an editor on that one, and the only way to fix the
many little issues I've noticed in it would be to redo the whole thing from scratch with all of the knowledge I've gained from working on my video editing app, writing the (still unfinished) Linux Video Editing guide, and from working with all of you. That, and using the DVD sources I couldn't afford when I made it the first time.

I am trimming off a few seconds from the beginning of the version in the test renders, as the first few seconds are incredibly weak in comparison to the rest (nevermind in comparison to such freakishly pretty and well-edited videos as "The Wasteland" and "Forbidden Memories" - Helen has shown talent I never thought I'd see in a "first video", and skill I still dream of posessing), and don't add anything to the story. Sure, it'll ruin the tie between the video and its title, but I'd rather do that than put those particulary weak first cuts right after Bakadeshi's beautiful entrance.
It looks like the Flash thing is going to work. Before anyone starts worrying about the narrations looking like a typical crappy Flash animation, however, I'd like to say that I'm actually using Flash primarily as a means for conveniently manipulating
raster graphics, so it is coming together as an unusually smooth handmade animation rather than anything you would see and think "Oooh, that's must have been done in Flash". What we are gaining from the whole Flash thing is mainly the ability to pan around the set and zoom in and out from the screen in something much cheaper than After Effects (at least considering I'm using the 30-day full features trial version, though I might actually buy the student licence if I like it and want to use it for any web development). I could do all of this in the GIMP as well, but it would take forever and be hard to fix if I (as I inevatably do) screwed it up the first time around.
Argh....now I have to actually
use that Windows partition I've kept hanging around on my laptop. Better than waiting a year for the first version of my own suite to be done, though, and I will probably pick up some nice ideas on interface design in the process, so it's probably for the best.
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Strange thing about installing Flash, through. I tried downloading the free 30-day trial from Macromedia, but the file I got from there wouldn't unzip and I couldn't install it. Determined to test this Flash thing out, I then resorted to doing something I haven't done in over two years, and ran a search for it on a p2p network. So I download the "cracked" version, but find that it's nothing but the trial version with a serial number for removing the 30-day restriction. Thrilled that I was able to install Flash and continue my unconditional boycot of pirated software (something about a software developer stealing software seems a bit sick, especially given the number of perfectly good applications that other friendly developers give away for free), I discarded the key and now have the same 30-day trial that I should have been able to obtain directly from Macromedia, and a perfectly clean and legal computer. Now I'm just a little curious as to why the trial version from Macromedia
didn't work
at all, while the second-hand copy of the same thing bundled with an external crack application worked
perfectly, when I had deleted the crack without using it. Somethng doesn't quite add up, and I'm wondering if, perhaps, Macromedia has inadvertently been uploading broken trial versions (remember, it wouldn't even unzip, nevermind install or run, and I tried downloading it from them twice with the same error).
Of course, I'm also equally curious as to why one of the characters from their "Professionals" propaganda... I mean "comic" so closely resembles Spike Spiegal. Blue suit, yellow shirt, large messy mass of dark hair. Seems a bit much to be a coincidence.
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Genius idea for the computer security and anti-piracy people, though:
Run a little routine every time the application starts up, and perhaps on other events as well, such as saving a document, that checks to see whether the computer is attached to the internet and then checks the application's key against a central registry if the computer is online to determine whether it is legitimate. Have it throw up some nasty Big-Brother style message and then uninstall itself, leaving marks all over the registry or file system to show that it was there. Then the pirates wouldn't be able to get away with just putting some serial number in a box through a "telephone registration" procedure - they'd have to stay off of the internet entirely while the program is running. Just an inconvenience, but I think it could be a very effective one. It could be made even more effective if certain key application features are tied to the internet, but this would actually inconvenience legitimate users on laptops or without internet service. I think Microsoft might have had something like that in mind when they put half of the MS Office help on some online resource rather than packaging it with the suite for local storage and access. Unfortunately, very few people actually use the help, and those who do tend to get very angry if they can't get to it when they need it. Consequently, I think my first idea is the best one, as it wouldn't hinder paying customers, and would throw a major hurdle into the path of illegal users, or else force the crackers to learn some real skills and alter the obfusticated internals of the application without breaking it (something that must be nearly impossible with the complex and already buggy applications being produced today) rather than just using decade-old password generating utilities like the programming pansies they are (awaits retribution from angry script-kiddies, too bad for them I don't use Outlook for my E-mail and randomly open .vbs files

).
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Ice cream sounds great. I don't know about the role model part though, I've also been periodically
not attending class in my sleep. Not that that has anything to do with this project, I just can't seem to develop a normal schedule. Thanks to this little bad habit, I now have to retake Differential Equations - like I'm not finding it dull and frustrating enough the first time around. Oh well, maybe I'll be able to keep up if I learn it in two passes instead of trying to get it all in one.