JOURNAL: dj_ultima_the_great (Jen )

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  • Three hundred eighty first entry - gragh 2007-10-14 00:45:39 Time - 11:03, Noise - X (TV) OST 2 - "Last Battle"

    One of my ultimate goals in AMV-ing was to use Final Fantasy in one of two ways. Either I use just one game and make a solid video with that, or I go for more of a vague concept and use every game in the series. Unfortunately, FFIII has to be left out of the party, because I don't have a version of that I can rip. In fact, I don't own it at all, nor have I ever played it. But yeah, anyway... that's been a long term goal for me. I think I've found a couple of songs that would work for the multi-FF concept, but I'll keep mulling about, probably for a long time. I don't intend to make the FF video anytime remotely soon, but it's a thought I like to keep in the back of my mind.

    My sister borrowed some anime again, which means I'm lacking CCS, X, Elfen Lied, one random Pokemon movie, and one random Trigun DVD. I guess that means I won't be working with them anytime soon, but that's okay. It'll take me at least a month to edit this video, so I doubt I'm going to get around to starting anything new while she has them.

    Was not terribly happy about my Japanese midterm. I thought I did good on it, and I actually did not all that great. What really irks me is teachers who give a yes/no or true/false question, and then they make it worth multiple points. No. If there's only one right answer and no visible work required to arrive at that answer, then it should only be worth one point. I hate losing multiple points just because the teacher needed to get to one hundred points and didn't know where else to put them. So, I lost eight points on the midterm for two questions with only possible answer apiece. I lost another twelve points for missing a single sentence in a conversation. That's fucking overkill as far as I'm concerned, but she obviously wants us to be perfect. It drives me insane. The class goes at transwarp in the first place (ja, ja, Star Trek nerddom seeping in), and then she grades harshly. Winning combo there, sensei.

    Speaking of that class, I'm scheduled to go on a field trip tomorrow to the Anderson Japanese Garden in Rockford, but the guy who is supposed to drive me and a two other guys hasn't called me yet to say when we're going to meet and leave. Sorry, men, but when you guys do stuff like this, it makes me lose faith in your gender. It really does. Stay on top of stuff, will you?

    I swear to Cod if he forgets me I am going apeshit on him. It's hard to get me pissed off enough to yell, but the one thing I can't stand in this world - even above drunkards and drug users - is unreliable people. I'll yell for that.

    I finally got my Silent Hill games back, except for SH4. I don't mind not having that, though, because I have it on the PC. I ran through about the first half of the third game today (took fifty minutes... that game is so short...). I'm just getting it back under my fingers again, so that I can show it to Heather as quickly and efficiently as possible. I mean, I intend to show her the story and imagery and whatnot, but I just don't want to be wasting time backtracking down a corridor because I forgot something. I know the game pretty well, but I always make little mistakes here and there. I could speed run it if not for the fact that there's already a run online that I can't compare to. The fastest I've done the game is 1:13:00, and apparently there's a run that goes for forty-five minutes. That's a ridiculous gap that I don't know how to bridge. Even if I optimize my route, I doubt I'd get below fifty minutes. The SH series isn't the best for me to speed run anyway, because I love stopping to look at stuff. I can't help it. I have a thing for bleeding walls. ^_^;;

    I posted two new pictures of my kittens on DA. One of Soki luffin' on a shoe (he adores my mother's shoes and cuddles up to them frequently... nobody knows why), and one of him and Tenkai cuddling up to each other. I had to reconstruct part of the picture to get rid of a random distraction. Soki was laying on a green potholder (our house is such a freakin' mess), so I rebuilt the carpet over the potholder and tried to lightly smudge the fur to make it look natural. It looks pretty good, and if I hadn't mentioned it, I don't think anyone would really notice. Anyway, the pictures are adorable. I wish I could go home to see the little fluffballs.

    Gotta remember to finish my letter to my grandpa, and I need to write an e-mail to sensei. Gah.

    Hrm... deciding whether I should sleep or play Silent Hill 3 more. I don't know when that guy is calling me tomorrow (if he even DOES), but it has to be early, so I really ought to sleep now. I'm starting to get a headache too - right behind the eyes. Those are the ones I hate the most, because they'll make me sick to my stomach if they get bad enough. I really shouldn't play a game... but I want to. *sigh* Decisions, decisions...

    In any case, I'm ending this here. Oh, before I forget, go watch this. It's depressing to be the only one to have commented on it. :(
    http://www.animemusicvideos.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=83952

    Nighty night, folks.


    - Jen

    PS: in math on Thursday, we went on break, and I noticed a small yellow spider right on my knee, facing me and staring at me. Maybe he was sending me good vibes? o.o

    /Spider Princess 
  • Three hundred eightieth entry - I should have been a dancer. 2007-10-10 16:53:52 Time - 2:03, Noise - whatever mah roomie is listening to

    I'm sure most of you have already seen this, but just in case you haven't, it's pure win:
    http://www.animemusicvideos.org/members/members_videoinfo.php?v=151101

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    After much mental debate, I've decided that I should have been a dancer. I wanted to when I was very young, and I've always enjoyed watching dancing. DDR, while not "real" dancing, has done nothing but perk that interest further. Moreover, whenever I hear music, I'm moving. I can't just sit still and listen to something. I'm fidgety anyways, but when I'm listening to something on my computer, I can't help but do little half-spins in my chair. I mean, I have good rhythm. Years of chorus and band have enforced that, although I believe it was always there. I have a good feel for music in general - the mood and flow. Had I been able to start young, I think I would be a dancer today. (Had my high school chorus teacher not been a pure nightmare, I probably would still be singing as well.)

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    Still waiting on a few tracks for FMV. Kind of impatient now. Trying very hard not to get pissy with the remaining people.

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    Okay... so... I just took an hour out there to e-mail my RA. I've been sending her a series of e-mails entitled "Things to Enrich Your Life - Lesson #'x' " It's Lesson 15 today. Basically, on my campus, there's maybe six other chicks who like the same things I do. And that's a hopeful estimate. So, when I walk into a room, I can run at the mouth about editing or anime or videogames and nobody has a fucking clue what I'm getting at. So, to at least get one person slightly more "in the know," I decided to start sending my RA these e-mails with links to videos about various things, many of which I have linked to in this journal and discussed here as well (blindfolded Rubik's cubing, live concerts, etc.). In a nutshell, I'm letting someone into the forbidden World of the Nerd.

    Today's Lesson was AMVs, finally. I've been avoiding it because her laptop can't handle h.264 very well, and she didn't want me to install the codecs for XviD. (She doesn't know much about computers, so she has this notion that a codec will actually take up a significant amount of space on her HD.) That leaves me with YouTube. I've never watched AMVs on The Forbidden Site, actually, and after viewing my first one, I never want to again. The quality was barely watchable. I couldn't imagine viewing some of the more effects-heavy ones on there. The Tube is fine for most other videos, but for AMVs, no thanks - not when I have better quality available.

    ...which brings me to a dilemma. I can't use her computer, I won't link her to YouTube, and she's entirely too busy to be dragged to my computer in my room every time I want to show her something.

    Finally, it hit me. Re-encoding to .wmv. Yeah, it's worse than the original, but it's better than the Tube, and she should be able to play them no problem with the codecs and player she already has. Then, she can just delete the video. No harm done, right? That's what I'm thinking (and hoping).

    The video I sent her was the one I linked to up top. Definitely not as pretty in .wmv, but it works decent enough (and yes, I even added black borders so that WMM would preserve the AR and everything :D ). As soon as I know the process works, I can start converting a little factory line of videos on my compy to .wmv.

    And just in case some of you are throwing up your innards at seeing me compress the already-compressed, I know. I KNOW. I don't need to be told that that's bad for the quality. Quite frankly, my RA doesn't know squat about video quality and I'm not going to work my ass off preserving it too much when she can't exactly tell the difference anyway. Making the .wmv's instead of linking her to the Tube is the extent of my dedication to this.

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    Pancakes for dinner in Glenview tonight. Yum yum. <3

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    It seems as though it's a requirement for the Spider Princess's subjects to greet her, even at college. I was walking to class two-ish weeks ago and there was a large outdoor spider in the dead center of a perfectly-shaped orb web on the metal fence lining the cemetery. I wanted to cheer him on, cuz he really did do a great job on the web. He was an interior decorator in a previous life, I think.

    Then, a day or two later, I was walking into a class hall and sitting right in the middle of the step to the side door I was entering was a nice, long-legged fellow with a red-orange body. It's like he was saying hello. o_O

    Teh spiders luv me. <3

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    Running out of HD space again. I really need to finish up my work with Onimusha 4 so that I can recover those 30-ish gigs that it's taking up. I have enough room to render the FMV MEP (if it ever gets finished), so I'm not worried about that, but I would like more.

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    I think I'm gonna go now. I have dinner, then I have to wash my hair, and then I'm gonna do homework before and after "game night" at 8. Yeah, I'm being social again. Ph33r m3.

    See you, folks. <333


    - Jen 
  • Three hundred seventy ninth entry - AWWWWWWW 2007-10-01 00:04:23 Time - 9:57, Noise - mah roomie, the storm, and the fan

    Y'know, I don't even know what this fad IS. It's just fun to do a spur-of-the-moment video to ridiculous music. Makes me a little more optimistic that I could do an Iron Chef someday, right-o?

    http://www.animemusicvideos.org/members/members_videoinfo.php?v=150910

    I was going to use my usual video description format, but really... does this shit NEED it??? I didn't think so. (On an amusing note, it already has half of the hits that Love/Hate has, and it's got a 4.5 star rating. That's awsm. XD )

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    So... I'm not really sure *what* I did this weekend. It sure as hell wasn't homework. o_O Nor did I study hiragana, although I have been thinking about them all weekend. I did finish rendering my footage, so I'm good to go on my next video. Oh, and I bought a bag of chips, because hard candy and a lone box of year-old pocky make up the entirety of my snacks in here.

    Brunch kinda sucked today. It's usually good, but it didn't have too much that appealed to me today. I ended up having scrambled eggs (fake), banana bread (doesn't taste like banana), and a bagel (last one on the plate, so it was hard). Not bad altogether, but brunch is usually better. But y'know, I haven't really been able to eat much lately anyway. It seems like every time I get more than a dozen bites of anything in my system, I'm full. Like, sick-full. I feel like such a waster when I take a cheeseburger, small fries, and a small drink, and I can't even finish that.

    Still waiting on some responses for FMV, as well as some segments. If I don't get responses from everyone by the time I get all of the segments, I'm most likely just going to forge ahead and hope there aren't any complaints after the fact. AtomX gave me the last little component I need to put the project together, so I'm basically ready to add everything in once I get all the pieces. Also, I should start working on song mixes for the next project - or rather, the interest gauge for the next project. I have several ideas floating around, and while I'm pretty sure I know what everyone is going to go for already, I'd like to present multiple options.

    Oh, oops. Walked away and forgot I was writing this entry. Gotta go to sleep now!

    Nighty night, folks.


    - Jen 
  • Three hundred seventy eighth entry - this entry took forever to write o_O 2007-09-24 23:03:52 Time - 8:50, Noise - whir of the fan

    Alright. This is the last time, I promise.

    It hasn't stopped being an announcement. And stuff. : /
    http://www.animemusicvideos.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=83380

    And if you haven't stopped being lazy... it hasn't stopped being a link. And stuff. : /
    http://www.animemusicvideos.org/members/members_videoinfo.php?v=150582

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    So... I realized something today that really bugs me. All of my friends here at college fall into one of two groups: people who have drug issues, and people who have ridiculous amounts of homework to do. It didn't bother me until I realized that the latter group spends no time with me because they're busy, and the former group spends no time with me because I walk away whenever they start talking about that shit - which usually happens about 1.7 minutes into any given conversation.

    Makes me wonder if I have any friends at all. They all treat me like a nuisance. I'm lucky if I get invited to a MEAL, much less any kind of event. Creepy Chick. I really am Creepy Chick, aren't I?

    By the way, I'm not emo about this. A bit angry, and very frustrated, but not emo.

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    It also occurred to me just a few minutes ago that if it has appeared at a con, Jaddzia has taken a picture of it. XD That's a good thing, though. It makes those of us who can't attend AWA feel like we've at least somewhat gotten the experience anyway - because, you know, it isn't the big events that you remember. It's the little stuff that sticks with you. The food you ate at a dinner with people you swear you know, but you're only just meeting for the first time. The color of the wood on the dresser that held the TV you watched with those same people while talking about nothing in particular. That's the kind of stuff that sticks with you.

    I mean, now, all this time after ACen, I don't really remember the content of the female AMV panel, but I do remember the sound of the girls' voices, and the awkward walking with... crutches, wasn't it? That I can stick to. I remember the Chinese in the fridge at the hotel... the crappy breakfast the next morning we were there... but most of the AMV results ceremony is a blur.

    You remember little things, and I think I like it better like that. In that way, I'll remember all of the .org members I meet for little things they did, but I'll forget important things like introductions. XD

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    Oh, blargh. I keep getting distracted. It's sto's fault, really. So, I'll end this here, with a link to the most awesome animal ever devised by nature. Not my favorite, but the most awsm. Check out the stats on this sucker.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardigrada

    Nighty night, loves.


    - Jen 
  • Three hundred seventy seventh entry - meow =^.^= 2007-09-23 00:52:32 Time - 11:40, Noise - Placebo - "H.K. Farewell"

    Just for keeping up appearances...

    It's still an announcement. And stuff. : /
    http://www.animemusicvideos.org/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=83380

    And if you're still lazy... it's still a link. And stuff. : /
    http://www.animemusicvideos.org/members/members_videoinfo.php?v=150582

    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

    So, I totally just remembered that I promised a kitten picture a few entries back. Well, I got a decent one cleaned up, so here it is. Adorable little Soki:

    http://mayuamakurathegreat.deviantart.com/art/His-First-Photoshoot-64500669

    This second one is only slightly different, but the fact that the camera glare only hit ONE eye makes him look all evil and cute and stuff...

    http://mayuamakurathegreat.deviantart.com/art/The-Demon-Eye-64682139

    The first picture got featured in wazabee's weekly Caturday journal entry. I'm watching him because he always gets a lot of beautiful submissions each week. That's where I'm slowly building up my stock of kitty pictures from. :D

    So... yep. That's Head Cat. Adorable, affectionate little Soki - whom I miss dearly while I'm away at college now. And I didn't even get to MEET the new kitty Tenkai.

    Anyway, since I promised a kitty picture, there it is. *purr*

    See you, folks.


    - Jen 
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