We've been working ardently on our projects this week, which consists of a seven minute video, a poster, a powerpoint, and a paper. For the video I made three animated shorts in flash, and though the animation process can be tedious, I had a lot of fun doing them. One of the animations used a technique that I just learned, which consists of mimicking rapid movement by using gradient in-betweens. There was a tutorial on this animation method on a site showcasing flash animations. It's my ambition to become better at flash so I can create unique stories without having to devote the majority of my energy focusing on the technique.



Here's a screen shot of one of my shorts. It's of a little programmer who's frustrated with Python (I'm sure many feel like this when JES says, "A local or global name could not be found. You need to define the function or variable before you try to use it in any way").

Yesterday's field trip was my favorite so far; we went to Jeff Krichmar's robotics lab at the neurological institute. Though the walk there was rather intense, it was worth it to see the robots that they are developing. They are currently working on an almost completely autonomous robot that can right itself after falling, realize when it needs to re-charge itself and find an energy refueling source, and learn how to cope with compromising situations. We also got to ride the Segway scooter, and now I wish I had one to go to class every day! Right now we are working on more JES code, and taking programs that Beth and Roshni have made for us and modifying them to do something a bit different. I took a grayscale program they wrote and altered it so that it leaves a trace of red in the picture. That way, I could take a picture of something like Snow White, and take all the color out excluding the red on her cheeks. Then you get a picture that looks somewhat old-fashioned.

Using programs that Beth and Roshni wrote for us, we made collages in JES today. I learned how to save your modified file, and how to allow the user to input values.



Here's my collage; though it is simple, it's exciting that one can do this using a programming language.

Yesterday I experimented with long-exposure pictures. The room was too bright for it to work very well, but I was able to make some pictures with a transparent effect. I have a Canon PowerShotA80, which works very well for my purposes. By setting the camera into manual mode and lengthening the exposure time, you then can move the subject of your picture in order to give it the appearance of being see-through.

We got good video cameras today! They'll be useful in recording touching moments of cosmos life. After lunch today we're going to Petco park to learn about the programming behind the jumbotron.

We are learning to do increasingly complex functions in Jython, such as being able to scale down, rotate, and copy images. I believe (and hope) that I am grasping the concept, but I need to learn how to allow the user to input values that would influence the function. I'm very tired and don't feel too well today, which is a shame because I really want to fully comprehend how to do specific (and general) functions in Jython.

The Discovery Lecture today was okay, but the subject (diabetes and implantable metabolic sensors) made me a bit queasy. David Gough seemed like a very intelligent researcher though, and it's exciting to know there might be help for diabetics on the horizon. I'm definitely going to watch my sugar intake from now on.

We're going to make some power point presentations, which should be fun. Learning more about the slide rule was interesting, but I feel sorry for those who had to do many complex calculations without the aid of a calculator. I think I'm loosing sleep for some reason; I've been very tired and kind of spacey. So if you're talking to me and I start to zone out/run into things when I'm walking/stare at things for a prolonged period for no apparent reason, I apologize.

We worked more with Jython today, practicing changing colors specific to an object in a picture. The lab was to turn Kermit the frog blue in various pictures. We also worked with Adobe Premiere, which for me just crashed. I saved it though, so it's okay. Since today is our first day of relative autonomy around campus, most students ate near Price Center. Mindi, Melanie and I went to the regular cafe for lunch. Forrest and I have a presentation due on thursday's speaker, Neal Driscoll. Here's my alien kitten I made yesterday. If I had a kitten like this in real life, I think I'd name him Peebles.