3D Chessboard

I’m getting more acquainted with Autodesk® 3DMax and I’m able to work more easily with its tools. When I’ve just started, I spent the whole hour just to model an apple which was just a shape without any material to make it look real. Thanks to my patient instructor and supportive classmate who took the pre-requisite course for this.

After three weeks of working on the chess pieces, I look at my own work with amazement although I still failed to perfect the knight’s mouth and ears and the queen’s crown. Now that I know how difficult it is to make a spline cage, the more I praise the skill and patience of the creators of my favorite Sims 2 game.

My work just involved modeling and application of materials. No light effects or animation were added.

Prada Movie Spot-the-Difference

I have seen it in the big screen long ago but had finished reading the novel only recently (although it’s been months too since I purchased the book)

For novels-turned-motion picture, I’d usually prefer to read the book first before watching the film. Aside from Harry Potter (which didn’t win my interest to get me read it), The Devil Wears Prada is an exemption. I rented its VCD for P16 while patiently saving for the 350-peso book.

I have to disagree with the one who posted a review saying that the movie is “faithful to the book”

The similarities were enough to portray maybe at least the exhausting routine of Andrea Sachs as Junior Assistant in Runway. Indeed there was the daily run to fetch the lattes, the “job a million girls would die for” cliché and Miranda’s monotonous “That’s all” remark but these did not suffice to consider the movie “faithful” to the original story.

I’ve noted some of the deviations:

The Movie: Andy’s boyfriend is Nate (Adrian Grenier) who works in the culinary.

The Novel: Alex is her boyfriend and he is a teacher for special kids.

The Movie: Miranda Priestly’s husband is Steven – the man she’s arguing with upstairs when Andy delivered the book in her home.

The Novel: Miranda lives with her third husband, Mr. Tomlinson a.k.a. B-DAD. He’s a cheerful old man.

The Movie: Andy started working at Runway right after she was interviewed by Miranda. Emily had to run after her to say she’s been accepted.

The Novel: An HR staff had to call her to announce that she got the job. She started working while Miranda was away for vacation hence she has been working for a month already before Miranda came back.

The Movie: Miranda ordered Andrea to have 15 Calvin Klein skirts be brought in her office.

The Novel: Miranda was in Oscar de la Renta’s estate when she phoned Emily to have a skirt flown to Dominican Republic. She just needed one skirt (not specifically CK); Emily has had various designer skirts brought in to choose what to send to Miranda.

The Movie: Andy was having dinner with her dad when Miranda called her to charter a flight back to New York on a stormy night so she could see her twins’ stage play.

The Novel: It was Emily whom Miranda demanded to charter a flight that particular night. Miranda was with B-DAD and just wanted to fly back home; the twins don’t have a play.

The Movie: The party where Andy first met Christian is hosted by James Holt who’s a designer himself

The Novel: James (surname not mentioned) is an Associate Beauty Editor for Runway and he was the one who invited Andrea to that party which was actually a party of Marshall Maden, a renowned hair colorist.

The Movie: Miranda asked Andy to get the unpublished Harry Potter as a punishment for bringing the Book upstairs the previous night. Christian helped Andy with the task.

The Novel: Miranda and the twins were in Paris when the fourth HP book is to be released that’s why she phoned the office to have the books flown there. Christian has no contribution to its accomplishment.

The Movie: Miranda held a benefit show at the Metropolitan Museum where she brings her assistants to greet the guests.

The Novel: The event at the Met was an engagement party for Miranda’s brother-in-law.

The Movie: Emily met an accident that’s why she wasn’t able to go with Miranda for Paris Fashion Week.

The Novel: Emily wasn’t able to go because she got seriously sick of a type of flu.

The Movie: Andy and Nigel went with Miranda to Paris.

The Novel: Nigel didn’t come with them and Miranda flew to Paris alone. Andrea followed few days after.

The Movie: French Runway’s Jacqueline Foyer seems to be an antagonist who attempted to replace Miranda.

The Novel: Briget Jardin is Editor-In-Chief of French Runway. She has no conflict with Miranda.

The Movie: Andy quitted her job because she doesn’t want to be like Miranda.

The Novel: Andy quitted because she got fed-up with Miranda when the latter demanded her to find a way to have the twins’ passports renewed so the kids could join them in Paris that same night.

Aside from these, some characters were “under portrayed”. Nigel for instance is really loud in his style whereas actor Stanley Tucci who played the role was quite conservative with his suits and jackets. The real Emily and Allison would actually wear midriffs to work although their stylish dresses in the movie aren’t bad either. And I was looking for at least one scene where Meryl Streep was wearing Miranda’s trademark white Herme’s scarf.

The book describes Miranda as the meaner devil boss that she is and the Runway workplace in its more hellish state but at least the movie still succeeded in giving the non-readers adequate visual of fashion obsession.

Anthem-Phobic

Last night’s headlines include Asian Pop Prince Christian Bautista’s apology for missing two lines of the Philippine National Anthem when he sung it for a boxing match last Sunday. [Related Video]

I suddenly remembered that I almost suffered similar fate on that particular Monday morning about a month ago. It has been a custom in our company that departments alternately host the flag raising ceremony held weekly in front of the Administration Building where a 94-foot tall flagpole stands. Loudspeakers and a microphone are setup and no less than 6 color officers hoist the big flag.

We were the host department that day and I was assigned – for the fourth time – to lead the pledge of allegiance. We arrived there a little late than scheduled and we are very embarrassed because everybody is ready for the ceremonies and they glared on us as we shuffled towards the middle-front of the assembly.

It seemed that our officemate who was tasked to lead the anthem was really decided to not show up that day and leave us frantically thinking for a last-minute tactic on handling the situation. It’s not his first time either to do the job and he’s among the very few people in our office who are given the talent so stage fright is definitely out of the issue.

Anyway, I was standing in front thinking how our superiors would resolve the matter (how would they declare to the crowd that our officemate-in-charge betrayed us) when the dreaded-although-not-expected thing happened: the emcee called my name! HIGH HEAVENS! This isn’t happening… This ISN’T happening! Still trying to live through the embarrassment of being late for the program and here it is, the rock of you-must-not-fail expectation was hurled on me. Talk about downside of being famous… “What if I missed the notes? What if I forgot the lyrics?”, these thoughts hit me. I wanted to be Jessica Alba in Fantastic 4 (never mind that she’s a lady) or at least turn into stone like those three statues of Volunteerism not too far from the flagpole. But I have no choice. I cannot refuse – not especially that the chairman of the board of directors was there staring at me as if I’m a wanted criminal he’d just recognized.

As I faced the audience, I quickly recalled a sportsfest in my first college when the person who led the anthem got confused with the parts having the same melody and repeated the lines and we thought we’ll never finish the song. And when was the last time I led the singing of the anthem by myself? Ah, in second grade. Great!

At the whistle of the color officer, I summoned all my remaining courage and started singing (my hand on my chest of course). The stares of the Chairman (who by the way is a retired navy) and employees from Senior Managers to rank-and-file are better motivation than the beat of a chorale maestro.

Thankfully, my lungs and vocal chords are cooperative. I’m hearing my own voice. And I’m surprised that I’m hitting notes I never reached before even with a falsetto. Bravo!

I didn’t imagine that it would go smoothly but I’m just glad it did. I cannot believe that it’s me who sang that morning. Maybe I did morph into somebody else although not Sue of the F4.

Lessons from the Ark

“When people pray for patience, does God give them patience or the opportunity to be patient?If one asks for courage, does God give him courage, or the opportunity to be courageous? If one asks for a family to be closer, do you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings, or does he give them opportunities to love each other?”

Really exhausted from work recently, I treated myself to the movies.

I rushed my socio-anthropology exam to catch my preferred viewing time which I only refer to as “the one before the last show” but which I wrongly estimated hence I still came half-an-hour late.

Bruce’s sequel is the story of congressman-elect Evan Baxter (Steve Carrel) known for his campaign slogan “Save the World” and “God” just knew how he could do that. After giving the congressman some signs and delivering tools to his home, God orders him to build an ark for a forthcoming flood. Baxter of course finds this ridiculous at first and refuses to obey until God lays down some reinforcement on him. It’s amusing how Baxter turned to the modern-day Noah quite literally with his beard and hair persistently growing, with a robe and staff complementing the look.

The story simply flowed sequentially without much surprise but for someone who used to regularly attend Sunday schools as a child, I appreciate how faithful the writers adopted things from the original story including the number of Noah’s sons (although Evan’s kids are adolescents and don’t have wives), direct quotes from the Bible, the pairs of animals, the people who refused to believe, the rainbow, and even the dove sent out to survey for dry land (although in the movie, it has no role as significant but at least it was there).

Since I became a student of Digital Movie Design, I became interested with production facts of films that I watch. I researched and was impressed to learn about when and how the ark was assembled, how the pairs of animals were rendered in computer graphics, and the production’s proactive effort advocating carbon-offsetting. [Know more]

Evan Almighty would not incite a standing ovation but at least not disappointing.

I’ll not tell how the flood happened but flood or no flood, to save the world we must make “one Act of Random Kindness at a time”.