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miximagic256 · 2 years ago

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Points of Interest (January - February 2023)

So here's something I may or may not do continually, Points of Interest is where I talk about anything I've been doing lately whether it's a project I'm working on or something I find interesting to talk about that is relevant.

The things I'm going to talk about date back to early January and a lot has happened during that time, so without further ado...

Short classes I've done

Back in January I joined two free short courses, one being art and illustration, and the other being about sewing, with the former lasting just 3 days (which honestly is way too short for a course) and the latter lasting 5 weeks. I realised this year that I love being creative and as such I should try and tap into various creative mediums to see how much I enjoy them.

With the Art & Illustration course it was a matter of looking at illustrations the tutor had picked out and trying to copy them while also trying different drawing techniques (such as drawing without the reference of what you're copying), despite this course only lasting 3 days it was very enjoyable and I got introduced to some really interesting illustrators. To be honest I don't think people give illustration enough credit, not only is it everywhere you go but there's an incredible amount of variants and styles from just the last 100 years alone and anyone that has any related interest in art should definitely look into illustration and illustrators.

The sewing course lasted 5 weeks (one day for each week) it was a beginner course so we were taught how to use a sewing machine and various stitching techniques, by the end of the course we had a choice of making a bag or a pincushion (I choose the latter), Despite having a sewing machine I haven't used it much but I hope I can find time to do an intermediate class at some point since I want to keep this momentum going and not lose what I have learnt. The last time I did sewing was in high school so the course was a refresher on a lot of things and the reason I wanted to take a sewing course was because I want to try and make my own clothes for cosplaying reasons, if you know me than you'd know that I have a huge list of favourite characters that I love to pieces and seeing some of the incredible cosplays people online make made me realise just how close you can get to looking like a certain character! Now granted it would probably take me a long time to reach a level like that but in the meantime I want to try and take it slow while having fun in the process!

Crash Bandicoot: N. Sane Trilogy

My Crash Bandicoot history is a little weird, growing up I had Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back and then later I got Crash Bandicoot: The Wrath of Cortex, but despite being a big fan of the series and having fond memories of Crash 2 I haven't actually played many of the games. Nevertheless the announcement of N. Sane Trilogy made me and many others excited as this would be Crash's return after years of being dormant, however only recently have I been actually playing the remake and it's been a really interesting experience especially considering I haven't actually played the original Crash 1 and 3, I have to admit I wonder how I will feel about playing the Crash 2 segment of the game since that's the one I'm most familiar with.

On the subject of Crash 2, I have to say that the original game has aged incredibly well:

For one the game has a save feature in a time a lot of games were still using passwords, sure games having save features predate the PlayStation but those were often expensive and not common so as a result games would resort to using passwords instead, I imagine that in 1997 most people managed to get a memory card so there wasn't a need to try and beat the game in one sitting which also got rid the need of writing down whatever password you were given to continue from where you last left off.

Second, Crash 2 had fluid and expressive character animations for Crash and especially Dr. Neo Cortex which was way ahead of many other games at the time considering that PS1 games were infamous for having stiff character animations, Dr. Cortex in this game is pretty interesting compared to how he is later on the franchise because unlike future Crash games which toned down how threatening he was in Crash 2 he's not only the main villain but he has complete control of the situation, he forced Crash to a warp room and gave him vague instructions which Crash follows because despite having a previous negative encounter Cortex knows that Crash has no other choice but to follow his instructions, and this is expressed even further in the game over screen where if you press "Yes" he says "play again Crash" while if you press "No" he says "I guess you didn't have what it takes Crash".

Notice anything? In both choices Dr. Cortex isn't sad or angry and that's because if you think about it he wins in either outcome, if you continue the fact that you are Dr. Cortex's biggest threat doesn't matter because you're collecting the crystals for him, if you don't continue Dr. Cortex may not get the crystals anymore but his biggest threat to stop his plan is now out of the way which again shows just how much control he has over the situation, this isn't even mentioning his incredible performance by well known voice actor Clancy Brown who absolutely kills it as Dr. Cortex (ironically he only voiced Dr. Cortex three times, with Lex Lang voicing the character in most of the series' duration, however Lex Lang does a good performance as Dr. Cortex as well I want to make that clear!)

Oh and remember the game over screen I mentioned earlier? They actually re lip synced Dr. Cortex's lines where he was speaking in different languages which means Dr. Cortex has different lip syncing to match the new dialogue which is incredible for 1997 and even by today's standards!

On top of all of this? Crash 2 was made just 11 months after Crash 1, yet there are so many improvements, minor and major, that it's hard to list them all and I don't know how Naughty Dog put so much effort in so little time. However they managed that, it shows!

Social media

Yeah, I'm going to talk about social media in this section, because as of this post Elon Musk has some(?) control of Twitter, now I haven't been using Twitter regularly for nearly a year (I do plan on coming back fully though) but from what I've heard a lot has happened in the time since he stepped in. Now the reason I'm bringing this is up is because some people have said that the issues brought to Twitter recently makes them think the website might be shut down or abandoned, something a lot of people see as something to celebrate but let me tell you why Twitter shutting down is a bad thing:

A lot of websites have come and gone on the internet (chances are 10 years from now the internet will look different yet again) however historically whenever a website shut down all it resulted was the users of that website moving to another more popular website. Remember when Vine shut down and all the Vine users moved to YouTube? Or when a lot of Tumblr users moved to Twitter nearly 5 years ago? When both of those migrations happened a lot of the issues the original website suffered from got carried over, that's because when a website disappears it doesn't mean the people who use it disappear as well since the only way to fix a website's userbase is for the users themselves to sort themselves out.

(If you think I'm being broad keep in mind I'm only talking about social media websites, of course a lot of websites have gone over the years but my point is if a website is large enough to gain a large userbase then they will remain online regardless if that website stays or not, also I have to say people from Twitter coming to Tumblr is honestly a full circle moment that's incredibly ironic).

A website's userbase is often formed from two things: the people themselves that use it, and the way the website is structured. How a person uses said website is up to them and this can range from person to person, however my point is while websites can be riddled with issues the fix is far more complicated than to just delete the website itself, a website redeeming itself can only be done through its management (if it's structured in a way that has them at least) or for a site like Twitter it's for the userbase to try and be smart with how they use it (sending tweets, dealing with accounts they don't like, etc.) I know this is easier said than done and chances are this won't happen on a large scale, but even being aware of the algorithm and how you add to it can help by a long run even if it's just you advising your friends on how to make their social media experience better for them and everyone else that follows them.

Puss in Boots: The Last Wish

I originally wasn't going to include this as I only planned talking about the things above, but as me and two other friends saw this movie on February 25th and considering that I don't plan to make a full post about this film, I've decided to include a segment dedicated to this as well:

WOW what an incredible film! Dreamworks is a studio with a weird track record (after all what do you do when you've achieved revenge - the very reason your studio was made in the first place?) But sometimes when they have the right direction they make something fantastic. There's so much I could say about this movie but to keep it short – what I love about Puss in Boots: The Last Wish so much is its execution.

A lot of the themes the movie tackles (vulnerability, accepting your morality, living to the best you can) are themes a lot of films (and especially children's media in general) have tackled with, but unfortunately sometimes when they are used they are either hamfisted or they aren't properly delved into making the impact far smaller than it has the potential to reach. But this film not only tackles those themes I mentioned above but it tackles them full-on, including the darker parts of those themes to such an extent that the film overall feels very mature since it knows what tone to have at that given moment.

The main plot about following a magic map so you can make a wish shows the desires of every character who wants to use it, for our three main characters Puss in Boots, Kitty Softpaws and Perrito, they all showcase themes the film is trying to show. Puss' wish is to gain back his missing eight lives because he always tries to aim himself towards this legendary status of himself that he can defeat anything and now that he's down to his last life feels that he can't live up to that. Kitty's wish its wanting to trust someone but feeling like she can't because of a history of being backstabbed, since being able to trust someone requires you to be vulnerable which results in making her closed-off. Perrito unlike Puss and Kitty doesn't have a wish to make because he's already happy with both himself and his life, which while it's clear a lot of that is a result of ignorance of how dark people can act he ends up helping our main protagonists because they realise it's possible to find people that don't want to use you and legitimately want to befriend you (Kitty) and to realise that even with one life that you can live and be happy with just one (Puss).

The film also stands out because of what it does differently, I've mentioned the themes above that it executes but it also has a traditional villain in a period where Disney hasn't done one in ages, not to mention there's a lot of fairytale characters that haven't really been seen on the big screen before which thanks to this being Dreamworks allows them to be utilised in interesting ways, since Dreamworks doesn't try to have a "clean" image of themselves unlike Disney.

There's so much more I can say about this film but I'm afraid that if I do I'll spoiler it (plus this post is quite long as it is!) If you haven't seen this movie yet then please find an opportunity to do so! You will not regret it.

Topic End: Epilogue

Well that's everything I wanted to cover from January - February, I hope you've enjoyed reading and I'll see you next time!

#docposting #points of interest

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miximagic256 · 2 years ago

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An Interview with Geoff Follin: 5 Years Later

5 years ago today I published an interview with former video game composer Geoff Follin, it’s by far the biggest thing I’ve ever done online as at the time of my interview there wasn’t much known about him so the interview got a lot of attention and got shared around everywhere.

As someone who had a massive Tim and Geoff Follin craze growing up, actually being the one to bring Geoff, someone who was mysterious for decades, into the public spotlight was absolutely incredible and it’s definitely one of the things I’m most proud of. So I decided to give a “director’s cut” on the interview and look back on how the interview holds up today.

As I mentioned on my original TwitLonger post I managed to secure an interview with Geoff over trying an old email of his, then trying to email his brother Mike, before eventually managing to get a response to a comment I left on Geoff's YouTube account that he was fine to do an interview and provided me an email to use where we arranged a time and date.

...But I do have to be honest, going back through that interview (especially the original TwitLonger post) made me cringe at parts. I don’t normally do interviews (hence why this is the only one I’ve ever done) but in hindsight I could have done a lot of things differently.

For one I ask too many questions relating to Geoff’s experience as a video game composer when the answer was always the same – He was okay doing it at the time but it wasn’t something he was really interested in and was happy moving away from it while doing something he was passionate about instead.

Furthermore instead of drawing attention to the fact that typos happened I should have just fixed them [like this] which is exactly what the republished version of the interview did (which I'll go into later) it looks incredibly rude honestly calling them out like that and this wasn't just with the typos either but in other sections as well, such as when I added "[In hindsight I should have guessed he meant to say “I” not “U”, also at this point he starts taking a long time to respond to my questions, so I ask if he’s alright, and that’s why his next response starts with “I’m doing other things too” I did ask if he’d like to finish the interview another time, but he wanted to keep going]" which is REALLY awkward to read and makes me glad that the republished version got rid of this entirely.

Speaking of, when I talk about the "republished" version, I mean this one on VGArc[dot]org, from what I remember this was the first website to republish my interview along with adding in a lot of new snippets of context (such as links and screenshots to whatever Geoff and I were talking about) and by cleaning it up a little making certain sections better to read (which is something I should have done in the first place). If you haven't read the interview yet I strongly recommend reading the version on this website since it's honestly a lot better than my original post (there was another website that republished my interview as well however the site seems to be gone since I can't find it).

Another thing to mention is at the time of the interview, there was a website called SongTreasure[dot]com which was the first time Geoff had put himself and his family in the public spotlight (excluding his YouTube channel where he posted his music) the purpose of this website was that your child would sing a song that they'd have available and then you would send the recording of the song the child sang to SongTreasure, they would then give the song back as a "personalised gift" by including an instrumental to the recording and also do any editing / sound mastering if required. A KickStarter was setup but it didn't reach its funding goal, you can listen to some of the original songs on Geoff's YouTube channel but otherwise there's nothing else (I should note my explanation of how SongTreasure worked probably isn't the best as the site doesn't exist anymore so I apologise if that's the case).

However while SongTreasure wasn't a success, you may notice that throughout this post I've regularly brought up Geoff's YouTube channel as it's not only still up but music is still posted to this day! whether they're soft piano pieces, the original songs he made for SongTreasure or even a song where his family is involved!

Interviewing Geoff Follin 5 years ago was such an interesting experience, being just 19 at the time and despite never doing an interview before I wanted to try to arrange one with him, and while I've mentioned things I would have done differently overall I'm so happy to have done this interview back then I'm really proud of doing it :)

Thanks for reading!

#docposting #geoff follin #video game composer #interview

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