Thursday, November 26, 2009

Batch Photo Watermarker

As I often deal with photos for the sites I'm running, I have been lately searching for a software that can batch watermark photos. Photoshop can do that, but the entire process has too many steps to remember from one time to the next. So I found this little software called Batch Photo Watermarker. It's small, it has a simple interface with everything in sight, and it only takes a few clicks to have the work done.

Batch Photo Watermarker can be found here:
http://www.easysector.com

The only thing I'm missing is the option to add shadow to the text.

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

2009 Skate Canada

2009 Skate Canada
Kitchener, Canada
19-22.11.2009

Men

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Jeremy ABBOTT

USA
232.9912
2Daisuke TAKAHASHI

JPN
231.3121
3Alban PREAUBERT

FRA
212.2843
4Michal BREZINA

CZE
202.3255
5Samuel CONTESTI

ITA
202.2574
6Patrick CHAN

CAN
198.7766
7Denis TEN

KAZ
193.3339
8Stephen CARRIERE

USA
188.31107
9Armin MAHBANOOZADEH

USA
186.4888
10Joey RUSSELL

CAN
168.71911
11Kevin VAN DER PERREN

BEL
168.541110
12Jeremy TEN

CAN
148.961212


Ladies

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Joannie ROCHETTE

CAN
182.9011
2Alissa CZISNY

USA
163.5324
3Laura LEPISTÖ

FIN
158.5242
4Mirai NAGASU

USA
156.8333
5Akiko SUZUKI

JPN
147.7285
6Amelie LACOSTE

CAN
141.1366
7Cynthia PHANEUF

CAN
132.4859
8Caroline ZHANG

USA
132.4678
9Sarah HECKEN

GER
124.40107
10Jenna MCCORKELL

GBR
123.50910
11Joshi HELGESSON

SWE
108.411111


Pairs

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Aliona SAVCHENKO / Robin SZOLKOWY

GER
206.7111
2Maria MUKHORTOVA / Maxim TRANKOV

RUS
185.7122
3Jessica DUBE / Bryce DAVISON

CAN
166.9333
4Anabelle LANGLOIS / Cody HAY

CAN
159.9544
5Caydee DENNEY / Jeremy BARRETT

USA
157.0955
6Kirsten MOORE-TOWERS / Dylan MOSCOVITCH

CAN
146.9176
7Caitlin YANKOWSKAS / John COUGHLIN

USA
143.6167
8Ksenia OZEROVA / Alexander ENBERT

RUS
113.3688


Ice Dance

FPl.NameNationPointsCDODFD
1Tessa VIRTUE / Scott MOIR

CAN
204.38111
2Nathalie PECHALAT / Fabian BOURZAT

FRA
185.07222
3Kaitlyn WEAVER / Andrew POJE

CAN
165.64344
4Ekaterina BOBROVA / Dmitri SOLOVIEV

RUS
161.68553
5Emily SAMUELSON / Evan BATES

USA
160.76435
6Madison HUBBELL / Keiffer HUBBELL

USA
141.63667
7Carolina HERMANN / Daniel HERMANN

GER
141.61776
8Andrea CHONG / Guillaume GFELLER

CAN
128.70888

Monday, November 23, 2009

Weird Tales - Two Sides Of A Coin

This was inspired by Weird Tales magazine One-Minute Weird Tales series. Unfortunately it ended up by being too long.

Two Sides Of A Coin

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

2009 Skate America

2009 Skate America
Lake Placid, USA
12-15.11.2009

Men

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Evan LYSACEK

USA
237.7211
2Shawn SAWYER

CAN
203.9154
3Ryan BRADLEY

USA
198.1282
4Florent AMODIO

FRA
197.5826
5Tomas VERNER

CZE
194.06113
6Kevin REYNOLDS

CAN
190.23105
7Adrian SCHULTHEISS

SWE
185.0747
8Brandon MROZ

USA
174.00311
9Yasuharu NANRI

JPN
168.8478
10Andrei LUTAI

RUS
167.7969
11Jialiang WU

CHN
164.26910
12Igor MACYPURA

SVK
144.021212


Ladies

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Yu-Na KIM

KOR
187.9812
2Rachael FLATT

USA
174.9121
3Julia SEBESTYEN

HUN
159.0333
4Fumie SUGURI

JPN
148.9945
5Elena GLEBOVA

EST
148.7154
6Elene GEDEVANISHVILI

GEO
144.1966
7Emily HUGHES

USA
135.31117
8Sarah HECKEN

GER
131.10128
9Joshi HELGESSON

SWE
129.91710
10Alexe GILLES

USA
129.01109
11Susanna PÖYKIÖ

FIN
124.22911
12Tugba KARADEMIR

TUR
122.40812


Pairs

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Xue SHEN / Hongbo ZHAO

CHN
201.4011
2Tatiana VOLOSOZHAR / Stanislav MOROZOV

UKR
171.8223
3Dan ZHANG / Hao ZHANG

CHN
168.1952
4Keauna MCLAUGHLIN / Rockne BRUBAKER

USA
165.3744
5Amanda EVORA / Mark LADWIG

USA
148.3365
6Brooke CASTILE / Benjamin OKOLSKI

USA
139.5876
7Stacey KEMP / David KING

GBR
130.8087
WDMeagan DUHAMEL / Craig BUNTIN

CAN
3


Ice Dance

FPl.NameNationPointsCDODFD
1Tanith BELBIN / Benjamin AGOSTO

USA
195.85111
2Anna CAPPELLINI / Luca LANOTTE

ITA
171.86323
3Alexandra ZARETSKI / Roman ZARETSKI

ISR
171.77432
4Jana KHOKHLOVA / Sergei NOVITSKI

RUS
168.25254
5Kimberly NAVARRO / Brent BOMMENTRE

USA
160.89546
6Madison CHOCK / Greg ZUERLEIN

USA
153.92785
7Kristina GORSHKOVA / Vitali BUTIKOV

RUS
152.43667
8Caitlin MALLORY / Kristjan RAND

EST
143.50979
9Zoe BLANC / Pierre-Loup BOUQUET

FRA
140.7110108
10Xiaoyang YU / Chen WANG

CHN
135.628910

Wednesday, November 11, 2009

2009 NHK Trophy

2009 NHK Trophy
Nagano, Japan
5-8.11.2009

Results

Men

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Brian JOUBERT

FRA
232.7011
2Johnny WEIR

USA
217.7033
3Michal BREZINA

CZE
217.4862
4Daisuke TAKAHASHI

JPN
214.2944
5Jeremy ABBOTT

USA
208.4526
6Adam RIPPON

USA
197.6185
7Takahiko KOZUKA

JPN
186.00510
8Artem BORODULIN

RUS
181.6279
9Daisuke MURAKAMI

JPN
181.0498
10Jeremy TEN

CAN
178.87127
11Vaughn CHIPEUR

CAN
176.361012
12Kristoffer BERNTSSON

SWE
176.011111


Ladies

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Miki ANDO

JPN
162.5522
2Alena LEONOVA

RUS
160.8551
3Ashley WAGNER

USA
155.9913
4Yukari NAKANO

JPN
152.3535
5Laura LEPISTO

FIN
152.1944
6Cynthia PHANEUF

CAN
142.0376
7Yan LIU

CHN
126.49610
8Annette DYTRT

GER
126.0199
9Oksana GOZEVA

RUS
123.97117
10Shoko ISHIKAWA

JPN
119.631011
11Becky BERESWILL

USA
118.42128
WDSarah MEIER

SUI
8


Pairs

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Qing PANG / Jian TONG

CHN
199.6521
2Yuko KAVAGUTI / Alexander SMIRNOV

RUS
193.0512
3Rena INOUE / John BALDWIN

USA
158.7843
4Caydee DENNEY / Jeremy BARRETT

USA
151.4335
5Mylene BRODEUR / John MATTATALL

CAN
150.7164
6Ksenia KRASILNIKOVA / Konstantin BEZMATERNIKH

RUS
137.4956
7Paige LAWRENCE / Rudi SWIEGERS

CAN
130.7777
8Narumi TAKAHASHI / Mervin TRAN

JPN
119.4888


Ice Dance

FPl.NameNationPointsCDODFD
1Meryl DAVIS / Charlie WHITE

USA
201.97111
2Sinead KERR / John KERR

GBR
177.73222
3Vanessa CRONE / Paul POIRIER

CAN
165.89433
4Ekaterina BOBROVA / Dmitri SOLOVIEV

RUS
160.01364
5Xintong HUANG / Xun ZHENG

CHN
154.90655
6Anna ZADOROZHNIUK / Sergei VERBILLO

UKR
154.61546
7Cathy REED / Chris REED

JPN
147.53778
8Allie HANN-MCCURDY / Michael CORENO

CAN
145.32987
9Lucie MYSLIVECKOVA / Matej NOVAK

CZE
142.33899
10Jane SUMMERSETT / Todd GILLES

USA
130.24101010

Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Story - Loneliness in the Night

Here's another story... this is one of the oldies, written quite a while ago I'm afraid.

Loneliness in the Night

Sunday, November 8, 2009

Supernatural – 5x08 – Changing Channels

Seriously? Well, it’s true I don’t normally follow TV series, not unless they happen to be on, I can’t fall asleep and there’s nothing else being aired beside football or politics. Hell, I haven’t followed a series week by week since the X-files, and even then it didn’t last more than 3, or was that 4?, seasons before getting bored and giving up on it. But, since Dean admitted that his guilty pleasure was hospital soaps, I guess I can also confess I have a soft spot for Supernatural without looking worse than he does doing it. I mean, he watches it for the cute nurses and I watch it for the hot guys in it, or at least in the beginning I did, which is understandable, but I still think I get better entertainment value by doing so.

I was vaguely aware of Supernatural thanks to a couple of friends who are fans of the show, or the actors/characters, whatever, but I haven’t bothered to watch it until this fall. One late night a Supernatural episode was on, the remote was running out of batteries, so I thought to leave it on until I fell asleep. It wasn’t even a good one, Metamorphosis from the 4th season, it was unusually gory for me and that usually puts me off. Still, I stoically watched it till the end and the last scene kinda paid off and made up for less enthralling parts. The second episode I watched was Monster Movie, the one shot in black and white. Very good direction and photography, but again not exactly my cup of tea especially since it had vampires and none other than Dracula himself. At this point I decided it was not worth losing my good night sleep over it.

Moving on to a few days later… this time it was the two parts angels episodes, quite a change from the previously watched ones. I watched them and I was hooked. That caused a logistical problem because it was already middle of season 4 and I came to the realization that I missed a lot and it wasn’t going to work. So this led me to following steps to fix the problem: 1. find all seasons’ episodes and 2. watch them. I’ve gotta say I was very busy the entire month of October, but with a lot of stubbornness and determination, you know me, I managed to catch up with the show, including the new episodes recently aired.

As a general conclusion, season 1 & 2 are rather average and not exactly memorable, though the quality of the show is increasing as we go until things start to heat up by the middle of season 3 and sky rocket from there. Season 4 was quite, let’s quote Dean, awesome actually, the best so far. Season 5 still hasn’t had me convinced as it seems to have returned to the monster of the week routine, which I don’t appreciate at all, but it does have two of the best episodes ever. And this brings us to the reasons of this post… this was one long introduction, I know.

Episode 8, Changing Channels. Now this episode is somewhere at the top of the best comedy episodes list, probably as good as Yellow Fever. It spoofs several TV shows, some old, some new, and since I said I don’t follow TV series I don’t doubt I missed a few things, but I was familiar enough with them to enjoy the experience as a whole. Enjoy is not the right word for it really. The whole thing was absolutely hilarious, from the bright green set of a sitcom filmed in front of a live audience, to the opening credits, the Incredible Hulk mention, the hospital drama, Japanese game show, false medical commercial, criminal procedure and KITT’s appearance. The list of funny moments, facial expressions and spot on delivered lines could continue for a long time because there is no pause, no stop to breathe… until one point towards the end when things get serious again so much that it makes you wanna hold your breath and see what happens next.

But let’s not forget that this is a Trickster episode, the playful demi-god introduced in Tall Tales, in which he makes the Winchester brothers fight with each other, and who reappears in Mystery Spot, where he kills Dean again and again… and again. So no wonder the boys remember him and they don’t do it fondly at all. Like we’ve learned in the previous two episodes, things start by being lots of fun, well, maybe not for the boys but definitely for the viewers, only to turn dramatically serious, and close to deadly towards the end.

The revelation regarding the Trickster being the archangel Gabriel was totally unexpected and possibly a bit too much. It’s hard to imagine Gabriel being the playful hedonist guy with a sweet tooth who can bend reality in any way he wants. I initially found the character annoying, but after repeated appearances I sort of got used to it and disliked it less. He certainly keeps the boys on their toes and the verbal confrontation between him and Dean at the end was very powerful. Some truths were said there, and I especially liked the way Dean commanded the whole thing and his determination not to let the powerful ones have it their way but make his own destiny. It remains to be seen if he made any impression on Gabriel with his speech and if he managed to get him on their side.

It was a bit surprising to discover that Sam still doesn’t realize how wrong he used to be with his behavior towards Dean, and that’s also underlined during the Japanese game show and possibly that’s why he got hit in the nuts as punishment, and he also doesn’t care for morals and wants to sideline with the enemy in hope to win the war and stop the apocalypse. One would think he should have learned something by now. On the other hand I saw people commenting on the answer given by Dean during the same Japanese game show and concluding that he resented his brother for their parents’ death. I think things are much simpler than that. It’s an undeniable truth the fact that if Sam hadn’t existed there would have been no reason for their parents to be killed and Dean is not known for hiding around the bush but telling things the way they are, so he did. It doesn’t mean he holds a grudge against Sam for something he’s not responsible of. Of course, hearing Dean starting to speak Japanese out of the blue was one of the highlights of the show for me along with Sam operating procedure in the surgery room.

Random giggle or ROFLMAO moments:

* Dean: I’m gonna need a bigger mouth. (while looking at the giant sandwich he’s just made for himself)

* Dean: Son of a bitch! (that was priceless)

* The boys riding the tandem bicycle.

* Actually the entire credit sequence and the soundtrack used were hilarious.

* Dean watching a medical soap opera while dressed as a FBI agent. Sam asking when he hit menopause.

* Dean asking the woman they were interrogating, and who claimed she saw the Incredible Hulk, if it was the one from the Bana or Norton movie and her replying that those movies were terrible.

* Dean going all fanboy inside the medical soap and knowing everything about everybody.

* Sam: This show has a ghost? Why! (probably because they paid Jeffrey Dean Morgan better to play the ghost in Grey’s Anatomy than the boys’ father in Supernatural, I’d say)

* Sam repeatedly getting slapped and being called brilliant, brilliant doctor.

* There actually was a Dr. Sexy whose look reminded me of Patrick Dempsy.

* Dean having a man crush on Dr. Sexy. (not sure that was a good idea to put it in the show, now we’ll never hear the end of it.

* Dr. Sexy: Doctor.
Dean: Doctor.
Sam nods and Dean slaps him from behind.
Sam: Doctor.

* Trickster: Heelloooo! (points at his face)

* Dean: It’s a guilty pleasure. (after having previously stated he’s not a fan of the show)

* Sam: I don’t know how to use any of this crap.
Dean: Well, figure it out! (lying on his stomach on the operation table with a bullet in his back)
Sam: OK, I’ll need a pen knife, dental floss, sewing needle, and a fifth of whiskey. (it worked!)

* The lady doctor touching the window with her hand and mouthing “I love you” after Sam is done operating on Dean’s back.

* Sappy elevator music used during the entire hospital segment.

* The use of seriously up to nausea. Seriously!

* The faces Dean makes during the Nutcracker Japanese game show, especially when Sam gets kicked in the nuts.

* Castiel bursting in and being sent away in a flash with the Japanese host commenting that Mr. Trickster doesn’t like pretty boys angels.

* Dean speaking Japanese. The face he makes when he realizes he’s won the game.

* The faux genital herpes commercial. Enough said.

* Return to the sitcom with the same “Son of a bitch!”

* The boys wonder how long they have to keep doing this. Sam says maybe forever and that they might die in there.
The audience laughs.
Dean: How was that funny?! Vultures…

* Castiel getting his ass kicked again. (frankly his presence was pretty much unnecessary during the entire episode, dunno why he bothered)

* The boys show up at a crime scene wearing black suits, blue shirts and dark sunglasses, at night.

* Dean: I'm wearing sunglasses at night. You know who does that? No talent douche bags.

* Dean: I hate that we're in a procedural cop show, and you want to know why? Because I hate procedural cop shows. There's like 300 of them on television, and they're all the freakin' same. It's like, 'Oooh, a plane crashed here.' Oh, shut up!"

* The boys taking off their glasses and putting them back on and crossing the police line are hilarious. The rest of the scene is so cheesy it’s hard not to laugh. I didn’t recognize the shot with the stake stabbing the heart, it didn’t seem to fit, so I’m assuming it’s from CSI: Miami. If that show is anything like this then it’s one crappy show.

* Day-Z motel sign.

* Sam and the Impala merging together to produce the KITT car.

* Sam: Um, Dean… that’s really uncomfortable. (while Dean has his hands in the trunk… sigh, I wish the producers didn’t listen to a certain part of the fans and stopped inserting hints like this. We’ll never hear the end of this either.)

* Sam: Should I honk? (while Dean is calling the Trickster)

* Dean: Nobody's going anywhere until Sam has opposable thumbs.
Trickster: What's the difference? Satan's going to ride his ass one way or another.
Sam gets out of the car and rubs his behind.

* Dean: You might say we pulled it out of Sam's ass. (referring to the holy oil they used to trap the Trickster in a circle)

* Dean: Well, call it personal experience, but nobody gets that angry unless they're talking about their own family.

* Trickster/Gabriel: You don't know my family. What you guys call the Apocalypse, I used to call Sunday dinner.

* Gabriel: How’s the search for Daddy going? Let me guess, awful. (asking Castiel)

* Dean: Don't say I never did anything for you. (then he pulls the fire alarm which turns on the sprinkler and releases Gabriel)

* Dean: Right about now, I wish I was back in a TV show.

Hat off to the leading actors, Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki, and the guest star, Richard Speight, Jr., they did an awesome job here.

Ending on a less optimistic note, dunno what to think about that, but Gabriel’s confession that “it's just gonna end bloody for all of us” got me a little concerned. Maybe there is no riding off in the sunset at the end, and I would really hate that. Too bad they’re doing the much anticipated body swap earlier in the season, as a writer I would save it for the big finale. At this point Dean is the only one capable to stand up to Lucifer and he’d have more chances to do it if they were inhabiting the same meat suit, Sam’s. And with a little luck, we can hope that Castiel did some improvement to Dean’s body when he pulled him out of hell so he won’t be too damaged by Michael, or maybe Sam can fight Michael off. Oh, I’d like that!

OK, I’m done, unless something outstanding happens I won’t comment again on the subject until the end of the season, and hopefully show.

Seriously!

PS. Here's a visual recap of the episode... sort of:
http://community.livejournal.com/jensenated/75020.html

Later edit: I'm still puzzled how they could come up after this brilliant episode with something such lame like the Supernatural convention one. I'm almost embarressed I took the time to comment on Changing Channels for a change. Maybe next week things will pick up again. Sigh.

Friday, November 6, 2009

2009 Cup of China

2009 Cup of China
Beijing, China
29.10.2009 - 01.11.2009

Men

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Nobunari ODA

JPN
239.5811
2Evan LYSACEK

USA
232.1732
3Sergei VORONOV

RUS
220.3923
4Samuel CONTESTI

ITA
207.8544
5Yannick PONSERO

FRA
195.1266
6Stephen CARRIERE

USA
195.0875
7Chao YANG

CHN
189.9988
8Kevin REYNOLDS

CAN
188.47117
9Jinlin GUAN

CHN
187.9559
10Denis TEN

KAZ
182.63910
11Armin MAHBANOOZADEH

USA
176.531211
12Ming XU

CHN
163.571012


Ladies

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Akiko SUZUKI

JPN
176.6641
2Kiira KORPI

FIN
163.2723
3Joannie ROCHETTE

CAN
163.1872
4Rachael FLATT

USA
157.7155
5Mirai NAGASU

USA
155.3816
6Carolina KOSTNER

ITA
154.1837
7Fumie SUGURI

JPN
145.9968
8Diane SZMIETT

CAN
144.28114
9Yan LIU

CHN
132.8089
10Beatrisa LIANG

USA
131.39910
11Bingwa GENG

CHN
121.201011
WDBinshu XU

CHN
12


Pairs

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Xue SHEN / Hongbo ZHAO

CHN
200.9711
2Dan ZHANG / Hao ZHANG

CHN
186.4942
3Tatiana VOLOSOZHAR / Stanislav MOROZOV

UKR
170.7923
4Meagan DUHAMEL / Craig BUNTIN

CAN
157.6054
5Lubov ILIUSHECHKINA / Nodari MAISURADZE

RUS
153.3037
6Huibo DONG / Yiming WU

CHN
146.4965
7Amanda EVORA / Mark LADWIG

USA
140.3276
8Vanessa JAMES / Yannick BONHEUR

FRA
134.778


Ice Dance

FPl.NameNationPointsCDODFD
1Tanith BELBIN / Benjamin AGOSTO

USA
194.51111
2Jana KHOKHLOVA / Sergei NOVITSKI

RUS
180.57223
3Federica FAIELLA / Massimo SCALI

ITA
179.92332
4Anna ZADOROZHNIUK / Sergei VERBILLO

UKR
158.09646
5Alexandra ZARETSKI / Roman ZARETSKI

ISR
156.86475
6Kaitlyn WEAVER / Andrew POJE

CAN
151.87594
7Xintong HUANG / Xun ZHENG

CHN
151.40857
8Madison CHOCK / Greg ZUERLEIN

USA
149.17768
9Xiaoyang YU / Chen WANG

CHN
137.76989

Sunday, November 1, 2009

First Step of Getting Published

So I'm getting published. No, it's not a novel. As it happens I haven't written that one yet. It's a short story, really short, called "The Souls of the Trees".

For over a year now I've been a member of Atelier Kult, an on-line literary workshop. Like I mentioned in a previous post, I'm not one of the most active members, I've only got three stories posted there and they are not even my best ones. I received some good advices there, critics and praises, and I got insulted for my own critics. Oh, well... Let's just say it was an interesting experience.

About four years ago a selection of texts was published as a fantasy anthology and now they want to repeat the experience. Imagine my surprise when last month I was contacted regarding one of my stories, which they wanted to include in the new anthology. The title is "Dancing on Mars and Other Fantasy Stories" and mine is just one out of 19 stories. The poor thing will get lost among them, though I've read most part of the others and it won't be in such bad company, considering the fact that they are all new aspiring writers.

The book is announced here on the publisher's blog, and it can be seen and ordered here. No detailed description available so far.

What freaks me out a little is how easily it happened, especially without me having to put too much effort into it. I remember when I turned 28 I promised myself I would give myself two more years of writing whatever silliness I felt like doing, and then I would seriously focus on writing. Two years later I had one story published in an on-line magazine, the same story won an award later on, and now another story is about to be published on paper this time. Who would have thought? Definitely not me. I mean, I've always known I would write and publish someday, but not so soon.

Hmm, I guess it's time to go back to work and start on a new story. The theme is imposed but there's no word limit. Yey, happy me! I'll let you know how it went in three months.