jole.ca » Personal http://jole.ca Apple, Tech Theatre, Computers and Whiteboards! Sat, 31 Jul 2010 06:40:50 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 Road Trip 2010 http://jole.ca/posts/road-trip-2010/ http://jole.ca/posts/road-trip-2010/#comments Sat, 31 Jul 2010 06:36:12 +0000 jolephoto http://jole.ca/?p=2227 How we’re going to pull this one off in 13 days I have no clue, but stay tuned for updates!

(We start off in Edmonton)

]]> http://jole.ca/posts/road-trip-2010/feed/ 0 Camp Fun http://jole.ca/posts/camp-fun/ http://jole.ca/posts/camp-fun/#comments Thu, 29 Jul 2010 06:39:59 +0000 jolephoto http://jole.ca/posts/camp-fun/

Having lots of fun at camp…

(Random sunset photoshoot at the beach…)

]]> http://jole.ca/posts/camp-fun/feed/ 0 It’s the OreoBook! http://jole.ca/posts/its-the-oreobook/ http://jole.ca/posts/its-the-oreobook/#comments Sun, 04 Jul 2010 05:45:42 +0000 jolephoto http://jole.ca/posts/its-the-oreobook/
I ordered a dead Black MacBook off eBay for a little under $200 a little while ago, and it finally arrived. I was hoping to do the following:
  • Replace my very blemished LCD backlight with a new display. The bits of standoff that broke over the years got ground into the back of the screen, creating some nasty dark spots on the screen. Since the Blackbook supposedly just got some rain on it, the display should have been fine. (It wasn’t)
  • Replace the plastic bits that are very pwn’d from 4 years of use
  • Replace the optical drive in my MacBook which has issues reading low-grade CD-Rs of all things (DVDs it’s been fine with oddly enough…)
  • Score another battery
  • Score another power adapter
  • Create an OreoBook

I wish there was a new MacBook Pro in that box…

Ah the BlackBook…

“What’s left of the power adapter”

A little dirty, but nothing a little cleaning can’t fix

Third party battery is barely used

Weird reconditioned serial # isn’t the same as on the mobo inside…

10 cycles… really? Hopefully I get some good performance out of this aftermarket little devil.

Oh dear. That’s some serious Thailand dirt in there. Have I mentioned it smells of burnt electronics and Thai food?

“A little rain on it”? ummmm wow this thing really cooked.

Solder smoke!

Found a few of these while cleaning out…gross.

The BlackBook has been beheaded!

Post vacuum…

Oh look, the Leopard Disc stuck inside the optical drive, as promised in the eBay listing!

Uh oh. Pixel pixie dust? Not good.

It’s everywhere!

I guess black pixels creates pixie dust at the bottom and top, but it clears up when you clear the screen. Not cool.

Well THIS is not a nice replacement…

I think I’ll take crappy backlight over pixie dust…

Hours later… the OreoBook emerges, with the BlackBook’s battery, display bezel/case, and optical drive, but WhiteBook’s screen.
Cute!

It wouldn’t be an OreoBook if the bottom battery weren’t black…

Yum.

Ok this thing is awesome.

Oh, did I mention I messed up the lid states? It doesn’t know when it’s closed or open. Oh well, that’s been broken for a while now anyway…

Bits of MacBook everywhere… iSight still doesn’t work either, which I may or may not fix at some point down the road.

This was a half-fun half-practical project. I realized that the real reason why I wanted a new MacBook Pro was because I wanted something that didn’t look like crap. So this gives the old MacBook a new look for a fraction of the price, and fixes a few little things along the way like battery life and optical drive issues.

]]> http://jole.ca/posts/its-the-oreobook/feed/ 3 jolemobile http://jole.ca/posts/jolemobile/ http://jole.ca/posts/jolemobile/#comments Fri, 25 Jun 2010 18:03:35 +0000 jolephoto http://jole.ca/posts/jolemobile/ Now you can spot me anywhere around town!

Service call!?

Milk crate is super practical.



Hurray for advertising!

]]> http://jole.ca/posts/jolemobile/feed/ 3 Duck Podcast: Episode 13 (in HD!) http://jole.ca/posts/duck-podcast-episode-13-in-hd/ http://jole.ca/posts/duck-podcast-episode-13-in-hd/#comments Mon, 14 Jun 2010 02:44:25 +0000 jolephoto http://jole.ca/posts/duck-podcast-episode-13-in-hd/
You may have already noticed, but the Duck Podcast has returned from it’s rather long hiatus, and it’s back with attitude! Or… High Def! Be sure to check out all the action on the official Duck Podcast website, http://duck.jole.ca.
Also, I’ve padded my YouTube account with old goodies from jolevideo, and some new stuff from my video archive. Be sure to check it out. I’ve been contemplating whether to promote jolevideo or just kill it off in favour of YouTube, since ol’ Google has certainly made progress with the popular video service over the past few years. I’ll be keeping both in service, but YouTube will be the primary public distribution area, with jolevideo being reserved for rejected videos.

]]> http://jole.ca/posts/duck-podcast-episode-13-in-hd/feed/ 0 Production: Livin’ Inside Out http://jole.ca/posts/production-livin-inside-out/ http://jole.ca/posts/production-livin-inside-out/#comments Mon, 07 Jun 2010 04:44:30 +0000 jolephoto http://jole.ca/posts/production-livin-inside-out/
Ok, so I wouldn’t exactly call this a major production in any way, but just like any show it had it’s share of interesting challenges.
The sunday school kids put on a musical at my church, and did a pretty awesome job at it. First Baptist has a great little stage in the basement as part of Jubilee Hall, but almost never gets used. A year or two ago we upgraded the sound system with a fresh amp (which I now know was kind of overkill) and the Mackie DFX•12 shown here. I wasn’t sure it was going to get used much, but the capacity would be there if a band or larger event were to ever take place. Livin’ Inside Out was clearly that event.
I imported the wireless systems from upstairs for the event, and had two of the kids wearing the lapels, which worked surprisingly well. If there isn’t much intensive dancing or anything lapels obviously work just fine. The third guy held a handheld since that’s what we had in stock. A few other soloists simply stepped up to the SM58s I setup at the front as required. (Blocking in this show was not very complex.)
At first it was tough to get the system free of feedback when using the lapels, but I soon realized that it was really just exactly 1kHz that kept ringing back, probably from the design of the room. As soon as I cut that frequency in the 5-band built-in EQ, there were no issues.
DSC_9751

QLab is always ready to go. The accompaniment CD was L/R Karaoke/Singing, so I plugged in the right channel into a stereo return which would send it mono to both L/R main mix. The disc was also “tracked” to allow jumping to particular measures in a song for rehearsal purposes, which meant a bit of manual time setup for the various cues so that they ran contiguously. I think there were still a few jerky points that iTunes Gapless Playback would have smoothened more effectively, but QLab let me focus on mixing the show and not pausing the track list before the next song.

The kids mostly just walked up to the mics for their lines/solos, and their height made for convenient placement of the stands on the floor level, which eliminated rumble noise and stage footprint.
]]> http://jole.ca/posts/production-livin-inside-out/feed/ 0 Production: ASLC 2010 http://jole.ca/posts/production-aslc-2010/ http://jole.ca/posts/production-aslc-2010/#comments Thu, 03 Jun 2010 16:31:18 +0000 jolephoto http://jole.ca/posts/production-aslc-2010/
Every year a high school in Alberta hosts the Alberta Student Leadership Conference (ASLC) that brings together students in leadership from across the province together to network and learn. I’ve been hearing about it for the past year before I even graduated, but this month the whole thing came together in what ended up being a technical bonanza.
There were three major events that required servicing: the Opening Ceremonies, the Dance later the same day, and the Closing Ceremonies. The first two were serviced by Stardust Events along with volunteers from the Harry Ainlay Tech Team, and of course me, jole.ca Technical Services. The Closing Ceremonies were held at the Myer Horowitz theatre, and was run mostly by the tech team and I, with some help from the house tech there. In all it was a pretty fun time with lots of new experiences with new people, albeit somewhat tiring and certainly stressful.
Opening

It’s the GrandMA! Bill from Stardust cues up lighting during rehearsal for the opening ceremonies. They had about four lighting stands along with a large lighting bar lighting the show, entirely composed of intelligent fixtures, both LED and traditional. Controlling the whole rig was the GrandMA Lite.

By the I arrived and finished setting up, my job was mostly done. I created the slide content, which included some quirky Dr. Seuss themed introductory slides, sponsor logos, and the video content to introduce the co-chairs/MCs and O Canada. I had Mitch (shown here) running sound out of QLab on my laptop, and got Misha to use his MacBook Pro to serve up the video for best video performance. Overall the show went off without too many issues. There was a glass breaking incidence mid-show which was recovered from well, but technically there were no major issues.

Dance

After the opening ceremonies wrapped up around 5pm, we needed to get Stardust’s equipment over to the Dinwoodie Lounge in the U of A Student’s Union building in time for the Dance that was to start at 8:45pm. We had a crew helping them get setup before 5pm, and we shifted the remaining resources over after opening finished up. Unfortunately the Dinwoodie lounge is located on the second floor, and everything being brought up had to go through a clunky freight elevator at the back of the room. It was a slow process, but we got everything up there.
The Hazer, loaded up at the Dance.

There were two sets of these, which you can imagine was incredibly fun to bring up and down the elevator.

One of Stardust’s Amp racks, apparently build in the 1980s!

Kevin claimed the fans sounded just like his server room. Figures.

A few of the 30ish LED lights that were used during the dance.
Bert, the sound guy, setting up his sound rack.
The GrandMA made it safely to the Dinwoodie, the left screen was apparently always like that.
Right before we began, there was a sudden need for Security personnel in order to obey all the University policies. I was security for a bit while some more teachers arrived.

DJ Kid Slim partied hard with about 700 ASLC kids. Most of it was run through his MacBook Pro and then out to Stardust’s sound system.

You can’t tell, but it was like 35ºC with 100% humidity in there. Some old-school lasers were setup, and started to really shine once the haze set in.

Gill & Misha take over the GrandMA for a bit and improvise with the lights.

Stardust had a media server for running projected visuals. It was Windows XP along with some proprietary software running out of a pair of NVIDIA cards. It was an interesting little setup, and one of their guys had it running pretty well, using both pre-built visuals and imported text to create the backgrounds on the fly.
After the dance wrapped up, it was a big job to get all the equipment back down and into the truck, but it was a great experience to work with a touring show company.
Closing
We had a day of rest while ASLC went on, and then there was closing ceremonies at the Myer Horowitz in SUB. Our load in was early in the morning, but when we got there we discovered that the house tech was told it would be a fairly minor event with a bit of speaking and a PowerPoint. Lights up, lights down. It was a little frustrating for all parties who needed to get setup and going before 10:45 when 700 students would come flowing through the doors.
The main components to this show was the music for dance groups, a video from the ASLC 2011 school, and a slideshow of photos from the conference. Despite being a pretty simple setup, we ended up with some major issues with audio playback.
I was setup backstage where the video hookup was, along with an audio connection. Our stage manager/director Mrs. Tran was with me, but the rest of the crew and equipment was upstairs in the booth. We rehearsed about three times with no glitches, but once we hit the first dance group at show time, we started to hit some snags.
Audio was dropping out between stage and booth, for reasons that still aren’t very clear. Although I was importing about 600 photos that were thrown at me at the last minute, jMacBook was still perfectly responsive and QLab’s playback bars were chugging along, but no audio was coming through. I unplugged and replugged the mini jack connector to make sure nothing was going on there, and even tried it with my iPod with no luck. Something was going wrong along the way.
Kevin reported later that he could hear very very faint sound coming from my source, as if “balance audio was going through an unbalanced connection” which is to say, the signal was cancelling itself leaving just a residual signal. This makes the most sense to me, because the DI box I was connected to was sitting on one of the base speakers behind the wall, and was probably getting bounced around and breaking the connection.
The house technician, in the booth, was convinced it was my laptop that was frozen, or the headphone jack that was broken, so I was left to my own devices as the rest of the show went on. A guest speaker gave us a 45 minute chance to catch up and calm down a bit, at which point we tested the signal to the mixer and it appeared fine. As a backup measure, we shuttled some of the music that was to come upstairs so that it could be played back there.
The ASLC 2011 team was next, which worked beautifully for the duration of their video portion, but at the very end when the volume jumped up and their dance group came on stage, the music quit. Again, I suspect the bass was shaking a loose connection with a bad cable or DI that broke it. As we tried to solve the situations, the dancers graciously counted down and began their dance. Many apologies to them!
For the finale, we had a slideshow which I assembled in basically 0 time with iPhoto. By this point, we were getting no sound, but since we had shuttled the music upstairs, we were able to synchronously play back the iPhoto show which was set to “fit to music duration” and the music upstairs at the same time. It worked out pretty well, all thanks to iPhoto which can create a beautiful slideshow with literally the click of a button, complete with Ken Burns and transitions.

The wall I sat against for most of the show.
In the end the CT dancers got the chance to dance after we got their music upstairs.
Summary
In all it was a pretty great experience. Non-theatre productions are always more exciting although much more stressful. When the sound was breaking up and there was very little I could do, it was a pretty powerless and draining feeling, but once the show is over you recover. In the future, I will probably insist on setting up video in the booth, or at the very least have a backup technician on-stage to help me out when it is that complex.
A great conference everyone, good work!
]]> http://jole.ca/posts/production-aslc-2010/feed/ 0 Whiteboard of the Week – 17 http://jole.ca/posts/whiteboard-of-the-week-17/ http://jole.ca/posts/whiteboard-of-the-week-17/#comments Mon, 17 May 2010 01:54:42 +0000 jolephoto http://jole.ca/posts/whiteboard-of-the-week-17/

Hurray! I remembered to publish one this week!

In this Whiteboard…
  • “Tag” (Rebecca)
  • The TI-34 (Rebecca)
  • “The Game (Rebecca)
  • A monster truck (Misha)
  • A Turtle (R)
  • A battle involving underwater canoes (Misha)
  • A TurkeyGoose™
  • Wild Kevin fighting Wild Misha, with Joel appearing to throw Pokeballs at them. (Misha…who else?)
  • An’s Pencil (An)
  • A cliff (\/)

]]> http://jole.ca/posts/whiteboard-of-the-week-17/feed/ 0 Need Web, Tech or IT? Check out jole.ca/cv! http://jole.ca/posts/need-web-tech-or-it-check-out-jole-cacv/ http://jole.ca/posts/need-web-tech-or-it-check-out-jole-cacv/#comments Mon, 10 May 2010 18:22:27 +0000 jolephoto http://jole.ca/posts/need-web-tech-or-it-check-out-jole-cacv/ I think the title pretty much sums it up. I’m looking for some work this summer, so if you have a WordPress project that needs doing, or maybe you just a good tech support guy, I’m your guy!

I put together a little page summarizing some of my previous experiences and activities, but I’m always up for a new challenge.
Check it out here: http://jole.ca/cv !
For this page, I used Fancybox which I will probably install across the board as my replacement for Lightbox. It’s a bit more compatible and the close button is way more obvious. Thanks Trevor! Also, this page will likely be the basis for a new web design for jole.ca, depending on whether or not I get some work :P
]]> http://jole.ca/posts/need-web-tech-or-it-check-out-jole-cacv/feed/ 0 Whiteboard of the Week – 16 http://jole.ca/posts/whiteboard-of-the-week-16/ http://jole.ca/posts/whiteboard-of-the-week-16/#comments Mon, 10 May 2010 02:32:50 +0000 jolephoto http://jole.ca/posts/whiteboard-of-the-week-16/
After nearly a year in absence, the Whiteboard of the Week makes its triumphant return!
In this episode, I got inspired by the guys at Twaggies, which got me to consult online sources for drawings.
  • Cornfish (courtesy Nick on FB)
  • Marmoset, Kickboxing Zebra, and The Raisins Rock Band, a funny looking GNU (courtesy Rebecca, MSN)
  • Green construction sign (intentionally green. Enviro-caution! Enviro horse!) (me)
  • Banana chocolate chip superhero, The Finding of Nemo (Nemo 302!) (An, MSN)
Hopefully I’ll do some more this summer. Have fun and keep it chill!
]]> http://jole.ca/posts/whiteboard-of-the-week-16/feed/ 0