blog@tinla http://blog.tinla.com/ Recent articles at blog@tinla en-gb Thu, 12 Nov 2009 12:00:02 GMT Where am I going to get enough Nail Varnish for this lot? Mia preping the conkers

]]> http://blog.tinla.com/article/21913.html http://blog.tinla.com/article/21913.html Thu, 01 Oct 2009 17:53:50 GMT Finally finished the kitchen reminded the other day that I've finally finished the kitchen rebuild, last mentioned here way back in May. Here is a photo of how it looked back then:

And here is how it looks now:

I dithered about for months because this was the one part of the design that had to be constructed from offcuts and blank sheets without a plan. Even though we'd massively altered some of the other cabinets to get them to fit our needs it seemed a lot trickier when it was a creation and not an alteration. There was also a lot of debate about hinges, because the door had to open into a wall. It turned out to be a lot easier than expected, and was yet another great excuse for family fun with the circular saw.

I guess I may as well throw in a messy photo of my other recent sawing product - a new "floating" desk for the office. I really need to stop going to IKEA... I genuinely hate the place and yet I keep buying stuff which can only encourage them.

]]> http://blog.tinla.com/article/21831.html http://blog.tinla.com/article/21831.html Sun, 27 Sep 2009 10:55:22 GMT 3D Video Idea 1 Just something I've been playing with. I have a vision for some kind of 3D rendered video mosaic, at the moment I'm raytracing it which is probably total overkill and a much faster render would do. But I like it in an odd way.

]]> http://blog.tinla.com/article/21528.html http://blog.tinla.com/article/21528.html Sat, 12 Sep 2009 10:03:24 GMT Loebeat Remix - Unruly Loebeat recently made a number of MP3 tracks available via their website. I decided to remix one of the tracks, Unruly, and take it in an altogether less 'pop' direction. The result is pleasing to my ear, and possibly not to many others ;)

And this is the even more insane video remix. I've mangled a Loebeat tune, 7000 photos of Salford and the intro from an 80's TV Classic into this tirade of oddness. Warning - massive filesize and tricky for some computers to play.

]]> http://blog.tinla.com/article/20386.html http://blog.tinla.com/article/20386.html Fri, 17 Jul 2009 18:24:04 GMT Kraftwerk at the Manchester Velodrome. MIF 2009. Kraftwerk were back in town last night as part of the Manchester International Festival 2009. They performed a lightly breathed upon version of the same show we were treated to back in 1994, the message of the day being "don't mess with a winning formula". Staging the performance at the Manchester Velodrome allowed the band to be joined by the GB Olympic Cycling team as they performed their classic track Tour de France, a classic meeting of music and man machine.

March 2004, Manchester Apollo
Kraftwerk Manchester Apollo 2004

July 2009, Manchester Velodrome
Kraftwerk Manchester Velodrome 2009

The new 3D visuals used during the second half of the performance.br> Kraftwerk Manchester Velodrome 2009

]]> http://blog.tinla.com/article/20103.html http://blog.tinla.com/article/20103.html Fri, 03 Jul 2009 07:13:16 GMT Photographs by Mia

]]> http://blog.tinla.com/article/19322.html http://blog.tinla.com/article/19322.html Fri, 22 May 2009 12:49:38 GMT SoundManager 2 Support I have added some a basic SoundManager2 macro to the colablog engine. To use it you need to ensure that you have the following lines somewhere in the HEAD block of the site template:

<link rel="stylesheet" href="http://blog.tinla.com/bin/sm2/sm2-custom.css" />
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://blog.tinla.com/bin/sm2/sm2-custom.js"></script>

and then just use the following macro wherever you want a player to appear:

<cb mp3withpreview::/path/to/file.mp3|/path/to/100x400-preview-image.jpg>

The marcos work like a playlist, when one finishes the playback automatically progresses to the next one. With any luck you get something like this when the macro(s) get expanded:

I know you'll love those sweet JPOP beats, according to wikipedia Genki Rockets (元気ロケッツ ?) is a hybrid band made up of unnamed musical artists. The face of the group is 18-year old Lumi, a fictional girl who was born in space on September 11, 2037 and has never been to Earth. Now thats my kind of band.

]]> http://blog.tinla.com/article/19222.html http://blog.tinla.com/article/19222.html Sat, 16 May 2009 19:04:48 GMT Converging Wii Bowling Scores
But maybe she has me psyched me out? What else could explain my plummeting scores? Soon we'll be meeting in the middle ;)

Mia playing Wii Bowling

Mia playing Wii Bowling

]]> http://blog.tinla.com/article/19156.html http://blog.tinla.com/article/19156.html Tue, 12 May 2009 19:15:07 GMT New Kitchen Anyone still checking this blog for updates has probably been wondering what has happened to me. The exciting excuse I have to offer (the most recent excuse at least) is that I've been distracted by an on-going kitchen fitting project. And if you don't think thats exciting then brace yourself for the inevitable photo compilation.
Our old kitchen was perhaps the only part of our house that genuinely annoyed us. It didn't have the space we needed. It was shabby.We disliked the colour. etc. etc. And even worse - it was hard wearing and refused to ever break in any meaningful way. Over Easter we finally snapped and decided to replace it.
We did a lot of shopping around and speaking to suppliers. They were pretty much all terrible. Some had good points - like B&Q's great hand-holding design service - but then they all ended up blowing it with crazy pricing and ludicrous 6 week lead times. Call me unreasonable but I almost never by anything unless I get my hands on it within a day or two. I've spent too long working with computers, where anything you can dream of can be shipped to you within 24 hours, to go back to accepting massive lead times. Add to that the instability in the market and you're highly unlikely to find me giving a glorified logistics company like B&Q such a long credit line.
If you go back to the basics you quickly come to the conclusion that a kitchen is a bunch of cheap pseudo-wood boxes with fancy doors hung on them. And no-one does cheap pseudo-wood better or cheaper than IKEA... and they have the whole lot in stock. If you want a solid wood kitchen to last 50 years then go elsewhere, but compared to rest of the competitive end of the market they're a breath of fresh air. They had everything in stock except for a couple of panels which we collected the next day. Superb. And they even let a loony like me run this lot through the express self-checkout (15 items or less) aisle ;)
You may also notice that the photo above contains 3 IKEA picture frames, an IKEA lamp, an IKEA rug and an IKEA sideboard (there is another one out of shot, along with an IKEA armchair, some more frames and probably a lot more stuff besides.)
So I just want it on record that I -hate- IKEA. I really like some of their products and their pricing can be compelling. But in their physical form of big blue boxes full of crowds of hellish people ... well that I hate.
The first job was to go a little crazy with the hammer, crowbar and saw. We cunningly managed to cling on to a working cooker for a few extra days by sawing the worktop into pieces with the hob and gas pipes still in place.
The wall mounted pipes were very annoying and required every floor unit to be modified in some way. This was especially tricky with the fancy carousel corner cupboard, but at the end of the day the trusty circular saw has ways of making things fit. Some minor changes were needed to the electrics to accommodate some new units and lights, it was all pretty easy if a bit time consuming.
Cutting the new worktops was one of three jobs for which I sought professional help. You need a proper guide (which is fairly expensive) a good router and a bit more confidence than I could muster. Getting them cut to properly knit together, fit the walls (which weren't square) and take the sink and hob was money well spent. I'd have undoubtedly destroyed at least one length of worktop trying to get it right.After they'd been cut it was fairly easy, but very fiddly, for me to fit everything to the units.
Professional helper number two was our friendly neighbour the plasterer. Doing the plastering after fitting the worktops was something we did because we were waiting for a gap in his scheduled work, but it actually turned out well.
While the plaster dried (the slowest part of the build?) I fitted the sink and redid all the under-sink plumbing. This was the most frustrating part of the project, and the only job I did where I had to re-buy parts and change my plan. Consumer "no solder" plumbing supplies are only just good enough to do the job they're sold for. My experience is that if you don't get it correct first time then you're better off binning them and starting again with replacements, or you'll never get a proper seal. Still, after a lot of messing about I now consider myself a master plumber and I even repaired a long standing low-pressure problem with our garden tap while I was at it.
Next came the paint. Not a lot to say about this... we went for white. Exciting stuff.
On the home straight, the wall cabinets went up in a single evening. Mind bogglingly simple compared to the base units. By this point we also had a working hob again, thanks to our final professional helper - a gas fitter.
And finally we're just about done. We have lights, we have plinth. We have the little wooden lip that goes around the floor. There are handles. And worktop matching upstands running around the wall. And a funky glass splashback. Yippee. All the tools are back in their boxes and you can make food without wading through sawdust. Happy days.
Most of the remaining jobs are fairly simple like replacing the face-plates on all the sockets and switches. The only significant bit left is making a nice new gloss box for the boiler.. we bought some extra panels (in the white) from IKEA for the job. Something for me to look at in a couple of weeks, when the family's sawdust aversion has died down a bit.
All in all this was a pretty simple build. It took 20 days from start to finish, which was longer than I'd expected but I can't complain as I hardly killed myself trying to get it done. If I'd booked workmen (rather than just phoning round neighbours and neighbours' friends asking for free time) then I'm sure it could have been done in a couple of weeks without too much stress. The average installation quote we had was something like £1800 to £2000 (with a 6 to 8 week lead time), lets just say that I'm very happy that I gave it a go.
]]> http://blog.tinla.com/article/19058.html http://blog.tinla.com/article/19058.html Wed, 06 May 2009 20:50:36 GMT Making a Rubens' Tube Rubens Tube

Recently Ramdaq, Dicey & I were chatting about various ways to visualise music. The conversation passed through lasers and smoke and finally settled upon flames. I suggested a classic physics experiment and sensory overload all rolled into one... the Rubens' Tube.

A full write-up of this project can be read on Meejah.com.

Music - "Girl, Let Herself Go" by Ramdaq ft. Claude Boogie

]]> http://blog.tinla.com/article/18251.html http://blog.tinla.com/article/18251.html Mon, 23 Mar 2009 13:43:28 GMT