Animoe

Meishi

2012-05-25T10:35:00.000-06:00

Meishi (名刺) is the Japanese word for Business Card. I have collected many business cards but only a few of them had really caught my attention to keep.

Here are some of the meishi from blogger friends that I have met and from some anime conventions I had attended.

I still have some of my cards featuring Konata with me but Im planning to make new presentation cards soon. Do you have a meishi to exchange with me?

Japanese people care a lot about meishi. Here is a video, explaining the proper way to exchange business cards in Japan. Do you use this kind of etiquette for business?

We are in Winter!

2012-05-19T10:05:00.001-06:00

Yeah, It's the rainy season over here. That means you should carry an umbrella under your arm every time you go out, but there are plenty of reasons to love the wet season, like the following images for example.

Omake shot > Ika Musume playing with her umbrella.

Mirai Stereogram

2012-05-11T09:59:00.000-06:00

Reviewing Wikipedia, a stereogram is any image that, through one of several techniques, is able to convey the experience of three-dimensionality. Basically is an optical illusion usually observed by allowing the eyes to focus behind the image (diverge) to create the illusion of depth (3D) in a 2D image.

Fooling aroung with stereograms, I have the next challenge for you following these simple rules:

Stare for several minutes the following image.
Allow your eyes to glaze and your mind to start questioning reality.
Start seeing things that are not really there!

What do you see? (The answer is below.)

Give up?

For the faint-hearted, here is what you should see:

Yeah! Its Mirai Suenaga, the main mascot of DannyChoo.com site.

If you want to know more about Mirai-chan, you can click in this link. If you want to make your own stereograms to impress your friends, you can visit this site http://www.easystereogrambuilder.com/

Update: By mistake I've previously uploaded the wrong stereogram but it is corrected now. Thanks to Facebook friends Kevin and Curtis for let me know.

Last Day in Rio

2012-05-09T09:53:00.000-06:00

Last batch of pictures from my trip to Rio de Janeiro. In my last day I briefly went to the last "Bloco" in the streets.

I will be missing the views of Rio de Janeiro. :(

I also went to Shopping Rio Sul. One of the biggest mall centers from here.

Kagami made cute friends in the mall.

Mcdees Time! The word "Sorvetes" is the portuguese for "Ice Cream". In my staying in Rio I almost ate a Casquinha by day. (a vanilla ice cream cone).

Hugo, Titanic 3D and Jack & Jill movies were presenting at the cinema.

One cool thing this mall has is an Ice Skate track in the last floor.

In my last afternoon, I went to watch a football play at Stadium João Havelange. It was the final match for the Carioca Cup between Vasco da Gama and Fluminense, two of the major soccer teams from Rio.

I bought my ticket to be in the Fluminense side. This was the entrance.

Brazilians are really fans of soccer.

Cute Fluminense Fan girl .

For the night.... Lapa 40 Degrees, one of the modern night dance restaurants with Samba live music.

There is more of the pictures (not visible here) available at my Flickr collection here.

Hangin' around at Ipanema Beach

2012-05-05T13:00:00.001-06:00

This is my first Time Lapse video. I shoot it during 15 mins at Ipanema Beach in my trip at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

For the uninitiated, Time Lapse photography is a technique were you take a bunch of consecutive pictures with your camera for a long period of time to produce a scene of just seconds.

It took me about 312 pictures, each of them taken at 5 secs intervals to produce 10 secs aprox. of video.
You can see some flickering. Well It is because I wasnt using a Tripod and wind had something to do.
For future time lapse projects and smoother videos reduce the intervals to 3 secs.
The software I used was FFMpeg to convert all the pictures into one AVI video. Then used Camtasia to add the first theme black screen and music. (Probably Adobe Premiere has more options and could handle it better).

Drossel Power Light

2012-05-01T11:32:00.000-06:00

In a previous post, we had Disco Drossel photoshoot and guess what? Since then Drossel got a new super power... The Power of Light!!

She has now the ability to handle light to her taste...

... and even to change its color.

Beware Drossel's Power beam. She is still learning to use it.

Drossel's fury is high voltage!

Nendoroid Merissa was trying out her powers too.

If you are wondering, for this photoshoot I used a technique called Light Painting.

This is the setup I used. Very simple right?

You will need a camera, a light source (I used my cellphone), a tripod and your figures.

Set up your camera to a low exposure setting and turn off the light. I used an exposure of 10 seconds (15 will work too) and a ISO of 100.

And the final result goes like this...

It was my first time with this photo technique so I did many trial and error shots.

Merissa is an angel. She has a halo, see?

You can check out my flickr stream for more pictures.

Fort Copacabana & Nautical Museum

2012-04-28T11:46:00.000-06:00

Sorry for the lack of posts in blog. I had a rough week, full with meetings and stuff to do. This time I uploaded some pictures of Fort Copacabana and Rio's Nautical Museum from my week in Rio de Janeiro. More pictures after the jump.

These canyons are huge!!

The Fort of Copacabana is located in a cape that divides Copacabana beach and Ipanema beach.

In the Nautical Museum there are a lot of ship and vessel models.

Want to see more pictures? Check out my Flickr collection.

Tomoe Mami

2012-04-22T18:48:00.001-06:00

From anime show Puella Magi Madoka Magica (魔法少女まどか☆マギカ) one of my favorite characters is Mami Tomoe. I like her because she has... BIG guns! Lol. Have you folks seen the show? Anyone else is Tomoe's fan?

Who is your favorite Madoka girl?

Omake Shot:

Source of the images: yande.re

Disco Drossel

2012-04-19T16:23:00.000-06:00

Inspired in blogger friend Kodomut post, I made up a Disco Drossel photoshoot.

The one leg dance.

Used my laptop screen to simulate the disco dance floor. More pictures in the Disco Drossel photostream in flickr.

Guess who joined to the dance...

...Merissa Seraphy!!

Any dirty dance ahead??

Rio's Zoo & National Museum

2012-04-16T10:14:00.000-06:00

Looks like I still have some pictures from my trip to Rio de Janeiro. This time I went to Jardim Zoológico (Zoo Garden) and National Museum.

Which animal is your favorite when you go to the Zoo?

It was a very hot day. No wonder why this Brown Bear had a little splash down the water.

Monkey business. Please don't feed the animals.

Tropical penguins!!

The National Museum was established in the former house of the Rio de Janeiro Emperor and it is run by Universidad Federal de Río de Janeiro (UFRJ). It is located just in front the Zoo Garden.

The museum has a bone collection of dinosaurs and many stuffed birds. The same reason why some locals know the museum as "House of the Birds".

Door detail of the main Gate of the former Imperial Palace. More pictures are available at my flickr Set.

Maracana Stadium

2012-04-13T11:12:00.000-06:00

The Estádio do Maracanã (Maracana Stadium) is one of the most important and historic stadiums of Brazil. The official name of the Stadium is Estádio Jornalista Mário Filho.

View of some of the original blue prints stadium project.

Actually the stadium is under modernizations for the FIFA 2014 World Cup football games so there isnt too much to see this time.

Funny thing, some workers had free time to funny around for the picture. ^_^

Zico.

Is this statue giving us the finger?

Nearby the Stadium there is a Aquatic Park.

More pictures in my flickr photostream

Rio - Day 6

2012-04-10T20:29:00.000-06:00

Some assorted pictures from day 6 in my past trip to Rio de Janeiro. More picturo es of this particular day and from my trip are available in the Week of Rio flickr collection.

I spent this day some time in the Ipanema and Leblon beach and some walks in downtown.

My transport around the "Cidade Maravilhosa" (wonderful city) was generally bus and subway. I try to avoid taxis, first because you dont get a full taste of the city you are visiting and second it may be a little insecure or expensive for a ride.

Here the subway is called "Metro" and there are some entry pre-paid cards you can buy to get on the subway. Upper picture is an electronic refill cabin for your metro card. You can also check the balance of the card.

Metro station. Looks very modern but not all stations look the same way. This is the "Cidade Nova" (New City) station. Very close to Maracana Stadium (will make a post about it).

Cidade Nova-

Shopping Leblon. A very huge an cool shopping mall.

Inside there was guess what? Yeah, a Starbucks coffee!

Kagamin with me in the restoration area, er, I mean in the food court. ^_^

Omake shot:

While walking in the city I just spotted the Google maps Street View car.

Misaki Mei

2012-04-06T17:03:00.002-06:00

Moe image gallery featuring Misaki Mei from anime show Another (アナザー). Mei is a beautiful isolated school girl who has an eye patch in her left eye. More pictures of her after the jump.

Have you seen "Another"?

Omake shot:
Mei in a red casual outfit.

Source of the pictures: zerochan.net (mostly).

Swimsuits gallery #2

2012-04-04T07:24:00.002-06:00

Swimsuits! Swimsuits everywhere! Summer holidays start today and it's already hard to choose between all cute girls in swimsuits. I don't know if I can keep my sanity.

Thank God Summer is here!!

I love thisFate and Nanoha image a lot.

What girl will you take to the beach with you?

source of the images: Yande.re (previously imouto.oreno.com)

Majutsu-Con 2012

2012-04-01T16:29:00.002-06:00

Photo review of Majutsu-Con, an Anime, Manga, Comics Convention. Up we have the gang from Death Note. More pictures after the jump.

Loved this cosplay a lot of Sakura and Syaoran from Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle.

Cool to see a cosplay of Mei Misaki from Another (アナザー) anime show.

Jin and Fuu from Samurai Champloo.

Cute maid cosplay girl. :)

Shiryu and Athena from Saint Seiya - 聖闘士星矢(セイントセイヤ)

Shuffling with LMFAO!!

Any Yugi-Oh Fans out there? I bet there will be now.

More pictures available in my Flickr photostream.

Pão de Açúcar

2012-03-29T19:26:00.000-06:00

More pictures from my trip to Rio de Janeiro - Brazil. Sugarloaf Mountain is another icon for the city specially because the modern touristic cable car service they have.

This is the land station. There are two more stations.

Once in the first station there is an Heliport for tours of the city by helicopter. Too bad I didnt know and I didnt had enough money for a 5 mins trip.

Part of the view of the city you can get in the mountain.

A view of Copacabana beach from Sugarloaf mountain.

Restoration point in second station.

Christ the Redeemer

2012-03-22T16:36:00.000-06:00

The main turistic attraction in Rio de Janeiro is Christ The Redeemer, a statue of Jesus Christ located in Corcovado mountain in the Tijuca Forest National Park. The statue is one of the New 7 Wonders of the New World.

Another of the New 7 Wonders I have visited is Machu Pichu ruins in a previous trip. See post for related pictures.

The Christ is located at 700-metre (2,300 ft) and to get there there is a train service station.

Close up picture of the head in detail.

Kagamin posed for a picture like many tourists do.

I know I had should taken the picture in front of her but I missed the chance.

And she wasn't possing at all but I couldnt resist to take her a picture.

More pictures of my trip can be found in my Rio's Flickr Set

Haruhi visits Rio Botanical Garden

2012-03-19T14:08:00.002-06:00

This is an outdoor photoshoot I did with Haruhi while visiting Rio's Botanical Garden. Enjoy the pics.

More pictures of Rio's Botanical Garden can be found in this related post.

Be carefull Haruhi! The water flow can be strong sometimes.

Doing some climbing?

See you next time!!

Rio Botanical Garden

2012-03-18T14:53:00.000-06:00

A botanical garden is a place that mantains plant collections for the purpose of display, education, research, conservation, and enjoyment. In Rio, one of the major attractions of the city is the Botanical Garden, part of the National Tijuca Forest (Floresta da Tijuca).

The main fountain of the garden depicts the central plaza.

There are some fountains where you can come over and drink fresh water.

Something cool I saw was a reserved area of the garden for a Japanese garden imitation.

Nearby Rio's Botanical Garden it's Parque Lage, (Lage Park), another park complex similar to Botanical Garden but it is smaller and maybe with less administrative attention.

The main attraction of the park is a small but cool aquarium.

More pictures are in my Flickr set here.

Konbini Friday in Rio

2012-03-16T09:08:00.000-06:00

Today I post pictures of the Konbini Friday I did in Rio de Janeiro in Pão de Açúcar convenience stores.

I saw a lot of products, mostly juices. Since I didnt know Portuguese I had to watch very closely the picture of the product to relate.

Organic Coffee. I didnt taste a single cup of coffee in Rio.

Some Portuguese words: Morango means Strawberry, Laranja means Orange, Limão is Lemon.

One flavor you dont see too much: Maracujá (Passion Fruit).

Omo washing powder

Hachikuji Mayoi

2012-03-13T20:40:00.000-06:00

From anime show Bakemonogatari, (化物語), one of my favorite (support) characters is Hachikuji Mayoi. She always carries a big pink backpack, wears a hairband, and sports ponytails.

Funny fact: She always misspells Araragi's name.

Im curious of what ítems does she carry in her backpack all the time. I think they say it in the manga or in the second season of the show but I dont know.

Source of the images: yande.re (old oreno.imouto.org)

Rio Food

2012-03-11T13:07:00.003-06:00

During my stay in Rio I ate a lot of different food. Ahead pictures of the meals and drinks I had.

Something interesting I noticed is that food is served (and charged) by Kilo. I mean by weight. Depending of how much food do you serve in your dish thats the amount of cash you will need to pay for.

In Rio there is Bob´s Burgers. A very popular rapid food chain.

Sushi in my lunch.

A very refreshing drink over here is Guaraná water. Guaraná is the fruit of a maple family plant. The most popular drink is Coca Cola, followed by Guaraná drinks.

Mcdees Time!!

KFC is not far behind. I had the chance to taste KFC served with beans. Not even over here is served like that. Does the same happens with you?

The above picture is a "Dobradinha con Feijao Branco". Basically is chicken and pork meat with white beans.

Usually my dishes cost about 15 - 25 Reals (about US$7 - US$15) plus drinks.

Peach Ice Tea.

Do you feel hungry now?

Carnaval Rio Pt. 2

2012-03-09T19:54:00.000-06:00

Second post of pictures of Rio Carnival. This time featuring Mangueira and Tijuca Samba Schools. Beware, some of the images are NSFW.

More pictures in my Flickr collection (II part). Are you a Google+ user? then click here.

Party on!!

She is pure devil...

...and she is an angel from heaven. :)

If you are planning to go to Rio next time, it would be wiser to learn to dance Samba. :)

Rio Carnival 2012 - Part 1

2012-03-06T10:17:00.000-06:00

Second day in my Rio trip was Sambodrome day. I went to see the Carnival Samba schools parade and here are some of the best pictures of the night (Part 1).

This girl was an Alice very energetic.

Some parade floats were allusive to the Dragon Chinese New Year.

Look at that woman!

Nice fantasy carnival dress.

More pictures are available at my Flickr Rio Carnival Set and in my Google+ Album.

A week in Rio - Day 1

2012-03-03T10:09:00.000-06:00

Last week I went to Rio de Janeiro for carnival holiday vacations. I was very excited for the trip. Also Haruhi, Lynette and Kagami who joined me in my adventure.

My arrival at the airport for my connection flight.

Yeay, Gate 25 with final destination Rio de Janeiro.

Total flight time from Guatemala to Rio was 10 hours.

Airline food during flight was good but dont you think they always serve too few snacks and drinks?

Customs area in International Airport of Rio. The original name for the airport is Antonio Carlos Jobim International Airport but it is popularly known by its original name Galeão International Airport.

Since I arrived at 2:00 am I had to make some time in the airport until 6:00am to get a taxi transfer to my hostel.

I thought I was the only one who would need to wait but there were others who decided to take a nap in the airport although it is forbidden but a very usual thing for early flights.

Once in Rio, the first thing I did after checkin in the hostel was to go to a "Bloco", a street carnival, in Ipanema beach.

As you can see, there was a lot of people. It was hard for me to walk around with my dSLR and take pictures.

Locals are called "Cariocas" and are very festive and friendly people. Also the girls are very beautiful, dont you think?

If you are in a hurry and need condoms these two guys will help you.

Want to see more pictures? there are more at my flickr set.