Temporal Paralysis

(I’m sorry for my 1-week delay in posting up the much needed pictures: Photobucket, in the end, served me much better than either Imageshack or Flickr, which are either slow or limited.)

AFA 2008 was a good event to test my DSLR 450D. It was also a good opportunity to get up close to the people I networked from the previous Anime Blogging Workshop. Although I didn’t manage to get more time with double, whose stature was something I find interesting, I did managed to spend time with the guys over at Team Blue, who are very kind and hospitable to let me join in their group.

This is going to be a picture-intensive post, so be prepared to get your bandwidth hammered (if your ISP plans are still tied down to volume-based subscription).

Many should’ve known that pre-registration are a joke (if you came down at 10:14 a.m.). It took me a near 10 minutes before some crew member decided that it’d be best to alleviate the queue crunch.

I wasn’t going to let that hamper my festive mood.

OK, that was too much of a crowd. So let’s move on shall we?

I realized that in pop culture, there’s a period where people are very into a certain trend, and then it fizzled out of a sudden. I feel sad for the products themselves (save the environment, save the world).

These stuff can be seen even near my office tower, which exacerbates a time where there’s so much mania for the little capsules that everyone got blinded by it. A year later, the fad died a slow death.

A certain somebody called up to me saying, "Real otakus buy figurines, not another Naruto headband." I lost who made that quote, but that make me feel dejected. Out of all the collections I have that are anime-related, no figurines grace my room. º|¯|_

I tried taking some potshots of the Gundam displays that was on display. Somebody told me about flash exposure compensation, which was some of the reasons why I see bounce cards on some DSLR cameras I see. Then again, Suntec convention hall ceilings are too high to do such things. Anyway, a hard flash is not good on cosplayers’ portraits.

It takes a good photographer to calculate the required flash settings, the aperture and shutter speed and the amount of exposure needed to make the image as clean and good as possible. That’s something that most new DSLR users will find daunting. (The idea for this event was to familiarize with my 450D).

Also, I failed a pointing particular Gundam models. I’m very daunted by such knowledge. (Then again, my good NS friend preferred the UC Gundam metaverse because the battles are more realistic than the modern contemporary "JESUS" Gundam battles.)

A lot of people commented about the same guy that cosplayed Gundam Exia back in CosFest, but this is my first experience seeing the guy in action. BTW, I heard that when Kunio Okawara found this cosplay shortly after his talk, he literally gaped his mouth big. "My Gundam….!"

*Cues in Daybreak’s Bell*

Anyway, my adventures continue inside the hall.

I managed to get a chat with one of the "security personnel", who lamented about the crowd’s incessant attempts to rail the stall to ruin. His fears were justified: some of the merchandises in the stall are really, really wanted by many fans attending the convention (sorry, I don’t dig Prince of Tennis), so it made sense to have some crowd control. This is to avoid any shoplifting and snatch theft resulting from a chaotic crowd.

e-jump would disagree with their point-of-view, probably.

I really should ask Sharon’s opinion of getting a larger booth in the next convention.

But enough of potential e-dorama, let’s continue with our story.

An exclusive Armored Core Nineball, available only on AFA’08. But there was a distraction from the staff of Toys ‘N Toys.

This may anger proponents of the 2D movement, probably. (Here’s an interesting New York Times article about something related to it.)

This might be banned in Malaysia.

‘A cute Tachikoma’ meme are nowadays dormant. (Solid State Society and 2nd GiG lose their appeal.)

Captain Harlock is LOVE! (Don’t quote that from me. I respected the character because he looks very respectable, for a space pirate I guess.)

The next stop was the cosplay section. But when I got near the area…

I can’t help but feel a bit dejected. I was hoping that the company-in-question would’ve already folded (after so much fiasco of last year), but you can’t help but harbour a grudging respect to their perseverance in bringing the level of fandom in Singapore to a higher level. At least they were trying to do something constructive: now how about stop sending those letters which aren’t going to profit anyone? (Even if the parties involved are now the correct parties, everybody knows the open secret anyway.)

OK. So enough of zetsubou*, I’m going to post 2 days worth of pictures of cosplayers.

(*In Japanese, zetsubou means "despair.")

An obligatory Naruto cosplay is asking for trouble, isn’t it? XD

OK, so in between, I tried experimenting some shots, and met a good friend I met during the workshop.

Hope you’re reading this. Hehe.

OK, so heading back to the convention again, I’m going to cover some of the events that had happened, on stage.

Mr. Kunio Okawara, nice chap, very versatile gentleman. Anyway, imagine him, and his expression when he saw that Gundam Exia cosplay.

A certain friend commented something about one of the presenters above. You’ll have to ask him for answers.

The cosplay is utter <censored>, but they did get a special prize as a consolation.

This cosplay team won the top prize. (Anyway, anyone wanna Pizza Hut orders?)

And, of course, there’s a reason why there’s a stage, and there’s a big crowd.

Obviously it’s For Ichirou Mizuki & May’n!

I would not post anymore pictures of them, because a certain someone will be very concerned. I can has legal letters?

So in short, the whole experience worked for me. I realized that there’s still more use for an 18-55 mom lens, because previously I thought that a 55-250 mm lens will also work; I prefer using bokeh as a subject isolation technique, but there are better techniques out there. I’ll gonna be prudent next time.

This also allow an opportunity to meet with some of the people who blogs in similar mindedness. I’d like to thank Gordon and Panther for giving me a chance to get along with Team Blue (Halo, anyone?). I’d also like to thank Kurogane for making that brief appearance and allowing to use you for our photoshoot. (Will only release that photoshoot to particular members).

Unfortunately, the one thing I realized where others have already known is: Name Cards! Now I have to find a name card making services to produce an identifier for others to recognise.

Again, work has prevented me from spending more time scaling back on the dark contrasts images I took. Please wait for a couple of days to get my blog posted up with lots of images.

So instead, I’d go for a standard text template and say this.

Overall, this AFA’08 is one of the best highlights in the local anime fan community. I’m expecting a lot of bloggers that I met and enjoy being in company with, to post up their images really soon. Mine’s are all too dark/too glaring. I just can’t expect much on a basic set-up of a Canon EOS 450D DSLR 18-55mm lens kit. That said, I finally took upon a chance to explore my camera a bit further (finally, I found out that by manually focus on a subject, sometimes a ‘bokeh’ can be had). I think I fell in love with some of the images I took.

I gotta take some rest. Tomorrow’s another day in life.

Actually, I’m quite busy preparing most of my pictures, as they turned out too dark for my liking. Suddenly, I need an external flash unit for my camera? OKANE! OKANE!

A 18-55mm lens kit isn’t a wide-ranging lens: I’m sure the D90 folks are having a last laugh. That said, this is my first attempt of shooting an event with a DSLR. (It was bought just in the nick of time: a few days to the event.) I was hoping I can get better shots of everything (either way, rich bastards would’ve probably gotten better equipment than mine); it’s a slow training process. Picture update’s once I gotten over this week. (Working over-time to recuperate losses over the weekend.)

Note: Suddenly I find myself outdated ‘cos, surprise, surprise, I’ve not watched any new shows for the Summer/Fall. Need better ways to sources. (Thank you, "The One That Rhymes With Fedex", now there is an increasing clamour to countersue back the companies behind the latest events.") I feel old so suddenly.

…I decided to take a stroll in Suntec City. Surprise surprise.

A group of people were seen near the entrance. I’m not quite sure why, but they do carry lots of posters. I presumed they were members of CDS, but I digress.

Packers are seen unpacking stuff inside. I probably guessed that the booths are the medium-sized companies that are vying for the anime market. We’ll see. (Rather unfortunate; the security staff told me kindly not to take any pictures because even the media isn’t here to take shots. Not that I cared.)

Which led me to take more strolls nearby.

Enter Catz In… Sesame Street?

Whoa, the last time I heard these guys, it was from a televised band competition. Name eludes my memory, though. But they sang a rendition of a rock song (again, its name eludes me, O~RU HEI~RU, DI. EMU. SHI!!!!) which went well.

Apparently it’s a children’s sale for Christmas. I walked over to Marina Square because I need to take a bus to Orchard Road for a brief stop-over. (I should’ve taken a shot of the Esplanade; oh well.)

So for the war that is coming up soon, I decided to travel in these "guns."

 
That Animax figure » is the proof that I attended Danny Choo’s workshop. Also, included in the arsenal is a tripod stand which is a pittance, unremarkably. It’s not worth the purchase for those in the know, because it doesn’t come up to an adult’s eye-level. But in my opinion, any tripod is better than no tripod.

Anyway, I did not purchased the VIP tickets to both May’n & Ichirou Mizuki concerts because, let’s face it, I’m a cheapo. (Actually, I’m broke: I spent nearly all of my money on the goddamn DSLR, which is a good investment and tool to learn with.)

See you there.

okto, or rather, Singapore, aired the first movie of the hit franchise, Evangelion 1.0: You Are (Not) Alone, on 10 p.m. Sunday, 16 November. A lot of fan community chatter expected that the television broadcast concord to the original content of the film. Unexpectedly, I have to admit I’m a new viewer to the entire Neon Genesis Evangelion franchise. (You wa shock!) Read on for my opinion of the movie, and probably, the franchise itself.

I couldn’t cared much about the oft-mentioned "symbolism" that the franchise frequently abused: replace "Rasengan" name with a Biblical reference, and all hell breaks loose. Therefore, I shall instead, take on the film as a first-time viewer.

I expect the wimp nature of Shinji Ikari to be, well, wimpy. The scale in which he wimps about, however, is tremendous. To be honest, considering the entire world lies on your hands, you would be taking serious about your job; Shinji, however, takes his job in a nonchalant fashion, as if he did not cared whether humanity and life on Earth will eventually survived or not.

Throughout the entire film, I felt agitated at both the voice acting, and the actual character’s indecisions to make solid decisions. Perhaps it was the father-child conflict, which Shinji wanted an acknowledgement from his father, to validate his existence. Maybe it was that Gendou Ikari wasn’t looking forward to having a son, and that he prefers females instead. Or it was the sense of detachment and loneliness Shinji always felt: whatever it was, I never bothered to look into the detail between the lines, because Shinji distracted my attention throughout the film’s running span.

Maybe that was because of that, it requires a second, or a third, viewing of the show in order to get the other details.

The theme of the show seemed to be confusing: was it about doing your job even if it conflicted with your wish for normalcy? Was it about recognising the deviance of the situation and accept that things happen and move on? Could it even be about the silly fawning of Ayanami Rei, which about 95% of the otaku audience that watched the show seemed to dream about?

I don’t know. I would expect the film to be good, and it did decent enough on the pacing and the flow of the story. The angels took on as a "monster of the moment" cliché, and the "introduction, prep, fight, debrief, private moment" cycle is executed, to a certain degree, in orderly fashion. It did well enough to introduce an enigma in the final scene, much like how "The Fellowship of the Ring" (pardon my lack of good movie knowledge) concluded with the quest still undone.

Of course, Evangelion 1.0, both subtly and overtly, reminds the audience that it is but a series of movies in the franchise. I could cheat and skip forward with actually acquiring the DVDs and watched the original series, but I find no motivation to do so. (The question of the perfect feminine figure that is Rei, was a part of the hate for the franchise.)

I’m not saying that the franchise sucked: if anything, I couldn’t find a reason not to watch the series. Probably it was because I was inducted into animé during the "moe phenomenon" — defined by character designs that emanate a sense of endearing from its viewers — that put me off from watching it. Even so, I still bothered to buy older shows that nobody fancy, so it wasn’t a question of a generation gap.

I think it was how the franchise concluded, and its subsequent milking of it, that finally put me off.

I would prefer to watch Evangelion if only people didn’t ramble about "How Rei must be my wife!" or "What is the Dead Sea Scrolls Apocrypha related to the pact?" As for the actual film, it finally reconnected me, to a certain degree, of what the anime community is all about, yet it also left me with a bitter aftertaste of "WTF is going on?" due to my mind trying to retch out a clearer understanding of the show. Indeed, others have call it a "mindfreak" (replace ‘freak’ with the famous expletive), I would call it "an intellectual trap."

Now I wouldn’t call it a good art, because seriously, I wasn’t really a hardcore fan of Ayanami Rei. It’s actually because I wanted to put in a picture of Rei with the moon in the background that appeared in the scene of the movie, but I am too lazy to do so.

I was reading up on the usual Xedo Defense forums when this news piece came up.

We are pleased to inform all XD members and potential members that we now have access to lawyers who are willing and interested to represent collectively those who may be in need. As those who have been issued Writs would need a lawyer anyway, it would be more cost effective if everybody shares the same lawyer.

In addition, there may be some legal funding to help those who are taking the stand. Not confirmed at this point but just to let everybody know that Odex/R&T cannot expect to walk over you simply because they think you have no resources to put up a fight against their invasion based on a technically flakey IP list.

Importantly, the lawyers who have offered to help us would have the full support of the XD research team to provide technical knowledge on the issues. This is a crucial advantage as we have known of lawyers made less than desirable recommendations to members in the previous Odexgate 2007. These are not lousy lawyers per se, but simply due to a lack of understanding about the relevant technology, and it is not reasonable also to expect a busy lawyer without the necessary background to learn all there is to learn in the days available.

So if you are on of those who have received Writs or know those who do, please help spread the message.

You are not alone.

Brilliant final line. The opposition has responded to the challenge from Rajah & Tann. Now, I am going to ask them about giving my piece of money for the legal defence fund.

The saga escalates onto another level. Now while the "official" stance was that Odex wasn’t behind the latest news, I seriously doubted that they had not done anything to facilitate it.

Basically, 4 writs of summons have been issued to the so-called "heavy downloaders." I’ve kept in touch with fellows over at Xedo Defense. There are lots of things I wished I could share, but unfortunately, I made a promise to them not to divulge any incriminating information out.

My heart goes out to the unfortunate victims. The damn saga will make the whole world think of Singapore as a dirty slit-eyed /b/-tards who make free world living a harder place to envision.

Evidently, that’s what I felt I was, when I found out the little nuggets of information that trickle yesterday.

…an animation festival has already concluded. Woe is me who missed out on it, and have to rely on a blogger to sum up the events that happened in it.

…I’ve also heard that you need to have a consistent blogging schedule, may/may not have interests in anime, and is somewhat sketchy on improving blog traffic, in order to attend/invited to an Animax-sponsored blogging workshop. It’s hosted by the "epitome of anime bloggers," Danny Choo. Entry ends on November 14, and the venue will be decided after the sponsor has confirmed the location. It’s on a Wednesday afternoon, so it’s a real incentive if it’s located somewhere near the CBD area. (That’s partly because I worked in the city district.)

So far, one anime blogger have publicly said [s]he’s invited to the event (much to the distraught of Impz — don’t worry, here’s a consolation for you).

 
Don’t worry, you’re still the "cool boy" in the eyes of SMU, anyway. がんばってね、イムプズさん。

…I’ve also heard that tickets for the May’n concert in AFA’08 have been finalized. The tickets are divided into: Diamond Passes and VIP Passes; unfortunately, the former tickets have already sold out. OTL I can forget about buying any passes at all (save for the entrance fees).

Overall, these information just exploded in front of me to realize that I might not be capitalizing on the successes of the anime scene in Singapore. okto’s Animania lineup, the success of the local anime bloggers, and the bringing in of the movers & shakers in the anime industry. I felt totally hopeless in the light of these things.