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Comment Swiss Tony (Score 1) 1051

> Being a Kernel Developer is a lot like being a Navy Seal [...]

Being a Kernel Developer is a lot like making love to a beautiful woman. First you PEEK, then you POKE. You think you're doing great, but suddenly she tells you that you're too BASIC, and gives you a C. Treating her like an object can be a plus (or two), but if you get linked to her publicly you might have to commit. And if you fail an interrupt and some of your bugs make it into the kernel, you'll end up supporting that mistake for the rest of your life.

Comment Re:Not even 60 FPS (Score 2) 710

Not sure if you're trolling or just very ignorant.

Any good 35 mm film camera in the market can do up to 120 FPS, usually 240 (and these aren't even specialized slow motion cameras). Slow motion is far easier and cheaper to do with film than digital sensors. All you need to to is speed up the camera motor, and compensate the exposure by using higher-sensitivity film.

Comment Re:Not just video footage which suffers from 30fps (Score 1) 710

Because some idiots think the stuttering look of lower FPS gives it a more "film-like" look, which looks more intellectual.

It's even worse when the original animator rendered it at 60 fps and someone decides to change it later, because then they make the 30 fps version by deinterlacing, which means they don't just lose fluidity, they also lose vertical resolution, and you end up with something that stutters and looks pixellated or blurry.

Comment Re:Woudln't a 3D projector would pull it off easil (Score 2) 710

If you remove the polarizing filters both eyes will see both images and you lose the 3D effect (you just get ghosting). The polarizing filters (on the projectors and glasses) are what makes sure each eye only sees images from the correct projector, they're not related to the projection speed.

Alternating frames requires active shutter glasses, which are more expensive. And, indeed, that's how active shutter 3D works, but, until now, one eye was seeing the film 1/48th of a second behind the other, since the two cameras were typically in sync to make post-production easier. With 48 fps cameras, active shutter systems will finally be able to feed each eye 24 "correct" frames per second (i.e., one eye will see frame 1L, then the other eye gets frame 2R, then 3L, 4R, etc.). Of course, if they just speed up the current system, they'll be doing 96 updates per second and one eye will still be slightly behind the other (but now just be 1/96th of a second), but my point is that 48 fps cameras have an advantage for active shutter stereo 3D even if that final movie is played at 24 fps.

Comment The actual claim seems a bit dodgy (Score 1, Insightful) 296

Here's the problem with Teller's claim:

"As a direct and proximate result of such unfair competition, Plaintiff [Teller] has suffered, and will continue to suffer, monetary loss and irreparable injury to his business, reputation, and goodwill."

I give him the last one; his goodwill definitely comes out of this injured, but how exactly has Teller suffered "monetary loss and irreparable injury to his business [and] reputation" ? Teller wasn't selling a kit with the trick, so he's not going to lose any "potential sales". No one seriously believes that people planning to go see or hire Penn & Teller will change their minds and hire Gerard Bakardy instead, and Bakardy made it perfectly clear that his trick was inspired by Teller's, so there's no damage done to Teller's "reputation", either (i.e., there's no suggestion that Teller may have copied Bakardy).

In other words, this smells like a pure "copyright troll", trying to deny someone else a chance to do something similar even though that person is in no way a competitor or a threat.

Movies

Should There Be a Sci-Fi Category At the Oscars? 309

An anonymous reader writes "In this chat with the originator of the light-saber in Star Wars and the Nostromo in Alien, director Roger Christian argues that the Academy Awards needs a special category for 'best science-fiction film.' It's a thorny subject, since such a new category would inevitably either get lumped in with fantasy/horror or further 'ghetto-ise' the genre. But with 2001 and Avatar snubbed for best picture, among many others over the years, does ANY sci-fi film ever have a shot at Best Picture?"

Comment $10k for video editing? Are you from 1992? (Score 1) 635

Apple's Final Cut Studio costs $1.2k (and includes not only video editing but also DVD / BD authoring, sound mixing, compositing and muti-format compression).

Adobe's CS Production Premium costs $1.4k (and includes all the above plus Photoshop, Illustrator, and a few other well-established applications).

Avid's Media Composer costs 2.3k (that's about $2.2k for the Avid logo and $100 for the software - still slightly overpriced).

All three packages above are production-proven, well-established in the professional market, supported by most relevant equipment manufacturers, and have hundreds of high quality plug-ins available from 3rd parties. And you say you're trying to sell (unknown) "video editing software" for $10k? Good luck with that.

Even assuming you're including some high-end compositing software (not that you'd need to; After Effects has come a long way), you can get Production Premium + Nuke (or Fusion) for $6.3k, and that would give you access to both AFX and OFX plug-ins. You could even throw in 3DS Max or Maya ($3.5k) and still be under $10k.

Did this article somehow get lost in the depths of the Slashdot queue for 20 years?

Programming

Tetris In 140 Bytes 215

mikejuk writes "Is it possible to write a JavaScript program in no more than a tweet's length? A website called 140byt.es says it is and has an implementation of Tetris to prove it. Ok, it only has two types of block — hence its title "Binary Tetris" — and there's no rotate, but it works. The blocks fall down the screen and you steer them into place. You can try it out by playing the demo. Of course the real fun is in figuring out how it works and there is lots of help on the site — so if you're bored how about the 140 character challenge?"
Science

Study: Online Dating Makes People "Picky" and "Unrealistic" 630

New submitter garthsundem writes with this tale of digital love: "A newly published meta-analysis of over 400 studies of online dating (PDF) shows both its popularity (second only to meeting through friends) and its impact. More online daters report seeking a 'soulmate' online, and do so by searching through the wealth of available profiles. Unfortunately soul-searchers focus on faults, both in viewing profiles and then also once dating in person, leading to quick exits when relationships inevitably get complicated."

Comment Re:And that is why not reading TFA is wrong (Score 1) 657

Wait, so when a judge uses copyright law to protect an artist from a company trying to rip off his work without any payment or acknowledgement, that's "why copyright is wrong"...? So I guess you think that if Sony or Universal decided to rip off some indie band's songs, put together an autotuned boy band to sing them, and then sell that version without any compensation or mention of the original authors, it would be "wrong" to sue them?

I have a feeling you didn't bother to read the actual verdict or understand what this case is about (but somehow still thought your opinion would be relevant). At least I hope you didn't, otherwise what you're saying is that there's no point in trying to make a living as an artist, because any company should be allowed to copy your work and keep all the profits.

Comment What planet do you live on? (Score 1) 657

Did you even bother to read the verdict? Nevermind, it was a rhetorical question (if you had, you would know that there no connection between this case and stock photography, because the basis of the verdict isn't even the photo itself, it's mainly the artistic work done on the photo, and the events that led to the creation of the "knock-off" image).

1. Company X was using artist A's image commercially (on its products' packaging) without giving credit or paying royalties.
2. (2011 verdict) Court ordered company X to pay the artist.
3. Company X director decided to create a similar image, to avoid paying the author.
4. Company X director wasn't even able to take a similar enough photo so he photoshopped elements from an image bank plus some of his photographs (and removed people, erased the sky, etc.) to create something similar to the work of artist A, and used it in his company's packaging instead of the original.
5. (this verdict) Court rules that company X is still trying to profit from artist A's work and must compensate him.

Which part of this do you have a problem with, exactly? How do you expect "society" to punish company X through "good taste" ? How are the people buying company X's products even supposed to know that their packaging uses a knock-off version of someone else's art? Do you think Microsoft or Zynga should be allowed to copy any independent game they come across without any compensation or acknowledgement of the original authors' work?

Good taste and not lawsuits should dictate our behaviour.

What planet do you live on? Is this some sort of Hyacinth Bucket form of free capitalism? "Oh, dumping all those chemicals into that river was in such poor taste. No, Richard, don't sue the factory, let's just glare at them disapprovingly, I'm sure the people buying their products on the other side of the world will vote with their wallets and everything will magically fix itself."

Laws exist for a reason, and, if anything, this case shows that (occasionally) copyright law can still be used to protect the actual artists. I'd expect Slashdot's readers to praise the judge, but of course, for that they would have to actually read the verdict, which I guess is asking too much. It's so much easier to post self-important rants about how clueless judges are and how any verdict spells doom for mankind due to [insert totally unrelated comparison].

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And it should be the law: If you use the word `paradigm' without knowing what the dictionary says it means, you go to jail. No exceptions. -- David Jones

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