McDonald McDVision

COOL TECH

So I ordered BigMac Avatar from McDonald. The movie is pretty good. Lots of high-tech deal. Definitely see it in 3D if you can.

The McDVision is pretty frustrating. I knew that it involved card tracking of some sort, and it works. But it's not pleasant. You have to wait for the gorgeous intro to load in its entirety before you can skip it. It takes a very long time for the plug-in to load and initialize. There's no scaling the view once it's on. And the first level is too simplistic, and I'm having trouble making the Avatar moves the forward. It kept jerking backwards, you know? Makes me wish for keyboard control.

This product has all the markings of graphic artist and computer geek all over it. Flashy, splashy, and an extremely sexy piece of technology, but ranked rather low on user interface and experience. It's not a technical issue. It's a design issue. Sigh.

Dancing Pennies

FUN with MOTION CAPTURE

I was bored one day, so I decided to make a stop motion capture movie using my Nintendo DSi and Flipnote Studio, and these pennies are it. It took me about 30 minutes total to take pictures and import them, one by one, to Flipnote Studio.

Christmas Present

FUN

I got a Lego Bionicle as Christmas present, so I made a quick stop motion movie out of it using my Nintendo DSi Camera and Flipnote Studio. Just a quick 20 minutes run.

Kimchi Fried Rice

PERSONAL COOKING

My fried rice will never fail! Well, at least it won't had I remember the ingredients. Forgot about the egg. I substituted Kimchi and a slice of cheese instead.

1 cup of rice
2 KFC thigh
1 small can kimchi
1 spoon olive oil
1 spoon sweet soy sauce

Cook rice w/ kimchi in rice cooker. Shred KFC thigh. When rice are cooked, put oil in wok, put in rice and chicken. Mix soy sauce when warm. Stir. Dump in a bowl. Put slice of cheese on top. Serves 1.

Christmas Shopping

I usually would spend about $1000, but not this year. I'm holding out for a 10 Hr Touch screen Netbook w/ webcam for data entry. Pretty mighty configuration, eh? I was hoping 1 would come out this year, but no luck. On another note, Dell has a netbook with Digital TV reception, if you're looking for portable TV. Either use Windows XP or Windows 7. Skip the Vista.

I'm not shopping for a smartphone, right now, but if I do, I will give that android phone a close look. Seems like a good Apple iPhone competition.

Webcam: Logitech C250 is good, but C905 is so much better. Unsure if the face tracking technology can be disabled, since sometimes, I'd want to step aside to show a picture.

Handheld camcorder: There's plenty, but Flip Ultra has 2 hour HD model with facebook connection.

I'm tempted to get one of these 500 GB portable storage for about $100. Western Digital model should be good. 1TB drive is available if you want a desktop solution.

For backup, I use memory card, but Staples carry these cute PNY 4 GB USB swivel drive for $15 that are good for keychain/necklace/earrings accessory.

Nintendo has DSi bundle for kids (Mario) Metallic Blue and adult (Brain Age) White. These are DSiWare titles, but still a good deal. I'm tempted to get one of these. That would be the white one, since I already have Mario.

MySims Camera DSiWare Review

REVIEW

Kawaii!

Who wants to pose virtual people onto your pictures? Nobody, that's who. At least that's what I thought. Obviously, I was wrong.

When I first read the description of MySims Camera, I wondered how they could possibly do 3D poses and animation yet maintain ease-of-use and convenience. It turns out that the poses are canned, and that the animation are really on the preview only. However, it works very well. There are quite a bit of animation that you can choose from. If you look at that flying Superman pose, that's actually swimming animation. The sideways portrait is actually not supported. The rotation doesn't permit it, so only one pose is possible.

The most important thing is: Do I have fun? Surprisingly, yes I do. I don't even play Sims. I don't have any of the game. However, the character selection, even limited to 7, is terrific, and I keep smiling at the result. Therefore, it is very well worth the price of $2.

You can, of course, create a series of MySims inspired notebook. But it also functions well as a comic creator, even if you have to drag Photo Graffiti to the process. Can you take a picture of a calendar and add MySims character to it? Can you make MySims themed playing cards? Yes and yes. For two dollars? This is great!

There is also a tie-in with existing MySims games. Supposedly there will be new characters. Unknown to me is whether the poses library will also be expanded. However, as I said before, I don't play the game, and I don't have any. So the question now is, will I get MySims Kingdom or MySims Agent?

myNotebook Blue DSiWare review

DSIWARE REVIEW

I have just downloaded a DSiWare program called myNotebook: Blue by nnooo. I'm a sucker for app type DSiWare. However, I can safely say that you should stay away from this one as far as possible. This is one of those program that is poorly designed.

I'm not saying that a notebook program for Nintendo DSi is a bad idea. In fact, it is a terrific idea. However, the execution for this program is very much lacking. The music is intolerable, and the first time I turn the music off, it didn't turn off! I had to lower the volume down to 10, save, quit, and re-run the program before it will take.

There is no exit button to the DSiMenu. Huh?

Unlockable paper type: a very bad idea. Can you imagine having a word processor that requires you to use the program before it gives you "unlockable" fonts? Especially, if there's no way for you to know how to unlock it? What's the big idea?

You only get 2 paper types: Lined and Square. No blank pages?

No zoom function. I know not many people want it, but I do.

No color yellow.

Pen type: Thick and thin line is provided. 2 rather indistinguishable pen types and an eraser.

Writing on pages: This really annoys me. You have to turn the Nintendo DSi upside down for writing even-odd pages. This you MUST do EVERY SINGLE TIME! Of course, the press material says that "you CAN ..." I think there is a big difference between "CAN" and "MUST". "CAN" implies that you can use the program either left or right handed. "MUST" implies that unless you can read and write upside down, you'd better practicing turning the device often. It is the latter, and the official video either skip this info or glossed over it. In this case, "MUST" means unless you do, better accept that you'll be skipping every other pages.

No Photo import/export function.

Playing paper games? Flipnote Studio does it better!

Okay, enough ramblings. Now for the things that they should have done to make this a good offering:
1. Custom paper design: I've been photographing paper and use the Graffiti function to do this. A dedicated notebook program should be able to do the same or better.
2. Color choices: A pallette choice would be great, even if it is limited to 256 colors or even websafe colors.
3. Don't make the user flip the device on every pages! Have it shown 1-2, then 2-3, then 3-4, and so on. Trying to conform exactly as real-life paper counterpart is counter productive.
4. If you have lined pages, a typewriter (keyboard) function would be nice, and then provide fixed pitch and proportional spacing font.
5. Skip the unlockables, please.
6. Respect DSi convention by providing exit button, even if you do it via select menu.
7. Skip the nearly indistinguishable pen type, and subtitute marker capability. Especially nice with expanded color pallette.
8. Import and Export to Photo. Ability to crop picture would be a plus. You can do a scrapbook style project. A much more worthy capability than "Playing paper games (not included)" statement.
9. Playing paper games: Better provide them on your website. Like I said: Flipnote Studio does it better. Photo Graffiti not too bad either. Without ability to import custom paper type, this claim is useless. It's like claiming you can play chess by drawing and erasing playing piece. Technically, that's true, but it is very, very inconvenient.
10. Organizing note: Flipnote Studio does it better with the calendar capability. And Flipnote is FREE.

In conclusion: If you feel that I keep saying Flipnote Studio does it better a lot, then you are absolutely correct! Skip this myNotebook offering, and download Flipnote Studio instead. What's more, if you do play paper games, you can upload your games to Hatena website and share the games with a lot of other people. And yes, with Flipnote Studio, you can import from the camera, thus giving you an unlimited custom paper design.

Normally, I don't give bad review since I am of the opinion that if I think it's bad, I must have misjudged the product. However, I don't know anybody who is sane who would be willing to use this considering that it is very inconvenient to use and of limited capability. Had Flipnote Studio not exist or is much more expensive, then this may have a chance. As it is, I wouldn't download it, even if it's free.