december 28, 2006

Alsace gastronomie



Alsace is one of the great, under-appreciated treasures of the wine world. This pretty enclave of fairytale villages in the lee of the forested Vosges Mountains offers a wide range of varietally labelled wines, of which the aromatic whites are still, despite global warming, much more successful than the light reds. For much of its history, Alsace was Elsass and part of Germany. The local surnames and tall green tapered bottles reflect this, along with the dominance of Riesling and the fragrant nature of many of the wines. But unlike in Germany, traditional winemaking philosophy in Alsace was to ferment all of the grape sugar into alcohol, resulting in dry, full-bodied wines (quite different in structure from Germany's lighter, sweeter counterparts)

december 23, 2006

Uptown Lisbon



Many compact digital cameras can perform both an optical and a digital zoom. A camera performs an optical zoom by moving the zoom lens so that it increases the magnification of light before it even reaches the digital sensor. In contrast, a
digital zoom degrades quality by simply interpolating the image-- after it has been acquired at the sensor.Even though the photo with digital zoom contains the same number of pixels, the detail is clearly far less than with optical zoom. Digital zoom should be almost entirely avoided, unless it helps to visualize a distant object on your camera's LCD preview screen. Alternatively, if you regularly shoot in JPEG and plan on cropping and enlarging the photo afterwards, digital zoom at least has the benefit of performing the interpolation before any compression artifacts set in. If you find you are needing digital zoom too frequently, purchase a teleconverter add-on, or better yet: a lens with a longer focal length.

The Valley of Munster



Blogging has also introduced opportunities for a new wave of amateur film critics to have their opinions heard. These review blogs may focus on one genre, director or actor, or encompass a much wider variety of films. Friends, friends of friends, or complete strangers are able to visit these sites, and can often leave their own comments about the movie and/or the author's review. Although much less frequented than their professional counterparts, these sites can gather a following of like-minded people who look to specific bloggers for reviews as they have found that the critic consistently exhibits an outlook very similar to their own.


december 09, 2006

Birth of the river Cuervo



Although camera movements are often implemented to add excitement to shots, their best use is when new information is revealed. At the beginning level, budding filmmakers sometimes tilt and pan without the proper motivation. Camera movements can be distracting and even annoying when overused or used without a reason. Don’t use a camera movement to show that you can. Use it when you know you need it.

december 06, 2006

Dirty Dutch



A disaster film or disaster movie is a film genre that has an impending or ongoing disaster as its subject and primary plot device. Such disasters include natural disasters such as floods, earthquakes, tsunamis or asteroid collisions, accidents such as shipwrecks or airplane crashes, or calamities like worldwide disease pandemics. A subgenre of action films, these films usually feature some degree of build-up, the disaster itself, and sometimes the aftermath, usually from the point of view of specific individual characters or their families or portraying the survival tactics of different people. 


december 05, 2006

Streets of London



In the all night cafe At a quarter past eleven, Same old man is sitting there on his own Looking at the world Over the rim of his tea-cup, Each tea last an hour Then he wanders home alone So how can you tell me you're lonely, And say for you that the sun don't shine? Let me take you by the hand and lead you through the streets of London I'll show you something to make you change your mind