Category: Jobs

  • On Iwai’s Vampire and Yu Aoi’s Mina

    I just watched Shunji Iwai’s Vampire – FINALLY! – sadly, it didn’t give me any important feels about it despite the LONG wait. Not even Yu-chan’s performance, though I really think having to speak English hindered her usual scene-stealing capabilities. It also seemed Iwai was slacking around with his script, and he just dropped Mina’s role for Aoi there if she wanted it at the last minute because she’s just so damn relaxed in it.

    shunji-iwai-vampire-yu-aoi-016

    I have no feelings towards Kevin Zegers, and Iwai only used all her actresses as passersby so even Keisha Castle-Hughes (only in the beginning), Kristin Kreuk (all the way into the end) and Katharine Isabelle (somewhere in the middle for a few minuets) fans are going to be disappointed. Rachael Leigh Cook has a bigger part in the film, but plays not a very compelling character, which I think would have been a better fit for Isabelle.

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  • Ghost: New Blogging Platform

    ghost-blog-platform-dashboard

    The latest blogging revolution is coming?

    Though it seems, somehow, that the people at WordPress want to turn itself into “an operating system,” — I can’t really see how, coz I don’t use WordPress for anything else other than blog — some very smart and all tech-wiz group of people have put together a blogging platform they’ve named Ghost. The biggest change is the way they handle your data dashboard.

    They recently completed a successful Kickstarter campaign, and for 10 pounds you could get a digital download of Ghost (I suppose for install?), though the video to promote the project and some of the benefits of the campaign make it seem like you can also sign up for usernames (like WordPress.com?). Some of the stats displayed on the dashboard seems to suggest some time of system connectivity.

    The other exciting aspect is its Markdown feature. The video makes it really really appealing to see how you can do almost magic to format and make your post pretty.

    ghost-blog-platform-markdown

    Of course, there’s also theme customization and the way it handles data, it seems that Ghost will work out across platforms and layouts. Flip it, turn it — just basic fluid design. Front-end and back-end. It seems that Ghost will let you work on post through your tiny mobile devices quite flawlessly, which isn’t one of WordPress strongest features. Then again, I hate having to whip something out on a smartphone or tablet.

    You can check the Ghost features on their site, though it’s not yet available.


  • Yu Aoi Updated Wiki Entry #2

    It’s a five-year fandom anniversary!

    and I’ve just gotten EXTRA lazy now. These are the links to Yu’s previous Wiki entries [1][2].

    I know that over the years (especially the last two), I have been lazying around not stalking enough news and being always late. Though some fans have disappeared from the internet, I still appreciate some of you lurkers.

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  • Assorted YAM Magazine Interviews

    yammag-interview-laure-shang-plympton-crowd-lu-guangzhong-esteman
    From left to right.- Laure Shang Wenjie, animator Bill Plympton, Crowd Lu, and Esteman.

    For the past couple of months I’ve been able to interview some of these awesome people. But that you knew if you were following all my ramblings on YAM Magazine.

    For some other of my interviews, click here.


  • Yu Aoi~ Google Image Search and Visits

    A few weeks ago, Google changed its image search to the rage of webmasters — especially bloggers of photographers. However, hits didn’t seem much too affected here. Maybe there was a 10% drop in hits, give or take. So I decided to keep an eye for it to check how affected the hits on the site were. It wasn’t until two or three days ago, when I installed Imaguard (besides having enabled Hot Linking, which has been on forever but doesn’t seem to work with Google Image Search for a reason — is that even ethical?) that I saw a BIG drop in hits. To check what was going on, I did a search on my most popular subject: “yu aoi” – the search is disheartening.

    google-image-search

    Before, when you used to image search for “yu aoi,” you would end up with a few tons of photos from my blog. Embarrassingly known as “amy the yu aoi fan,” Besides trying to avoid the posting of random picture spam with no data, I did try to do some research with my barely capable level of Japanese. For commercial work, I tried looking up at campaign names, and creatives involved — for photoshoots, I tried my best to post photographer names and maybe stylists. So people who were fans, would generally end up in my site.

    Now when you search for “yu aoi,” there’s only one of my files showing up in the first four lines of images. Before, the first few lines used to be flooded with the photos I posted with details.

    WAIT, it gets worse.

    google-image-search-002

    When I do an specific search for “yu aoi + amy wong,” the selected photos in the search get some mix up with Pinterest and WeHeartIt, which are re-postings from my blog. Sighs.

    Is it time to look for some other search tool other than Google?


  • The Ultimate Guide to Boy Bands of the 90s

    yammag-ultimate-guide-boy-band-90s

    What started like a simple post, ended up taking a lot of hours of research and boy band video-watching. I may or not regret it.

    Voila! The Ultimate Guide to Boy Bands of the 90s ~

    There were boy bands I hadn’t even heard of… and some that I had to dust off my VHS tapes to get their names. Ha!


  • Top50 Songs of 2012~

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    It’s that time of the year again.

    You know where to go.