Up - Whatever Happened To Pixar

I went to see Disney-Pixar's latest creation, Up, tonight. I have been excited for months, I was ready to drive over 100 miles to see it in Real-D 3D because when I first heard about it, the cinema here - Signature Theatres - did not yet have RealD. I was really impressed with RealD at Signature after seeing Monsters vs Aliens a couple months ago. On that note, if you go see it, I was disappointed that screen 8 at Signature is already damaged as new as it is - the bottom middle of the screen was all scratched up. I understand that the silver screens are very fragile, but this almost looked like someone had keyed the screen or something. If so, that's very sad :( Ruin the movies for all of us... it was somewhat distracting and I'd try to see my next 3D movie on their other screen with 3D unless they actually decide to spend the money to fix this (I don't even know if it's fixable - maybe it was just dirt but it definitely looked like scratches :( )

While I'm reviewing technical elements, the 3D was much less intense and cool than Monsters vs Aliens and it was used more to add artistic depth than to provide an in your face environment. That's Pixar's artistic choice and I respect it, though it was a hair disappointing because to me, the distractions of 3D weren't worth it for that - the glasses and the ghosting. Ghosting (double image from an image leaking into the wrong eye) was much much worse than ghosting in Monsters vs Aliens. I don't know why.

Okay, enough technical stuff about the cinema and the technical details of the 3D use. It's time for a movie review. And in one word it is: bad. I grew up on Pixar - Toy Story, A Bug's Life, Toy Story 2, etc... all marvels. Pixar went downhill in my mind somewhat with Cars but Ratatouille was amazing. Up is even worse than Cars. It's just not enjoyable. Pixar movies are not supposed to have a funeral in the first 1/4 of the movie. That's just not fun. But then again, none of the movie is fun. It's more of a comedic tragedy than a comedy...

A wilderness scout. A grumpy man (who ends up being nice and the good guy). A rare bird. Talking dogs (with special collars). Without giving too much away, the movie is a series of disappointments. Dreams never happened. A childhood hero turned bad guy with no redemption. A mildly happy ending with sad undertones due to what's implied. A vague and disconnected plot.

Yeah, that's enough for now. Save your money, wait to go see a good movie. If you like sad stories, 3D animation (presented in 3D), and a somewhat connected plot line (I still don't totally get the point) then go enjoy. Otherwise, I can think of many better choices! Hannah Montana was amazing for example if you're looking Disney movies. But it's not still in theaters most places.

Mark

We sell the beauty and destroy the girl...

Bebo Normanhas a great song out there called Britney. It is an apology song written to Britney Spears. Here are part of the lyrics for the song:

Britney, I'm sorry for the lies we told

We took you into our arms, then left you cold

Britney, I'm sorry for this cruel, cruel world

We sell the beauty but destroy the girl

These are powerful words, not just as they relate to Britney Spears but to other celebrities as well. One of the teen pop stars I respect the most right now is Miley Cyrus. Not only is she really talented and her music inspirational (hey, she takes after her dad!); but she speaks out about her faith in Christ. And yet, for little simple teenage mistakes she gets torn apart in the media circus. But guess what? The tabloids and entertainment media are vultures, in the business of destroying celebrity lives to make a quick buck (a fact that was clearly referenced in Hannah Montana: The Movie).

But that is not news, a surprise, nor blog-worthy. My concern is proclaimed followers of Christ, who are, intentionally or not, tearing apart celebrities and others. This became a major concern of mine when I read about the response of the American Family Associate to a Tweet that Miley Cyrus posted to the famous gay blogger who thrives as a vulture on celebrity trash talk and homosexual agenda promotion. Miley Cyrus, a 15 year old, demonstrated exceptional maturity and understanding of God's love by stating "I am a Christian and I love you - gay or not - because you are no different than anyone else! We are all God's children."

What she said is 100% true. We are all God's children and we all have our issues and sin in our life. We all need His love and we need to reach out and show love to each other. The Bible says this: "The Spirit and the bride say, "Come!" Let the one who hears this say, "Come!" Let whoever is thirsty come; whoever wishes may have the water of life as a free gift." - Revelation 22:17 (NCV).

Whoever is hungry, come. Whoever wishes may have the water of life as a free gift. No exclusion of sinners no matter what the sin because, after all, "Everyone has sinned and fallen short of God's glorious standard" - Romans 3:23. Miley Cyrus gets that and shows exceptional maturity in her faith and understanding of God's love when communicating with the very hardest type of person to reach.

The "American Family Association" however chooses to take the tactic of the Pharisees and attempt to tear Miley Cyrus apart by stating " "Clearly she is confused and does not understand the Bible. Please pray for the Lord to open her eyes to the truth."

Yes, Miley made more than just that one comment. In talking to a proud, professional, homosexual celebrity gossip blogger she focused on the love of God and His desire for happiness. She said things in a way trying to find common ground without saying things that she knew would just shut him down. The "American Family Association" should be proud of her and holding her up as an example of what Jesus would have done. Instead, they provide an example of what the Pharisees would have done and tear her apart for expressing the love of Christ.

What has the Church became? Let us return to seeking the word of Christ for our guidance, and putting the stones of the Pharisees aside and trading it for the love of our Saviour, Jesus. One huge step in doing that will be in getting behind those in a position of incredible influence over the kids of our world (like Miley) who proclaim their faith in Jesus!

God bless y'all and prayers for our crazy world,

Mark

On Acrylics, Money, and Short-sighted Marketing...

Hey everyone, now it's time for a face painting related article. This one is more from the business side of things, so it's kinda applicable to a lot of people other than face painters.

I was recently booked by a local business (I won't name them, I don't go there... I only name those I have something positive to say about) to face paint at an event they are having. About a week later I got an email saying they would like to cancel and were "sorry for the confusion". I politely asked them why, but I got no response. I am therefore going to assume it was financial, given that when they booked me they said I had been highly recommended. They are still advertising face painting at their event, so they have obviously gone with someone else. If it was artistic, and they think they found a better artist, well, my ego can handle that and I wish them luck. But they didn't say, and based on how they had talked to me I can only assume they tried to save a buck.

Since I certainly won't be going to attend their event, I don't know exactly how they're going to save a buck. There are a handful of face painters around here using acrylic paints on kids' faces. Acrylic paints can be bought for 99 cents a bottle at Wal-Mart and they could even find their own employees. If this is the route they went, I am truly angered. Why? They're putting kids' happiness, health and even lives at risk. Snazaroo, one of the major face painting makeup companies has much more to say on this than I do. To summarize, non-toxic doesn't mean hypo-allergenic or comfortable. Just not poisonous when swallowed. Acrylic paints itch, are hard to remove, and are likely to cause severe allergic reactions. These make parents and kids not want to be painted again (I deal with people worried based on past acrylic reactions all the time); and can cause a severe reaction (and depending on the paint and the kid, reactions could potentially be life threatening.

Now, let's imagine they did things right and they bought real makeup for face painting or they hired another face painter using proper makeup and safety precautions who bid lower. Let's imagine they even did it for artistic reasons, not for money. Did they handle things in a way to benefit themselves? Absolutely not. If it was for artistic reasons, they could have openly communicated it - and should have decided before committing with anyone. But again, I'm assuming money. At most they saved $100 or so (assuming they bought cheap dangerous acrylic paints themselves to use - they saved even less if they are using safe products or if they hired someone just a bit cheaper using safe products). But they've already alienated a potential customer and someone who would've been *promoting* them is now writing about how poorly they handled things. By not even communicating, they simply decided word of mouth doesn't matter. Furthermore, I will not only be indifferent to their business now; I will choose to avoid it.

The worst mistake they made? No communication, not being willing to answer a very polite "what is the reason for canceling your booking?" They may have saved some pennies, but in the long run they made a bad business choice. As for me? $20 non-refundable deposit before I'll save a date for corporate events from now on.

P.S. Don't bother asking me who the business is - I'm not going to choose to hurt them back by naming them. Everybody makes mistakes, and I do, oddly, wish them luck - everybody needs it with the economy like it is now.

The Hannah Montana Movie

Okay, so it's a little late to be reviewing this movie... I took my cousin and two of our friends to see this movie for the last showing here at Signature Theatres in Kalispell. First, I have to give Signature Theatres some serious credit here. After having been out for over a month, I was surprised the film was in excellent condition (very few scratches, only a little dust - a bit of jumping at each splice between reels; but overall EXCELLENT condition for a film that's been running for a month).

Anyways, onto my review of this movie. I almost never read movie reviews until after I have seen the movie. I was shocked to see such awful reviews of such a truly excellent movie. This is a series and franchise that, all things considered, Disney has done right. It's about a girl, who is with her real dad, and has to deal with very real situations and make the right choices. And she learns her lessons without it being cheesy or bad. Miley Cyrus is a very talented singer (nothing like her dad though, Billy Ray Cyrus is one of my absolute favorite singers of all time), and the entire thing feels very real.

The movie starts with this successful, realistic, clean, and fun franchise and takes it to the big screen. One review I read said the movie "has no crossover adult appeal." Nonsense. It doesn't have inappropriate hidden double entendre's. It doesn't have mild curse words or borderline-inappropriate humor. It doesn't have anything edgy. I guess that's why they say that. But guess what? I'm an adult and I can't remember the last time I laughed my head off so much at a movie. It's well-written with good, clean humor that makes you genuinely laugh - rather than respond to cheap tricks. Good humor doesn't need to be edgy and controversial.

More importantly, it's not just about having a fun time. It's about learning how to balance what's important in life. This is a lesson kids and adults alike need to learn in our country, and I think anybody could benefit and learn from the lessons presented in Hannah Montana: The Movie. Go out and watch it today if you can, and if you can't then look forward to picking it up on Blu Ray or DVD later this year. Look forward to more kids and family movie reviews in this space soon. Until then, I want to leave you with some of the words from The Climb, my favorite song in the movie:

I can almost see it

That dream I am dreaming

But there's a voice inside my head saying


"You'll never reach it"



Every step I'm taking


Every move I make feels


Lost with no direction


My faith is shaking



But I gotta keep trying


Gotta keep my head held high





There's always gonna be another mountain


I'm always gonna wanna make it move


Always gonna be a uphill battle


Sometimes I'm gonna have to lose



Ain't about how fast I get there


Ain't about what's waiting on the other side


It's the climb

Flying (Or Something Remotely Similar...)

Flying (Or Something Remotely Similar...) P5100181 Originally uploaded by Markie's World

It's time for something light hearted and fun after yesterday. If you haven't read yesterday's post yet, read it first. Please. The experience changed my life. Okay, so I was over at my cousins' house today (who are all younger than me) and they were playing on the swing they built. Well they wanted me to take my turn and I couldn't really sit in it. So instead I used the ropes to strap myself to it and pretend I was flying. It was scary because at a couple points my head barely clears the ground. This was around my third attempt at it, and I mainly was trying to get a good ending for the video (which my cousin cut off a couple seconds early, oh well - I'll have to do it again with my little HD camera one of these days :) ). They even got me to say "I believe I can fly" during it if you listen close. So you are probably wondering what on earth I posted this for? Well, I am really serious a lot of the time (well at least when I need to be - working at schools, during funerals, etc). But I really think we need to learn to have fun too! It's okay to be a total goofball and silly and weird sometimes. Especially around family and friends. We laughed so much making this video it was well worth it. And I am so thankful for all I have - wonderful relatives to enjoy this day with (sadly, my mom couldn't make it :( ); good health (I still have a bit of a cough but I think it's allergies at this point); people who love me and care about me. Those are great things, and God has amazing plans for me. I am so excited for all that the Lord is doing. We're all going to the same place - to meet the Lord. Let's make sure of three things - that when we get there, we'll get to stay with Him (if you're not sure then please visit this link! It might be the most important thing you ever do), that we've loved and reached out to everyone we've encountered by following His calling, and that we enjoyed the journey as much as possible! Mark

What Does AT&T Mean For Montana?

[Breaking News - It's Official, AT&T has agreed to buy Alltel here in Montana, of couse how the transition will go is still just my best guess based on my knowledge of past transactions]

Well, it's all over the news today - AT&T is rumored (and I note, rumored) to be close to buying most of the Alltel divested markets. See FierceWireless and many other sources. If you're an Alltel customer in Montana, you probably wonder what this means to you.

First, we have to take a step back. In January, Verizon Wireless completed a deal to purchase Alltel. The FCC and DOJ approved this conditional on them selling 105 market areas where Verizon and Alltel would have a near monopoly (including 9 of the 10 market areas in Montana, the 1 remaining Montana market has no Verizon service so they were allowed to keep Alltel there). Montana and the Dakotas have essentially Verizon and Alltel. There is some competition but not nearly enough. I have MTPCS CellularOne and I like them, but they have a very small number of customers.

So how does this affect you, the Montana Alltel customer. Well, today, it looks like AT&T is probably set to become your new wireless carrier. That's a good thing, really. It's not certain either - the AT&T deal may not go through, and even if it does, they might sell Montana to someone else - the news only says AT&T is ready to buy most of the Alltel markets that have to be divested, not all of them. We'll continue on the assumption AT&T does pick up Montana, but it's not certain yet.

In the short term, nothing at all will change for you. But over time, AT&T will make changes. Alltel (like Verizon) uses a type of network known as a CDMA network. AT&T uses the same type of network as MTPCS CellularOne (unrelated to the old CDMA CelluarOne that became Alltel), this is known as GSM. In order to offer AT&T phones, AT&T is going to need to convert to GSM. If you are familiar with what happened with CellularOne for months when they did this, you may be dreading this process. Honestly, I love CellularOne's service, but AT&T can pull off this transition much more smoothly.

Alltel already has some GSM coverage in Montana created for a roaming agreement with T-Mobile that has been around for years. Since it's not their main network, their GSM is not nearly as good as their CDMA, but AT&T has a building block to start from and AT&T customers from out of state will be able to be on an AT&T owned network from day one.

I imagine that AT&T will want to stop selling CDMA handsets as soon as possible so that there is less equipment that won't work on their network. I expect AT&T to begin immediately following the closure of their sale to make the major network improvements (especially in switching) required to begin selling GSM handsets in Montana. I fully expect them to maintain a transition period where existing Alltel CDMA customers stay on the Alltel CDMA network; at least until the GSM network is fully built-out.

Following this network completion, I expect the pressure to start gently but get stronger and stronger to buy a GSM handset. You'll probably be given an extremely good price on a GSM handset as well as the promise of better coverage outside of Montana, since you'll be able to stay on AT&T's network. Possibly even better coverage in Montana if they add new sites ("towers") since they will be GSM only.

AT&T has some great handsets, including the iPhone. GSM also offers some very nice benefits over CDMA - SIM card access control (a card in your phone is activated instead of the phone itself so you can buy a cheap generic GSM phone on eBay instead of an overpriced one from your carrier when your phone breaks - just pop in your SIM to activate it), global roaming (Verizon global phones are GSM/CDMA dual-mode phones; most of the world is just GSM), and much better three-way calling are the three biggest I can think of.

Will there be a downside? Well, AT&T costs more than Alltel (they have similar pricing to Verizon). I expect them to honor Alltel contract pricing at least for the length of the contracts, though. Also, GSM technology is based on a time-division system where if you get too far from a site you end up out of your time slot even if you have great signal. This limit is 35km. It is very unlikely this limit will ever affect you, since terrain and capacity issues usually limit cell sites to much less than 35km. In a few cases in the flat plains of eastern Montana it is possible Alltel has a few sites that are expected to cover more than 35km, if this is the case, it would not be very difficult for AT&T to add fill in coverage.

But for most people, this is great news. It means another national network competing here, and in the long run - with more competition - probably better coverage for all Montanans (including those on Verizon). This is a good thing.

P.S. Remember this is all speculation based on the latest news and on how customers have been handled in past acquisitions by a carrier that uses a competing technology. Until it's officially announced, nothing is certain.

Netbooks, Almost Ready For Prime Time

They seem to be all the rage these days, those teeny-tiny laptop computers known as netbooks. A couple weeks ago my 11-year-old cousin was asking me if I thought she should buy one, and I decided to look into them and I've been tempted myself. I tried an ASUS Eee PC 2G Surf over a year ago, and I could not think of how a machine could be more unimpressive. The screen was too small for the net. The storage was too limited for, well, anything. And the Celeron processor couldn't handle YouTube...

Today's netbooks are all much nicer but they're not perfect, and not quite to the point where I want to buy one. Why?

1. Operating System - As many XP fans as are out there, Windows XP is ugly, dated, and insecure. Vista is too expensive for netbook manufacturers. Mac OS X is only available as an EULA-violating hack - and it has compatibility issues that make for a not quite amazing experience. Linux seems the perfect answer, but honestly - the software support just isn't *quite* there. It's tempting though, the possibility of an Ubuntu Netbook Remix netbook. But many common internet applications, like video chat with Google, MSN, AIM, etc don't work (easily) in Linux. This could be solved with a nice Apple netbook, or possibly with Windows 7, or with better Linux support by major companies.

2. Batteries - Netbooks either have big ugly batteries sticking out the bottom like tumors; or battery lives that are so ridiculously short that the portable lifestyle convenience factor goes away.

3. Design - Following the big ugly batteries sticking out the bottom - netbooks are (generally) ugly. Even the ones meant to be cute (like the Valentine's MSI Wind) are actually tacky and toy-like. The Samsung NC10 is the best looking but at $429 you're getting into a very expensive device compared to the rest of the class. Some serious industrial design skills are needed in the netbook manufacturing world.

4. Screen resolution - 1024x600 just doesn't quite cut it. Give me 1280x720 in a 10" or 11" screen in a device just as portable, and I'll take one.

5. Power adapters - This goes along with design, but is perhaps even worse, especially given the poor battery life. I don't want a netbook with two cords and a big bulky power adapter design. I want a 30W version of a compact cell phone travel charger. And yes, it can be done, because that's basically what Apple's chargers are. Except a MacBook charger is 55W, so the 30W or so netbook chargers ought to be able to be at least as small and convenient... Think about your chargers people!

There we are, five reasons netbooks aren't quite there yet. All are minor and easily resolvable. And the company that does get them right, or at least get closer to getting things right, will get my business. I want a netbook, but I want to wait for a netbook that's fully cooked...

Welcome!

Hey everyone! I decided to go ahead and try this Blogger thing to create a web diary for y'all to read. I'll be posting soon :)