BANG XXVI Pics (and a Vid)

I have yet, to date, been able to play with the same set of people in the twenty-some odd puzzle events I've participated in. Eric Prestemon and Dan Roberts joined us in our Viking expedition in the really well-executed BANG XXVI. I've put up pictures of the event and a short video of the penny challenge.

We had a lot of fun, and were really impressed with the puzzles and production value, so many kudos to Los Jefes and Code Yellow! The meta gave us quite the knocking, but in the end we're kind of proud that we didn't take any hints, even if it might have bumped us up a few positions in the rankings.

BANG 26 also brings to an end what (little) influence I had on SNAP simulcasts. In my quest to have The Smoking GNU do one, I was able to help Seattle teams find counterparts in the Bay Area. The simulcasts would have (hopefully) happened anyway, but I like to think of it as my own small contribution to the community.

Shinteki 5 Playtest and Volunteering Photos, Vids

I seem to be keep putting off writing about my experiences playtesting Shinteki 5, playing on Meat Machine's team. Maybe it's the heat, the fact that my daughter's on summer break, or Karina's and my sudden obsession with Dexter. Regardless, I've put the photos from the event up in my puzzle event album.

A few years ago, I wasn't able to playtest but volunteered to help out in "Hero" mode (i.e. have car, will transport), had a great time, and met some very cool people. This time, unfortunately, I only could stick around for the first couple Shinteki 5 puzzles and therefore the pictures I have from it are kind of limited. I may be a mediocre photographer (with a mediocre camera) but I try to make up for it by being prolific. I don't know all the team names, though, so I'll update descriptions with any information sent my way.

After a spectacular crash on the slippery grass during the first puzzle, I decided to take a few videos. Of course, none of them (green, red, or violet) turned out to be as interesting.

Photos from BANG XX, 21, and 22, plus One Video

I've finally had a chance to organize and upload photos from the past few events:

BANG XX
Many of these were at night, and thus didn't turn out the greatest. On top of that, we only got about halfway through the event.

BANG 21
Entirely coincidentally, I took 21 photos. Includes a video of one round of blackjack.

BANG 22 Scouting
From our first scouting trip to downtown San Rafael, with the comments that were made about usability. (The Falkirk Mansion was unfortunately being used the same day of our event.)

"You Are Not Alone"

I'd taken the catchphrase of SNAP 4/BANG 19 to reference to I Am Legend, which, considering that it's the day after Halloween, "may prove frightening to young children", and has to do with an infection, seemed reasonable. It wasn't until this morning that I remembered that it's also the four-word message uttered by the Face of Boe as he died that had a major influence on the later end of the third season of Doctor Who.



But something tells me that's not the direction they're headed.

Annotations for our Ghost Patrol Video

A while ago, I mentioned that I had considered trying out the new "Annotations" feature at Youtube for our Ghost Patrol video. Truth is, I did try it out and annotated about 90% of the video before getting bored and moving on to other things.

Last week at the Iron Puzzler BANG, we talked with Alexandra and Larry and the subject of the video came up again. Freshly inspired, I went and added what few remaining notes I could think of and published it.

These annotations are mostly behind-the-scenes info with a few notes on continuity errors we made. For the most part, I decided not to explain some of our attempts at humor — such as nicknames that combine a band name and a popular video game character, or interesting pronunciations of the word "exercise" — instead leaving them for the viewer to discover and groan at on their own.

Pop-Up (Ghost Patrol) Video

I was re-watching a few of the Ghost Patrol application videos this morning, and saw that the Burnin' Beaters have added Pop-up Video style annotations to their video on Youtube. Pretty cool, especially since there were some parts where I wasn't sure what was going on originally (e.g. the Starcraft portion) and I always love insider trivia.

I had been kind of tempted to do something similar when, after uploading our video, I noticed the "Annotations" (beta) button. But by then, I was pretty sick of our video and wasn't sure there was enough information I could add to make the annotations interesting (apart from explaining the continuity errors, which might take longer than the video). This is definitely not the case with the Burnin' Beaters, though. It's good stuff.

Learning from the Ghost Patrol Application Video

Things I Learned from Filming the Ghost Patrol Application Video:

1. There's a reason none of the GNUs are actors.
   
2. A cheap steadycam mount can be built for a camcorder in only a few hours for only a few bucks.
   
3. Actors who also directors always cut everyone else's scene before their own.
   
4. Camcorders have crappy sound.
   
5. My camcorder is crappy in low-level lighting.
   
6. I could have made an effective boom mic with an American Idol USB microphone and a broom handle.
   
7. Three minutes is really too short a time to show how bad we are at ghost catching.
   
8. Not many stores sell "real" eggbeaters.
   
9. The ability to preserve continuity when filming on a 1.5 day schedule is next to impossible.
   
10. I'm tired of using Microsoft Movie Maker for video editing.
    
11. Bloopers are never quite as funny after the fact.
    
12. Not many people in the U.S. have heard of Top Gear (my *ahem* original idea).
    
13. I'm not even sure enough people are familiar with the show we did decide to parody to make it amusing.
    
14. Your spouse will always claim yours is the best video, despite protesting that she's not being biased.
    
15. "This will only take a few hours to film" is never true.
    
16. It takes me a couple hours to memorize just a handful of lines.
    
17. People who have just arrived home and find you've been using their house as a set while they were away waterskiing for a week are still able to be gulled into being extras if you provide root beer.
    
18. We'll always prefer our "Director's Cut" despite it maybe being a tiny bit too wordy...
    

There's actually another thing I learned, but since it's technical and might ruin whatever chance our movie has for being enjoyed, I won't mention it here.

Chuck and Hellboy

Ah, the joys of cross-promotion... I love it!

Is there anything this man couldn't do?

Salvador Dali on What's My Line?. These nine minutes cracked me up more than ninety minutes of today's "comedy" films.

Infocom, Hitchhikers, and Text Adventures

Okay, so I snuck a look in at /. and came across something wonderful: Playable versions of the sequel to Infocom's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy were found on a hard drive backup and given to a blogger. He, naturally, blogged about them and made available the two version for download as well as making one playable via an applet.

The comments following the article include some from Infocom people themselves, such as Steve Meretzky and Marc Blank! A very interesting read.

The other thing I found from reading the comments is that a documentary about text adventurs and Infocom entitled "Get Lamp" is in the works. Infocom is one of the main reasons why I got interested in programming in the first place and I like to think of many of the puzzle hunts I've participated in as "real" interactive fiction. Growing up, I didn't want to be a fireman, an astronaut, a doctor or a lawyer: I wanted to work for Infocom.



Of course, that's impossible now. I did end up writing an IF game, but never completing it to my satisfaction. Something about being a stay-at-home father kind of sucks up your time. :)

All Glory to the HypnoCube

Is there something wrong with me that the first thing I thought when I came across this is "How can I use that to make a puzzle?" Apart from the $400 price tag that is...

Midnight Madness: The Music Video

Snout and Drunken Spiders started off their Game with a rousing rendition of the theme song of the film the Game was based on. I quickly shot my borrowed camera into the air because I wasn't sure if the thirty other video cameras were recording it right...

MSPH 11.0 - Pics and Vids

After upgrading my Gallery2 server, I was finally have the capacity to embed videos. With that, the pictures and videos I took at Microsoft Puzzle Hunt 11.0 are now up.

MSPH 11.0 Opening Video

Here's a video I took of part of the opening ceremony for Microsoft Puzzle Hunt 11.0. My apologies for the shakiness... I blame the epilepsy.

No More Secrets Blooper Video

When you've got 10-20 hairpin trigger devices setup for a Rube Goldberg device, odds are, with any given take, that one of them is going to fail. Want proof?