Cheating at Practice / GreenSmoke

Practicing in Photoshop is hard, when you take it seriously.

I need to start being a little more hones with my photoshop posts... Sometimes I do a review piece, instead of going out and doing a project.
Sometimes I just don't have the time... and today is one of those times.

I did this piece before my blog even existed. It's the prototype for the one called Crimson Chaos, which is the basis of my blog background. That makes this GreenSmoke ancient. I don't remember all that went in to it... Let's just say that you can do an almost unlimited number of things with filter> render> clouds. It's not incredible, but it was the most effort I had put into a piece yet at the time... like I said, it's pre-TLC.

In other news, I didn't know TLC was my blog's name abbreviated. How cliché.

New Year's Surprise

I was pleasantly surprised to be introduced to this awesome "translator bot" tonight by Marianne. I dunno how she found it, but I'm grateful... It's kinda freaky how smart it is.
It's not perfect, but I thought it might be a person for a sec...

It's a google bot you can put on your google chat list. It will parrot anything you say to it back to you in the language you've chosen! It's awesome. She was kinda confusing me for a sec when she spoke in Japanese - correctly... I was like... well... fast learner? cheater helping?

I didn't know what to think. Usually the grammar of translators is very poor. This one's not perfect by any standard, but it's better than I am. Faster, if nothing else.

The link she gave me is here:
http://www.google.com/support/talkgadget/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=89921
It's not only in Japanese... you could use a Russian/Spanish/French/German/whatever-you-want one!

Looking for Lyrics

I'm taking the songwriting more seriously now. I'm going to go write a song. It will be a while until it's finished.

I will post it when I'm satisfied with it, though. I'm excited... I haven't written a song in ages.

In other news, I've got four songs finished perfect lately, and am left with an almost-clean slate.
I've been working on Lee's what it does to us and Secondhand Serenade's Fall For You. Along with Jack Johnson's Banana Pancakes and Sitting, Waiting, Wishing that's quite a lot in just a month or two.

I do need to get better with lyrics... I find myself making up songs as I go about my day every now and then... I just can't make up stuff that would go with guitar, stupid as it sounds. Perhaps I need to write more down, or keep scratch paper with me.

Photoshop Links

My laptop is FIXED!!! kinda... anyway, it's functional again.
so I'll be able to start posting all the posts up to today. (whatever that day is for you when you read this, lol...)

Anyways, I have links from the more pick-what-you-want-to learn field to the very beginner stuff.
Even if you have some experience in Photoshop, the beginner stuff works as a good set of reminders, and can speed up your work, if not give you inspiration.

This one's group of things called How to Master Photoshop in a week... I'm still reading it.
http://elitebydesign.com/how-to-master-photoshop-in-just-one-week/

Here's a good misc group at PaintBits - I've done a few.
http://www.paintbits.com/2008/06/27/photoshop-tutorials-you-should-see/

This one tries to explain pen-tool paths. I'm going to look at it - it's probably valuable.
http://www.elated.com/articles/photoshop-paths-explained/

Here at Tutorial9 they have a lot of useful stuff well-sorted. They attempt to cover everything, and at least cover all the bases
http://www.tutorial9.net/category/photoshop/

This is a list of drawing tutorials I found just today. I intend to spend a while here.
Drawing is where I have trouble - I'm not naturally artistic... these should help, though!
http://psdfan.com/inspiration/25-amazing-photoshop-drawing-tutorials/

Obsessed with iKnow...

iKnow's website has helped me incredibly in learning - it seems to be all I do with Japanese these days... I need to go work on learning how to write.

Just because you recognize a kanji doesn't mean you can draw it on a napkin, for example. They can get relatively similar also, and are easy to confuse if you don't take the time to sort out differences.

Anyways, I only have a few new things lately, nothing special...

I do have a new pair of opposites...
軽い - karui - light
重い - omoi - heavy

to pay is 払う - harau

and I already knew to read, 読む - yomu

Fall for You (Round Two)

I've been working on this (by Secondhand Serenade) today. With my messed up laptop charger, I've not much else to do.
Oh well. More time with my guitar...

It only uses four chords, really, but I get the order of them scrambled up.
They're C,Am,F, and G. Very straightforward - but very confusing...
Also, I only seem to know about half of the words. That doesn't help. I need to fix that.
By the time this is actually posted, I hope to have it perfect. That will be one more down.

I hoped to write something about Christmas / New Year's celebrations as far as songwriting goes, but it never happened... how typical of me... I have this terrible lyric-writing that's been haunting me for months...

How am I supposed to tackle it?

More Time Off...

I'm really wanting my laptop to be fixed - I'll finally go say something to my Dad about it...
I have looked at photoshop tutorials today, but I didn't find much inspiring.

I'm going to get a whole bunch of links together for the next post - It'll be beginner tutorials for those interested. I'll skim them myself - there are some things I never learn to use, simply because I don't find them useful, and often I'm mistaken in that. Also... I forget things. I'm human. So shoot me.

That's all I have in the Photoshop biz right now...
I've been practicing with selections and the pen tool, but to no significant avail.

Vocab... Once Again.

I need to go out and do something original with my japanese.
It has become a hum-drum boring-ness. I need to learn to use it better.

Anyways... today I worked on more vocabulary.

Some more familiar words, and some totally new ones.

Amid the mainly review ones was:
kaeru - to return, to go back
It's marked at 80% competion. It may be one of the first ones I completely pass off!

The new ones were:
冬 - fuyu - winter
胸 - mune - chest
重い - omoi - heavy
払う - harau - to pay
読む - yomu - to read

yomu I already kinda knew. good to have it practiced, though.

They covered 年 - toshi - year, one I already know fully.

Also, I spotted 寒い - samui - cold in one of the example sentences.
That's helped un-confuse me - I get it and 暑い - atsui - hot/warm(weather) mixed up.

The Blame Goes to Me...

...and it all comes undone again.

I can't believe I let this happen to me... I'm rather annoyed. It's technically not my fault, As I have tried to take care of it, but I'm going to end up so far behind it'll be days before I put up what's actually going on that day in my life.

Oh well... today I worked on What It Does to Us by my good friend the rekceD eeL.
It's getting near perfect...

I wanted to work on Confident, but I haven't been able to remember the chords, and (being the dum-dum I am) I didn't write them down anywhere. So I'm going to have to go ask him.
I have the lyrics, strangely enough...

Speaking of lyrics, Alyssa still wants those I wrote a while back for her birthday... and I will, girl. Hold on just a little longer.

I'm going to write a song, I'm sure of that, but I'm not entirely sure of the topic. I guess we'll just have to see, now won't we?

The Works I Promised...

This post is coming extremely late, but I didn't have any control over that fact.
My laptop's charger broke, so I haven't had access to all my computer stuff in ages. I'm back now, And did a few pics I'm proud of.
This is not one of them. You can see why I never got around to Christmas stuff - it doesn't please me. I can't do anything worth looking at when it comes to ornaments, and it's hard to find a good tutorial, anyway. I did learn a bit about gradients and spheres, so it's not the end of the world.






This is Smoke on the Water - A little piece I did when I was bored... It's not much, but it shows off my favorite water trick.




Say hello to my favorite one, Leaky Rainbow. I like it - It's a great concept piece, if nothing else. I learned how to use brushes in newer ways... I've started to create my own brushes, and two of them are in this one. I learned how to do some of this in a tutorial I read recently. It's my new fave, though it's nothing special...

New vs. Review

I did a whole bunch online this evening at iKnow. Unfortunately, it was all old news.
The "new" material had several things I already knew.

The only reason I did so much was because of that.
They are getting into old garbage I figured out at the very beginning.
So... lots of time for review. There will be a few new things, but there's nothing wrong with reviewing what you know.

Today's new words are:

体 - karada - body,health
待つ - matsu - to wait (for)
低い - short, low
名前 - namae - name
夫 - otto - husband
起こす - okosu - to wake up
次 - tsugi -next
美しい - utsukushii - beautiful
結婚 - kekkon - marriage

Another One Down

I finally have Banana Pancakes perfected!!!
That's something to scratch off the to-do list.

I've been needing to get stuff cleared up.

Now I need to take a peek at the other stuff.

Right now the work-in-progress list includes...

-Confident (Lee)
-What it Does to Us (Lee)
-Fall For You (Secondhand Serenade)

-I'll Be (Edwin McCain)
-Hit Me With Your Best Shot (Pat Benatar)

and misc Christmas songs.

I have been thinking of writing a song. I was going to a while back, but I didn't have the time.
I think it's about that time...

The Brush Technique How-to

I have had trouble coming up with good Christmas-themed works.
I've been working on this pathetic little ornament, but I still don't like it. I hate to go without a new picture, but I've come up with a solution. I'll have several next time around. I promise.

It's not very hard to make sparkles and ornaments and ribbons - all you need is a little creativity. That's where I have trouble - I'm a total robot when it comes to creativity. I hate doing things from scratch. I hate it. It drives me nuts if little things aren't perfect or if they're permanent. I like to keep my options open.
Oh well. I'm just going to have to get over it - and the sooner the better.

Today I'll cover brushes and technique.
You need to know this definition- I didn't until recently.
Jitter = a randomness generator
a size jitter makes the same thing in different sizes randomly.
an angle jitter rotates things to different angles randomly.

The brush menu (top right, window>brushes, or F5) has magical properties. you can do all kinds of things with it. Open it with the brush tool selected...

---Brush Tip Shape - an expanded version of what you see when you right-click.
Here you can flip it over the X and Y axes and rotate it to any given angle. You can change the spacing, which spreads a scattered(read on) brush out.
---Shape dynamics - contains jitters of size, angle, and "roundness"
Along with spacing(see Brush Tip Shape), size/angle jitters can be your best friend.
---Scattering - scatters the brush everywhere. Great for sparkles, etc.
You can toggle whether both axes are scattered, and can increase the count (w/ jitter) of the brush.
---Texture - applies a texture (image pattern) to a brush.
You can control the properties of the texture, particularly the scale.
---Dual Brush - applies a brush-to-your-brush.
Using it is a bit tricky - It's best to find a bigger or smoother brush and set a smaller or more random brush as dual. If you succeed with it you'll get wild results.
---Color Dynamics - a color property jitter.
It has Fore/Back color jitters with Hue, Sat. and Brightness. The Purity jitter is the most important with the latter two - it regulates the amount of blacks and whites.
---Other Dynamics - the opacity and flow jitters.
They'll randomize how solid it comes out.
---Noise, Wet Edges, and Airbrush -These are pure property-less special effects.
They come in handy, too, so experiment with them as well.
---Smoothing - makes a drawing tablet's strokes less sharp
---Protect Texture - ensures that all of your different brushes use the texture that you specified.

Japanese for the Day

No - I didn't leave out my regular post.

This evening was crazy, but I did study earlier in the day, for a little bit.
I was cleaning my room all day - and good thing, too - I didn't think anyone would end up going in there. But I was wrong.

Anyways, the words of the day are a little odd. Some of them are old.
死ぬ - shinu - to die
乗る - noru - to ride, take (taxi,car,bus, etc.)
書く - to write (already knew this one)
安い - cheap (inexpensive)
頭 - atama - head
話す - hanasu - to say,tell (knew this one, too)

I must say, the whole "my dog got sick and died" example (with pic) was rather... I dunno... politically incorrect? slightly disturbing, at the very least. Not that it bothered me, but still...

hanasu and kaku I already knew. Technically, kaku is new. I knew the kanji by itself as the noun "sho", or "writings."

Eliza's Coming !!!?

Eliza Owen, one of the (if not the) closest of my friends is going to be stopping by this evening. That's kinda crazy, considering she's had two birthdays since I saw her last. I'll be strange - it's been so long...

That's the headline of today, aside the fact that I dug up my old Japanese stuff (which in comparison doesn't even register on the radar), which I will deal with next post.
Tonight will probably be a night I'll remember for some time, whether for good or ill.

All I know is the house is clean (finally) and my mom made brownies. Yum!
But seriously... This occasion is sure to be anything but typical.

...
...later...
...

The funny thing about tonight is I never had a brownie. Eliza had at least two I believe...
She's known for being the Sugar Angel.
天使の砂糖 (That's Tenshi no Satou.)

Anyways, that was fun, and a lot less weird than I thought it would be...
We haven't seen each other in almost a year and a half, but it was just like old times...

I still am curious how our parents got along... they didn't say anything or make any remark. I felt like there was bound to be some comments coming, but they said nothing, which is surprising. I almost wish they had - makes me wonder...

エライザ/ Eliza... what can I say?... All I know is she's one of a kind.
The kind everyone wants, but nobody deserves.
If there is such a thing as too much fun, only she would know. She's the best friend anyone could have. Everyone needs an Eliza... lol...

If only, if only the woodpecker cried...

Abi and Drew were here too, of course.
アビ/ Abi is the lovable older sister - Who I seem to share a plane of reality with, as odd as that sounds. We both are in college and both have been using the invisalign braces, and just got them off at the same time. It's funny how much we seem to have in common, despite how different we are...

ヅレウ/ Drew is Eliza's adorkable twin brother, who is her total opposite in every way. And yet he's cool. A little obsessed with Halo, and nerdy, but we all love him anyway. He's writing a sci-fi book about something. Supposedly I'll be aiding with it.

Well, that's all I got to say about that. wow. just wow.

From Guitar Hero?

I've been watching my brothers play Guitar Hero III (sometimes with my real guitar in hand) and I've been thinking of learning something from it.

I'm not sure what, though - all I know is I do have an amp now, and it makes sense that I should learn a song meant for an electric guitar.

I still find Guitar Hero a bit cheesy and fake, as impressive as some of them have been on occasion. Still, there are classics on it, or at least some that may become classic, and I would be foolish not to take advantage of what's available.

I do have stuff I need to catch up on, like I'll Be that Lee suggested.
I figured out the chords to Hit Me With Your Best Shot (Pat Benatar) just by listening.
That's a start.
It's E, A x2, C# x2, B x2
E - 779997
A - 577655
C#-9 11 11 10 9 9
B - 799877

Chrome Blossom

I've re-discovered this tutorial I found long ago.
It teaches you the way to make the top of these two images.
I haven't found a good use for this yet, but the big accomplishment was finding it. It took me forever to find it on the internet. This is a tutorial I visited long, long ago, back when I knew precious little of photoshop. So long ago,
that even if I did bookmark it, it would have been lost to time on my dad's computer.
I found it though!!!

What you have to do is paint-bucket a color of your choice and then filter> render> clouds, then distort> pinch (100%) two or three times, render> lighting effects , and then (filter)sketch> chrome and set the layer blending mode to linear light.

This one I tweaked with my crazy difference gradient trick on a layer mask. And then duplicated the layer mask as a normal layer set to overlay.

Expanding My Vocabulary

I've learned a lot of new words recently.

This is all thanks to using that iKnow website's application. It's been very handy.
I have several study cards laid out, with what is approaching a hundred words.

A couple I know off the top of my head -

始める - hajimeru - to start
買う - kau - to buy
売る - uru - to sell
分かる - wakaru - to understand
若い - wakai - young (got these two mixed up at first)
少ない - sukunai - few, little
高い - takai - tall, expensive (building, price)
帰る - kaeru - to return, to go back
変える - kaeru - to change (I still confuse these)
家 - uchi/ie - house/home
作る - tsukuru - to make, to create
置く - oku - to put
聞く - kiku - to hear/listen, to ask
飛ぶ - tobu - to fly
住む - sumu - to live

and a few more I had to look at that I knew but couldn't remember...

時間 - jikan - hour, time
知る - shiru - to know
近く - chikaku - near, close to
近い - chikai - near, soon
顔 - kao -face
言う - iu - to speak/say
続く - tsuduku - to continue/follow
思う - omou - to think
走る - hashiru - to run
立つ - tatsu - to stand, rise
戻る - modoru - to return, turn back

I'm not perfect, but it's helping me a lot! I'm excited!

now, I know and can use more Japanese!
今、私はもう日本語に知る使う！

Finger Frustration

I was going to have a song to play for people, at the very least... there was a little Christmas party tonight at our place my mom threw.

I didn't get that chance though... there were millions of little kids running everywhere. The only reason they didn't destroy my guitar is because I had my brother get it to my room.

I've had a water blister on my thumb from playing my guitar too much and/or too hard. It's really irritating and disabling. If I ignore it and play anyways it just gets worse. So that's out of the question... Which is sad, too, because now I'm home - I have my amp and Darren has his drums...

I wonder if we could put some kind of band together... we just need a kid who can play a bass. but we lack that, so I don't know...

I'm Home!!!

The ride home was a pain; I've never had to go all the way across the country by myself.
I managed to figure it all out. Flying isn't as complicated as I thought it would be.

I took off at around 3 and touched down at 10:30. It wasn't that long, though; It was only an hour to Salt Lake City and 3 1/2 to Atlanta. But I changed time zones, adding 2 hours. Including the before, in between, and afterward stuff of baggage checkin/out and waiting and traveling it all added up to my whole day.

I'm still going to miss Rexburg...

The ride home inspired me to do some sky and airplane inspired photoshop projects. I need to go and look for some airplane brushes... I know a few places to look, including DeviantArt.
I might even incorporate both with something Christmas related.

iKnow Where I'll Be Learning Now...

I found a cool new site yesterday that taught Japanese very well.
It uses a flash-card like memorization, but all different kinds of recognition, and has audio. It has example sentences, and is clean and well organized.

The website is called iKnow.
My only problem is I don't, or at least haven't yet, had the time to learn or do much there. I did do some, though, and it has helped me with my common verbs enormously.
Some of what I picked up in one go:

思う - omou - to think (v)
時間 - jikan - time, hour (n)
使う - tsukau - to use (v)
言う - to speak, say (v)
少ない - sukunai - few, little (adj)
多い - ooi - many, numerous (adj)

It seems to be an incredible site. My only worry is that it might not be free forever; however, there doesn't seem to be any restriction set as of yet. It's probably the best learning tool I've yet discovered...

Silver Bells

I started playing random Christmas songs while I was playing my guitar tonight. I don't know what's come over me. I love Christmas all of a sudden. Came up with multiple ways of playing Silver Bells...

I still have exams and crap I don't want to deal with tomorrow - I don't have much to look forward to, either. I just am "in the mood" for Christmas this year. Weird.

Anyways, I developed a great way of learning to play a version of anything. If you begin to play like a child hitting single notes on a piano, you can eventually find the key something is in, and switch the single notes for chords that contain them. Finding appropriate ones isn't as difficult as you would think it would be; it's much easier than playing piano, anyway.

So get out there and learn to play some Christmas songs! I don't care if you play piano, guitar, flute, clarinet, or a tuba or ukulele for crying out loud! It's Christmas time, and there are good songs out there. Yes, many have been played too often and are irritating. Some of them still have their charm, though, and should be sought after.

It's Christmas Time!!!

In honor of the Christmas holiday approaching, I've changed my blog background to a cool red and green.

I might just make a permanent restructuring of font, color, background, and style after New Years. We'll see, though. I want the back to be something to last, not flashy, but comfy.

I'm excited for the holidays. I hope to incorporate Christmas into all of my sundry hobbies - and Photoshop is no exception. I need to go look up some good Christmas-themed brushes.

Hopefully I'll have a whole showcase of Christmas works by the time that day comes.

If anyone with photoshop wants links to the brushes I use, I'll be leaving links.

New Words and Kanji

I have a new word I've picked up.
It's it's music, ongaku.

音楽
The kanji are sound (on) + music/comfort (gaku).

Take note there's a homophone here, which occurs (very!) often in Japanese.
gaku is also learning, or 学
so gaku ≠ gaku if we're talking 学 and 楽

Keep also in mind that in general, 音読みis for pairs and 訓読み is for individuals.
Why?
alone, 学 is gaku, and
alone, 楽 is raku. gaku is the chinese onyomi for pairs for 楽.
(See Kanji - the Chinese Characters for further explanation.)

I'm hoping to get more words like this lodged in my brain once school is over and I have time... It's going to be sad when it ends, though... I'm going to miss all of my friends...

Picking Up New Sounds

I've been looking to broaden my range in every conceivable interpretation of those words. For one thing, I need to work on my singing. For another, I need to learn to create more varying tunes on my guitar, and I need to find some new stuff to listen to.

I think I'm going to attempt I'll Be that Lee proposed. That might help with vocals.

The current song I've been working with has made my hand all cramped in new places... Ultimately, that means I'm doing new things, which is a good sign of improvement.

The new thing I'm looking into is Dashboard Confessional. Some of their songs are easily recognizable - though I didn't know I liked them. Kyle, a friend in a class mentioned them as a place to find songs to learn... sounds like a plan.

However, my main concern is getting new things to play, and I still don't feel like I've found success, even though there's lots of songs I'm still working on... it's some kind of loopy desire I seem to have all of a sudden to want to be able to play anything... even though such a thing isn't feasible.

Does anyone have ideas for Christmas songs to learn? Piano or guitar, I'm in the mood.

Forest Downpour

While this isn't an incredible piece, it's a beautiful proof-of-concept.
My new trick: Gradient Difference.
If you take the gradient preset of red, blue, and yellow, and you set the mode (at the top) to Difference, you can use it repeatedly over itself for a wild little multicolor effect. If you take that effect and cycle the colors with H/S/L (ctrl or cmd+U) or with Levels... (ctrl or cmd+L), there's lots of exploration to be done. This one was made by a layer of verticals set to difference mode and 50% opacity laid on another random one colorized green. I like it, though it's nothing incredible.

Iku versus Okonau

I am rather annoyed with this character. What character is it?
This one.

行
It has a double meaning.

I hate double meanings.

行く, iku, is a word I am familiar with; it means "to go"

行う, okonau, is a word... but wait... THE SAME KANJI ??? That's retarded.
okonau is the verb "to do".

I have them straightened, so there's no confusion... but I am still learning more complicated verb conjugations, and how and I supposed to know which is which in a real context ???

That's my annoyance of the day.

彼 は 読み書き が できる。
kare wa yomi+kaki ga dekiru.
He can read and write.

And that's the word for today - できる/dekiru - to be able (to).

Boys Like Girls

My Favorite Band Ever!!! Look them up... They're incredible.
I've kinda been a fan since high school. (those were the days...)
The Great Escape and Heels over Head are some of my faves.
Five Minutes to Midnight and Hero - Heroine are also incredible.

Even those with a slightly different taste might like Thunder and Learning to Fall.
Everyone should hear their songs, if only once. Some will like some better than others, but they're bound to like at least one... unless they're very picky people.

I just got the CD, and it was worth it.

They're my inspiration, and I'm excited to get home to my amp and my bro's drums...

I don't know what I'll write, but it will be something inspired by them. It'll be so strange being home when it happens...

I might write about a number of things - there's going to be a lot of things going on in my life in the near future.

Liquid Sky

I made another combo with my Liquid Heat and Violet Splash.
This one's nothing special; however, it's slightly different in that I used VS twice
and LH once. I used the blending modes Lighten on LH and Overlay on 50% opacity for the top VS.

I think it came out well; I may make a pack of all my recent works for wallpaper in a bit. I don't think I have enough to do so at the moment, but I will. If anyone's interested in getting the compilation, I may put it on DeviantArt and put a link here on my blog. Also, if you click on the images here in my blog, they open in a new window in their true size. You can right-click->save them from there.

Starting Cards

I finally have my cards begun, and though I don't have much, I have a plan that has been put in place. I put the kanji and pronunciation on one side, and the definition on the other.

It should help me to get the things I don't have memorized, and the things I do attached to the new material.

My current words are:

教会 - kyoukai - church
天気 - tenki - angel
聖徒 - seito - disciple

名誉 - meiyo - honor
責任 - sekinin - responsibility

音楽 - ongaku - music

私は音楽が大好きです。
watashi wa ongaku daisuki desu.
I like music.

Secondhand Serenade

They sing Fall For You, one of the songs I've been learning on my guitar.
It uses:

Am - 002210
C - 032010
F - 133211
G 320003

I just got the CD it's on, and I must say I'm pleased. They're pretty good.
It's A Twist In My Story, the latest addition to my collection of music.

I hope to start getting a few more things to add... I haven't had much good and new music in a while...
I'll be going back home in a little over a week, though, so I can fix my iTunes and update my iPod.

That's two Apple products in the same sentence. Yuck.
Let's make some things clear: a) I like apples, and b) I hate Apple
Just for clarification. They try to be trendsetters, and pretend to typify "cool". I find the amount of decisions their software makes for you distasteful. They are stable, yes, and so are stones. but rocks don't grow, do they?

Anyways, I like having my music portable, and haven't had that luxury, as I've had to switch to my own iTunes (I used to use my mom's laptop). I don't want to lose the stuff that's on my iPod that isn't with me - so my iPod is kinda missing new stuff. That's ok, though - I'm often busy, and don't need it very much.

Violet Splash

I've been looking for something purple, and I think I found it. It took a large batch of my personal tricks. Aside from cloud and arrow brushes, it's almost completely original.
In this one, I used a few filter> render> cloud layers, and changed their color and brightness and contrast, along with the blending mode. My favorite chrome water trick was placed on screen. I played with a few subliminally placed gradients, to improve the "lighting" of the image. The flare was a natural by-product of my experimentation; it wasn't intentional, though I did encourage it's prominence.

Back to the Kanji / Addressing People

I haven't worked on kanji specifically in ages. I need to.
I got a cool little keyring of about a hundred blank cards at the bookstore today.
It should help me with practice. It was cheap, so if it proves as useful as i think it will, I'm going to go back and get a few more.

In 日本語, you refer to yourself and others in different ways, depending on context.
For yourself, the common "i" is
私, わたし.(watashi)

わたくし(watakushi) is the formal pronunciation.
僕, ぼく, (boku) is the casual/fairly polite for males.
girls can use あたし, (atashi) but it has a very "cutesy" or "girly" sound, so some prefer watashi.
also... 俺、おれ is a very rough one used by guys in certain extremely casual contexts.
わし is used by some middle-aged males.

In addressing others, attaching -san to the first or last name is common. often, Japanese prefers using the specific name. 先生 (sensei) is used to those that have significant knowledge.
other forms of -san are -kun and -chan. Assuming equal or lower status, -kun is a male form, and -chan an endearing female form.

The three levels of politeness are 1-Name(w/suffix), 2-nothing, and 3-あなた(anata). I use it often, but in a real context, anata could come off as rude, unless they're a friend.
きみ (kimi) is a close female form, like anata. It also could be taken as rude, though it implies closeness.

Another Song and a Birthday

I've been learning a new song I was going to show to Marianne, as soon as I'd straightened it up, along with Alyssa's.

Today's her birthday. Not that she wanted anyone to know... such a mysterious girl...
So... since that ain't happnin'... I'll elaborate.

It's Banana Pancakes by Jack Johnson.
It's a fun song, albeit a difficult one.
the sliding around, at the beginning for example, is very hard to do.

The new chords are:

G7 - 353433
Amin7 - 575555
D - 557775
C7 - 335353, and
C7 - x323xx (very uncommon/unique slide variant of x212xx(B7) )

D is only used on the bridge.

Hopefully I'll be able to play it for her at some point...
There was a time I considered getting Daniel to learn it, but it would have taken half a year even if he had wanted to... Hardest song I've learned up to this point.

Can't you see, can't you see... Rain all day and I don't mind.

Photoshop Secrets

Most of these are not new to me (as I turn the internet upside down to learn things), but many would find them useful, and here they are...

If you are in the middle of dragging the mouse to make a selection, and you press and hold space, you can drag the not-yet-defined selection box around.

If you scroll (with the mouse) you can move up and down in the pic. Holding ctrl (cmd on a mac) will let you go sideways.

If you click in the box of a menu, like for font or blending options, you can use the up and down arrow keys to look through and preview all the different options. NOTE: This often records the change in your history. Do too many and you may erase all of your "undos"!!!

You can change the workspace background color with the paint bucket by shift+clicking on it!

Ctrl(cmd) + Alt(opt) + Shift + K will bring up shortcut options.

See this and more at: http://www.bspcn.com/2007/09/11/photoshop-secret-shortcuts/

Learning to Speak

I'm covering a new unit at guidetojapanese.org.

It's Essential Grammar - covering the polite, formal, and informal wordings and colloquialisms.
丁寧語 - teineigo - polite language - that's what I'm learning.

For example, using the (き)ます ending instead of the -ru / -u ending.
A good example is the sentence,
"I speak Japanese to you" - わたし は あなた に 日本語 を 話します。

it has tense...
ます - present
ません - negative
ました - past
ませんでした - neg. past

です is the polite form ending. It replaces the present だ, and ends it's conjugated forms. They're not the same, though. I've already covered the two, however...
for explanation, see my post Nouns.

On another note, the へ particle implies literal coming/going, while the に particle implies coming/going for a purpose.

Thanksgiving

I haven't had too much time to play my guitar.
That's kind of a lie, as I've had nothing to do since Saturday.

But I haven't been interested... I've had a book to read,
The Screwtape Letters, by C. S. Lewis.
It's a good book, and a good read, no matter what religion you are.

I spent today over at the Zimmermans, some family friends. They're lots of fun.
Frank Zimmerman is my dad's old roommate. I have all brothers, they have all girls... kinda funny... There's Erica (16), Bree(14), Kimberly and Shannon, both something around 8... not sure... and Cassie, who's 10 months old.

Apparently Bree keeps in touch with my nutty younger brother... they're a lot alike...

Anyway, it's Thanksgiving, and if you haven't made a list of things you're grateful for, you'd best do so at some point.

I'm grateful for:
(in no particular order)

friends, family, roommates, food, math, science, my education, holidays, my laptop, my guitar, chocolate, running hot water, my warm blanket, pillows, my warm spot on the couch, showers, sunshine, rain, snow, wind, water, flowers, my clothes, the sky above, the grass beneath, the sound of rainfall, the wind in the trees, the birds in the air, love, friendship, soap, refrigerators, dishwashers, sound, color, peace, light, quiet, freedom, creativity, light, music, art, dancing, singing, sleep, fun, jokes, electricity, contact lenses, paper and pencil, dry erase boards, comics, cars, cell phones, computers, my ipod, flash drives, the internet, Google, FireFox, heated apartments, the Savior, repentance, technology in general, the Gospel in general, and life in general.

Liquid Heat

This is today's piece.
I've been looking to make something fiery, and found a tutorial that gave me an
idea... funny thing is, this looks nothing like what the tutorial was going to make. I basically took the advice of playing with filter>liquify and smudge tool. Even the way it is colored was done differently... he used a hue adjustment layer, but i used a solid orange layer with blending set to color. I also added a few light red and yellow highlights on a top layer.

It was originally going to be a customizable fire effect, but this looks nothing like a flame, by shape. It was basically a vertical gray rectangle with filter> sketch> fibers. Then a big 90 degree motion blur, and the whole thing turned sideways. It was stretched to the sides of the screen and warped, and then liquify and smudge were used until desired results were achieved. Last the colors were played with. I added an inner and an outer glow, and used red and yellow brushes on a separate layer on overlay.

So... technique of the day? Liquify it!

Looking Up Sentences

I have a little secret I've used to help myself with learning new words and phrases. And sentences, for that matter.

At the Jisho (jisho is japanese for dictionary, fyi) (http://jisho.org/sentences/) I look up key words in their sentence search. It's taught me a lot about grammar.

辞書 is the kanji for jisho/dictionary. It's word/term + writing(s). Just a thought...

It's useful for learning new words, too.
Most of the words are links to their definitions. (infinitive, it doesn't discuss tense)
I can learn words to help me use words i already know better!

The most important ones i've learned are こと ("thing"), しかし ("but"), and ついて ("about").
こと is rather generic, and often used with another word. It threw me off a while back when i was tying to figure out something else ( the "-are" passive).

Japanese grammar, as hard as it is, once you get over it you can read almost anything (if you're looking up the sundry kanji).


アコースティックギターが欲しい！しかし、貧しい・・・。
I want an acoustic guitar! But I'm poor...

I'll Be...

Looking for a new song to play, My buddy Lee suggested a song i didn't recognize at first...
I don't know how old it is... but it is a rather old one.

It's Edwin McCain's I'll Be.

A great one. A great suggestion. just not what I was expecting it to be.
And I think I will learn it.

It'll be time before i get to it, though... I have other business to attend to at the moment...

I'm learning to play the theme for Hyrule Field from:
The Legend of Zelda : Twilight Princess (the best game of all time)
...and it's going well. Slow, but well.
That's taken a bit of my time... if any of you want to know what it sounds like,
you can listen HERE.
That's MIDI (computer-generated), so it's not anything like hearing it on a real piano- it will give you a rough idea, though.

I'll be your crying shoulder,
I'll be love's suicide
I'll be better when I'm older,
I'll be the greatest fan of your life.

Bubbling Moons / Moonlight

That's the names of two recent pieces i've been working on.
The top is an original, from scratch.
I used all sorts of cool brushes.
I warped the background, which started of as a plain noise gradient

The second is a derivative work, made with the one from my previous post... you can never go wrong with mixing them!

That's the tip of the day, I suppose. When you can't find a way to spice something up further, try blending it with another work, using blendng modes.

Learning to Read

I learned a few new words recenty, which i thought I'd share...

信仰 shinkou - faith
希望 kibou - hope
慈愛 jiai - charity


My reading comprehension skills have increased markedly recently.
I wish I could give examples, but that's kind of an abstract thing...

You just have to know your parts of grammar... there's the particles, of course, but also な, た, した, -aれ, -ない, and other conjugation stuff.
You also have to know your katakana for names, and words spelled in kana alone,
like こと, ついて, あなた(がた), and わたし(たち).

I'm getting there. soon enough, i'll be able to just look up the kanji as i go... that's the goal, anyway.

Jonas

Jonas is a sad song, about some people in need, and a man who ignored them.
It is one of the few songs that has ever made me cry.

It's basically the opposite of "A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief".
It is the voice of those in need being passed by...

It's more powerful live; I've heard it live twice now, both the time that video was made, and last night. Those girls have some real talent. I never get tired of hearing it.
I'm going to attempt learn it; it won't be easy to figure out just by listening to.

If you're interested, it's posted on YouTube HERE.

Jonas, Jonas, don't you - walk away from us... we see the dimness in your eyes.
Jonas, Jonas, you're no - different from us... only in the way you cry...

Energy Transfer

That's the title of my latest piece. It uses the blending mode "screen", a layer blending option, "outer glow", and a new technique, noise gradients.
It really wasn't that hard to do; I just started with filter> render> clouds like I often do. I used green and black. It looked dirty, so I downed the brightness and upped the contrast.

Using the mode "screen", i used a series of green-to-black gradients; the "screen mode" makes black transparent, giving me the noise grad stripes&circle and the normal-grad beams of light.

I used a random circle brush.
I also used some plus brushes I had. I divided everything into separate layers, so I could manipulate things individually -- i had four "plus" layers. I gave them all a green outer glow.

I later manipulated the colors, making the circles teal and moving the angled pluses toward yellow.

It was an easier project than you would think. My advice for today: experiment!

Japanese Sites

I've been searching for Japanese reading material, because even though my understanding of Japanese is good, I can't develop it, as I don't have ways to practice.

I did find a few things, but none of them would be very useful...

However, i did (re)find a site in my bookmarks that quizzes you on Kanji. It's a really good place, be it for learning or for practicing.
It's www.asahi-net.or.jp, and has a java applet that covers the meaning(two way), onyomi, and kunyomi pronouncing.
Note, however, that it expects you to know your 仮名(kana).

My studying level of kanji is level 2, and though I'm not the best with pronunciation, I hope to know the meanings, specifically. I want to learn my Kanji pronunciation through learning words that contain them.

Word of the day: 先日 - senjitsu - "the other day"

Techniques On the Strings

I've had to work hard to get to where i can play the new song I've been working on.

I've never had too much difficulty with sliding up and down, but now I'm having to do it with switching on the E and A strings.
Sliding and jumping on the low E is a pain; I do it on the high e all the time, but when you drop from A to E or try to slide down on E, the finger wants to slip the string off the neck.
It's my fault; I need to stop hitting it at an angle, and hit it straight down.
Practice makes perfect! Anyways... The song is going well, and I hope to have it done soon.

If anyone has ideas as to what I ought to learn next, I'd be grateful.
I was going to learn Cookie Jar, but I've had trouble getting a hold of good tabs... either that or I'm doing something wrong... I know enough Jack Johnson songs for now, anyway.

I still need to write a song, but haven't found inspiration yet... I have a few chord ideas, though.

can't you see that it's just raining...

Another Winter Party !!!

Surprise! I have an amazing background now.

I love it. I'll probably keep it until around Christmas.

If someone expresses interest, I can show how it is done.
Otherwise, I won't because I have other things I could be doing.

I think I'm going to try and make a similar one for My desktop.

We'll see, though. I definitely have found the spirit of winter.
I will need to find a Christmas mood if I'm going to have an awesome one for it, too.
I meant to do something snowy, but this is what came out. oh well. Maybe next time.

That's one of the funny things about art - true art dictates its self. You just follow what is best until you can't improve upon it further.

Subordinate Clauses and Gobi

With nouns describing nouns, you just put them together.
For example,

International Education Center
国際教育センタ

There is NO da/desu!!!
However, you can use the -janai, -datta, -janakatta (past and/or negative) to modify, though.

Person who is not student do not go to school.
学生じゃない人は、学校に行かない。


So... I bet you're wondering... What's a gobi?
Either way, I'll tell you:
A gobi ends a sentence with a "tone"; we have them in english, too.

the gobi ね looks for agreement.

Cool, huh?*
"huh?" here is the same as ね. It's like "isn't it?", or "right?"

the gobi よ informs of something new.

Neat, you know?*
よ is the equivalent of "you know" in English.

You can also use よね as "you know.. .., right?" they must be in that order, though.

*you don't use question marks with them in Japanese.

Playing for People

Everybody is different when playing in front of people, I've noticed.

-Trevor was always good at it, but people loved him, so, you know...
-Lee's good, but doesn't realize he is. I've never seen him play for a big crowd.
-I don't usually stress too much, but I've never played for a huge crowd, so I don't know...

I'll probably show a few things I've learned to Kara and Bree (Lee's girls) soon.
I don't know how that'll go... hopefully well.
I've been working on one that's one of Kara's faves.

I have a whole list of ones "in the works" I need to get together.
The most recent ones are:

- Sitting, Waiting, Wishing - Jack Johnson
- *(secret)
- What It Does to Us -Lee
- Confident - Lee
- *(secret)
- Special Day (Me)

Forgive my leaving out two. I'll fill them in when I am able to.

Winter Party!!!

I've changed the blog to I winter background! I used all kinds of brushes and layering...

Tips for today:
- Plan ahead with image size. Altering dimensions later is a pain, and hard to keep looking good.

- Use scattering and angle jitters on brushes!!! you can find these on the brush menu in the top right.

- Make a new layer regularly, otherwise you'll end up in deep doggy doo later when you want to change something, but can't.

-The Image>Adjustments>... menu is full of wonderful things. Levels, Hue/Saturation, and Brightness/Contrast are some of my faves. Desaturate and Invert are good, too.

I'll have something cool in soon...

Verbs

Japanese verbs end in u. -ru, -tsu, -ku, -su, and so on are the infinitive endings.
for example,
to speak is 話す(hanasu).

In 日本語, a grammatically complete sentence only needs a verb.
It is similar to Spanish in that the subject can be implied. However, in Japanese,
the object can be implied too!

For example,

Eat.
食べる。

There are two types of verbs: Ichidan (ru) and Godan (u).

with "ru" verbs, you drop the -ru to conjugate.
with "u" verbs, you change the -u to something else.

for negative, you add "nai".
RU/Ichidan: 食べる＝食べない (tabe[ru/nai])
U/Godan: 話す＝話さない (hana[su/sanai])

For past you add た. for different endings you do different things.

Ending	Non-Past	changes to...	Past
す	話す	す→した	話した
く ぐ	書く 泳ぐ	く→いた ぐ→いだ	書いた 泳いだ
む ぶ ぬ	噛む 遊ぶ 死ぬ	む→んだ ぶ→んだ ぬ→んだ	噛んだ 遊んだ 死んだ
る う つ	切る 買う 持つ	る→った う→った つ→った	切った 買った 持った

Credits for this chart go to Tae Kim at www.guidetojapanese.org

That's a lot to deal with, but it's not that bad once you get it down.
We'll continue this later :)

In Between Dreams

Jack Johnson is the man.

I just got another album of his, and I am pleased.
Jack Johnson is my hero.

There. I said it. (And you, Lee!!!)

This one has Sitting, Waiting, Wishing and Banana Pancakes!!!
It also has Better Together and Remember When, two new faves!!!

!!! :)

I would learn every Jack Johnson song in existence if it were feasible.
(That would be dumb, anyway.)

I am going to learn a few more before moving on, though.

I won't reveal what I'm learning yet, but it'll be something awesome!


The wisdom's in the trees, not the glass windows...

Blending Modes

Blending modes are key in Phtotshop. You can go without, but they will do amazing things!

• When you want to add something in a subtle way, be it an object or coloring, use Overlay.
• Use Hue, Sat., and Lum. ones to add said properties of one layer to another.
• Difference and Exclusion invert colors and give unusual, but sometimes cool results
  

You can select the first normal, and then use the down arrow key do flip through them* until you have one you like.
*Flipping through them makes undo steps, of which there is a limit. Don't do it if you might need some undos!

When you want to combine two layers, blending options is the way to go.

Also try:

• changing either layer's opacity
• reversing the order of the two layers
• inverting the colors in either layer
• changing the modifying(top) layer's brightness/contrast

You'll get to see a cool example soon!

Na-Adjectives and I-Adjectives

"Na" adjectives behave just like nouns, and are "conjugated" the same way.
See my post "Nouns" for reference.

	Positive	Negative
Present	だ	じゃない
Past	だった	じゃなかった

You put these after them, to use them like objects, i.e. "[the|this|that] (noun) is (adj)"

The sky is blue.
空が青です。

They are adjectives, though. And they describe. You can place them before the noun. If you use the present positive (plain) form, you put な(na) before them.

I like the big sky.
私はビッグな空を気に入る。




I-adjectives end in い. You conjugate them like this:

	Positive	Negative
Present	い	くない
Past	かった	くなかった

NOTE: You CANNOT use them with だ / です . If you use them like "(noun) is (adj)", but you just put it after the noun; you don't put da/desu at the end.

The building is tall.
高いビル。

The building was not tall.
高くなかったビル。

They can be used in combination with nouns, too, like so:

I like the blue sky.
私は青空気に入る。

Fall for You

I've been looking for a new song, and I think I found it!!!
It's Fall For You by Secondhand Serenade.

It's a beautiful song, and I only know about it because several girls have shown it to me. hmm...

It's kinda iffy in that, there are simple easy-to-follow chord and vocal patterns, but in different parts of the song, the vocals have varying levels of energy. And that's just one prob... the other is the number of times to strum a chord.
At the beginning, for example, it's only once per measure!
And then it moves to the chorus, doing it once per count (4 per measure).
Then in some of the more energetic parts it's twice per count. bleh.

I'm going to have to sit down and work out the details on paper, so I can memorize.
It's kinda hard to memorize without patterns!!! But sequences work, too, if you identify them.

All of this is extremely doable, though and the chords are just
Am(x02210), C(021010), F(133211), and a slightly ambiguous G.
G is both (320003) and (355433). I think it uses both, but at different times...

It looks like it'll be a cool song to learn... I'm excited!

Wallpaper and Brushes

I haven't done too much in PS today.

I've been needing to change my blog background for the wintertime, though.

I want to make a snowy wintery one, like Lee did at Leetopia.
It'll be cool when it's done, but I've been kinda stumped as to how to start.
It'll come to me when it's time, I guess...

I've been finding cool wallpapers for my laptop... I wish I could show them, but they really aren't mine to share... let's just say Flickr and DeviantArt have many wonders...

So... yeah... I've been expanding and renaming my brushes. I will probably get on it today... I'm excited to get started... after this, I will get a Christmas one going for December.
So I finally have Photoshop projects to do... and I'm ready...

Nouns

I have had a little bit of a fit with trying to get my words sorted... so I'm kinda behind on posting, though I have several ready to post... forgive me.

With nouns, you can express present/future* and past, and positive and negative.
*note that there is no "future" tense in 日本語; you specify the time, if you need to.

These are "is" "isn't", "was", and "wasn't".

	Positive	Negative
Present	だ	じゃない
Past	だった	じゃなかった

Note that だ can be pronounce all kinds of ways in different parts of Japan... an alternative that is used more often is です。

(It) is water.
水です。

(It) isn't (a) mountain.
山じゃない。

(It) was (a) fish.
魚だった。

(It) wasn't (an) apple.
りんごじゃなかった。

If it's not used at the end of a sentence, you don't use だ or です after it.

A fish can swim.
(fish swims, it can.)
魚は泳ぐことはできる。

(I) want some water.
水が欲しい。

Stresses and Strings

Tomorrow is Friday!!! I have homework, so I doubt I'll have an extremely happy one... however...
Most of my stress is gone... at least it's gone down...

I have found, in my experience, that playing my guitar seems to lower stress.
Perhaps that's one of the things I use it for- a stress reliever - I can release emotion through it.

I need to work more on my guitar practice.
I've been playing a lot of Jack Johnson lately, but I need to branch out...

I got water blister on my thumb- I've been playing with my finger, something I haven't done much before...

I did find the end riff to Times Like These, though...
e---------------|
b---------------|
G----------9---|
D----------9---|
A-----7-9-11--|
E--/9------0---|

The chord played before it is F#m.
The only ones the song uses are:
001120 -E
222442 -F#m
556775 -A
778997 -B


what a pain... I've been trying to remember it forever...
I finally just gave up and looked it up.

Somehow I know it'll never be the same.

Brushes Galore !!!

For all my amigos out there who play in photoshop, there are lots of cool brushes for you to find at DeviantArt.
From the DeviantArt Home, on the left menu,
click: resources > application resources > photoshop brushes.

If you click on them, and then click download (on the left in the pages), you can use them in your artwork... they're really cool!

I used to use them a lot, but I haven't in almost a year... I forgot how cool they are.
Try doing a search for lightning, grass, fire, water, flowers, hearts, grunge, vector, stars, plants or trees, leaves, splashes, blood, clouds, smoke, fractals, abstract... the list goes on and on.

once you download them, extract the .zip file if it's in one, and put the ".abr" brush file in (assuming you're using CS2, if not, go to whatever alternative folder name):

C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe Photoshop CS2\Presets\Brushes

If you put it in this folder, when you right click while using the brush, and click the arrow in the top right of the popup menu, it will be under your list of brushes to use as you please!!!

The Particles

I need to work more on all of my hobbies...
I've just been extremely busy.

Sentence of the Day:
私は日本語で打つ。
watashi wa nihongo de utsu.
I type in Japanese.

I've become more familiar with the particle で now.
there's
は, that sets the topic,
が, labels the subject,
も, inclusive particle that adds to the topic,
を, the direct object marker,
の, shows ownership,
に, that directs toward (like "to"),
へ, that shows gereral direction, but not necessarily destination,
で, by means of / context,
と, and,
や, and...etc,
とか, a more colloquial form of や,
か, question marker,

and I think that's all of them. Yay!

Now I just need to work on my verb conjugations...
And my Kanji...

Cookie Jar

...that's the name of the Jack Johnson song I'm thinking of learning.

I need to find something more "romantic", though. I need to work on expanding my "chicks dig it" library, if you know what I mean... I really want to be able to play a wider variety, but I don't know just quite how to go about it. Perhaps I just need to write a new song.

I've been thinking of writing one about Danielle... but for now, that's our little secret. Yup. Don't tell anyone; it's just between me, Robert, and you, the entire world ;)

Well, anywho, anywhere, anywhat, anywhen, anywhy... I tink I'm gonna start writing some lyrics... I probably won't post them- I don't post stuff that I hold personal, not usually...

I need to improve Alyssa's song, so I can show it to her when I'm not half asleep. I might write a song about all four of us (Daniel, Marianne, Alyssa, Robert)... but things might be changing, so I might wait before deciding on the specific topics...

Oh, and Eliza wanted me to make a collection of all I'd written... problem is, I never managed to finish the lyrics to much of what I would include. And I need to find a decent way to record it.

So... yeah. I have my work cut out for me, as far as guitaring goes...

Daniel might be picking up guitar... it would be cool to have someone to play with...

As a Matter of Fract(al)

Today I found a program. A very special program. And I'm addicted. To it. Bad.
I've been looking for a method of generating fractals for my art in photoshop.

AND I FOUND IT !!!!!!

It's called ContextFree, and you can find it HERE.
You have to "learn" to use it, because it's like a programming engine.
It would only take someone a few days, though. it's rather simple.
I did it in a few hours -- I'm a programmer though, so it was easier for me. This is an image I made entirely in ContextFree. I invented a tree and grew a whole bunch of them.

If anyone expresses interest, I can post a few how-to tutorials. There's a lot of experimentation involved in learning it, so it's fun.
I have many friends that use photoshop, but I don't know how many visit here. I would be delighted to teach it (it'll do INCREDIBLE things), but I won't waste my breath if there's no need. I will be posting art that involves ContextFree, so if anyone has tried to imitate my works, they'll likely begin to need this now.

Teasing Translations

My roommates got people pumpkins for the night we carved them... he left a note on the dry erase board afterward...

I need money
for the pumpkins ($5)
Thanks!

I erased and replaced it with Japanese, just to be annoying...

わたしは南瓜の
金をください ($5)
ありがとう！

I got some kinda threat about spreading my jibberish... lol...
in doing so, I discovered a new word - kabocha, or pumpkin.
the kanji for it is 南瓜, southern+melon. Interesting, huh?

I also got down the word for fountain/spring. It's izumi, 泉 .

I never did look up the word "Halloween"... I'll probably make a list of all the holidays sometime soon.
In the meantime, I need to work on my areas of discipline, that I covered previously.

If anyone is curious, I'm beginning to translate whole sentences. If you want you can submit sentences and I'll translate them for you and post them here.
ではまた！

Running Out of Ideas...

Lately I've been short of things to learn on my guitar.
I need to start writing songs, but I need to continue learning, too.

I can't seem to come up with much to do...

I can play Sitting, Waiting, Wishing perfectly now. I need to pick up something to do.

On the back of the to-do list, I've got to try and memorize Minority by Green Day, and I've got to go re-learn the ending of Times Like These (Jack Johnson of course)...

I need to learn a new song...
Sweet Home Alabama is a classic I need to go learn.
Wake Me Up When September Ends (Green Day) is another.
There might be a few good John Denver songs... I'll have to look.

I'm just tired right now, and short on ideas as a result. I'll probably look through my iTunes, and see if anything gives me ideas.

In the meantime, if anybody out there has ideas as to what I ought to learn, feel free to let me know.

Differencing Gradients

I experimented with gradients recently, and discovered a neat way to mix them.
If you create a series gradients, each on its own layer, with blending mode set to difference, you'd see them combine with each other. They kinda inverse where they overlap, and experimenting with different ones you can make all kinds of neat things. This is one I
did in studying gradient. There are probably far more complicated and more interesting designs; I just gradually gained an aim with this one, so I didn't stray from what I had begun to envision.

Image>Adjustments> Levels... is a powerful tool if you practice using it. It can help you give cool colors to abstract art. Try changing the red, green, and blue values (from the RGB dropdown menu) in relation to each other. You get flame red,orange, and yellow if you give red 0-85, green 85-190, and 190-255, without moving the gray bias arrow.
I've previously talked about how levels can imrove quality; it can create something entirely new, too. I'll probably add some stuff to this pic later- you can always fine something neat to add; just don't limit yourself to a specific tool/technique or part of the image. Do random stuff; after a while, go back to old things and see if you have new ideas!

A Student Of...

I've been learning a few words of education and profession.
my sentence for the day:
彼は医学の学生だ。
かれはいがくのがくせいだ。
kare wa igaku no gakusei da.
He is a medical student.

the knowledge/discipline of medicine is igaku, 医学。
student, a rather common and important word to know, is gakusei, 学生。
so I'm a student of japanese, 日本語の学生。

I've been looking at areas of knowledge, and found these:

(forensic)medicine is (法)医学, (hou)igaku.
physiology is 生理学, seirigaku.
psychology is 心理学, shinrigaku.
nutritional science is 栄養学, eiyougaku.
anatomy is 解剖学, kaibougaku.

science is 科学, kagaku.
chemisty is 化学, also pronounced kagaku.
biochemistry is 生化学, seikagaku. (the kanji 生 means life)
physical science(physics) is (物)理学, (butsu)rigaku.
biology is 生物学, seibutsugaku.
astronomy is 天文学, tenmongaku.

history is 私学, shigaku.
law is 法学, hougaku.
humanities is 人文科学, jinbunkagaku.

language(linguistics) is (言)語学, gengogaku.
lierature is 文学, bungaku.

geometry is 幾何学, kikagaku.
mathematics(algebra) is (代)数学, (dai)suugaku.

Learning Another Song!!!

Today I started learning Sitting, Waiting, Wishing by Jack Johnson.

And maybe you been through this before
But its my first time
So please ignore
The next few lines cause they're directed at you.

I already can play all of it!!! Not together, but I'm working on that.
For those of you that play guitar (LEE!)
the tabs can be found by clicking here.

The same pattern is followed on all but the 1st measure, namely:
(B=A+1)
(C=A+2)
*counting
A C C A x x (x2) *1,+
A C C B x x (x2) *2,3
x x x x x x *4
A C A B x x (x4) *1+2, 3
x x x x x x *4
(move to new a,b,c)

The first measure is rest(x2), ACCAxx(x2), ACAAxx(x4) instead.
You'll have to take a look-see at the verse.

The bridge is C(335553),E(022100),F(033200),G(055400).
Each chord is played 2 measures. the whole thing is played twice.

The three things you'd need to learn it would be:
Tabs
Lyrics
to Hear it

I wish I would have kept it secret; I could have surprised Marianne with it or something.
Hey Alyssa! Look at the lyrics. See any...irony... in me learning this?
Hint:

Learning loving somebody don't make them love you.

Posting And Scripting

I've been making up for the entries I've missed. I'm caught up now, so no more confusion. I post them in order, so the more recent days that I've done I haven't posted until now.
So everything's in order now.

We'll all live happily ever after. Now all I need is a girlfriend... and a life.

Anyways, I've been searching the topic of scripting in photoshop, and I've discovered how to do it. There's and ExtendScript ToolKit that came with Photoshop that I didn't know about. Now I do, and I'm going to begin to play with it.
I made a piece of code that toggles layer visibility. It's not much, but it works, and it's a step toward learning the language. It's JavaScript, by the way.

Coding in JavaScript will probably be an additional little hobby for Photoshop. I may start designing my own filters. I have some cool techniques that are complex filter combos and stuff that would be really cool if I could make them a one step built-in effect. For now, though, I don't know enough, and it's something I'm going to have to work on.

Solving the Riddle

I finally solved a problem with a Japanese word I had found!
I've been battling it forever. It's hard to find the meaning to conjugated verbs on the internet. Especially if you're not familiar with every single conjugation.
So, I've been battling this one,
by the name of 命じられた. That's meijirareta for you English folk.
And I'm not totally helpless- I know what 命 is.

命じ(る) is the verb "to command".
That's all I could gather. But no one would elaborate on "-rare-", and you can't exactly type it into search engines, unless you're looking for something, well, "rare". So I was stuck.

Turns out, to conjugate a verb in passive voice (perform v. be performed), you simply drop the ending infinitive U from RU for A and add RERU. That gives you 命じられる!
Which isn't the same, of course. But past tense you replace RU with TA.
And the end result? "was commanded": 命じられた.

So... maybe I should stop relying so much on kana for conjugation; it seems sound can change, and rearrange them.

I'm so proud of myself -- or rather, I feel much less stupid now.
And that's how it happened. The end.

Sitting, Waiting, Wishing

must I always be waiting, waiting on you...

Jack Johnson is the best. He's a real guitarist, and I love his songs.
My latest (re)discovery is Sitting, Waiting, Wishing.

My friend Marianne has a very random iTunes collection. That's one of the only Jack Johnson songs she has. It's one of my favorites that I don't have. I think I'm going to learn to play it. I'll put on the to-do list; I've got other things on my plate.

That's one of the best JJ songs out there, though. I can play Fall Line and Times Like These. I've been thinking of adding one to my knowledge, and I think I found the one.

If you haven't seen the YouTube video, you need to. It's excellent. And it's backwards. Really wild, and fun to watch.

I can't always be playing, playing your fool...

Photoshop Artwork

I want to learn to be an artist. I want to learn to use Photoshop like some use paper and pencil. Even if I have to draw a bunch of manga characters to do it.
That's what I've decided.

For my lack of creativity, that's a bold declaration.

I'm trying to learn to draw people, but I'm not sure which style I want to pursue. Manga is only one of many forms. They don't all have names; that's just one of the ones that does, and is well known. I'd like to be able to draw people I know, in time.

This is from a lesson I took on how to draw hair. yep. It's mine.
Nothing incredible, but you can recognize it as what it is, So that's a step. My real trouble is learning to draw faces. They've always been very hard for me.
It's kind of ironic, as being a true artist requires seeing thing in parts, not just as a whole. I'm not going to go nuts drawing dumb things. I want to be able to do one thing at a time. the hair I've never been good with - that's one thing down.
Next I'll do faces. It'll take some time to get good at anything. I hope to "work my way" to being more comfortable with drawing people; I've never been good at it, and Photoshop may be my ticket out of this hole.

You basically just draw it with a crude brush, smudge the edges into the desired shape, and use thin dodge / burn strokes on highlights / midtones.

Looking It Up

I've been trying to learn my kanji by reading things with them.
Looking the ones I don't know up, I'll learn the common ones, the ones I need to know.
That's my theory, anyway.
Thing is, my grammar's not so excellent. So it's slow work.

I am starting to get it, though. some of the ones I've learned recently are:
存在する - sonzaisuru - being
喜び - yorokobi - joy


And I've got more to go.
I just hope I'll be able to pick them up quickly. And not forget them.

The "suru" in sonzaisuru is what you add to something to make it a verb. There's a large collection of suru verbs. You conjugate the +suru (i.e. +shita, +ta, +shimasen, etc.).
Whenever you see する, it's usually after a verb, a kanji you might not know. It's easy to recognize.

Remembering the Tune

I forgot the tune to Lee's What It Does to Us, and I've been trying to remember it for ages. I have the chords listed somewhere, but I couldn't remember how to strum it. It''s been killing me.
It's my favorite song, and not knowing how to play it has been frustrating. Now I know it, though, and I'm going to start learning it.

It's "do-da-de-da. very simple. It hits different strings on the up versus the down. It gives the sound color, and is "fun" to listen to. I just hope that I don't have trouble learning to match the chords and vocals.

the down is lower. The counts are down+up+rest+up , repeated quickly.

I can't wait to take a look at it. I haven't had time to do hardly anything, because I've been so busy. I'm excited, though. It's one of the best songs I've heard in a long time, and being able to play it (well) would make me happy.

Photoshopping Photography

I have been submitting some of my photography to DeviantArt. I've been enhancing the color on some of them, and have found two very important tools for doing so.
You can make any clear (as in not blurry) photograph have great lighting.
All you need is image>adjustments> levels... (or Ctrl L / Command L).

You bring the outer white and black arrows to where the graph begins and ends. You do it for each of RGB, Red, Green, and Blue, choosing them from the top menu. Then you have to slide the middle ones until you get the "correct" colors you're looking for. Do the RGB one last, as doing the other three increases the brightness. That's all RGB will most likely do, and in combo you may go overboard. Afterward, going to image>adjustments>brightness/ contrast... you can fix the brightness properties as you desire. As you might notice, the bottom one is quite an improvement from the top. I didn't do very much, but the improvement is awesome.