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Hello From Dublin

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Hello From Dublin

Hello.

We are still out and about ...now in Dublin.

Anyone from the forum over here?

Our house sitters are having fun at our place.

Dublin has changed in 8 years- very prosperous, many more ethnic groups- 2% of the pop. is Chinese, many Pols....

Went to the Irish Film center to buy Irish animation. We keep running into folks we know.

Best.

Larry L.'s picture
Larry web site http://tooninst[URL=http://tooninstitute.awn.com]itute.awn.com [/URL]blog: [U]http://www.awm.com/blogs/always-animated [/U] email: larry.lauria@gmail.com
The Snowman saga

Hello.

We have traveled into town the past two days to check out the scene.

At Easons- a department store, I attempted to buy two items- a sketchbook and a DVD.

I found a wonderful sketchbook with a zippy cover on it.

Next, I perused the DVD section for animation.

I came up with the SNOWMAN - an enchanting animated Christmas special- animated by hand with every drawing rendered in tone. It had the TV special and special features including a 24 minute doc. on the making of the film. Alas it is in PAL DVD format only. I would have loved to have added it to my collection.

Also had a chance to to meet with my old boss Jerome Morrissey. Jerome is now head of putting tech in every school in Ireland. He is also incorporating tech,. into all the courses and subjects at all levels. He was in great form and we remininced about the old times and how successful the program was at Ballyfermot.

It was a great day!

Thanks for the update Rob - keep them coming....

Back at Ballyfermot

Hello.

Today was another interesting day her in Dublin.

I waited almost almost an hour for a bus going into to Dublin. After a while, I thought...if I lived here again I would have to have a car. Finally, a bus came and gave us a lift. There was a little old lady at my stop and I think the bus actually stopped for her. We got on board. The bus was jammed full of people and we didn't stop again until Palmerstown.

Once we entered the highway- I was glad to be on the bus because the dual-carriage way was bumper to bumper- 12 miles outside the city. Ireland has the best economy in Europe and the new wealth the country has seen has exceeded the infrastructure- too many car and not enough roads.

Made it to Ballyfermot College of Further Learning and met up with Eddie Hallahan (an instructor and former student) and Maureen Conway, Principal; and John Moriarity Head of film and TV. It was great to be back at the school.
They have done a good job of integrating 2D into 3D and now have a degree program. The program is still great!

Spoke to about 75 students for an hour and a half- they were great! the usual topics- the industry, jobs, news, etc.

Got to hit the sack - off to Galway tomorrow.

Thanks.

I *love* Galway! Do try to hit the Cliffs of Moher while you're over there!

Tech TV

I came up with the SNOWMAN - an enchanting animated Christmas special- animated by hand with every drawing rendered in tone. It had the TV special and special features including a 24 minute doc. on the making of the film. Alas it is in PAL DVD format only. I would have loved to have added it to my collection.

It's my experience that quite a lot of DVD players can be switched to "codefree" through some undocumented feature or another. All I had to do with my player was visit the manufacturer's website and download an Acrobat document which included a code to be entered in one of the menues. (Otherwise I could never have ordered that Jim Henson's The Storyteller DVD from Canada.)
There's that fps and resolution difference between PAL and NTSC, of course. If I want to watch my American Futurama DVDs I first have to switch my player to NTSC because otherwise frames get skipped. Maybe NTSC players can display PAL's 25 fps without difficulty but I'm not sure about the higher PAL resolution ...

Back...Back ...Back in the USSS of A

Hello.

Whew! Finally back in the U.S.- had a great time in Dublin and Galway.

Here are some conclusions...

Ireland has the strongest economy in Europe- not an observation- that is fact.

Dubliner's are just coping with their new popularity. The house we rented in 1995 was worth 50,000 Irish pounds or $75,000 U.S. Dollars...the same house can now sell for 400,000 euros or about 550,000 U.S. dollars. There is so much money floating around Ireland. Fact: in England after the Arab investors in real estate come the Irish.

Traffic in Dublin is really bad and needs to be fixed (back-ups out to Lucan where we lived 12 miles from the center of Dublin are normal)...too many cars- too few roads.

2% of the Ireland's population is Chinese... 45,000 new foreign workers are needed every year...the laborers come from Poland and Russia.

A large challenge is the Nigerian population...everyone mentioned it...because of a loop hole in the Irish Constitution...Nigerian women seeking a better life come to Ireland when they are 8 months pregnant; when the baby is born in Ireland - according to law it is automatically awarded Irish citizenship. So the mothers can stay in Ireland and take advantage of their socialized services- from medical care to welfare. Then, other members of the family can also come to Ireland. No one likes it and knows how to fix it....

Ireland is RIPE for feature production with several animation production studios which have gained worldwide attention....couple that with the E.C.'s Media- Cartoon Feature initiative to produce features in Europe.

My wife's granfather came from Ireland so we qualify for an Irish passport.
Very Cool!

By the way, on the way to the cliffs of Mohr in Ballyvaghan there is a pub called Monk's Pub- it has the best seafood chowder in the world with giant chunks of cod, shrimp and lobster held together with just a touch of a creme base. The pub had a roaring peet fire and was sinply wonderful!
Absolutely amazing!

Thanks. Good to be home!

Hey Larry!

Great to have you back!

Have a Merry Christmas!

OHHH Galway

Galway was one of my favorite places as well in Ireland. Oh man I cant remember it but there was this place by the river with the most amazing Fish and Chips!

Sounds like you are having a fun time keep the updates coming!

Maybe NTSC players can display PAL's 25 fps without difficulty but I'm not sure about the higher PAL resolution ...

If the player can play both formats, which is not unusual, then the biggest problem would be to whether or not the TV set it's connected to supports both PAL and NTSC signals.

I just bought a compact Philips DVD player and am still experimenting with it. Already found the region-free code (pretty short and easy to do, and a lot of people charge a fortune to do the job...). Still looking for a PAL DVD to make the test, but my master's tutor told me that most Philips TVs support both PAL and NTSC. Here in Brazil we have PAL-M (local PAL format) and NTSC, so the TVs here have both option. Brazilian Philips TVs have a signal menu because of that, and it includes a third option called AUTO, which supports both PAL-M and NTSC, and plus PAL :~) I wonder if it supports SECAM and other formats...

Here in Brazil we have PAL-M (local PAL format) and NTSC, so the TVs here have both option. Brazilian Philips TVs have a signal menu because of that, and it includes a third option called AUTO, which supports both PAL-M and NTSC, and plus PAL :~) I wonder if it supports SECAM and other formats...

Yes, SECAM is sort of an awkward format. I don't know if they use it for Canadian DVDs since they're partly French there. What I know, however, is that even though my Canadian DVDs are recognised as RC 1s, I don't have to switch the player to NTSC to be able to view them without skipping frames. American DVDs only play satisfyingly if I reset the player to NTSC.
Argh - one should hope digital filming will soon bring us a worldwide standard. When we worked on our school projects, they told us to output everything at PAL's 25 fps and later said in order to be able to run the films on movie projectors it'd have to be the average 24 fps. That, of course, resulted in our team having to reevaluate the frame count for every single scene. Very annoying.

No Smoking in Irish pubs and other public places!

Hello.

One of the best aspects about the "new" Ireland is the new no smoking law in pubs and oher public buildings.

The pubs were wonderful to visit to socialize and eat (sorry, I don't drink). Pubs are an Irish way of life.

We went to eat at several places and the dining experience was really enhanced!

We really are very grateful for our stay nd we really enjoyed ourselves.

Thanks.

Hi Larry. Good to hear you had a great trip and made it back safe and sound. I just finished a nine-day tour of the Midwest. I sure don't miss the snow but it was great to see family and friends! Enjoy the rest of the Holiday Season.

Hey Rob. Good to hear from you too! I have been wondering how you were doing from time to time. Checked your website the other day to see if you had any news but I don't suppose that is at the top of your list at the moment. I hope you are learning tons and having a blast! Happy Holidays!

cm

Hello From California!

Hey Larry! Sounds like you are having some fun! I am 8 time zones away and made it to San Diego!

Pendulum Studios is great! Having a blast animating on a large project! Have fun in Ireland...say hello to any McGuckins you run into for me...(my extended family)

cheers