Subscribe
This brought up tearful, happy memories of a well loved film: somebody with a lot of love for robots (Mike Senna) made a real-life WALL*E!
It's only two years and 25 hr/wk work. Slacker! *sniffles*
(via Slashfilm)
Showing posts with label Animation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Animation. Show all posts
A Real Life WALL-E Robot!
Tweet
It's only two years and 25 hr/wk work. Slacker! *sniffles*
(via Slashfilm)
Satoshi Kon's last words, or: Cancer sucks
Tweet
Satoshi Kon, director of the excellent Millenium Actress and interesting-but-flawed Paprika, passed away late summer last year unexpectedly at the age of 46 from pancreatic cancer. I didn't learn of this news until today, quite randomly. It's sad that the news didn't travel far enough to me at the time of his death. It speaks of its untimeliness, as he was the sort of promising director whose filmography could become a cult favourite given perhaps a couple more projects. He was working on The Dream Machine, which his production team at Mad House continued to work on after his death, to be released some time this year. It's on my Screen List (developing) for films I'm looking forward to see now.
As an apt twist to a cinematic figure's life story, Satoshi Kon was given about six months to live after the diagnosis. He kept this news to only his wife and a couple of friends until the first death-scare of pneumonia. He explained this odd decision, amongst other ramblings, in a letter posted on his blog posthumously by his family, which has been translated to English by a fan. It's a touching read (and helps to remind me why I've come to think of all the things that could kill you in old age, Alzheimer's is a blessing in disguise, sort of?). Satoshi was able to elucidate what made him happy and scared at the same time - the good things life, and the letting go of them. I think I can relate.
There are so many people that I want to see at least once (well there are some I don't want to see too), but if I see them I'm afraid that that the thought that "I can never see this person again" will take me over, and that I wouldn't be able to greet death gracefully.
I loved the world I lived in. Just the fact that I can think that makes me happy.Living a life that makes you love it - that's all you can hope for, methinks.
R.I.P. Satoshi.
Operant conditioning at work: and you don't even have to sing!
Tweet
Jack Russell in an invisible Skinner Box!
Operant conditioning is a type of learning that occurs when a behaviour's likelihood of being repeated is affected by its consequences. In this case, a treat is presented upon the closing of a drawer or the pulling of a shoe string, positively reinforcing its behaviour and motivating the dog to repeat it. Some shaping might have occurred before the dog could learn to do so in the first place. Shaping may involve a giving-withholding-giving treat pattern as the dog gets closer and closer to the desired behaviour. You can see evidence of shaping in the video, when the dog waited for a treat after taking her shoes off (the point at which during training/shaping, it would've gotten a treat in the beginning), and could only get actual treats after both shoes were taken off AND slippers were fetched! It's not animal slavery if they're happy doing it!
Just think though, all this work could easily be avoided if you'd just sing a song. Witness:
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (Cottrell & Hand, 1937)
Enchanted (Lima, 2007)
