A.C. Flory's Blog, page 36

Jacquie Lawson Retrospective

I’ve been a fan of the Jacquie Lawson, digital Advent Calendars since 2013, when I received my first one as a gift. I wrote this post about it at the time and gave the whole experience an 11 out of 10. Now, a blogging friend – waves to Techie Granny – has created a series of videos looking at the history of the Jacqui Lawson advent calendars.

The Youtube video below is the first in Techie Granny’s series and describes the concept’s humble beginnings:

The research that’s gone into the whole series delights me, and I love the clear, professional presentation as well. Nevertheless, it’s the story of how Jacquie Lawson started that warms my heart. She had an idea and worked bloody hard to make it happen. And then it took off. That gives hope to all of us.

cheers,
Meeks

A bit of fun. :D

Disclaimer: this is all the Offspring’s fault!

Have a great weekend,
Meeks

-runs and hides-

p.s. the music is Habanera from Carmen, a brilliant opera composed by Bizet. You’re welcome.

p.p.s. oh what the hell! This is my favourite video of Habanera:

And if Habanera doesn’t ring any bells, Aussie might remember a certain commercial for garage doors?…at 2:20.

The Making of a Tukti, (or digital collage with bitmaps and Corel)

In my previous post I showed you the finished Tukti graphic (shown on the left). In this post, I want to show you a few of the techniques I used to create the graphic.

I call this style of making graphics ‘digital collage’, but real digital collage involves taking whole photos, making them very small and then building an over-arching image out of them. Think tiled mosaic. If you zoom in far enough, you can still see each image in its entirety.

My version of digital collage is rather different. I cut snippets of shape and colour and texture out of photos and then build up a multi-layered image out of all those snippets.

To give you some idea of what I mean, these are some of the 40 snippets I used to create the Tukti:

And those bits don’t include the many transparencies I used to blend the colours and textures into an apparently seamless whole. But before I confuse you too much, let me show you what I mean by some of this terminology.

First up, you need to get an idea of the difference between bitmap images [derived from photographs] and vector images [derived from geometry]. The image below is part of the original concept drawing and shows the Tukti eye blown up so you can see the pixels:

Pixels are tiny squares of colour which is how digital devices represent an analogue image – i.e. a photo, drawing or painting. There are literally millions of pixels in an average photo, and the gradations of colour help to create both smooth colour transitions as well as ‘outlines’.

By contrast, vector graphics are all about outlines. You have lines, closed shapes and solid colours like the image below:

The beauty of vector graphics is that images have transparent backgrounds. That means they can be layered, one on top of the other. Bitmaps can’t.

In the example shown below, the two images on the left look as if they have a transparent background, but that’s only because the page is the same colour as the background. When you place the bitmap on top of a darker coloured background, like the image on the right, it becomes obvious that the red circle sits inside a white background.

Luckily, Corel has a couple of ways of creating a hybrid vector image out of a bitmap. The first method uses nodes to draw the outer perimeter of the bitmap into the area of interest, node by node:

If anyone’s interested, I gave a fairly detailed explanation of this technique in a post entitled How to vector a bitmap. This is the technique I’ve used for most my graphics, but for regular shapes there is another way of ‘hiding’ the background of a bitmap:

Using the example of the eye again, you draw a vector circle on top of the eye image [white circle on top of left image above]. Next, you select the circle, hold down the Shift key, and select the eye image so you end up with two objects selected.

The sequence in which you select the objects is important because it tells Corel which object is the ‘do-er’ and which is the ‘do-ee’. In this case, the circle is the ‘do-er’ and the eye image is the ‘do-ee’.

Next we click the Object function and select Intersect from the Shaping menu:

The Intersect function uses the circle to create a duplicate of the image, but only of the bits inside the circle. The new object is still a bitmap, but all the bits outside the circle are hidden.

Hidden but not deleted.

This is important because each ‘snippet’ you create still has the entire bitmap image in it. That means Corel is working with the whole image even though it looks as if it’s only working with a small part of it. That can, and does, chew up computer resources.

Despite the issue of resources, I love this technique for the images it allows me to create. I hope you enjoyed this small insight into my techniques and how vector graphics work.

cheers,
Meeks

Ta Dah… a Tukti

I don’t have time for the post I’d planned so for now I’ll just show you the Tukti, complete with legs.

I’ll show more in the next post.

cheers,
Meeks

Progress report

I’ve been doing a lot of graphics lately. It seems to be the only creative activity I can focus on with all the craziness in the world, so here are the latest concept images of the iVokh:

These two images will never grace the cover of a book, but they have clarified a number of simple mechanical issues for me. One of them is that when the primary arms are held up above the head, the legs have to be a little bit apart otherwise there is not enough ‘give’ in the wings.

I would very much like to create an image of the iVokh flying, but I know that will be a major project so instead I’m working on creating a digital ‘collage’ of the Tukti. They’re cute little critters and have an important role to play in the on-going story of Vokhtah.

This is the original concept drawing:

And this is how far I’ve got in translating that concept into a more photo-realistic, 3D image:

Creating something that looks ‘furry’ with vector graphics has been a lot harder than I originally thought. Read…I didn’t think. Anyway, I’m pleased with how the head and body finally turned out, and once I have the legs done, I’ll do a post showing a little bit of the process. As per usual, I create my digital collages with Corel Draw X8.

Hope you’re all having a great weekend,

cheers,
Meeks

A song for our times

While exploring songs by Amaranth – thanks Matthew! – I stumbled across this one on Youtube:

According to Wiki:

‘Within Temptation is a Dutch symphonic metal band founded in April 1996.’

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Within_Temptation

I don’t know about you, but this is my kind of music…driving rhythm, powerful melody, glorious voices…and if you watch all the way to the end you’ll see what I mean about it being a song for our times.

Meeks

The truth about vaccines and their boosters

Before I begin, I have to clarify that I’m only looking at the effectiveness of vaccines against the original Omicron variant in this post. I have no information about the Omicron BA.2 variant.

First up, a truth that no government wants to admit: neither Pfizer, Moderna or AstraZeneca do much to protect against symptomatic disease with Omicron:

Comparison of Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca vaccines at 2 doses

I took this data from a study that appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine: https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMoa2119451 If you scroll down to Table 3, which appears just before the Discussion, you can check the raw data for yourselves. This data compares the effectiveness of all three vaccines against the Delta variant and the Omicron variant. This is an example:

https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMoa2119451

As you can see, AstraZeneca is shown by its scientific name rather than the one we’re all familiar with. The same applies to Pfizer – BNT162b2 – and Moderna – mRNA-1273. For each vaccine, Table 3 displays its effectiveness against Delta and Omicron at specific time points. The 2 – 4 week time point is when the vaccine is at its most effective in preventing symptomatic disease. You can then see how quickly that effectiveness wanes over time.

Because I found the presentation of the data a bit hard to follow, I translated it into a spreadsheet and made it more visually clear:

The data from Table 3 showing the results for the Omicron variant only

Despite my best efforts, the data is still confusing so let me walk you through it. On the far left you have the effectiveness of the three vaccines at just 2 doses. As you can see, after 5 months, none of them are very effective and AstraZeneca is the least effective of all. This means that if you are Australian, over 65 and received only 2 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine, you have virtually no protection. AT. ALL.

Until just 2 weeks ago, I fell into the ‘no protection at all’ category.

Now let’s have a look at what effect the boosters have. I’m going to start by looking at each vaccine boosted by itself – i.e. by a third dose of the same vaccine.

AstraZeneca

Looking at the table above you can see that 2 doses of AstraZeneca boosted with a 3rd dose of AstraZeneca – i.e. 3 doses of AstraZeneca – provides a maximum of 55.6% protection at 2-4 weeks. By week 9 – just over 2 months later – that protection has dropped to 46.7%.

Pfizer

Two initial doses of Pfizer followed by a Pfizer booster – i.e. 3 doses of Pfizer – provides a maximum of 67.2% protection. By week 10 that’s dropped to 45.7% protection.

Moderna

Two initial doses of Moderna followed by a Moderna booster – i.e. 3 doses of Moderna – provides a maximum of 66.3% protection. I can’t tell you what that protection becomes at week 10 because there is no data for it. The reason there’s no data is because there were only 7 people in the study who had 3 doses of Moderna. I guess that was simply too small a sample size to be significant.

To recap, 3 doses of the same vaccine at weeks 2 – 4 – i.e. when protection was highest – resulted in:

55.6% protection for AstraZeneca66.3% protection for Moderna67.2% protection for Pfizer

Pfizer comes out on top, but only by a very small percent. AstraZeneca is roughly 11% worse than either of the mRNA vaccines. That said, the level of protection still isn’t stellar…for any of them.

Now, let’s see what happens when you mix-and-match vaccines.

When AstraZeneca is boosted by Pfizer, the level of protection at week 2-4 is 62.4%. AstraZeneca boosted by Moderna provides quite a bit more protection at 70.1%.

Significantly, boosting with Moderna causes that protection to also wane less by weeks 9 – 10:

60.9% with Moderna39.6% with Pfizer

I’m pleased to say that I received my Moderna booster two weeks ago so my protection is reasonably high. I say ‘reasonably’ because I only have 1/2 a thyroid. That means my immune system is a bit compromised and the vaccines can’t provide me with the same level of protection.

The most interesting bit of data, however, is yet to come.

If you received two doses of Pfizer and followed that up with the Moderna booster, you will have the highest level of protection at 73.9%. By contrast, two doses of Moderna followed by a Pfizer booster will only give you a 64.9% level of protection.

So in conclusion:

Get a booster as soon as you hit the 3 month mark [after your second dose of whatever].If at all possible, get the Moderna booster, especially if you received AstraZeneca as your base vaccine.Any booster is better than none.Keep taking precautions even after you receive your booster – even 73.9% protection isn’t all that much.

The study I’ve referenced here only looked at protections from symptomatic disease. Not severe disease. Not death. If the vaccines work the same way against Omicron as they did against earlier variants then there’s a good chance they will protect against severe disease and death, but the data isn’t in yet, so they may not. And given that BA.2 is a bit of an unknown quantity, we don’t even know if the boosters are as effective against it as they are against BA.1.

Governments and media have gone quiet on the pandemic, leading a lot of people to believe that the danger is over. It’s not. It’s just that no-one wants to admit that vaccines are not the magic bullet we were promised. The continuing death toll here in Australia and elsewhere in the world is proof of that.

Get your booster. Wear a mask. Don’t be a fool, the life you save may be your own.

Meeks

Thank you, Woolworths! Paper bags!

My shopping in the boot of my car

Right from the start of this pandemic, one of the two largest supermarket chains here in Australia has been leading the way when it comes to innovation.

First they got online shopping with a contactless home delivery service running smoothly. Then they set up a ‘Direct to Boot’ service that allows me to order online and have someone bring the shopping out and deposit it straight into my boot. Quick, efficient, NO CONTACT! And free.Today Woolworths gave me something I’ve wanted for years – paper carry bags.

We’d all just become used to taking our own bags with us [for shopping] when the pandemic hit. Since then, if you wanted contactless shopping you had to accept the old plastic shopping bags. I have about a million of them stashed away. Now, at last, I can have the convenience and peace of mind of contactless shopping without the guilt of all those damn plastic bags.

Seriously, I’m just about jumping for joy. I haven’t checked the composition of these paper carry bags yet, but I’m hoping they’re made from recycled paper. That would kill two very big birds with one stone.

And in case you’re wondering about the strength of these paper carry bags, have a closer look at what I bought:

What’s inside the bag?

This first bag contains butter, yoghurt, and…ta dah…chicken thigh cutlets in the big paper parcel. Yes, the chicken is inside a single use plastic bag inside the paper, but it’s still ‘leaky’ stuff, and quite heavy, but the bag held up without a single problem.

The second closeup shows fruit and veg – not in individual single use plastic. Brilliant. Again, not a problem at all:

Fruit and veg

The best part though, is what happens once those bags are emptied. I’m going to fold them up and put them straight into the recycling bin. Easey peasey.

Seriously, Woolworths deserves to be congratulated on all the innovations it has implemented these last two years. I hope the other supermarket chains take notice and follow suit.

Well done Woolies!

Meeks

A twentieth-century dictator fighting a twenty-first century war

A view of Ukraine, and Putin, from Chris James who lives and works in Poland. Not a happy read but an important one.

Chris James's blog

If you’ve ever read about the First World War and marvelled at how civilised societies tolerated their young men being flung at fixed machine gun positions only to be mowed down in their thousands, wonder no more. In 1914, military commanders adhered to nineteenth-century tactics, but it was a twentieth-century war with far deadlier weapons. And despite heavy losses, the generals could not accept that tactics they learned from the middle of the previous century and earlier had become redundant. In today’s idiom, they ‘doubled down’ and kept throwing away young lives.

Today, Putin’s unprovoked attack on Ukraine carries a similar parallel: a deluded mind wedded to an outdated mentality that twentieth-century imperialism is right, where smaller countries are fair game for absorption or, if they resist, destruction. That the 69-year-old Putin is both strategically out of date and tactically incompetent matters little to the Ukrainian civilians currently dying under…

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Music of Ukraine – Jinjer

Rather than posting the complete video of this song, I’m posting a vocal coach’s reaction to it.

Warning: Do NOT eat or drink while watching this video.

You like?

MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA…..