Six Feet Under

Opening sequences or idents for TV programs are a splendid way to understand how to build emotion and feeling into short film clips as indeed we often try in the world of commercials. They are a great example of 'its not what you say but how you say it'.

Idents.tv is a nifty resource if you want to get up to speed on typography, design, music, direction, DOP, special effects and the use of storyboards. Its fascinating to see how the show Six Feet Under created theirs over here.

Marxist Libertarian

No surprises on the political compass test for me then. I don't really believe in perma-ideology given that nothing lasts for ever, but broadly speaking I'm going to be hanging out with Gandhi and the other libertarian socialists in the bottom left. This is quite a fun little data visualisation and perceptual mapping exercise.

Incidentally I've been trying to persuade advertising agencies to do 3D perceptual brand mapping for years. Sadly not one of the them has had the perspicacity to make a flash designer and excel spreadsheet whizz kid available. So I might as well blog about it instead.

Oh Captain my Captain

Tim Footman is a writer based in Bangkok. One day through his blog roll I came across a link which I felt was something quite different. It was the blog of Brian, a 45 year old advertising copywriter and soon to be published author based in Donegal who was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and only six to twelve months to live. I wrote about it here.

There is no happy ending in blogging I guess. I assumed that one day I would be thinking about Brian, realise he hadn't posted for a while, and that maybe there would be a slow but increasing sense of 'The End' parading as radio silence. This indeed happened early last month as Capt. Pancreas had gone quiet for a few weeks but then he reappeared with news of being in treatment. I guess there was no online access in the hospital.

Brian is responsible for coming up with the phrase "trying to squeeze the sweetness out of every second" and I just discovered he died on Friday.

He leaves a seven year old son, a wife and a bunch of people that never met him in real life but could feel his warmth and generosity.

O Captain my Captain
O Captain my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weathered every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up--for you the flag is flung for you the bugle trills,
For you bouquets and ribboned wreaths for you the shores a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head!
It is some dream that on the deck,
You've fallen cold and dead.

My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchored safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

- Walt Whitman