I normally use aperture for any editing of my photos, but from time to time I like to experiment with some plugins. This time I tried to give a dreamy look to this girl. I wasn’t convinced by any of the three different version I had created, and the Bleach Bypass that usually satisfies me, was not interesting this time.
I do not usually like working so heavily on the shots. After a while they seems almost fake, they lose the sense of reality I tend to see in the photos. However it is good, from time to time, to publish something slightly different.

You’d think that people with nut allergies would know to ask about nuts in food before eating–especially a cuisine (Indian, Thai, etc.) known to contain them. You’d think that, because that’s common sense, but you’d be wrong.

Managers at the up-market [Masala World] London chain, which include Chutney Mary in Chelsea and the award-winning Amaya in Belgravia, show all customers who say they have the allergy a 100-word health warning.

The card makes clear that while only some dishes have nuts as an ingredient, all may become accidentally contaminated with traces of nut in the kitchen.

It adds that the restaurant owners, Masala World, cannot be held liable for adverse reactions to its food.

The drastic step has been taken following a threat of legal action by a customer who suffered a serious allergic reaction to a dish which did not contain nuts in its recipe.

[…]

In the past, managers at the restaurants have spoken to allergy sufferers about the risks of contamination. Menus have also stated that all dishes may contain traces of nuts. But following the legal threat, Masala World toughened its stance, and even banned allergy sufferers from using its restaurants for a week while it reviewed its policy.

From this month, customers at its five Masala Zone restaurants in London who state that they suffer from a nut allergy are being asked by managers to read the cards.

The group’s other three restaurants are in the process of introducing similar cards.

They state: ‘We cannot guarantee that our food is free from traces of nuts . . . therefore customers with nut allergies/intolerances wishing to eat in our restaurants do so entirely at their own risk.’

The Daily Mail has more.

Today’s comic is the miracle baby of this comic and this comic. I wonder if I’ve violated any international statutes by doing two “Neverending Story” references withing a 12 month period. I’ll probably get a small fine and slap on the wrist at most.

The current HE server was able to withstand the last two front page Digg’s MUCH better than my old shared hosting solution, but there was still several hours of down time for each bediggification.

Regarding the comic, I tried something different this time. I DREW the comic… ON PAPER!!!

Check that out! It’s like a new (old) world. This was basically a test to see if I was still able to draw when pixels weren’t involved. I’m considering making this a regular thing and selling the one of a kind, signed originals with a print of the finished comic. Any interest?

SAVE HIJINKS ENSUE DONATION DRIVE UPDATE:

After announcing the Donation Drive yesterday you guys have already knocked me on my ass. Monthly subscriptions are at $280/month (over 10% of the goal!) and you sent an additional $500 in one time donations! I am floored by your support and generosity.

The goal to keep The Experiment going is get $2000-$2500/month (roughly half my required income to take care of my bills and family) in Donation Subscriptions in the next 30-60 days. Get ready for me sounding like a broken record because this is going to be my main focus for the next month. Together, I’m pretty sure we can make this happen.

Special thanks to Adam and Chris at Save Hiatus for pimping the Donation Drive. It’s like they have had practice rallying people around a cause or something.

If you have already donated, or are unable to, please spread the word about what we are trying to accomplish. The more Fancy Bastards the better!

I don’t know about you, but I am a big video podcast consumer. I subscribe to a long list of video podcasts, from various publishers, and stream them to my 50″ TV (Apple TV style). It works great, and I am slowly moving away from viewing “traditional” TV.

I have been doing this for a while, and have noticed some things.

First, I am surprised how few podcasts do HD, or at least higher-than-iPod quality streams. Second, I am surprised at how few of them are well produced. Third, very few of them offer an array of options, designed to meet the modern consumer where they are, irrelevant of platform.

What I have also noticed, is how well Revision3 seems to be tackling all of these.

They offer a wide range of video options, as you can see:

Among those various options, many satisfy higher resolution needs. Why is this important? Because the future of this new media is not intended merely for the portable devices. Rather, it is for those big flat-panel TV’s people are starting to buy. Providers such as TiVo are even offering means to stream podcasts to your TV. Why spend my time hunched over a computer screen, when I can kick back in my recliner and enjoy it even more?

The other big hitter is production quality. HD video is only as good as the set, lighting, cast, and content it is recording. This is where I have seen Revision3 really put some focus as well. As I have watched many of their shows over time, there has been a clear and intentional improvement of “how” they do a show.

They know how to build a set, they know how to light it. They know how to setup a green screen, and they know how to use video tools to properly take advantage of it. They also know how to find interesting people that fit the content they want to deliver. They also know how to build a website, that fits well with their purpose. They continually seem to improve on all of these fronts.

While I don’t like every show they make, I like the focus on quality and content they put into it. I like that they are willing to try something, and if it doesn’t work, do something else. I also like that they don’t seem to take themselves too seriously. Good job Revision3 folks. Keep up the good work, I hope it pays off for you.

P.S. - CrankyGeeks/Geekbrief: You do many of these things well, too. CG: Please go widescreen.

P.S.S. - Holy cow CNET, you are a tech media company and it is 2008. Act like it. How about some better-than-complete-crap video quality? Toss in widescreen for the fun of it.

P.S.S.S. - Alex A: Diggnation is a great show, but do you really have to drop the F-bomb so much? It makes me not want to watch while my kids are around.

Welcome to the 20 Awesome Photography Blogs project as we highlight some of the greatest photo bloggers in the world. Today, our featured city is London. Hope you enjoy our selections. Did we miss one? I’m sure we did. However, kindly suggest another great London photoblog for our viewers in the comments!

1. London Rubbish 6

2. Hin Chua 1

3. Chemical 0

4. Apparently Nothing

5. Camera Juice

6. FrazerFotos

7. DicksDaily

8. Andrew’s Photoblog

9. iLondon 0

10. Daniel Kaspar

11. Once in a

12. Goodnight, London! 1

13. mrtoes

14. Odds & Ends 1

15. Postcards from London

16. My Glass Eye 3

18. Naughty James 1

19. milou 3

20. Perous Secret Diary 0

Be sure to check out our OKTOBERFEST contest … great prize giveaways…ends Oct.31, 2008!

TrashDispatch.com:

Human Waste Being Transformed Into Hydrogen For Cars

The Orange County Sanitation District is about to begin converting human waste into hydrogen fuel in a first-of-its-kind attempt to turn sewage into a salable product.

The district, along with UC Irvine researchers and private companies, has agreed to install the new device in an $8 million demonstration project that could begin operating by May.

And if it takes off, sewage treatment plants around the country could one day double as gas stations - emphasis on the gas.read more | digg story

This week, forgoing the usual Sunday Pages news items, I’m going to take a quick look at the meagre purchases I made at yesterday’s Camden Comics mini-Festival, Low Energy Day. I’ll leave it to the official site to explain the idea, but needless to say it’s a frankly brilliant one and my only regret is that I haven’t made it to the Camden Comics Stall sooner. Bear in mine, I was feeling pretty wiped out after finishing moving house that morning, so with just enough strength to drag myself from Northfields to Camden, I didn’t have much time to hang around and check out everyone, nor could I afford to - there are around a hundred different exhibitors all with their own body of work, so what I chose to purchase here is in no way an indicator of quality, it’s just the books I bought on the day. Reviews and more below the cut!

The first comic I got was Claude TC’s adaptation of “The Island of Dr. Moreau,” which recasts the lead as a teenage slacker and his hit-man friend. It won my attention largely for the fruit polos reference on the first page, and I was easily convinced to buy the second part straight away as well. The idea of retelling the story in this way really appealed to me, and having only vague memories of the original it’s a nice way to revisit the material a little. I’d actually be interested in seeing other books given similar treatment. The artwork is very strong with a large variety of characters and locales rendered expertly. While part 1 is all fairly slow, the action really gets flying in part 2, and it’s here the artwork really comes into its own. Issue #2 does end on a cliffhanger, so I’ll be looking forward to seeing what comes next in issue #3. The series doesn’t appear to be mentioned much on the Gronk Comics website, but the lead characters are taken from his other series, Reckless Youth.

Paul B Rainey’s “Dear Robert and Partner” is a semi-autobiographical comic about writing a letter to a noisy neighbour. It’s a topic that, in the months before we moved house, I became more than an expert on, as the flat above ours was being renovated and the dude, for some reason, felt like 11:30pm was the perfect hour to do some hammering. But I digress. The narrative is held together by the letter, while events surrounding it unfold in 3-panel chunks beneath the text. It’s a nice experiment that works really well, though the ending falls a little flat because it feels like there’s no real conclusion to the letter or the associated story, which, in a way, is the danger of autobiographical comics - life goes on, and episodes rarely conclude in a satisfying way, which can negatively impact the narrative sometimes. Besides that, it’s a good, personal read, a little different from the usual comics, and that’s what’s great about self-published material.

From Douglas Noble, I purchased 2005’s Strip for Me #18 which contains a rather experimental story called “The Space Between Worlds.” The title attracted me to this particular issue, I think. Noble takes an unusual approach to comics, juxtaposing visual and textual narrative without fully integrating them. The detached, abstract romance of the story leads me to compare it to this year’s Xbox LIVE must-buy Braid as a similar psychological experience - or at least as similar as comics and gaming can get. It’s to Noble’s credit that with 16 pictures on each page, and 20 pages of story that every thumbnail image appears individually composed. It’s a nice dense read that you can really spend a lot of time digesting, and while I can’t speak for the usual anthology format of the title, this one was a pleasant surprise to pick up.

Elsewhere, Marc Ellerby had brought along his new mini-comic, an odds-and-ends compilation called Sad Girls For Life. I was well-pleased with the purchases I made off Ellerby at Bristol earlier this year - Speed Trail and Ellerbisms V1 and have been following his on-line comics ever since. This collection opens with what Ellerby describes as a “stupid zombie comic” called “Morning has Broken” from 2004, featuring a more dynamic, angular look to his artwork reminiscent (in a good way) of Jim Mahfood, or the more insane strips you used to find in Sonic The Comic. It continues with other short comics drawn over the last few years, including some unprinted Ellerbism’s and some rarer Polar Opposites, which are always fantastic, especially the one in which he argues with the acerbic Penguin 2 about the star power of Penguins. It’s like Pokey the Penguin, only more coherent.

Sad Girls for Life is a brilliant taster for all of Ellerby’s work, and easily the most entertaining comic purchase I made all weekend - and that includes 2 week’s worth of Marvel/DC comics. Ellerby is currently between series following the conclusion of Oni Press’ “Love the Way You Love” for which he was the artist, so now more than ever you need to get to his site and buy some quality mini-comics - SGFL isn’t up yet, so while you wait for that to appear in the on-line shop, why not go for the Ellerbisms or Polar Opposites collection?

Lastly, I got myself one of those coveted Gillen/McKelvie Phonogram T-Shirts. Jamie didn’t actually have any minicomics to sell, he was just flogging copies of the Image-published Phonogram/Suburban Glamour trades which I already own. By the standards of this event, that makes him a complete sellout, and frankly I’m surprised they let him in at all. Possibly it was because he was handing out those excellent Phonogram 2: The Singles Club postcards for free, one of which I took for myself, and another of which I left displayed prominently in Camden Tube Station, because that’s about as Street Team as I’m getting. Phonogram 2 is out in December, and until then you should also have read Phonogram: Rue Brittania and Suburban Glamour.

Having maxed out both finances and body temperature (Camden market hall is nothing if not RIDICULOUSLY HOT) I took my leave. From where I was, LED looked like a massive success - I turned up quite late in the afternoon and the place was still packed solid, and encouragingly it appears to attract people far less likely to get into a comic shop or convention under their own steam. Certainly worth trip for any London-based comics fan, though, for a taste of Bristol/Birmingham right in your own back garden.

Well the mammoth Unforgettable Tour has come to an end, but don’t fret I only mean the first leg. The magic will go on to cast its spell on Australia, Europe, Africa, South Africa, Middle East, South Asia and of course India in the subsequent phases.
Here the Pictures of Unforgettable tour London. All images copyright and courtesy of Wizcraft International.
Amitabh Bachchan got a standing ovation by a 20,000 strong audience in London on August 24, as he recited — in his inimitable baritone dialogues — dialogues from his all-time hits like Deewar and Agneepath, as part of the Unforgettable world tour.

Bachchan became emotional while delivering dialogues from Deewar. Recalling the scene when he goes to a temple for the first time asking God to save his mother’s life, Amitabh said at the tour, “Whenever I do the scene, I get emotional about my mother, whom I lost last year.”

Bachchan also read out some of the poems from Agneepath, penned by his late father Harivansh Rai Bachchan.

Besides the regular stars on the show — Abhishek Bachchan Aishwarya Rai Bachchan, Preity Zinta [Images], Ritesh Deshmukh , and music directors Vishal and Shekhar, Shilpa Shetty joined the London leg of the tour. They were assisted by a cast of 130 stage artists, who kept the crowd spell bound with their scintillating performances.

The event promoted by India’s Wizcraft International Entertainment — which marks Bachchans’ comeback to the stage after a gap of almost 20 years — will have its final show at Rotterdam in Netherlands on August 29.

Broadway Hit New Novelty Show

If you thought HAIRSPRAY was a hit on Broadway, you’re right. The fact is, the show is also the hottest ticket in London’s West End. The show is such a hit in the UK that it has spawned an entirely new television program. No, not casting a lead in the show. No, not a backstage look at a Broadway production. With Sky 1’s launch of Hairspray The School Musical, one high school has been selected to audition, cast, rehearse, and produce a full-scale Broadway level production of Hairspray. From the show’s PR:

“Hairspray: The School Musical” follows the hardworking students on their rollercoaster journey from the playground to the stage; with romance, tantrums and tough decisions along the way.

The show also features stage stars coaching the student, and the whole circus is lead by UK Chicago star Denise Van Outen. You can’t stop the beat, or the sophomores! Watch on-line.

-Broadway Magazine, Broadway.tv

Denise Van Outen attends the World Premiere of ‘Hairspray The School Muscial’ at the Lyric Theatre on August 31, 2008 in London, England. Ferdadus Shamim/WireImage.com.

Lloyds of London: experimental

Currently doing the rounds on the net is this intriguing photo of part of the Lloyds Building in London, taken by Esthr Dyson. It’s been cited at This is Broken and refered to today at Boing Boing.

The original can be seen at Dyson’s Flickr stream here.