I just found this handy banner to count down to the Doctor Who Christmas Special on effulgent_girl's profile page (btw, hi! :) ). If you want one, too, head over to phtoshopranger.
146 days left!

Didn't manage to work any further on the vid. I'm simply too exhausted after work. At the moment I'm scrolling through the latest entries on farscape_weekly. Isn't it amazing how many vids are still done about this show long gone?

Yay, only 25 minutes till I can get out of here!

Eeek! Cockroach! On the Raspberry! *runs to the window to throw it out* *pants*

Sorry... some way to say 'Hey, I'm back'. I was just about to write my first entry for ages, when I realized, I was holding a cockroach in my hand. Ahem... but the time of written exams is over. There's only one oral exam waiting for me in late August and after that I'm no longer a student. Such a relief. Wheeeee!

For now I finally have time to do something except learning. At the moment, I'm catching up with Doctor Who while I'm still avoiding spoilers. Four episodes to go. So if anyone is still reading this, please, please, don't spoil me. ;)

So much to catching up to... hopefully, that means getting back to vidding or wallpapering soon. God, my current wallpaper is so old. But my brain feels completely fried. Maybe it helps just to start working on something. And I'm just realizing that means writing in English, too. I didn't need the language for months now and it surely shows while I'm writing this.

Uhm, when I think about it, I need a new LJ layout. And icons. Well, I could always say, I'm missing the snow and that's why my LJ looks like it's December. Sure...

Oh, I haven't got any DW Series 3 vids yet! Any recommendations? I must have missed quite a bunch. Seriously, not one single Martha vid. Now I'm really feeling out of the loop.

Off to bed now. Hopefully, the train will be waiting there for me tomorrow. One day of strike was certainly enough. At least they waited until my exams were over and I didn't have to hurry anymore.

bunnythenavia: Got your nudge, btw. It's the reason I hurried back here so soon after my exams. :)

all: Expect a visit to your journals in the near future. I've missed a lot and I won't be able to catch up all of it but at least I won't be completely ignorant. Like I am now.

I can't watch vids the same way that I did before I opened that vidding programme for the first time (without even thinking about starting of going down the vidding lane). Haven't decided yet if it's a good thing or a bad thing. On the one hand, I notice editing errors/slopiness more often and a lot more detailed than before. And I can't ignore it that easily anymore. On the other the same goes for small details, the ones, that make a good vid even better. Cuts and storytelling, transitions and fades, subtle effects and some of the thoughts that went into all of that. Ruins some vids I enjoyed before and makes others even more awesome. Watching 'old' vids, I constantly catch myself thinking 'That was *really* clever' or 'Whoah, how did they achieve that?' or 'How come I never noticed that before?'.

I don't like, that it kinda takes the innocence our of watching vids. Just leaning back, quietly enjoying whatever's playing on my screen. It also feels as if my eyes have gotten faster, because I can suddenly see images in those scenes with incredible quick cuts, that were nothing more than a blur before. It's just strange. When I think about it, it's similiar to what happened after arting for a while. Perhaps I should have expected it. At the moment I'm still clinging to the old days, when it was different.

On another note, could somebody stop me? Pleeeaaase? I've gone rampant on amazon.co.uk. I was putting together that long overdue order and couldn't resist surfing around a bit. Let's just say, I'm not the kind of person, who buys lots of merchandise. Not only am I now waiting for a few Doctor Who books (like the Annual, which was dispatched a few hours after I placed the order), no, I've also ordered the S2 DVDs (at least I get them from someone else as a gift - who that will be hasn't been decided yet) and something else, I'd never thought I'd buy. It goes with batteries. Has a small light. Wrong colour for a flashlight though. And I dare not say more until it's actually, physically here. And I know how silly that is, but that's how I feel at the moment (and hey, LJ even has a silly mood icon).

Speaking of silly: One big YAAAAY for David and Freema making an apperance on Children in Need! Makes me realize how much I miss new episodes of Doctor Who. :D

Ah, and if you haven't seen it, remember to comment on http://waka-laka.livejournal.com/548754.html?view=7309714 to get someone's friend to donate 10p for Children in Need. Poor guy, he had no idea, what he was getting himself into...

What can I say? I'm in a writing mood. And I don't like to have a comatose livejournal. ;)

The new flat is looking better and better every day. And it better be! This constant hammering, drilling and many more unidentifiable sounds all day long is getting on my nerves. Especially now, that I'm at home most of the day. Oh, I couldn't think of a more peaceful way of waking up than by the sound of WHAMWHAMWHAM. Or the VRRRRRRRR and the whole ground trembling underneath my feet while I'm having breakfast. Also very annoying when you're watching tv. Dramatic scene with lots of almost-sobbing in it: I am soooo sorry... RRRROOOOOAAAAAA! *sighs* At least they are now getting to the point where it looks more homelike and tidier every day instead of more dirt and exposing ugly walls.

Next part behind a cut, Torchwood spoiler territory for episode 4:
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Then there's the new vid... Jack-vid to "In the End"... now that I've finished about 2 minutes of it, I have to thank dune_drd immensely for reccing the song and pitching the general idea for the story! :D I knew, it would be a challenge and it really is. So far, I'm mostly happy with the outcome and hope, that I don't ruin the remaining minute with lyrics and the beginning and ending without lyrics. I still need to decide how the next few seconds will come across best visually. Wanna see, what comes next. I was thinking tomorrow. *crosses fingers*

BTW, I'm struggling a bit with the vid in the technical sense. I had to deinstall the XviD codec for VirtualDub to open the files (strange, because they are XviD - and now I'm having some problems with MPEG2 files). Now, sometimes when the scene changes, like a cut from one person to the other, one frame from later on in the scene sneaks itself in. Most of the time it's only from a few frames later. And i have now idea why. Especially annoying when the clip I want to use is short already and I have to hide the beginning to avert twitching people. Whyyyy?

I also discovered, that HD is a gorgeus invention but will bring my pc to its knees. HD clips: bad idea. HD clips with lots of effects: worse idea. HD clips with lots of effects on two layers: *is killed by pc* Seriously, there's times when I have no idea what I'm vidding until I export it. Makes timing a nightmare. As much as I love the quality, I now decided on using HD only when I really need it. Like clips where I want to zoom. Everything else has to settle for normal quality. Downside: the logo is now a mix of BBC HD and BBC3. At least it's slightly amusing when I pay attention to it.

Must-stop-writing-now. Time to sleep a bit. Just when I wanted to mention, that I finished watching Casanova weeks after the first part. And yes, dune_drd, you were absolutely correct, I loved it. :D

I've been trying to write an update for the past days. Surprisingly work gets in the way. That's absolutely astounding to me, who had given up hope to ever get something to do here. Ironically, I've got my last day here on Thursday next week. Now I'm thinking it wasn't too bad here after all. I might actually miss this place... a little.

I'm also in the process of getting my own flat. Lot of work still to be done (from Friday on, one (supporting) wall will be teared down, another one built, one still needs a hole for a new door). I just want to know how it will look like when everthing's finished. Still need some money for furnitures, so some of that will probably have to wait a while. Why do these things have to be so expensive?

One thing that has to suffer because of all of this is my next vid. It's now a WIP for about 2 weeks. That's probably the longest editing time I've had. Last week there were lots of days when I didn't get to do anything and when I did it weren't more than a few seconds. I really wanted to do something, finally getting that song ('Summer of 69') out of my head but things kept getting in the way. Then I devoted a huge part (when compared to what I should have done for flat-planning) of my weekend to continue editing - and watching the first part of Casanova (so funny and lighthearted, put me in the right mood for vidding - but, my god, what's with the blue contact lenses? they looked horrible, especially in the darker scenes). Anyway, 20 seconds to go, a few re-edits, then it's finally, finally done. Wheee!

Probably won't be today, perhaps tommorow. If it doesn't get done this week and something gets in the way for the whole weekend, I will be sooo disappointed... and in a bad mood for the next week. *keeps her fingers crossed*

Random things:
- I put up my first ebay auction yesterday (am I behind on that or what?)
- slightly more than 4 days, till I get to see Torchwood - why do I have to work on that day? And dare you who gets in my way Monday afternoon!

brienze posted a meme at her journal this morning and here's my version of it. Time flew by so fast today... I can't believe it's almost time for my lunch break already. Yay, 3 more hours of sitting here afterwards and my time at work is over. :D

If everthing goes as plannend, I will finish my next video today. Some more editing, especially at the end, the credits and perhaps one more thing and that's it. Oh, I hope it turns out alright...

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PS: I still need new icons. Perhaps I will finally make some if I write this often enough. ;)

WTF? Just logged into my Photobucket account to upload some stuff, and surprise, surprise, apparently there had been some redesigning going on. Nothing big... or so I thought. Out of curiosity I clicked that very small link "Uploading Options" and that was when it hit me: the max image size of 800x600 wasn't just an accident, it's the second largest option for images! 1024x768 being the maximum.

Next thing i knew I was on a frantic search for some explanation. Either I'm too stupid to navigate their page or Photobucket doesn't really have the best description for their services cause some pages later I still hadn't found one. Last place to look? The forums where I was expecting to find some users that were venting about that "new and improved" option. Getting a paid account for $25 a year for that comfort of having a well-sorted interface where you can actually store wallpapers in their full size? Oh, I don't think so, not as long as there are other options.

While I was considering these options, already planning on transfering all my data to some other service, another post sent me clicking back to my album, expecting the horrible sight of all my uploaded images bigger than 1024x768 being resized in the most pixelated way. And it took years to load (at least it felt like that). The result (yay, still 1280x1024!) restored at least some of my faith in Photobucket.

And then it was time for me to discover the big news. Apparently there had been so many raging, disappointed emails that they decided to implement the "no resizing for images no bigger than 1MB"-feature again. *relievedsigh* Announced only on their Blog of course. Was it really necessary to make their users search for this info instead of stating it a bit clearer in the uploading options? Okay there's the "1 MB size - coming soon" comment, but with all the greyed out options it looks like images may only be max 1024x768 AND max 1MB in the near future. Or maybe it's just my brain not working properly because of that damn cold I seem to have caught.

So now I'm waiting for the new old option, that will make Photobucket a useful storage again. Ah, and BTW, I'm working on a new video, but don't expect it to be finished anytime soon. I started on Thursday and only got to 0:43 today. I could've done so much today but my cold-infested mind refuses to form coherent thoughts about vidding. :(

So, I got myself a journal... gosh, guess I'm not the only person on our lovely planet Earth who has one. As I have no idea what I'm doing here half of the time and haven't been around for long in the livejournalling community (is this even a word?), I guess you just have to bear with me.

I intend to use this as some sort of art archive. Spares me the website-designing and I get to explore this liveyournal thingy a bit. Perhaps I will figure it out one day. But before I start to do exactly that, I give this journal its purpose. It's an old wallpaper of mine, back from the days when there was still a Farscape minseries coming (*sniff*) but I still like it: