garyhenson.net

Natalie - 2 years old

Gary Henson — 2010-08-22T13:17:34+12:00

Wow - Natalie is now 2 years old.

Things have been a lot easier this year since we sorted out the allergies. She's been really good at nights for months now, which means we should be catching up on our sleep too.

Unfortunately it doesn't seem to work this way, as Andrea often has to stay up late doing her uni assignments, and I stay up because I feel guilty going to bed before her. Or because I'm working, but the results are the same.

I've uploaded some photos to the gallery, and here are a couple of videos.

My Little Pumpkin

Gary Henson — 2010-06-19T21:35:42+12:00

Natalie's carer has quite a few kids costumes, and Natalie is often wearing one or another when we go to pick her up in the evenings.

I love this one.

Natalie - Trampoline

Gary Henson — 2010-06-19T17:00:22+12:00

Schlock Mercenary

Gary Henson — 2009-11-11T11:14:16+13:00

As some of you know, I've been working with The Tayler Corporation to develop the official Schlock Mercenary iPhone app.

It's been a little over three months in the making, with me working evenings and weekends (not all of them thankfully), but it is finally ready for beta release.

If you're not a reader, and like the sound of a comic "space opera", then head on over to Schlock Mercenary and have a look at some of the archives.

Howard has been doing the strip since June 2000, and hasn't missed a single day since then.

All of the 3400+ strips are available in the iPhone app, in a higher resolution than what is available on the website.

More information on the app is available at the Plus 14 Ltd website.

Natalie goes Shopping

Gary Henson — 2009-08-07T09:09:34+12:00

Natalie goes Shopping from Tarlen on Vimeo.

Natalie playing with one of her first birthday presents. She's not walking on her own yet, but it looks like it may not be too long.

One Year On

Gary Henson — 2009-08-05T17:34:31+12:00

So Natalie turned one last Sunday (the 2nd - check the Gallery for a few photos) and it's a good time to look back on the past year.

Lows:

Sleep, right at the top.
Allergies - Natalie wasn't very happy for a while until we discovered her allergies to Cats, Eggs & Milk. Once those were discovered it became a lot easier.
Having to take her to hospital because she wasn't feeding and was getting dehydrated.

Highs:

The first time she smiled at us.
The first time she laughed/giggled.
Every subsequent time she smiled or laughed/giggled at us.
When she started sitting up on her own.
When she started crawling.
When she started pulling herself to standing.
When she started "talking".
Any night she sleeps through.
The way Sammy behaves towards her (extremely tolerant).
Her reaction every time she sees Sammy (she loves Sammy).
Every time she does something new.
When she first started giving us "kisses" (just before her birthday).
Cuddles.
Millions of great photos.
The trip to Australia going very smoothly.
Pretty much everything else...

To summarise, there are a lot more high moments than lows... or at least you remember more highs than lows.

Best daughter ever!

Natalie loves Sammy

Gary Henson — 2009-07-13T09:34:24+12:00

Natalie and Sammy from Tarlen on Vimeo.

48 Hour Reviews

Gary Henson — 2009-05-15T15:36:14+12:00

Our heat for the 48 Hours was last night. We were pretty well received, and got #2 in the Audience Favourite voting (out of 12, though 4 had been disqualified due to late hand-ins).

There were two unofficial reviewers in the audience, who had this to say:

Autofire

Religious film - Guy discovers he can change the world by writing entries into "Worldpaedia" (As opposed to the wiki version). The concept of "what I write becomes reality" has been played with before, so it had the potential to become "same/same," however it was a very well executed story with nice use of elements.

Creating a wiki...I mean Worldpaedia page under his own name, he updates it and starts changing the greater world with much good intent (world peace, etc). Eventually though he gets a god complex...

Nicely performed, arguably best of the heat....

And the second guy, who has been unofficially reviewing all the 48 Hour shorts for a few years now:

Omnipedia by Autofire (Religious)

John discovers that if he writes a thing in Worldpedia, it comes true. He quickly realises this effectively makes him a god, with the power to fix the world's wrongs and gift himself a socialite girlfriend. However, he is not prepared for the uncomfortable consequences. A good story, pacey, and a nice short-story style ending.

A-

I'm quite happy with all that.

48 Hour Post Mortem

Gary Henson — 2009-05-11T19:26:44+12:00

Last weekend was the 48 Hour Film Festival. Unfortunately it encompassed Andrea's first mothers day, but despite that we made a movie. Here I lay out the basic process for those interested. If you're not, skip to the end.

6:00pm, Friday 8th: The weekend began at the Freemans Bay Community Centre where we were given the required elements:

Genre: The Politically Incorrect Movie or The Religious Movie
Line: "It doesn't fit"
Prop: A Rock
Character: Alex Puddle, an exaggerator.

With 264 teams in Auckland, there were a LOT of people there. The atmosphere was, as always, charged with adrenaline, Stella Artois and V. The required info was given via drawing numbers for the genres, then everything was revealed just before 7pm.

7:10pm, Friday 8th: We met up at Cactuslab to nut out a basic script, locations, cast etc. This kept us going until about 11:30pm. At this point we all went home, where most of us went to bed, while Frank started fleshing out the script. For the record, I got about 6 hours sleep, while Frank probably got about 3.

8:00am, Saturday 9th: Meeting at Melita's place, we set up and started shooting. Various people came and went throughout the day, and we managed to get the filming done by 6:30pm.

We then all went home and most people had dinner, spent quality time with their families, and went to bed. I had dinner, spent a short amount of time with my family, then started editing.

8:00pm, Saturday 9th: 3 hours of capturing 2 hours video to my PC was followed by about 5 hours of editing on Saturday night/Sunday morning. I managed to get a (very) rough cut together that came to 10 mins, 35 sec. EEK! The max time allowed is 7mins including credits.

I had intentionally let a fair amount of excess video that needed trimming, but I didn't think it was quite that much. I also did a couple of simple blue screen shots, and got to bed right on 3am.

8:00am, Sunday 10th: After about 4 hours sleep, a shower and breakfast, I went back to the editing.

I did a few more of the bluescreen shots until Frank arrived at about 9:30am. We then started working on cutting the video down to the required length.

12:45pm, Sunday 10th: First computer crash. I hit save, then left the room to get a drink, and returned to find the computer mid-restart. Once it was back I re-opened Premiere to the message "This project is corrupted and cannot be opened."

Thankfully an auto-save from 40 mins prior worked fine, and as most of that time was figuring out what to do, it only to 10 mins to recover.

2:00pm, Sunday 10th: Second computer crash. Saw the bluescreen this time. Thankfully the project wasn't corrupted, undoubtedly because I had started backing it up every couple of minutes.

2:45pm, Sunday 10th: Third computer crash, again not corrupting the file, just taking out 10 mins in restart Windows, start up Premiere and load project file.

3:10pm, Sunday 10th: Editing complete from video point of view. Project rendered out and backed up to external device. We could hand this in if needs be, but we wouldn't be too happy about it. We managed to get the short down to 6:39 by trimming a lot of shots quite a lot, and by dropping one scene entirely (sorry Chris!).

4:00pm, Sunday 10th: Sound effects and music added to project, now in state we would be happy to hand it in, but still a couple of minor edits to do if they don't take too long. Frank heads home at this point, confident that I can handle the minor work left to do.

4:45pm, Sunday 10th: Editing done, final render complete, and I start the output to tape process. At the same time I call my mum to wish her a Happy Mother's Day.

5:17pm, Sunday 10th: Tape written, I hop in the car to hand it in in Freemans Bay.

5:47pm, Sunday 10th: I'm the first through the door at the Auckland finishing line, and we're done!

Result: I'm quite pleased with this years work. Frank's writing was solid, with strong material that had a pretty good connection to "the real world". Last years film was quite good, but it existed alone without any connection to real subjects or events. This short referenced a number of real topics, which made it much more relatable to most people.

The filming quality was reasonable. I'm happy with the sound except for one shot where the Rode VideoMic had been unplugged (by me) and I didn't realise it. Still, it wasn't BAD, just not as good.

Lighting was a bit of an issue, as Melita's house was quite dark, with very few lights itself. With the help of a couple of 500W halogen risers, and a reflector, we sorted most of that out pretty well.

One thing I didn't make enough of a deal over was the White Balance. Since we were filming under halogens, I should have rebalanced the colour a few times, but it totally slipped my mind. Thankfully the only shots that it was REALLY noticable were the shots that were intended to be "on TV" in the film, and as such I determined that it could pass.

Overall though, I'm happy. I think we improve with every year, and hopefully the trend continues.

The heat is this Thursday, and hopefully it will be received well by the audience of about 200 other team members and judges.

Daddy's Hat

Gary Henson — 2009-04-15T21:24:55+12:00

Thankfully not a grumpy baby.

Natalie - 2nd Birthday

Gary Henson — 2010-08-22T12:47:33+12:00

Photos of Natalie at her 2nd birthday party and a couple of weeks afterwards.

Natalie - By Kylie Cassidy

Gary Henson — 2010-06-27T20:49:40+12:00

We had some photos of Natalie done by a professional photographer. Here are the results.

Natalie - Part 8

Gary Henson — 2010-06-19T14:04:02+12:00

Photos from the 23rd of April to the 3rd of June 2010

Natalie - Part 7

Gary Henson — 2010-06-19T13:58:51+12:00

Photos of Natalie from the 14th of February 2010 through to the 13th of April 2010.

Natalie - Part 6

Gary Henson — 2010-02-13T21:22:13+13:00

Photos from January 2010 through to the 13th of February

Natalie - Part 5

Gary Henson — 2009-12-31T20:33:22+13:00

Photos of Natalie from late October to Christmas 2009. Includes photos of our Australian trip over Christmas.

Natalie - Part 4

Gary Henson — 2009-10-13T20:33:41+13:00

Photos of Natalie from 28th of August to mid October.

Natalie - Part 3

Gary Henson — 2009-08-23T19:57:20+12:00

Natalie - 1st Birthday

Gary Henson — 2009-08-04T20:53:04+12:00

Here are photos from Natalies 1st birthday party. Big thanks to everyone that came along, it was a great day.

Natalie - Part 2

Gary Henson — 2009-07-23T10:36:34+12:00

I thought it was probably time to start adding new galleries of Natalie rather than continuing to add to the first.