Election Thoughts

For starters it seems as if all young people dislike the conservatives, but not me. Their platform actually benefits my family a lot. My parents are two police officers and Harper is big on law enforcement, but also my family has the money to pay for privatized health care, so it would almost be in our benefit to have that. 

The other day in class we were learning about the baby boomers, and how in about 10 or so years they will all be retired. Normally any population pyramid looks like a pyramid. However, because there are so many baby boomers ours has a bulge where they sit at the top. This isn’t concerning at the moment, but ten year down the road, when the students of today are taxpayers, all of those elderly people will be retired. The largest portion of our population will not have to pay taxes, but on top of that they will use up the most resources. Elderly people like to go and see their doctors all of the time because they don’t have a busy schedule, and its none other than the tax payers, us, that will have to pay for that. You will have a small portion of our population supporting the largest portion of a population.  This means that we will have to pay even more taxes, than people do now, to support the mass amount of elderly people.

I’m not one for politics, however learning this a few days ago made me a little happier that the conservative have a majority government.

Five Golden Rules to Stop Motion Animation 

Stop motion animation is very hard to properly do. Many simple beginners’ mistakes could be quickly fixed to make any stop motion animation look much more professional. 

1.       CONTROL YOUR MOVEMENT. The golden rule of animation is that nothing should move unless you want it to. Most beginners’ mistakes relate back to movement. The camera, the set and shadows from the lights will all shift so you must watch out for that.

2.       FIX DOWN YOUR STUDIO. If any part of your studio is not firmly fixed down you should do so now. Any part of your studio is liable to get bumped during your many hours of animating so make sure it is unmovable. If part of your set get moved half way through shooting, even if its only a centimeter, your audience will immediately be able to tell what frame the set or studio was moved in.

3.       FIX DOWN YOUR TRIPOD. This one should be the most obvious rule, however many people attempting stop motion animation still forget, or choose not to do this. Over many hours of shooting your tripod will get bumped and unless it is tapped down you will lose you spot. Even if you try to reposition your tripod the audience will still be able to tell what frame it moved at.

4.       CONTROL YOUR LIGHT SOURCES. It is hard to have total control over light sources, so try to not work near a window without blinds, because you will not have full control of the natural light that comes in from there. Also, if you set up lighting, do not move your lighting around until you are completely finished with that scene. If you attempt to reposition your lights back in place half way through shooting your audience will be able to tell.

5.       KNOW YOUR CHARACTERS. Set up your story boards, character sheets, master copies, on a nearby desk or table as you will be refer to those sheets every couple of minutes. You want to be able to know your characters well enough that you do not need to refer back to your storyboards for every shot.

Stop motion animation can be a spectacular sight to see, if it is done properly. Keeping these 5 tips in mind will always insure that you are following the basics of stop motion animation!

The Way the Crow Flies Reader Review

Novelist Ann-Marie MacDonald is the author of the international bestselling novel The Way the Crow Flies.

Life on the move for eight-year-old Madeleine McCarthy is already the norm. Royal Canadian Air Force family is relocating to the base in Centralia, the site of the accident that prevented her father from battling the Germans during World War II. Her father jack is her hero. This is just one of their many new starts. 

By the time Madeleine turns nine; her innocent childhood has vanished when a fellow schoolmate is murdered. The father that she loves so dearly is caught up in a web of lies and must choose where his loyalties lie. Twenty years later Madeleine uncovers the truth about the catastrophe that changed her life forever. 

This is a powerful story, precisely layered with complex secrets, that properly depicts the optimism that embraced the early sixties. MacDonald incorporates the classic history of the Cold War and the space race into a beautifully written and equally compassionate novel.

Three Keys to Creativity

To be creative you must suspend all judgement. Keeping an open mind is the initial spark to creating. Many people stifle their creativity because they can’t turn off their internal editor. This is the dreaded observer effect. This is the voice in your head that says “that’s not a good idea” or “you are wasting your time.” Creating and editing are two completely different processes. The right side of your brain handles creating, while your left side, the editing. Both processes are necessary; however there is a time and place for everything. Without the ability to suspend judgement your internal editor will kill off every creative idea you have. 

The second key to creativity is perseverance and dedication. Anything worth doing is worth doing well. The ability to create something spectacular and see the process through till the end is something that comes from the heart; it is what separates the great from the good. Without perseverance the ideas you imagine will never become all that they can be. 

The third key to creativity is optimism. The ability to see enormous ideas as only another hurtle in the grand scheme of life. Seeing every challenge as nothing too big to overcome and that there is a solution to every problem, is a vital key to creating. Simply because without this, the creators would be too overwhelmed by the idea to initially create. Without these three elements creativity is not possible, because creativity virtually is open mindedness, dedication and optimism. 

Slut Walk

What you wear may increase the amount of sexual harassment you receive, however, if a man has it in his head to rape you, what you are wearing often times is not a factor. Rape is about empowerment, proving they have the ability to rape you, and less about sex. Although the constable’s statement fits the Bill of Sexual Harassment, it is this mentality that will make rape victims more and more intimidated to press charges against attackers. 

Rape survivors have to live with the shame and the guilt everyday. No matter where, or how, or by whom, this feeling of individual responsibility never goes away. One of the main reasons for this feeling is because of people like this. People who have ignorant biases, and have no idea what it feels like to live with that shameful feeling for the rest of life.  This attitude is only promoting the rape women. 

Although his statement was not proper, neither was the way the women handled it. If they were looking for negative attention they have most definitely received it. For the most part fully clothed women of all ages partook in the parade. However, dressing in scantily clad clothing and parading around the streets of Toronto would only further those ignorant comments. There could have been a much classier solution to that statement rather than the manner in which some of those women behaved in.

"We live in a society that teaches don't get raped, instead of don't rape!"