CES 2013 - My First One!

2013's CES was my first time at the show, and it certainly didn't disappoint. It was busy, loud, educational, gorgeous, and network-y. It started with my mother running the car over my luggage, that luggage contained the handouts that I was flying to Vegas to hand out. Those that know me, will probably not be shocked to hear that I was cool as a cucumber. She thought I was crazy for not killing her and was concerned that I would have a mental breakdown. I did not, and after re-creating the broken handouts, I was ready to deliver the cupcakes and packets that I was dispatched by Backblaze to Vegas to give out.

The cupcakes that I had to deliver.

Once that was done, I was on to the show...

Best of CES -

 I really liked Zuvo Water. It was a cool idea and the way that the filtering works makes it a great water purification system for any region of the country.

I also really liked the Pebble watch, but I backed it on Kickstarter, so I'm excited about it anyhow.

Another really cool piece of tech was Samsung's Curved OLED screen. It was gorgeous and the curved form factor made it stand out as a living room showpiece.

Worst of CES-

iPad and iDevice and Android covers for phones and tablets. It seemed that 70% of the show floor was geared towards things to cover up your mobile gear. The only one of those that was interesting was a skin by a company called ZeroChroma, which had an awesome case. Everyone else...meh. (Full disclosure: ZeroChroma had an RV that gave me and a few others a ride to the show, saved us a 30 minute wait).

The CES app for mobile devices. For a conference about innovation, the app looks like something out of a 2003 feature phone. Total garbage.

The app had to update every time you launched it. Awful when everyone is fighting for bandwidth. Garbage.

The UI. More Garbage.

And here are the pictures of the rest of the show!

My dream car (Dodge Viper). Here's the new one. Yummy.

I found a Backblaze customer at the show! There were more than 1, but he was the first!

This was called the Solowheel by Inventist. This little ditty really captured my imagination.

This was gorgeous. Not the model, but the Hyundai Genesis that she was showing off. So pretty.

Sony's massive circular dome of coolness, showing neat videos above their displays.

Sony's 4K television, playing a Taylor Swift music video. So...half awesome.

Sony's immersion gaming/video set up. You put on the gear and you get 3D/Surround gaming. Pretty neat.

 

Not sure who Konka is, but they had a neat waterfall-writing display.

 

Samsung's framed television display. This one got a lot of attention, and was very pretty.

Samsung was also showing off transparent video glass for store displays. Very cool in person, loses a bit on video.

Another neat little thing from Tat'z. I put my face on my thumb. Folks at my local sports bar hilariously said that now I was actually capable of shoving my own head up my own ass. Hah.

Polar was showing off their heartbeat monitors by having members of the United States jump-rope team perform. They were consistent!

Dropcam was showing off their cameras and was using +Brian Wilson's Oceangaze as a demo! 

Pebble actually exists and now has a release date: January 23rd, 2013! I took a picture with the Pebble CEO +Eric Migicovsky, with a Pebble on my wrist. I can confirm that it is glorious.

And here's the lovely little fellow itself. 

Monster Cable's Awards Ceremonies. A bit blurry, but Alicia Keys performed that night.

Some Alicia Keys singing. She has an awesome voice. I was impressed.

CNET's Brian Cooley and Molly Wood tape a segment.

The Ubuntu phone. Pretty cool! The Ubuntu folks gave me a free copy of Ubuntu! They're too kind!

The Razer Edge, CNET's best of CES winner. A tablet that can run games, and run them very well and with peripherals. It was pretty damn cool, but the controls felt a bit wonky. Hopefully they'll iterate!

Parrot's AR Drone 2.0 demo. They were dancing. Neato.

Cute sign on the Las Vegas strip. Not CES related, but I got a kick out of it.

Stunt and Gimmicks threw what was possibly the most productive and fun party of my first CES and I can't wait for the next one. I got to see some very cool stuff, including the Instacube, Zuvo Water, Agloves, and Kubi from Revolve Robotics.

 A jello bathtub was created.

Bathtub networking ensued. 

LG's OLED TV's. These things were amazingly thin and look incredible. They immediately made me regret not having more disposable income.

LG was also showing off large touch display tech to be used in museums and any place where an informational touch interface would be neat.

3D is dead huh? Tell that to LG and these people all wearing awesome glasses, watching an awesome display. I think what The Verge meant was that companies weren't pushing it as heavily as last year. This year it was all about 4K resolution. Notice the guy on the left trying to touch it.

What you can't see clearly is the 3D image that LG was blasting all over a huge wall. It was very very impressive.

Sony's 8K television. This thing was crazy, you could get about a foot from the TV and not see pixels. The blacks were not very vibrant though, but that's OK for a prototype.

Samsung's curved OLED screen. Supposedly it's more natural for the eye to view the TV with the slight curve in it, but when I asked a Samsung rep why they built it, or what the point was, he just said, "We did it because we could." Well played.

Star Craft 2 player Idra plays against challengers at a demo booth. If you could survive for 15 minutes, you got a power supply.

I went to Evil Dead the Musical in Vegas on my last night there. I took a photo with some cast members...and unexpectedly got drenched in stage blood.

This is what you look like after being drenched in blood. Walking around Vegas looking like this did not give me as many weird looks as I had thought.

That's all folks! It was a good trip and I hope to revisit it next year! 

*Edit* Just for fun, I took all these photos on my HTC EVO 4G LTE. Some pics are gorgeous, others are a bit dark. It worked really well as a point and shoot though.

Expendables 2: Electric Boogaloo

Stallone, Schwarzenegger, Statham, Li, Crews, Couture, Van-Damme, Willis, Lundgren, Norris...good times! There's really no reason to talk about the plot of this movie. In as few words as possible: Van-Damme steals a bunch of uranium (cliche); Willis sends in Stallone's team to get the uranium back (cliche); mayhem and bad puns ensue (cliche).

If you couldn't guess by the trailer, this movie isn't really about plot. It's about having everyone you know and love from the 80's and 90's and sometimes even 70's, in the same movie, kicking ass together. It's a blast. There's no point, there's no reason for them to be doing any of what they're doing, there's not even any great dialog (except when they each say everyone's catch-phrases to one another, which, by the way, is friggin' awesome).

Lets talk about the acting! Please read the opening line listing all of the films actors. OK great!

Anyhow, if you ever wanted to see a movie that is Van-Damme incredible, and you enjoyed the first Expendables, you should certainly watch this movie. It is more of the awesome same. Watching this movie made me want to take a week off and watch Bloodsport, Lone Wolf, Running Man, Rambo, and every other crappy action movie ever. It really is a blast of nostalgic past, and with Expendables 3 no doubt on the horizon, I can't wait to see which other folks they pick up. My vote is for Vin Diesel, Dwayne Johnson, and maybe a former Bond, I'd love to see Pierce Brosnan or hell, why not, Sean Connery in a bad ass role, and lets throw in Angelina Jolie as an ass-kicking ninja hooker.

Expendables 2 gets a 2.5/5 (lets be honest, if you don't like action, there isn't much for you here; but if you do like action, this gets a 5/5 (a motorcycle gets shot at a helicopter...)!

Go see it, and if you have a dream cast for the all-but-inevitable Expendables 3, lets hear it!

The Bourne Legacy: More Like Leg-to-your-facey

First thing's first; The Bourne Legacy takes place at the same time as The Bourne Ultimatum. Also, it does not have Jason Bourne in it, except for in name. The main character here is Aaron Cross, played by the ever increasingly bad-ass Jeremy Renner (possibly the best thing to ever come out of Modesto, California). Aaron Cross is a member of Operation Outcome, which is similar to the previous films' Treadstone (of which Jason Bourne was a member) and Blackbriar (which was sent after Jason to silence him, after he threatened to expose them). If you're not familiar, all of those programs/operations are CIA Black Ops projects that are creating super duper field operatives.

Spoilers-ish, in this film the Outcome agents are treated with a virus that helps them increase their mental capacity and physical prowess by some percentage. This works out great for Aaron Cross because before joining the military he was a dummy! The army recruiter added 12 points to his IQ...durr. Anyhow one of the scientists involved in this virus engineering is Dr. Marta Shearing (Rachel Weisz, who I've been in love with since The Mummy). Aaron and Marta's paths cross (get it?) and they go off in search for a stem cell that can help Aaron's character stay smart indefinitely. 

The main bad (or good, depending on your political/conspiracy leanings) is Eric Bayer (Edward Norton, who is great and I wish he'd make more movies instead of being a selfish brat and only making things he "believes" in...ugh). His role is basically the same one that was played by Joan Allen (as Pam Landy) in the other Bourne movies, he's trying to find Aaron Cross before not so flattering information about the United States is released to the public.

Enough about plot. The movie's actually pretty cool, and the action set-pieces are great (much like in the Total Recall remake; however unlike the Total Recall remake, the dialog was not atrocious and non-action elements kept my attention). If you like action, and if you've seen any of the other Bourne movies and are looking in to this one, you are probably are, you should certainly see this movie. If you are cautious about throwing money away, you can see it in a matinee, but in a theater with the thundering surround sound is probably the way to go. I will say this: the car chase scene in this film takes place in Manila, and is very well done, as far as chases go, but will leave you wondering how in the hell they could shoot there (it looks a smidge crowded). 

This guy gets a 4/5, all-around good flick, good action, and Jeremy Renner getting another franchise to be a part of is good news for everyone. I think the next movie, "The Cross Identity" (probably), will start with Rachel's character being found face-down in a plate of Pad Thai somewhere off the coast of Thailand, and Cross teaming up with Jason Bourne to take down the baddies (or goodies). I'm very excited about this!  

*EDIT* There's also a Moby song at the end of the film and everyone knows that the way to Yev's heart is through a Moby song.

Quick note about Total Recall as I will not be writing about it:

I give it 1.5/5. The 1 is for the CGI and action sequences, which are good, as long as no one is talking. The .5 is for the cast, I love Colin Ferrell and wish he would be in more stuff; Kate Beckinsale is always cute; Jessica Biel is kind of a bad-ass here which makes me think of her in Blade Trinity, which makes me happy; Bryan Cranston is not cooking meth, but plays a believable baddy nonetheless; and
Bill Nighy might be one of my favorite current Brits. All those folks are great, but their dialog is horrible, so you can go ahead and just re-watch the Arnold campy classic movie instead.

Hopefully this will re-set my ability to write these things and I'll get more out there. Not going to write one for Dark Knight. If you haven't seen it, you're an idiot and should go. As always, comment/share/suggest! 

Movie Digest - Avengers, Men In Black 3, Dark Shadows, Wrath of the Titans (in order of watchability)

I haven't posted in a little while and was asked today why I hadn't written about the Avengers. Well, it's simple really. What else could I say about it? The common wisdom has been that you should go see it, so if you haven't...go now! I have seen a few other movies lately, here's a quick rundown of what I have seen as of late:

1. Avengers - Go see this movie. Its really that simple, it's expertly done. Joss Whedon (the director [also of Cabin in the Woods fame]) does an incredible job of adding comic book elements into a fast-paced action film.   It has all of your favorite superheroes, Thor, Iron Man, Captain America, Samuel L. Jackson, The Hulk, and Scarlet Johansson's ass in tight pants. See? All your favorites! Just go watch it, it doesn't really need a review, but its a solid 5/5.

2. Men in Black 3 - The third installment in the Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith franchise is a bit too light on the Jones, but is still heavy on the comedy. This film follows Will Smith's Agent J as he goes back in time to kill an assassin that wants to erase Jones' Agent K from the future. The younger K is played by Josh Brolin and he does an impeccable job of channeling the Tommy Lee Jones-isms, including the signature facial expressions and speech patterns. This is a good fun action flick, but I couldn't remember the second movie too well, so I can't comment too much on the continuity, but its worth seeing if you have an extra $10 and want an excuse to eat some popcorn. This one gets a 3.5/5 (points deducted for being a tad long, and starting off a bit flat).

3. Dark Shadows - Not Tim Burton and Johnny Depp's best collaboration. The movie itself isn't too bad, but some of the writing and the general tone of the movie felt "off". It was a bit hard to follow and switched from comedy, to serious, to comedy, to horror-ish movie willy nilly and made it hard to really get into the groove of the movie. Top marks go to Chloe Grace Moretz who plays a teenage Collins girl living in the old Collins estate. The movie is about Barnabus Collins (Depp), a vampire coming back from being imprisoned in a coffin for 200 years by a witch (Eva Green) who has a crush on him that she just can't seem to get over. That is basically the plot, the witch is in love with Barnabus and since the love is unrequited, she kills his lady-love and turns him into a vampire for all eternity. Beyond that there's very little twisting and turning and the plot of having to save the Collin's Canary from going under so that they can keep their business up and running is a bit light on excitement. This one gets a 2.5/5, you should see it at home, if there's nothing better on.

4. Wrath of the Titans. If you thought the first one was bad, this one is even worse. I have no idea how they got Ralph Fiennes and Liam Neeson to come back for a second shoot, but I imagine it involved a lot of money and the promise of prostitutes. The best part of this move was Bill Nighy, who has a minimal role, but happens to be the highlight of any movie he is in. The story revolved around Zeus (Leeson) being imprisoned by Hades (Fiennes) so that Chronos can leech his power and come back to life. Persueus (Sam Worthington) has to save the day by doing impossible and random stuff, including going through a maze, which while it was interestingly designed and shot, was very confusing and hard to follow along with. You can skip this one, 1.5/5. Only see it if you need an excuse to eat butter and can only justify doing so by putting it on popcorn, and need to be watching something in order to do that.

As always, comments/suggestions/recommendations are welcome!

The Cabin in the Woods - most fun you can have with your pants on.

Not much to say about this movie because if you say practically anything it will be ruined. Written by Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard, this is absolutely not a horror film, but does have horror elements. That is practically all I can say about the movie.

It really is something that is best seen without knowing anything about it. If you can avoid the commercials/trailers for it as well. It is scary at parts, so know you will get a few scares, but they are telegraphed fairly well so it won't be difficult to know when you need to do the 'ol "look through the fingers" trick.

So lets do a little checklist:

Acting - Check (Bradley Whitfield is great)
Horror - Check (scary nightmarish creatures)
Comedy - Check (this is very much a Joss Whedon script)
Gore - Check (things get a little messy)
Evil Dead - Check (this has a very Evil Dead vibe, almost so much that I expected Bruce Campbell to pop in at some point).

That is all I'm saying. If you can stomach a smidge bit of scary time, this is by far one of the most fun movies I've seen all year (granted its before the summer blockbusters, but I strongly think that it will be a contender throughout the summer).

Please see this movie.  4.5/5 (very little could have been better, seriously).

Comment/share/enjoy

1 Year Anniversary!

Happy anniversary to me! And happy April Fool's Day to you! Today marks the 1 year anniversary of
my moving out to California from Iowa. I remember it like it was only yesterday, my Altima was filled to the brim with my life's accumulation of crap. Since then much has happened! For example, that car is no longer with me, instead, I'm driving a brand new Kia Soul!

I've also gotten made into a cartoon, by an artist who I "met" while doing support for my company Backblaze and have since become "twitter friends" with! I've helped with our companies largest advertising campaign on reddit as part of World Backup Day (March 31st, backup your computers)! I've reduced the number of questions I ask at work from 20+ per day to about 4-5 per day (what I consider one of my greatest accomplishments). I have had the good fortune of representing Backblaze at conferences, conventions, and meetups.  I've found an awesome hot spring (Callistoga Hot Springs) less than two hours away from where I live! In addition to finding a hot spring, I've tried my darndest to find new restaurants, and continue my mission of seeing almost every crappy movie that comes out (I accidentally see some good ones as well).  I've explored San Francisco, gone down to LA, and have found time to keep on visiting Iowa as often as possible. I've also thought about getting healthier, which is a "step" in the right direction!

Oh, also I've launched a very successful website: www.yevyev.com, it has 4 views!

All in all it was a very good year and I'm excited to see where the next one will take me! Here's a few more pictures I've accumulated throughout the year!

I cooked this on my own! Yay! 

The End! 

More silly posts and reviews surely to come! 

Chronicle (Better than Narnia)

There's something I need to get off my chest. I really dislike movies shot in 1st person. There, I said it. I first found out about this preference during Doom, which had one scene shot in 1st person. Unfortunately for Doom, it was also probably the best sequence in the movie. This dislike of 1st person camera work was further enhanced when I went to see Cloverfield, which actually made me feel nauseous, but with the help of some diet coke, I persevered. Chronicle follows in their footsteps and was a bit difficult for me to watch at the beginning (when they were not only shooting through a shaky cam, but had the audacity to do it with an SD camera). The movie was hard to watch, but I'm glad I toughed it out.

Chronicle follows 3 kids as they find a glowing thingy that makes their noses bleed and gives them telekinetic powers. So far that is about all the information that you would get from the trailer. Luckily, the trailer does not ruin the movie, as it is incredibly vague. I won't give out too much about the plot, but the movie more or less follows them around as they work out their new-found "muscles".

The main character is Andrew (Dane DeHaan), who is a socially awkward, shy, and troubled high school senior. His cousin Matt (Alex Russell) is an awkward popular kid who is looking out for Andrew and plays the voice of reason in the group. Their buddy Steve (Michael B. Jordan) is the popular jock who is also running for class president. The other characters in the movie don't really matter as they don't have powers and, well, who cares?

The movie is very well done and watching the characters transform as their powers get more and more developed is pretty cool. Of course there has to be some conflict within the group and that escalates throughout the movie, which leads to a climactic flying sequence around the Seattle space needle.

This gets a solid 4/5 (could have been a 4.5/5 if not for the shaky cam). Go see it! Also, its been out for a week or so, and may be leaving theaters soon, so run and see it if you need to, but only if you don't get nauseous easily!

Comment/Write/Suggest below!