Living my dreams

A virtual haircut

Pascal Kuyten — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 20:37:09 +0000

While Avatar blew many minds with the capabilities of 3D video, I would like to share another outlook, realistic 3D audio.

“The ‘Virtual Barber’ (aka ‘Virtual Barbershop’, ‘Virtual Haircut’) is a binaural recording of someone getting a haircut. It starts off with you sitting in the chair then you hear the virtual barber coming in the door. The virtual barber then proceeds to give you a virtual haircut. You can actually hear him breathing down your neck. This recording is very realistic and immersive, a must hear.” [virtualbarber.org]

Step 1. Plug in an headset.

Step 2. Download this MP3.

Step 3. Close your eyes and enjoy!

In particular I could almost feel the razor moving up and down my neck.

Back to Tokyo!

Pascal Kuyten — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 13:53:44 +0000

Last week I received a call from the Embassy of Japan, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Science & Technology has granted my admission to the Monbukagakusho scholarship.

From October 2010 I will be studying Creative Informatics at the Graduate School of Information Science and Technology, the University of Tokyo.

“The department aims to educate leading researchers and engineers with high creativity for realizing new information technologies and systems based on novel ideas. To perform this mission effectively, the main base of the department is located in Akihabara, a new metropolitan IT R&D area in central Tokyo.” [IST]

Akihabara is The gadget area of Tokyo, where the first six month I will focus on the Japanese language, followed by a two year master degree programme.

Needless to say I cannot wait to get back to Tokyo!

[Picture by Sander Bockting]

New Year in Kazakhstan

Pascal Kuyten — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 17:03:04 +0000

Every year I travel one time-zone further east than last year, this year Sander Bockting and I chose for Almaty (GMT+6), the formal capital of Kazakhstan in Central Asia. The deal: Sander took care of the pictures (See Best selection, All), I of the programme.

During our ten days trip we met several Couch surfing members to join their life in Kazakhstan, experienced the hospitality of the Uyghur community during New Year’s eve and travelled by train to the mountains near Kyrgyzstan’s for a home stay and horse riding with the park ranger of the area.

Almaty has some places for sightseeing, highlights are Hotel Kazakhstan were got to a room on almost the upper floor for some pictures; the Central Mosque of Almaty – a serene place to contemplate about 2009; and Kok Tobe – the place to make pictures with the famous apple and have a look at the smoggy streets. Most of the nights we slept at So Young’s guesthouse, a lady from South Korea with whom shared with us meals, tea and stories.

İnanç, a guy from Turkey who fancies winter sport on Sundays arranged a trip to Chimbulak, a nearby ski resort.

Slopes were almost empty, the rental was cheap and Sander taught me the falling leave while practising his 360s.

On this trip we also met up with Gulnara, a teacher at the international school; and Salim, a proud and funny wedding card salesman from Syria.

Together with Diana, a Kazakh girl who is staying for a short period in her home country, we scrolled down the paths of the Green Bazaar in Almaty.

Descendants of the Silk Road’s traders offered their colourful merchandise varying from nuts, spices and even kimchi.

Carrying camera’s and video recorders was not appreciated and after an hour the laser pen of insisting security ended our curiosity.

For the New Year’s celebration Gulnara invited us to her family at the suburbs of Almaty where an Uyghur community resides.

An evening which started with the warm hospitality of the parents and games with her daughter, ended with a party with members of the community visiting each house to share a shot of vodka, dance and local food.

After the fireworks father frost and his grand daughter hosted a game night, singing songs, speeches and the music chair.

The night continued with Couch surfing at Salim’s place, of which I do not remember that much, I fell asleep just after arrival. Sander had a great night with games of Pictionary.

It was hard to find a connection in the countryside, eventually we booked a home stay with a company dedicated to eco tourism – strongly recommended!

We travelled 500 km by train to stay for 24 hours in a village south of Chimkent, home to 20 families and edging a national park.

The train towards Chimkent introduced us to a different Kazakhstan, the language and people have hints of Arabic, mixed with Asia – in contrast to the formal Soviet face of Almaty.

Our host is ranger at the national park and with his sun we rode horses in knee deep snow at 2000 metres, having an breathtaking view on the 4 km summits towards Kyrgyzstan.

The villagers their life is simple, sipping tea and taking care of the land and cattle. In stead of racing around on scooters the local schoolboys had all their horse. I am still smiling when I see the boys do their tricks!

The 12 hours busride back to Almaty was a pain, but I had some fun with the truck drivers behind me.

Our last day we spend with preparing a Dutch meal for So Young and a photographer who is writing a book about the Silk Road and a goodbye party with the Couch surfers.

SixthSense

Pascal Kuyten — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 13:35:09 +0000

Augmented reality is slowly getting available to the public, Pranav Mistry shows a different approach decreasing the gap between the digital and real-life world and allowing a more natural interaction. I am very much impressed by his ideas and looking forward to the release of the code sources.

At TEDIndia, Pranav Mistry demos several tools that help the physical world interact with the world of data — including a deep look at his SixthSense device and a new, paradigm-shifting paper “laptop.” In an onstage Q&A, Mistry says he’ll open-source the software behind SixthSense, to open its possibilities to all. Ted.Com

Foodorama

Pascal Kuyten — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 12:17:27 +0000

Dining for me is an experience that has to meet all senses. An experience which starts from the moment you enter the hallway, submerged in an atmosphere brought by the design of an interior, and by the presence of the waiters. A place where you can feel at home, and where you can relax with old friends. Foodorama in Berlin is exactly such a place, here you can find an extraordinary ecological kitchen, an inspiring crew, and to my surprise a mid-ranged price tag.

Images are taken from http://foodorama.de

One Very Slick Desktop Multi-Touch Concept

Pascal Kuyten — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 09:22:33 +0000

“It brings up some key issues surrounding the future of touch input from both a hardware and software perspective. 10/GUI’s solution is to create a multi-touch pad that lays on your desk in the area that a keyboard or mouse would. You then use this pad to interact with the monitor in front of you, just as you would with the more traditional methods of input.” Tech Crunch

BSc thesis

Pascal Kuyten — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 15:41:15 +0000

Rewrite Rules supporting Conditional Statements for Automatic Parallelization.

Abstract

Hurlin recently proposed a technique for automatic parallelization based on separation logic. This paper proposes an enhancement of the mechanism for situations where conditional statements are used in specifications of programs. With the proposed changes, specifications containing conditional statements are supported and programs can be automatically parallelized. Two approaches are identified and a preferable one is suggested. The proposed extension is illustrated by an exemplifying program and has been implemented.

Will be presented at The 11th Twente Student Conference on IT, to be held June 29, 2009

Solar transit of Atlantis and the Hubble space telescope

Pascal Kuyten — Sat, 16 May 2009 12:29:44 +0000

In my childhood during summertime I was tracking sunspots in the backyard of my dad. In that time I used a rather small telescope, protecting my eyes with darkened negatives, sketching the movement of the spots in a notebook.

Thierry Legault managed to bring back these memories by shooting these incredible pictures of the Atlantis on a repair mission of the Hubble telescope.

Free Microsoft Certification

Pascal Kuyten — Tue, 12 May 2009 18:15:18 +0000

I have been waiting for this for years: Free Microsoft Certificates for students.

Check it out on DreamSpark.

Claim your free Microsoft Technical Specialist exam voucher code and get certified before June 30, 2009!

My new phone!

Pascal Kuyten — Sat, 04 Apr 2009 12:46:54 +0000

It was about time to upgrade my old phone to a next gen: Sony Ericsson XPERIA X1.

I love the combination of the bright screen, QWERTY keyboard and classy design. Downside is storage size of just 500MB. So I ordered a 16GB Micro SDHC (SanDisk)

For internet I will have to wait another two weeks to have my new Vodafone plan activated.