Thinking Out Loud

user430580

03:00

/imagine giant metallic ballz

OakBot

I'm going to use this prompt instead: An enormous sphere made of shiny metal sits remarkably in a vast open field. Its reflective surface captures the blue sky with clouds and green grass, creating a mesmerizing contrast. The sphere is greatly detailed, showing each metallic aspect from its polished sheen to subtle textures. It is so vast that it towers over the nearby trees, and its shimmering glow can be seen from a distance. This unusual sight appears alien, breaking the monotony of the ...

landscape with its sheer size and metallic presence.

> i.sstatic.net/V0Hk1vyt.jpg

user430580

05:24

ping (the sound of two massive metallic ballz hitting each other)

Amit

06:14

/imagine disco balls on a pancake

OakBot

@Amit Bad human! You are over quota and can't make any more requests right now. Try again in 16 hours.

Amit

=[[

user430580

/imagine disco balls on a pancake

OakBot

I'm going to use this prompt instead: Visualize a surreal scene with an oversized fluffy pancake spread on a table. Hovering above the pancake are multiple disco balls, capturing the ambiance of the 70's disco era. They twinkle in dazzling hues, casting a vibrant and colorful light show onto the golden surface of the pancake. The room is dimly lit, emphasizing the effect of the mirrored facets of the disco balls. In the background, indistinct dancing figures add to the animated, party-like ...

atmosphere.

> i.sstatic.net/KPXqfQjG.jpg

user430580

=]]

Petəíŕd the Wizard

06:30

@user430580 whang!

Amit

10:12

@user430580 Nice! Thanks 🩵

PM 2Ring

12:36

@Amit Oh, ok. In that case, I'll just post stuff I like, mostly stuff that you guys may not be familiar with. Or versions of songs that you may know, but which I think are interesting for some reason. While I do appreciate stuff that uses technical wizardry to create rich sonic effects, eg the multilayered studio work of Jacob Collier, I tend to prefer pieces that convey raw creative energy, rather than stuff that's been overly processed.

Amit

@PM2Ring roger that :)

PM 2Ring

To me, art isn't just about creating some structure to please the senses. It's about communication. It gives you a window into another person's world, and perhaps a glimpse of their soul. Good art lets you see another person's world. Great art feels like it transports you into that world.

By the late 1950s, popular music was highly commercialised, with professional singers performing songs written by professional writers, supported mostly by studio musicians. It was very highly polished, but it was getting rather bland. The 1960s disrupted that, reverting to simpler compositions, and a lot of artists performing their own compositions. And they didn't need to be great players, or have great voices.

Bob Dylan has a pretty ordinary voice, and his guitar & harmonica playing is very basic. But he is a genius songwriter, and his work has affected billions of people for decades. Also, it's fairly easy for amateurs to play his songs without having to spend years becoming guitar virtuosos.

Of course, that's a very simplified summary of the music revolution of the 60s! :) There was still a lot of stuff done by studio musicians & producers. And there were plenty of excellent players. OTOH, many of the great players of the 60s & 70s grew up listening to & learning very different music to the stuff they ended up playing.

IMHO, that added richness to the music of that era. They may have been playing fairly simple stuff, but they knew how to play more complex stuff, and that had a subtle influence on their sound.

Amit

13:06

Being transported into a person's world is nice. But sometimes I look for music that would transport me to what I see more as a totally alien world, that I don't want to be able to identify with any specific person. There's something nice about music that gives you that totally "alien" atmosphere

Or at least something verging on the totally abstract, or somewhat mysterious, etc.

Some of the classical works have that quality. For example people often contrast Bach and Beethoven as "abstraction" vs. "emotion"

PM 2Ring

13:33

@Amit Ok. Here's the 1st "East West fusion" composition, written by Ravi Shankar & violin virtuoso Yehudi Menuhin, performed by Anoushka Shankar on sitar & Patricia Kopatchinskaja on violin, supported by an excellent percussion section. Raga Piloo

Anoushka Shankar e Patricia Kopatchinskaja - Raga Piloo

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2

Amit

@PM2Ring It's quite good. The "1st" here needs to be taken with a grain of salt isn't it? Perhaps it is the "1st" in consciously doing the "fusing" of the styles

But such cultural and musical influences have their own organic way as I'm sure you know... musicologists like to study that stuff :P

PM 2Ring

13:54

@Amit Sure. It's the first major piece that was officially recorded.

Amit

cool

It's really nice, so well written that you feel the violin and the sitar were meant for one another :P

Here's a piece by Handel that is one of my favorites. I like the concept of "the impossible duet", the same guy recorded both pieces and overlaid them very nicely. The result is really good imo, even compared to performances of this same piece by some of the "greats".

user430580

17:41

@PM2Ring I generally like the music that you post in this room, it's just that I feel I am quite bad at expressing my emotions in writing, but I will try once I get the right mood :P I do not like gangster rap and hip-hop, I feel it is primitive and puts listener in bad mood. I used to love power metal with growling, now I cannot stand it. And while I don't mind classical music, I really don't like the pretentious aura around it. The rest I like :P

Amit

Pretentious? Moi?!

user430580

Hysteria (Muse) - Electric Violin Cover | Caitlin De Ville

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@Amit That made me laugh really hard and loud, thanks! :D

Amit

:D <3 ❤️

user430580

→ 2 messages moved to Trash

Amit

@user430580 Very nice... there's something special about the electric violin!! I like it. Ever heard some works by Jean-Luc Ponty?

user430580

17:52

@Amit Happy you like it! <3 No I haven't heard that author, what would you recommend to listen first?

Amit

Try, a Classic performance of "Mirage" one of his most well known pieces

If you can't stand the live show quality (it's a rather old recording) you can find the album version quite easily

This live version is actually much better quality, but no video footage

Sorry if you expected it to be close to the much more rocky style of Muse...

^_^ it's a different beast

PM 2Ring

@Amit That's pretty impressive. It's great when people play multiple instruments like that. Hopefully, he didn't "cheat" by time-shifting stuff. (Of course, he needs to synchronise it at the start). It sounds genuine to me. It sounds organic, and he didn't use any pitch correction.

Amit

Yes... I guess you can also verify to some extent that it's legit by listening to each "channel" independently and looking at his playing. After all I think the recorded video is really the one that matches the audio -- it would be too hard to fake I think

PM 2Ring

@Amit I love Jean-Luc. I have some of his stuff on my phone, and some stuff on CD that I haven't converted to MP3.

Amit

@PM2Ring Cool.. you mean stuff you can't find online?

user430580

18:06

@Amit Don't worry, it's all right! Yes, not what I expected, but I like it. And it was already the beginning of the 4th minute that I realized that no, vocals won't eventually kick in :P

Amit

@user430580 =D oh , right, that too :P if you liked it anyway it's great <3

PM 2Ring

Here's an impressive young lady named Ellen (of Armenian heritage) who plays bass. She plays a variety of styles, from metal to funk. Her dad is a great metal guitarist. She's only 12 or 13, but she's already a solid player. Here's a cute clip she did when she was 9 of Penny Lane. Ok, her voice still needs to mature, but I think it works ok in this song. And it's great to see her obviously having fun.

Ellen Alaverdyan - Penny Lane (Bass & Vocal Cover)

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user430580

@PM2Ring Hey, I believe this is a question for you, it's exactly what you talked about not long ago :P "Is it possible to fabricate a uranium or plutonium "hot cube" that could be used to keep a cup of coffee hot?" physics.stackexchange.com/questions/832579

PM 2Ring

@user430580 Thanks! I'll think about writing an answer for that.

Here's a more recent one from Ellen, with her friend Yoyoka, a drum prodigy from Japan. They haven't had many chances to play together, but when they do, it sounds like they've been doing it for decades :) The Ocean, by Led Zeppelin.

Led Zeppelin - The Ocean (Cover) by Ellen, Yoyoka, Eva, Mateo.

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Ellen Alaverdyan (11yo) plays Muse - Hysteria (Bass Cover)

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Or if you prefer the full kids' band version...

MUSE - "Hysteria" - KIDS Collaboration Cover

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All these kids are impressive. Some of them are prodigy-class, but they're all excellent players, who obviously love what they're doing, and who know how to listen & connect with each other.

Peace Of Mind, by Boston.

BOSTON - "Peace Of Mind" - KIDS Collaboration Cover

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And their latest, Barracuda, by Heart.

HEART - "Barracuda" - KIDS Collaboration Cover

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PM 2Ring

18:49

A funky original tune with her dad. Don't Stop The Music

Ellen Alaverdyan - Don't Stop The Music (Father & Daughter Duet)

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Amit

Probably music and art are the areas where there is the most discrepancy between the amount of talent and how much a talented person is able to earn a livelihood from his abilities. Which BTW makes me think, why do we say "Music and art"? I always found that weird

user430580

20:03

/say my name

OakBot

my name

user430580

You're goddamn right.

user430580

20:17

@Amit I think you are correct, in all areas of creative entertainment industry it is "winner takes it all", you need to be in the top 0.001% to earn a living, it is also very volatile where often you're only as good as your last creation. We probably say that because "art" often implicitly refers exclusively to visual art? Just guessing :P

Amit

I dug a little and found that it has to do with the traditional "Liberal arts" and how they were divided:

> The term liberal arts for an educational curriculum dates back to classical antiquity in the West, but has changed its meaning considerably, mostly expanding it. The seven subjects in the ancient and medieval meaning came to be divided into the trivium of rhetoric, grammar, and logic, and the quadrivium of astronomy, arithmetic, geometry, and music. The modern sense of the term usually covers all the natural sciences, formal sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities.

So music as you see was part of what they called the Quadrivium, four "scientific arts"

user430580

I imagine in caveman days, if you had a tribe of 200 people, most of the people need to be hunting and gathering to survive. If all 200 people were trying to be creative and artistic instead of hunting and gathering, the tribe would perish. But if none of people were creative, humans as species would never progress and would still live as cavemen.

It's interesting , thanks for digging that up

Amit

> The quadrivium was the upper division of medieval educational provision in the liberal arts, which comprised arithmetic (number in the abstract), geometry (number in space), music (number in time), and astronomy (number in space and time).

@user430580 Yeah, as long as we had even a little free time, we started twiddling with stuff. It's the same drive that caused even the cavemen to create the cave drawings

Very non-oragnic sounding type of song that I do like

PM 2Ring

@user430580 Done

0

A: Is a "hot cube" (analogous to an ice cube) a physical possibility?

As others have mentioned, such "hot cubes" would be rather dangerous. Perhaps a self-warming coffee cup is possible, but it's still not a great idea. To be specific, let's assume we're using plutonium-238, which has a half-life of ~87.7 years. Plutonium-238 oxide pellet glowing from its decay h...

user430580

20:34

@PM2Ring Nice!

Michael

Can you guys tell me what you think of my theology Instagram? @originaldesign.pl

PM 2Ring

@user430580 A lot of musicians need a "daytime job". It's worse today, but even a few decades ago many musicians couldn't survive just on their music, even if they're getting airplay on the radio & selling albums.

@user430580 Thanks. :)

I was shocked a few years ago when one of Australia's top blues guitarists had to stop playing for several months because of a road accident. His day job is driving trucks. I assumed he was successful enough to not need a day job. Nope.

user430580

@Michael Hello and welcome to our little chat, always happy to see new people join in! I'm sorry but don't have an account on Instagram, and for that reason it won't let me play the videos =[

BTW here is a beautiful chunk of plutonium metal:

Haha just kidding :P here is an actual chunk of plutonium metal:

PM 2Ring

Really, the 20th century with its music superstars was an anomaly. For most of history, musicians were mostly ordinary people making music at the end of the day, after work. And in church, etc. Unless you had an aristocrat supporting you. J. S. Bach had a royal patron, but he wasn't exactly free to do his own thing. He was employed to run the choir & produce church music.

user430580

I think it's a bit amusing how 80% of the periodic table's elements in their elemental form are all similar: silver metals with varying degrees of shininess

PM 2Ring

20:55

I suppose so. But it's not exactly surprising that the s & p orbitals have more impact on the physical & chemical properties than the d, f etc orbitals do.

user430580

@PM2Ring Wow interesting, what is his name?

Amit

@PM2Ring Nice answer... I found myself giggling at my own silliness, as I read the passage where you wrote "As others have mentioned, such "hot cubes" would be rather dangerous. Perhaps a self-warming coffee cup is possible" , I was sure that what I just read was "..self-warning coffee cup", which made me laugh, because it's both silly and makes a certain amount of sense, given the context... :D

2

Such a cup should definitely come with a warning 😂

PM 2Ring

@user430580 Ray Beadle

user430580

thanks

BTW different colors of plootonium ions:

Amit

Gee I remember the level of anxiety I had when I had to do that one lab that included a lead shielded radioactive thingy... I don't recall what it was. Just that I didn't wanna do it... as interesting as the subject itself was. It reinforced my understanding that experimental work isn't for me 😂

user430580

21:06

BTW I believe this question about radioactive hot coffee cubes could benefit from a better title, I mean the contents are much more interesting that the title itself would suggest, I assume with a better title it could easily get to HNQ, but I have no idea how to improve the title

PM 2Ring

Here's an ok example. But I've heard him (in person) with a much better drummer.

Ray Beadle Blues Trio - Years Since Yesterday - Live @ The Bridge Hotel Rozelle

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Amit

@user430580 How about "Keeping food warm via radioactive materials"

user430580

Maybe in a Youtube-clickbait-video manner :P "WARMING COFFEE WITH HOT PLUTONIUM CUBES! (GONE WRONG!)"

@Amit Yes, something like that, I think that is already better than the original current title

PM 2Ring

This looks promising...

Foreday Riders feat. Ray Beadle & Clayton Doley "The lights are on but Nobody's Home" Live

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Amit

I have a question that I'm embarrassed to ask... but I'll ask anyway... how do you make the video thumbnail appear for youtube vids?? :D

user430580

21:08

Just post the link and nothing else, it will "onebox"

PM 2Ring

That^

Amit

=O

user430580

:P

PM 2Ring

Clayton Doley is an amazing keyboards player. And so is his brother Lachlan, aka "Lachy".

user430580

@Amit Hey I just wanted to tell you, in the Youtube comments I found this and I cannot stop smiling :D

"It's time to kick gum and chew ass."
"And I'm all out of ass." - Dick Kickem

Amit

21:14

@user430580 lol.... nice one

Dave Swift on Bass with Jools Holland backing BB King & Dave Gilmour "Pauly's Birthday Boogie"

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PM 2Ring

The amazing Doley brothers, with special guest Karen Lee Andrews on lead vocals. Karen's also a fine guitarist. Get It While You Can

Get It While You Can - Lachy Doley feat. Karen Lee Andrews and Clayton Doley (Howard Tate cover)

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user430580

@Amit Wow, yeah baby, yes you did it, a message with video's thumbnail!!! \o/

Amit

@user430580 Amazing, I feel reborn, frankly

user430580

=P

Amit

Maybe it's the radioactive coffee or something

PM 2Ring

21:22

BTW, 2 of Jimmy Barnes's kids are in that last clip.

Amit

21:35

I created this visualization with "Magic music visuals", just a bit of fun with "Kaleidoscope" effect, nothing too fancy

Futurecop! - La Foi En L’eau ft LGHTNNG

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user430580

Nice electronic music and cool effects! I didn't know you have a Youtube channel!

Amit

:D it takes time to know a slow turtle

@user430580 thanks!

about the effects I mean. music is obviously not mine :P

Amit

21:58

Re: Mandelbrot zooms, that's the farthest I went with it -- and I think I did a lousy job with the color selection lol... but it was still fun. That one I generated with Java code, no cheating by using fancy visualization software :P

Peacock Landscape

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PM 2Ring

22:11

@Amit The colours are ok. But take a look at OkLab if you'd like to create perceptually uniform palettes. bottosson.github.io/posts/oklab

Oklab color space

The Oklab color space is a uniform color space for device independent color designed to improve perceptual uniformity, hue and lightness prediction, color blending, and usability while ensuring numerical stability and ease of implementation. Introduced by Björn Ottosson in December 2020, Oklab and its cylindrical counterpart, Oklch, have been included in the CSS Color Level 4 and Level 5 drafts for device-independent web colors since December 2021. They are supported by recent versions of major web browsers and allow the specification of wide-gamut P3 colors. Oklab's model is fitted with improved...

Here's a really simple demo I did a while ago.

Click on it to open it in a new tab / window. Then the green square starts the animation, and the red square stops it.

Amit

@PM2Ring Thanks!

@PM2Ring That's nice... it means it's a matter of getting your proportions right isn't it? This uniform palette idea

PM 2Ring

@Amit In a uniform colour space, the perceptual difference between 2 colours should be a linear function of the Euclidean distance between them. So if you "walk" through the space with equal-sized steps, the differences between adjacent colours should be equal.

In my example, I used the OkLch parameterisation: lightness, chroma, hue. So I just stepped around a hue circle with equal angle steps, using fixed lightness & chroma.

Amit

22:30

I see, noted. I'll remember that the next time I do anything graphics related

PM 2Ring

The only problem is that you have to limit the chroma & lightness, because it's possible to specify OkLch / OkLab colours that fall outside the sRGB colour gamut. When you do that, the software just clips the RGB values to keep them in range. Eg, if your using 8 bit colour channels, they get clipped to be within 0-255.

user430580

@Amit You generated it with Java code? Seriously, Java?

Sep 28 at 23:40, by Amit

lolz, in Java, EW

=P

PM 2Ring

Here's an example with L=0.75, C=0.15. A few of the colours are slightly clipped, but it's barely noticeable, and the cycle looks quite uniform to me.

Amit

@user430580 😂😂

I would EW only something I know well enough 😉

@PM2Ring 👌🏻

PM 2Ring

Dropping the chroma to 0.12 eliminates the clipping. (I also doubled the number of sectors).

Amit

22:42

They're getting infinitesimal

It's like doing calculus on acid

@user430580 Frankly: what happened was that I realized it would be too messy to code in C++, which I knew very well, and would take too long for me in Python, because I don't know it well enough. So I settled for Java :p

PM 2Ring

You also get a bit of an optical illusion at the borders between sectors. Your colour processing circuits aren't quite sure whether there's a definite step or a smooth transition, and they kind of enhance the colour near the border.

Amit

@PM2Ring Yes, especially if you focus a bit to the side rather than directly on the wheel

user430580

@PM2Ring I believe it is this illusion:

Cornsweet illusion

The Cornsweet illusion, also known as the Craik–O'Brien–Cornsweet illusion or the Craik–Cornsweet illusion, is an optical illusion that was described in detail by Tom Cornsweet in the late 1960s. Kenneth Craik and Vivian O'Brien had made earlier observations in a similar vein. The original version of the illusion involved a rapidly spinning black-and-white disk, painted in a way that would create the appearance of a gradient effect when in motion. An equivalent static version of illusion is composed of a gray rectangle where the left half fades to a lighter shade as it approaches a vertical center...

Disclaimer: I don't 100% understand it =P

PM 2Ring

@user430580 It's probably related, but my images don't have gradients.

So it's more like Mach bands. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mach_bands

user430580

23:00

@PM2Ring Yes that's 100% it!

Amit

There has to be a rock band with that name

How are we with shoegaze?

Cocteau Twins - Carolyn's Fingers (Official Video)

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PM 2Ring

23:16

@Amit Elizabeth Davidson Fraser is an angel.

Amit

@PM2Ring She's astonishing... yes

One of a kind

PM 2Ring

Sadly, she can't sing like that anymore.

Amit

I haven't listened to any of her recent work

@PM2Ring Ok I've heard a bit of her more recent solo tracks. Yes it seems she shifted her style to be a lot softer, as a way to make up for a loss of range I assume...

PM 2Ring

Sarah Jarosz is an Americana / bluegrass singer / songwriter / multi-instrumentalist from Texas. But she sings a wide variety of material. Here she is with the Punch Brothers (also Americana / bluegrass), doing Teardrop. Ok, it's not Liz Fraser, but it's still a damn fine version, IMHO.