elanya

It turns out today was a pretty good day! I did a bunch of cool things at work. The skype tour actually went quite well, I think - certainly better than R expected it to. I think she was encouraged by the possibility, but at the same time, it is giving away staff time and programming for free to people who will never actually come and visit here, so I can understand her concerns. The museum is poor - we need income to survive.

We also had a meeting with a group (originating in the UK but now with people in Canada as well) who develop digital/virtual technologies for museums. It was interesting and encouraging and we can probably work with them - they will help find and apply for grants and stuff to, so it isn't just a matter of us finding money and paying them to make something. They emphasized something I think R sometimes needs o be reminded of - you need to have a narrative, not just cool tech. You need a purpose of the cool tech, it is not an end in itself. We're lacking in narratives.

I had some cool ideas for ways to use AR stuff in the museum, though, form that museum. Let me grab them from the email I sent her... I have to say I feel like one of the advantages of their model of operations is that they get to hear a lot of ideas - they may not work for a particular client, but maybe a different client could use them, right? I hope they aren't just idea mining, but they do seem to be relatively successful. And they are museums professionals, with PhDs in museology from Leicester, and such. They were really cool. TBH I'd like to quit and go work for them :V

Ah ha ha I managed to send it from the wrong account great @_@ I guess that explains why she didn't answer :p

short form ideas:
-use AR(?) to project site map images onto their corresponding locations on the village, either as an AR image or as a googlemap overlay for people to look at while wandering the site

-create a couple of scavenger hunts where you collect pieces that all come together into some kind of story/image/animation - basically you get stuff along the way and a bonus for completion

-combine AR scavenger hunting for both real and virtual objects in the museum/village with a choose your own adventure game. Seriously how cool would *that* be?

VR excavation! I mean this is the next level of the sandbox full of artifacts that most museums have. You can have different difficulties, form your basic 'dig and find a thing' to offering different kinds of tools to find different things (objects and features!) and interact with them. You could totally have a shovel, a trowel, a screen, a measuring tape....

What I am also curious about doing, while I am funding and finding time for all these cool imaginary projects, is to rebuild an excavation from the notes taken during excavation. It would be.... a lot of work. You could generalize stuff a lot (randomizing objects retrieved from a particular layer or unit), but still... I mean, you couldn't necessarily 'replace' every unique single artifact, unless it was a tiny site and you could scan the entire collection some how. But I'm not sure that would be the point. hmmhmmmhmmm

Anyway you heard it here first :p

Oh, also, on my way home from work, I bought a frickin' cake. It was a cannoli cake, and it was pretty good :D

At least I still had my computer open, I guess.

Not too much of interest - it was a Museum day, and I talked to HK there about the plan for tomorrow, where we are giving a tour and demoing some stuff to one of the director's classes. So I'm going in in the afternoon instead of the morning, and will head straight downtown to find myself dinner somewhere and go to kitting.

Oh, also, my ex-coworker (he still works there, for now) made a VR bowling game :V It was pretty fun, though not what I'd meant to try out!

I did some writing tonight, but I'm getting close to the 'end' of the story, which is all fine, but I'm not sure if It is going to manage to seem like a story and not just a series of events. So we'll see. I need to tie things together more tightly, I guess. Maybe this last pivotal conversation I'm working towards will give me more room for that. And maybe if I aim for that I'll have more inspiration.

Despite being awake and staring at my computer until almost 3 AM yesterday, I somehow managed not to make an entry. I am really bad at making and keeping habits. I am totally the person who will do something everyday for a year and then just miss it one day with no reason. I wonder about my brain sometimes :p Sometimes I wish you could just get brain scans or whatever without having a specific need, just to have a baseline for comparison. But that would be pointlessly expensive. And there are people in my life who need them for more legit reasons :/ I admit I am sometimes paranoid that there is something wrong and it just hasn't been noticed yet, but I know that is not really rational. If there was a real problem, I would know by now, not just wonder. Everyone's body does weird things from time to time, so I shouldn't get all hypochondriac, especially when I have seen what more serious symptoms look like.

Anyway.

Yesterday was decently interesting. I didn't get to scan anything, but I did compile exit surveys from the VR exhibit. It gave me surprising feels! Partly to see the number of older women (over 40 and over 60) who'd tried it and loved it. They said a range of heartening things, like that ii was immersive, that if gave them a sense of emotional and spiritual connection to the history, that they were pleased to be able to participate in this wave of new technology, and so forth. I am also amused at the mid-twenties dudes complaining that the vive headset was too heavy when women old enough to be their grandmothers were all 'no complaints, it felt fine!' It was nice to be even tangentially involved in the project, anyway. And I did a minor bit of tech supporting for the equipment while I was there as well.

Then last night, among other things, I was knitting, and managed to work the tip off one of my Karbonz, because of course I did. I'm pretty sure these are the ones I already had to replace (my US 4's). But maybe I'm using my 5's? Anyway, this is a new issue, but also a resolvable one. I just superglued it back on. Luckily I was near the end of the row. If I didn't love everything else about these needles so much I would probably stop buying them. But honestly I think the problem is me :p Meanwhile, have a pic of my work in progress on this scarf!

( Pic! )

This morning I got dinner in the crock pot, then has my "post-board review" with the HR person from PC. It was informative, mostly in the sense that it confirmed a lot of stuff for me that I suspected. i am terrible at having examples, and need to elaborate more on my answers, and take more cues from the questions. In these kinds of interviews, they aren't allowed to prompt for further explanations, so it is all on me and how I answer things. It seems like on some of the most-relevant questions I did quite well, but fell down in a few key areas. Part of having not great examples is a matter of experience, and part of it is not being vicious enough to past employers, and part of it is not being able to explain myself well when I do. As I said, it was helpful, if a little depressing. They interviewed less than ten people, though and since it was an open call I know that to make it that far I had to pass a lot of benchmarks. But in the end, I didn't even make it into the hiring pool, let alone make it to the top. Ugh. He was very encouraging though, and aid I should definitely continue to apply for other collections type positions with the agency. I'll keep an eye out, but they don't come up that often :p Meanwhile, I hope I didn't screw up my SA interview as badly. Ugh. At least they *know* I'm awesome. Right?

There than that I managed to get some laundry started, change the sheets on my bed, and do some general room tidying. I might try to put up the poster I got from the art show on my wall... I have the print tacked up just to get it out of the way, but I'd really like to get it framed. I'll keep an eye out for something nice for it. karanguni asked my for a pic, and I took one - it isn't super great, because the print is in a plastic sleeve and there is some glare, but it gives a pretty good idea!

( The Cat by Justin Erickson )

I have a bunch of other things I'd like to do today - mostly writing stuff, at this point. I did my EI report and subsequent phone call, but was only on hold for about 15 min this time, so not too bad. And I should go switch the laundry too... But I want to touch up my chocolate box, and work on the Thirteen story and maybe do some other little chocolate box thing? We'll see how my afternoon/evening goes, I guess.

This mornign I helped with the media day for the new VRachaeology exhibit that is openign at the museum where I volunteer. Mostly I was there to help wth technology and to be someone to talk to to kill time between the actually important people. I also took some pictured for the museum's social media accounts.


Tomorrow, the exhibit opens to the public, and also there will be swarms of schoolchildren. I'll be on deck for that first day, since I know the most about it of the people who will ever really be monitoring visitors. I also have to go in early to help put up the vinyl lettering, which was supposed to have come in yesterday and which actually was maaaaybe finished late this afternoon.

Here is a video from the local Free Press, taken from the media day, wooh!

and now, Clone Wars o'clock :)