Humphrey Murray BComp

Saturday morning marked the completion of my uni degree with our graduation ceremony. It was a pretty cool morning. We got to walk through the streets of Launceston to Albert Hall. The ceremony was rather long, mostly due to the fact that they had to read out lots and lots of names!

It was a bit weird during the beginning of the ceremony. It started off with depressing organ music and a procession of deans and stuff walking up the front in their gowns and robes. It really reminded me of sitting through a traditional church service. The only difference being that it wasn't the God of Heaven and Earth that was the focus, but the God of Knowledge and Understanding. :-s

However after that, they had some chick sing, "Oh Holy Night". So it was really cool to have a hymn about Jesus been sung.

After the ceremony, we got to eat food! So that was cool. :-)

Last ever undergraduate uni results!

Well I received my uni results today. I'm really happy with them, because they are higher on average then they were last semester. :-)

I was particully happy with my music (elective) mark. Anyway, here are the results!

Aural & Ensemble 1A	1	71	Distinction
Software Engineering Project A	1	82	High Distinction
Computer Networks	1	80	High Distinction
Knowledge-Based Systems	1	78	Distinction
Aural & Ensemble 1B	2	67	Credit
Software Engineering Project B	2	84	High Distinction
Computer Graphics & Animation	2	86	High Distinction
Mobile and Ubiquitous Computing	2	86	High Distinction

Spare time!

So what does somebody like Humphrey do when he's on holidays and got nothing else to do?? He works on a jig-saw puzzle. So after many hours of pain and frustration I have managed to get some of the pieces matched together :-)

Anyway.. back to the old granny sport me thinks!

Jams Outrageous Bucks Surf

6:20 am today... RING RING... goes my alarm! Got out of bed, ate, and headed off to the East Coast for Jams Bucks Day! Yay! We hit the surf, and we went hard core. I kinda froze to death, as the wetsuit I was wearing had short sleeves and arms. But that was cool :-)

I sorta stood up on the first wave I caught! However it wasn't long after that, that my hands and feet started to go numb. I discovered that surfing is rather hard when you are numb limps, so I ditched the board and went body surfing instead!

After that we all went off to get some hot chippies for lunch! So good after a big surf :-p Then we played a game of Olly Oop. Which is an awesome game which involves passing the ball around while doing crazy jumps, and trying to stay in the circle!

We then did the usual Bucks Night things.

How tough is my camera?
On the way home, I left my digital camera sitting on the top of the car. So the combination of a corner and 100 or so clicks caused it to fall off the roof. We heard a thud, and we all turned around, only the see my camera rolling along the road.
Anyway, we u-bolted, and picked it up... and guess what? It still works fine! A few minor scratches and a very slightly munted battery bay is about all that happened. Keep in mind that the road was sealed, and the camera was not in it's case. That's a pretty good effort I think... Not even the lens or the LCD display got a single scratch!! Also the sudden jolt didn't corrupted any data on the memory card either.
Thank you Jesus!

That reminds me of the Usb Flash disk that I left in the pocket of my jeans while they were been washed. So the flash disk survived both the washing machine and the drier.... and it still worked fine. Actually, I'm still using it!

Crazy Bogans!

Last night I could hear some bogans making a racket outside our house. It sounded like there were smashing our fence! So I went outside and shone my torch at them. That probably wasn't the smartest thing to do, because that really.. yes really pissed them off! They wanted us to fight them. Instead of fighting them, we rang the cops (who didn't actually seem to come).

This morning I went outside to discover our remodeled mailbox and fence.

If anybody know who those bloody bogans are, let me know and I'll go talk to their parents! :-)

Uni is over!

My Saturday morning exam marked the end of my undergraduate degree!! Yes that's right... I've finished! Just a lil matter of a graduation ceremony and I'm all done! :-) Here is a lil picture of how I feel about computers now that I've finished a degree in computing!

So what now? Well I'm planning to go back and do a year of honours!

New Keyboard & Mouse

Last Friday, my new wireless keyboard and mouse arrived! As it arrived the day before my last exam, I didn't actually get that much study done.... But that's ok, because I needed an excuse to not study! :-)

This keyboard/mouse was a bargain! This exact model sells for $175 down in Launceston, but I got it new off eBay for $66 including postage!! :-)

My College Animation

I was sorting through some of the junk that is scattered throughout my room, getting it ready for when I move, and I came across a CD. On that I found the animation I did back in college. Here is in case any of you are interested in seeing it.


See it here:

college_animation.mov
(9Mb QuickTime Movie)

Optical Illusion?

Hey guys, I came across this while studying for an exam:

Are tiles A & B the same colour?


Click here to see the answer

More info and full description at:
http://web.mit.edu/persci/people/adelson/checkershadow_illusion.html

Animation now available in Quicktime

My graphics assignment can now be viewed by using quicktime:

BenderChase.mov
(8.8Mb Quicktime Movie)

Animation Download Now Available

My graphics assignment is now available for downloading.

---

Download the Animation:

BenderChase.mov
(8.8Mb Quicktime Movie)

BenderChase.zip
(5.6Mb Windows Executable)

Both downloads require Quicktime 6.5 to be installed.

---

If you've downloaded the window executable, unzip it (it needs all of the files), and run BlenderChase.exe

Once you've got it running, press 'a' to start the animation.
Some other useful command keys are:
a -Start
p -Pause
w -Wireframe Mode
You can also click different mouse buttons and drag to change the view.

By the way, I do not own the copyright for any of the sounds in the animation. However, I won't be making any money out of it. The copyright holders have been acknowledged within the animation.

Graphics Assignment Finished!

Well after two days without any sleep, I have now finished my graphics assignment. YAY! I spent most of the weekend and all of last night working on it. Was it worth it? OH YEAH! I'm proud of my creation!

It now goes for 60 seconds. What happens? Well I'm not going to say because that will spoil it for when you watch it.


Download the Animation:

BenderChase.zip
(5.8Mb Windows Executable)

On the way...

We my graphics assignment is coming along very nicely. It's actually due in 6 days and 18 hours, so wish me luck.

Today was a milestone, because I finished my gravity / momentum physics engine. This means that I can tell the bike where to go in the horizontal direction, and it automatically jumps in the air when he goes over a bump, and always falls nicely to the ground. The suspension also moves up and down!

As you can see, the animation has come a long way since my last post about it. Yes, that is Bender from Futurama! What I didn't realise before I started modeling Bender is that the lecturer in charge is a huge Futurama fan. I wonder if he'll give me some extra marks? He probably won't if he reads this!

Anyway, the animation only runs for 8.5 seconds so far, and it has to run from 30 - 60 seconds. So.. I better get back into the C++.

Car on fire!

Tonight I was innocently working on an assignment, when there were some weird sounds coming from outside my bedroom window. Dave & I went to investigate, and it turned out that there was a car on fire!

By the time we went out there to check it out, there were two firetrucks, and a few policeman checking it out. One of them asked us some questions, but I was too into my assignment to notice that anything had happened.

So what type of car is it? The fireman I was talking to thought that it was probably a Hydunda Excel. I think it used to be white, but it's pretty hard to tell! So if you own an Excell, then I know where it is!

Yes, that it steam / smoke coming from the car... and it didn't smell very nice.

Demo Day Success

A big thankyou to everybody who came along and supported us at demo day. The day was a great success, and hopefully we get marked really well for it! (We get our marks tomorrow).

Just in case you don't know, we have been working all year as a team on our Help Desk Analyser. Demo day was the day where we got to show off all of the work that we had done.

Survey :: Slave2Work

How much time do you spend doing uni work each day?

It only just occurred to me how much work I'm actually doing at university this semester. I know that I have been struggling to get 8 hours sleep a night, and that I haven't had time to do a lot of lifes simple pleasures. But, I didn't realise how much work I have been putting into uni.


The standard Australian day:
8 hours at work
8 hours in bed asleep
8 hours for lifes simple pleasures
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24 hours in a day.

The standard 3rd year Bachelor of computer day:
8 hours in bed asleep
11-12 hours of uni work
4 hours for lifes simple pleasures.
---
24 hours in a day.

So you wake up, go to uni, take a lunch break, get back into the work... You then look at your clock and realise that it's 6pm, so you head home, cook tea, eat tea... Then you jump back behind the computer and get back into uni work until about 10:30 - 11pm. That is your day!!

4 hours left over is great you say?
Time gets eaten away... Because it takes about 1 hour to get out of bed, have a shower, eat breakfast, and get to uni. And then about 0.5 - 1 hour for lunch. And then you get home from uni, so you need another 1 hour to cook tea. If you take a 15 minute morning tea and afternoon tea breaks that equals another 30 mins, and if you probably take 30 mins to go to sleep. And those 4 hours add up to the time left for lifes simple pleasures.

So that equates to not having enough time to live. No time to:

• Relax
• Go for a walk/jog/run
• Read the Bible
• Pray
• Worship
• Watch Tv
• Pick up chicks
• Relax
• And even cook

So I have 2 questions that I want to ask you today...

• Do you live your life like this?
• How many hours a day do you spend doing Uni work?

The Latest...

So what is happening in the super exciting life of Humphrey these days?

Well uni has been really busy. This week has been a BIG week for project, because this Monday coming is Demo Day. Demo Day is where we have a stall, and we have to show off all of the work that we have done this year. It's open to whoever wants to come along, so you better come now that you've read this! If you don't, I'll feel super-rejected, and never talk to you again! (Only kidding). Anyway, it's from 11-3 this Monday the 26th of September.

apart from that, not much has been happening. In one unit we have to write a Java guessing game for a mobile phone. I just given a music aural assignment today. YAY!! And my motorbike pursuit in Graphics hasn't come very far this week. Hopefully it will VERY SOON!!

Anyway, that's about everything that has happened this week, so have a good one!

Animation Taking Strides

Well, I started working on my 2nd assignment for Computer Graphics & Animation. I know this sounds weird, but I really enjoying working on this assignment. We have to create a 30 - 60 second 3d animation using only C++ to create it.

My plan is to create a motorbike that will automatically interact with gravity and the terrain. Once I've done this, then I'm going to create a big motorbike chase! I'm pretty excited about how this might turn out. It also means that I'm putting to use all of that trigonometry that I learn in college!

Stay tuned for more info about how this assignment is going :-)

The Devious Photographer

Thomas told me that I had to tell the story about how I took the traffic light photo in my last post.

The closest set of traffic lights to my house are only there to allow people to cross the street. I drove up there in the rain, and got out of my warm car. Now the lights only go red when a pedestrian presses the button, so I went and pressed the button. I then took a few steps back and tried to take a photo of the red light. That was when I found out that my camera had flat batteries.

By now a large line of cars had pulled up at the red light. I quickly returned to my car, only to receive some VERY ANNOYED looks from the stationary cars. One passenger even stuck his unholy finger up at me!

I managed to find some spare batteries in my glove box, but this time I headed down the street to the next set of lights. I waited for the lights to change by themselves this time before I took the photo.

Surviving Wallace & Gromit

So why is this post entitled, "Surviving Wallace & Gromit"? Well, today a few of us humans went and saw Wallace & Gromit. While we were driving back, we skidded through a red light! The driver in question pleaded and begged that I wouldn't disclose their identity. Bucketing rain and chatting people could have been why the driver in question didn't see the red light. However, I believe it was because the driver wasn't paying attention!

Anyway, back to the movie...
It was an awesome flick. My favourite part would have to be the "May contain nuts" joke. No idea what I'm talking about? Then go see the movie, cause I'm not going to give away the plot.

Thomas also has a similar post

Updated: The Nerd? Geek? or Dork? Test!

Sorry guys, but Stuart & Thomas informed me that I posted the wrong score in my blog. So I have now found the right values and have now replaced them. Sooo....

For The Record:

• A Nerd is someone who is passionate about learning/being smart/academia.
• A Geek is someone who is passionate about some particular area or subject, often an obscure or difficult one.
• A Dork is someone who has difficulty with common social expectations/interactions.

I scored less than half in all three, earning me the title of: Joe Normal.

(Go and take "The Nerd? Geek? or Dork?" test now)

Melbourne Photos Available

I've now got all of the photos from Melbourne on my photo gallery.
To see them go to www.humphreysphotogallery.com
I'm still yet to put the videos that Caleb took on the site.

Melbourne Spirits

Today we got back from our Melbourne trip. Yes! That's right, I went to Melbourne!! How cool is that?? We went because we managed to get some $30 tickets on the plane! So that's only $60 for a return ticket. I thought I better go, as I spend more on petrol at times.

I went with Thomas, Stuart, Caleb, & Laura. For those of you who are on the ball, you'd know that is the whole Project Team. It wasn't just us project people that went; Stuart & Elly, + Amelia & her sis also came. Except we didn't see much of us, because they organized different accommodation then we did.

The trip lasted for 5 days, and was heaps of fun.
So what did we do? Well just to get started we...

• Flew over there
• Checked out the crown casino
• Stayed at the backpackers
• Explored the many skyscrapers
• Went to the aquarium
• Ate pizza and all you can eat casino buffet
• Explored the zoo
• Having a primate throw a rubber chicken at us
  
• Shopped
• Explored the public transport system
• Spent over 30 mins watching the trains, trams, taxi's, and car out the window of our room
  
• Felt the fire display at the casino
• And lots & lots of walking!
  

The rest of the guys also went along to the Lion King Production. Apparently it was absolutely awesome, but I went and visited my cousin Isobel & my Aunty Denny. :-) My cousin lives out at Geelong, so I got to catch the train all the way out there!

So there you have it - A very quick summary of my trip to Melbourne!

Further details / photos at:

• My photo gallery
• Tom's Blog
• Stu's Blog

Broadband is out

Our broadband got disconnected late last week! Our phone got disconnected a couple of weeks ago since we hadn't paid the phone bill, but the internet just kept on working! Except then on friday last week, our pay-as-you go power ran out. After I pressed the emergency credit button the internet didn't work.

What I think is happening is that since the modem was connected before our phone got disconnected, it just stayed connected even though the phone was disconnected. But when the power was cut, the modem wouldn't re-connect.

It's kinda good in a way, because it means that I have to find something else to do for the week off besides sitting on the internet. But I think we're going to pay the bill soon, and get it back on. As it's going to be pretty hard to do uni without the net.

Hit Counter

Well I now have a hit counter on my blog. So now I can see how many people are looking at my blog! You can find the counter down the bottom of the page. I also started the counter counting at 10 instead of 0 so that I feel better!

Emsemble Performance

Today our ensemble performed in class, and we played Michelle by The Beatles.  For those of you who don't already know, I am studying a class called Aural & Ensemble as an elective at uni.  For that we have to be able to listen to music, and write down the chords.  So Hard!  Plus, we also have to be part of an ensemble.
So we performed, and I think we did pretty well.  Stay tuned, as we have to do 2 external gigs in order to pass.

I finished my graphics assignment

I'm really excited, because I finished the first assignment for Computer Graphics & Animation! For the assignment, we were given a 2D drawing program, and we had to extend it's functionality. It was a really satifying feeling submitting it!
So now we have to start working on the 2nd assignment. For that we have to produce a 3D animation that lasts between 30 & 60 seconds. I still haven't worked out what I'm doing for it, so please leave some suggestions.

I can't believe that I have a blog

What is happening? I have a blog!! Even though I'm a bit of a geek at times, I was determined to never have a blog. Except I got sick of everybody else having one, and talking about it. So now I have a blog!!