David Moisan

@ChrisAlvino @anishmoonka Something about that orange sodium glow for sure. Osram Sylvania had two plants in my town.

@anishmoonka I miss LA at midnight before the LED lights replaced all the sodium lamps. This movie always makes me nostalgic for that specific time and place. Brilliant choice to choose to shoot on digital for this movie

Michael Mann couldn't shoot Collateral on film. The cameras couldn't see Los Angeles at night the way he wanted. So he picked a digital camera no other major Hollywood movie had used. The crew was still building parts for it during the shoot. Mann was chasing a specific look. Around 10 or 11pm in LA winters, a low cloud bank drifts in off the ocean and settles about 1,200 feet up. The orange sodium streetlamps below light up the bottom of those clouds and turn the whole sky into a soft, hazy glow. Mann said it looked like winter in England. Movie film couldn't see that. To shoot a single downtown block clearly, the crew would have had to bring in massive lights and brighten up entire streets just to make the buildings visible. Even with the lens open as wide as it goes to pull in any available light, almost nothing outside the foreground would stay in focus. The camera Mann picked was the Thomson Viper, brand new and not really ready for production. There was no memory card or storage inside the body. It had to be plugged into a separate hard drive with a cable. About 80% of Collateral was shot digital. The other 20% on regular film was mostly the Korean nightclub shootout, where the bright club lighting gave the crew plenty to work with. The coyote scene only exists because of the digital camera. Mann didn't plan it. A small pack of coyotes wandered across an empty street between takes, and because the camera could see in near-darkness, the crew just rolled. On film, that shot would have required lighting up the whole intersection first. The helicopter shots over the city work the same way. Palm trees against the night sky, the downtown skyline lit only by the city's own light. On 35mm film, none of that would have shown up. The movie cost $65 million to make and earned $220 million worldwide. It won Best Cinematography at the BAFTAs, the British version of the Oscars, and helped push Hollywood toward digital cameras for night shoots. One catch. That orange light Mann chased is mostly gone now. Starting in 2009, LA began replacing its sodium vapor streetlamps with white LEDs. By 2013 the city had swapped out 141,000 of them. Today the lighting system is 98% LED. The Los Angeles you see in Collateral doesn't exist anymore.

@rushicrypto There was a backlash during the dot-com boom. BlowTheDotOutTheAss.com. AI reminds me of that. I loved the Net, made my bones on it. But people were cray-cray!

I have heard people claim that the reaction people are having against AI is the same reaction people had when the internet started to be introduced. And as someone who was there at the time, I can tell you NO IT FUCKING WASN'T.

@cqcqcqdx Inside the flue would not have the best lifespan. In those days, though,the state of the radio art evolved quickly.

@cqcqcqdx The safe boundary for that is half-way to the next state!

somewhere far...away

@JustJoshinNH @MissesDread He had a happy retirement! [Record scratch] LOL, nope! 😯

@MissesDread Oh that little shit. I’m so glad he suffered.

Robespierre

@ArchaeoBenjamin Incroyable!

They had to replace my whole keyboard, but I have my laptop back now. I shall now use it to watch French Gay Shit.

@tonyhouser @MakeAugusta Early radios were battery-powered. There were two types, A and B and the radios had one battery for tube heaters, and the other to power the radio. Eventually, A and B batteries were superseded. When transistor radios came out, old tube battery radios, and *their* batteries went.

@MakeAugusta There are AA, AAA, C & D cell batteries. What ever happened to A & B cell batteries?

Does anyone have an interesting true story about batteries that takes place between 1790 and 1950?

@AngryLevantine Yes, I see your post.

@BostonMassUSA We called it Screwberries!

Est. 1972, Strawberries Records & Tapes expanded to 81 stores across New England during its 34-year existence. It was the biggest music retailer in the region, the 8th largest in the US, and its cutesy name belied its founder's shady rep and mob ties.

@berkie1 I want to go up to Salisbury Beach, but it's such a pain. Newburyport CR is 20 minutes to the river plus 40 minutes on foot to the beach.

On the first real beach day of the year in New England, as you circle for limited beachside parking, a reminder that 100 years ago you could hop on an electric streetcar from cities like Lowell, Lawrence, and Salem straight to the beaches of Plum Island and Cape Ann. 🏖️

@JustJoshinNH HONK! 😄

I was accused of pushing Star of David propaganda and yes. It’s true. I’m all about propaganda. Matter of fact, I’m in favor of a proper gander, too.

@Jay_McGill94 A lot of us disabled people have been online for years. Color me shocked.

Oh, the irony. The older generation is becoming addicted too? Hmmm...but I suppose the logic behind this is that as you age, you become more susceptible to loneliness. Connections and relationships decrease, so social media becomes the alternative.

@JustJoshinNH My mom's cat would give me that look when she smelled my coat, "YOU'RE NOT GOING OUT!"

When she suspects I’m ready to move she makes it clear I need to reconsider my decisions

@DJSnM My headcanon: Grand Moff Tarkin has IBS and told staff, "Don't commence primary ignition til I get back!" Spoiler: He did not come back. Luke's torpedo blew up the Death Star's men's room, and fixed his IBS for a few milliseconds!

My head canon is the Death Star weapon system was still in ‘Silicon Valley minimum viable product’ state - they could make it work for the investor demo but they literally had engineers hand tweaking things from the consoles in the depths of the machine to make it work.

@JustJoshinNH I guess my Threads feed is irredeemable, for all the people who swear, "I'm an *empath*!!" (My brain just hears, "I care MORE!")

There are probably exceptions but in my experience folks who insist on saying this are more mimics than anything else and are interested in sizing you up

@tatertotsconor There used to be a plush toy with a chip that repeated the last 30 seconds of what it heard. I borrowed one, and had great fun using it on my birds! 😃

Hahaha!!! I was outside and heard a bird call I wasn’t familiar with, so I used my app to identify it. Then I hit the button that plays the bird calls to see if it was the right bird. That motherfucker came flying right at me, buzzed my head, then landed next to me yelling. 😂😂

@magi_jay Most of the songs I listen to on French radio are about boning someone else's wife at the beach, no shock there.

The French would think it was odd if their Prez wasn't having affairs. They were so perplexed over Bill Clinton. It wasn't just like "This is odd." It was like "Ok. So you have explained it to me. The controversy. Can you explain again?" Like they wanted a diagram or something.

@berkie1 Marblehead, a town I best know for a sign posted years ago, "MARBLEHEAD CELEBRATES DIVERSITY...BUT NOT WITH MY DAUGHTER!"

A major driver of Massachusetts’ housing crisis is every zoning change must survive a ‘Town Meeting’ vote in 300+ towns. Too often, these debates are flooded with lies & fearmongering. This anonymous flyer was mailed to Marblehead voters just days ahead of a 2024 town meeting.

@tatertotsconor "If not for snuggling, then why does it smell like Papa?" ❤️

“All of the fur got washed off your clothes in the laundry but don’t worry… I put it back on them for you.” - Ruby

@ArchaeoBenjamin The campists are coming out of the wainscoting, I see.

It's not "blind hatred," it's educated anger.