another sam chan: the student blogger

We have a really special post today, with our first guest ever on anothersamchan.com, Mati Ma from Vancouver’s very own One Arm Bear! We talk about the band, Twitter (@anothersamchan, @onearmbear), the weather, American history, football, and get really deep, like diving board deep. We’re also giving away their debut CD, Blurred as well as NCAA Football 2009 for PS3 (in honor of Superbowl Weekend). So make sure you watch the whole show and get in on it! We realize its a bit long, but time flies when you’re having fun, and we sure did (have fun, not make time fly). Check it out and leave your entries in the comments section, or on twitter, facebook, email, and the rest of the social media round table. We’ll put anyone’s who has the correct answers in a draw and pick from there. The contest will go until February 10th, 2009. The questions, as promised, are below.

Battle of the Sexes Questions: One Arm Bear Blurred CD:
1.Vodka, Triple Sec, Cranberry Juice and Lime make what trendy cocktail?

2. Finish this ad slogan: “Maybe she’s born with it, _______”

3. Who won four MTV Music Awards for his/her pop hit ‘Livin’ la Vida Loca’?

NCAA Football 2009 (PS3):

1. What basketball star fought Arnold Schwarzenegger in Conan the Destroyer?

2. ‘Bonita’, ‘koi’ and ‘plaice’ are types of what?

3. What dot-gobbling icon became an electronic arcade game sensation in the 1980s? Remember to enter all three answers for a chance to win and leave your email so we can contact you.

If you’re interested in more of One Arm Bear’s songs, there’s a couple of them up on their virb, and remember to get tickets for SHOCKWAVE. We’ll see you there.

ps – go pittsburgh!

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So you’ve probably noticed that I’ve disappeared for the most of this month (or you haven’t, but then you probably wouldn’t be reading this). This month started off with a barrage of finals, including a period where I didn’t sleep for four days. If you bothered to hunt me down on twitter, it was that period that I was there both day and night. And then after that, I went and has laser eye surgury done so I was told to stay away from anything with light rays. I lasted about 4 hours before I turned on the TV. Regardless, I am still recovering slowly right now but I just had to drop by and wish everybody a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. This will most likely be my last post this year so I just want to thank everybody that’s dropped by here and I promise not to disappear like this again anytime soon! I have a few things up my sleeve in the upcoming year so it should be interesting.

I also have a little treat for all you viewers with a special Christmas edition video blog: The One with Zero. The story goes that this year for Secret Santa with Elfster, my friends and I decided we would have to create something along with getting a present. I’ve decided to embarrass myself share it with my faithful readers here as well so enjoy and have a safe, warm, and cozy holiday!

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It’s been well over a month since I did my first Video Blog, and I’ve decided to make some reflections. If any student wants a pointer to do better, here’s a huge tip I’ve learned in my 16+ years of school: teachers, professors, and T.A’s love reflection. Just like employees love asking their interviewees what they think their weaknesses are, teachers love knowing what you think you did wrong and what you can do to improve. Any educators out there concur?

Regardless, here’s a couple of things I noticed after watching it a few times:

Actually: I lost count after 20 but I think it was actually on-screen jitters. I don’t actually say ‘actually’ that much in real life. Actually, I barely say it at all. In blog and in real life. Absolutely came in at a distant second for most annoying words used in the video.

Compression City: At a ridiculous 400mb and 4 hours of upload time, the ‘quality’ was definitely not worth it. I filmed with a Sony T9 digital camera with the highest quality. I noticed no such quality benefits. Next time, I’m going to stick to the low quality and go for a quick upload so that I can actually get some sleep.

I’ve Got a Cramp Voice: Apparently my voice is actually lower in real life according to some, but I guess my own ears are out of wack. Besides having a ridiculously low tone, I also noticed that I sounded like I was having a cramp or constipated the entire video, what with my slurring and use of tones.

Overall though, I was satisfied with the way it turned out in one shot, and will be doing some more video work in the near future. You’ll have to keep checking my Tweet to see when though. Any recommendations on editing programs and video recorders? I’ve been looking at the Flip Mino but I’m not ready to splurge out 200 + a trip down to the states to get VGA quality.

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