harry-potter on S Anand

Wed, 23 Jun 2021 14:14:05 +0000

The #HarryPotter Screen Time video featured a bar chart race made in PowerPoint. Many of you asked how I made it.

Here’s a step-by-step tutorial. https://youtu.be/E1SeoUV8awI

(BTW, there are just 9 people on LinkedIn who match “bar chart race” and #powerpoint. This is for you, friends!)

Gramener converted this feature into a product, SlideSense.ai. But more on that later 🙂

The original video is at https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn%3Ali%3Aactivity%3A6801138072068214784/

Thu, 20 May 2021 13:34:35 +0000

This is my first Lightboard video – interacting with a data visualization on-camera.

Hans Rosling did something like this with BBC 4. That’s been my inspiration.

In this video, I share the screen time of the Harry Potter supporting cast. The bar chart race was created in PowerPoint, and the lightboard effect was created with OBS. (I’ll share a tutorial soon.)

What do you think of the video? Any comments? Questions?

A busy break from blogging

Fri, 24 Aug 2007 12:00:00 +0000

Between July 17th and August 22nd, I saw 57 movies and read 7 books. There were Saturdays when I watched four movies back-to-back. (I tried five. Couldn’t stay awake.) Amidst this, I also cooked, cleaned, shopped… and went to office. (Oh yes, I was working 10 hours a day.) And managed to build some interesting sites which I’ll release in a while.

But first, let me share the books with you.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

I wasn’t planning to buy it. I figured I’d just wait for the soft copy. On 21st July at 8am, I went shopping to the local Sainsbury’s to get groceries for my pre-movie cooking. I didn’t know that was the release date. And there it was. In a huge stack. 50% discount. Should I? Shouldn’t I? After finishing the rest of my shopping, and having deeply analysed the cost-benefit and ROI, I figured: if I didn’t buy it now, someone else might tell me the answers!

Was Snape evil? I couldn’t believe that. Not after Dumbledore’s implicit trust. Besides, I re-read Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, and if Dumbledore was dismissing Harry’s explicit warnings about Snape, he had to know something more. Anyway, what was the significance of Dumbledore’s last words? “Severus… please…” Please what? Dumbledore begging for death seemed more likely than Dumbledore begging for life. I had to know.

Who dies? Voldemort, of course. But who else? It couldn’t be Harry, unless J K Rowling was looking to make herself one of the most hated novelists. Yet, it seems so… possible. Harry dying to take Voldemort out. Naah, can’t be. Not Ron or Hermione either. Same reason. One of the other Weasleys? Maybe. Plenty of them anyway. Hopefully Percy. Hargrid? Possible. Lupin? The last of Harry’s father’s friends?

And all the minor questions: What’s the significance of Harry’s eyes? What does Wormtail do to help Harry? What’s the significance of Voldemort having used Harry’s blood to resurrect himself? etc. etc.

So I bought it.

But didn’t start reading.

I knew that if I picked it up, I wouldn’t put it down. It was time to cook. And watch movies.

By 4:00pm, after three movies, I couldn’t stand it any more. So I picked it up. Read until 2:00am. Picked it up again on Sunday at 9:00am, and starved until 11:00am until I finished it.

Whew! What a book. Definitely the raciest of the lot. My earlier favourite in the series was The Prisoner of Azkaban, though The Half-Blood Prince came close. But this one beats them all. Resolves most of the mysteries till date, too. As Stephen King says in his review of Harry Potter, but by the time she penned the final line of Deathly Hallows, she had become one of the finer stylists in her native country.

How to be Good

And then there was Nick Hornby’s book. I’d seen a couple of his movies: About a Boy and High Fidelity. They were interesting, and I’d heard the books were good. Figured I’d pick one up.

And it was hilarious!

How to be Good is the funniest book I’ve read since Five Point Someone and The Inscrutable Americans. Most of my colleagues kept wondering what I was laughing out so loudly about.

This is the story. The author is a doctor and a good wife. “Gooder” than her husband, certainly, and that makes her feel good. Until he has suddently becomes GOOD. Truly good. Saint-like. And then she can’t stand him any more. The story is in first person, so you can see her thoughts almost verbatim. (See thoughts verbatim? Well, whatever the phrase is.)

The Runaway Jury

I had just seen the movie Runaway Jury, so I had to re-read it immediately. The movie was surprisingly good, though. Dustin Hoffman, Gene Hackman, John Cusack and Rachel Weisz. Many changes from the book, but didn’t detract from the experience.

Batman Year One, The Dark Knight Returns and Understanding Comics

I saw 300. WOW! Brilliant. One of the greatest visual experiences ever. Possibly better than V for Vendetta and certainly better than Sin City – both of which I thought had incredible visuals. The colours, the texture, the contrast, the surrealism – whew!

That’s when it hit me. Three of the best movies I’ve seen recently were based on graphic novels (comics). Two by Frank Miller. Maybe I should explore this a little more.

I got myself Batman Year One – and that’s when I realised where Batman Begins got its inspiration from. The graphics were pretty old style, but the story, incredible. Then I picked up The Dark Knight Returns. Now THAT is phenomenal graphics. And what a story! Christopher Nolan’s next movie is slated to be The Dark Knight. Really looking forward to that.

With all this, I ended up reading a bunch of new Superman comics as well (but they were lousy, so I won’t mention anything), and in the meanwhile, heard about Scott McCloud’s comic book on comics – Understanding Comics. Like I said, it’s a comic book, but non-fiction. It’s about the history and art of comics. Very nice reading, and quite insightful too. I think every visual designer should take a look at it.

Pro Javascript Techniques

I’d been reading up a lot of Javascript recently – learning mostly from Douglas Crockford, Peter Paul-Koch, Dean Edwards, and John Resig. So when I realised John had a book, I had to read it. Douglas Crockford recommends JavaScript: The Definitive Guide (5th Edition) as the least bad among many bad books. I read it. Sorry, but it was quite a bore. Pro Javascript Techniques on the other hand, is gripping. Dives right into modern techniques, writing style, and is filled with practical advice. How wonderful.

So anyway, that’s what my month’s been like. Well worth the break from blogging, I think. (And I haven’t even told you about the movies or sites yet! Well, soon.)

Comments

Sachin Gopalakrishnan 24 Aug 2007 12:00 pm: And i thought this was not exactly a blog!!!
Vinu Yamunan 24 Aug 2007 12:00 pm: Dude, Where’’d you have the energy for all that? Seeing that you cooked, cleaned AND shopped, my guess is that the wife was not in town - true/false? Anyways, good to see you on the blogosphere. Love your music as well as the C&H search pages. Am surprised you have not commented on the ‘‘Asap Utilities Add-in" in your excel related postings… check it out if you haven’’t already! later Vinu
Karthik A 24 Aug 2007 12:00 pm: I felt so too about the last Harry Potter. Like Vinu said, you got the rights to 5 movies after cooking and cleaning on a weekend since your wife’’s not in town…..
sathish 24 Aug 2007 12:00 pm: Anand, a nice set of books.. especially the graphic novels.. I still do not understand the term graphic novel that much.. but, love comics anyway…. I have been reading Osama Tezuka’’s Buddha series - Every time, I see The Dark Knight, my hands itch; but, they are so damn costly in India (atleast the hardback is).. And if you are interested in fantasy - I would suggest Steven Erikson’’s – A Tale of Malazan The book of Fallen I have been reading them with greater ferocity than Tolkien and George R R Martin..Do give it a shot if you are in a mood for fantasy - but, be prepared for long long hours of endless reading..

Book quotation quiz

Fri, 21 Apr 2006 12:00:00 +0000

These are quotes from books. How many titles can you guess? (Case insensitive. Ignore punctuation. So “Hitchhiker’s” is “Hitchhikers” without the apostrophe. Don’t forget the leading “A” and “The”. Harry Potter books begin with “Harry Potter and the…”.)

Anything over 10 / 25 is impressive.

Comments

Dhar 21 Apr 2006 4:28 pm: Anand Man… LOTR is one book in three parts and not a trilogy. So LOTR is the correct answer to a couple of questions instead of ROTK etc.
Dhar 21 Apr 2006 4:35 pm: Hmmm, a particular quote occurs in more than one Ludlum novels. In fact, I suspect that particular one is there in all the three.
Dhar 21 Apr 2006 4:40 pm: Finally got 17 / 25. But I suspect that is because we have been reading similar stuff lately.
S Anand 21 Apr 2006 5:05 pm: Agreed: LOTR is a single book. Loved it so much I had to put in a quote from each part!
Chitra 22 Apr 2006 3:14 am: Nice one :)!
JLT 22 Apr 2006 8:03 pm: And just like that, bumped into your blog . walked through 10/25 mark without realising. u could raise the bar.
suhas 23 Apr 2006 9:46 pm: hey, how do i find out the answers to the ones i have not been able to figure out?
S Anand 24 Apr 2006 6:45 am: You can e-mail me. root dot node at gmail dot com.
S Anand 10 May 2006 5:29 pm: Test comment.
Mayur 6 Jun 2006 7:20 pm: Hey nice quiz this, i usually dont quiz but i guess i found someting im decent at 12/25
Natasha 19 Nov 2006 6:36 am: yay i got 12/25 by myself and with help got 14!!! i congradulate you on a great quiz!
Hemant 7 Feb 2007 10:24 pm: Actually, LOTR is not 1 book. JRR Tokein actually wrote it as three different books. We now read it as one. I read this in the first few pages of the first book.
simplecoffee 21 Apr 2006 12:00 pm: Um, well, ‘Cain is for Charlie and Delta is for Cain’ is only used in The Bourne Identity. Supremacy has ‘Cain is for Carlos and Delta is for Cain’, while Ultimatum hasn’t got it.

Harry Potter 6

Sat, 16 Jul 2005 12:00:00 +0000

I went to Waterstones at Oxford Street to see the release of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. There was a party the previous night, with all the fanfare associated with a previous night. But things seemed fairly quiet when I was there. The usual crowd at Oxford Street, and the usual crowd at Waterstones.

I already knew who dies in the sixth book. I couldn’t help spotting it as I was reading some blog. Since the suspense was already spoilt, I opened to the last few pages, and ended up learning who the Half-Blood Prince was.

Comments

mintu 16 Jul 2005 12:00 pm: what is the name of harry potter book,6 in hindi

A real invisible cloak

Sun, 09 Feb 2003 12:00:00 +0000

An invisible cloak, a la Harry Potter. Except that it’s real, and Japanese. via KurzweilAI

Dumbledore dead

Sun, 27 Oct 2002 12:00:00 +0000

I didn’t know that Richard Harris was Dumbledore. Pity. He’s no more.

“He did threaten to kill me if I recast (Professor Dumbledore). I cannot even repeat what he said. He still has got that fight inside of him,” Columbus said.

Now, does that mean that he’s already finished his role in the sequel?

Burning Harry Potter books

Thu, 03 Jan 2002 12:00:00 +0000

Some people have nothing better to do than burn Harry Potter books.

Harry Potter site popular

Tue, 20 Nov 2001 12:00:00 +0000

The Harry Potter site is becoming quite popular. But what I don’t get is the comment on CNet saying “Females made up 63 percent of the site’s audience, while males accounted for more than 37 percent.” Hmm… what were they expecting? Martians?

Harry Potter in India only in Apr 2002

Wed, 07 Nov 2001 12:00:00 +0000

The Harry Potter movie is coming to India only in Apr 2002. :-(

Harry Potter movie

Wed, 07 Mar 2001 12:00:00 +0000

Warner Brothers are making a Harry Potter movie.

Comments

Khanjan 26 Sep 2008 12:27 am: Harry Potter is best movie. please watching me thi movies