Open Hatch

Just beautiful.

A cross raised over a church in Iraq. Religious liberty arriving. Just beautiful.

[This is written in response to the second comment at this report at brietbart.com]

I have no respect for that comment, Cindy.

First, all of the questions center on religion or aspects of personal history which are implicitly assumed to be bad (else why ask about them - what can they have, minus such assumptions, logically, to do with a politician’s values, platforms, etc? - never mind that even “logically” they don’t?) Here’s a comparison: back in Kennedy’s day if anyone asked “Did you know he’s a Catholic?” - to answer either “Yes” or “No” would admit, unchallenged, the unstated but assumed position of “No Catholic could be a good president” - itself carrying yet another nasty layer of an assumed “Every Catholic tarnishes politics.” (or is or does X or Y bad thing) Even in Kennedy’s day the United States hadn’t much unshackled itself from bigotry against Catholics and/or Irish people - during the surge of Irish immigrants late in the 19th and early 20th century, it was common for hiring businesses to post signs that read IRISH NEED NOT APPLY; that social segregation broke down later but strains of prejudice still ran strong - and still do, against many religions and many ethnicities. To buy into such unfounded assumptions, unchallenged, that any such matters probed so nefariously in such cartoonish, distorted, vastly oversimplified and unrealistic caricatures - to suppose these hold any validity against the good of people or their abilities is to follow in the path of hasty, bigoted foolishness. Learn about the people you may vote for. Don’t take oversimplified sound bytes and questions as valid inquisitions into truth. For heaven’s sake, have we not seen enough in this nation of the potential for misleading information and bigotry to tarnish and corrupt?

Some proper responses to either the question “Did you know Kennedy is a Catholic?” or “Did you know Romney is a Mormon?” are these: “Did you know our constitution forbids any test of religion for Presidential Candidates?” - or “It is very sad that after so many turmoils our nation has suffered at the hands of bigotry that it continues to run so strong.”

Religion is nothing to a candidate’s eligibility. Where religion informs values, that may be the only area of concern. Mormonism’s values are by and large square with the traditional and mainstream values of historical and conservative America. Period. End of that discussion.

And (at last) second, the question “why is Mitt whining” is simply nasty. First, it’s quite inaccurate to assert he whines. Second, sadness or disappointment is an appropriate response to bigotry; and the mature response is, rather, to ask How has our nation not learned, after so many wars that hinged on questions of bigotry (The Civil War won in defense of Blacks, and the Second World War in defense of Jews and many others - both wars also in defense of our own citizens), that bigotry is one of the primary destroyers of civilization - or How does our nation still tolerate bigotry - even so glibly unsubtle, rampant, and shameless? Down with bigotry! Judge a man by his values and the content of his character, not by his religion, his race, or any other ethnic concern. Bigotry is a favorite tool of the Devil. Wake up to it! Snap out of it, America!

I think these screen shots may be a bit old, and I’m confused by text appearing at this site saying that the Playstation 3 is “forthcoming” (it’s long since already out - maybe this page was posted before it was out) - but oh wow these screen shots are beautiful. These are on-the-fly renders from the game. The characters maybe could afford to possess any emotion other than a tough-guy scowl - but then, maybe that’s just the Metal Gear universe.

The game isn’t out yet (at this writing).

I sequenced (really more sampled) together this music incorporating planetary radio noise samples available from NASA under the Public Domain; it uses other free samples and original sounds too.

(Download .mp3 file, ~1.3 MB)

Please share your comments about this piece; I’m up for possibly improving it.

I release this under Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States; it is free for any use and I do not require but request credit to me by full name (Richard Alexander Hall) in all use.

[UPDATE: the original of this post suggested using the “Dean Scream” in entertainment projects, and failed also to credit and link to a fellow from whose page I obtained a copy of the “Wilhelm Scream”. I’ve learned that the “Dean Scream” most probably is not necessarily in the clear for use in entertainment projects - which is too bad ]

(Close your eyes when it turns black and white with Uma Thurman slashing a sword, and when someone pulls out a knife. Unless you aren’t squeamish or don’t hate gratuitous violence.)

This is another of at least a few videos posted at YouTube showcasing the myriad uses in films of a stock sound originating at Warner Bros. in 1951, eventually dubbed by Ben Burtt the “Wilhelm Scream”.

Yes, it is actually used in all those shows and films. This isn’t some weird dub-over of them (I was really surprised and amused to learn it was used in THE LORD OF THE RINGS films two and three).

I found a wave file of the “classic” Wilhelm Scream apparently directly copied from the original take Here it is. Click. Click. Click.

(That’s an mp3 burn of the sound)

You can also hear the sound at sound designer Steve Lee’s web site, hollywoodlostandfound.net (this is where I grabbed the sound from), and read a detailed history of it there.

At that page and in an interview with a director (in addition to Steve Lee) in this YouTube video, I’ve learned that the man who popularized the sound, Designer Ben Burtt, will no longer be using the sound (he used it in all six Star Wars films). My blunt take: the public has caught on to the “secret” of its use - previously, mostly an in-joke between many sound designers - so now, it’s, like, popular. And the first rule of hard-core Nerddom is that if it’s popular, it isn’t “cool” anymore.

I think that’s a silly decision on Ben Burtt’s part (I only speculate, perhaps unfairly, on his reasons).

I emailed Steve Lee about the legality of using the Wilhelm Scream - in a nutshell no one knows for sure who the original artist is, and while technically it is owned by Warner Bros., it has been used very abundantly (by people from all kinds of other studios and networks, etc.), and no known squabbles or legal issues have been raised over it.

Lee also added:

By the way, Ben is indeed working on “Indy 4″ and I
would be very surprised if there isn’t a Wilhelm in it.

An interesting aside - I’ve noticed a certain recording of a hawk cry appears almost pedantically in many desert and wilderness scenes in films, and it turns out it is in fact an often used recording - it’s mentioned in this Wikipedia page as “..a certain recording of the cry of the Red-tailed Hawk.”

A tradition of people who know the in-joke of the Wilhelm Scream is to shout “Wilhelm!” whenever they hear the sound effect in a movie. But if it isn’t cool to use the Wilhelm Scream anymore, how about something else?

This scream of Howard Dean, the “Dean Scream”, famously baffled and alienated the public to Howard Dean (arguably in part because the press replayed the “Scream” a lot - which.. I dunno.. it’s pretty funny and may deserve press).

I pulled that flash video out of YouTube, dumped its audio to a .wav file, made a sample of the audience cheering noise in the background of it, and then used that noise in a noise removal tool to isolate a very good approximation of Dean’s Scream without the audience cheering in the background.

(There are technical reasons this sound may not be “perfect”, but I doubt I’d hear much or any difference without those factors - also that’s an mp3 burn of the .wav file).

I wish, oh how I wish, that the “Dean Scream” was legally a for-sure “in the clear” sound to use in any entertainment project. For informational / educational / news use (such as this post), it’s in the clear under “Fair Use” - but it isn’t necessarily in the clear for use in entertainment media.

If another actor imitated the Dean Scream however, and released it to the Public Domain - hey, we could have us the basis of something new.

Wait a bit - I think I’ll do just that.