Blue-ray DVDs

Samsung today launched the Blue-ray DVD player in the UK. For a couple of months we have been hearing about the Blue-ray DVDs as the next big thing in optical data storage/usage. Capable of holding about 50 GB of data, these discs promise a higher picture resolution and a high definition quality of video which means the movies we could watch would have greater sharpness and rich colors.

For further reading on Blue-Ray discs check out the official site of the BDA group

DSLR Photography

Found this good tutorial on DSLR Photography on a forum.

For those of you in the process of thinking to buy a DSLR soon ... my suggestion is go for the Canon 400D aka Digital Rebel XTi. Apparently it is getting good reviews from buyers and has many good features as compared to the earlier Canon version.

for further features check out

4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42 ..... the Lost-mania begins again !

"the Others ", the hatch, pressing the button, 4, 8,15, 16, 23, 42 ..... if these strike something in your brain then you know what I am talking about.

Yes, I am one of those Losties or Lost-aways, the terms coined to describe the fans of this overwhelming drama series being aired in US on ABC. I was introduced to it by my flatmate in Munich in the summer of 2005 (the time period when the Ashes series was the other most talked about thing). The pilot episode itself had caught me by amazement. After that day, I admit to being stung by the Lost-bee. If you dont make sense of what I am talking about, then check out

Though I am dont belong the distinguished class of Losties, I do follow the series quite closely. I have this colleague in my Uni lab who is another one crazy Lostie, and after each episode we watch we go through this endless discussions over the story and what would happen next. At the end of season 1, me and my München-mate had run our imaginations wild and speculated our own end to the story. But the 2nd season has brought a good twist to the plot. The whole thing about the Hatch just created more buzz to this series. and now when the 3rd season starting to be aired in US on 4th October, we are all waiting with unabated enthusiasm to know what happen to Jack, Kate, and Sawyer after the last encounter with the Others. also what happened after the explosion on the island. the fate of Locke and Mr. Ecko is still hanging. The show writers have introduced some new characters this season and state that the story would revolve around the Others and their lives.

A simple Google for Lost will give tonnes of pointers. Wikipedia has a great stub for it. Though you could find the episode spoilers for all episodes aired, I suggest you to check those story spoilers only after having watched the episode. Some of them have great trivia stuff, which help in giving the complete picture of the story. There is this great forum on Lost where you can discuss/argue the plot. Infact such is the popularity of the show that these holidaymakers were too delighted when they came across the sets of Lost on this island in Hawaii. The show also made way into the comic strip here PhD comics

Talking about the plot, there have been many theories and innumerable discussion threads across several forums. The creators of the show have been on campus in some US universities and involved in some good discussions with the students who are similarly crazy about the whole stuff. I once came across a blog maintained by a student who is tracking the occurance of the numbers in each of the episode and his theories on their relevance to the plot. Personally my take on the plot (as shared by many others as well) is as such - the survivors of the crash as in the state of purgatory death. Though the show creators reject these claims, there are several instances in the plot which support this theory. The manner in which events happen with each of the survivors and they way they are related with their past lives, and how they repent their previous mistakes and the correlation in their emotions with their past to their present life on the island all seem to point to this theory that these survivors are in the state of transigience - admitting their sins and realising their mistakes. for example

• In the episode where Shannon is shot, she sees Walt which nobody else can see. Only when Sayid assures her that he loves her and believes her, that he starts seeing Walt.

• When Kate sees the black horse on the island and confesses her crime to an unconscious Sawyer, Sawyer also starts seeing the horse and finds it perfectly appropriate on the island.
  

• In the episode where Goodwin is unmasked, he tells to Anna Lucia that the Others had taken only few of the survivors because they were the good ones and were now having a good time, implying that the ones left behind and going through the traumatic experiances are not good - sinners in other words.
  

All these give a hint that these events are happening in the minds of these survivors and their events on the island intercross only to the extent that their previous experiences are relevant.

other interesting sites are ...

TV Gasm
Buddy TV