{digital.media} Enjoy Forever

Do
I
really
look
like
Pai Mei
or
is
it
just
an
illusion?

{photography.nature} Sweet Cherries

Bought from China town (Dundas and Spadina), the above cherry was singularly the sweetest cherry I have eaten in Toronto.

While playing around with colours, I was thinking to myself how cruel we are to neglect the colour in computer vision and work with gray-scale images. For me, the following two images have different depth perceptions and their only difference is in the local colour information. Motion information exist and that helps in the creation of a depth map, but we often neglect the importance of colour.

{conversations.nonesense} Who is righter?

"Good and evil in ethics are abstract values. You cannot say an action is good in some circumstances and evil in some other circumstances. It just does not make sense to me," argued Mohan while Suru was staring at him.

"If you categorize theft as an evil action, stealing bread for the poor is still evil. In my opinion, what makes people sympathize in such a situation, is their disability to implement an organization that supports the hungry layers of the society. Stealing bread for them is not a solution and is still evil," continued Mohan. Suru nodded in disagreement.

"Why can't you see that idealism is not realizable? Why do you think that there are no such ideal Utopias in the world? Isn't it over simplification to blame just everyone for not implementing such a society? Think about it. There ought to be another reason," said Suru matter-of-factly.

There was a silence after Mohan started to utter something which remained as an unclear sound. He did not finish the word. A few moments later, Mohan headed to the kitchen to pour a cup of tea for himself.

"Care for a cup of tea?" asked Mohan.

"No, thanks. I will make some coffee for myself," replied Suru. A thousand thoughts struck his head right after denying Mohan's offer for tea. Why did he deny it? Was that because he hated to agree with just anything that Mohan says? He was skeptical indeed. When he got to kitchen he told Mohan that he feels like having tea rather than coffee at the moment. Mohan smiled and poured him a cup of tea. The tea aroma was dominant in the living room where both friends were watching an unimportant hockey game. In fact, none of them were actually watching the game, but sinking in their deep thoughts.

When I was looking at them from here, I thought to myself that they both could be right. No one is righter than the other. Everybody is right in a way. Is this the reason why few people use the comparative adjectives righter? Being right is not a measurable function, so I cannot just compare and use that weird adjective.

A dragonfly, may be called giraffe dragonfly or even tiger dragonfly! 

{science.vision} CVR 2005 is over

Listening and talking to some of the world's premeier researchers in the field and knowing how they approach a problem was a learning experience for me.

Now, I am back to my normal life and I have to finish a paper propsal by tonight...

{science.vision} CVR 2005

I will be attending the Computational Vision in Neural and Machine Systems conference held in York University form tomorrow till Saturday.

It is my first visit to York University. There would be invited talks from renowned professors in vision research with two flavours: computer vision and neuroscience.

Berkeley's Jitendra Malik, Duke's Carlo Tomasi, U of T's Allan Jepson are only those whose work I have seen before. I am sure if you are into neuroscience, you will find many interesting talks by those who know what they are saying. And this is very important. Very few people know what they are saying and I don't like to miss the opportunity to listen to them (so I should go and get some sleep now!).

BTW, if you want to pick on me on why I have omitted the titles Dr./Prof. from the names of these scientists, I should emphasize that when you believe in someone's work, you will never give him a title. The name alone says it all. Have you ever heard someone say Professor Newton, or Professor Maxwell?

Shhhhhhh, mamooshi is sleeeeeeeeping :-) 

{education.ideas} Canadian Education System

There are serious flaws in Canadian higher education system. The conditions of a research stipend offer made to a research student is uni-directional toward the sole benefit of the supervisor. The main problem with such a contract is that the evaluation is not quantitative and the research supervisor must be "satisfied" with the progress or he can cancel the contract. What usually happens is that there is a mutual agreement between both parties and no one crosses the line. So, everybody is happy. The research progresses, the student gets paid, and the articles get published. However, if a research supervisor wants to abnormally call the progress unsatisfactory even if the progress is good, there are absolutely no higher authorities that would look into the problem. I am not an activist (if I don't have to be one), and I sure have better things to do than spending my time (life?) correcting this flaw. But if you happen to be an activist, a member of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), Canadian Federation of Students (CFS), or any other Canadian associations that care for education, there are research supervisors that use this legal advantage to abuse their fellow students. Modern slavery in year 2005.

{photography.urban} Blue Everything

Unlike some serious photographers that can't stand a blue sky, I like a blue everything. Do not mind the financial institution. This is not an advertisement (and I do not even have an account with them!)

"Eiffel 65's Blue (Da Ba De)"

Yo listen up here's a story
About a little guy that lives in a blue world
And all day and all night and everything he sees
Is just blue like him inside and outside
Blue his house with a blue little window
And a blue corvette
And everything is blue for him and hisself
And everybody around
Cos he ain't got nobody to listen to

I'm blue da ba dee da ba die...

I have a blue house with a blue window.
Blue is the colour of all that I wear.
Blue are the streets and all the trees are too.
I have a girlfriend and she is so blue.
Blue are the people here that walk around,
Blue like my corvette, it's standing outside.
Blue are the words I say and what I think.
Blue are the feelings that live inside me.

I'm blue da ba dee da ba die...

Inside and outside blue his house
With the blue little window and a blue corvette
And everything is blue for him and hisself
And everybody around cause he aint got
Nobody to listen to

I'm blue da ba dee da ba die...

So, it was obvious that my choice between a blue corvette (under a blue sky) and a red corvette (under a red sky)

is the blue corvette (with the red corvette chasing her).

{life.ideas} Sci-Fi

Year 2007. Yes, that's future and I am just fancying sharing my Utopia with you. My sci-fi post.

You would have a unique ID tied to your credit card.

There would be no centralized news websites. The reporters would blog the hell out of the news in their blogs. The team-workers, would establish a collective "news-blog" and update it every half an hour. You would be charged a tiny amount to know what is going on in the world.

There would be no traditional news groups. Everybody would share and discuss an idea through a collective weblog, a "grouplog". You need your unique ID to ask a question. No anonymous questions allowed. Your ID is tied to your credit history, so you won't simply spam others or that would ruin your credit. You can of course adopt a nickname if you are shy to ask your sex-related questions under your real ID.

You would not email reports to your boss, but rather share them on the company's blog. Note that a blog might be private and available to a number of authorized IDs.

You would not send an article to a technical journal, you'd just upload it on the journal blog "jourlog", and let other scholars judge your work. When real people comment and criticize your work, others would have a better chance of rating your work.

There would not be different media players, but rather media blogs, "midilog"s, so that you can catch up the old and new hits. Each time you listen to something, a minimal amount is charged to your credit card. It would be a fraction of a cent, so you wouldn't care. Given that millions listen to a song per day, the artists will have sth to eat next day. Why should Yahoo, MSN, RealOne, etc. benefit from others talents? I would rather pay it all to the artist.

The list can go on, but I am too sleepy to ramble more.

{photography.urban} Northern Downtown Buildings

I grabbed these images, while playing with my camera. They are taken from the window of our apartment (facing north). Manulife Center, CIBC, and Bay buildings at Yonge and Bloor are seen here.


Canon PowerShot A510 | Tv 8s | Av 4 | ISO 50 | f 8mm | Globally and locally processed | Fixed |


Canon PowerShot A510 | Tv 6s | Av 5.5 | ISO 50 | f 23mm | unprocessed | Handheld |



Canon PowerShot A510 | Tv 15s | Av 5.6 | ISO 50 | f 6mm | unprocessed | Handheld |

{art.photography} My New Camera

Canon PowerShot A510 | Tv 1/60 | Av 3.5 | ISO 50 | f 5.8mm | Globally and locally processed |

I love my new camera. It's a gift from my sister. I am so excited and play with it a lot. The above photo is inspired by the [daily dose of imagery] and the Sin City movie.

{sports.soccer} Iran's Roadmap to WC 2006

Team Melli, figure courtesy of PersianLeague.com

Team Melli will host North Korea in a decisive match to qualify for World Cup 2006 in Germany. The soccer fever has reached Toronto. Farid and I decided to buy the matches (next one is with Bahrain on Wednesday). The spectators will be limited to 32,000, but I think there would be 40,000 in Azadi Stadium. This would lessen the pressure on Team Melli in my opinion. Ali Karimi will try to impress Bayern manager and Freydun Zandi will continue his high-class performance (he scored a goal against Azerbaijan in a friendly match last week). Hashemian is motivated to prove to Hannover managre that he will fit in the starting line-up. Mahdavikia will try his best to convince HSV new manager that he is a talented player, although didn't play well the previous season.

The North Koreans will fight back to earn their pride and stop Iran. It will not be an easy match for Iran, but I think we will win this one 2-0. The next clash againsh Bahrain would be a draw. Four points in these two games will secure our playoff berth. The last match is against Japnan, in Japan, where we will win 3-2 to lead group B into the playoffs. Soccer fever is high.

{life.personal} The Journey Is Over

It was all like a sweet dream. It past by too fast. We did spent some good time together, but I didn't want to say goodbye. I did't know for how long I wouldn't have the opportunity to see them and that made me hug my sister and her husband once more, after saying goodbye and before saying the final goodbye. They are a sweet couple.

Life would soon be back to the normal pace and I think I would post more. Or study more. Or both. But, for now, I am deprived of energy and I should refill my empty stomach. Many things happened in the world during my absence. First of all, Jon Stewart is back from his two-week break. Second, so much happened on ghorbati that I cannot even keep up to. Third, there is an open letter on Taftestan. Third again, my laptop babe has a new "havoo". Fourth, I am not going to the conference held in San Francisco!