aug 2010 newsletter

If you are wondering why you do not remember seeing this newsletter last month, I confess that there was none. Unfortunately due to my own necessary winter medical maintenance and other similarly unexpected events I eventually had to concede Julys newsletter was not going to happen.

Also, expected changes and improvements I have been talking about for a while now have taken a bit longer than expected to get up and running. So at this stage all I can say is, watch this space and you will be the first to know when it all happens.

In the mean time, some more interesting tid bits in this newsletter and please do mossy on over to the Aureola Facebook page for more regular posts of information.

Paul Perry

Personal and Technological Maintenance.

Having succumbed recently to a passing cold and threat of chest infection and with the ever present maintenance of older recording equipment I naturally start looking for comparisons. But apart from the need of repair I find there is no great similarity.

When we go to the doctor most of the time they are eliminating possibilities and treating symptoms. When the older equipment I use to transfer audio and visual media from breaks down there is generally a manual to show you what to look for. And as happened on a 45 year old tape recorder recently I didn't even need to go to the manual to work out the problem when I could smell something burning. Because of past experience with this machine I had a pretty good idea of the problem and a few parts replaced a week later fixed that.

Much more recent digital technology though is very different. When it breaks down it is more than likely cheaper and easier to replace it with a newer model. Considering this months humour below, it is probably just as well medical science cannot do that with our working parts.

Magic Lanterns and Early Slide Shows

Early magic lantern projectors were described by a jesuit scientist Athanasius Kircher in 1671, though they were known before then. In 1666 englishman Samuel Pepys commented in his diary of a Mr Reeves demonstrating a "lanthorn that shows tricks", which so impressed him that he purchased it.

This was about 200 years before the first photographs were made and so the images were hand painted onto glass. The light source was firstly a yellow smoky oil lamp. Gradually optics, light sources and reflectors improved resulting in sharper brighter images.

Who would have thought the ubiquitous slide show had such a long history.

The Search is on for Captain Thunderbolt

The National Film and Sound Archive in Australia is on the hunt for original 35mm film material of the film Captain Thunderbolt produced in 1951 by Cecil Holmes. Until now only available as an incomplete poor quality print on 16mm film.

The NFSA is constantly on the lookout for early material to add to the national collection of our audio visual heritage. Search your attics, basements and back sheds etc.. Because these are often the places where previously discarded treasures of national significance have been found. My experience is also that these are the sort of places a lost or unknown part of your own families heritage are also often to be found.

When Were the First Sound Recordings

Ask this question and most would reply Edison on a cylinder gramophone and when they do you may tell them they are wrong.

Early devices such as a barrel organ or musical box could only play pre programmed stored music, they could not record a live performance. The earliest known live recordings were made by a Parisian inventor Edouard-Leon Scott de Martinville on a phonautograph in 1857. The recordings were made by scratching wavy lines on a strip on paper blackened by soot from an oil lamp.

These recordings could not then be played, but one was eventually read using a laser stylus at Indiana University, Bloomington USA, in 2008. The recording was found to be the inventor singing a French folk song.

Australian Computer Heritage

Australia first computer was the CSIR Mk1 in 1949.

The 1966 census was first processed electronically.

The internet was connected to Australia first in 1981, but not strictly available to the public until 1989.

The IBM PC was released in Australia 1983.

Humour

Bill Gates recently stated, if General Motors had kept had kept up with technology like the computer industry we would be driving $25 cars that got 1000 miles to the gallon.

In response GM issued a press release stating, if GM had developed technology like Microsoft we would be all driving cars with the following characteristics.

1. For no reason whatsoever your car would crash twice a day.
2. Every time they repainted the lines on the road you would have to buy a new car.
3. Occasionally your car would die for no reason. You would have to pull over, close all the windows, shut off the car, restart it and open all the windows before continuing. For some reason you would simply accept this.
4. Occasionally a manoeuvre such as a left turn would cause your car to shut down and refuse to start, in which case you would have to reinstall the engine.
5. Macintosh would make a car that was powered by the sun, was reliable, five times as fast and twice as easy to drive - but would only run on five percent of the roads.
6. The oil, water temperature and alternator lights would be all replaced by a single "This car has Performed An Illegal Operation" warning light.
7. The airbag would ask "are you sure" before deploying.
8. Occasionally for no reason your car would lock you out and refuse to let you in until you simultaneously lifted the door handle, turned the key and grabbed hold of the radio antenna.
9. Every time a new car was introduced buyers would have to learn how to drive it all over again because none of the controls would be the same.
10. You would have to press the "Start" button to turn it off.

Please feel free to contact me with any questions and comments on this newsletter and suggestions of what you would like me to cover in future issues.