Film Festival Delegate Card and Kit

Last week, from 9^th to 16^th December, I took break from my projects and immerse into a world of good cinema. 16^th Edition of International Film Festival of Kerala (IIFK) was going on at Trivandrum, the Capital of my state Kerala. As a busy professional I never got a chance to dedicate myself a whole week for such a cultural program.

Now, being an independent consultant, I can manage my time in a more balancing way by providing equal importance to Life and Work. The Film Festival was quite good experience. I met some nice people and watched a number of classic films.

I watched 19 films in 5 days! There was a special retrospective section for Masters of Cinema like Robert Bresson and Nagisa Oshima.  Actually the first movie I watched, Pickpocket, was directed by Bresson. There were lot of good movies from different part of the world and I tried to watch selected ones.

Following are the movies I watched

1. Pickpocket                          Robert Bresson                                        French
2. Poetry                                   Chang Dong Lee                                       S.Korea
3. A Screaming Man             Mahamat Saleh Haroun                        Chad/Belgium
4. Angel’s Fall                         Semih Kaplanoglu                                   Turkey
5. The Painting Lesson       Pablo Perelman                                         Chile/Mexico
6. Faust                                     Aleksander Sokurov                                Russia
7. Damascus with Love      Muhammed Abdul Aziz                          Syria
8. Beloved                               Christophe Honore                                   UK/Czech
9. By Chance Balthazar      Robert Bresson                                           French
10. Eternity & A Day             Angelopoulos                                              Greek/Italy
11. Rough Hands                    Mohamed Asli                                             Morocco
12. Short Films                        Adolf Mekas                                                 USA
13. Mumbai Diaries               Kiran Rao                                                      India
14. Abu, Son of Adam          Salim Ahmed                                               India
15. The First Grader             Justin Chadwick                                         Kenya/US
16. Together                            Zajedno                                                          Zerbia
17. The Colours of                 Carlos Cesar Arbelaez                              Colombia
    the Mountains
18. That Day                            Raoul Ruiz                                                   France
19. Future Lasts Forever   Ozcan Alper                                                Turkey/Kurdish

Colombian film, ‘The Colours of the Mountains’ directed by Carlos Cesar Arbelaez choosen as the Best picture of the Year.  Overall it was a good memorable experience.

I guess more is coming.  Keep up with updates from Google release notes page

+1 Button

Google released +1 button publicly in June.  Page owners can easily integrate it into their webpage. Some SEO nerds claiming, adding a +1 button will boost SEO for the site.  I’m not sure, but for a user when she search for something and if a correct webpage appears, then she can click on +1 button in it (if +1 button already inserted in page) and publicly and show her appreciation. Later this can help your friends and contacts find the best stuff when they search. +1‘s also help show you useful recommendations on the topics you’re interested in your search results.

Google+

In the month of June itself, Google announced Google+, which is a social network something similar to Facebook. Google+ allowed anyone to open a G+ profile and interact with friends. You can group people in different circles.  So, you can share your updates only with friends in selected circle.  If you share any update to public, it’s visible to everyone.

In August Google announced we can share the +1’s with your circles on G+. When Google+ released publicly in September, they added it with Search and Hangout features. In this month Google Blogger users experience enhanced UI interfaces and able to use  the Dynamic View templates which was developed by using HTML5.

Google Pages

The much awaited Brand pages for business from Google is announced on November 7.  With Google+, users were only able to create personal profiles with real personal names.  Now with Google+ pages, Companies or any brands are able to create brand pages for boosting the social interaction.

Google Badge

 Add a Google badge to your website through this.  Just a reminder, still it’s under development, so you may found some difficulties.

https://developers.google.com/+/plugins/badge/preview

If the above link not working for you, try this for a static Badge for your webpage

https://developers.google.com/+/plugins/badge/#static

Google Direct Connect

This month beginning google introduced a new feature called Direct Connect which helps users to find Google Pages for brands directly.  Just type ‘+Brand name’ you’ll get it. Here one thing we should note, Google retire the old functionality of + operator in normal Google search. Try searching  ‘+Brand Banker’ in Google+

See the video of Direct Connect

How to make my Google page for Google Direct Connect?

http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=1708844

Recommended Read for Google Direct Connect & Google Page

http://searchengineland.com/a-look-at-google-direct-connect-for-google-pages-100382

How to create a Google plus Page for Business ?

Don’t waste time. Make your page immediately by open the url plus.google.com/pages/create

Remember one thing, if you are using this link, you must already have an active Google+ profile.  If not, you’ll be asked to create one.

When you are creating Google+ Profile, most of the time it’ll not allow using company names or generic terms. (for instance, second name as Limited, Restaurant etc).  so use your real name.  Don’t worry you can hid your personal Google+ Profile by editing it later. Once you created the Google+ basic profile (in just 2 steps, if you skip the options for creating and adding people in your circles and importing your contacts from other accounts).  I suggest you to skip the personal profile enhancements to a later stage and proceed to create Google+ page account.

Click to view in full page

Just choose the type of your business and follow the procedure.  But remember, Google+ will not allow you to create infinite pages for you at a time.  When I tried, Google pause my page creation after I completed 15 pages.

( added after 4hrs of the initial post: Later I allowed to add 5 more pages, ie. 20 pages total for one Google account. Then when it shows the message ‘You have reached the limit of pages you can own. You will need to delete some before you can create new ones.’)

Visit this Google page I created.

Google Page Guide

If you need more details get it from the creators themselves! Visit Google Page Guide

Google Page Review

Google Engineer, Dennis Troper, shared his thoughts about Google Page in his G+ post.  You can see that here.  But it seems some notable technology pros like Robert Scoble is not so happy with Google Pages.  See what he feels about Google Page.

If you think you need professionals in building Online Brand Reputation for your Business, get a basic idea about Online Branding from here.

The main advantage is if you wrote a code in Lua (native development language of Corona, which is somewhat similar to AS) you can port it into Android and iOS platforms with a simple click on ‘Build’ button. But to get this ‘Build’ option you have to buy the SDK.

The good news for developers is that the SDK is available free for trial. Once you acquainted with Lua, you can go for paid version of Corona SDK. I’m sure it’s worth.

The free Corona SDK comes with a debugger and Simulator. The Corona SDK folder contains, Sample Code and tools. Once you downloaded and install Corona SDK, simply run the simulator and open up any Sample Code folder and open the files named main.lua

In tools you got a 30 day trial version of Corona Project Manager, Spriteloq – Flash SWF to Corona sprite sheet exporter and a plug-in for Photoshop CS5 or above, named Kwik. Kwik is good for creating animations and events in Photoshop. This can be used in Corona as it is. Note that, the SDK doesn’t contain a program editor; you can use anything you like. I’m using Notepad++.

Lua is very similar to AS3, but OOP. Got a good number of APIs.

Though Lua is syntactically different than ActionScript, you’ll find Lua easier if you are a seasoned AS developer. Corona SDK and Lua programming language open new terrains for ActionScript Developers. To read more, check out the documentation

“Timeline is the story of your life…in a new way to express who you are,” Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on Thursday announcing the new feature.  Yes, the timeline concept can become the story of ones life – if we updated FB with everything we gone through each day.

At present Timeline is only for Facebook developers for testing.  As I was waiting for it from the last time I came to know about it in F8 and curious to know what surprise FB brings I activated Timeline for me.  See the screen shot of my page below.

Facebook Timeline

As a professional working in Online Branding the first thing caught my attention is the introduction of Cover page on top of profile.  I just uploaded an image with my companies’ promotion.

FB introduced some other features also and “View Activity” is one interesting thing among them.   View Activity shows you (only owner can see this not others) a list view of all your Facebook activity that is organized by year since the date you joined Facebook. It includes such information as what you’ve written on friends’ walls, photos and links you’ve shared, and photos you’ve been tagged in.

The visual change may seem drastic to many FB users who are become quite familiar with good old layout.  I think FB made a bold move on this while G+ is tightening the competition. But I’m sure, once familiar with FB going to win with the new concept and it’s a great practical lesson for all UI & UX designers for thinking out of the box.

Read more in http://www.facebook.com/about/timeline

These days seems beautiful for me; not just because rain showers all the time; I am learning new technologies, getting more insights about online branding as I’m doing projects with full effort and great dedication and I feel my efforts get appreciated. I feel content.

Few months back, I moved back to my home surrounded with plush greenery from an office-flat-office city life in Arabian Gulf. Dubai gave me very good experiences in life and career – some seems bitter but that also ‘good experiences’ as it would help me to avoid such situations in future.

A good life could motivate the imagination and boost creativity.  As everyone else, technology wizards also know that imagination can lead to invention. At least Intel is realized that and they are looking for science fiction writers for exploring the possibilities with technology.

“The Tomorrow-Project” is a unique literary project launched by Technology giant Intel, which shows the important effects that contemporary research will have on our future and the relevance that this research has for each of us. Research currently being conducted by Intel in the fields of photonics, robotics, telematics, dynamic physical rendering and intelligent sensors served as the basis to inspire four bestselling authors. The results are four short stories which paint amusing, thought-provoking and hopeful pictures of our future.

Get the stories from here. [Download PDF File]

Steve Jobs’s Resignation came as another hurricane and it shook everywhere.  But I think this resignation is having more impact in the whole IT & Entertainment industry. The Change is inevitable and it came. Here is the resignation letter from Steve – a precise one.

To the Apple Board of Directors and the Apple Community:

I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come.

I hereby resign as CEO of Apple. I would like to serve, if the Board sees fit, as Chairman of the Board, director and Apple employee.

As far as my successor goes, I strongly recommend that we execute our succession plan and name Tim Cook as CEO of Apple.

I believe Apple’s brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it. And I look forward to watching and contributing to its success in a new role.

I have made some of the best friends of my life at Apple, and I thank you all for the many years of being able to work alongside you.

Steve

Jobs, you did well. You changed the industry and set new culture.

Yesterday I bought Faber-Castell art brushes.  Once reach my place, I’m planning to start painting.  It’s clear sun there as it’s summer time.  Hot days…  But the canals near my home might be having streams.  So my backyard will be cool and I already started dreaming about painting & reading under the shades of trees.  Also, this is going to be the perfect time for picking up some more knowledge in mobile programming.  Already got an enquiry from Australia for template creation.  I hope, that’ll be enough for a peaceful time.

Also here is a good talk from Michael Bierut.  It’s a good talk for designers and their part for supporting clients.

You may already know that Ginger Bird (Android 2.3) is supporting NFC. It’s newly introduced one touch word selection is bringing it closer to its Apple counterpart in terms of interaction. Ha.. I I’m losing in Android world… excuse, let me come back to Mobile world Congress News.

As I read from the site and other media sources, everything went well in Barcelona Mobile Congress. Prior to the Congress, the big news about Nokia & Windows alliance came out but still nothing stops the rally of Android.

This year’s “Best Mobile Advertising & Marketing Campaign” (Category 2) awarded to Mobilera – Outeractive for their Unilever Cornetto Multiplayer Interactive Wall Projection Mapping Game. Hope, one day I’ll kiss on that award!