Indian Cinema Re'Colorised'....!!!

The Art of Indian Cinema has always been truly depicting the greatest hard work that was invested by all the Crew either directly or indireclty. One Film of its kind is Mughal-e-Azam, the all time blockbuster that reinvented the new way of making an Indian Cinema. The movie has a great reputation in success both financially and technically. The Cost of the movie is 15 million rupees that according to today’s times make it into 2 billion rupees, which makes it as the costliest movie ever made. The battle sequence between Salim and Akbar involved a large crew consisting 2000 camels, 5000 horses and many soldiers who were hired from the Indian Army and also with a special permission from the Indian Ministry of Defense to shoot them in Jaipur.Does'nt this sound like a Hollywood movie?

The History

The film is directed by K Asif, who always had this great passion of making movie with a script like Mughal-e-Azam way back in 1944.At that time he could convince a financer Shiraz Ali, with a lead role played by a prominent person, who unfortunately died of a Heart Attack and the film went incomplete with the financer moving to Pakistan in 1947.Film reshoots again in 1951 with a new financer Shapoorji pallonji and in 1960, the movie was released and has out placed all the records of Indian Cinema. The Original Mughal-e-Azam is 85% B/W and 15 % colour. Infact if we go back to our past, the Technicolor for a motion picture in India was started in 1957.Inspired by this idea, the Director always wanted to have this movie in color which wasn’t fulfilled totally because making a colour film in those days was highly expensive. So Asif satisfied himself with bits of the movie converting into colour.
Later in 2002, the film producer Shapoorji pallonji gave his movie to the Indian Academy of Arts and Animation to execute Colourisation Technique. To say, this is not a new technique, this has already been introduced in many of the Hollywood movies.

The Technology

The Colorization works have started in 2002 for a 35mm film format. Now what is this 35mm? We might have heard it many times but really don’t know what exactly it is? Or either hasn’t showed an interest on it. A 35mm is basically the length if each frame in a film reels. These reels are projected in a 35mm Projector. Now, coming back to the colorization part, the main process of making a movie into a colour involves 3 stages.

Restoration

In this Process, the reel of the movie is collected and is digitally transformed. Before making any corrections, a copy of the Original is taken and work will be undertaken on it. This reel is scanned thoroughly and all sorts of corrections such as Contrast corrections, Scratch removals, pin hole removals, fungus correction, adjusting the braked Frames. This work is done by a Team of specialists in Restoration using 3TB (1 Terabyte=1000 GB) of data. Now this Film print is sent for colorization.

Colorization

This is the Main Process and requires a lot of Patience. A Team of people who have their expertise in Color Modulation involve in this work. The process starts about the discussion and documentation about the colors to be used, a small research work on the Ancient times so that the output should look almost real and the shadowing concepts. Once the colors were decided the actual work starts, the designers have to work in a special software tool (like the Adobe Photoshop), which can render the effect of colorization. Now, all the above things sound really simple but I can get the closer view on it, the designers have to take each frame of the film, 24 frames of a any motion picture will make 1 sec of the Actual video which we look in the movie. Now, think again, Mughal-e-Azam has 3,000,000 frames and each frame should be colorized individually and the toughest part is that all the frames should be in sync with each other in terms of colors. Now the colouring of frame involves the facial textures, the background colours, the colours of the side artists facial and their costumes, main artists costumes, if we can recollect the huge sets of Mughal-e-azam, each pillar has certain design’s, which also need to be colored. And this is a time consuming process, it took 1-½ years to actually colour the Mughal-e-Azam b/w version. Now I call this as the Heights of Patience. All these work for the movie is done by the Indian Academy of Arts and Animation and its truly commendable.

Post Production

After all the Colorizing work, the print is converted to a wide screen format and is recorded in a new negative.

The Music

After all the work on enhancing the picture, now it’s digitalizing the Music of the Movie. The Music for the movies like Mughal-e-Azam is the soul. The Music Director of the movie, Naushad was so keen on the film’s music as the song “Pyar Kiya to Darna Kya” was rewritten 105 times by the lyricist shakeel badayuni and the song “Ae Mohabbat Zindabad”, sung by Mohd Rafi with a 100 singers in chorus and 120 musicians playing the classical instruments at a time. Ismail Darbar had done the Music for the digitalized version. Now, music digitalization is nothing but the conversion old music, which is in monotype to a Stereotype Surround version, to say technically converting it to Dolby 6.1 surround sound.

Every one of us might be having many questions as to what is monotype music and stereotype music? What is Dolby 6.1? I, probably I have the answer to these questions. The Monotype music is nothing but giving the music of all instruments in a single output, i.e, speaker. So this is the mixed sound of all the instruments at once and the disadvantage in having such type of music is that we can’t differentiate the different instruments in it. On the other hand, stereotype music is getting the output of different instruments differently. The clarity will be more when compared to monotype. The Surround factor, many of us will be knowing about this, still this is an excellent feature which gives the output of the sound same at any corner of the room and Dolby is the company which provides such system .The 6.1 gives the number of speakers and the sub woofers like 6 stereotype speakers and one sub-woofer and so is called Dolby Digital 6.1 surround.

Coming back to the business, Music digitalizing, the voices of all the artists are tracked separately with special software(used by many Music directors and is not revealed) and all the noise, which we generally hear in all the Old movies, are removed. Instead a special Background music is given to suit the current Scene. And when it comes to the Songs, all the instruments were reused again. They are recorded digitally and the voices, which are tracked separately, are added to the music. This actually gives the feel of the Original music re-played again digitally.

So, Just to color 1 sec of a movie takes so much of hard work, imagine the whole movie Now, if we watch the colored version in a theatre near by, we would probably never expect all these happening and would never appreciate them either. The point, which I want to make through this post, is that all Digitally transformed movies like Mughal-e-Azam, Naya Daur and many films, which are going to get colored are a greater piece of Hard work and needs to be appreciated but not to be criticized.

Note-This Post is started and targeted to the people who hate the transformation of Old movies to color. I accept that the films are the masterpieces in their own ways but certain amount of credit should be given to the digital version.

Mahesh Bhatt was against coloring Mughal-e-Azam- “It's like painting the Red Fort in acrylic emulsion”.

Cricket-a "Technical" Game?...Let me Explain.

Have you ever thought that how much time does it take for you to know that Sachin Tendulkar has hit a Six when he actually hits it? Or do you even know that the live feed you watch is actually being delayed? And moreover do you know that there are actually 500-600 crew men working to get the live coverage, which are covered in 25 Different camera's which includes the stump camera to the Ultra Slow Motion Cameras? And there are 300-400 people working onsite in order to get the Real Stadium atmosphere in fact better than the stadium view, well many questions which we might not be thinking about, some of us might knowing about it and some us don’t, but many of us don’t know about the real work happening and the technology used in it, this post is all about the Cricketing Technology and how are they being used.

The Coverage

The Video Feed which we receive is actually delayed for 4 seconds. But this is the Minimum time as we can’t digest the fact that we still are 4 seconds late. The Video which we receive is captured in 16-25 cameras. These feeds are sent to a Video Mixer where all the signals are monitored. This signal is called as Clean signal which is dealt with various forms of Graphics like slow motion replays, score ticker, .etc.They term this as a Dirty Signal. The Video mixer is like the heart of the system as the view can be flipped to different cameras which is eventually decided Crew Manager. Its he who decides about the different camera angles which we see on TV. It is known from one of my web search that Harsha Bhogle of ESPN STAR listens more often to his crew manager before he actually speaks. So here a commentator job is to concentrate on the voice of his manager, talk simultaneously about the live match, switch on to the facts about the Match and players on his Computer, which is definitely a job of a great MULTI TASKER and they are. Coming to the procedure, this Dirty signal is sent to the Outstation Broadcast or the OB Van from where the signal is sent to the Satellite, and then this is distributed to the Earth Station where some changes are made, like the advertisements, the studio panel review, logo of the channel, etc and finally we get the signal from our local station nearby our place and we watch, cheer and get our self entertained.
Now what if the system used crashes suddenly and this is actually the case sometimes, a backup goes on 2-3 laptops, so even this case is solved but the major equipments were given an Assured Time warranty, so even these equipments are changed accordingly. This certainly doesn’t seem like a 4 sec work, and now I hope reading this post certainly made you realize the hard work many people do, but it’s all the Information Technology and its Advancements

a screenshot of the software used to monitor all the Camera feeds

The Hawk-Eye

You might have heard this in many of the Cricket and Tennis matches these days. But for many of us who don’t know about “What Hawk-Eye is?”, then let me give you a small Introduction. A Hawk-eye is 3D analyses of the objects (a ball in this case) which predicts its path and let us know about the correctness of the decision made on a particular sport. This is developed by a group of engineers at Roke Manor Research Limited who had built the software which tracks the Ball Motion. This feature has been included in the Cricket Matches in 2001.This has been helpful in many major decisions, like the L.B.W, boundaries made overall in the match(called the Wagon Wheel),runs scored in a particular kind of a delivery bowled.Now,how this works?. A Digital snaps are taken every millisecond and then all these images are transformed to a 3-D image with special software and automatically all such images are merged to get the final Hawk-Eye Animation. This really is a complex procedure and takes few minutes of time to get the real view of the ball with 5mm Accuracy.

The Snicko

The Snicko, technically called as Snickometer is generally a powerful microphone, fitted to the stumps which can finely record the major nicks made when a ball is bowled. This is a powerful TV tool which helps in taking many major cricketing decisions.

Information Management System

When ever, a short pitch ball is bowled to Sachin Tendulkar, he hooks it up to a Six. So, A fielder is placed accordingly by the bowler. Now the bowler gets all this information from the Information Management System. This pretty much holds the records of all the bowlers and the batsman’s moves. You must have noticed every Team Coach carrying a Laptop but he essentially operates this software and records the videos. These Videos are viewed to the players by the coach in their Practice sessions and workout is made to resolve the weakness. This is made by a software called e-Cricket Pro(developed by phoenix solutions).This software is also used many of the TV broadcasters to brief all the situations, all the minor information are stored in their databases to used accordingly and given some feed to the Commentators.

These are some areas in Cricket where IT is used in fact there are many major areas which are yet to be discussed but still there is a great amount of technology involved.
Now the essence is that , playing cricket not only entertain the viewers but also made people innovate with some great ideas which are helpful in building IT.

The High-F"iPhone" Indianised....

Well the "i" factor seems to have been working for the APPLE,Inc.The latest launch,The iPhone, after all the hype,is finally out with loads of people waiting outside the Apple Stores,AT&T stores in various parts of USA.Mobile Maniac's there,had a few sleepless nights just to buy this Fabulous Gadget And finally the reviews are ON and many of them say that "Its Worth having that Hype".

Different Models in iPhone

Now let me Indianise this topic as many of us want to have a hand over it. "When will it be launched in India?","What could be the price?","Will it work in hands of Indian customers?",these are the probable questions many of us will be having.But i have done my part of research and found out some answers and this is post is all about it.

Launching in India,this might take some time,Infact it was said earlier by the Apple,Inc. that the Asia Pacific deals will start in 2008,but now the recent news is that they will be out in the Indian Markets soon this November.

Now the immediate question is "Where do we get them?",The Apple,Inc made a deal with HCL and Wipro for their product sale.In fact even the previous gizmo,Ipod had its sale option through HCL.The product cost is $499 with 4GB capacity and $599 with 8GB capacity.The cost of the phone is still yet undecided for Indian Market.However people who want to have one from their US relations, a small caution,the iPhone is not going to work as the Apple,Inc. have tied a deal with AT&T,so effectively its more a US product as some conversion has to be made to make it work in India.And phone has to be registered online with AT&T Security code through iTunes.Any how soon it will be launched in India for its effective Usage for Indian Customers.so No worries here as well.

a Horizontal View of the iPhone

Now its functionality in India,seems to have troubled many people.In order to answer this,let me explain you with its features.The Impressive feature of this device is the Touch Screen Facility.The Apple has embedded Mac OS for the functionality and the GUI(Graphic User Interface) effects are completely Astounding.The Touch Screen facility was made the major use of this phone.The phone can be used vertically and horizontally with a 3.5" display.The iPhone sports itself with a 2MP camera which seems to be doing good with this phone but the Hard fact is that we cannot record a video,its only a still camera.Soon or later we can expect a Video recording facility in later models.The remaining features are same as every other mobile has,like the calculator,calender,clocks,remainders,notes..,etc.

iPhone Screenshots in different Menu's

The iPhone basically is made with four major options,Phone,Internet,Music and Mapping.The Indian users majorily treat it as a phone with an iPod as the scope for the Phone based Internet is still low .This comes to the fact of comparing this phone with the existing music phones."Will it be worthful to spend so much amount as we can have all the same features with a low price?".If this is the query then I would say that iPhone,specially to the local customers doesnt appeal much but if you are looking for a phone which is highly Sophisticated,and want to make a style statement,then this is what you need.The underlying fact is that all its features can't be used effectively.The full fledged features are really Excellent,the Graphics,Visual Display,flexibility to shift from one feature to another,sleek hardware with a stylish look will definitely grab everyones attention on you.The Internet feature is tremendously outstanding.The Battery life,they claim that it is 8 hrs and the music playback is 24hrs.But the Concerned factor is that "How far is this True?," because the iPods fail to keep up the Promise.

Now the unique features of this phone is its Graphics.It will redefine the Style statement which many of the existing Mobile Manufacturers did.The most stylish way to make a call and listen music,browse internet is here and this is not all.The Multimedia Utilities are also working great.The onscreen QWERTY keyboard make SMS's,edit documents,make mails really simple.The Auto Rotation of Screen,You Tube player,photo viewer,onsite Zoom option, everything is Brilliant.Now, by knowing about its features,it is surely meant for people who handle their phone sensitively but if this made to handle Rough hands then this definitely will outdate all the existing Mobiles.

WIRELESS LAN AND SECURITIES

ABSTRACT

Motivated by the need to reduce IT costs while increasing employee productivity; enterprise-wide Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) solutions are becoming increasingly viable. With Wireless LAN’s users can access shared information without having to look for a place to plug in, and network managers can setup or augment networks without installing or moving wires. Thus Wireless LAN’s have gained extreme popularity in a variety of industries and applications over the last few years, health-care, retail, manufacturing, warehousing, and academics to name a few. Proliferation of Mobile computing devices has boosted employee demand for access to their organization network beyond the tether of their office workstation. Meanwhile, accelerated wireless transmission rates and increasing vendor adherence to standard based interoperability are enhancing the practicality of Wireless LAN’s. Yet the same wireless technologies that can erase the physical limitations of wired communications to increase user flexibility, boost employee productivity, and lower cost of network ownership also expose network based assets to considerable risks.
The Security embedded in wireless LAN’s technologies falls short of providing adequate protection. Early adopting organizations have found that evaluating, and where possible, mitigating these risks before deploying a wireless LAN is beneficial. This paper also summarizes wireless network security planning by providing an overview of the security risks and technical challenges in this area, as well as summarizing key recommendations for a secure Wireless LAN’s.

Network Security-Firewalls

Abstract:

The Internet is a marvelous technology advantage that provides access to information in revolutionary ways & in a timeless manner. Its explosive growth also causes major danger that provides the ability to pollute & destroy information in even more revolutionary ways. Everyone is jumping on the Internet bandwagon today. So this leads to various attacks by the unauthorized users. In an organization, the use of some resources or data may be restricted to a few people. People who are unauthorized to use these resources can gain access to them by using the passwords of other people.Over the past few years, the organizations central intelligence agencies, U.S. department of justice & NASA have had their web sites hacked. The hackers are using very sophisticated tools for gaining unauthorized access to computer system. Therefore it is important to secure a network.

Network security is the effort to create a secure computing platform, designed so that users cannot actions that they are not allowed to perform but can perform the actions that they are allowed to.

One of the popular techniques to secure the network is implementing firewalls. A firewall provides not only real security but also often plays an important role as a security blanket for management. A firewall can also acts as a corporate ambassador to the Internet. Thus a firewall acts as a safety alarm in this scenario. You can use a firewall to protect your home network and family from offensive Web sites and potential hackers.

In this paper, the way of obtaining a secured network and thereby integrating the freedom and privacy by employing a proper security organization which prevents the unauthorized access caused by several intruders such as viruses, worms, Trojan horses or hackers etc,. is discussed. This paper also presents the types of attacks and the counter measures to be taken for those attacks.

Infrared Keyboard....

No Words to describe how cool this Gadget is....Well this is a new key board called as ITECH VIRTUAL KEYBOARD....This is basically BLUETOOTH & Infrared enabled while da basic mechanism is like this...this devices transfers our keystrokes via wireless networking n da data is transferred to ur PDA or Pocket PC..This 22nd Century gadget is about half the size of da average deck of cards, sits wirelessly on any flat surface, and projects a red standard QWERTY-layout(like da layout of da normal keyboard we use daily) keyboard on any flat opaque surface Using detection technology it "watches" our fingers hit the key locations it has projected, and then sends the keystrokes through to your PDA, smart phone or pocket PC via Bluetooth. The projected keyboard is highly visible even in strong light (though it does of course look spectacularly cool in the dark).It is highly portable n u'll b definitely interrupted by everyone askin u dat "wer can i get this keyboard!!!!". The price of is keyboard is a bit high...but i'll tell u one thin if u wanna luk different n stylish from others u hav 2 spend sme bucks :))

Projector Keyboard

Rs. 12999/-

Features

• Infrared Projector Keyboard - projects a keyboard template onto any flat opaque surface.
• Runs off mains or battery (2 hour run time per charge).
• Works with laptops, PC's, Windows Mobile, Palm OS5 and Smartphone (device must have Bluetooth enabled!).
• Main unit has sound effects control, intensity of projector keyboard, time out settings (to conserve battery life), key sensitivity.
• Size: 9 x 3.5 x 2.5cm

Specifications:

• PC Windows 2000 or Windows XP required for installation of drivers onto PDA or other handheld device.
• Keyboard drivers for PDA or other handheld device or smartphone will be transferred from your PC.
• Detection Rate - Up to 400 characters per minute.
• Detection Algorithm - Multiple keystroke support.
• Effective Keystroke - Approximately 2mm.
• Battery Capacity - 120 minutes continuous typing.

Contents:

• Infrared keyboard projector
• Carry case for projector
• Mains adaptor
• 2 x mini-format CD-Rom's for driver installation
• Instruction manual/quick start guide.