mardi 15 décembre 2009

(super) Road Trip!

Hi there everyone! I'm back! I was hoping to do my laundry tonight but apparently somebody moved in the apartment next to the laundry room, so it's closed. Tant pis, I don't feel like going back to the lab anyway (yes, I'm fed up with my thesis) so I'll revive my blog, which has been kinda quiet for the past few months.

For a good reason! I've been to Brazil on vacation, a summer school, Germany on work, Italy for fun and now working like crazy! Not so much time to write..

So, I was obliged to go to Germany by car to get my precious PC over to the DLR for seting up the final demonstrator for the final review meeting of the european consorcium, the AccuRobAs. I left around 10:20 on a beautiful sunday (the 11/10) and arrived at Munich (close to Pasing station) at my hotel around 22:30. A nice trip, no surprises, was a little worried that my credit card would not work in Switzerland but it did. Beautiful paysage in the French alps, near Grenoble!






Switzerland was boring as always and I couldn't go so fast on the Autobahn cause I was running out of fuel! so most of the time I spent looking 4 a gas station. Not so much fun (I did 180 km/h once on a longer stretch but that was it). Once again proud of my little Brava (champagne)




And yes, I did have to work very very hard in Germany. I don't often say this, cause I think it sounds stupid when sobody says that he or she had to work his ass off (in my opinion, that's lazy talk). But it was the beggining of the (still ongoing) most stressfull period of my life. I've been pretty much having all stress symptoms I could ever detect: aftas, alergies, loss of hair, my eye's jumpin, cannot sleep, anxiety, etc... But they had good beer! And I had quite a few..

Weissbier





Finally, the demonstrator worked at the last minute and it was a big (HUUUUUUUGE) relief. I had to switch between 4 acquisition boards to make it work. Damned, it was stressful..



Job done, I headed south to Bologna (yep, trenitalia on strike and I had to go pick up Sara -- merde alors)... After a rather weird crossing over to Italy (weird mountain/death roads in Austria) I picked Sara up and headed to Deiva Marina, in the Cinque Terre national park!

Here it is:


And that place is super cool! While the rest of Europe was under heavy rains, I was enjoying a beautiful sun and very pleasent temperature. This place is really amazing, it's definetly worth checking out! Here are some pics
















Overall, I drove around 2500 km !! Not bad!!!



On monday, I headed back to Montpellier (was glad to be back home) and to work! Not really :P I had to go sailing of course! I took a weekend to go sailing on a proper boat around the Montpellier bay. Was not so much fun though.. Much less sportive than the Catamaran and the weather didn't help (we spent saturday docked at Sète and that wasn't much fun).. It was, however, an interesting experience and now I know that if I have to go back to Brazil by boat, I'm probably going to die :P

Here are some videos that I've uploaded to my youtube account:





e esse video é o mais engraçado.. O lobo dos mares ensinando a gente com toda sua didatica (fais ce que je te dis, je m'en fous comment tu l'as fait, fais-le et c'est tout!)



And that's not all! I still did very very short laps with a lamborguini Superleggera, like this one here:


But i drove it like this :P



So.. that's how it ends, the story of my second semester at Montpellier.. Between some Salsa lessons and the thesis, that's life "south-of-france" style..




R

mercredi 25 novembre 2009

Latest News!

Hi there everyone, i haven't been posting anything for some time now .. lotta stuff going on, finishing my thesis and everything..

just wanna tell you all to check out my youtube page, I've recently posted some videos there

www.youtube.com/rogerioar

and while doing it, check out this old tune! :P
http://www.deezer.com/listen-3155191

mercredi 4 novembre 2009

White Bus Demolition Derby

This one goes for my friend Pedro, from Seven Lakes city, Brazil, thanks Pedro for sending me these cool vids!

So, leaving the thesis aside for a second, this is worth a post on my blog, of course! ;)

First I'll let you see the white bus from hell, terrorizing this city in Russia! This guy must consider himself a lucky **********.



white bus strikes again



and again!



Now here's the full story!
:P



anybody that understand russian can explain this to me?? me, i lived 23 years in Brasil and I've never seen this amount of destruction!

long live TransUrb, Gyn!

jeudi 1 octobre 2009

Aints and Traffic Jams

I guess some people have seen this video on youtube,



This was a study from the Nagoya university on the phenomenon of traffic jams!

Now, let's take this incredible lesson from nature

http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/23176/

cool, right??

R

mardi 8 septembre 2009

German way of life

Galera, peço a todos pra lerem o post da minha amiga Fernanda, que faz seu doutorado em Munique sobre uma festa de aniversario alemã.. Ela descreve muito muito bem o desconforto que nos latinos sentimos durante as celebraçoes dos nossos amigos germanicos!!

http://mochilaoacademico.blogspot.com/2009/09/jeito-alemao.html

pessoalmente, eu dei umas boas gargalhadas!

dimanche 16 août 2009

Violencia na midia

Assim nao da. Apos a repercussao mundial do caso, eu assisti uma entrevista com o tal deputado amazonense na Internet, onde ele explicava como ele conseguia as noticias antes da concorrencia. Seu segredo? Botava equipes de reportagem no IML, que corriam antes do 'carro-tumba' nas cenas de crimes para obter sua reportagem. Francamente.. Que sede de sangue é essa pela parte dos telespectadores que motiva uma equipe de TV a realizar tal plano? Seria grande a diferença entre os circos romanos, onde o publico assistia pessoas sendo devoradas por leoes na arena e a televisao brasileira, que publica apenas o "aftermath", o famoso " Tah laaah mais um corpo extendido no chão"? O ridiculo vai além dos programas "sensacionalistas" de nomes sugestivos como "chumbo grosso" ou "190", que passam apos o almoco . A triste realidade da midia brasileira se mostra mais claramente no horario nobre, na famosa "seçao sangue" dos telejornais das 8. Se o que estou dizendo parece novo para voce, experimente notar o conteudo dos primeiros 30 minutos de todos telejornais da noite.

Faremos agora um paralelo com a televisao francesa. Apesar de nao ter uma televisao em casa, é facil diferenciar o teor das noticias que por aqui sao difundidas. Reportagens sobre atividades de verao, curiosidades sobre o pais e regiao, entre varias outras reportagens mais edificantes. Qual seria entao as consequencias de uma televisao menos sanguinolenta? Nao é dificil concluir que, naturalmente, o teor das conversas entre colegas de trabalho, familiares e amigos é significantemente mais descontraido, menos pesado e mais alegre.

Atravessando a fonteira com os "fratelli", a minha curta estadia na bela Italia me deixou a marcante impressao que 90% de todas conversas naquele pais giram em torno de 2 principais assuntos: Berlusconi e o nosso caro papa. Ainda duvidam do que estou dizendo? www.libero.it, ou www.repubblica.it .. vedi e credi

Tal poder da midia sobre as populaçoes é conhecido desde muito tempo, mas uma pergunta para no ar. Até que ponto todo este fenomeno nao se trata de um circulo vicioso? Até que ponto o telespectador realimenta a midia, pois afinal a midia tem interesse em prover ao telespectador aquilo que ele deseja ver, seja pelo interesse de vender "telesenas", arrebanhar fieis ou manipular a opiniao publica. Tudo isso nos tras de volta ao caso do deputado amazonense.

http://terratv.terra.com.br/Noticias/Brasil/4194-244868/AM-deputado-nega-crimes-para-aumentar-audiencia.htm

bbc news:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8200820.stm

le monde:
http://www.lemonde.fr/ameriques/article/2009/08/13/l-audimat-etait-presque-parfait_1228385_3222.html


O que tem voce a dizer sobre isso?

R

samedi 15 août 2009

Robots in our daily life (pt)

Hi everyone,
every now and then I find myself stuck in the lab in a saturday night so I need a constant reminder of why I'm doing what I'm doing.. of course the answers are very personal but I guess this video will helps you who has a "normal" life understand why research has a lot to do with one's personal goals in life!

http://terratv.terra.com.br/Especiais/Entretenimento/Discovery/4535-227518/Guerra-nas-Estrelas-A-Ciencia-da-Ficcao-Inteligencia-Artificial2.htm

It's in portuguese, sorry :(

R

dimanche 12 juillet 2009

Serie Must-Do's at Montpellier - 1 - Catamara Course

Last week I took a Catamaran course at the Ecole de Voile at Palavas-Les-Flots with Antonio. I must say that it was one of the coolest things I've ever done here at Montpellier and I totally recomend it to everybody.

We took our 16 m Hobie Cat to the sea the very first day and quickly learned the basis. We were damn lucky: we had the tramontane (north wind) blowing for the whole week! I must say, me and my coequipier Antonio are twice more radical than before this 'cata' course :P

Now we're level two sailers!! :) Hey, I know what u're thinking! At least we're not level 0 as before in Goiania! And we even took the little boat to extremes! We even almost capsized the cata a couple of times!! ROCK AND ROLL!!

Here's a cool video to show all that can be done with the little catamaran we had:


samedi 4 juillet 2009

(Es) Para refletir

Video Blog!

Hey! dont forget to check out my Video Blog on Youtube!
www.youtube.com/rogerioar

jeudi 2 juillet 2009

Tramway

I guess I also have the same addiction as Amelie Poulain.. i dont find weird insolite stuff, they find me!! check out the drunk guy sitting at the bench pulking at the ad for the Tramway!!



Hope he also pulks at Arruda, mayor of Brasilia who wants to copy the tramway tech back home (superfaturadamente, obvio)!! Mardito!!

Noticia do correio

mercredi 1 juillet 2009

Electrifying Images!




Check out these experiments on a very particular way to find the perfect lighting for your pictures...

Simply amazing!

http://www.wired.com/culture/art/magazine/17-07/pl_art

samedi 20 juin 2009

Road Trip! (Lille)












The 5 hour trip on the TGV wasn't so much fun but we made it to Lille.. we quickly found our cool Ibis hotel and came back to the Gare to pick Antonio up.. when we were about to ask ourselves 'ok, now what?', Dani heard someone speak portuguese and we met some cool Brazilian girls who invited us for some drinks in a pub nearby! We talked a little and people soon found out about my amazing skills in salsa and so we went out dancing to the 'cubanito'..


The Domenican girls danced really well (so well that they had to dance with themselves cause nobody was good enough to dance with them). We ended our soirée around 3AM and made it home in a pleasent spring chill (9°C)


Nxt day we woke up around 11, had a coffee at Paul's and I took a train to Valenciennes to pick up the car with Lucas.. Was glad to see my brother was still alive. Antonio and Dani were xploring Lille but they weren't so sucessfull.. :P

Before ending this post on Lille, I have to say something about the weird oeuvres d'art that were spread in the city center.. The topic of the exposition was: 'Anges et Démons'.. apparently, the baby's body represent the angel and the deformations are the 'démon' within.. odd but cool, like most good things in life =)

vendredi 19 juin 2009

Augmented Reality (2)

Bruno has recently posted a cool video from the researches at Rennes (LAGADIC? correct me if I'm wrong) and I promissed to post the link to the research group at Oxford..

Check out the Ewok rampage demo!! really cool

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9HMn6bd-v8

They keep a page on youtube with lots of interesting demos!

http://www.youtube.com/user/activevision

check it out!

lundi 15 juin 2009

Road Trip!

Finally, the adventures of last weekend's road trip is on my blog! Check out the precise route, 1240 km according to Google, featuring small swiss mountain roads, wineyards and medieval fairs!!


More on the roadtrip soon on my blog :)

dimanche 24 mai 2009

(Pt) Para refletir

Quando lemos Mankiw (versao portuguesa) em nossos cursos introdutorios de economia, nos deparamos com a célebre explicaçao do principio do "tradeoff". O exemplo é do 'tradeoff' entre Mickael Jordan cortar a grama de seu quintal e jogar basquete. Obviamente se ao invés de cortar a grama do seu quintal, ele pagasse alguem para corta-la, seu lucro seria varias vezes maior visto que ele é uma estrela do basquete e a remuneraçao pelo seu tempo de jogo é bem maior que a de um cortador de grama.

Agora analisemos o caso de outra perspectiva: sem o cortador de grama, Mickael Jordan haveria sua vida social abalada pelo aspecto 'familia adams' de seu jardim, consequentemente afetando sua atividade profissional. Logicamente, o trabalho do cortador de grama esta indiretamente relacionado ao trabalho do jogador de basquete. E podemos encontrar analogias assim em toda parte.

Logo, que passemos a olhar com outros olhos este organismo tao complexo que é a sociedade humana, com mais respeito as atividades profissionais daqueles ao nosso redor.

Em suma, diga 'bonjour' ao motorista do onibus e o camarada que limpa sua lixeira!

http://www.hojenoticia.com.br/editoria_materia.php?id=24414

lundi 18 mai 2009

A Must Visit Blog...

http://awkwardfamilyphotos.com/2009/05/16/awkward-exclusive-bon-family-blowout/

For a moment of relaxation, this is worth it :P

dimanche 10 mai 2009

More Wood in the Fire (mais lenha na fogueira)

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/05/creationism-dig-violated-students-rights/

just like euronews: no comments

Transformers?

It's really beautiful to see mankind assembling highly complex systems with scientific purposes. Hopefully someday people will stop their childish fetish for weaponry and realise that without a common effort towards less selfish goals, earth will become a paradise..

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2009/05/gallery_nif

vendredi 8 mai 2009

Hot topic: Cognitive-Enhancing Drugs!

http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/jamais-cascio/open-future/me

This is an old discussion.. I've read this paper somewhere else pointing the downside of these drugs but I strongly believe that progress will be made and in a very near future, we'll probably be feeding people some 'smart' drugs..

for now, i rely on the good old brazilian coffee!

dimanche 26 avril 2009

Doctor of the Future

http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/135/the-doctor-of-the-future.html

"Health care accounts for $1 in every $6 spent in the United States"

I think this speaks for itself.. Innovation is really the cure for the health system? Pretty good discussion on this article. New trends and case studies.

Computer graphics at work

So far, I believe computer graphics' the popular cousin of computer vision. Here's an example, if you know what i mean ;)
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/ed_ulbrich_shows_how_benjamin_button_got_his_face.html

lundi 13 avril 2009

Humanoids.. oh humanoids...

http://www.ijrr.org/ijrr_2008/volume27-issue10/096316/QRIO-navigation.wmv

A robot going through a room, recognizing obstacles using stereovision. As we can all see, the state of the art still far from sci-fi performance! Hasta la vista...

dimanche 22 février 2009

Bonjour!

Maybe English's better, this blog SO FAR, has absolutely no purposes! I'm registering here pretty much everything I find 'cool' or worth 'putting on my blog'..
cheers people n happy reading