latest spinning

Sep. 19th, 2025 07:19 am
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee
Ah, the art yarn of it all. :3

handspun yarn

2-ply from these singles:

podcast friday

Sep. 19th, 2025 07:09 am
sabotabby: (doom doom doom)
[personal profile] sabotabby
 You should stop whatever you're doing and listen to Wizards & Spaceships' latest, "The Science Bros Answer Your Science Questions Part 2." There's a lot of explaining physics (and the problems with time travel, but also how mutable the immutable laws of the universe might be), and more slagging off the idea of Mars colonization. But most importantly there's a bit about dragon evolution that is rad as hell. It will make your day.

Reading Wednesday

Sep. 17th, 2025 06:55 am
sabotabby: (books!)
[personal profile] sabotabby
 Just finished: Notes From a Regicide by Isaac Fellman. Goddamn this was good. It's one of those dreamy, elegiac works where I'm at a loss to tell you exactly why it affected me that strongly (but honestly, read the plot summary I mentioned two weeks ago) and that's a critical part of its strength, the degree to which Fellman inhabits the story. I've seen a lot of post-apocalyptic, we're back to a lower technology level settings, but very few where the social and cultural changes affect the style (the other one is Ada Palmer, who is writing semi-utopian, higher-technology settings but does a similar thing where the prose evokes a more historical style but is off slightly, because it's the future). He's also doing a lot of work with biography and memory; there is one part where Griffon, reflecting on Etoine, describes him as cold, admits we've seen almost nothing of this, and suggests that he only really talks about his moments of passion in disproportion to how he was in regular life. This is very much a throw-you-into-the-deep-end type of book in terms of its worldbuilding, and even to some degree its characters. We never really find out who Yair was beyond the cross-dressing Jewish guy who took Etoine and Zaffre in when they moved to New York, and that he's dead and they still mourn him, and it doesn't matter, because it's outside of Griffon's scope and his parents don't like to talk about the past.

Okay, I think that actually nails down why it resonated with me so deeply. It reminds me of my grandparents—who, for the record, were not trans, were not revolutionaries or leftists in any way, and were not artistic—in the way that when they told stories, they would evade a great deal. Like a Turner painting where most of it is an ethereal abstract and you get maybe one section of specific detail. It was frustrating as a child, of course, never really knowing your family's story, and I think this is a pretty common experience and why everyone is so obsessed with genealogy and connecting with fifth cousins these days. I imagine even more so if you find out your parents were artist-revolutionaries in a magical city frozen in time. Anyway. I loved this one quite a bit.

It's Okay, Just Set Me On Fire by Billions Against Billionaires. This is a 'zine, which I wouldn't normally log except it's really good and I wanted to draw your attention to it. It's about how fascist billionaires suck. All the writing is quite strong and it includes a single-player Basilisk simulation RPG and you should get it for the cover alone. It was quietly slipped to me by a member of the collective who put it out and now my goal is to write something worthy of the second issue. Here it is.

Currently reading: Antifa Lit Journal Vol. 1: What If We Kissed While Sinking a Billionaire's Yacht?, edited by Chrys Gorman. Well, the first story fuckin' whips. I mean, it's an anthology about how fascists suck. Maybe there's a broader rant I have about author/editor-led anthologies in general, because I keep having the same issues with them (see what I did there?) but it's a project worth doing anyway, and worth buying for the cover alone (so buy it).

lolnope

Sep. 16th, 2025 04:02 am
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee
behold, a spammer

A particularly hilarious example of low-effort spammer/scammer.

Seriously considering how much spam I could effortlessly screen out if I set up my email to automatically delete ANYTHING with the word "Amazon" in it that isn't on a very small (like, a half-dozen people small) whitelist of family and close friends.
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee
(cross-posted: [community profile] communal_creators)

earlier:
- part 0: preliminaries
- part 1: brief demo: engraving software (Dorico)



Brief walkthrough of the start of a fake piano sketch in Cubase Pro that I'll build into a hybrid orchestral piece using MIDI and VSTs. I don't claim this is good music, just something for demonstration purposes and to talk through some of the technical details. This is musically unexciting but covering DAW basics will make the later hybrid orchestra bits easier to understand, hypothetically.

(Sorry, the audio recorded in mono; I will look at my audio interface settings again.)

For those curious about my usual style(s) of music, my music reel.

a 3-ply yarn

Sep. 14th, 2025 04:13 pm
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee
(cross-posted to [community profile] communal_creators)

Earlier:
- part 0: preliminaries (includes partial glossary of terms)



I know there are a lot of people who haaaaaate being forced to sit through video but since audio playback is inherent to the enterprise...This is under a minute, promise.

This is a brief demonstration of the opening of one of my compositions partially engraved (~sheet music typesetting) in Dorico. The two industry-standard engraving apps in media composition scoring are Dorico and Sibelius; Finale used to be a third but was sunsetted to much consternation.

If you come from classical music (especially classical orchestral music), you may be ??? about the score formatting. This is because scores for session orchestra and concert/classical orchestra have different formatting! (See part 0: preliminaries for more detail as to why). Differences for session orchestra you see here include:

- Score is in C (NOT a transposing score for the conductor - nota bene, transposing is "allowed" for octaves), but we won't have e.g. horn in F or trumpet in Bb. Read more... )

As for playback:

- Guess what, Dorico and Sibelius at the level of orchestral scores are spendy. :]

- I'm using NotePerformer, which is the standard higher-quality playback engine, especially if you don't have time to mock it up in the DAW (or you're an art/concert composer for whom a mockup is not part of your workflow). But that's also money (~$130 USD).

NotePerformer is pretty credible with a lot of orchestral instruments. You still have to massage its output. For example, in Sibelius [not shown] you can set playback to molto espressivo (LOTS OF FEELING) vs. senza espressivo (NO FEELINGS EVER!!!) (etc). My experience is that particular instruments can be less "real"-sounding and the "vocalists" (both SATB choir and associated "solo" voices) are absolutely terrible, as in "my vacuum cleaner sings more credibly than this" terrible.

Aside: There are some good vocal VST libraries for specific use cases. I hate that I am often able to straight-up identify "Oh yeah, XYZ floating ethereal ~Celtic Twilight vibes soprano 'ahhh' ululation in this trailer/score/whatever was $SPECIFIC_VST_LIBRARY" because, apparently, I have no life; but this is not unusual in this field.

I know at least one full-time composer/orchestrator/musician who straight-up bounces NotePerformer output and then processes that in the DAW (reverb etc) and, you know, this person makes a living doing this. So that's one route one can take.

Why, you ask, can't we just export this score-stuff into a DAW with all the fancy (...spendy) VST instruments and "paste in" nicer/more individualized instruments? Dorico (and Sibelius) do in fact export to MIDI and MusicXML. [1] This is a very reasonable question that will be the topic of the next walkthrough (part 2), mainly because it's a surprisingly (annoying) complicated topic as to why this is rarely straightforward. (Let me tell you all about negative track delay...)

[1] Missed these glossary items earlier! brief explanations of MIDI and MusicXML )

Happy to answer questions, although I have no idea if anyone else finds this interesting. :p

not good spinning demo: EEW 6.1

Sep. 13th, 2025 01:04 pm
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee


Dreaming Robots' Electric Eel Wheel 6.1 e-spinner with some sacrificial Rambouillet/Gotland wool blend. Sorry about the mess; too hot to go outside with this. I don't claim this is good spinning, just a brief demonstration of Getting The E-Spinner To Do A Thing.
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee


Ashford Traveller (single treadle although you can see that, Scotch tension). Spinning mulberry (bombyx) silk from combed top.

podcast friday

Sep. 12th, 2025 07:20 am
sabotabby: (doom doom doom)
[personal profile] sabotabby
My major podcast news is that I finally finished listening to Mike Duncan's French Revolution series. A phrase I remember from the foreword to the copy of Ulysses I read as a teenager always sticks in my head: "you put it down with the triumph of a general suppressing a revolt," or something like that. I commend the effort it took to make this podcast—it's nso much research and writing and analysis and it's an incredibly good history of the French Revolution.

But.

Nothing really sticks in my head. This is possibly because Mike is more interested in dates and names than I am, and more interested in military strategy than either he claims or I can understand. But it's also a factor of his voice, which he can't really help, but I'm quite allergic to what I call NPR Voice. I just kind of drift off. It's kind of like, "this happened, and then this person did this. How droll." I have the same problem with Conspirituality sometimes, and pretty much all the time with Democracy Now. It just slides off my brain. Nevertheless it's worth listening to if that is not a problem for you.
dreamerinsilico: a small, stylized white cat (Pangur Ban from The Secret of Kells) (Default)
[personal profile] dreamerinsilico
Hello, and thank you in advance for creating for me! 

Please consider prompts as offerings for potential inspiration, rather than an attempted restriction - I don’t sign up for exchanges with my heart set on something hyperspecific, and would rather you write something you’re interested in.  

For completeness (so if you're reading this letter, you don't need to tab back and forth to my signup), I will include the information for each fandom that's in the signup, with any additional details.  (Information copied from my signup will be in dark purple text.)

General preferences

General preferences )

Hades

Hades )

Interview with the Vampire

Interview with the Vampire )

Baldur's Gate

Baldur's Gate )

The Silmarillion

The Silmarillion )

The Lord of the Rings

The Lord of the Rings )


spinning WIP

Sep. 11th, 2025 05:21 am
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee
Or: if your goal is threadweight/cobweb, why silk fiber is not quite as profligate an expense as you might think:



The white is mulberry bombyx silk; the tawny stuff was my briefly foraying into eri silk. This is for personal use/enjoyment (needle lace) so it's fine that I'm wandering off like this. This is several hours of admittedly inefficient spinning, since I take frequent breaks so there's a very start-stop nature to it, but because the spin is so fine, this bobbin is...not very full.



This is what I have REMAINING in 2 oz. of mulberry silk combed top (about $25 USD). It exploded out of the package (typical) and also, it barely looks like I've even used any of it. As it stands, I suspect I'm going to be spinning this combed top for the next 30,000 years. :)

That said, silk is my absolute favorite to spin and I prefer spinning threadweight, so this is not a hardship.
yhlee: a fox with the label FOX YOU! (fox you!)
[personal profile] yhlee
Ex Tenebris: a gothic space opera TTRPG [Kickstarter, already funded!].

Beyond the dark emptiness of space, beyond dreaming, lies the Tenebrium. Only you can unearth its mysteries, defeat the twisted horrors that lurk there, and keep humanity from becoming prey.

In Ex Tenebris, you play a ragtag team of investigators, protecting the Republic of Stars from terrifying supernatural threats. You will face sorcerers and cults, dark technology from lost civilisations and the slobbering terrors lurking in the nightmare realm of the Tenebrium.

Ex Tenebris is a complete TTRPG containing all the rules, setting and scenarios that you need to embark on adventures amongst the stars.

[...]

Ex Tenebris takes inspiration from the grotesque imagery of the Aliens movies, the existential dread of Event Horizon, the mysticism of Dune, the dark gothic setting of Warhammer 40,000, and the weird science/magic fusion of Ninefox Gambit.


- Josh Fox, lead designer & writer
- Becky Annison, writer
- Juan Ochoa, illustrator
- Nathan D. Paoletta, layout and graphic design
- Andriy Lukin, logo design
- Jog Brogzin, cartographer
- Chirag Asnani, writer
- Sarah Doom, writer
- Eleanor Hingley, writer
- Kieron Gillen, writer
- Yoon Ha Lee, writer (howdy!)
- Tejas Oza, writer
- Galen Pejeau, writer

alpaca adventures, cont'd

Sep. 10th, 2025 04:49 pm
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee


Test spin of small experimental alpaca floof batch.

For lagniappe, the completed smol woven object made from my handspun that's headed to [personal profile] eller, mostly wool/silk/angelina blends (both colorways). :3

Reading Wednesday

Sep. 10th, 2025 07:34 am
sabotabby: (books!)
[personal profile] sabotabby
 Just finished: Nothing.

Currently reading: Notes From a Regicide by Isaac Fellman. I'm getting near the end of this and it's so good. By the way, fantasy authors, this is how you do worldbuilding. Fellman isn't concerned with why things work as they do, the details of how the post-apocalyptic New York functions or why Stephensport is stuck in time; everything is character, narrowed to the focus of Griffon and Etoine. Even Zaffre's rebel activities are in soft focus—we know there are revolutionary trans nuns (hell yeah) but Etoine is so hyperfocused on her, and what she represents, that the scale and scope of their rebellion are outside the scope of his understanding. 

And it's just written so well. There's a subtle strangeness to all of the language that is just weird and offputting enough to feel like journal entries of two men across a gap of time and culture, not only from us, but from each other.

processing alpaca floof, cont'd

Sep. 9th, 2025 02:42 pm
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee




I used hand carders after washing, then drying outside. It's extremely fluffy (and probably de facto blended with catten floof). I've never spun alpaca before, so that's next!
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee
Wrapping up this tiny DIY loom + handspun (the yarns and the silk thread) for [personal profile] eller. :) Mainly bobbin-end leftovers from plying yarns that went to their furever homes. :)



yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee
The adventure begins. :)





(Alternately, I have misidentified the bag and it's really mohair?!)
yhlee: Alto clef and whole note (middle C). (Default)
[personal profile] yhlee
(cross-posted with slight adjustments from [personal profile] foxmoth at [profile] communal_creator)

Howdy! I’m Yoon, an MFA student in media composition and orchestration. I am here today to talk to you about sampled orchestral mockups in composing music.... It’s a niche field even in (media) composition due to the cost + tech barriers to entry. I thought folks might be curious (and maybe interested in trying their hand at a lower-cost version of it).

To the extent that I have musical training (mostly Obligatory Asian-American Piano Lessons by volume), it’s classically inflected. Even folks who hate classical music :) probably know it exists. A more “traditional”/conservatory approach to writing for (symphony) orchestra might involve pen-and-paper composing to generate sheet music. This is my background and I still do a lot of sketching on staff paper.

This inherently means you’re reading (Western classical) music notation (of which more anon) and often means you’re wrassling explicitly with music theory and related topics.

However! These day, hiring a session orchestra is semi-doable by a dedicated individual if you have the money lying around. Read more... )

So most mortals who are doing orchesstral or hybrid orchestral scores for film or TV and especially non-AAA video games are using sampled orchestra mockups.

Note: unless otherwise specified, if I say “music notation” or “music theory” I’m referencing more or less common practice Western (European-derived)-style music notation simply in the interests of avoiding unwieldiness in this overview. some further observations )

Hiring a session orchestra may be surprisingly semi-doable by a normal human but most work in orchestral media composition (film, TV, video game scores) is now done in software via sampled orchestral mockup. This includes classical-ish, e.g. John Williams everything or Carlos Rafael Rivera’s score for The Queen’s Gambit, or hybrid orchestra (e.g. Two Steps from Hell) with synth or “modern” instrumentation elements.

A quick and dirty (incomplete) overview of terms you might come across in this space, with simplified explanations. There’s a LOT of jargon, some of which is obscure or confusing even to e.g. classical musicians entering this space! Read more... )

This has all been in the way of preliminaries, apologies! This is an extremely technical field so the jargon alone is A Lot.

These days, composers often write (in that workflow) using engraving software. In this context, this means “music typesetting for sheet music,” and for session work specifically there are strict formatting rules to save time (money). The other workflow for computer-based composition + production (i.e. not tracking live instruments, of which more discussion later) involves taking everything into the DAW and producing realistic-sounding mockups in software. I will (in future posts) run through DAW examples of this (hopefully with video + audio capture so you can see the workflow).

Happy to answer any questions; it’s almost impossible even to gesture at a bunch of the music or tech stuff in a small space, and I have almost certainly missed some useful jargon because it's UNENDING. :p

ETA #1
next: part 1: brief demo of engraving software + playback

needle lace WIP

Sep. 7th, 2025 03:33 pm
yhlee: a stylized fox's head and the Roman numeral IX (nine / 9) (hxx ninefox)
[personal profile] yhlee
Perhaps overly ambitious for a project, but I'm doing this as a fun hobby fidget with no expectation it'll turn out "well." (In real-life, this is fiber-based trolling.)



I started this a few years ago but life got busy.

(Technical details posted elsewhere to [community profile] prototypediablerie.)