a home for my scans

Well, something of a new chapter in the continuing saga of my scans.

I discovered that you can buy extra space from google. This blog is actually hosted by google and I really like the interface and it randomly occurred to me that I should set up a blog for scan city.

I'd discovered that when you upload pictures to your blog, they go into something called picasa web folders, also a google product. Then I discoverd you could buy the extra space and a plan formed that I could buy a wodge and upload my magazine scans there. That way, I can still use the main scan-city site to host my artbook scans as I'd originally planned, but it means my magazine scans aren't 'going to waste' (not that they ever were--just after the whole AP thing they'd been left without a home).

So I've set it up here - scan-city blog. It took a little experimentation last night to get things to work as I'd hoped. What I hadn't appreciated is that pics you upload via the blog get resized to be a max of 1600 pixels high. But if you upload directly to picasa they can be a lot bigger, so I had to work all that out.

Also, what I don't want to do is upload my originals. Generally, I actually scan at 400ddpi and occasionally do 600dpi too. I also save as very high quality jpegs, making the individual files quite monster.

Also, things like posters I often take multiple angles of. My scanner is A3, but Japanese mags are generally slightly larger than A4, so when they do a 2-page size poster it's a little bigger than A3. That means as well as doing a full-page scan, if it's a series I like or an image I like, I often scan it in two halves as well.

But I don't want all of them on there, or at those sorts of sizes, so it means I'm going to have to go through and re-save everything. This also gives me the opportunity to add a "micro sig" I came up with to identify the scans as mine.

I'm kinda used to this--it's similar to what I used to do for upload to AP--but of course I never kept the versions I uploaded to AP (my thinking at the time was why bother--I've got bigger versions already :/) so it means over a years worth of stuff to plough through :(.

I've also decided to combine the spreads from now on, rather than do individual pages like they are for that first Animage that's up there at the moment. It means I can make the files smaller, there's physically less files to upload and I also think it looks better.

I also scanned the new megami this w/end and I actually scanned some other stuff too--a freebie book and 'groundwork of gurren lagann'. Not huge things with too many scans, but hopefully it sets a trend.

Nia book turned up on Friday--it's nice, although I'm not really into loli, so it's not quite in the same league as the yoko book was. I've also ordered a second copy of Geass Rebels following the successful completion of some e-bay auctions.

Obviously doing some scanning means I had a chance to watch some new 'mu:

• Allison & Lillia. Watched a couple more and my opinion is unchanged. It's really very good indeed. The story itself is quest like in nature, but it's also reminiscent of something like Kino's Journey. In fact, if you imagine Kino's, but with a central purpose as well as less reliance on the abstract and allegorical, you're pretty much there.
  
• Naisho no Tsubomi. Hmm, if I admit I thought this was good, it also kinda marks me out as a weirdo. This is what I could describe as a "coming of age" slice of life story. As in literally--it's about a girl changing into a young woman if you see what I mean. She enters puberty, gets a first crush on a boy, discovers what pregnancy is really all about (her mum). Really then this is more aimed at young teenage girls, but it's actually pretty well done--it has a strong air of reality to it and is sensitively done.
  
• Amatsuki. This was really very good. After something of a spate of Shounen Ai type shows I'd thought that this may be another, but it isn't at all really. It's about a kid that seems to have been time jumped back to the Edo period and has spirits and magic and stuff. That's not a very good sell, but I actually really enjoyed it--another stand out show of the season for me.
  
• xxxHOLIC - Kei. Kinda okay, I guess. I'm disadvantaged that I've not seen the original and I believe this is also somehow tied into Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicles, which I'm also unfamiliar with. I've an upcoming review of X where I kinda discuss how I don't quite "get" CLAMP, so I'll leave it there, I guess.
  

I've also got a long way into GUNxSWORD (which turns out has nothing to do with Gonzo as I said in a previous blog--dunno how I got that idea :/). It really is a cracking show. Definitely one for a future review.

What else? Oh yeah--having spent a fortune on cleaning products the other w/end I brought them to bear this w/end, and everything (well, most everything) is all sparkly fresh again.