Graham  Bratzel

What I’m reading:

The Ear, The Eye And The Arm, by Nancy Farmer. I remember liking this in 5th grade or so, and I haven’t read it since. It should be a nice break after Brando Sando. Then maybe Red God will be out.

What I just read:

The Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson. Its reputation recedes it, and I appreciate a rules-based or pseudo-scientific magic system like this that gets into socioeconomic implications more than the “there’s a school where they learn about it” of the Name of the Wind. Which I think might have been the first series where an orphaned magic boy goes to magic school? I can’t remember. I also might be salty about Doors of Stone.

What I’m designing:

A 3D printed track for the air timer for Deep Sea Adventure. Fit is fine, but it turns out that physical UX is tough.

What camera I’m using:

The X-T5, mostly with the Sigma 56mm f/1.4 around the house and the 18-50mm f/2.8 for out and about. But downtown at night? Still the GR III.

I even just sent my A7IV gear to MPB. I know, I know, full frame, but I don’t want to edit, and the X-T5 is quieter. After the X100VI and GR III, I appreciate a quiet shutter. And I have my recipes set: Astia, Reggie’s Portra, a high contast B&W from Captn Look, and so on. I eschew verisimilitude.

Would you like to know more?

I can tell you about the time I played …

  • A headless electric bass in a sci-fi jukebox musical to sold out shows at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

It was my high school’s performance of Return to the Forbidden Planet, and I sewed my own costume as a Space Rodeo Clown.

  • Smoke on the Water on a giant harp that used the Space Needle as the soundboard.

Too long for pizzicato, of course, so you bow with gloves covered in rosin.

  • Tic-tac-toe against a chicken and lost every time.

If tic-tac-toe weren’t a solved game, I’d have concerns.

And the time I won …

  • A bike competition with a trike we finished in the parking lot the night before.

Lucky for us, the design report awarded more points than the actual race.

  • A jazz combo competition while wearing a utilikilt and protecting my upright bass from my sporran’s buckle.

The bass was school property, but it’s never right to hurt a bass.

  • A remote controlled airplane competition after building it using only a given box of limited supplies.

It had yardstick wing spars, a gutter fuselage and Spitfire wings, and we soaked the engine manual’s pages in superglue to blend the wing roots.