Last weekend Demodays 2011 [aka Buenzli 20] took place in Olten Switzerland, and I was finally, luckily able to attend it. It was an awesome party, and even more awesome
was meeting some of the people I had only known by nicknames till then, in person. I also had a chance to meet with the founder of one of my top 2 favourite demogroups, Satori. The weather was quite lovely, the BBQ was great and all in all it was quite a load of fun. I only wish I had taken more photos. But the few that I did take, you can find here.
There was also a good number nice productions this year. The OHP demo compo was as always very cute. In the “interactive” category, someone had come up with a type-writer, auto typing one liners from various scene websites for the duration of the party. In the PC demo category there was a lovely new demo from Satori, and interestingly enough Calodox had a prod after pretty much forever.
The Satori demo, named “Burnside Odyssey” is definitely one of the most awesome demos I’ve ever seen. It really is a work of wonder, with breath taking visuals and lovely music. Some of those colours and patterns really send me tripping. Seeing that demo on the big screen was quite fantastic. Even though unfortunately due to hardware efficiency issues the demo was running at a pretty much slow motion rate, it still was a marvel to look upon. Below you can see a video of it, but it’s best if you check out the exe here.
The one thing that I find somewhat less than fortunate, to be completely honest, is the result of the demo compo. I’m sorry to be saying this, but I find the winning demo completely and utterly dull. To me it looked like a poor remix of scenes from a few previous demos of the same group, dyed with a rather awful layer of gray on top. There were at least 2 demos in the compo that would have deserved the spot quite a bit more… but anyway, it looks to me like the events that followed have caused a bit of a drama… check for yourself here.
So it took a tad long for me to sort through the load of photos me and Genox took from the Swiss National Day [1st of August] fireworks. But it’s finally done, and you can check out a selection here in this album.
It was a quite a lovely day, starting with a good load of BBQ and ending with possibly the most exquisite fire works I’ve ever seen up close. And I’m not putting that lightly. We were on the top of a heal in Niederwil, so that we had a good view to all the surrounding houses and farms. It seems like the people of Switzerland make it very much their personal business [and not necessarily a government responsibility, as it is often the case in Canada for instance] to make the 1st of August celebrations as shiny as possible. Basically, every single house in the vicinity had their own fireworks, some of which were really really amazing. So imagine standing on a top of heal, in the middle of a circle of fireworks, quite a few of which put the Y2K fireworks to shame. Huge colourful glow raining on you from all directions. You try to catch everything with your eyes… and more than a few times I came very close to falling down backwards… It was completely insane and truly awesome.
Oh, right, I forgot to mention…. the pictures and movies from Fasnacht 2011 parades are online! You can check them out here. =)
I was at the venue both in Biberist and Solothurn this year, so there’s photos and videos from both. It was quite a lot of fun being there, and I’m still collecting confetti from my clothing, shoes and the flat’s floor. =P As you may notice in a couple of Solothurn videos / pics, I was given a bit of an up close and personal confetti shower so when I got home, I was looking like a very colourful clown of some sort, specially since confetti has a way of sticking and staying in my curly hair. =P
A few examples:
Oh wow, would you look at this? Yesterday I came across the coolest news here in this article. Apparently the first robotic amusement park of Europe is being built in Neuchatel [I’ve actually been there! ;)]. Check out the article for more info.
So you can imagine how excited I was to read about this. I feel like a million box… I’m actually going to be there! =D I now have to go see where I can find more information about this. This is absolutely AWESOME, WOOOOOHOOOOOOOWWW! =D
![Robosphere[1]](http://lh4.ggpht.com/_Tl7xVSHEwJs/S9Nr5Q6jmPI/AAAAAAAAAV0/Fi-PHwppzcY/Robosphere1_thumb1.jpg?imgmax=800 "Robosphere[1]")
Oh God… Oh God…. OOOOOOOHHHHHHHH GGGGGGGOOOODDDD…. only 4 days left. As previously mentioned on the Purple Blog, on Sunday the 16th I shall fly to Zürich, and have what will probably be one of the most unusual and exciting holidays of life. So much is coming… so much is about to happen… soooooooo much to look forward to. Of course right now every second feels like an hour, every hour feels like a day and every day feels like a month. I guess the reason for the major excitement overdose is obvious: there’s a little city not so far from Zürich, called Solothurn, and there’s a certain Genox in Solothurn… well… yeah! =)
And there’s more…. a lot more. It’s very complicated right now, I can’t foretell what’s going to happen in the coming months, but lets just say that in the not very far future I may not need a plain ticket anymore when I want to see Genox. I have some serious homework to do while I’m in Switzerland. I have to figure out the final details of what I may be getting myself into. So much excitement, so much to do….. 😉
![Robosphere[1]](http://lh4.ggpht.com/_Tl7xVSHEwJs/S9Nr4wiVxdI/AAAAAAAAAVw/9MHhURGXqzg/s1600-h/Robosphere13.jpg "Robosphere[1]")
