My Life Is Murder – season 2

On By Rick McIn TVLeave a comment

I didn’t have much motivation to continue with this otherwise entertaining show as it’s quite formulaic. Few surprises.

The star is some weird kind of police consultant who is asked in on murder cases that have gone cold. Or might get cold.

Does she get paid? … It doesn’t seem so.

My main incentive to continue with season 2 was that Lucy Lawless moved the show from Melbourne to Auckland. 

Detective Harry Henare replaces DI Kieran Hussey. Exactly,.

George Stathopoulos replaces Reuben Wulf as the owner of the small restaurant where Lucy sells homemade bread. Exactly.

Formula.

Ebony Vagulans as Madison Feliciano, Alexa’s assistant, is just as sassy. BUT moves in with her boss in Auckland. 

They made more of an effort to show off the local scenery. Auckland is gorgeous.

William Shatner asks Alexa out in episode 4. 😀 It’s as much a comedy as a drama.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

“Upscaling” photos in 2023

On By Rick McIn photos, product complaints, product endorsements, videoLeave a comment

Image scaling (upscaling) refers to the resizing of a digital image.

When upscaling a photo, more pixels must be generated. 

There are different ways software tries to do this.

Based on this tutorial, I downloaded the Upscayl app which is FREE and offline. 

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

When it works, results can be amazing. 

For me it certainly hasn’t worked, at times. A very bad photo is hard to improve.

Here is one of my 4K iPhone photos compressed smaller by Instagram. It looks fine on a phone, but terrible if you zoom in on a good monitor.

Check the same photo upscaled to 16,128 x 9,072 pixels on Flickr Pro.

Zoom in.

This is ONE of the many reasons I store my original photos on Flickr Pro, not one of the free social media sharing sites. They all compress.

Henri, le Chat Noir 😀

On By Rick McIn humourLeave a comment

Val introduced me to the Henri videos.

Existential angst, as only a cat in France could suffer. 😀

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Henri, le Chat Noir … French for “Henry, the Black Cat”) is a web series of short films on the existential musings of the cat Henri, written and directed by William Braden.

… Braden was inspired by the American perception of French films as “very pretentious and self-involved.

Henri was actually from Seattle. He lived to the age of 17.

Requiem by Geir Tangen

On By Rick McIn booksLeave a comment

Geir Tangen is a Norwegian crime fiction writer and blogger.

Requiem is a good book — but I gave up at 55% finding it too bleak. Too dark. 

Nobody to cheer for. 

In fact, I should give up Nordic noir completely.

Happy Valley – season 1

On By Rick McIn TVLeave a comment

I finally got round to watching the 2015 BAFTA for Best Drama Series. 

Happy Valley is fantastic TV — but very hard to watch. It’s simply too intense. 

Devastating.

Catherine Cawood is a divorced police sergeant with two children.

She is still trying to recover from the suicide of her daughter, which happened eight years ago.

Catherine is raising her grandson, Ryan, who was born due to her daughter being raped by Tommy Lee Royce.

Just when it seems like Catherine is gaining control over her life, she discovers that Tommy, whom she holds responsible for her daughter’s suicide, has been released from prison after serving time for other offences.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Lazarus by Lars Kepler

On By Rick McIn booksLeave a comment

One of the best thrillers (2020) of the year!

Kepler treats us readers to a nonstop roller coaster of suspense, taking us deep into the hearts and minds of perfectly realized characters.

And, oh, what a villain!

—Jeffery Deaver

This is a very intense novel.

A mysterious killer is brutally murdering Europe’s most loathsome criminals.

When police discover that two of the victims have disturbing connections to Detective Joona Linna, it’s clear that somebody’s trying to send him a message.

As the body count rises, the evidence seems to point to a ghost from Joona’s past… the most terrifying villain he’s ever had to face.

Surprisingly, detective Saga Bauer is the main character in this book.

Joona Linna disappeared in order to protect his daughter from the bad guy.

The Artful Dodger (2023)

On By Rick McIn TVLeave a comment

The Artful Dodger (2023) is an Australian / New Zealand television series …

… sequel that includes characters from the classic Charles Dickens novel Oliver Twist (1838). 

It features Thomas Brodie-Sangster (Sam in Love Actually) as the eponymous Artful Dodger and David Thewlis as Fagin. …

Maia Mitchell as Lady Belle Fox, the governor’s daughter, self-educated in the field of medicine …

The two do have chemistry.

What I like about this show is the fast, YouTube-like editing. Modern music. Funny dialogue.

A fresh take on Oliver Twist.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Inspired by Photographer Peter McKinnon

On By Rick McIn photos, videoLeave a comment

Best of the best when it comes to photography online.

How does Peter motivate himself? 

…. Change. Challenge.

He switched to film only for a year, for example.

Click PLAY or watch his year in review on YouTube.