sukimon

This past weekend, I got to see King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, a documentary focused on two men, Steve Wiebe and Billy Mitchell, and their efforts to get the world record high score for the classic arcade game, Donkey Kong.

Although there was a lot of retro history and footage, especially of the Classic Videogame & Pinball Championships in Weirs Beach, New Hampshire, King of Kong was surprisingly accessible to the viewer uneducated in video game lore. Love, envy, disappointment, perseverance, redemption, King of Kong had it all, and by the end of the film, everyone in the theater wanted to see how things turn out for Wiebe and Mitchell. It’s like watching an early Wrestlemania event with a side of Rudy.

Currently, King of Kong is on a limited distribution schedule, so watch this film while you can, or petition your local theater to pick it up.

King of Kong official website
FAQ on King of Kong (NOTE: contains spoilers)
Twin Galaxies – The Official Arcade Scorekeepers

With a runtime of over 23 minutes, this is one of the more painful video captures I’ve ever seen, a Super Mario Brothers mod, apparently created by some masochistic Taiwanese. Hardest. SMB. Mod. Ever.

One can just watch the first couple of minutes, but for some reason I couldn’t look away, and after a while you’ll catch yourself cheering/yelling at the little mustachioed doode to make it.

• Hardest. Video. Game. Ever. (G4tv.com)
• And for those who can’t download stuff from G4, try this YouTube link.

Thanks to Knick for sending me the links to side scrolling pain.

So I finally got my super8mm, black and white rolls developed and transferred to video. Yes, super 8mm film is alive and (for now) kicking, thanks to music video, skateboard films like Charnoski and Nichols’ Fruit of the Vine or Tent City, and websites like Filmshooting.com. So why film? It’s more expensive to shoot, you have to pay more attention to lighting and exposure settings, you can’t immediately see the results, there are plug-ins and programs that can simulate the look of film, etc. Despite all these drawbacks, I love super8 film because:

• It’s more expensive, but it’s not prohibitively expensive; it’s the cheapest of all film formats.
• It’s relatively easy to get the equipment from garage sales or ebay.
• You could imitate the look of film with a normal video camera, but shooting film is an entirely different experience than shooting video. Anyone who’s shot super8 before knows what I’m talking about.
• Watching footage from a projector is such a different (and cooler) experience than viewing the same stuff via a dvd player and TV.
• Film is still the best archival media format. I could write a whole series of posts on this one, but it’ll be easier if you just check out the Home Movie Day or Film Forever sites.

Anyways, I thought I’d share some of the footage I got back from the developers, mainly for my friends in Oz and for Matt, owner of the currently defunct Fatt Matt’s Skatepark. Leave relevant comments if you want the film nerd details (i.e., what camera I used, film stock, film labs, etc.).

Enjoy.

click image link to download film

click image link to download film

click image link to download film

When not fixing other people’s problems, MB creates earrings out of Apple logo medallions extracted from old Macintosh cases. MB sold a bunch of these at one of the MIT Electronic Swapfests we visited this past summer and is now auctioning a pair on Ebay. As of this writing, there’s still time to bid on these retro beauties. Check out the pics below and see for yourself:

No serious Apple Computer Inc. collection is complete without a pair of these bad boys/girls. Bid now.