August 14
Day 28
Hello. Today I am only at work for a few hours because I have a leadership meeting at my school, so this will be very brief. Roger told me to continue to make the new ICAs and PCAs for the same images, and hopefully I will be able to finish those by Friday. I am also really getting down to work on my final presentation, gathering data and assembling the slides. I hope to have it done by early next week, so I have time to practice it and get comfortable with it. I love to give presentations and talk in front of crowds, so I am looking forward to showing people what I have been doing this summer.
DFTBA
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
Being Productive
August 13
Day 27
Hello. Needless to say after visiting the Observatory last night, I was a little tired today. But I got here, bright and early, and I got stuff done. Yep. I'm still really tired.
In reality though, I did get through a lot of files today. I finished running all the files through one processing method yesterday, and I started on the second process today. It's mostly a lot of waiting for files to load, but once they are all done I will finally get to make the Polynomial Texture Maps, which will be exciting because its new and will hopefully have good results.
DFTBA
Day 27
Hello. Needless to say after visiting the Observatory last night, I was a little tired today. But I got here, bright and early, and I got stuff done. Yep. I'm still really tired.
In reality though, I did get through a lot of files today. I finished running all the files through one processing method yesterday, and I started on the second process today. It's mostly a lot of waiting for files to load, but once they are all done I will finally get to make the Polynomial Texture Maps, which will be exciting because its new and will hopefully have good results.
DFTBA
Mees Observatory
August 12
Day 26
Hello. Yesterday I didn't get into work till around 1, then I worked for a few hours, finishing all of the files that Roger had left for me. All of the interns left from CIS and we went to Mendon Ponds for a Sticky Lips BBQ picnic. We then drove to Mees Observatory in Naples to go star gazing. Our tours guides were very nice, giving us the history of the Observatory and testing our knowledge of stars and galaxies. The forecast was not great, but we got very lucky and the sky ended up being clear. We looked at double stars, the Ring Nebula, and other amazing things. I thought that the Ring Nebula was the coolest, it looked like a smoke ring floating through space. Last night was also the peak of the Perseid meteors and we were able to see some from on top of the Observatory. The sky was so clear of clouds and light pollution that you could faintly see the Milky Way. It was an amazing experience.
Here is a link to the Observatory: http://mees.rochesterastronomy.org/
DFTBA
Day 26
Hello. Yesterday I didn't get into work till around 1, then I worked for a few hours, finishing all of the files that Roger had left for me. All of the interns left from CIS and we went to Mendon Ponds for a Sticky Lips BBQ picnic. We then drove to Mees Observatory in Naples to go star gazing. Our tours guides were very nice, giving us the history of the Observatory and testing our knowledge of stars and galaxies. The forecast was not great, but we got very lucky and the sky ended up being clear. We looked at double stars, the Ring Nebula, and other amazing things. I thought that the Ring Nebula was the coolest, it looked like a smoke ring floating through space. Last night was also the peak of the Perseid meteors and we were able to see some from on top of the Observatory. The sky was so clear of clouds and light pollution that you could faintly see the Milky Way. It was an amazing experience.
Here is a link to the Observatory: http://mees.rochesterastronomy.org/
DFTBA
Friday, August 9, 2013
Bring a Friend to Work Day
August 9
Day 25
Hello. Today was bring a friend to work day. I invited my friend from school who was interested in the research I am doing. It was fun to see her and to meet all of the other interns' friends. We had the picnic today, though we had to eat inside because it was raining. Probably the best part of today was having to explain my work to people. It will be good practice for the presentation. I saw when they got tired of me talking and I saw what topics they thought were more engaging. I took my friend on a tour of the labs, some of which I hadn't even been in yet. It was really cool to see what all of the other interns are doing.
I am almost done with the Latin manuscript files and, hopefully, on Monday I can try to Polynomial Texture Map program. On Monday all of the interns are going to Mees Observatory in the evening, so I will only be in the lab for a few hours. I am so excited for the observatory! It sounds like a really cool place with a great history. The Perseids are happening while we are there so I hope that the sky is clear so we can see them well.
DFTBA
Day 25
Hello. Today was bring a friend to work day. I invited my friend from school who was interested in the research I am doing. It was fun to see her and to meet all of the other interns' friends. We had the picnic today, though we had to eat inside because it was raining. Probably the best part of today was having to explain my work to people. It will be good practice for the presentation. I saw when they got tired of me talking and I saw what topics they thought were more engaging. I took my friend on a tour of the labs, some of which I hadn't even been in yet. It was really cool to see what all of the other interns are doing.
I am almost done with the Latin manuscript files and, hopefully, on Monday I can try to Polynomial Texture Map program. On Monday all of the interns are going to Mees Observatory in the evening, so I will only be in the lab for a few hours. I am so excited for the observatory! It sounds like a really cool place with a great history. The Perseids are happening while we are there so I hope that the sky is clear so we can see them well.
DFTBA
Thursday, August 8, 2013
August 8
Day 24
Hello. Today was pretty uneventful. No computer problems at all, and I got a lot of work done. I am almost done with creating the ICAs and PCAs for the Latin manuscript. After I finish those I get to start experimenting with the Polynomial Texture Mapping program. I think that that will be fun and I am looking forward to learning something new.
This morning we had a intern meeting about our outlines for our final presentations. Mine didn't get too many comments, which I think is a good thing but some more feedback would have been nice. The one thing that someone did say though was that my presentation and that Calvin's (the other historical document restoration intern) presentation look to be very similar and he wondered why we were not presenting together. While the base of our projects are the same, up until the Latin manuscript we have been working on completely different projects and those are what we are focusing on. He is focusing on the Archimedes pages while I have been working on Saint Catherine's data. These require different processing and have different stories.
I think that the key to my presentation will be making the audience understand why the research matters. I think that the best way to do this is by giving them the background and the story of the manuscripts and make the manuscripts not some random piece of old paper, but a possible key to important mysteries in history. Calvin made fun of me the other day for getting excited about the Roman death mask, but I have always loved the history of Rome and to be able to work on something like that artifact was amazing. I mean think about it, that mask was made as a remembrance of a man who died 2000 years ago. And I can still see what he looked like. That's crazy. Often when I ask Roger where the manuscripts come from or how old they are he doesn't know and he is more interested in processing them. But I feel like adding the extra level of story to the process makes it more interesting and engaging.
DFTBA
Day 24
Hello. Today was pretty uneventful. No computer problems at all, and I got a lot of work done. I am almost done with creating the ICAs and PCAs for the Latin manuscript. After I finish those I get to start experimenting with the Polynomial Texture Mapping program. I think that that will be fun and I am looking forward to learning something new.
This morning we had a intern meeting about our outlines for our final presentations. Mine didn't get too many comments, which I think is a good thing but some more feedback would have been nice. The one thing that someone did say though was that my presentation and that Calvin's (the other historical document restoration intern) presentation look to be very similar and he wondered why we were not presenting together. While the base of our projects are the same, up until the Latin manuscript we have been working on completely different projects and those are what we are focusing on. He is focusing on the Archimedes pages while I have been working on Saint Catherine's data. These require different processing and have different stories.
I think that the key to my presentation will be making the audience understand why the research matters. I think that the best way to do this is by giving them the background and the story of the manuscripts and make the manuscripts not some random piece of old paper, but a possible key to important mysteries in history. Calvin made fun of me the other day for getting excited about the Roman death mask, but I have always loved the history of Rome and to be able to work on something like that artifact was amazing. I mean think about it, that mask was made as a remembrance of a man who died 2000 years ago. And I can still see what he looked like. That's crazy. Often when I ask Roger where the manuscripts come from or how old they are he doesn't know and he is more interested in processing them. But I feel like adding the extra level of story to the process makes it more interesting and engaging.
DFTBA
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
August 7
Day 23
Today was surprisingly free of technology issues. I got the files on the new drive that I was waiting for yesterday and kept working on those. The person who gave us this data also gave us a suggested ROI to use for the images. Unfortunately this ROI was not working for all of the images, and I spent today trying to see if it matched any of the files. After that I continued to make ICAs and PCAs for the Latin manuscripts.
While I was waiting for the drive this morning I did some work on Zooniverse. Zooniverse is a website that lets researchers post data that they need more manpower to examine. This website allows anyone to help researchers find new stars or count the number of fish in a given area. My favorite is the project that helps to monitor wildlife in the Serengeti using wildlife cameras. All you have to do is record how many lions or elephants that you see in the image and you are actually helping with conservation efforts in Africa. It is really cool and I think that harnessing the power of the internet is a great way to get research done with limited funding. If you have any time go look it up.
DFTBA
Day 23
Today was surprisingly free of technology issues. I got the files on the new drive that I was waiting for yesterday and kept working on those. The person who gave us this data also gave us a suggested ROI to use for the images. Unfortunately this ROI was not working for all of the images, and I spent today trying to see if it matched any of the files. After that I continued to make ICAs and PCAs for the Latin manuscripts.
While I was waiting for the drive this morning I did some work on Zooniverse. Zooniverse is a website that lets researchers post data that they need more manpower to examine. This website allows anyone to help researchers find new stars or count the number of fish in a given area. My favorite is the project that helps to monitor wildlife in the Serengeti using wildlife cameras. All you have to do is record how many lions or elephants that you see in the image and you are actually helping with conservation efforts in Africa. It is really cool and I think that harnessing the power of the internet is a great way to get research done with limited funding. If you have any time go look it up.
DFTBA
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Why, technology? Why?
August 6
Day 22
Hello. This morning started off really well. And then the fickle deities of technology decided that I had been productive enough for one day and killed my computer. After the screen completely froze and I shut the computer down, I restarted it and tried to get back to work. But something was wrong with the program that I was using, ENVI. It ran into errors every time I tried to save an image or calibrate and image. I eventually realized that the problem was because the memory on my disk drive was almost out (200MB left). This made it difficult for the program to run and impossible to save anything. Luckily, we had ordered 4 new drives, 3 Terabytes each, and they came in late this afternoon. It will now take 6.5 hours to move all of my files and sync the drives. Hopefully I will be able to get back to work tomorrow. I feel like I've said that a lot. Maybe this time it will actually happen. It was nice to have a break this afternoon, though.
DFTBA
Day 22
Hello. This morning started off really well. And then the fickle deities of technology decided that I had been productive enough for one day and killed my computer. After the screen completely froze and I shut the computer down, I restarted it and tried to get back to work. But something was wrong with the program that I was using, ENVI. It ran into errors every time I tried to save an image or calibrate and image. I eventually realized that the problem was because the memory on my disk drive was almost out (200MB left). This made it difficult for the program to run and impossible to save anything. Luckily, we had ordered 4 new drives, 3 Terabytes each, and they came in late this afternoon. It will now take 6.5 hours to move all of my files and sync the drives. Hopefully I will be able to get back to work tomorrow. I feel like I've said that a lot. Maybe this time it will actually happen. It was nice to have a break this afternoon, though.
DFTBA
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