Reverse Milky Way

Before I fell asleep last night I watched a ton of music videos that the artists filmed in reverse. It's pretty amazing how they learned to lip sync the words backward so they appear as if they are actually sung forward. This concept has produced some very interesting effects - just check out Mute Math's oh so untypical video:

http://vodpod.com/watch/526182-mute-math-typical

Editing and mixing video has led me to experience some rather unique dreams - one of my favs involved speeding up and slowing down time...but none as oddly intriguing as reverse motion.

Last nights dream wasn't lucid...in fact it felt quite real...real enough to fool me to believe that time was running backward. Why in the world would I believe such a thing? Let me share just one experience from my dream:

I'm racing down a very tall hill...and the further I go, the faster I fly - when suddenly, I look to the sky and see the milky way spinning in reverse. It gave me a really weird sensation, like I broke the barrier of time. At that moment, I came to a complete halt and just watched the stars spin in reverse. I really don't know how long this lasted, but it felt like forever.

I'm not sure this dream meant anything, really. I mean, I'm basically thinking about video effects and motion 24/7 because theres unlimited possibility when it comes to mixing visual elements. Either way - it's worth checking into. "Reverse Motion in Dreams"

http://books.google.com/books?id=FrVdlB94eJ0C&pg=PA132&lpg=PA132&dq=reverse+motion+milky+way+dream&source=bl&ots=eeLf0NV8Kd&sig=-F0qc3QTpqB1PLp6IFLlm5n22l8&hl=en&ei=B9OES_6jCZX-Na_5vDM&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=9&ved=0CCMQ6AEwCA#v=onepage&q=reverse%20motion%20milky%20way%20dream&f=false

^^I came across this interesting passage in The Brothers Karamazov but otherwise nothing is written on reverse motion in dreams that I could find. I searched Dream dictionaries with "Milky Way spinning backward" & "Reverse motion" and "Reverse motion Milky way." This came up for spinning:

"A process, activity, or project where something is being created—such as a relationship, a foundation or beginning, art, or anything that can be created"

Dreamin' Up Tunes

Dreaming opens us to a level of understanding we often overlook in waking life. Maybe because during the day our minds are preoccupied with fleeting thoughts - school, work, food, love, friends, family - plus all the jazz we like to indulge in during our downtime. No wonder it's during the quiet hours of the night when our imagination is operating at peak potential. I found this interesting:

Paul McCartney came up with the tune for the song "Yesterday" in a dream:

"I woke up with a lovely tune in my head. I thought, 'That's great, I wonder what that is?' There was an upright piano next to me, to the right of the bed by the window. I got out of bed, sat at the piano, found G, found F sharp minor 7th -- and that leads you through then to B to E minor, and finally back to E. It all leads forward logically. I liked the melody a lot, but because I'd dreamed it, I couldn't believe I'd written it. I thought, 'No, I've never written anything like this before.' But I had the tune, which was the most magic thing!"

Two Moons: My Mass Effect Dream

Some of you may have heard of the game Mass Effect 2. I've never played it. My roommate who G33ks out on his PS3 hooked up to a massive monitor boasts a visual output on ME2 that puts 1080p Blueray to shame. (I didn't think that was possible either, but all I can say is wow - sleek graphics man.) I'm not sure why I'm sharing this except for a simple connection: my dream which boasts such stunning visuals I'm pissed I don't come with a record button. This particular dream stemmed from the original game, not your hot off the rack release from this past week.

I fell asleep last night after a couple solid hours of traveling different galaxies in Mass Effect. The first one. Surveying the planets. Collecting random probes and sediment. I'd only played once before, about a year ago and didn't travel outside the Citidel. For non-g33k3rs, The Citadel is a massive space station, constructed over 50 millennia ago in the heart of the Serpent Nebula close to the star known as the widow.

*If none of this makes sense to you, just imagine a huge space station so far into the future the races that currently inhabit the ship don't even know who the ancestors were that built it aside from discovering little traces of their history. We can survey any planet - some are gorgeous and heavenly, but most are fire-filled, frozen or too treacherous to inhabit. So here we are, stuck saving humanities ass from all sorts of chaos. Light speed communication at our fingertips. Where is the inspiration behind this flowing from?

Try to chew on this creative masterpiece:

Travel through the Mass Effect universe is aided through the use of Mass Relays, which are technological artifacts that are capable of transporting vessels nearly instantaneously between star clusters and systems. There are two types of Mass Relays: primary and secondary. Primary relays are linked with a twin, and so have a single line of travel, but can span as many as a hundred thousand light years, according to the game's Codex. Secondary relays are omnidirectional and can send ships to any relay within its limited range of about a hundred light years.

In hindsight, I should have known I was in for another "video game dream" - where I literally have full control over my situations and outcomes, etc. To say the least, it was epic because it was almost like my dream self was being controlled in third person. So - woot woo, I wasn't afraid of heights.* If you check out my earlier posts, I still haven't mastered this when I'm awake*

All in all, after being warped around the universe and experiencing lighter gravity in my dreams I realize how friggin' powerful a single video game experience can be. Video games are far more powerful than movies because it's interactive, not passive.

There was truly only one part of my dream last night that stuck out. So I'm only including one dream content analysis quote for now. Let me explain - in my dream I am walking around with a very wise woman. She mutters something to me in Latin which started with a V. Vitruvian? No. It was three words. I felt as if I knew what she was communicating, despite not quite understanding the full context of the phrase. Suddenly I look up, and see two moons.

Both were blurry.

One dream interpreter explains: usage of 2s in your dream are symbols of "duality. It means that you are stuck in the middle of something. Whatever it is, you need to make up your mind in order to return to a state of singularity."

this contrasts with the two suns dream I had nearly a year and a half ago...

"People always "look to the heavens" for answers to life, history, and creation. The way you analyzed the reason for this amazing phenomenon indicates you're smart and you like to look to scientific things and probe for the meanings in happenings. There actually is a time when two suns are visible, and this event is called 'sun dogs'. I have seen it 3 times and it is quite weird to see the shadows from the light of 2 suns!"

This dream is validating that you have curiosity into the nature of events, and particularly your interest in science.

So although the graphics were no where as intricate as Mass Effect 2, the original still captured my attention enough to dream of being in a place unlike anywhere on Earth. I guess the heart of my idea is: if you play a game enough, do you start to view the world differently?

vincit qui patitur

"he conquers who endures"

veritate et virtute

"with truth and courage"