Disoriented

I was strolling around Glorietta the other day and noticed this big tarpaulin poster the mall put up to cover the renovation being made to the section damaged by an explosion in 2007. Walking on the second level, I was approaching the atrium and the activity area from one of the hallways when I noticed the huge poster showing what that side of the mall would like after the construction is done. I thought that it was a good idea. But as I got near the atrium and started walking around the corridor, I felt something was wrong as the corner of my eye caught the huge poster. So I turned my head towards the direction of the poster as I walked around the side of the atrium and I realized I was feeling a little nauseous. I got disoriented momentarily, in 3d! And I knew what was wrong. I think the photo’s angle was off. The scale at some points around the atrium is bit confusing as well.

View from hallway
(click photo to enlarge)

From the hallway, the scale and angle seems correct, but as I walked towards the atrium and started to see the floor below, it all went wrong.

View from 2nd level corridor
(click photo to enlarge)

More of the uneasiness came when I went to the atrium and felt the presence of the giant monochromatic people above me. I felt like they were going to step on me or pick and eat me.

View from activity area
(click photo to enlarge)

Inconsistent horizon level
(click photo to enlarge)

The artist who made the 3d could have made the scene more on the eye level so that the floor would not run up high the scene. Background artists of sitcoms are good at this. They have the correct perspective and a good sense of scale. Try to remember scenes from Palibhasa Lalaki, Home Along da Riles, and Bubble Gang. I think there is also a mistake in the composition of the entourage (people) in the scene. Notice that the eye level of the people used in the photo does not fall on the same horizon. I drew a red horizontal line on the photo and leveled it on the eyes of the nearest lady. The two people farthest on the scene on the ground floor are off the horizon. Incorrect perspective. With that and the sheer size of the poster, I got disoriented!

2 Cities

This is Makati, a portion of Metro Manila, Philippines:


And this is Prague in Czech Republic:

Click here to see the city in 360 degrees, in very high resolution! Enjoy!
(I tried to find if something like this was done for a city in the Philippines but there was none. I guess nobody's interested. How sad...)

Watered

In his October 11, 2009 article on the Inquirer, Arch. Augusto Villalon pointed out that the Philippine government’s (local and national) response to natural calamities such as the recent typhoons Ondoy and Pepeng is careless. So careless, that they think of measures to undertake a day or even hours before the event. Even worse, they "plan" their response when a disaster is already happening. If I remember my lessons right, planning is supposed to be thinking ahead in preparation for an expected event or series of events. Now, when a critical event is a big and obvious possibility, it is also critical to plan big and way, way ahead of time. I heard someone say that we cannot really say what’s going to happen because these are acts of nature, acts of God. Agree. However, the elements brought about by these acts have been around us for millions of years that we know how they behave. Their behavior is already obvious to us. Imagine Metro Manila and its streets as a huge dry dent on the ground. Within are smaller and deeper dents with water, the esteros. Even a deeper and larger dent is the Pasig River that leads to the deepest dents outside Metro Manila, the Manila Bay and the surrounding seas. Now if we started to fill the deep dents inside Metro Manila, water would seek and take up the space on the next dent available. Isn’t that obvious? And we don’t want that water to be on the dry dent where we are, don't we? Then why fill up the esteros and the rivers? Not only with garbage, but also with soil and concrete.

The canals and esteros of Manila, the tributaries of the Pasig River, were wide and clean back then. Just like in Venice, the canals of Manila used to play a big role in the capital’s transportation and commerce. People would go around the town and trade goods via the natural water system.

An estero in Old Manila
[photo from Ohio Historical Society]

Tondo Canal
[photo from Smithsonian Institution Research Information System]

Now when we hear the word estero (Spanish for estuary) or canal, we’d think of a channel with dark, muddy “water”, stagnant or flowing on it. Pasig River and its branches don’t appeal to us anymore. Nowadays we can easily ignore the importance and the role of these waterways in our daily lives. We only remember the part they play in the urban life when we see the waters which are supposedly running on them come rushing through our streets and filling up our living rooms. If we don’t want to be watered again, let us reconsider how we treat our rivers and canals before they consider us (the way we don't want to be considered).

Looking Back

I watched Apocalypse: Second World War on National Geographic the other day and I couldn't help but imagine how Manila would look like if it was spared from the war. So I looked for photographs and illustrations of how Manila looked like before the war and here are some of what I got:

[photos from Smithsonian Institution Research Information System]

After the war:

[photo from here]

[photo taken from here]

Could Manila be a "more interesting" place if the bombs did not land on it? Could it have evolved differently?