New Found Hobby - PLAMO

Heyya! So, these past few months have been a little busy due to work - and I'm starting to appreciate my shifting/rotating schedule! I like how we have some day offs during the weekday, and the challenge of commuting. But work is not what we're talking about now, it's about my new found hobby!

Me at Gundam Caravan during GMKC 2017 @ SM North Edsa Annex 

New Year, New Life.

As we go through each phase in our life, there are things we must learn to let go of. In my case, choosing a good start in my career, meant leaving all of my loved ones behind. In as much as I would want to work in the province, I cannot find a good opportunity to start my career in the IT industry, and as any person who desires to be in the industry, I made a decision to move into the Metro.

I started passing resumes after Christmas. I did that in hopes that there will be no scheduled interview during the holiday seasons. And sure enough, after a handful of resumes sent, I was called for an interview at 2 IT companies in Mandaluyong, and Makati, respectively. 

One problem of leaving the comforts of your home is finding a place to stay in an alien environment, so it's always a good idea to contact someone you know from the place you're going to. In my case, it's my cousin. I find their boarded house (I don't how to express it in english, lol) perfect because it lies in the middle of the places I was called for. 

The Journey

Hey! I took a short vacay just after the exam because,

IT FEELS SO GOOD TO BE HOME! 😌 

So, let me tell you what I had to go through during the 5-month reviewing spree. It was May and I had no freaking idea what was going on with me. I was excited and anxious at the same time. I am about to embark on a journey that will potentially change my future.
WARNING: Long Post 😀

All of us in 1 photo. Yes, we did not have beds. We slept on the floor. Sad lyf. 😢

The Journey. It wasn't easy. It wasn't hard either. It just depends on yourself. It's whether you make it hard, or easy. LOL I don't know what I'm saying. Okay, so there were 5 of us in our dorm. 3 of us went to the same review center, while the other 2 went to another review center. This allowed us to share our materials and knowledge, and "tricks" learned from each respective review centers. Another advantage of sharing the room with friends is the teaching and learning process. Of course, no one person can know it all. There were times when one of us, at random, just begin shouting questions and the others, sometimes, will respond. It was fun, spontaneously answering questions. 

The Review Starts!

Hi guys! I apologize for the lack of content the past few months. I just graduated college. Yes! And not yes. Yes, because I am finally a degree holder. Not yes, because I think the knowledge and experience I gained in 5, 17 years of education is not yet enough to prepare me for the real life. 

My girlfriend is already preparing for her life as a professional, and it makes me think of mine. I will still be taking my licensure exam, so I will have to review for about 5 months. By then, Andrea will already have a career. 5 months is a long time to think for my career, because as of now, I am still wondering what field am I going to specialize in. 

As an ECE graduate, there are a couple of fields of specialization to choose from: telecommuncations, semicon industry, aviation, medicine, navigation, broadcasting, audio, and networking, among other fields. 

I am personally interested in computers, so I am thinking of joining the IT bandwagon. Specifically the in the Networking field. I have little to no experience about networking though, as we barely scratched the surface in our lectures and limited lab equipments. I am planning on taking a cadetship or any job that has a training before employment. I also plan on becoming a CCNA. (Cisco Certified Network Associate) And continue that path.

The ECE board exam has a lot of pressure in it. Our school had passing rates below the national passing rate I think for the last 3 years. I hope this batch will break this rating. In the previous April ECE Board Exam, only 2 out of 12 first timers passed. (8 failed, 2 conditional) 6 out of 14 repeaters passed. (7 failed, 1 conditional) with an overall performance of 8 out of 15 passed and 3 are conditional. Wow. Our board exam is dubbed as "One of the hardest board exams." and I accept this challenge!

Anyhow, I apologize for the lack of posts for the next few months. We will undergo rigorous training (loljk) to finally become a registered ECE.

To my friends who's also reviewing for their board, good luck to us and may God help us!

To my readers, thank you for understanding!

And to everyone else, cheers!

On-The-Job Training at RPN 9

Hey guys! Yes, it's been a while. Really. This first semester of AY 2015-2016 is our OJT, ECE200B. They recently moved it from 2nd semester, to the 1st semester. According to the department, placing the OJT in the 5th yr 2nd semester (final semester for graduating students) breaks their concentration on academics. I agree. I can attest to that. Going to OJT really breaks the academic concentration of a student. Mainly because he/she is now focusing on his/her work rather than his/her studies. And there is A LOT of leisure time which made the focus (on studies) really difficult. They did this because the passing rate of our licensure exam is quite low, and inter changing the 1st and 2nd semester subjects, hopefully, will help the students focus. 

Okay. We did our OJT at Radio Philippines Network Inc., Manila. We didn't really decide, though. A friend asked us if we want to hold our OJT at CNN Philippines. Since it's new, (it only came to the Philippines last March 2015) we said, "Yeah, why not?". I was really excited, to be working in CNN. But unfortunately, we were assigned to its transmitter in mega Manila, RPN. If you must know, working in an STL (Studio/Transmitter Link) or in a transmitter in general, is not really exciting. And as a young, future engineer, I would like to make the most of my OJT. The hunger for action, adventure, and excitement. The only action we get during our stay there was during emergencies: power interruptions and fluctuations, and signal losses. 

RPN Tower.
"Tower of Ispleketengteng"
-Jonathan Mina

Rejected!

Hey guys. A lot has happened since my last post. This one will specifically talk about the experience about creating our regulated power supply (Because I forgot some of the things that occurred so, blame my memory). So it has been two weeks. Two weeks that we didn't have class for ECE 136. The instructor discussed a regulated and an unregulated power supply before giving us the instructions of computing, designing, and building our own power supply. We had to gather and compile all our knowledge of electronics to analyze and compute for the resistance values. 

Schematic Diagram of the Split Power Supply
Note: The values in the diagram are different
from the values computed. However,
the same transistors and rectifier diodes were used.

Radio-Active!

Hey guys! Haha. I can't believe my last post was 3 months ago! :O Time really flies, doesn't? Specially when you have so many things to do, you just lose track of time! Well, this past months have been really hectic. I'll just go over them really quick. 

In June, I was suggested by friends to be a video editor for the local Enactus Competition held last June 20. Pre-production began at around (if memory serves me well), June 2; that was creating the script. I believe almost all of the data that was needed was already collected. There were three groups, each with their respective projects and members. Ours was the "LUCKY THEO'S : A Potential Industry Giant." It was about a woman who is the first producer of dried mango in the province. The winners in the competition get to represent MMSU ENACTUS for the National Competitions, and the project was the conglomeration of the projects in the local competition. Also, the IT Experts (that's the video editors) are automatically a part of the team MMSU as well. So I had the opportunity to help represent the University in the National Competition. Working beside me was Jezar, a second year Marketing student.

La Virgen Milagrosa

Hey guys! Last Friday, (May 16,2014) we had our last class in our summer class. And last Saturday, we went out to La Virgen Milagrosa, Badoc, Ilocos Norte to have fun and celebrate because we can finally start our summer vacation!

La Virgen Milagrosa Chapel [Click image for larger view]

The story behind this saint is that there was a crate (or crates) that washed up on the sea. The fishermen found these crates along the boundary of Badoc and Sinait. In these crates were the Black Nazarene and the La Virgen Milagrosa statues.

First Summer Class: ☑

Hey guys! We can finally have our summer vacation because our classes has officially ended! Hurrah! Last Friday, May 16, 2014 we had our final practical examination in our Numericals, and last Thursday, (May 15) we had our last long exam for ElectroMag.

So how was our summer class? Exciting and partly boring. Exciting because in Numericals, you have to do a LOT of simple and repetitive arithmetic solutions. Sometimes the quiz/exam is solved (in earlier lectures, using different methods), there's this thrill and adrenaline when you push the equals button, crossing your fingers and hoping that you get the same answer. Otherwise you have to carefully inspect your solution and say, "Where the hell did I go wrong?" I said that many times; during seat works and exams. There was this one time that I finally arrived at the 'answer', and upon seeing the problem, I got one variable wrong. And that was 10 minutes before the exam was over. Lol. And boring because our ElectroMag (Electromagnetism) was a report type class. No further elaboration needed. 

What is Summer.

Hello fellas! This summer, we will have our first official summer class. Which is kind of a bummer because 3rd year 2nd sem. really takes a lot of a student, having a summer vacation before 4th yr (remember that part where almost all of the class failed in one subject?) would've been nice. I'll endure. It's only until May 19.

So, last April 8, my dad sent a surprise package! Yay! It contained the ice shaver (lol sounds weird), my mother's bangles, a tablet, and a camera. Whoa. Didn't expect those things. Thanks a lot, Dad! :D Since then, I reviewed the videos I downloaded almost a year ago (this is what I did last summer 2013, watched videos in photography lol excited much?) to refresh my knowledge. The camera is a Canon 600D and the tablet is a Lenovo IdeaTab A2107. The camera I asked, but not the tablet. If only I knew, I would've just got a Nintendo 2ds/3ds instead of a tablet. I already have a phone and I am very contented with it. So, with the new camera, I recently got into photography, while learning the basics. As of writing, I am still absorbing the core values.

3rd Year is.. Almoost Done!

Hey folks! How're you? How're the exams? I hope they were fine, and I hope that you passed all of your subjects. If you didn't, well at least you tried and gave it our all, that's what counts, isn't it? As Patel Piscine said, "And above all, don't lose hope." (Life of Pi, 2012)

As the 2nd semester of our 3rd year in college is coming to a close, all I can say is this has been the busiest semester.. Yet! Haha. To be honest, the first two years, I was relaxed and very petiks. It's only this year that I really experienced stress and exhaustion (physically and mentally), pulling out all-nighters, and confusion. It has it's own share of ups and downs. Fun and misery. You get the point. 

As of writing, I still haven't collected all of my class cards, and there's a slight problem. I still have a conditional grade (4.0), and we're having the removals next week and hopefully, pass it. There's a lot of confusions and problems why the instructor gave us a conditional grade. There are at least 25 of us who got a conditional grade. *Sigh. And we still have to get the illusive Mech 103 class card. >_<

Fortunately, those subjects weren't a pre/co-requisite for our summer classes, so we were still able to enroll without them. I got officially enrolled this afternoon, because our subjects weren't on their database this morning. -__- So we had to wait. 

Sorry if I took too long to post stuff. It's just that this has been the most stressed semester.. Yet! Haha! Brace our selves! Almost (or more than) 50% of the 4th year ECEs failed in their power amp. Whew! There are some lucky ones who had an Inc. grade. Frightening? I take that as a challenge! loljk. Again, sorry if I haven't been active lately. I'll try to post in between activities this summer. Let's all take a short vacation then return to school! Cheers! ✌

My Definition of A Busy Week.

Hey there! I have been really busy this past week. Busiest productive week ever! It started Saturday last week when we attended the YOUnique Conference at Victory Center, Batac. The next day (Sunday), there was a free Finance Seminar for the first 170 registrants of the conference. Luckily we met that condition. Since it's free, why not grab the opportunity? 

Monday, we had a long exam in one of our major subjects. Aaaand yeah.. Why? Haha. Tuesday, we made the circuit for the same subject which was supposed to be tested Thursday, but got postponed. Wednesday afternoon, we had no class but me and Melchor started to edit the video we were tasked to do, but it seems that there were some files missing so we just finished what we could. Thursday morning, we had no class because the circuit testing was postponed, but we did our take home exam/problem set for Math 60 (Probability and Statistics) which was due Friday! Friday, we only had ONE class, and we were supposed to pass the Math 60 problem set but again, it got postponed because it was too much to handle. (90+ problems). Saturday, today, we attended the Sirib Express 2nd Familiarization Tour. Sunday, since Melchor went home to his hometown, we weren't able to continue editing the video, instead I accepted a favor from a friend to add some opening and ending credits to their video. So there's the summary of the week.

I'll just leave this for now, since our Finals is coming in fast! I'll post the happenings when I have some free time. 'Till then, cheers! ✌

September's Judgment: Mechanics 101

I can't believe it's already October! September truly was a very busy month, so sorry for not posting. And my post last month was about August! What!? A lot has happened this September, some were fun and exciting, and some were depressing and sad. Let me narrate what has happened this September. (I should have just drafted some of the details then, I don't have that much long term memory.)

September was like climbing a mountain, uhm no. September was like pushing yourself through a needle hole. Yep that's the description. It was Saturday morning, and it was raining as I traveled to school. The rain drops on my coat just like the time is counting down to my judgment. It's as if the weather is predicting the results for the exam. We had the FINAL EXAMINATION for the subject, Mechanics 101.

Looking For Johnny Moon 2013

The Looking For Johnny Moon is a project of the Provincial Government of Ilocos Norte to train Ilocanos in the field of Creative Media Arts, and in a aim to promote Ilocos Norte as a "shooting ground" for national and maybe, international films. Johnny Moon is the English translation of Juan Luna, (Juan = Johnny, Luna = Moon) a national artist and an icon of art in Ilocos Norte.

Looking For Johnny Moon 2013 Poster

The Program and the Name Tag

A Fansign from my Idol and our Almost Failed Report.

Sorry for not posting last week. You see, the week before last week, I lost a battle of RPS. (Rock - Paper - Scissors) You can read about it on my last post. Well, we, I'm sorry, I did a lot of research of the dances that hit in the 60's, 70's, 80's, 90's, the 2000's, here in the Philippines. But unfortunately, I kind of failed. :/ The only resource that I had are the threads from certain forums where the users post about their experiences in the said time periods. 

The report was OK in the beginning, I did the "Twist", but as the time went on, the teacher's interest became lesser and lesser by the decade. He was looking for some Filipino dances, but we didn't have any until the 1990's! The teacher almost stopped our report, and we would've failed, until in the 2000's, he asked who are my other group mates. And since we're reporting on dances, he made my other group mates dance, including Cyril, a passive and silent student.

Warning: Long Post

Hello friends! How's life so far? My life has been so crazy these past few days. Here are some of the details, and we'll go through them later. Last July 13, I was asked by a friend if I can edit/create a video. Of course I can, we can. Since we have a crew that was formed from our Human 1 Class. We had a LOT of exams. My false teeth are kinda loose, much more!

Let's begin with the video thing. I started video editing in high school. This was the first video I ever edited (Click here). I got into editing when I came across a compositing software called FX Home VisionLab Studio. It had some pretty good effect presets. (as you can see in the video) All I did in the video was drag-and-drop. Then I saw the 'light saber' effect in the program, and I immediately planned a shoot. This was the outcome. (Click here, Facebook link) Post production (editing) took two days because I had to keyframe everything. Haha. And there were no sounds because my old desktop had no compatible audio drivers. :(

Anyway, from accepting the video editing, I learned a lot. When she was stating how she would like the opening sequence, I already knew I was going to use a 3D program, since I (think) cannot do that using a compositing program. The opening sequence was a gate, in which you have to enter the correct password to get into a building. Here's a snapshot of what I came up with.

Picture was slightly edited. I added the sky in the background.

Blog Post #4 - An Awesome Week

I was supposed  to post this last week but the internet was out again *sigh. We were already thinking of switching ISPs (Internet Service Provider) then the first awesome thing happened, the afternoon we were talking about that, the internet worked itself! Haha. I missed the internet during those days without connection so last weekend I indulged myself in internetly goodness. (Read that with Ryan Connolly's voice)

Last Monday, (July 8, 2013) we were supposed to have a class at 11am-2pm but the meeting that the instructor attended wasn't adjourned yet. So our class was again suspended for the nth time, and it was our last period for that day. We finally had our first meeting for that subject (Draw 21: Computer Aided-Drafting) this afternoon. Anyway, since we were in the library, why not make use of it? So me and my awesome friends went to the American Corner of the University Library to enjoy some games and some air conditioning goodness. (Again, read it with Ryan Connolly's voice)

Blog Post #3 - 2 Weeks of Inactivity

Good day fellow humans! Sorry I have been inactive for the past two weeks. First all of, I have my school works, and secondly, there's this thing that I had to do for a friend. Besides those, nothing interesting have been happening with my journey through life. 

Well, there were some good things that happened last Tuesday, July 2. We had an exam in Mechanics. It was all or nothing because the teacher only gave us one problem,
and only one (I think) got the correct answer. Yes that's right. Only one in our whole class got the correct answer, all of the rest got 5 marks for effort. The problem was very tricky because you have to apply what you know about circles and rectangles. And here's the good news,

Blog Post #2 - 2 Pokemon that Caught my Attention

Pokemon Black Logo

Recently I was playing Pokemon Black to prepare my self for the much awaited release of the Gen VI Pokemon - Pokemon X & Y this October. And because I was outdated with the Pokemon series. The last version I played was Fire Red which was a long time ago, and I haven't even played the Gen IV series! Well, I played a little bit of Platinum and Soul Silver during the summer of 2011 which by now I had forgotten the story line and the other stuff. Haha.

Blog Post #1 - End of Summery Days

Okay now summer is almost over. . Wait! It's already over! Haha. I had just enrolled in my university, and boy! That was really exhausting! Could you imagine 5 hours waiting in line? Of course you can. Anyone can. Here is a photo of what it looks like, click here, credits to Glenn Dave. (Can you find me there? lol) 

Anyway, how did you spend your summer? Did you visit other places? Did you enjoy your 2 months vacation? Did you do any productive things? My summer? Well, its. . . cool. Yes, I did visit some places and yes, I kinda enjoyed my 2 month vacation. But I did not do any productive things. Why? Haha. I would be asking you the same question.