Tech

Being a web dev I know it is not wise to get into the scene too late for any upcoming and interesting technologies. And one thing that I delayed learning was building 3D sites. The most famous library out there, ThreeJS, helps developers accomplish the task of converting their flat 2D designs into visually appealing 3D masterpieces. I have always wanted to check it out and grasp the basics. Here’s my first attempt at using the ThreeJS library. It’s not perfect, but I was really happy that I could understand the basics of 3D website development just starting out.

I want to take a deep dive into how ThreeJS is making use of WebGL for rendering these 3D models. But for now, I’ve come to understand the basics of creating a renderer, a camera, and a scene object. Also, making use of the prebuilt geometric shapes and the various lighting options to illuminate the scenes. There’s a lot to explore here. Will create a detailed blog on this soon.

Books

I’m finally done reading Premchand’s classic Kafan and other short stories. Took me some time to read it because my Devanagari reading skills are a bit dusty. However, I plan to read more regional language books in Hindi and Marathi going forward. I want to do this so that I am not completely oblivious to the literary scene in these two languages. I plan on reading a Marathi book next. Research for it is on!

Movies

This week in the theatres there are two massy movies that are battling each other. While the fans are divided on either side, none of these movies are for me. So, I stayed home, and while I was pretty busy this week with work, I was able to fit in a very old movie that had been on my watch list for the longest time.

Image credit: Amazon Prime Video

No Smoking (2007) is a psychological thriller directed by one of my all-time favourites, Anurag Kashyap. It stars John Abraham as a chain-smoking narcissist named K. K is married to Anjali, played by Ayesha Takia, who is always irritated by K’s constant smoking. She wants him to give up smoking. But K is wedded to his cigarettes and does not play well with anyone who tells him how to live his life (even if it is for his own good). The story really begins when, after a lot of struggle, K decides to give up smoking and try out a rehabilitation centre known as “Prayogshala” suggested to him by his friends. K ends up giving ₹21 lakhs to the head of Prayogshala, played by Paresh Rawal and finds out that if he ever tries to smoke again, the consequence of it would not be great for himself and his family.

This movie blends dark humour with Kafkaesque vibes and explores themes of addiction, ego, free will, and redemption. I would definitely recommend this movie to everyone who likes thrillers!

And that’s a wrap on this week’s media consumption. ✌️