Stars!

Okay well, time for another edition of Steph's AP Physics blog! Yay! I think I'll combine two blogs into one because I don't think either will be very good. Alrighty then. That being said, let's start. Today's topic is: STARS. I love stars and I think they're awesome.

So this weekend, I uploaded a song on my iPod called "Airplanes." I really like the chorus which goes "Can we pretend that airplanes in the night sky are like shooting stars? I could really use a wish right now." I like stars and wishes, so it got me thinking. What are shooting stars? I found out that meteoroids get caught in the atmosphere and burn up as they fall to earth, hence the awesomeness that is a shooting star. Though the name is very inaccurate. The reason they fall to earth is GRAVITY! And the earth's gravitational field! OH MY GOSH! 9.8 m/s^2!!!

The other star I'm going to talk about is a balloon. :] One of my balloons from my birthday is deflating, but still has some helium in it. Right now, it looks super cool because if I were to cut it off the string, it would float in midair! So yeah, the weight (MG!) of the balloon points DOWN! Like ALWAYS! Buttttt, the helium inside the balloon keeps it afloat by evening out the weight just enough so the balloon is in equilibrium! Yay!

Ignore the giant mess that is my room. >.<. But yeah, there you go. It's all floaty (I'm talking about the blue star, in case you didn't know)!

Have a great week everyone. Just a few more! We can make it!

Waterrrrrr...

So today, my blog is kind of late, because my friends threw me a surprise party today! YAY FRIENDS! Haha. Well anyway, we went swimming in the pool about 2 hours ago, and yes, it was freezing cold. But super fun anyway. We had a waterproof camera, so we took tons of pictures. And I saw a few different physics optics concepts.

First, we took pictures through the mediums. Our faces were above water, but the camera was submerged in water. There was refraction of light, and on top of that, the waves in the pool increased the distortion. Hence, the picture below.

Second, I saw reflection at the surface of the water. You can see some reflections of my friends and my faces on the surface due to the flash.

Third, my friends and I took underwater pictures. That was fun, but kind of hard to do without drowning. But the final products came out super cool. Since the camera and us were in the same medium, there was no refraction or refraction or anything, so the picture came out (relatively) normal (besides our obviously weird smiles).

Well, that's pretty much how my amazing day went. I hope all you people have a great week. We'll have fun with our giant review packets for physics, won't we, Doc? Next time you get the chance, everyone should go take pictures underwater. But no drowning. That's bad. ;) Happy Headmaster's Holiday everyone! :D

Sinking...?

Doc, does my extra post count for this week? Is this blog necessary? Oh well, I guess I'll do it anyway. Just in case. Ooooh. Or do I get extra credit for my extra blog? Haha. Just kidding (not really).

Okay well, prom is coming up in about a month for so, and since I'm a girl, I need things like a dress and shoes. Dress: Check, Shoes: uncheck. :( Haha. I was thinking about shoes, and my mind wandered to Junior Ring Ceremony, which happened to be the last time I wore heels. Good times. :] I wore the heels I wear to virtually every formal thing I go to. They're black, 4 inches high, and have a scary skinny heel.

I had to walk with all my heavy bags and stuff from Weinberg to the Chapel in those heels. And on the way, my friends and I had to walk over some grass. Apparently, it had rained a few hours before, and the grass and dirt were soft. As we walked across that grass, I realized that I was getting stuck in the ground with every step I took. I started freaking out along with a few of my other heel-wearing friends, while Danielle, who was in flats looked at us strangely.

This, my friends, is a lesson in surface area related to weight (mg). There was more pressure focused on that smaller area. Danielle's flats had a greater surface area than my pointy heel did, thus, I sank into the ground while Danielle didn't. Plus, my heels were high, so I added a few more inches of potential energy to myself. :] If I wore my other heels which are wedges and have a larger surface area, I wouldn't have sunk even though they are heels too.

Wow this was a pretty lame topic. Sorry about that, people. I'll think of something better next week (hopefully). Thanks for singing to me, AP physics period 7/8. I should have video taped that. Have a good week, you guys! FAIR WEEK! Live it up! :]

An Extra Post

Hello everyone! This is a special edition of Stephieee's AP Phys blog, made especially for doc! :]

So, you may or may not know, but I recently had my self portrait posted in Seto Hall for the Artist of Iolani exhibition. Doc seemed to like it, so he told me to blog about it.

That's me with my self portrait. :D I don't really know what doc wants me to say, so I'll just talk about it. This was shot for my self portrait assignment for Photo class. I had to take 200-something images of myself which was strange, but kind of fun. To take this particular picture, I set up a tripod and used the self timer in my (messy) room. I don't know where I got the inspiration to use the headphones, but I guess it works because music is a big part of my life and I like listening to it pretty much all the time. :] I shot myself with a digital SLR, Canon Rebel (The one that was featured in my other blog!). I must say, it was really strange to see such a large picture of my face on display some place. Haha.

The Artists of Iolani exhibit was really interesting to me because it gave me a chance to see what other art classes do. I'm always holed up in the Photo room, so seeing other artists' work from different mediums was amazing to me because of what they can do. It was also cool seeing work I have seen before from my Photo peers. I like the idea of the exhibit because unlike other electives, artists don't really get to have their moments. Dance has dance showcase, performing arts classes have recitals and concerts, and theatre has performances. But art doesn't really have that, so it's nice to have some place to show off what we've been working so hard on the entire year. Sure our work is around school all the time, But having all the mediums in one place at one time is a nice change.

Plus I got to sign my name on the huge wooden board in the back of the room. That made me feel a little accomplished. Overall, I'd say this was a really good experience. And according to doc, my portrait is very much like me, so I'm glad I was able to portray myself through a photograph.

I think that's pretty much all I can say about this. Doc, if you're reading this, and you want me to add anything, just let me know. That goes for anyone one else too. Enjoy extended schedule! :D Say Happy Birthday to me if you see me tomorrow! :D

I Need to FOCUS!

For those of you who don't know, I love taking pictures of things. And I kind of need to because I am in Photography class. I don't particularly enjoy life in that class, but that's a different story. Regardless, I like taking pictures. :] I especially like my daddy's high tech expensive digital SLR that I get to use for class. Ironically, I rarely use it for class because I'm too afraid of hurting it. >.<

Photography has a lot to do with lenses and mirrors because, well, they're on the cameras. My fancy camera also has mirrors inside that make sure the picture is upright and such, and you can see them if you take off the camera lens, which, by the way, is changeable. I once had to change it out for my dad's wide angle lens, which as we know, is a converging lens, and I've been wanting a fisheye lens, which, as we know, is a diverging lens that distorts the image and makes everything look all bulgy.

Anyway, I chose to take the picture of my awesome camera from the side to focus on the length of the lens. Pictures need to be in focus to be considered good. And my cameras have a function called autofocus, which really comes in handy. This big camera uses a computer to calculate how best to make things in focus. But my little black point and shoot sends out a little infrared beam which gets returned and tells the camera how far away the object is. Either way, the camera has to adjust the distance between the object and the lens so that the image will be in focus where it matters the most: on the tiny mirrors. all the light has to meet at one point, and the camera has to figure out how far the lens needs to be from the subject to make that one point. So if you have ever seen me take a picture, you watch the camera lens move around a bit before taking the picture. That, my friend, is physics in action. :]

Fourth quarter! Almost there! Extended this week! And I turn 17 on Wednesday! AIYA! >.< Hope everyone has a great week!