Lengthy Lightwave Update

It's been a while since I posted about what I've been doing in my 3D Computer Art class, and with the end of the semester fast approaching, I think it's time for a little catch-up. After my last post, we did a few more fairly simple modeling assignments that I really don't find worth uploading pics of. After that, we moved into rendered images, and things got a little more interesting.

Assignment 3-4 (don't ask)
This had a really weird prompt - we had to create a "self-representation" that combined items that had some importance to us, creating a bizzare creature/character/person that represented our interests. Uh... riiiiiight. We then had to create a simple setting out of additional objects, place the character into that setting, and produce a final rendered output.

After a few false starts (I really hate out-there "artsy" prompts like this), I eventually created this image:


In case you can't tell, the objects included are: video camera, book (on back), keyboard, laptop, LEGOs, pencil (art), light bulb (creativity)... and the hand I made earlier in the semester because I didn't know what to put for the guy's left hand. The hardest part of this project was getting the skelton to work. This was the first character I'd made from a solid mesh, with controlling "bones" inside that would deform the mesh in a "natural" way. Problem was: bones are stupid, and don't know what parts of the body they should affect. I would move the right arm, and half of the right side of the torso would come with it! This project also took waaaay to long to render, as I foolishly modeled the actual raised "LEGO" text on the blocks. I only did it once, then copy/pasted the rest, but the final result added up to a lot of polygons.

Assignment 5
This was a lot of fun. We were supposed to create a scene in which every object was the default "light gray" color. Everything interesting had to be done with geometry, bump maps, and lighting. Since the 3 final renders were to be in black and white, we were told to create 3 distinct, interesting lighting setups. I made a castle/mansion-y interior with a fireplace and whatnot. My first render was a somewhat boring overview of the room lit from various places:


My second render got a bit more interesting, and I played with the volumetric effects Lightwave has (about 1000x more flexible and better-looking than TrueSpace's):


Finally, I decided to try a fairly radical angle with dramatic lighting from the fireplace (turn your head to the left if you don't see it immediatly):


I really enjoyed this assignment, although in retrospect theyre are a lot of things I would have done a little differently, and I never had time to do some of the cool things I planned (chandeliers and such).

Assignment 6 (current project)
We pretty much jsut started this one, so I'm nowhere near finished yet. We're supposed to "...recreate a past environment, room, or space that you associate with." This environment doesn't have to depict a real place, but the final image should "tell a story." The depiction can be abstract, surreal, impressionistic, emotional, or realistic. (Obviously, I chose realism - I want to do CG for my movies, not "explore the human condition" or somesuch) Yeah, this is another wacky "artsy" assignment, but it's vague enough that I can do just about anything and justify it. I chose to depict a landcape scene, with the story being someone who is camping. (for Halapy: I'm basically re-arranging parts of the land around the lake at Heritage, with a few "artistic liscence" additions of my own).

I still have a long way to go, but as of tonight I've made a lot of progress on the grassy hill where the campsite will be (using Lightwave's SasLite hair plugin to make the grass), a pretty decent tree, and a broken-down stone wall. (Why is there a stone wall on this hill? - Because it looks cool there.) Anyway, here's my W.I.P. shot:


Obviously, everything beyond the hill in the foreground is still at a very rough stage. At one point, I tried covering the entire terrain with the simulated grass, but I ran into an internal limit with the SasLite plugin (they have to give you some incentive to pay money for the full version of "Sasquatch"). In light of this, I'm now using the SasLite grass just for the hill, and will find a simple grassy texture map for the rest of the land, since it's too far away to tell the difference anyway.

I also still need to do the water properly, clone that tree about a million times, and add the campfire. All of this while trying to finish my final Writing 205 project, and catching up on play reviews for my two drama classes. This next week should prove interesting...

An Interesting Day/Night

This is totally random, so I'll just write everything that happened today. Skip to the end for a humorously short summary if you don't want to read. (actually, it might be funnier to read the short version first, then find out WTF I was talking about!)

First of all, I had to get up at 8am (Nooooooo!!) to meet a go to a sophomore's film shoot I'm helping out with. We then spent the next 7 hours or so moving heavy film equiptment all over campus in impossibly warm weather (think high 70s...), sitting on a dolly to provide ballast, telling passers-by not to look at the camera, and sometimes just sitting around waiting for the guys in charge to figure out what they were doing. Tiring, but it was kinda fun, and I got to get a sample of what I'll be doing in my film classes next year. (Their advice? Learn to use a light meter. Doesn't matter how artsy your shot is if the film isn't exposed properly)

Around 8pm I went to see "Horatio Sanz and the Kings of Improv" at Goldstein Auditorium with Mike and Maisha (both from film) and their friend Diana, who happens to be a witch. The improv show was alright, but not quite as great as I expected. Afterwards, I ended up getting autographs from Horatio and the other people he was performing with. (Hey, the opportunity was there, and the line wasn't too long.)

(I was too lazy to get the scanner, so I took a picture with my digital camera)

When the show was over, Mike wanted to do something, so Diana suggested we check out this "Unique Tea House" on Marshall Street. None of us had heard of such a place, but we went to see what she was so exited about.

You can't really blame us for not knowing about this place. It's on the second floor above an Indian restaurant, hidden away behind a doorway labeled for a hair stylist. The only sign advertising it is a smal lighted one about 20 feet in the air, where no one ever looks. Once inside, you find this nice little... tea house, guess. I'll take a picture the next time I'm there, but the whole place has a subdued, calm, eastern feel to it. In addition to various teas, they have these colorful fruit drinks with all kinds of odd things in them, that actually taste quite good. I had something with apple, honey, and a hint of lemon. Unusual ("Unique," even!), but good. The Unique Tea House is definitely one of those little undiscovered gems one finds around college campuses.

We talked about a ton of things, from filmmaking to coffee, to funny "drunk roommate" stories, to Diana's paganism (She's a "good witch" - no spells on other people, but she'll give a free Tarot reading if you like). All in all, just hanging around in a cool place wasting a couple hours in random conversation.

Aftward we met Diana's boyfriend, who seems to share Tony's enthusiam for Kingdom Hearts 2 (although I don't know if Tony can be surpassed in fanaticism... After helping with the film shoot he bugged out in a hurry because he had to "save the Pridelands." "Simba needs me!") The (now) 5 of us talked a while longer while wandering around campus. We actually ended up at an overlook by the College of Law with a nice view of part of the city, and a nearby parking garage that looks really cool at night. After that I came back here to my dorm.

The humorously short version:

Carried heavy equiptment, acted as ballast. Got Horatio Sanz's autograph, and then was treated to some tasty colorful drinks by a witch. Ended up in a parking garage. All in all, a fun day. ;)

Remember, Remember the Fifth of November...

Remember remember the fifth of November

Gunpowder, treason and plot.
I see no reason why gunpowder, treason
Should ever be forgot...

Yeah, I guess you could count that as an endorsement! Go see V for Vendetta!

...Now I can't get the 1812 Overture out of my head...

Why I Hate US Airways

You know, I used to like flying.

I'm back at S.U. this week after a typically uneventful spring break, but I had a bit of adventure getting here. It's story time...

I was supposed to fly back sunday night on a flight that left at 8:40, and got me here around 10. That was the plan. After my typical last minute rush of packing (made worse by the obsessive need to watch the "Serenity" DVD my dad had purchased before I left) I got to the Pittsburgh airport, made it through security, and sat down at my gate with enough time left to play with the free WiFi.

Close to the time we were supposed to board, there's an announcement saying there's an "overbooking situation" on this flight, and they're looking for 3 or 4 (!) volunteers with flexible travel plans to switch to a later flight. I'd heard this before, and it didn't concern me much since the airline usually finds a few volunteers to keep their compassionless business model running (They'd rather overbook and kick people off a flight than risk having a few empty seats that aren't being paid for).

Unfortunatly, this went differently this time. A little while later, they called four names to come to the counter, and mine was one of them. We were informed that we might get bumped, and that we needed to wait here until everyone else got on the plane. We waited. And waited. While I was talking to another passenger who had been affected (a girl who also went to SU, and had an 8am class the next day), we overheard an interesting discussion. It seemed the plane was supposed to be ready to take off now, but they were waiting on some checked luggage that was late. The supervisor on duty wasn't happy with this, as apparently its against airline policy to delay takeoff for late luggage.

U.S. Airways overbooks its flights, and likes to leave suitcases behind when they don't make it to the plane on time. And they wonder why they're always on the verge of bankruptcy...

Anyway, eventually they mumbled something about being sorry for the inconvenience, and told us we could in fact get on the plane. Awesome! I gathered my things, and headed out to the plane. Since this was a small "Express" flight, standard carry-ons won't fit in the overhead bins. Instead, you put a yellow "Gate-Check" tag on them, and on your way to the plane, hand them to guy who puts them in the back of the plane. At your destination, you pick them up at the gate, rather than at baggage claim. I handed my roller-bag to the guy, and got on the plane with just my backpack containing my laptop and a few other small, expensive things I don't trust out of my sight. I sat down, and breathed a sigh of relief that this trip was finally getting underway.

Then the late luggage showed up.

Apparently, the luggage they had delayed the plane for was quite numerous. In fact, it wouldn't all fit in the back of the plane. The stewardess (attendant? What't the PC term?) started asking people very nicely if they could fit extra bags under the seats and whatnot. She was actually being quite thoughtful, doing everything possible to avoid leaving anything behind.

Then the supervisor showed up. He said that while the plane wasn't overbooked, it was overweight, so the four of us had to get off again. The thoughtful stewardess tried to offer us the choice of having our bags taken off and put on a later flight while staying on ourselves, but the supervisor said she couldn't do that. Dumbfounded, we exited the plane again.

The supervisor merits special mention. Now, most people still seem like people when they are working. Either they are pleasant and trying to help you (like the stewardess), or they hate their job and it shows, or whatever, but you can still tell they are human. Then there are people who come across as company policy books come to life. They aren't compassionate, they don't even offer a sad "I wish I could help" smile to calm you down. No emotion, no empathy. From all appearances, they have no souls.

The supervisor was of the latter type. Think Dick Cheney. Seriously, this guy looked (and sorta sounded) like Dick Cheney. (No joke!) His nametag said "Sean L." because apparently he doesn't have the guts to put his last name behind the work he does.

Once off the plane, I asked whether my gate-checked luggage would be taken off the plane. The supervisor assured me that it would, but that they couldn't just give it to me there on the tarmac (you guessed it: against policy), but that we could get our bags later at baggage claim F. Then one of the workers nearby got the brilliant idea to take our names down so that they could get our bags off the plane. Keep in mind, this only occured to him after the supervisor had assured us that all would be taken care of. Before we could ask any more pesky questions, the supervisor shooed us back into the airport.

At this point, we obviously weren't too happy. I was already planning this blog post. The girl I talked to earlier was nearly in tears after a phone call with her boss in Syracuse who wasn't very understanding that she wouldn't be able to work her 11pm shift that night. A middle-aged woman in our group looked like she wanted to shoot someone. The supervisor gave us a very unconvincing apology for our troubles (again, think Cheney), and then it was time for the paperwork.

If you get bumped from a flight at US Airways, they are "generous" enough to put you on the next flight out, (in this case, at 7:15 the next morning) put you up in a hotel for the night, and give you a $10 meal voucher to use at the airport restaurants. The only real nice thing they give you is a free round-trip ticket to anywhere in the continental US, usable anytime within the next year (except for black-out dates like, oh, any significant holiday). Of course, you have to sign this ticket to accept it - right under some rather fine print that promises you won't sue the airline. Mmmm... extortion!

I took the free ticket and meal, but passed on the hotel; This is my hometown, I'll sleep in my own bed tonight, thank you very much! I called my dad, and told him he had to turn around and pick me up again. The supervisor reminded us that our luggage was at baggage claim F. (How could he be so sure? He hadn't checked or anything.) He also gave us the assurance that you cannot get bumped twice, so we were guaranteed our flight in the morning. (Gee, how nice...) Broken and defeated, we all headed to baggage claim F.

I'll bet you can see where this is going. Yup, my gate-checked roller-bag wasn't there. The other passengers' luggage was sitting on the corousel, but mine was MIA. After a fruitless search, I shuffled over to the baggage claim/customer service desk. I explained the situation to the nice guy behind the counter (at least this one seemed human!), and he went into a back room to check. After a phone call, he told me there had been some sort of "miscommunication," and my bag had stayed on the plane and gone to Syracuse without me.

Damn you, Dick Cheney-alike!!

The man told me that my luggage would be locked up in Syracuse overnight, and I could pick it up when I arrived the next day. I walked to the passenger pick-up area, my mind stuck on the image of an equally-pleasant guy in Syracuse telling my my bag had accidently been sent back to Pittsburgh...

On monday I got up much earlier than I generally prefer, brushed my teeth using my finger as a toothbrush (my real toothbrush was in Syracuse...), and went back to the airport.

My own trip would go smothly this time, but I did get one last glimpse of US Airways incompetence. While wating for my flight, the announcement came that this flight was in an "overbooking situation," and they were looking for seven volunteers to give up their seats. Seven! It seems the flight we had been bumped to was overbooked to begin with, and the four of us were making it even worse! So now, the events of the previous night had affected the travel plans of a total of 11 people. Fortunatly, they got the volunteers, so no one had to go through quite what we had, but still.

I count it as a minor miracle that when I arrived in Syracuse my roller-bag was, in fact, waiting for me at the baggage claim desk. I got a cab, rode back to my dorm, thanked God I had no morning classes on mondays, and collapsed in my bed.

So yeah, not liking US Airways too much at the moment. And Sean L, wherever you are.... YOU SUCK!

Huge X-Men 3 Spoiler Cover-up

As a movie studio, what do you do when the trailer for your highly-anticipated upcoming film reveals something it shouldn't? Modify the trailer, of course! Nevermind the fact that removing the evidence only serves to confirm that yes, that shot did mean exactly what you thought it did.

Bottom line: the trailer that is online now is not the one that was originally posted a couple days ago.

WARNING! REALLY MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD! YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

Seriously, this is a big spoiler. Maybe not "I am your father" big, but possibly close. I couldn't even ethically make myself put the images on the front page of this blog, so you'll have to click your way to having part of the movie ruined. If you click any of the links below, I cannot be held responsible for the consequences. You have been warned

In the currently available trailers, the shot around time index 2:16 is Wolverine scratching his way down a wall.

However, when the trailer was first released, that same shot was something altogether different - SPOILER WARNING! Don't click this!!!!.

If you just clicked that second link, I'm so sorry. I won't describe what it is here, but it should be obvious if you look at what's in the picture, what's going on, and what's missing. I can't believe 20th Century Fox let that out, even if only for a short time. My guess - some editor's job is not as secure as it once was after this incident.

Rottentomatoes.com also shows the original image (SPOILER!) in their flipbook.

There. With as many SPOILER tags as I put in this post, you have no one to blame but yourself. And that dumb editor at 20th Century Fox.

Hanley Films: Coming Soon (Again)

Yes, thanks to Will and his contacts on the AnandTech forums, I now have reliable hosting for HanleyFilms.net again.  Well, for six months anyway.

If you click this link and see a smiley, it means I finally got the stupid DNS settings right.

Penny-Arcade Guys Get Macs!

That's right folks; Tycho and Gabe, creators of the wildly popular and gamer-oriented webcomic Penny-Arcade, have both purchased computers from Apple. Gabe's MacBook Pro (I still think that's a dumb name) hasn't shipped yet, but Tycho has been using his recently-arrived Intel iMac, and has all manner of good things to say about it:

I've used my own Mac for every computing task this week. What I have ascertained is not that PCs as we know them lack good design, but that PCs as we know them have hardly any design to speak of. I'm not trying to be insulting. Use a Mac for a week, and we'll talk again.

(mocking snarkiness follows...)

To my PC-loyal friends: What now, guys?
We are toppling your monuments, your idols, your bastions of power... and comedic sarcasm. People are beginning to see - There's a better way! (And unlike the current Democratic Party, we actually know what we're talking about when we say that!) Resistance is futile. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own. Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated. With drop shadows, and translucency!

Internet2 is Fun

Seeing as both our schools are on Internet2, Will and I decided to play around with that a little bit. Will had already seen AIM file transfers work over Internet2, but we wondered how well HTTP would work. I fired up the webserver (Apache) on my PowerBook G4, and put up a simple page offering up one of the > 1 gig DV Quicktime masters for my movies.


Wheeeee! Nice and fast. Almost 1 megabit a second, across state lines! (Don't worry, the movie only consists of footage shot by me, and music by Edgen, so it's all legit.)

In related news, the University of Pittsburgh is mean and firewalls thier students so Will can't do this. And they have the same "one computer per residental connection - no switches or routers!" rule that SU has. Pity, since a dedicated server running 24/7 out of my dorm room would totally solve my movie-hosting issues.

Fun With SU's Unix System

I decided to finally get around to seeing what Syracuse is giving me in terms or webspace, of for nothing else than to finally host my movies in a stable place. So, I started looking around the Computing and Media Services site.

Andy is probably the only one who will appreciate this, but I was delighted to find that students set up their webspace through a normal, old-fashioned UNIX shell account! And on a Sun server, no less? Geek heaven!

But here's the fun part: some of thier instructions are flat-out wrong! In particular, once you've logged in, made a public_html folder if it wasn't already there, and created index.html with pico, (Yay pico! More geekery!) you are told to set permissions. I though this seemed like a lot of work for non-UNIX geeks, but at least they spelled out exactly what to type, right?

Well, explicit instructions don't help much if they are incorrect. Check this passage:

changing permissions on files

1. Change to the public_html folder by typing "cd public_html" and press Enter.
2. Type "ls -l" to view the folder's contents.
3. To set permissions for a file within the public_html folder, type "chmod 644 name of file" and press Enter.
   NOTE Replace "name of file" with the actual file name. For example, "index.html".
   To set permissions for all files within the folder, type "chmod 644 *.*" and press Enter.

Nice and simple, right? Problem is, those aren't the permissions you want for public HTML files. "chmod 644" gives everyone read access to the files, but a webserver needs execute privileges to show the page. So if you followed the instructions, then tried visiting your site, all you would see is a nice "Error 403: Forbidden". So I just went ahead and fixed it with "chmod 755 index.html", and now my test page is up for all to see. But someone who isn't a total nerd can't be expected to know that.

I guess I'll have to call/e-mail them tomorrow. Calling might be more fun - how knowlegable of a person do you think they put in charge of the phone? >:)

More Emulator Geekery

In my last post I hinted at my initial playing around with Q - an x86 (and other) emulator for OS X. Well, I got "somewhere" with it, and here's the results.

Warning: the following images depict the results of me being bored, frequently late at night. Emulation of a foriegn processor architectures redefines the very word "slow." We're talking 10x decrease in performance over native speed, easily. On a 1.67 GHz laptop. The tasks depicted cannot concievably serve any useful purpose whatsoever, and were done purely "for the hell of it."

Ahem. Anyway, after several hours, (during which I went to class and did some homework) the WinXP install finished, and I tried to boot it, only to be met by this confusing error during login:

A problem is preventing Windows from accurately checking the license for this computer.
Error Code: 0x800703e6.

Whoops. At this point I figured XP wasn't going to work (though I didn't know why) but I didn't really care since something with lower requirements like 98 would be much more suited for this anyway. With XP giving me problems, I tried to fool around with my Knoppix LiveCD, creating a new virtual machine with no hard drive, set to boot from CD.


Obviously, this worked, but it wasn't pleasant. Those of you who have used it know that Knoppix is pretty sluggish to begin with. Put it on a virtual CPU that would be lucky to get up to 100 MHz-equivalent speed, with only 256 meg of RAM allocated to it, and the experience becomes downright painful. Frozen Bubble wasn't even playable at lowest graphics settings. (Granted, no one uses a PC emulator for gaming, but it's Frozen Bubble!)

After that entertaining but useless experiment, I returned to the Windows issue. Looling through various online forums, I found that the error could be avoided by installing Service Pack 1.

Problem: I have a SP1 CD, so I don't need the internet, but how does one install SP1 if you can't even log-in?
Solution: Everyone's favorite last-resort, Safe Mode!


This did the trick, but do I even need to mention how god-awefully slow it was? Eventually, however, the "machine" rebooted...


Success! The system was beyond sluggish, but it worked, and as far as Windows was concerned, nothing outside of the "computer" it was running on even existed. I was even able to use what is arguably the most frequently-run and well known pieces of Win32 software on the planet:


Although it would be difficult to do much on a slow, emulated system like this, I was suprised to find that, once they were launched, basic GUI applications like Solitaire or MSPaint were actually quite useable. (Here I mean "useable" in the same sense that Doom 3 on a GeForce 4 MX is "playable") Networking even worked, although with no anti-virus, and the fact that Windows update would take too long to be feasable, I wasn't to eager to go online with this. While I obvously couldn't do any gaming on a setup like this (my main reasone for having both a Mac and a PC) I could easily see this sort of solution working for someone who just has one little program that they can't leave behind.

Granted, this is really nothing new. VirtualPC has been around for years, and Microsoft's tweaking of it allows Windows to be run faster on it then on this solution. The main draw to Q is that it's open source, and consequently free, whereas VPC costs $250.

Q is an interesting curiosity on my G4, but on the new Intel-based Macs, it has a chance to really shine. A preliminary Unversal Binary has been released, and users are already reporting that it is quite fast, with the virtual CPU benchmarking as high as 600 MHz on the Intel iMac. If the QEMU Accelerator is ported to OS X/x86, things could really get interesting.

I'm Such a Geek

Just a little teaser of what I'm playing with right now...


I'll post more on this when I get somewhere with it. For the curious: Q Emulator homepage.

I love open source. :)

Hallmark Day

Instead of merely echoing most of my friends' sentiments, I'm going to do it Film Student style with a movie quote:

"Random Thoughts, for Valentines day, 2004. The day's a holiday invented by greeting card companies, to make people feel like crap."

- Joel Barish, as played by Jim Carrey in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

The year's off a bit, but it still applies.

It's Not My Birthday!

Past midnight - looks like it's technically no longer my birthday.

Woo-hoo, 19. I can officially do... nothing I couldn't last year. Except maybe buy beer in Canada. So if I go to Canada in the next year, I'm all set.

Thanks to eveyone who wished me a Happy Birthday in person, on AIM, on Facebook or on the phone. Even if most of you will never read this!

It's My Birthday!

Past midnight - looks like it's technically my birthday now.



Yay me.

Really cool multi-touch interface

I've seen lots of weird research ideas into "alternative" interfaces for computers, but this one seems really, really interesting. It's a touch-panel interface that can recognize multiple contact points at once, and do things based on the movement of both points. For example: if you touch opposite corners of an image and then pull your fingers apart, the image will scale up. If you rotate. Or, (depending on how the software is set up) you could zoom in.

This NYU page has a quicktime video showing some great proof-of-concept programs in action. The "Google Earth"-ish one looks especially fun. I want one!

Lightwave is fun!

Ok, it's been awhile since I updated this (although I think I'm still ahead of my friends with that...) but I wanted to put up some of what I've been working on in my 3D Computer Art class. Lightwave is a much less intuitive 3D program than I'm used to, but it's also a lot more powerful, and I'm liking the control that I have over what I'm modeling.

The first thing we modeled was a mug. Simple enough, but it taught us about lathes, the bend tool, sub-patching, and a slew of other features of the Lightwave interface.


Our next few models were a little more free-form, as we had to make three things from a really crappy poem we had to write. I made a pencil, a pad of paper, and a hand.




Really, I think the hand says it all. I thought I was ok at modeling, (even did some nice low-poly characters for Andy's and my senior project) and I could probably have made something resembling a hand in TrueSpace, but not like this. Well, maybe with a lot of practice, but not in the hour-and-a-half that it took me to do this. I like Lightwave.

On another topic, I've finished watching all the existing episodes of Firefly. Shiny! Very, very good series - Fox executives were fools to cancel it. Of course, this seems to be a theme with them (vis-a-vis: Family Guy). Haley, thank you for having this at the LAN party! Now all I need to do is see Serenity.


Extra fun bit of trivia: This post does not randomly jump from one topic to another...

The visual effects for both Firefly and Serenity were primarily done in Lightwave. :)

'Tis the Season

Looks like none of my friends have done this yet, so I'll be the first to say:

Happy Winter-een-mas!

If you are very confused right now... well, the official site might help you. But maybe not. ;)

Jack Thompson is a terrible human being

Most of you who read this blog also frequent Ctrl-Alt-Del, so you may have seen this on their main page already. In case you haven't I'll just quote Tim here:

A reader has just brought this matter to my attention.

From GamingHorizon.com:

"Earlier this month, gamer named Mitchell S. with the online screenname "Kuja105" who posts on a few online videogame forums (including GameFaqs.com and MetalGearSolid.org) committed suicide. On January 2 he posted a message in both forums detailing his intent to end his own life, citing overwhelming complications with school and finances.

A very brief period of initial disbelief was followed by a barrage of replies from fellow forum members pleading that he not take his life, trying to talk him out of it.

For days, no word was heard from Mitchell. Fearing the worst, members and administration from metalgearsolid.org began searching for contact information, spending hours on the phone trying to get in touch with him. Finally on January 4, Ryan K., an administrator at metalgearsolid.org, got him on the phone and spent hours desperately trying to talk him out of it.

Sadly, Mitchell soon ended his own life by consuming antifreeze and painkillers.

Later, members from the site contacted Mitchell's family to find out the grave news. They reported it to their online community, and posted a tribute to their passed friend on the front page of metalgearsolid.org." Full Report Here.

Mr. Jack Thompson then sent in the following letter regarding the situation to MetalGearSolid.org, one of the forums frequented by Mitchell, where he was known well:

"Your "gamer friend" will find peace through the Lord, Jesus Christ, but sadly it's too late for that.

There is a void in every heart. You can fill it up with the things of God, or the things not of God. This unfortunate soul chose to fill it up with combat games. The playing of these video games is masturbatory activity, meaning senseless self-stimulation. If you gamers could use a dictionary you would know that that term is not necessarily a sexual one.

The real tragedy here extends beyond the life and death of this one fellow. There are literally millions of young people and young adults whose despair is deepend by turning to the things of this world and then finding them meaningless.

All of you gamers need to put down the controllers and get a life. The utter inanity of the vast majority of postings here shows how vapid "gaming" really is.

You are one of the cheerleaders for this wasting of time and the wasting of lives. Do you feel any remorse for having contributed to this "culture of death?" Of course not. Hey, let's all play MORE games, and ignore all the really productive things to do with our lives.

Let's pretend to be shocked that a gamer might descend into deeper depression, as his gamer "buds," knowing he was killing himself, couldn't figure out how to call 911 themselves for him. That would have involved leaving their computers I guess.

Sad. Sad for all of you."

Ok, so I was well aware that Jack Thompson was an extremist idealogue and an idiot, but I was previously unware that he lacked a soul. Seriously, what kind of person takes the tragic death of a member of a community and tries to twist it to damn the very community which is still grieving over the loss? That's just evil!

I noted how Thompson stole Bush's "culture of life" speil and called gaming a "culture of death". Sorry Jack, but if your "culture of life" allows and promotes the cold exploitation of an individual's death for one's own means, then I want none of it.

Dead Pixel Fixer?

I thought WidowPC's dead pixel fixer looked interesting. It's a epilepsy-inducing movie you are supposed to run on loop behind a dead pixel overnight, and it might be able to un-stick it. I have no idea whether or not this actually works, as I've had the incredible good fortune of never owning an LCD with any dead pixels (over an old Dell laptop, a PowerBook, a 19" display, a PDA, an iPod nano, and a cell phone!) but I can't think of how it would hurt to try if you suffer from this all-too-common problem.

This thread on Applegeeks has a couple testimonials that the thing does sometimes work.

Comic, Apple, College, Yay! (or, Yet Another "Update" Post)

It's another multi-topic update post, so I've broken it into sections for easy reading.

Comic

First off, new comic on Directionless! That's right, I have real honest-to-God content again, and I even introduced a new character!

Apple

Tuesday was the keynote address at the annual Macworld expo, and as usual Apple rolled out a bunch of new stuff. Most interesting among the things announced was the actual introduction of the first Intel-based Macs, specifically, the iMac and the MacBook Pro.

Let me just say this: The name "MacBook Pro" sucks. A lot. "PowerBook" sounded cool. "MacBook Pro" makes you sound like a clucking chicken if you say it too fast. I can understand wanting to drop "Power" from the name since the PowerPC G4 chip is no longer being used, but wanting "Mac" in all your product names was no excuse for accepting such a sucky name. "ProBook" wouldn't have been great, but it would have been better.

Sigh... Name aside, the hardware looks good, although since Final Cut Pro/Express isn't a universal binary yet, it wouldn't do me much good even if I could afford a new laptop. But is is good to see the PowerBook get a big update like this. The G5 is still an awesome chip (That's why Microsoft is using something based on it in the XBox 360) but the G4 was getting more than a little long in the tooth. And Core Duo is actually really cool! Best of all, it seems it's good enough to wow the Penny-Arcade guys!


In other Apple-related news, I used some of my Christmas money to buy another 512 meg stick of RAM for my PowerBook, bringing it up to a Gig. Mmmm.... RAM. :)

College

Heading back to Syracuse tomorrow, classes start tuesday. The online scheduling system for SU doesn't offer nice online schedules like CMU does (well, it kinda does, but they aren't publicly-accessable) but that doesn't stop me from making my own:

My Spring 2006 Schedule

All in all, a mixed bag. I have no classes on friday, and nothing starts before 12:30pm, which is awesome. On the other hand, on thursday I have class pretty much straight from 12:30 to 10pm, with less than an hour break in there for dinner. Yuck. I got into the "Intro to 3D" computer arts class, so I get to spend 3 hours a week sitting in front of a PowerMac playing with Lightwave, which is cool. Unfortunatly, I also have Writing 205, which is a whole class devoted to research papers.


So that's recent events. Don't expect another update until I get back to college and settled in. Now I have to pack. :(

New Content on "Directionless"

It's not much, but there's some belated Christmas-themed filler up over at my webcomic, "Directionless." (remember that?) I do plan on continuing the comic, and should have something along the lines of real content up this coming weekend. I have a few ideas and such, I just need to draw them.

Upcoming absence

My break so far...

Got home at like 3:00 AM Saturday morning, slept most of the rest of the day. Sunday night I hung out at Haley's for A Very Bitter Beer Pong and watched Donnie Darko, a very weird but interesting movie. And, uh, that about brings you up to speed. Yeah, the amount of craziness leading up to finals makes the lack of stuff going on now seem a little odd. Of course, there's nothing unpleasant about doing nothing! :)

But I didn't make this post to point out how little I've been doing, I made it to point out that from December 23-27 I'll be visiting relatives in New Hampshire. (Another long car trip? Noooooooo!!!) So, if anyone (coughHaleycough) is planning anything (coughlan partycough) over break, please don't do it then!

And Halapy, I fully plan on updating the webcomic.

Eventually.

I Am Home!

Finals are done. Have seen Narnia and Kong. Enjoyed both. Will see again. More to follow.

That is all.

Busy, Busy, Busy.

While everyone else is justifying a lack of updates by saying nothing is happening, I haven't been updating because too much has been happening.

It goes like this: Next week is finals week, commonly known as college's miniature hell. But here's the thing - only one of my classes is even having a "proper" final during that week. The rest all either have abnormally large exams on the last day of class, or have papers due. So for me, this is hell week.

So here's how "Hanley's Hell Week" breaks down...

Last weekend - dealt with a very poorly-timed cold while trying to get my revised draft for Writing done to e-mail to the professor. Had also planned on starting my Art Media paper, but that didn't happen. Things became complicated when my roommate came home drunker than he's ever been Saturday night ("You were only gone for 2 hours!" "Fwuuuuhhhgg...?") and I had to make sure he didn't vomit on the wrong things (aka: anything mine) So, yeah... That was a barrel of laughs... Not.

Monday - The cold turned into a sore throat/coughing sort of thing. Had the last class for Film History, my only class with a "normal" final. Professor did a bit of review, but of course didn't tell us anything useful. We then had to watch some "art" films, one of which could only be described as a sadist's take on childbirth.... yeeeeah. That night I had my last Intro to Acting class. Good news - no exams, and we got free pizza. Bad news - I had to perform my assigned scene one last time, which I really didn't feel like doing with a sore throat. Class ended at 10pm, and I tried to use the time to write my Art Media final essay. Didn't get anywhere, partially because I was struggling with the topic, partially because I just hate that class, but mostly because I felt like crap.

Today (Tuesday) - Woke up feeling a little better (I think my fever broke in the middle of the night. I have no better explanation for why I started shivering uncontrollably for no apparent reason...) . I wrote my entire Art Media essay in one 3-hour run, which sucked but at least I got it done and didn't make it entirely BS. Went to Writing and found out I wasn't really as near being done as I'd thought I was with my paper. Went to the last class of Art Media (and there was much rejoicing!) and turned in my crappy-but-at-least-it-works paper. Then we watched an interesting film (watching something interesting in Art Media? Unheard-of!) of a Rube Goldberg-like device involving lots of fire and small explosives, and another one that was a feature-length (100 min) film comprised of one continuous steadycam shot, and all done in one take. I felt so bad for the poor cameraman by the end of the movie.

Looking to the future....

Tomorrow - Wake up for my "9:30 am but a 20-minute walk away" Theater class where we'll be doing some sort of review for the test on Friday. The I can come back and try to finish the 650-page book ("Bonfire of the Vanities") that I need to be familiar with (among other things) for the "final" exam in Anthropology of American Life at 7:00 pm. And before you say it, I checked - there are no SparkNotes for this book! :(

Thursday - Last Writing class, where we'll basically be given time to work on our papers, get feedback on them, and cry over how bad they are. I then start studying for my Theater final. This is also possibly my last chance to hunt down the teacher of the 3D Animation class I want to take next semester, as I need his signature (it's normally reserved for Computer Arts majors) and he's never in his office (even during office hours) and never checks his e-mail!

Friday - Wake again up for my "9:30 am but a 20-minute walk away" Theater class, but this time I have a "final" exam to take. I then come back and frantically revise my Writing Essay so it can be dropped of in the professor's mailbox by 5:00 pm. Only then can I rest.

At that point, I will basically have nothing to do for the better part of a week because my Film History final, the only "real" final I have and the last thing I have to do before I can go home, is on Friday the 16th. As soon as it's done, I cram the majority of my stuff into my dad's car (parents drive up Friday morning) and head back to the 'Burgh! :D

So yeah, don;t expect much else out of me until after this Friday. If you do hear anything from me before then, kindly remind me that I have work to do!!!!!!!1

signing off...

Awesome Christmas Lights!

Someone set up their Christmas lights to be synchronized with what sounds like a Trans-Siberian Orchestra song (update: I've identified the song as "Wizards in Winter"). The result is nothing less than awe-inspiring!

NOTE: It has been brought to my attention that the first site I linked to contains advertisements which some people may deem objectionable. An alternate link can be found below:

Incredible Christmas Lights!

Quick - someone get Andy! This must be duplicated! :)

Update 12-2-05: I found some more information on Carson Williams, the guy behind this stuff.

First, he's on Wikipedia (and honestly, what isn't these days?)

Also, here's another one of his light shows. The song isn't as cool as the first one, but it's still impressive.

There's a WGMD radio interview where he explains some of what he did. The host is kind of annoying, but there are some nice tidbits. Apparently the Trans-Siberian Orchestra (who did the music in the first video) really like the display and may be putting a higher-res version up on their own website.

Finally, he gave some text instructions on how it's done, and posted the sequencing file he used.

Home Tomorrow! W00t!

Happy Day-After-Your-Birthday, Will!

I catch a cab at 8:45 AM, wade through Thanksgiving lines at the airport, catch my 11:15 flight out and I'll be in Pittsburgh by 1:00. My roommate left yesterday, and most everyone else on my floor left today so it's pretty barren tonight. This was the dining hall at 6:30 PM...


There wasn't much food, either. Just hot dogs, hamburgers, some crappy pasta, and salad. I pity the poor fools who aren't going home over the break. The one upshot of there being not many people here is pretty much all the crazy kids went home already, so the people left behind are pretty cool. I got to introduce the joy that is "Rejected" to a couple more people. Muahahaha!


Recapping the time since my last post - well, I got a "new" Canon Optura 30 video camera off ebay. $310 for a camera that was $899 a year and a half ago is not bad, if you ask me. Throw in a case and extra battery and you have one happy film student!

What else happened? Oh yeah, we finally had snow on Friday! Come on, this is Syracuse for crying out loud, we should have had snow before Halloween! Pittsburgh got snow before us!


I've also been dealing with scheduling, which is turing into a real pain. Oh, I got my required courses in all right, although the only schedule that fits requires me to make the 20-minute walk from Syracuse Stage to Main Campus in less than 10 to get to my next class... but we told the professor about that so he's just going to try to shift the second class 10 minutes later. But that isn't the real problem - the real problem is my electives. I took so many AP's in high school that I can get out of all but 3 of my "academic elective" (read: arts & sciences) classes, one of which I took this semester. Instead, I can skip electives altogether some semesters (which I will take advantage of Junior and Senior year since I'll be spending so much time making longer films) or take studio electives (art stuff) instead. A studio elective sounded good for spring, so I signed up for "Introduction to 3D," where you get to learn Lightwave. Sounds like a really fun class. The problem is, it's normally reserved for Computer Arts majors (what happened to the ease of exploring different interests within the Transmedia department?) so I have to get a slip signed by the professor to let me take it.

Ok, but there's one problem with that - I can't track him down! his office hours are listed as only 12pm-1pm Thursdays, but when I went last week the door was shut and locked! I sent an e-mail, but I haven't heard a response yet. The head of my department said I was doing what I should, and that if I don't get a response in another week, I should send a follow-up e-mail. But by then the course may be full! Sigh... college. There is some good news about my schedule, though; As it's shaping up now, I won't have any classes on friday. Granted, I'll have an 8:30 am class on Monday, but whatever.

Wow, that turned into a rather long rant. I guess then I shouldn't go on too much about my stupid last paper for Writing 105, or my even more stupid Final essay for Art Media... yeah.

I know I've been neglecting the comic for... like... a month. I'll see if I can do something about that over break. Heck, maybe tonight, I'm not really doing anything else. We'll see.

To my friends: I'll see you guys back in the 'Burgh! We seriously need to have a LAN party, or Risk, or D&D. Something!

Shenanigans!

As Mike pointed out, he and Will had some fun with me last night. As requested, I'm posting the exceedingly humorous logs from the AIM sessions I had with the two. Be warned - they're long! I couldn't summarize what happened if I tried, so you'll just have to figure out what's going on for yourself! Rest assured, this will make it into the comic in some form. It's just too good to pass up.

We'll start with my chat with Will. I signed on to AIM last night, and was greeted with this:

12:56 AM
x2Xtreme21x: yeah so... um... haley's passed out on my floor in a pool of his own vomit... good thing?
Mike Hanley: not usually...
Mike Hanley:
x2Xtreme21x: its' quite humorous
x2Xtreme21x: I found like... scars on his wrists
Mike Hanley: until you have to clean up said vomit
Mike Hanley: scars?
x2Xtreme21x: from like razors
x2Xtreme21x:
Mike Hanley: eesh. fun
x2Xtreme21x: yeeeeeeeah
x2Xtreme21x: ..... thoughts?
Mike Hanley: i find it ironic that this happens right after i see you're in the "I prefer not to drink on weekends" facebook group
x2Xtreme21x: ... I am?
Mike Hanley: and yes, I'm aware this is haley not you, but still funny
x2Xtreme21x: it's not ME.. it's HALEY
Mike Hanley: was that on his profile?
x2Xtreme21x: no it's on mine
Mike Hanley: k, my point still stands
Mike Hanley: that fact that after you "give it up", you have to deal with this
x2Xtreme21x: AM I PASSED OUT ON MY FLOOR IN A POOL OF VOMIT?!
x2Xtreme21x: NO IT'S HALEY
Mike Hanley: i know
Mike Hanley: nevermind
x2Xtreme21x: it's gonna be a bitch to clean this up..
Mike Hanley: i would imagine
1:00 AM
x2Xtreme21x: I'll get him to once he wakes up
x2Xtreme21x: with his ASS
Mike Hanley: just make sure he's on his side so he doesn't drown in it
x2Xtreme21x: um
x2Xtreme21x: too late?
Mike Hanley: is he breathing? if so, not too late
x2Xtreme21x: um
x2Xtreme21x: I don't wanna go near that..
x2Xtreme21x: he's a runner... he can stand a long time without oxygen....... right?
Mike Hanley: ...
x2Xtreme21x: I might be a little drunk myself..
Mike Hanley: what position is he in now?
x2Xtreme21x: DOGGY STYLE
Mike Hanley: face down, then?
x2Xtreme21x: umm..
x2Xtreme21x: I think?
Mike Hanley: ...
x2Xtreme21x: yes... face down
Mike Hanley: just nudge him over with your foot until he's on his side
x2Xtreme21x: I don't know... he crawled into my closet
Mike Hanley: O_O
Mike Hanley: fuuuuuuun
x2Xtreme21x: um yeah
x2Xtreme21x: so... HOW'S LIFE?
Mike Hanley: um... less eventful than your own
Mike Hanley: thankfully
Mike Hanley: seriously, just make sure Haley's still breathing and put him on his side. Drowning in your own vomit would be a horrible way to go.
Mike Hanley: and yes, he will owe you big time after this....
Mike Hanley: wait...
x2Xtreme21x: ummm
x2Xtreme21x: maybe that's not haley..
Mike Hanley: he just signed on AIM...
Mike Hanley: yeah
Mike Hanley: WTF?
x2Xtreme21x: WHO IS IN MY CLOSET?
Mike Hanley: who is on your floor?
1:05 AM
x2Xtreme21x: ... WHAT THE FUCK
x2Xtreme21x: it's NOT HALEY
x2Xtreme21x: oh shit
Mike Hanley: yeah
Mike Hanley: shit indeed
Mike Hanley: do you know who it is?
x2Xtreme21x: [01:05] x2Xtreme21x: yeah so... you're not on my floor
[01:05] Mike Haley: Uh..?
[01:05] x2Xtreme21x: yeah someone's passed out in my closet..
[01:05] Mike Haley: ... Uh?
[01:06] x2Xtreme21x: I SWEAR TO GOD IT'S YOU
[01:06] Mike Haley: ... Yes, Will. It's me.
Mike Hanley: you really need to figure out who this guy is
x2Xtreme21x: well it's kinda tough that he's passed out
x2Xtreme21x: hmmmmm...
1:10 AM
x2Xtreme21x: HOLY SHIT I THINK I KNOW WH OIT IS
x2Xtreme21x: ... it's Haley I swear
Mike Hanley: I'm talking to him right now on AIM
x2Xtreme21x: who?
Mike Hanley: Haley!
x2Xtreme21x: oh
x2Xtreme21x: then wtf
x2Xtreme21x: WHHO ARE YOU????
Mike Hanley: Mike Hanley, you messaged me, remember?
x2Xtreme21x: not yo
Mike Hanley: oh, him
x2Xtreme21x: HALEY
Mike Hanley: ITS NOT HALEY
Mike Hanley: I'M TALKING TO HALEY
x2Xtreme21x: YOU CAN'T PROVE TAHT
1:15 AM
Mike Hanley: Haley is going to come over to help you
Mike Hanley: but you'll need to sign him in
x2Xtreme21x: HE'S ALREAXY HERE
x2Xtreme21x: I SWEAR TO YOU MIKE
Mike Hanley: just trust me, alright
Mike Hanley: just trust that someone is coming to help you.
x2Xtreme21x: um
x2Xtreme21x: help me?
x2Xtreme21x: Im fine
x2Xtreme21x: it's fucking HALEY THAT NEEDS HELP
Mike Hanley: whatever, you need help with the situation

Heh, yeah. Around here is where Will called to tell me it was a joke, and make sure I hadn't called his parents or anything. :) And then my chat with Mike. Keep in mind these are going on around the same time:

1:06 AM
Mike Hanley: so, um, wtf?
drkdstryer1: ???
Mike Hanley: who is passed out on will's floor ????
drkdstryer1: Will is like... really drunk
Mike Hanley: apparently hes not the only one
drkdstryer1: I don't know what's going on
drkdstryer1: So like
Mike Hanley: here's the chat so far:
drkdstryer1: What has he been telling you
drkdstryer1: ?
The AIM service could not send the message: A message or picture is too large to be transmitted.
Mike Hanley: hmm, too long to send
drkdstryer1: What is the synopsis?
Mike Hanley: someone is passed out in a pool of his own vomit in Will's closet
Mike Hanley: he thought it was you
drkdstryer1: ... uh
drkdstryer1: Like
Mike Hanley: then you signed on
drkdstryer1: I'm in my dorm
drkdstryer1: All night
1:10 AM
drkdstryer1: I was at the track house for like an hour, but I'm home now
Mike Hanley: the fact remains - there's someone passed out in their own vomit in will's closet
Mike Hanley: obviously not you, but someone
drkdstryer1: Like, he thinks it' me?
drkdstryer1: Wait
Mike Hanley: not anymore
drkdstryer1: Will... doesn;'t really have a closet
drkdstryer1: Like, it's really small
Mike Hanley: will says the guy kinda crawled into it
drkdstryer1: No way can someone fit in there
drkdstryer1: That's like NOT POSSIBLE
Mike Hanley: so i'm picturing half-in half-out
Mike Hanley: he still thought it was you, i told him im talking to you, now he's says "oh. the wtf?"
drkdstryer1: Like, I'm gonna go down to Pitt now
drkdstryer1: Should I?
Mike Hanley: yeah, i think he really needs help
drkdstryer1: It's really late though :
Mike Hanley: he's obviously slightly drunk himself
drkdstryer1: Eh
Mike Hanley: oh dear
drkdstryer1: ?
Mike Hanley: x2Xtreme21x: ... it's Haley I swear
Mike Hanley: I'm talking to him right now on AIM
x2Xtreme21x: who?
Mike Hanley: Haley!
x2Xtreme21x: oh
x2Xtreme21x: then wtf
x2Xtreme21x: WHHO ARE YOU????
Mike Hanley: Mike Hanley, you messaged me, remember?
x2Xtreme21x: not yo
Mike Hanley: oh, him
x2Xtreme21x: HALEY
Mike Hanley: ITS NOT HALEY
Mike Hanley: I'M TALKING TO HALEY
x2Xtreme21x: YOU CAN'T PROVE TAHT
drkdstryer1: Oh shit
drkdstryer1: Afk
drkdstryer1: To Pitt!
drkdstryer1: Oh shit
drkdstryer1: I can't get into his dorm
1:15 AM
drkdstryer1: He needs to sign me oin
drkdstryer1: *in
drkdstryer1: Do you know his cell?
Mike Hanley: um
drkdstryer1: Can you call Will? I ahvew like no minutes left
Mike Hanley: hold on
drkdstryer1: I can give you his number
Mike Hanley: im talking to will on aim
drkdstryer1: Just be like "Haley's coming"
Mike Hanley: Mike Hanley: Haley is going to come over to help you
Mike Hanley: but you'll need to sign him in
x2Xtreme21x: HE'S ALREAXY HERE
x2Xtreme21x: I SWEAR TO YOU MIKE
Mike Hanley: just trust me, alright
Mike Hanley: just trust that someone is coming to help you.
drkdstryer1: Heh right
drkdstryer1: Thanks
Mike Hanley: call him when you get tthere
drkdstryer1: If my plan lets me....
Mike Hanley: x2Xtreme21x: um
x2Xtreme21x: help me?
x2Xtreme21x: Im fine
x2Xtreme21x: it's fucking HALEY THAT NEEDS HELP
Mike Hanley: whatever, you need help with the situation
drkdstryer1: O shit
Mike Hanley: he still thinks its you....
drkdstryer1: Yeah, I'm gone nowe
drkdstryer1: Talk to you later
Mike Hanley: let me know how it goes
Mike Hanley: call me if you need more reasoning with will

Haley has a blog!

Attention! - After a long history of reading and occasionally commenting on others, perfoming the blogging equivalent of lurking, Haley has finally been successfully talked into starting his own blog. This battle has been won, but the war isn't over! The villian is now threatening to not update again under some pretense of having a "boring life." Our efforts must not fail! We must spam him with comments to force him into updating!

Ahem. Yeah, so the only serious news in this post is that Haley has a blog now.

I'l be home this weekend

Yup. First weekend in November I'm going to be taking advantage of my dad's frequent flyer miles (and a convenient 3 day weekend thanks to Eid ul-Fitr) and making a quick trip back to Pittsburgh. Should be a nice change of pace, and I'll probably sleep better without my roommate snoring :)

Directionless is up!

Took an age and a half, but my new webcomic Directionless finally exists on the internet! There's only two comics so far, but I'm working on that part. I'm aiming for once-a-week updates, but anyone familiar with Medieval Mayhem should know not to expect that rule to be set in stone.

Yes, I know there are ads, but they're just little banners, and using Comic Genesis lets me use their slick automation tools so I don't have to update things like archive pages and "Prev"/"Next" buttons - I just upload a properly named JPEG, even in advance if I want to, and it will all be automatically updated on the appropriate day. Slick. And it's free, so who's complaining?

The Evil, Ironic Pop-Up

Yes, it's true, even with Firefox's built in filter, some cleverly-coded pop-up ads still get through. Some of them still follow the "make it look like a Windows message box" template, since apparently there are still people that stupid left in the world.

But this one tops them all...

The irony is just overwhelming...

Wikipedia = Hitchhiker's Guide to Earth?

An interesting article on Slate.com compares Wikipedia to the famous creaton of Douglas Adams that we all know and love. (or at least we should!)

The parallels between The Hitchhiker's Guide (as found in Adams' original BBC radio series and novels) and Wikipedia are so striking, it's a wonder that the author's rabid fans don't think he invented time travel. Since its editor was perennially out to lunch, the Guide was amended "by any passing stranger who happened to wander into the empty offices on an afternoon and saw something worth doing." This anonymous group effort ends up outselling Encyclopedia Galactica even though "it has many omissions and contains much that is apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate."

Interesting way to look at it, to say the least.

Welcome to the New Red Scare

Looks like our new society of fear and anxiety has at least one undeniable effect: wasting the Secret Service's time with frivilous nonsense that makes everyone involved look like a friggin' moron. Oh wait, I just called a god-loving Wal-Mart employee a moron, when he was just trying to protect his country from the ominous threat of the Thumbtack Terrorists? Help! The thought police are coming for meeeeeeeee!

Article from AlterNet

And a less opinionated local story to prove this isn't just "fabricated by the liberal media":

Article from WVEC-TV

Drink the Water!

Yay! - The "Boil water" order has been lifted.

Don't Drink The Water!

Oh, this is fun to wake up to: Looks like there's E-Coli in the tap water here.

An e-mail from the University offers this helpful advice:

Water should be boiled at a full boil for a minimum of one minute
before drinking, making ice, brushing teeth, washing dishes or being
used in food preparation; boiling kills most bacteria and other
organisms in the water.

Bathing is permitted, but incidental ingestion during bathing
activities should be avoided.

It's like studying abroad in Mexico! Just without the travel costs, or that annoying language barrier!

Comic Name and Update

It is decided: the new comic will be called "Directionless." Now I just need to start the prolonged process of getting a Comic Genesis account.

Plus, I've finished the second comic!

I had to do a bit of trimming to the lengthy dialogue I had written originally, but I think the point still comes across. Tell me what you think.

FYI, this conversation never actually happened, but when were were driving in there really was a sign hanging on one of the frats that read "Freshman Girl Drop-Off."

My Comic Needs a Name!

Apparently the Comic Genesis registration process can take awhile... like in the neighborhood of 2 weeks. In light of this, I need to start trying to get my new webcomic online soon if I want it to actually be online in the forseeable future. There is just one problem with this...

I have no name for the comic!

So I'm asking anyone who reads this (which I'm aware amounts to 2, maybe 3 people) to help me out. The comic will be mostly about odd/funny things that happen around campus, and will be primarily based on things that have actually happened. the characters will probably be based on people from my floor, but I'll probably combine people, as well as change some of the names (to protect the not-quite-innocent). I may also have an occasional "commentary" strip where I parody a movie I just saw or something.

If none of that made sense, here are some examples of similar comics:

http://machall.com/index.php?strip_id=29
http://machall.com/index.php?strip_id=30
http://machall.com/index.php?strip_id=193
http://www.applegeeks.com/comic_archive/viewcomic.php?issue=6
http://machall.com/index.php?strip_id=320
http://loserz.scribblekid.org/index.php?id=12

And last (but most importantly...) here are the names i'm considering for the comic

• "Life of Mike"
• "Directionless"
• "Figurative Monotony" (whatever that means. Will came up with it.)
• ????

Please leave comments if you like one of these over the others, or if you have a better idea.

On a side note, you can see a little preview of the second comic in the current Picture Of The Moment.

UPDATE: (on Monday) So far the only intelligent/coherent feedback I've recieved has been in favor of "Directionless", so unless something marvelously inspired comes my way in the next 6 hours or so, that's what I'm sticking with.

Coloring and shading on the second comic are coming along nicely.

The Coming Fight For My Money

Well isn't that just perfect. Looks like F.E.A.R. and Quake IV are both coming out on October 18th. (give or take). I'm sure they'll each cost in the neghborhood of $55, and I'm not inclined to dump in excess of a hundred bucks on video games that I don't have as much time to play as I used to anyway, especially so soon after getting the nano.

Crap!

iPod Nano Review

I got my iPod Nano! First impression - this thing is so tiny it's funny! As someone from the dorm across the hall noted, "it doesn't even look like a real iPod, it looks more like a toy!"
As usual, Apple used typically extravagent packaging that makes the sheer act of buying and opening the Nano an experience. It came on a tiny little black box (about the size of a Shuffle box) which was placed in a special "commemorative" bag to take it home in. That thing turned a few heads on the bus!
The back of the box has a shot that would make anyone covet this thing...
The inner part (with the silver apple on the spine) slides out and opens like a book to reveal the Nano sitting in a custom cutout, wrapped in protective plastic, with a little plastic tab to help you pull it out. The headphones, cable, CD-ROM and other such things are tucked away in two pouches in the left part of the box.

Did I mention the thing is small?
And of course, size comparison against the thinkness of my old Shuffle: the Nano is actually thinner.
So far, I'm very impressed. Sound quality is great (it is an iPod, y'know?). Battery life is great - I played with it a ton last night from about 7:00 on, a bit today, and I spent the last 2-3 hours trying to deliberately run down the battery by keeping the backlight on nonstop. It's still going. The scroll wheel is a a design concept that works beautifully (as Andy can attest to), and 4 gig is plenty to fit my measly collection of music. Plus, the black model is simply the sexiest device I've ever held! Some people complain about the headphone jack being on the "bottom," but I really haven't had a problem with it.

Of course, nothing is perfect, and this review wouldn't be complete without the two minor flaws:

1.) The scroll wheel is a little too sensitive. It's fairly easy to adapt to this, but it would be nicer if the sensitivity could be adjusted.

2.) Sharing a flaw with the similarly beautiful PSP, the Nano's beauty comes with a price: shiny black and chrome may look awesome, but they pick up fingerprints like nobody's business! Scratches could be another problem, but I've been lucky enough to avoid any on the front as of yet (there's a small one on the back).

First Comic is Done!

I got the scanner, and was able to put together the first issue/episode/page of my new webcomic

(Click image for larger view)

Ok, so i went overboard on the shading a little bit... I was trying to follow Ian McConville's tutorial on how he does Mac Hall. Or at least, how he did it at one point. His style has changed a couple times over the years. My drawing style is quite different from any of his, but I think the shading technique still worked pretty well.

Anyway, this is the first of a series of comics I'll be making in my free time to document silly/funny things that happen around campus (mostly on my floor, y'know, since I live here and all). I have several ideas waiting to be made into comics, but I still don't have a name for the webcomic as a whole! I'm open to suggestions, so feel free to leave a comment.


In other news, the Apple Store finally has 4 gig iPod nanos back in stock, and since I was on the list they're holding one for me to pick up tomorrow evening. Expect an in-depth (and probably drool-soaked) review tomorrow night!

Free Opera - Permanently

Some people (who may or may not be named Andy) will be happy to hear that the Opera Browser team have extended the "free registration code for our birthday" offer until... forever. That's right, Opera is now totally free, no ads, no registration. Too bad I'm already rather attached to Firefox on Windows/Linux, and Safari on Mac OS X.

Fly Me to the Moon...

Looks like NASA is finally going back to the moon. I, for one, am excited. For too long we've been wasting our time (not to mention billions of dollars) spinning pretty little circles around our own planet. It's time to move on, and this return to the moon is the first step in getting NASA off it's ass. Even better, the new design, similar to the Apollo rockets, has the crew capsule on the top of the boosters, making the whole "shedding foam that could hit the crew capsule" problem irrelevant. (duh!)

I can't wait!

Bravo, Bush. Bravo.

I bet a lot of you never expected to see a title like that out of me, huh? Well, this is a special occasion. President Bush has not only admitted that there were failures all over the government when it came to responding to Katrina, he said he takes responsibility for those failures, and wants to find out exactly where and how things went wrong at every level of government. I'm very glad he pointed out the obvious (to me, at least) link between how effective we are at responding to a massive natural disaster and how effective we'd be against an equally massive terrorist attack.

Of course, there's always the possibility this is just a political move to gain back lost popularity, but I'm willing to give Bush the benefit of doubt on this one. Watch the video with that CNN article - he genuinely sounds humbled by this.

So bravo, Mr. President. I may be wholeheartedly against 99% of the other things your administration has done over the last 5 years, but you have my complete support in this particular endeavor.


...I feel so dirty!

Clarification - Some people have taken this post to mean that I have become a proto-Bush supporter. This couldn't be farther from the truth! I'm just glad to see him finally admit failure, and I truly hope he's sincere in his wanting to get to the bottom of the structural problems in our emergency response system. It doesn't make up for all the other things I disagree with, but it's a tiny ray of light through an otherwise cloudy sky.

Nano, Thou Shalt be Mine

Ok, so I have no willpower. I admit it. I'm going to get a black 4 GB iPod Nano. The 3-times-a-week 20 minute walks to my drama classes just made me yearn for a more capable player than my Shuffle. Besides, who can argue with carrying your entire music library, and still being able to have 2 GB free for other stuff - hell, I could hold the uncompressed DVD image for my movies in that!

Unfortunately, the Apple Store here in Syracuse is out of them. They got the shipment in last night, and they're already out. Wow, I knew they'd be popular, but that's nuts! So now I'm on the waitlist, and will be called as soon as more are in. They did have a 2 GB display model left that I was able to play with. Pretty slick - as thin as it is, it actually feels sturdier than my Shuffle, probably because of the metal back. The weight is just right, the screen is clear and bright, and the scroll wheel works fine. I want!

Political Musings Around Deus Ex

Before I say anything, let me point out that this is just my random musing over an idea I thought up about 5 minutes ago. It isn't a well-constructed or complete argument, nor do I intend it to be - just me spitting out what I'm thinking about.

I don't know how many of my friends actually played through a significant part of Deus Ex, (most found it too slow) but I finished it last year and really enjoyed it. One thing I found interesting about it was the way it depicted the near-future of our world. The world of Deus Ex is filled with fear and terrorism. Some leaders (political and otherwise) use this fear to further thair own adgendas. Of course, being a video game, their adgendas mainly center around variants of "take over the world," but I still found it to be an interesting parallel to our own world. (Here is where all my conservative friends just opened their mouths and started shaking their heads - bear with me!) The fact that the game came out before 9/11 made it seems all the more prophetic. The fact that leaders exploiting fears over terrorism played prominently gave me the impression that this was a "liberal-friendly/sympathizing" game.

I recently found a review of the game from when it was new (2000) in which the author laments the fact that the game's designers took up "ultra-right fantasies" for much of the games plot. He said "a plot which fingers the UN as the chief agency seeking world domination is only heading one way politically", and noted "a wimpy liberal isn’t going to find much attractive about their final choices."

Wait - I'm a liberal, I loved this game, and it's plot most of all! I guess my point is that politics aren't static. What was considered a "right" game under Clinton can now be considered a "left" game under Bush. I guess that would just make it an "anti-government" game, although newspaper clippings and e-mails tend to paint a favorable picture of the fictional President Mead, who opposes the the increased powers of UNATCO.

Actually, I guess I don't really have too much of a point, just throwing my observations out there. I just found the difference between my impression of the game and this review's.

Thoughts, anyone?

More News From Apple Land

iPod Nano = Cool

Leave it to Apple to release a product that I in no way need, but really, really want! The new iPod Nano replaces the iPod Mini, Apple's previously best-selling iPod (and the one Andy has). It's smaller, unbelievably thin, and in my opinion the sexiest looking iPod yet. As I said, I have no need for one. my Shuffle still works fine, and the new Nanos are a bit overpriced (like all 1st-gen iPod models) - but they're still cool! I guess I'll have to stick it out and hold on to my conviction to not buy another iPod until video models come out (or until I make a radical shift and start litsening to enough music that a Shuffle won't cut it) but this new iPod will make that hard!

Apple also announced the Motorola ROKR, which plays iTMS songs. Meh - I prefer different devices for different tasks.

There's also a new version of iTunes (version 5) that adds more search capabilities, folders in the playlist pane, parental controls, "smart" shuffle (lowers the chances of playing two songs from the same artist back to back), and a more streamlined interface.

Finally, Quicktime 7 for Windows is done! now when I finally get my movie site working again, people can all view the H.264 video. This version should be included with the iTunes 5 download. Also! - for my iTunes-hating friends, you can download Quicktime 7 without having to get iTunes, they just hide it. Here's the link to the Quicktime 7 Standalone Player.

UPDATE: Tried out the final version of Windows QT7. Bad news - H.264 performance still sucks. Looks like viewing the DVD-quality versions of my movies online for now will be limited to those with sickeningly fast computers... or Macs. I do find it odd that My 2.2 (actual) GHz Athlon XP 3200 can't keep up with my 1.6 GHz G4 Powerbook. I guss this is just one of those rare cases in which AltiVec actually makes a big difference.

What the Hell?

If you needed any more proof that our government doesn't know what they're doing with the aftermath of Katrina, here it is. Yes, I'm sure handing out fliers with contact information for FEMA is important, but it doesn't need to be done by firefighters! Their skills would be put to much better use, oh I don't know, saving people?

This is FEMA we're talking about - the people who are supposed to know how to handle a natural disaster. And don't get me started on the 50 assigned to be walking publicity stunts for the president... The Daily Kos has a nice rant on that.

Flint 1A Rules!

I love my floor. Syracuse University, Flint Hall, first floor, A wing now has, without a doubt, the most awesome lounge ever.

I present... stadium seating!


So in short: boredom + college students + furniture + a few large "aquired" buckets = awesomeness!

UPDATE: Bed risers stacked on top of tables do not make a very sturdy base for a couch with 2-3 people on it. The back row is down! The others should be stable enough to stay put, as long as we don't get any (understandably) nervous R.D.'s snooping around...

ANOTHER UPDATE: The awesomeness is no more - our RA's got nervous. The stadium seating is gone, back to boring old "normal" furniture arrangements.

New Orleans Blog

This is incredible: Survival of New Orleans Blog
It's the blog of a guy at a New Orleans hosting company who stayed behind to ride out the storm and maintain the network. It gives a very different (and horrifying) look at the situation down there than what you see on TV. In his words, "It's Lord of The Flies out there!"

This is really bad...

On a totally unrelated note: Ok, comment spam has gotten out of control, so I've implemented word verification on comments.

Settled In

First week of classes is over, I think I finally know my way around (mostly), and now I can just sit down and update this blog. First of all - click that Red Cross link up there. It only takes a minute, and every little bit helps. Katrina really wreaked hell on the gulf coast, and the survivors need all the help they can get.

Now that that's off my chest, on the college stuff. I promised pictures awhile ago, so here they are. My dorm room in all its glory... (W00t! Big Matrix poster!)


And another view...


Classes have been OK so far, but I have developed an intense hatred for textbooks. I chose to preorder mine, figuring it would make my life easier. Nope. It seems the $200 worth of books they handed me upon arriving was only for two classes! I spent an additional $140 for Writing, and still have to buy stuff for Art Media and Anthropology of American Life on Film. Grrr...

Anyway, with all the crazy/random/funny crap that goes on at college, I've decided there's no way I can'tget back into webcomics. This time I'll be making an actual drawn comic, not sprites. Everything will be based on things that actually happen here. My parents are going to send up the spare (?) scanner, but I did do this test using the "digital camera as a scanner" trick - a trick that works very poorly, as the lines come out all blurry and messy. Blurry lines = hard to color and shade on the computer. The image below is my "comic" rendering of me and my roommate, who is saying an actual quote of his (quite frequently during the first 3 or 4 days).

I think it turned out pretty good, especially since it's not a style I frequently draw in. Putting that little picture on my door has already generated a few comments, so at the very least it looks like my hall will be readers. I won't have any finished comics until the scanner gets here (not doing the camera thing again...). I'll post a link here when it's up. I'll probably be using Comic Genesis (formerly KeenSpace) for hosting - anyone know much about them?

Oh, and there seem to be problems with the Hanley Films server, so that website is back to its "Coming Soon" page for now. I hope I don't have to find new hosting. Y'know, like something I pay for...