A little realism in a CG world

I have been looking at getting the new ZBrush 3.1 program for a while now ever since I was told from some folks in the industry that I needed to have more complex models. My thoughts on ZBrush to start focused on so many people who didn't know how to model, were using this as a crutch. Sure! You can make some amazing images and models, but what if you get in a studio that only has Maya or XSI? Can you make the transition?

This kind of stems back to an animation professor showing me a reel of a student who received an internship at a studio in Dallas, TX. The models were amazing, but you could tell right off that it was ZBrush. His other models were ok, but they were the inside of a Yacht. Many extrudes, bevels and not really complex modeling. At this point, I thought "This cat knows how to manipulate models, but it doesn't appear that he can do so in the base 3D application." Maybe I'm mistaken, but from the looks of the portfolio, that's how it appeared.

Of course change is like anything, we all tend to buck it until we try out the new way of things and find that we actually like the new way better than the old. So, as my copy of ZBrush sits in transit, I wait anxiously to check out the posible options that I will have available to me in bringing my characters to life with that little bit of extra realism.

Mark this day in history!

Well, as most of you know, I just got done car shopping. I decided to go with a *cough* Ford. It's not my first choice, but it'll work until the 2010 Camaro comes out and I can afford it. All is well though considering it could have been a lot worse. Here is a pic of the new car from a magazine although I should have some pics soon of the car.

New outlook to bring the last half of the year

Well, as it turns out I was in a car wreck on the 4th. An 82 year old lady wasn't paying attention and ran a red light while catching me right in the middle of the intersection. Good things have come of this though, she is ok and I'm ok, but old people cars are obviously more metal than mine. Hers appeared to have minor damage as it's suprising since she went through a brick wall after hitting my car twice (in the front and then spun to get the rear). It obviously could have been a lot worse and as I said, I'm just happy everyone is ok and no kids were in the cars.
With that being said, here are some pics of the Camaro as it sits now.


A lot of good memories in the car, but from the sounds of it they are going to total it. I'll have to wait and see Monday. If they do then I'll be car shopping for another Camaro and see what I can find for a good price that hasn't been beat on.

More later.

Well, it's about time! The 2009 *sigh* Camaro is going to be hitting the streets in late 2008 early 2009. It's going to be REALLY nice and about the right time for me to trade in this one.
The new one is SUPER nice and indeed something that I'm looking forward to taking even a test drive in. If you want to see the prototype, have a look at the new Transformers movie.

New equipment for home

Well, I finally went out and bought a new external MyBox Western Digital external 1 Terrabyte drive to place all my animations and training DVDs on. I have to admit, the new drive is amazing and a nice addition. I think that I may end up getting a second 1 Terrabyte drive and start to get the drive space that I need. The config can be set to Raid 0 or Raid 1 (0 does not mirror the 500G drive, but uses both as one partition. So a smaller drive may be in order to hold documents and things that do not require a large amount of space. As you can see in the image, the blue circle is where the Terra drive is. Such a pretty sight to behold wouldn't you agree? So now it's time to get back to work and get some more things done here. Only two days to compile everything together and get the school work that I need to get done, completed. Wish me luck!

Chow.

Adobe CS3 Installation

Ok, well here's the story. While paying over $900.00 US for the Adobe suite I figured that I got a deal. I was unaware that it was going to be such a hassle and of how broke the installer is for XP Pro.

I installed disk 1 with no problems. Disk 2 required the Adobe 8 pkg to be installed. Upon trying to install it, the install hung, with no errors of course. I then installed 8 and went back to the install (note: disk 1 alone is about a 45 min install each time). It passed Adobe 8 and then hung on the next pkg. >.<

Not a problem, so I thought; I'll just call adobe. Blah blah blah... 15 minutes later of giving almost everything except my birth marks to them I was told "Oh, well it seems that this will have to go to technical support and they won't be in until tomorrow."

Let's recap... $900+ Adobe Master Collection CS3, 5 hours or troubleshooting the install, a call to an overseas "help" desk to wait until tomorrow? What!?!?!? So if you can wait for Adobe to get off their coffee breaks and stop playing with the cube toys, maybe we could have an installer that works for the amount of money that they are getting for their products. Hell, I haven't had this much trouble with an installer even from a freeware package!

Adobe, loose the interns and hire some real programmers that know how to make an installer that isn't broke before releasing it out to the public.

House gets flooded...

Well, as of last Friday our house was flooded and we ended up with some rain water in the bedroom, living area and kitchen. So now begins the task of getting everything in order to get the carpet and base boards taken care of. It's really a mess and I hope that nobody has to go through this. We did get some relief from the insurance company and it should cover our costs. Overall everyone is ok and just a little bummed about having to replace the new carpet we just had installed. Other than that, it could have been a lot worse.

It's been a while

Well, finally school has come to a close for the term. The next term is going to bring me back to working on some more 3D projects in Unreal Tounament 2004 with level design! Woot! Have to wonder how these will come out in the 9 weeks that we have. It should be interesting to see what happens.

Other than that, not a lot has been going on. There are a few points that I have been kind of down, but I think that's really just not working as much as I would like to in 3D and itching to get out there in the real world of entertainment. I know it's a ways off, but really 12 months isn't a long time and then i'll be looking for a new job and trying to get my foot in the door at some studio. Just have to see how things go! ;)

Reasons to clean your desk

I know this is an odd post, but I had to share. Let me simplify this, I went home for lunch and got a Mt. Dew. For those who know me, this is pretty normal. I came to work and set the Dew down on the desk, again no big deal. I went to then reach for the Dew and noticed two cans on my desk, one from a couple days ago (obviously flat) and another that I had just placed. Hmmmm, I know one is going to be nasty so do I chance it and have a sip? LOL, as it turns out I believe I chose the right one. Out of concern, I threw both in the trash and decided to start over. ;) Home gets a little worse as I could have 3-6 cans depending on the work I am doing.

A word of caution though. If you smoke or dip and use a common can for your trash. Enough said on that. ;)

Monday evening

Well, not much going on. Just trying to get back into the swing of things with my sketching. This week we are supposed to continue to work on the character design for the final project and my creativity seems to have abandon ship. I think tonight I may try to watch one of my design DVDs and see if I can pick something back up.

On a different note, I was in class today (well not really since it's online) and someone posted a response to me where it sounded like the person was trying to help me understand character design. The amusing thing is that I also tutor at the college and teach animation students how to work in the applications and understand their projects. I don't know, it just kind of caught me wrong although i'm sure that it wasn't meant to sound that way.

Anyway, I'll get back to work and see what kind of interesting creatures I can being to life. ;)

First post and two weeks left of school for the term.

Well, it seems that things have been going good recently. School is pushing along, although right now I am doing more drawing for class than 3D work. The last 3D class that I had was almost three or four terms ago. So I can only hope that the next class that I get is for 3D as I don't want to forget some of the things that I was working on before.

*coffee break*

Ever have one of those mornings where you get your coffee and then as you're walking along, you notice that the coffee is starting to get out of control and is going to spill over on to the new carpet (or old carpet)? You guessed it! Just as I was coming back to continue. It wasn't that bad until I put my hand out to catch the coffee (freshly made and $%&^ hot) from hitting the floor. Let's see... Hot coffee on carpet or possible burn on the hand? Sometimes common sense abandons us at the most inopportune times.