 YES INDEED.
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And The Promise Of Things To Come
Sunday, June 18th, 2006, 10:00 PM
I missed another update. Be appeased by the picture at left for now. It may become something more by this Thursday.
One reason I didn't update last Thursday is because I had a big Digital Logic test that evening, which I destroyed. I slaughtered it. I was its utter ruination. I... I guess the point I'm trying to get across here is that I did pretty well.
My tonsil feels better now.
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 Image courtesy Marcello.
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Almost Reliable
Saturday, June 10th, 2006, 12:20 AM
Whoops. Missed my scheduled update yesterday without even realizing it. At least I'm not in charge of anything important like a webcomic or something.
In my defense, though, I woke up with an extremely disgruntled tonsil yesterday. Yes, tonsil. Only my right-side tonsil appears to have taken up arms against me. The one on the left is still just blissfully... uh... doing whatever it is that tonsils do. My the point is that I was in pain. So naturally I used that as an excuse not to do anything at all whatsoever all day. It was quite glorious.
So, as you've most likely ascertained by now, I have no new content for you this update other than these actual words. But they're good words, the kind that hand out cups of Gatorade to random people in marathons. The kind that bother taking their used batteries to the proper disposal authorities instead of simply tossing them in with the other, less explosive garbage. The kind that liked Weezer before they got popular.
I'm still mulling over what to do for a personal project. The 3D animated short I've discussed earlier is far from ruled out, but dadgummit if I don't keep coming up with more ideas. Marcello and I have discussed the possibility of remaking one of the Megaman games for this one contest thing. Additionally, I've considered trying to code my first game in C/C++. It would of course be something extremely simple, like a PacMan clone or a Frogger clone or something of that sort, possibly something even simpler. I wouldn't mind working on two ideas at the same time if I weren't already involved with working on something with Marcello. Ah well. I need to make a decision soon, though, as the summer is quickly slipping away. How about this: I'll have my project commitments decided by next Thursday's update. Yes... yes, that should work. I can already smell it, the pungent odor of that which we like to call victory.
By the way, I have found the most awesome movie poster ever made. You may now bask in the awesome.
Also, homies, if you ain't yet got your grubby little mouse pointers on DangerDoom's free CD release over at Adult Swim, then boy, you best bust a move.
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 Slider bots are popular with evil overlords who wish to save a few bucks.
 The apparently peaceful town of New Sylvanton.
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I am the champion!
Sunday, June 4th, 2006, 5:00 PM
That's right. Of course, I've known it all my life. But now it's official! I've won my first 2draw contest, and I have to say, it was fun. Now that I think of it, I haven't entered any art contests since high school. So of course, being that it was an art contest, I have some new art for my gallery here. You may behold the art by clicking on the thumbnails at left.
The winning picture was the one of the robot. I may end up building and animating the bot in 3DS Max as part of a possible 3D animated short. I'm not sure that I've settled on that design yet, but if I do go ahead with the short it will probably feature some revision of that bot. Here is the description of the bot that I posted on 2draw:
'Slider' Armed Robotic Sentry
Intended for mild security duty, the Slider is armed with a dual laser turret and three targeting eyes to help it discern distance and movement. On flat ground it can maintain a maximum moving speed of nearly 15 MPH, and due to its lightweight construction it has a vertical jump of 4.2 feet. However, Sliders have severe difficulty making sudden stops or turns at speeds above 6 MPH, prompting their nickname.
The standard Slider model shown here weighs in at a mere 180 lbs and stands about 4' tall. While the dual laser turret remains the most popular choice of weaponry, Sliders are also available with dual submachine guns or a single high-caliber machine gun in the turret.
Although not a particularly fearsome robot individually, Slider units are able to wirelessly communicate with each other to swarm a foe. Those who are interested in low-cost security often will purchase a few Sliders rather than spring for a larger, more expensive robot due to how easy it is to upgrade a security force by adding extra Slider units.
One of my buddies put up a higher-quality version of the Pocketpeople music video we made, so I've updated that link on the project page. Here it is for your convenience.
I'm planning to start updating every Thursday. We'll see how that goes.
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studio toasty: the choice of a new generation.
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WELL WELL WELL
Thursday, May 18th, 2006, 5:00 PM
Admit it, you didn't expect me to keep updating this site. I wasn't sure what to expect either, but here we are less than a week later and I'm busting out another update.
Yeah, I'm responsible like that now.
So then, let's get to it. First off, I've posted some info on the projects page for a couple new side projects. The first one is top secret hush-hush G14-classified type stuff I'm doing for Cellosoft. The second project is simply a 3D logo and splash screen animation for studio toasty, my own little production studio here. You can see a current render at left.
Next up, I've added some tasty new links to the links page, including a bunch of cool artists' sites. Go check them out. I believe you'll find them quite palatable.
Lastly, I got the links in the music section working, so you can now download all the songs listed if you so desire. I even threw in the previously unreleased piano original Glow. This summer I plan to record/construct more music for my 3D short, so I'll keep you posted on any new stuff.
I'm still working on the details for the 3D short itself. I'll put up some information about it as soon as I have something more concrete and substantial.
Online amusements of the week: Spock does Cribs, and an amazing Singing in the Rain Remix. I bet you never knew that Gene Kelly could robot dance so well.
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Whoah dude, it's like, symbolism.
Robots are frickin sweet.
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Of Robots and Music
Sunday, May 14th, 2006, 2:00 PM
I just updated the projects page with info on the robot music video I helped work on. I think it's awesome myself, but hey, don't take my word for it.
It's Mother's Day! Hi Mom! Did you get that link from Dan? He showed it to me yesterday. Made me think of Rob and Scott. Love you!
I watched Fern Gully with a few friends last night. They projected it onto the side of an apartment building, which was pretty cool. It was almost like our own personal yet very public theater. The movie itself was, of course, very rad. My favorite line: "You know, bodacious, like, 'you are one bodacious babe.'" The rap by Robin Williams was pretty classic as well, and who could forget Hexxus singing about chow mein rain? Sure, it had horrible pacing and its dialogue was about as natural as plastic, but it was a part of my childhood. Gotta respect your roots.
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 Hey, it's a Bob Ross!
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Artwork Gallery Up
Saturday, May 13th, 2006, 2:20 PM
I got my art galleries up this morning. Each picture has a nice big, juicy thumbnail in the gallery, but I've decided to forego making a page for each picture for now in anticipation of my inevitable lethargy. Simplicity is the name of the game here, and by the beard of Zeus, I want to win.
Have you heard of this saving the internet business? It would appear that a bunch of consumer advocacy groups are at odds with those nasty, nasty telecom corporations over some internet-regulation legislation. I plan to at least send one of their form letters to my representative. I'm not cool with dirty business shenanigans.
In less responsible news, you absolutely must check out Pirate Baby's Cabana Battle Street Fight 2006 if you're a fan of old-school videogames. Be warned, though: it's as violent as it is awesome. And it's very very awesome.
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Hooray!
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Problem Fixed!
Friday, May 12th, 2006, 11:00 PM
With Marcello's help I've switched the site over to PHP. The sections all work now, but they're still lacking content. I'll work on it more over the weekend.
In other news, I worked on the plot of my summer project this morning and I'm really excited with what I came up with. Right now I'm planning to have four characters (one's just a voiceover, though; more on that later) who are part of a military squad set in a sci-fi world. The short will follow their assignment to check out an unresponsive research facility from the (3rd person) perspective of one of the characters. It sounds ambitious, and it is. I know I won't finish this summer, but even if I never finish it I'll certainly produce some really cool stuff in the process. I'll discuss my plans in more detail soon.
Oh, and that's not me in the picture at left. Seems like a happy fellow though, doesn't he?
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 My new master.
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Toasty's Mobile Estates
Thursday, May 11th, 2006, 3:30 PM
Marcello has been most gracious in granting me space on his server, which is also home to Cellosoft and 2draw. Say hello to toasty.cellosoft.com! And no more 20MB limit! Still gotta finish the rest of the site, though. So much to do...
Hmm... I seem to be having a problem with getting any page other than this one to use SSI. I'll have to wait till Cello gets back online tonight to help fix it.
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Click on the pictures below to enlarge. Art by Studio Ghibli.
 Cool pseudo-19th century settings.
 The castle itself is animated in a way reminiscent of Monty Python.
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Miyazaki is all up ons.
Monday, May 8th, 2006, 9:30 PM
Just watched Howl's Moving Castle for the first time yesterday, and for the second time today. Maybe it's just my combination of being an art student and a sucker for sentimental movies, but that movie completely entranced me. At several points in the film I thought to myself, "This is it, this is the kind of storytelling I want to do."
Don't mistake this for any kind of formal cinematic review. At the moment I'm completely infatuated with the film, and I'm pointedly avoiding noticing any of its flaws with the same enthusiasm as a kid stubbornly plugging his ears and humming a familiar tune. This movie took me closer to that idyllic childlike sense of wonder and imagination than I've been in quite some time. Well, without the use of hallucinogens, anyway. AMIRITE LOL
Still working on filling out the new site. Going to post some info about the music video group project I helped with in the next few days. I'm still deciding what I want to do for a personal project this summer, although I'm pretty certain it'll be some kind of 3D animated short.
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 ATHF FTW.
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GENTLEMEN, BEHOLD!
Monday, May 8th, 2006, 1:30 PM
I decided to take some time this week to put up a quick new site that I wouldn't be embarrassed to link people to. Honestly, the last few have been so fugly and--well, let's just move on.
I'm determined to make this the first personal site that I update regularly. Every other attempt of mine has eventually crashed and burned in that respect, but I have a newfound drive to start being responsible and professional and all those other grown-up words. Plus I have like two years' worth of liquid inspiration stockpiled due to a certain coffee company's overzealous shipping policy.
You might notice that the format of this site seems suspiciously similar to a blog. Or you might not. Either way, that's intentional: I'm going to use the Home page simultaneously as a way of announcing new content on my site and keeping a kind of journal. At least, that's what I've got planned.
Yeah, that top navigation's not working yet. I'll get to it.
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