2007/08/30

Gotta Be Quick

Not much in the way of news tonight. Every summer the little community I'm in has games of Baseball every Thursday. They're just little pickup games, and other than the people running it, I'm one of the oldest who still goes. Tonight was the last game of the summer. So we all had hot dogs. It really drives it home that the summer is at an end. I was at my neighbor/cousin's house all night, so I'm just getting on long enough to type this. I have to go to bed because I have an early day tomorrow.

As you probably can figure from reading that, I didn't get a chance to render any robo pics. But be patient. I will get them done as soon as physically possible.


!pleh ,neecrs rouy ni kcuts m'I

2007/08/29

It's Done!

I finally finished the new robot today. What? You want pictures? I was planning on rendering a new shot for my Pic, and maybe some other ones for the heck of it. Unfortunately, my dad has been using the computer since 6 this morning, and he does 3D work too. So by the time I got on the computer was overheated and worn out. It kept crashing while I was trying to pose the Robot for the pic. As soon as I can get on the computer while it's stable, I'll render up a nice gallery of pics.

I got an e-mail last night from the website I ordered the GP2X from, and they gave me the FedEx tracking number. I checked on the website, and It's expected to arrive on the 6th. I can't wait. I was hoping to get it before school started, but at least I'll be getting it soon.

Which reminds me, school is just around the corner, 5 days of summer vacation left, and then it's back to the old grind. This year it's grade 12, "Kings of the School" as I've heard some people say. Quite possibly the last year of high school. This year is also a first for me in that it will be the first time since I've started high school that I've been to the same school for two years in a row. It will be nice to actually get the classes I want, other than just getting whatever I could be put into at the last minute.

I'm starting to ramble now because my connection has cut out meaning that I cannot save or publish this blog, or chat with anyone. I'm using the live CD right now, so there's not much else I can do. Hopefully the connection will come back and I can end this post.

...Nope, still no connection. So.... anyone seen any good tv lately? I haven't been watching it much myself. Just Doctor who. Monday's episode was pretty good. I quoted a line from it at the end of the post before last. Although I wrote that from memory, so it's probably a bit off. And I still don't have a connection... wow, I don't think it's ever gone out for this long before. It's a good thing I couldn't get the robot pictures today, I wouldn't be able to upload them anyway. I still don't have a connection, but I'm calling it quits.


I'll just wait in silence, in order to maintain some quality here.

Little Bite-Sized News Bits

I finally did it. The robot now has a head. Tomorrow I'll just have to add the neck, and it will be done.

I did manage to get that Darwinia game working. And it's pretty fun. It can be slow and challenging at times, but you usually feel like you're actually accomplishing something.

Not much else is going on. The GP2X is en-route. I just got another e-mail confirming that it has been shipped. I'm waiting for the tracking number to start working.

Yes, this post has small paragraphs. you have a problem with that? I know my English teacher would...

2007/08/27

Display Driver Update!?!

As a nice gesture today, my brother bought me a belated birthday Gift. Its a game called Darwinia. It's supposed to be a very unique game, and has had hight ratings, but I can't get it to work. I'm in the middle of waiting for new display drivers to download. The site's instructions said to uninstall the old ones first, so my computer is running a bit slow at the moment. But hopefully it will all be worth it. That means no robot updates today, but I think I have an Idea for what the head might look like....

"This is my Timey-Wimey Device. It goes "Bing" when there's stuff. It also boils eggs at 30 paces... whether you want it to or not, actually. I'm avoiding hens, it's not pretty when they pop" - Doctor who

2007/08/26

I'm Getting One!

I've manged to hit my goal, so I ordered it today. That's right, the GP2X is in the mail! (or will be at some point tomorrow) I can't wait for it to show up. I just hope it gets here before school starts. It would be nice to have a few days to figure it out. I wonder if the school would let me classify it as a PDA, or something like that. And if so, I wonder what they're policy on those are...

My attempts at working on the robot last night were foiled. Blender didn't work so well on the live CD, and by the time I decided I wouldn't be able to get it working and moved to Windows, My brother came down and booted me off the Comp. I might work on it a bit tonight, but I don't know.

Other than that there's not too much going on. Just the same-old same-old.

the head... definitely the hardest part of the robot

2007/08/25

Burnt by the Weather

There was a big storm last night, big enough to make the power flicker a few times, and the TV had tornado warnings going. I don't think any tornadoes ever formed though. The flicker of the power did have some interesting effects... We were at my grandma's at this time, but my dad was home. He said that the power went out for about an hour. When it came back on, here could hear electricity crackling in the laundry room. There was also a smell of burning plastic. It turns out all that noise and smell was the water furnace doing something it definitely shouldn't. So we've been without air conditioning today, and will be tomorrow (Sunday, I notice as I type this it's 2 minutes after midnight...) It's not all too hot, but it's a bit muggy.

I'm still using the LiveCD for all my computing needs. Right now I'm trying to see if I can't find a way to get blender working. In which case I'll work on the robot's head. There's not much else going on, but I did see something very interesting today. I had no idea Windows XP could run on a computer with 64 mb of ram, considering the minimum requirements are... oh wow... I just looked it up as I'm typing this and the minimum is 64... wow... that's a bit embarrassing. I'm just going to shut up now...

the minimum is 64mb? Since when?

Burnt by the Firewall

I'm blogging once again from the Fedora Live CD. My dad installed a new firewall on Windows, and it's driving me up the wall, constantly telling me it denied something, occasionally giving me the option to accept it, but mostly making executive decisions, and just telling me. So I'm having fun messing around with settings in GNOME. I've added a pair of eyes and a fish to the top menu on my screen. I really like how customizable everything is. It's a real shame it will all be lost when I reboot. I think once I'm done saving up for the GP2X (almost there, can probably order it by next week) I'll have to save up for my own external hard drive, unless I can get a job, in which case I'll save up for a laptop. But that's dreaming a little bit.

I can't get to the robot files from here, so no progress on that...

2007/08/23

New Linux Live CD!

I don't think I've ever posted about this before or not, but I'm a big GNU/Linux fan. Back when I had Dial-up I was stuck trying little live CD versions, like Damn Small Linux, or Slax. These were nice cause they fit on my thumb drive, but were laking in a lot of features because they were so small. Last night I downloaded the Fedora 7 Live CD. It's a bit big for my thumb drive (well, I could put it on there if I really wanted, but not much else). I'm finding It really enjoyable, actually I'm using it right now to type this. I really like the look of this Live CD, after I convinced it I had a screen that could do better than 800x600, I started testing everything. Compiz worked just fine, and I Really like it, my windows are all stretchy and wobbly, and I can spin the whole thing on a 3D cube. If something crashes, the window goes all gray-scale so you know that particular window is done for. I'm am having a hard time with getting music going, because of the lack of MP3 support, and My CD drive is full. All in all though, I really, really like this. If it weren't a live CD, I'd always use it. Maybe I can talk my dad into letting me install another hard drive...

I set my resolution without having to use the Shell! Hoora!

2007/08/22

Birthday, Binder and Robot News

Soo.... my birthday went well. My parents have told me to think about what I want from them. I going to wait until the end of the week to decide. There's something I'm saving up for (a GP2X) There's a chance I might have a job for the next two days, at $10.00 and hour, which would make it so I can afford it. If I don't then I'll ask for some help in buying it. If I can afford it on my own, then I'll think of something else at that point. There's a really good chance I won't have the job, because it's tomorrow morning and I didn't hear back from the guy who's hiring people, which means I'm on the list of people to call if someone doesn't show up tomorrow. Maybe I'll get lucky.

I went back to school shopping yesterday. It was nice for once to go without my brother. I didn't need much this year, as almost everything from last year survived. I just replaced my old mechanical-pencil/pen/other-pen-or-stylus-your-choice all-in-one multipurpose writing utensil with a nice, simple, quality mechanical pencil. It was really the only part of my last "device" that I really ever used. I got the usual refills of stuff: paper, lead, and erasers. I got a new lunch bag and a new binder-type-thing. It's not really a binder.

With the exception of grade 9 French (where a binder was a requirement) I haven't used a binder since starting high school. In grade school I tried using binders, but they just didn't work for me. When I tried to write in them, the pages would tear out, so I had to take the paper out to write on. I've always been a bit lazy when it comes to organizing that kind of thing, so instead of putting pages back, they would end up it the front inside pocket of the binder. That's right, all the papers for all of my classes were kept in the same pocket of one binder. Not the best way to stay organized. When it came to grade nine, I had an Idea: Just forget the rings, and get a folder with a pocket for each class. I managed to find something very close to what I was looking for. It was plastic, had no rings, folded open with a notepad inside, and had three tabbed pockets to put papers in. Lucky Three pockets was enough, cause the school I go to is semestered, and I had one class each semester that didn't need a folder (gym and French). I ran into problems though, with the way it held the notepad in place. Actually, that was the problem, It expected a notepad, which I bound at the top, whereas for schoolwork, I needed a notebook, bound on the left side. It just meant that the book wasn't firmly attached to the folder, also, at the end of the year, when it was getting full, it started cracking. When I started grade 10, I got a new folder. It was bigger, and had 5 folders, one for each subject, and an extra folder for stuff like newsletters and a pack of grid paper. It had smoother plastic then the first one, meaning I could use it as a lap desk, but it still expected a top-bound notepad, instead of a side-bound notebook. It lasted me through both grade 10 and 11, but it has some pretty bad cracks in it. So this year I've gotten a new one. It has 7 folders, six of which are labeled, and also a pocket that could count as an eighth folder. It's made mostly made out of fabric, with plastic for the folder dividers, and some cardboard reinforcement. Best of all, it is designed for a side-bound notebook! The fabric should be more durable then the plastic, and it's lighter and more flexible. I like this new folder.

In robot news, I just finished the hand a few minutes ago, which means all I have left to do is attach the hands and feet to the rest of the robot, and make a head. That will be the hard part. I have no clue what to do for the face, I'm thinking of trying to make it look like a mechanical version of my own...

If you missed the Themed image yesterday, and still want to see it, It's in a photo album called "Themed Pics". Any themed images I use on this blog will end up there, so feel free to check them out, just follow the link on the left to my photo albums. Well, that about wraps it up for this post

for some reason, I really enjoy back-to-school shopping. And cheesecake, that's what I had for my birthday.

2007/08/21

Happy Birthday to Me!

Okay, technically, it's Tuesday. I guess that means I missed a post. Oh well, not much I can do about that now. So tomorrow, or today or whatever (Tues. Aug. 21) Is my birthday, so I can't wait. Not too too much else going on. I made a foot for the robot, so I've just got the hands and head left, if I don't decide to scrap the feet too.

I've decided to start theming this page for special occasions. Today, I'm just going so far as to give my good 'ol robot a party hat.

I look like a monkey, and I smell like one too... cha-cha-cha

2007/08/19

In the Aftermath of the Party

The party yesterday went off without a hitch. Guests started arriving at 3:00pm yesterday afternoon, and everyone was gone by 1:30pm. So we were an hour and a half short of having it go the full 24 hours. We played baseball, volleyball and soccer. Most of the adults just socialized, and it was the younger of us playing the sports. When it got dark there was capture the flag, and about six different types of tag and hide-and-go-seek. When nothing else was going on, the Wii got a real workout. The food was good, but some of it ran out pretty fast. There was 111 guests in total, so the 40 hot dogs went pretty fast, along with the small pot of meatballs. But there's still plenty of pork and cake left over. Some people spent the night, but most went home late on Saturday. Tonight's garbage night, so we don't have to worry about storing the trash for a week. No one seemed to mind when it started raining.

That's about it for me today. Looking forward to next week, well Tuesday to be exact. Why? Nothing to exciting. If you really must know then check back on Tuesday. Until Nex - oops, um.... See ya!

I must find a good way to end my posts.

2007/08/17

Party!

Tomorrow we're having a big pig roast at my house. We used to do it annually, but then we stopped. This year was my grandpa's 70th birthday, and he really misses them, so he's funding a great big one this year. We have no clue how many people are coming. I've invited a few people, my brothers invited his friends, all of our family is invited, my parents are inviting friends, my aunts inviting friends, and my grandparents are inviting friends, and none of the invitations say to RSVP. This should be interesting. How do you prepare for X number of guests, when you have no clue to what X would be? We're just assuming 70-100 and hoping for the best. It's going to be allot of fun with all sorts of games like baseball and tennis and volleyball. Some people are planning on spending the night too. According to the invitation, it all starts at 3 and ends at "..." So don't be surprised if I don't update at all tomorrow.

Robot? what do you... Ohhhh THAT robot? Do I have to talk about it every post? It's coming.

2007/08/16

One Step Forward, And That Same Step Back

Not much going on of late, again. I've been working on the robot as much as possible. Last night I designed a Torso for it, which I'm going to trash cause I don't really like it. This is why it's taking me so long. I want something that looks like I didn't throw it together. The torso had that look, most likely because I just threw it together. I'm also finding it hard to fit computer time in. My dad uses the computer for work - and I'm going to end this line of though right now, before I slip back into my old complaining ways. So the robot is coming, and since I haven't yet figured out a good way to end a post, I'll just stop.

No, seriously, I'm done.

"Hello, I'm Cyborg_572, and I'm a complainer. It's been 6 posts since I've last complained, but earlier today, I was really tempted..."

Why do they call it anonymous if you start by saying your name?

2007/08/15

My 3D Work, A Comparison

All this talk of the new Robot has got me all curious. I went back into the copy I keep of the old laptops hardrive, and found some of my old work from November/December 2003. It was on an older version of Rhino then the robot was made on, so it didn't have the benefit of the Flamingo renderer.





















All of these images were made pretty close together. The Pot was finished on November 29, 2003, the Alien was done a couple hours later, and the Joystick was finished the next day. There's nothing too special about them, mostly just 3D primitives that have been scaled wierd and Booleaned. The Robot was made in August of 2004, but was rendered with Flamingo. That was made using primitives and a technique from the tutorials part of the Manual.


These Next pictures were made recently, in Blender. There a bit of an improvement from the older works.
That one on the left is some kind of massager, I guess. I modeled it first, and decided what it was later. Not usually the best way to do things. I'm hopping to really up the quality of the robot, but be warned, I'm heading away from photo-realism with it. I want to try for something that looks like a cartoon. I've always liked 3D images that try to look like 2D images. I just love the Irony of it. You put in so much extra time and effort to make a complex 3D model that looks like someone drew it in a matter of minutes. The real fun comes when you animate it though, that's were you save allot of effort, cause you don't have to draw it from a bunch of different angles. Of course, it takes 5 minutes to render one second of video... I guess there's pros and cons flying all over the place, I'll just stick with the 3D though, cause that's what I know.

I must go now to do work on the new robot. Until next time... man, that's getting old, I've ended four of the last five blogs that way. hmmm...


As you can tell, I like to make inanimate objects, which gets in the way of my goal of making an animation...

2007/08/14

Just Another Post, Mostly Robot News

Oops, looks like I missed a day there. Oh well, only by a few minutes. I just finished a test render of an arm for my robot, it took forever because I rendered an 8 second animation of it. I think it's coming along nicely, if I can figure out anything other than the arms and legs. I still have no clue what to make the feet, hands, body, or head look like, but I'll figure it out as I go. I have a strong urge to post a picture of the new arm, but I want to keep it a surprise.

I almost regret setting up the web counter, as it shows me that I was quite right in calling this "my quiet little corner of the web" Oh well, not much I can do about that, other than try to create interesting posts that attract the attention of people who will read this.

There's not much else to go on about right now, hopefully in the coming days I'll get more done with the robot. Eventually I'd like to animate it completely in a video, but that's if I can muster up something to resemble a plot. I've never been much for creativity.

Until the next time, Have fun!

hmmm.. quantity, or quality... I need content.

2007/08/12

A Blog Update About The Updates to My Blog

Welcome once again to my quiet little corner of the web. There's not much going on to talk about, so most of my news actually involves some of the changes I've made to this blog.

A couple posts ago I mentioned that some family was visiting the area and one of them has a Deviant Art page. Well, they're heading home tomorrow. I did ask about a link to the deviant art page and am happy to say that she was more than happy to let me link to it. So please, check out Sombraro-o-doom's Deviant Art page, there's some really nice artwork there. I've added a link to the side bar, under "Other Sites to Check Out:"

I've made a few other changes too, though nothing drastic. The "Powered by Blogger" Icon has been moved up a few notches to be directly under the "Blog Archive", and I've added a web counter, it will count all the visits from today onwards, along with some other useful information. Thanks to StatCounter.com for there wonderful free services. Something really hard to notice is that I've changed the fonts on all the titles from Arial to Verdana.

My redesign for the robot is coming along nicely, I've been experimenting with some neat effects I'd like to use, and it seems that most of them will work. I hope to get the new version in place pretty soon.

Not much real news today, just pointing out the potentially obvious. ;)

2007/08/11

Web Browsing On My Wii

What? Two posts in two days? I haven't done that in a long time. Tonight I'm trying something new; this post is being wriitten from the comfort of my couch, using the Wii's internet channel. XD Although the internet connection is fast enough to use with the Wii, it's a bit unstable, which offers some interesting challenges. If the connection is lost, theres a chance the page might refresh, which would reset everything. If I'm typing the keyboard, any edits I've made disapear. So I'm only typing a few words at a time and saving often. I also can't use bloggers WYSIWYG editor, so I'm trying to remember as many HTML tags as I can.

The Internet channel does work pretty nice though, I've been playing Flash games and movies full screen on my tv all night. It's a fun way to pass the time.

You may notice some changes in the page layout of this blog, or maybe not, they were small changes. I've decided that along with my display pic, I should update the look of my whole blog. Expect alot of subtle changes in the future, I'm going to be messing with colour and whatnot alot until I find a look I like.

Until next time, Have a good day, or week, or however long it is before I post again.

This small text takes allot more HTML than i thought it would.

2007/08/09

Summer Update

Well, I've once again gone an insanely long time between posts, over a month if I'm not mistaken. I guess my plans for posting more during the summer are... oh well. It's been such a good week this week. I've managed to do several things I've been wanting to do for a long time. I have no clue where to begin, I'll just go at it chronologically.

  1. Met some family who lives 3000 kilometers away, who I haven't seen in at least 7 years
  2. Got to be a DJ for a night
  3. Played Cricket
  4. Saw the Simpson's Movie (I recommend it to anyone who likes the Simpsons. It was awesome!)
  5. Got high-speed internet
  6. Used my Wii online
There was the odd thing or two that was less enjoyable, but I don't want to dampen the mood. Points 1, 3, and 5 have to be my favorites, especially since I had doubts of any of them ever actually happening. I don't want to talk to much about my family online... but one of my family members from afar has a deviant art page. If I can get her permission, I'll post a link. Until then, all shall remain anonymous.
I was really surprised at how fun cricket is. I was at an historical reenactment, and one of the reenactment personnel got a pick-up game going. It took him all of five minutes to explain the rules and we started. It's awesome. No fouls, no bases, no tagging. Anytime the person hitting feels safe taking a run, they can. If they hit it and don't feel safe, they don't have to run. The ball can be hit in any direction. And all you have to do to get some on out is catch the ball after they hit it, but before it touches the ground, or just whip the ball at the wicket before they cross the safe line. I did find myself having to struggle to take the game seriously though, having read "Life, The Universe and Everything" (one of the books in the hitchhikers trilogy).

In other news... Can you see that blue robot, the one on the "About me" panel? Well, here's a pic in case I've removed it by the time you're reading this: Well, that pic has been around forever. I think I made it the first time I was on MSN, so it's definitely very old, well for a DP anyway. I made the model for it long before that using my dad's copy of Rhinoceros. It was a grey robot then, and it was doing a handstand. Like this:
I've decided that I'm tired of this old robot, which I made back in 2004. I've decided that I'm going to create a new robot, loosely based on this one, but using Blender instead of Rhino, and adding My 3 more years of 3D experience to make it much better.

I sincerely hope to update this blog allot more often. Now that I have high-speed, that might be a possibility. This whole process has become allot more painless, and once I get the Wii web browser, I could do this from the couch. Until next time, Enjoy what's left of the summer, I know I will.

Edit: added the Title... stupid! stupid! stupid! :P

By the way, the closest thing to a name that robot has is "Robo2" which is its Rhino file's file name.