Wow! It’s been over a month since my last update! It’s easy to go a long time without updating, especially when you’ve been keeping yourself busy. And busy I’ve been! As you know, I picked up a Canon 7d a while ago, but I haven’t really gotten around to doing any video with it; until now, that is! The video that you see above is my most recent play-thing: a time-lapse video of a melting ice cube. Pictures were taken every 15 seconds and there’s a little bit of color correction done in post. I look forward to more forays into this area in the future.

I’ve becoming increasingly interested in video recently, and I may just have to start coming up with some concepts for my own short film. Interestingly, though I work as a visual effects artist, I think I want to try something that has no vfx work in it. I’ve been watching more films recently too:

Avatar
Was an entertaining movie. Reminded me of the usual Dances With Wolves/Pocahontas/Last Samurai plot and carried it well I think. I would have seen it twice if I didn’t have to see it in 3D. I found the action scenes too difficult to focus on and really would have preferred to see it in 2D.

Alice in Wonderland
Knowing that Alice wasn’t real 3D, I didn’t even want to give the glasses a chance. Was sorely disappointed in the story, and looking back I remember very little aside from Depp’s Scottish accent. Why was the hatter Scottish?

The Karate Kid
I’m not sure if I have ever seen this one before! But I watched it recently and I have to say, this is part of what is inspiring me to get into doing some live action stuff right now. A film that was well done with very little budget.

The Karate Kid Part II
What can I say? Watched the first one and had to watch the second. I’ve got the third one waiting to be seen now too. I had seen the last 30 minutes of this one before… but nothing before that. I like films that aren’t driven by visual effects.

Seven Samurai
We had a bunch of people over to watch this during Kurasawa’s 100th birthday. It’s the first time I’ve seen one of his films, and I was definitely a fan. It’s a long film, but well done.

La Dolce Vita
Ok… so I’m not a fan of every film. I think this one fits into the wtf genre of films.

My first attempt at a time-lapse was actually a melting chocolate bunny. Of course silly old me accidentally melted the poor thing in the process of trying to set-up. Lessons learned. Of course, I have been busy with taking photos over the past month as well, and it’s only fair that I show off a few more of them too.

I’ve been trying to get back into doing music. Starz Animation has an event that they have called “Music Night” that they run every now and then. A bunch of employees get together, learn some music, and put on a show. This year the company decided to move off site and into a pub for music night, so if you happened to be at the Blue Moon Pub in Toronto on March 26th, you could have seen me doing a few songs with some of the gang there. If you weren’t so lucky to have found your way into said pub on said night however, here’s a video I got of one of the songs we did. That would be me in the white shirt with the set of lungs.

And finally, before your head explodes, I’m going to leave you with this: it is my birthday on May 5th. These are things I want:

Audio
Windscreen
Boss GT-10 Guitar Effects Processor

Video
Spiderbrace 2 Combo
EF-S 10-22mm 3.5-4.5 USM

I apologize for having ludicrously expensive hobbies. You could always check here for any other ideas.

Ah that new web design smell: Only half as noxious as new car smell. I attempted to launch the new design on Thursday, but failed to test in Internet Explorer. Tisk tisk I might add. It did not bode well and there were all sorts of Errors that cropped up. Layout problems… crashing… you know… the typical. At any rate, I believe that it’s all sorted out now and working in the latest versions of Internet Explorer, Chrome, and Firefox. There’s one more item stricken from the to-do list. As I’m now involved in a music night with work I’ve got some songs to be doing, so I’ll be trying to get them recorded in the near future.

Speaking of which, I’ve done gone and made things a little bit harder on myself for completing the items on that list. A little more than a week ago, I broke down and bought myself a PSP. A used one that came with God of War. I’ve also broken down futher and picked up Final Fantasy Tactics, a component cable, an 8gb memory stick, and a bunch of demos from the PSNetwork. I’ve only played about an hour and a half of Tactics so far (though had played the PS1 version more than once) and I gotta say: awesome. This is what the game should have been in the first place. The translation is great, and I’m really a fan of the style used in the cut scenes. Bravo Squenix. You did some good in this world. Expect me to swoon some more when I finish the current book series I’m involved in.

And for the sake not letting this one escape… here’s a picture I took last week. Better late than never, right?

- Record 12 songs

- Destiny of an Emperor Palace Theme
- Mr Big: Take Cover
- Joe Satriani: Love Thing
- Satriani: Ten Words
- Megadeth: She Wolf
- Megadeth: Back in the Day
- Skid Row: Slave to the Grind
- Yngwie Malmsteen: Sorrow
- Bach: Prelude Cello Suite #1 (BWV1007)
- Moist: Push
- Jimmy Eat World: Futures
- Foo Fighters: Monkey Wrench

- Perform live
- Participate in a video game competition
- Beat the games I own but have never finished

- Assassin’s Creed
- Dragon Quest V
- Legend of Zelda Twilight Princess
- Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicals
- Drake’s Fortune
- Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days

- Finish re-reading The Wheel of Time and then read The Gathering Storm

– The Path of Daggers
- Winter’s Heart
- Crossroads of Twilight
- Knife of Dreams
- The Gathering Storm
- Towers of Midnight?

– Redesign this website
- Pay for a new lens using money earned from photography
- Make a triptych
- Finish the Dragoon Kain Munny that I started
- Leave North America

   Usually, when I feel that I don’t have much to write, I just don’t bother. There hasn’t been a whole lot lately that I feel the mass public would miss out on if I didn’t report, but I figure, “What the heck. More than 500 visitors since the last time I updated, and I got 3 new drawings that aren’t all that bad. Let’s make with the html-ing already!”

   I told myself I wouldn’t do it. I tried to stay away from it. But alas, the Final Fantasy franchise has a Vulcan death grip on my hypothalamus, effectively disabling my resistance to gaming. I eventually got ole Spock to let go, but not before letting it suck up around 15 hours of my life. Once school ends, I’m sure I’ll find a way to let it suck up much more than that. I must say, the game was way more fun than I expected. Anyone out there who has considered not playing it, I suggest at least renting it. I’ve also grown addicted to reading. I personally find it humourous. I was an avid little reader when I was a wee one, but I hadn’t read a single novel in an eight year period. Since June, I’ve now read about 15 I think. I’m currently on book 5 of Robert Jordon’s Wheel of Time series. I quite enjoy it. I’ve also been trying to re-acquaint myself with Photoshop. Gnomon is helping with that. My short needs more work.

There are three new figure drawings up. They’re the first of my attempts at observational drawings in full colour.

   Wow! It seems like regardless of how well intentioned I am, I always go too long without an update. So here it is: one rather large update. My internship at SESI this summer was amazing. I learned a lot, and got to meet some pretty great people. Without the help of Jeff Wagner in particular, I don’t think I would have left there with even half of my current Houdini knowledge. I left a week later than I was scheduled to leave, so I had a chance to help out with the Lsystems tutorial as well as get the two new T.O. interns ready to continue the project that we had been working on for SIGGRAPH. On the topic of the internship, I’ve got some added movies in the gallery. I’ve got a test of the particle fireball I developed (I believe that SESI is in the progress of making a tutorial for this effect), as well as an Electrocution effect that I created. Also, I’ve got a link to the SIGGRAPH demo (I worked on effects and designed the muscle-bound villain) on the SESI website. Lots of excitement!

   In other news, I was awarded the Nova Scotia Talent Trust scholarship this year. It’s always nice to receive some help toward that $40k debt I’ve racked up. This leads me to mentioning that I’m finally in my graduate year at Sheridan. About time! We’ve got a couple of great new teachers this year, Dennis Turner for example. I almost feel bad for just mentioning him though, as we have a ton of great teachers at Sheridan at the moment including Barry Parker, Gerry Zeldin, Mark Mayerson, Doug Smith (who unfortunately is impossible to find a webpage with quick reference for, due to the internet thinking that a colleague of his also named Doug Smith are in fact the same omnipotent identity) and Bruno Degazio. The school is surprisingly organized this year too. It’s a shame it took them 3 years to get our curriculum worked out, but at least the years to come will have a… less… um, how shall I put it… impaired education. I mean, the third years this year are even allowed to do 3d films for their group films. An opportunity that we were fiercely denied.

   I’ve begun work on my thesis project: A 1 minute film about the Aral Sea. I’m pretty excited about it, but it’s going to be a lot of work. My leica reel has been posted in the gallery, so feel free to check it out, and give me some feedback on it if you want. I’ve also placed three new figure drawings in the gallery. As I said, large update!

   Note to those who love music. Check out Dream Theater’s live DVD, Score. Best concert DVD I’ve ever bought!

Hey there anyone who reads this! The summer is already almost half-over, and I felt that meant it was time for me to apologize. I feel bad when I look at my stat counter and see that I’ve had more than 200 unique visitors since my last update, some of whom have checked back multiple times. I feel bad because I know there are people who seem interested in this little den of mine, and yet I have not the new material with which to appeal to their roving minds. I’ve been relatively busy this summer. I’m currently working 12 hour days in an (assuredly futile) attempt to get things accomplished at my internship, but man am I learning. For those of you out of the know, I’m currently interning with SESI doing secretive secretive work. I’ll be able to post some of it at the end of the summer. It’s not going to be a very large quantity… but I’ve learned so much in Houdini this summer that hopefully I’ll be able to pull off some nice stuff for my graduate thesis this upcoming year. And if not… well… I’ve been trying to play guitar again… maybe I can get a job in the subway or something. I likely won’t have my commissions section up… for a long time… and I hope to get some tutorials up by the end of the summer too. Maybe even a Houdini one.

Well hello out there to anyone who should be stumbling across my site! Huge update for me. May 5th was my birthday, and so I decided that I’d give myself a birthday by redesigning my website. Hope you find it comfortable enough to look at, I like it better than the design I’ve had for the past two years. It’s essentially the same, but different colours, slightly different layout, and I’m also adding a section for tutorials. I’ve got a couple that I’ve done for my fellow students and so figure that I may as well place them online for maximum audience enjoyment. At any rate, the biggest portion of the work is done, but obviously it’s not finished. I’ll try to have stuff like… my resume… updated soon, get the tutorials up, and then I might toy with the layout of my links, and gallery. I of course have plenty of other news, but, I’ll save that for tomorrow maybe.

Wow! So tomorrow will be the last day of school for the 2005-2006 school year here at Sheridan College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning. That means that I start my internship on Monday, which hopefully means I’ll be a Houdini pro in about four months. Well… at least very familiar with it. Because Jarrett has been asking for it, here’s a newer version of my Demo Reel. It’s got a model tagged onto the end that I’m working on. Any Marvel Comic fans out there? My arm muscles are tired… I need to play guitar more. It’s been way way too long. At any rate, this weekend will likely be devoted to watching instructional material on Houdini. Just as a reminder, Zero Hour and a Half takes place on ConceptArt.org every sunday. Be there! Speaking of being there, Pixar came to visit Sheridan today. Watching the process of The Incredibles was pretty neat. I was able to give my demo to the two animators (whose names I regretfully forget) so hopefully I can get some feedback. Curse you EA. Thank you Bioware. Alright, time for my incoherrant (made even more incoherrant due to me not spell checking, I’m sure) speech to end. See you next month!

Just finished eating an Easter Dinner with the roommates and the family of one of the roommates. Chicken can be quite tasty… and pumpkin pie… can be made quite poorly. That’s what happens when you allow me to make it though. Guess now I know how not to do it though. At any rate, I also am trying to get a weekly sketch thing going seeing as I’ve been kind of ignoring the old illustrative arts for a while now. You can find out more about that at my thread at ConceptArt.org I posted this week’s work in my gallery in the illustration section. I am rather pleased with it. Thank you Scott Robertson.

I updated my Demo Reel to include some of the rough tests I have done that weren’t included in my old demo… I figure it’s not a bad idea to show some of the knowledge that I have that I have not yet put into a scene. The shot of the rain on the maya ocean… is… not clear at all… so I’m currently making a new version of that with more than 15 minutes put into it.