Allegro Digital

RSS Beware: Site Design Switching 2|18|2010

2010-02-17T11:35:00.005-05:00

As you are aware, not only did I have plans to change the site design, but google pulled a fast one on me and also has decided to limit the ftp capabilities of blogger.

I'll be switching the site tomorrow night, so here's some short head's up for those of you who subscribe through RSS... things are a gunna be changing.

Catch ya on the flipside!

Eviction Notice

2010-02-02T15:21:00.004-05:00

I'm being evicted from Blogger :*(

On the up side, this news came to me while I was already in the middle of re-designing my site... but this unfortunately means that I need to find another method for easily updating the blog portion of my site...

~~Does anyone have any suggestions for non-google operated blogging systems that can connect to custom webspaces through ftp?~~

I found my solution

Orianthi - Highly Strung ft. Steve Vai

2010-01-27T17:13:00.002-05:00

Can't stop listening to this at the moment.

Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II

2010-01-17T00:27:00.000-05:00

I've only had a DSLR for a little more than a month now, so I don't particularly feel qualified to make in depth reviews just yet. But taking the advice from some friends and teh interwebz, I decided to pick up a Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 II from Best Buy on Boxing Day since I saw that they were selling it for a piddly $99. Apparently, I wasn't the only person keen on such a sale as it ended up being sold out. The lens was put on back order however, and I have received it this week. Having got a little time to play, I can say this: I likes. Here's a few of the pictures that I've taken with said lens this week:

The bus shelter on King/Church, and my mug (Andrea made me that scarf).

My desk after a night of gaming, and a random person from my neighbourhood waiting for the streetcar.

The view from George St. in Toronto, and some optical equipment at my optometrist's.

10 Things to Do in 2010

2010-01-16T12:38:00.010-05:00

- Record 12 songs
     - Destiny of an Emperor Palace Theme
     - Mr Big: Take Cover
     - Satriani: Ten Words
     - Megadeth: She Wolf
     - Megadeth: Back in the Day
     - Skid Row: Slave to the Grind
     - Yngwie Malmsteen: Sorrow
     - Steve Vai: Here and Now
     - Bach: Prelude Cello Suite #1 (BWV1007)
     - Extreme: He-Man Woman Hater
     - ???
     - ???
- 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

Final Fantasy IV: Echoes of Betrayal, Light of Redemption, An OverClocked ReMix Album (Trailer)

2010-01-05T23:35:00.006-05:00

You may recall that I am a fan of music. Of gaming. Of video game music. And you may even recall that I am a fan of Final Fantasy IV. Thus, it should be of no surprise to you then, that when I heard of Final Fantasy IV: Echoes of Betrayal, Light of Redemption; a nerdgasm ensued.

Destiny of an Emperor - Palace

2010-01-03T15:54:00.005-05:00

So now that I have a guitar again, I'm in the process or re-learning how to play. I've decided to start with learning a song from Destiny of an Emperor. I just figured out the bass line and recorded it, so over the next week hopefully I can figure out the guitar.

Destiny of an Emperor, Palace Theme

INTRO:
G|--------------------------|
D|------------------------8-|
A|-13-----13-13-9-8-6-6-6---|
E|--------------------------|

THEME:
________________________________________________________
|
|3x
|G|-------------------------------------------------|
|D|-------11-------13-15-13----13-15-13----13-15-13-|
|A|----11----11-13----------13----------13----------|
|E|-11----------------------------------------------|
|
|
|G|-------------------13-15-|
|D|----------11-13/15-------|
|A|----11-13----------------|
|E|-14----------------------|
|
|
|G|----15----15----13----13---10---10-------|
|D|-------------------------------------6-8-|
|A|-13----13----11----11----9----9----6-----|
|E|-----------------------------------------|
|
|
|G|---10---10----13----13-------------|
|D|-----------------------------------|
|A|-9----9----11----11----13-13-11-13-|
|E|-----------------------------------|
|________________________________________________________

The Distant Future: The year 2010

2010-01-02T11:36:00.003-05:00

Gad ZOOKS man. It's the future! But is this blog going to be about the future? Or even the present? Heck NO! I ain't got time for the future, bro. I only got times for the past. And that's why it's time for another episode of "What happened already that you don't know about." It would be pretty pointless to try and tell you about celebrities... or world news. Chances are you have already paid more attention to that than I have. But the one thing I am an authority on... one thing I can tell you about that you have greviously under-attended, is moi. So what exactly transpired in recent memory that is worth discussing? Why X-mas of course!

Not that I like to brag (I like to brag), but my X-mas rocked my socks off. To the max. First off, I have to do the no-no of story telling and jump straight to the climax. See this guitar here? It's a Douglas SR-370 7 String Guitar. I've only put a few hours into this one so far, but the verdict? Awesome. I ran out and bought the Dream Theater Systematic Chaos book and plan on learning the song Repentance... though I've been guitarless for 2 and a half years now, so while it's awesome to finally have one again; between the lack of practice and the fact that it's also my first seven string... I've got lotsa learnin' to do.

Other items of awesome acquired this holiday include: Assassin's Creed (played for a few hours yesterday and am loving it), Uncharted: Drake's Fortune(not yet played), Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days(not yet played), Star Trek(as you know I loved everything except the lens flares), Transformers 2(have not seen), Devin Townsend Project: Addicted(AWESOME). I have more games now than I know what to do with. So it's just as well that I've finally done the unthinkable and sold my Nintendo and Super Nintendo. It was a teary good bye... but I've got enough faith in Zerogame Project that it was time to clear up some space.

Here's some more pics that I took over the holidays:

Some macros of a flower at my In-Laws'.

X-mas food.

My In-laws' living room, and my wife's new Keyboard.

My wife's step-dad's new camera, and frost on my window.

My Biggest Purchase to Date

2009-12-20T20:41:00.006-05:00

Last week (well... technically earlier than last week... but I only finally got a memory card and was able to take pictures with it as of last week) I got myself a digital soul sucker. It's also the most expensive thing I've ever bought at one time. You know... aside from the whole engagement/wedding ring combo. Or my education. And was it worth it? Well given the amount that I'll no doubt continue to spend in the future on lenses... that's a question that's up for debate... however I'm going to have to say yes. Why yes? Well, for starters, because the camera can withstand the frozen tundra of Canada. This in itself should be reason enough for anyone, but in the end I really have to say that it's worth it because I said so.

I've wanted a camera (read as good camera) for a long time now. We ended up borrowing a good point and click when on our honeymoon, but decided that it might just be worth it to get a decent camera of our own for the next time we go on a vacation. A point and click is all well and good, but my interest lay in the zone of DSLR. I'm always keen on getting fine control over exposure, and depth of field and getting macro and telescopic images. Also, I just wanted one because I am greedy. A few weeks back, we saw Lady Gaga in concert, and were reminded once more of the burning desire for some camera love.... Thus a Canon 7D was procured.

Here's some pictures I done took in the past week with it:

Toronto's Cavalcade of Lights.

Downtown fog, followed by downtown on a rainy night.

Another downtown night pic, as well as some Rock Climbing at Joe Rockhead's.

A couple of pics from the Elliot Animation X-Mas party.

I discovered I have a Macro lens! A week old orange slice, and Metal Gear Ray.

Sepiroth's Hair and an origami crab mounting a rice cake (with black bean jelly).

I wrote my first MEL script today

2009-12-14T22:37:00.002-05:00

As you're likely aware (because you all keep very up to date on everything related to me), I have used Houdini for the past two and a half years. I have been back to using Maya again since the summer. What have I learned in this time? Yes. That's right. Maya is a piece of $%#&. Interpret that however you wish. For all you know, I could mean that it is a piece of gold. Yes... it could mean that.

Well, I decided to grab the reindeer by the reins and look a little more closely into MEL rather than just copying and pasting snippets from other people. I decided to try any make a bunch of parameters equal to the values in a bunch of other parameters. It doesn't seem like Maya gives the user any easy way to do this. But why should it? Why would a user ever want to set a bunch of parameters to be equal to that of a bunch of other parameters? I miss you Houdini. I miss you very much.

Anyways, for those who are into sado machocism, here's the MEL script:

string $copyobj = "pCube";
string $pasteobj = "nurbsCylinder";
$startnum = 1;
$endnum = 7;

for ($i = $startnum; $i <= $endnum; $i++)
{
connectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".tx") ($pasteobj+$i+".tx");
disconnectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".tx") ($pasteobj+$i+".tx");
connectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".ty") ($pasteobj+$i+".ty");
disconnectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".ty") ($pasteobj+$i+".ty");
connectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".tz") ($pasteobj+$i+".tz");
disconnectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".tz") ($pasteobj+$i+".tz");

connectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".rx") ($pasteobj+$i+".rx");
disconnectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".rx") ($pasteobj+$i+".rx");
connectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".ry") ($pasteobj+$i+".ry");
disconnectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".ry") ($pasteobj+$i+".ry");
connectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".rz") ($pasteobj+$i+".rz");
disconnectAttr ($copyobj+$i+".rz") ($pasteobj+$i+".rz");
};

A Cars Toon : Tokyo Mater

2009-11-24T10:42:00.004-05:00

I cannot say that I had anything to do with this stuff; but I do like the oil effects.

Fire Tornado!

2009-11-19T18:35:00.002-05:00

I want one for x-mas

Things I want that you have not yet given me:

2009-11-02T19:00:00.006-05:00

Camera Stuff:
- Best Buy - Canon EF 50mm f1.8 II Lens
- MemorySuppliers.com - Sandisk 8GB Extreme IV Compact Flash Memory Card
- MostlyDigital.ca - Canon LP-E6 Battery Pack

Blu-Ray Movies:
- Best Buy - Star Trek (Special Edition)
- Best Buy - Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2 Disc Special Edition)

Games:
(Playstation2)
- Square-Enix.com - Kingdom Hearts Re: Chain of Memories

(Nintendo DS)
~~- Best Buy - Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days~~
- HMV - Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia
- Amazon.ca - Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin
- Amazon.ca - Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow

(Playstation3)
~~- Best Buy - Assassin's Creed~~
- Best Buy - inFamous
- Best Buy - Prototype
~~- Best Buy - Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune~~

CDs:
- Amazon.ca - Paul Gilbert: Alligator Farm
- Amazon.ca - Paul Gilbert: Flying Dog
- Amazon.ca - An Evening with John Petrucci and Jordan Rudess
- Machinae Supremacy Website - Machinae Supremacy: Redeemer
- Machinae Supremacy Website - Machinae Supremacy: Deus Ex Machinae
- HMV - Any of Devin Townsend's albums

Books:
~~- Chapters/Indigo - Terry Goodkind: The Law of Nines~~

New Guitar:
~~- Ebay - Douglas SR-370~~

Dream Theater - Metropolis Part 1 (Images and Words) - SPLIT-SCREEN COVERS - VRA!

2009-10-18T14:36:00.002-04:00

Fuck. Now I need to start practicing music again. I want in on some of this.

Final Fantasy Advent Children Complete

2009-10-11T20:41:00.003-04:00

This afternoon I sat down. That in itself should be thrilling beyond comprehension to you. I'm hoping that that, combined with the mere fact that I'm updating you with something that isn't a quick Youtube video that I found at work, shan't mean that your cerebral cortex will need any scraping. Now, it you'll let me continue my story; As I was sitting, I was watching Final Fantasy Advent Children Complete. Complete you ask? COMPLETE I respond. Advent Children was a... watchable sequel to the Final Fantasy VII video game. It was... difficult to follow. Even having played the game... I didn't really "get it". It was fun though because it contained characters that I liked, and had some nice visual effects. I watched the fan translated pirated version when it was still only in Japanese, I bought the DVD and watched it more than once, and when the Blu-Ray version came out... I said gawl-dernit... I'm getting rid of this and getting the shiny new thing that has a new cartoon with it.

I am glad that I did.

The short, by itself was reason enough for me to check out the new release. The artwork is great, and it was interesting to learn some more about this character that I was supposed to just take for granted as being important. The original release of the film sure didn't motivate me to give a rat's ass about Denzel. The short was nice though. I definitely give it my sigil of awesomeness. Which is to say, see it if you get a chance. It won't make your eyes bleed, and you may just enjoy it. As usual, be aware that Blu-Ray releases suck big time on SD televisions. I'll actually have to correct myself here. If you try to read the subtitles on a SD tv... it will make your eyes bleed.

Now, as for the feature film itself? They made it enjoyable. ~~All~~ The vast majority of plot holes that were present in the first film have now been filled in. There are additional scenes, different dialog tracks, and scenes that have been replaced with better versions. I actually feel bad having watched this. I feel bad because this is the version that everyone should see. People that saw the original release are right to complain about it. It shouldn't have been released in the state that it was in. I wish that this could have been the original release because it drew me in, made me care about the characters, and actually had me make exclamations out loud. For those who have not watched this film, I heavily recommend that this is the version you see. For those of you who have seen the original release... I implore thee to see this version too!

And just for the heck of it... here's a bit of fan art I did back in 2006. Enjoy!

1 million fps Slow Motion video of bullet impacts made by Werner Mehl from Kurzzeit

2009-10-10T08:45:00.002-04:00

Because destruction is that much better at 1,000,000 fps

The Protomen - Hope Rides Alone

2009-09-23T12:26:00.002-04:00

A Megaman Rock Opera

Dan Haid - Listen and Learn

2009-09-16T13:42:00.002-04:00

I'm never attempted to use this feature before... so I have no idea if it will work.

Here's a music video done by my wife and her brother.

Home Theater Personal Computer!

2009-09-07T12:06:00.007-04:00

What's the first thing that a gamer realizes upon investing in a brand new HDTV and sitting down to enjoy some old school video games? That HDTV's suck for playing old school video games. Well, that's not completely fair. It's not that the HDTV sucks... it's that it's too good. I recently bought a Samsung PN42B450. It's a great tv, and I'm pleased with how it works with my PS3. It handles widescreen sources great. What I'm not pleased with: all new widescreen tv's have grey pillar boxing. What is pillar boxing you ask? Well, these tv's are widescreen. When a fullscreen source is supplied to the tv, the tv places bars on the sides of the image to fill up the screen without distorting the image. The problem with this, is that this static image on either side of your screen causes uneven burn in on the set. Over years, the tv will result in these box shapes to be faintly present when watching anything. TV manufacturers have thus decided that grey is better for your tv than black. Unfortunately, it is hideous on the eyes. Be aware that if you ware watching full screen tv, or a vcr, or an old school gaming system on a new tv, you can expect these pillar boxes. The reality, is that this burn in shouldn't be much of an issue as long as the majority of your use is not 4:3. It would be nice if the manufacturers at least gave the option of black in the tv's preferences. I've heard of some people out there that have attached curtains to their tv to cover up the hideous grey when watching tv at night.

Problema número deux: Resolution. The NES resolution is 256x224. That's a pretty significant difference when upscaling to 720p. It means that the image ends up looking blurry, and can sometimes introduce buzzing little artifacts that make it difficult to look at. SNES and Sega Genesis also have this same resolution. Look forward to blurry, pillar boxed images on your old consoles on a new tv. Well... like most nerds, I could not simply accept this. While some gamers have gone so far as to modify their original systems to have better output. Others have modded their original consoles into modern computers with emulation abilities. I decided against either of these methods due to the time and money that would be involved. Though I *do* wish I had a NESPC.

And so I decided I would go to somewhat of a similar route. There's been a fair bit of progress with miniature computers recently, and it would be about the same price and less time to simply pick up a pre-built mini computer specifically designed to sit near my tv. The system would be quiet, energy efficient, and while not be very powerful would at let me emulate old games at better resolution and without the grey pillar boxes. There's a few of these that seemed like decent options such as the eeebox and the RevoAspire. But then it struck me. The new PS3 just came out. Sony eliminated the option to put linux on the PS3Slim. I have a fat PS3. Why pay $400 for a dedicated emulation gaming pc when I could take advantage of linux on the PS3?

And so, I've now got Yellow Dog Linux 6.1 running on my PS3 with various NES/SNES games running at a proper resolution and without the grey pillarboxes. The set-up could be far easier. People who make Linux distributions are masochists. But it does what I want it to do.

Progressive Nation 2009 in Toronto

2009-09-06T11:03:00.001-04:00

It's not unusual for me to to do retro-active posts, however it is unusual for me to start a post, save it, and then completely forget to go back to it. On August 14th, I went to see the Progressive Nation tour at the Molson Amphitheatre in Toronto. This concert ended up being more of an after thought for me really (for what it's worth I also bought the tickets before writing this blog post). I was originally planning on seeing Chickenfoot on the 4th, but when I went to buy tickets, I saw that PizzaPizza and Ticketmaster were running a promotion for dirt cheap tickets to various concerts. The Progressive Nation tour was one of them! How could I turn down $20 tickets for a 5 hour concert? So one concert ended up becoming two concerts. Actually, my mom ended up visiting in that same time period, and so we went to see the Moody Blues. So two concerts ended up becoming three concerts.

So Chickenfoot first... well... this was kind of an unfortunate series of events. I was going to see them with Jeff Wagner from SESI but, for reasons that I cannot seem to find, the date ended up being bumped from the 4th to the 5th. We never really gave much thought to this as we had plenty of warning, however as the date approached we realized that Jeff was flying to New Orleans for Siggraph on the 5th! As much as I wanted to see Chickenfoot, it just seemed like the tickets were pricey enough that it wasn't worth going on my own. I had just moved into a new apartment, and had lots of stuff to keep spending money on, so I refunded the tickets. I ended up using my portion of the money, as well as a wedding gift certificate from Tristan on a new tv stand (to go with our new tv). So I may have missed out on this concert, but I did end up with some furniture that needed to be purchased without having to take any extra money out of my bank account.

Well... the Moody Blues certainly didn't earn their name by being exciting on stage. I saw them on the 12th at the Molson Amphitheatre... and it was kind of a bittersweet experience. The Moody Blues are excellent musicians, who are spot on when they play. Justin can really belt out the lyrics, and if you close your eyes you can really get into the music. Based on what I've watched on Youtube, and my dad's dvd collection, the band has never had much stage presence, and this concert was no different. If you're a fan of their music, and have never been to a concert then by all means: go see them! If you've been to concerts before though, keep in mind that they have little stage presence. No opening band, and they take an intermission partway through. The audience is a different breed as well. While I didn't get much enjoyment out of the concert, it was interesting to see the crowd of 50 somethings getting into it by mildly patting their knees in time to the music and starting up conversations with the strangers next to them.

I've seen Dream Theater twice already in the past, and so I was content to just get the cheapest tickets despite the fact that they were in the back of the Amphitheatre. It ended up being a a very hot day, and the event started at 6pm... I don't get off work until 6:30 and work in the opposite end of town but tried to leave a bit early for the concert. When I arrived at the Amphitheatre, I decided that what with the heat and all, I may as well get myself an ice cream from the Baskin Robbins that is at Ontario Place. Frustratingly, security would not let me take the cone with me to the venue so I was even later arriving to the concert as I stood outside the gates eating my dessert. Unfortunately I ended up sitting down just as the opening band was finishing. It was still pretty early, and so I figured that I had just caught the end of the first band, but at least I would be able to see the other three. Dream Theater is the only band of the four that I was actually familiar with, so when the next band began, I had no idea who it was I was listening to. I was stunned at how good the guitar work was, but certainly felt that the rest of the band was a little lack-luster. I remember commenting to Andrea that "This band could get a lot more popular if they found a better singer." I didn't realize at the time that this was Zappa Plays Zappa that I was listening to.

Dream Theater's set began, and the music was good. The audience began singing... but well... there was a distinct cheap feeling to the seats that we were in (see the top of the two images to the left). The people around me were... well, slobs would be a flattering description. One guy in front of me was drunk out of his trees and was kicked out after throwing his beer bottle about 15 feet into the air. Music was good... couldn't really see the band, audience around me was a bit lack lustre... but hey... what do you expect for the cheapest tickets? Guess I've learned my lesson... definitely no tickets cheaper than mid-range for me in the future. But wait! There's more! About halfway through Dream Theater's set, these two guys approached Andrea and I. "Hey" they say, "we've got to take off early. Here, have our tickets. They're way better; enjoy the rest of the concert." We were instantly upgraded from being at the back to the amphitheatre, to being at the front of the amphitheatre. The only time I've been closer to the stage is at the Opera House for Symphony X, where there are no seats. Let's just say that not only was the visual show better now that we could see the band, but the audience was COMPLETELY different. They were so much more into it. Except of course for the guy who was passed out drunk next to me. I'm assuming he was a Zappa fan.

Former SESI co-op is Missing

2009-08-24T22:01:00.005-04:00

Furqan is, without a doubt, one of the friendliest, nicest acting guys I've ever met. He's also gone missing. The Toronto Police Service is requesting the public's assistance with an abduction investigation.

It is reported that:

On Saturday, August 22, 2009, at 3:28 p.m, the victim was driving his car in the Midwest Road/Midland Avenue area when three men, one of whom was in possession of a gun, forced the victim off the road. Shortly-after, the victim's vehicle was located by police and the victim remains missing.

The victim has been identified as Furqan Muhammad-Haroon, 22, of Toronto.

He is described as brown, 5'10", 181 lbs., black eyes, black, short, wavy hair, with a beard with no mustache and wears eye glasses. He was last seen wearing a blue, long-sleeved crew neck shirt and dark, blue jeans.

The victim's vehicle is described as a green, 2003 Mazda, MPV van with Ontario Licence Plate ASEH 887.

Anyone with information is asked to contact police at 416-808-4100, Crime Stoppers anonymously at 416-222-TIPS (8477), online at www.222tips.com, or text TOR and your message to CRIMES (274637).

Constable Tony Vella, Public Information, for Detective Karen Hunte, 41 Division

UPDATE:
Toronto Police say they have found 22-year-old Furqan Muhammad-Haroon. The man was reported to have been abducted on saturday. Tonight, police say he has been charged with public mischief. He is scheduled to appear in court tomorrow. Muhammad-Haroon was located in St.Catherines.

Police initially said three men, one carrying a gun, had reportedly forced his vehicle off the road and abducted him. However, after reconstructing the events leading up to Muhammad-Haroon's disappearance, investigators now believe "there is no information to indicate an abduction took place," Const. Wendy Drummond said this morning.

Muhammad-Haroon was recently fired from his summer job with IBM. On Aug. 13, the University of Toronto student was charged with theft under $5,000.

"Computer-related equipment" was reported stolen from an IBM lab three days earlier, said Const. Marina Orlovski, a spokeswoman with the York Region police service. Muhammad-Haroon was arrested after investigators spoke with the manager and reviewed security footage, she said.

He is scheduled to appear in Newmarket court on Sept. 15.

The charge raises numerous questions for detectives. For one, the day Muhammad-Haroon went missing, he was planning to leave the country to visit family living abroad. But, typically an individual facing criminal charges is not allowed to leave the province.

Update 2:
Furqan was released on $20,000 bail for public mischief charges. He is also facing more charges in relation to theft at Side Effects Software. Coincidentally... some of the equipment stolen from SESI happened to be some of my personal computing equipment that I had brought to work...

Left 4 Dead

2009-07-11T01:30:00.006-04:00

I discovered that enterprising individuals may opt to customize Left 4 Dead in a variety of ways. One of the simplest "mods" that one can make is to change the texture maps/skins of the characters/props, and so I decided to take a stab at that (as you can see by the image to the right) before making any more involved explorations into the world of modding. Making a level seems tempting, but man... this game was not set-up to allow for straightforward editing. I'm not sure what the rules are for naming convention... but it seems that you may randomly add characters to some file names... but not to others... same with reducing the number of characters in a file name. There also appear to be multiple instances of texture calls per character... how these calls are actually used? Dunno... all I found was that attempting to edit the second call causes Left 4 Dead not to start. At any rate, I've created a "new" skin for Zoey (which was mostly just an edit of the default one in Photoshop). No more "me time" though until I finish some shading stuff.

Update: I decided that I'm not going to do any additional work on the Zoey skin, so I've uploaded it in case anyone else wants to use it. You can download the skin here. You'll want to enlarge the image to your right and make sure that the pak01_dir.vpk file has lines that have been edited to look as they do in the image. If you're not familiar with how to edit skins in Left 4 Dead, you'll want to look through this page.

Warner Music Group

2009-07-09T01:49:00.003-04:00

I like to sing. I may suck at singing... but I like doing it. I've posted videos on Youtube. They're met with mixed response, however generally the feedback has been positive... which leads me to believe that I'm not that bad since Youtube comments are generally trash. Megadeth and Dream Theater both favorited videos that I've put up there. And the videos were later removed by Warner Music Group. Sure... I get copyright. But seriously guys... when fans are trying to promote your shit... it's not cool to get in their faces and show them that you run a douche-bag operation. I buy all my music, and I fully encourage others to. However, I am now boycotting Warner. Sorry Dream Theater.... sorry Megadeth... sorry DragonForce (who I've been listening since you were DragonHeart and were offering your shit for free online)... but I'm not buying anything from you again until your on a label that isn't a piece of shit.

Overdue Update #7: Allegro ex-SESI

2009-07-01T20:27:00.005-04:00

I'm sure the news has spread to some of you already, but for those who haven't been kept up-to-date: I recently decided that it was time to take a different step with my career and leave Side Effects Software Inc. It was a great stay with the folks over there, and without question I learned more there than I would have thought. But it seemed like it was the right time to get into production, and so I am now working as a visual effects artist at Starz on Gnomeo and Juliet (notice another SESI alumni, Calin Casain in the image on the site with Sir. Elton John). In short, it is both sad to leave a place that I really liked and exciting to get into production. Also note that the above image was not created by me. I found it. On Google.

In other news, I've had some time to watch some movies, listen to some music, and play some games recently. Here's the list with some brief thoughts list:

Games:

Left 4 Dead - Fanstastic. Look me up on Steam (Allegro) if you're interested in having a game when I happen to have a chance
Metal Gear Solid 4 - Superb. It's a great movie, with a tiny bit of really good game play. I wish there were more game play though. I picked this up at Future Shop when I had only intended on picking up Left 4 Dead. But for some reason, the special edition was back in stock and selling for $30... regular edition is $60... so, it was a no-brainer to pick this up.
Mirror's Edge - Awesome. Haven't had a chance to get very far yet, but it's probably the first game I've played where I died in the training level.
Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon - Captivating. I really like strategy rpg's, and this series is pretty great as deaths are permanent.
Bionic Commando Re:Armed - WICKED! A remake of the original Bionic Commando for the NES, this game is damned good. Also got to play some multiplayer with Tristan when he was down for the wedding. Kicks Ass.
Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection - Drool Inducing. A collection of totally rad genesis games. So far haven't played much of it, but almost all of the titles are awesome. If you're into RPG's it's totally worth it for the Shining Force / Phantasy Star series. Don't snub the Golden Axe or Streets of Rage either.
Dragon Quest V - Will make you grin like a school kid. This one was never released in North America back in the day, but is part of the Zenethian trilogy (of which part IV was the first). Dragon Quest/Warrior IV is perhaps my favorite RPG evah, and this one so far seems to be making as good of an impression.

Film:

Up - Good. I'm not certain why this film has the amazing scores that it does on Rotten Tomatoes... but it is a good film. Too many things that made me go "wait a second..." though to like it as much as either Nemo or Incredibles.
Terminator Salvation - Bearable. This one does deserve the Rotten Tomatoes score. It's got some nice eye candy... but if you're looking for a compelling story... look elsewhere.
Final Fantasy VII Advent Children Complete - Very Nice. If only they had included Last Order in this release it would have been perfect. Still, the animated short included was stunning, and this version of the film actually made some sense.
Vertigo - Damned Good. Never watched an entire Hitchcock film before. I will have to catch up.

Music:

Dream Theater: Black Clouds and Silver Linings - Radical. The third disc is... extraneous since all they did was strip out the vocal tracks. I'm as disappointed with this disc as I was with the bonus disc from Nightwish's Dark Passion Play. I don't count an "instrumental" version as one that simply isn't a complete mix. The first two discs however are pretty good. A little less melody that I hope to hear when listening to LaBrie... but good nonetheless.
Chickenfoot: Chickenfoot - Great. A really solid rock cd. Somewhere between Van Halen and Joe Satriani. Glad I picked this one up, and looking forward to seeing them in August.

I've also started to sell off some stuff on Ebay. So far, I've managed to sell off one broken Playstation 2, and a fishing game for the original playstation. Current items I'm attempting to relenquish include:

Megaman 2 and Megaman 3
Mega Man X5
Civilization II
RPG Maker

Overdue Update #6: The Honeymoon Concludes

2009-06-26T23:56:00.003-04:00

Monday, the 25th
Monday was our last full day in Orlando, and we decided to take it easy. We slept in, and used up the last of our groceries to eat a salad for lunch in one of the gazebos at the resort. For those of you now familiar with Florida: Geckos are about as common in Orlando as pigeons are in Toronto. This means the little jerks are everywhere. While we were eating, we saw this one gecko who started to just kind of bob up and down like crazy. I whipped out the camera, hoping for a video of his odd behaviour... and he stopped moving. After about five minutes, I was about to give up on him when a second gecko appeared and set gecko numero uno into territory protection mode all over again. Dude wasn't going to take no lip from no one.

In the evening, we made our way to Downtown Disney. Unfortunately it's not as cool as we had hoped. The clubs that were on Pleasure Island have closed, the Virgin Music store has closed, and you had to pay an exorbitant amount to get into the arcade. We settled for wandering and sight seeing. There's not that many other places one can go to get infrackinsane candy apples, ore see Lego sea serpents. We also grabbed dinner at the Rainforest Cafe. We made it under the protection of their gigantic mushroom roof seconds before the day's thunder storm began dumping down on the area. Happily enough, by the time our meal was done, the rain had stopped.

After dinner, we decided to walk around some of the shops a bit. I drooled over some more candy in Goofy's Candy Company (I'm actually surprised at just how little junk I consumed on this trip in comparison to how much was flaunted before my eyes). After we left there we explored some of the other shops including the Disney store, Tren-D, the Lego Store, and Ghirardelli. I broke down at Ghirardelli and bought some drinking chocolate which, I must say, is damned good. It's literally chocolate that is melted into your drink. By the time we got some last minute gifts, it was getting late, getting thundery, and it was time to go. We got in the rental *just* as the rain came back down. Two close calls for the newly weds.

Tuesday, the 26th
And so arrives the final day of the honeymoon. Really there wasn't much to this day. We got up, and had our traditional free breakfast buffet from the resort, ensured that all of our stuff was packed, checked out, and got on the freeway back to the airport. In the top left image you see Andrea scoping out the monorail that takes passengers from the security area of the airport to where the planes are. The top right is a capture of the piña colada chocolate that I bought in the airport. The bottom left is our wedding/engagement rings, and the bottom right is, what appears to be, the sunny state of Florida. We got back into Toronto at a pretty reasonable time and were able to just sit and relax before getting back to the grind.

It was a good honeymoon.