The Silent Hunter...

Can i has Kamra plz?

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 16:46:00 +0000

Thanks to local resident Ben for the opportunity. Ive been looking into a digital camera for at least 5 years now but never deemed $400+ for a decent one worth the price of admission to take random shots at moderate quality.

So he lets me purches his Nikon Coolpix 4600 for $25, due to the fact it had no batteries, memory card, or USB connector.
Well thankfully for me i dont need the USB connector, my PC has the memory card readers first off, also i dont have a true MicroSD card, its a MiniSD (the really tiny ones) and i use a MicroSD Converter which i slot the thing into, i also have a USB adapter for said miniSD, so im covered in that department already!
I just needed batteries. And so i did.

Heres a shot i took with it

aaaand heres what the camera looks liek for realz

this is cool :D

The Land of Concentration part 3

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 17:00:00 +0000

Yo,

please excuse the delay of this blog, im not sure anyone cares anyways, nto like this is some big trafficked blog or anything.
But enough of that onto whats important: My levels of concentration.

We were off to a rocky start, what with the Tropic Thunder fiasco, but Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, i took extra step initiatives and did something.
on Friday, me and Steve went to the school and i did some moderate drawing and crappy keyframed flash stick man thinger. Totally uninspired flash thing, but the drawing felt good. I went with the intention of animating something, but instead i decided to brush up on my Anthro character art and seeked out a few tutorials online.

On Saturday, it was pretty much a gong show, me and Steve spent the day ploaying around with music creation software, ACiD and FL Studio to be more precise. I think we may have figure dout FLS tudio without having to resort to tutorials, haha.
Later that day, had a meeting with the Silver Shot crew, but that didn't fly unfortunately, so we ended up watching a bunch of AVGN videos.
Also Stephen and Jami and I, beat Saints Row, it only took till 3:30AM.

on Sunday however, after i dropped Stephen back off at home (around 11AM when i got back i think) i locked myself in my room, checked my remaining messages, and with nothing else to do, my xbox downstairs, nothing to play on PS3, and my Wii required to much movement, i finally checked out 11 second club again for this months competition.

K now honestly, the clip is in ALL french or some foreign language i cant understand, im assuming this is to give free reign over everything but i dont have the foggiest of what id do with it.
So saying "Fuck it" i went to MovieWavs.com and surfed for good clips.
I settled on 2 clips from "Snatch" and pieced them together to create my own challenge. This is however, 24 seconds instead of 11. But the first good chunks worth wont involve any lip synching, its all narration so thatll ease it up a bit.

Here the clip: http://www.blackjagstudios.com/stuff/Pikeys_Clip.mp3

Ill be posting the storyboards next when they're done

Also a bit of good news, my drum kit is on its way :D

with that i leave you with the daily YouTube

i highly encourage watching the whole "The Heist" by Derren Brown, its incredibly fascinating!

The Land of Concentration day 2

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 17:31:00 +0000

Well its day 2 and i havent even started yet.

Operation: Get Shit Done; is still not underway as i originally planned.
The other day (Wednesday) was the actual premiere of Tropic Thunder, a movie i was killing myself waiting to see. When i was informed it was the 13th instead of the 15th (like the posters said) i jumped at the immediate chance to see the earliest showing i could.
After watchign that rediculously awesome movie, i came back to see Cole Doner drive into the driveway, and opted to make me watch Full Metal Jacket, because i had to see it.
By the time that movie was finished, it was 12:30 and i needed to get to sleep.

Enter the next day, Day 2 of when i planned on doing this 'cleansing of distractions', i was talking to my brother online about Tropic Thunder, and got really pissed at me. Apparently i had told him i promised to see it with him on opening day.
Well its a good thing for him i really wanted to watch it again, so after work i hopped in my car, drove 35 minutes to his town, picked him up, drive for 45 minutes back to Kelowna, and set up a time to watch it with roommate Cody and his girlfriend.
Once that was finished me and Stephen chilled instead of worked, i turned on Beetlejuice/geuse and he chatted online on my computer.
He jammed on his guitar, i practiced some drumming on the Rock Band drum pads, despite they werent hooked up i just tried to imagine the sound each one made. It was easy because i couldn't exactly hear where i was fucking up, rather it sounded good in my head XD
Then we turne don I AM Legend and fell asleap. Well i did anyways.

This is now Day 3, i started downloading trial software of some music cretion software but couldn't install them beofre having to head out to work. So Stephens in charge of monitoring the progress with that.
The day is young, and while Stephen is here i dont actually beleive ill get much done in the way of Animation stuff, but we can certainly figure out stuff musically.

anyways whatever, the moral of the story is: Movie Posters a dirty filthy liars, and should never be trusted with information, or candy.
mmm candy..

With that done, i present to you, the daily YouTube: today is a double feature of Americas Got Talent Ozzy Impersonators.
Watch the first one, then watch the second one, then repeat int hat order one more time.
Or do whatever you want, i dont really care :)

Now Begins a Journey, to the Land of Concentration and Loudness

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 17:54:00 +0000

So ive been going on for years now on a personal mission to own every console and have a healthy selection of games for each system i own.
I have accomplished this lifelong goal of mine.
To any standard nerd this is a dream come true. To msot normal people this is a bit excessive. To a person like me: Why the hell did i do it?

First let me bring you back a small ways: I never grew up with money. With me i owned 1 console per generation (try as i might), so i had to make the right decisions, and i only had a paltry selection of my own games to choose from. Otherwise i was renting.
Some nights while others would dream about naked women riding around on scooters while doing gymnasi- sorry those were still mine, but meanwhile i dreamt one day i would choose a generation to own every system within. Then id go back to dreaming about naked women on scooters.

Back to the point, i do now own everything. Xbox360 Premium w/ Gold Live account, Playstation 3 80GB, Wii, PSP Slim, and DS Fatty. All 5 current generation mainstream systems sit atop and below my TV on a daily basis. Begging for me to use them to help justify the thousands of dollars i saw beside me. And thus i would.

So here i am now, an aspiring animator who needs practice, a game designer who needs time, and in about 2 weeks time ill be the proud owner of a new drum kit.
Where does gaming fit in? Here the thing: I wont let it.

Ive decided for the greater good of myself, to lock away about 98% of my games, all my previous-gen systems, and leave only the Wii and PS3 out, with 1 game per system.
On the PS3 ill leave GTA4 out, and with the Wii im leaving Okami out.
the 360, its games, and everytghing below gets put away for an unspecified amount of time.

Whats the point of all this? Concentration. I cant guarantee myself itll be liek the old days, where becaus ei didn't have much in the way of gaming, id say to myself "K im gonna open flash and continue to work on Transparent, i only got 1 more week for that deadline" but any facet of that back is more welcome than anything ive been trying so far.

So the deal is this: cutting back about 80% of my gaming habbit, putting fourth effort on doing animations, learning the Drums, and continuing to do the best job i can with the Silver Creek team.

I hope this works >_> otherwise im hopeless, ill be documenting my experience in this blog, making it yet another "Adventure" in something.

on a lighter note, heres the drum kit i puchased, jsut gotta wait 2 weeks for its arrival :D

if i had a tail, itd be wagigng so hard itd knock people out >_>im SUPER stoked for this.

Im going to rip off my little brother's idea for his blog and do a "Song of the Day" thing, not-sponsored in part by YouTube, Vimeo, etc. But itll be a ":Video of the Day" thing

Last.fm Widgets

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 21:52:00 +0000

Now you can see what im listening to and my top artists and stuff.

nifty.

(check it out on the right)

http://www.last.fm/user/DJDarkViper << My Actual last.fm profile

This is hot

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 18:18:00 +0000

and i want it on my wall.

Wouldn't mind one of Psycho Mantis either, then the Beauty and the Beasts.. k.. k.. im gonna stop now before i get too excited >_>

Casper: Theres Good boo To-night

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:53:00 +0000

i--i jus-- i cannot beleive... omg...

i havent seen this episode of Casper since i was.. holy god tiny. its the episode i remember most vividly, i remember at the time in elementry, Foxes were my favorite animal, and this episode almost brought me to tears.
it almost does now for the nostalic factor of it all lol

LMAO

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 17:37:00 +0000

This is just too awesome LOL
id eat here, ALL the time!

Starting off the day right

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 16:57:00 +0000

nothing like getting caught speeding in a construction zone in the morning eh? Oh ya i jsut WANTED to get rid of that $362, it didn't need it anyways >_>

A first time for anything part 2

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 07:30:00 +0000

The deed is done. My good friend Ryan has finally gotten himself a wife, the lovely Christine. They're actually a good couple and everytime i see them together (which admittedly isn't exactly often) the chi flows smoothly.

The wedding was very nice, i showed up directly at 10 to 3 (the wedding started at 3) and had enough time to find a seat before watching the hour long ceremony. Watching my friend become married was an experience. But the moment he said "i do" to his new wife, it hit me like a sledgehammer in the chest, not because i was emotional about the whole thing (its the manly thing to say while i sit here and blog at 12AM), but because it made me realize, thats pretty much exactly what i want to.
--TANGENT--
Ive never actually understood why men get cold feet when it comes to marriage, ive never understood why an adult male becomes so freaked out at the thought of a wife and kids, i guess its just me. Ive always wanted that, ever since i was a kid. That being said, im a giant chicken when it comes to conversing with prospective women. I dunno it jsut happens, i struggle to find somehting to say, awkward silence happens, and suddenly im boring the other person to death. I want to meet a nice gamer chick who is also single. Ive met plenty of gamer chicks and always find the conversations entertaining, but theyre never single. Oh well, ill find something soon.
--/TANGENT--

So after the wedding were told the reception time and place and i think "This woujld eb a perfect time to run home and blog about what jsut happened" of course id be locked out of my house so i decided to meander around Penticton instead. Grabbed me an Ice Capp and travelled all around place. I know with these gas prices its getting harder and harder to jsutify cruising, but i didn't care, it felt nice. Eventually i found my way by the mall, and i saw the PetCetera store to my left, so i thought id go check out the dogs for adoption area. Of course its jsut cats, im told i need to go to the SPCA to see the dogs. And of course theyd be closed on a Sunday, oh well. So i ran to the Mall and went to CDPlus and found the new Disturbed album, i dunno, nothing about the contents of the CD has stood out to me so far, but then i was barely paying attention. I was too busy daydreaming about owning a dog for myself, and traveling around with them in the car (as i see everyone else frickin doing, sparking the day dreaming).
I went o the mall again to kill off the remaining hour of wait, and i found my way to EB games. Lookin sharp in my new jeans, hair, sunglasses, etc. I picked up the PS3 controller and played Battlefiled Bad Company. The WHOLE time im playing this beast, these three kids on a bench about 17 feet away, stood there. Occassionally i could hear them cough out "PS3" and a loud "I WANNA PLAY THE PS3". All the while im rolling my eyes. Im not gonna give it up if they think whining about it or giving not so subtle hints behind my back is going to win them. So i kept playing, and they kept wining. Fourty-Five minutes pass of course, and theyre STILL behind me. Ill give em kudos for determination. So while im totally not doing the right thing in BFBC and im being all sneaky and accurate and doing the game on Hard with ease, i finally set a bomb off undernethe me to set me back to the checkpoint, (on purpose) and put the controller down. I then start walking away and i see the kids run up to it. First thing i hear is "how do i play this" meanwhile the fucktard jumped on the SECOND controller port.
Fucking. N00bs.
So i stood and watched and it was a trainwreck, but i couldn't continue laughing ast their shitty performance any longer, i had to go to the reception. So i told the kid "to blow up a wall, stand next to it and fire a rocket at it" promptly killing himself, i laughed and left.

At the reception, i was a little shakey, stiff, and nervous. I was at a party where i knew NO ONE but the groom, the wife, and the grooms good friend (and my friend) Joe. Thats it. Everyone else was a new face to me.
So naturally im a little intimidated, i wanna meet some people and have a good time but i cant muster up the gumption to do anything about it. Eventually this Jeff guy beside me noted theres a bar right beside us, and because the reception was to be alcohol free, we decided to make a getaway to the Bar for a drink and return back. I followed, i met up with my good friend Pierre Smirnoff, had a good time, and made my way back to the reception. The drink, loosened me up something fierce. I wasn't drunk, nor wa si in a haze, i just felt alot more confident about my actions and how little i cared about what others thought. Now i knew i needed to drive home so i stopped drinking right then and there and since ive been gulping down Water like were running out of it tommorrow or something.
Danced, talked it up, made a fool out of myself once or twice in small concentrated groups, got some nice shots with Joe and Ryan,, and i stayed till the end of the party.

Ok, that last part has some significance. To anybody who has ever partied with ME, knows i have a nasty habbit of cutting out early. And for various reasons but msotly jsut caus eim not necessarily feeling it. Im not club hopper, i dont go to bars very often, and even house parties i go to bed early at. Im not a partier (which also explains why i dont exactly know how to chat up random women :p), so i always duck out. I stayed til the end opf this one, and i wont lie, i even thought about going home around 10PM, but then somethin happened: i realized i was having fun, so i didn't cut out at my projected time. Instead i left when i realized everyone else had left, and i said my congrats and 'seeyalaters' to Ryan and Christine.

In short, it was a good day for sure.

Man its so crazy, my friend is married... i still dont know what to think about that lol. Oh well.

Conratulations Ryan and Christine! Congratulations :) and thanks for a wonderful night from me :)

-k

A first time for Anything

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 16:02:00 +0000

Later today, im about to witness one thing i didn;t actually expect to be doing for at least another few years. But here it is.

No one would know that im talking about a good friend of mines Wedding. I never blogged about it or really talked about it in any sense because i still cant beleive its happening. Even as i sit her ein my chair, im oblivious to how my friend is feeling right now because, well, ive never had to do this before.
Im not actually DOING anything thee, im purly just a witness on Ryans side. But im still nervous as hell. Why is that?

Anyways i gotta get to Kelowna sometime this morning to pick up my dress shirt (or buy a new one) and tie.

I still cant beleive it, one of my friends is getting married. The first one as well (if you havent gathered that already). Thisll be an interesting experience for all of us involved i think.

Well Ryan, ill see ya at the ceremony :) . Ill blog about how it went, because i know ill be looking for things to note about, being as i dont have an actual Camera to my name >_>

The Journey: Press Start to Begin

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:05:00 +0000

Starting now, i am about to embark on a brand new adventure, and adventure detailing things ive never tried before, an adventure into something that feels comfortable, yet, scary.

Being a wannabe Game Designer ive had it in my best interest to try and create a game in my mind that id both enjoy playing, and enjoy making. Its a frivilous balance as there's always good and bad and the appeal level is always up in the air. Being also a wannabe Games Animator i have the sole intent on doing my absolute best in beleivable virtual acting while maintaining smooth transitions. the art of manipulating graph lines is a fine one and one that i take particular pride in.

Ill be the first to admit, im not awesome at either. But this is where the journey begins.

Ive teamed up with an old friend of mine who specializes in modeling and texturing. My part of this two man commando team is Animation and Scripting. Hes also got most mapping while i tackle project management and exporting. The idea is not to be overrun with eachothers duties, but rather dabble in everything as its needed, so it should be an interesting development model when we have no real set plan other than "just get it done" and "babysteps" heh
Together we handle the games design, and decide on the technology. So far it looks like well be starting with the TGE (Torque Game Engine) as its cheap and easy, after working with thsi for a while we hope to integrate Havok Physics and Animation, if not then thats ok too, later on when we feel were confident and the beta releases prove positive, we plan to upgrade to the TAGE (Torque Advanced Game Engine) which basically enables shader support and allows us to make our game look modernized.

The product in said development is officially 'unannounced' at press time, but please, keep on watching this blog for little updates here and there as im sure im going to leak out information. I kind of already did if you look into this post enough.

Thats it for now before Kris kills me!

-k

360 is repaired

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 22:21:00 +0000

or replaced XD

Anyways jsut got the email from MS saying my console is being shipped back to me. Now i onyl got to wait 1 more week.

Andy, Nathaniel, and all you other guys who play RSV2 on the box, ill be joining you soon (if you havent started already), though truth be told, i much rather enjoy the precision of the mouse :p

Stephen Unveils the new Hardware!

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 19:14:00 +0000

R.I.P. George Carlin

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Mon, 23 Jun 2008 07:32:00 +0000

The world lost a great man last night. A man who truely saw for the world for what it was, a man who had many a face but remained recognizable, a man who played a role in many a great film, a man who has brought up such Comedic classics liek "The list of things you cannot say on TV" and much more.

I feel i lost a hero today, George Carlin, you will be missed.

Rest in peace buddy.

Life changing

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 20:49:00 +0000

Ive made an incredbly important decision in my life.

Im moving back home temporarily for a month, to get my life in order and infuse some habbits which i sorely need before i even think about moving to Vancouver somewhere in December.

Good times indeed. I hope to take the best of what i have right now;

and infuse it into this body:

if you want an indication, that chuck norris shirt is incredibly tight on me now. And no, its not from washing it either.

Oy'vey

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 16:31:00 +0000

Well i planned on getting down and dirty with some Maya based Animation last night right after work.

Course not.

I managed to figure out one issue ive been having since day 1 in maya 2008 thats been really holding me back, and deleted some poses that are either way to early in the animation and arent called for, or are just too goofy for the mood, oh well, under my own discretion i deleted em anyways. Thats about it.

Im not THAT easily distracted its when everyone else wants to do things around me and i get sucked into it, usually by will. Ive resisted numerouos times walking downstairs just to play some brawl, ive resisted going to movies, ive resisted going to the bar for Wings and other fun activities to try and remain productive. But, it jsut never frickin turns out that way regardless. I can almsot pinpoint the moments when my day is shot for productivity.

Maybe when the roommates are primarily in Vancouver this week i can get something done...

I wanna see if i can get some stuff done tonight, i at l;east want to get the conductor segment done, or the wink segment... either way i want to get this intro sequence out the door :(

-k

My FireFox 3.0 Extensions Recommendations

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 20:09:00 +0000

With the official release of FireFox3.0, its about time to discuss, extensions.
Back in the beta, not alot of these extensions were compatible, thanks to some serious changes in the inner workings of the browser and how it handled these marvelous plugins.
So now ive made sure to grab the best of my favorite and gie them a proper run in Firefox3.0 to see if they work, and gladly, not only do most of them work now (as of today) but msot have gone through GREAT improvements in functionality and UI tweaks.

there are a few extensions which really stand out to me, and make my life jsut an awesome ball of awesome. So i wish to share with you my ABSOLUTE favorite standouts. Here goes:

1. FlashGet
ok you got me, this isn't technically a "Firefox extension" its a standalone program that works with Firefox. The fact its a download manager, accelerator, AND highly competant Torrent client is not the onyl claims to fame, if you hilight a URL and Copy it using Ctrl+C to your clipboard, itll send the URL directly to FlashGet to queue up and download. Oh ya, highlight entire block listings of address URLs the same way, and press Ctrl+C once, and itll queue everything up, in order.
Makes RapidShare downloading a snap.

2. DownThemAll
Built in Download Manager and Accelerator for FireFox, works pretty flawlessly, and quickly. Ive downlaoded 400MB objects in a minute or two. DTAoneClick is a nice feature that takes the last directory you saved your last file to, and and downloads to that in one shot.

3. FireFTP
Ive always applauded how useful FireFTP is. But v0.99 that came with the release of FF3.0, is jsut GODLY now. Now equipped with UI functionality tweaks, and better connection stability, i can now properly pimp out one of my favorit efeatures: On Site Editing. With < 0.98, you right click on a file on the server side and choose "Open wtih..." and chose your favorite editor which you add manually tot he list via options menu. itll make a copy to your temp int files and open it in your editor, make you change, save, and click "Uplaod" in the floating window.
NOW, with 0.99, all you have to do is Right Click the file and open with your favorite editor, as per said before. But now theyve cut out the middle man of pressing the "Upload" button and now just uploads when you press Ctrl+S to save. genius. Now i no longer have to micromanage 50 floating upload buttons LOL

4. FoxyTunes
its almost like a built in media player in FireFox. But instead it jsut controls your existing media players, which theres ALOT of comaptability for. For that extra hit of discretion, they hide your media player and make it look liek FoxyTunes is the only show in town. The added bonus is when you close FireFox, it wont stop the music, your media player jsut shows up again continuing where you left off, awesome!

5. PicLens
OMG, this is SO cool. its a Picture/Video browser thats compatible with some of my most common sites, DeviantArt and YouTube. It has to be seen to be beleived, but the plugin opens a new fully 3D window browser, and lets you seemlessly slide back and fourth across the RSS of the page, and gies you low resolution thumbnail views of what your about to see. Click on one, anywhere, and itll smoothly zoom in and start playing the video or downlaoding the higher rez image. you can browse to the actual page by clicking the "Globe" link under the pic. Its way to slick for words, seriously, just check it out.

6. ScribeFire
Im using this as we speak. Originally called "Performancing for FireFox" some thing happened an dnow their called ScribeFire, and thats totally cool with me. ScribeFire sounds better anyways.
So what is it? Its a blogging tool silly. It adds itself to your status bar as a golden page icon, and brings upa built in panel with all options imagineable to blog, including multiple account management and posting and.. like, EVERYTHING you could want, including a totally competant rich text editor.
in short: it kicks ass.

7. TwittyTunes
i only JUST starte dusing this totday, and its hilariously awesome. I click a button in the bottom right of my browser, and it talks with FoxyTunes to see which some im playing and with one more click i can tell the world what im listneing too. Or i can type in my own message no problem. Making it a competant built in Twitter aggitater.

8. TwitterFox
This pokes the Twitter server every couple minutes to see if your friends have posted anything and pops them up like MSN notifications, also allows you to reply to them in one shot too.
Awesome.

So theres a few, ill post later with links to each one. For now, jsut bring up the Add-ons window in FireFox and use the built in extension search for each of these and give them a proper shot. Who knows, you may just like them :D

Got any recommendations for me to try out? i lvoe screwing with Firefox, elt me know your favorite extensions or themes!

Unconventional

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 16:59:00 +0000

So of course id catch a LITTLE slack from my post yesterday regaridng Vista, and to be honest i was prepared for it. Bombarded with "So why should i upgrade" and i always gave the same response "You dont". I wasn't trying to convert or convince anyone to upgrade, i posted MY Top 10 Reasons Why IM Glad I Switched to Vista. "im" or references to my first person are listed upwards of 3 times in a single sentence. Why did i post it? A quick guide to the common question "AWWW! Vista?! Why?!" so now i just copy paste the link to them and be done with it.

ONTO other things:

Demo Reel work, seems whenever i get that touch of motivation i need, something come sup. Take yesterday for instance, i had an uncontrollable desire to leave work and open maya and finish the intro sequence to my demo reel, unfortunately a house party got thrown, and if that wouldn't have made it hard enough to concentrate, i got invited to see the new Hulk movie.
the hulk movie was awesome, but by the time i realized what was going on, it was 2AM, now im normally inclined to work on my stuff either direct early in the morning or really early in the morning, but alas, work @ 9 :\
I plan on doing some stuff tonight but i think tonight is when me and Jami are starting Metal gear 4 again, which is something vie waited longer than my schooling for, so in some twisted sense, this actually takes precedent for me.

WOW. Yeah i got on the WoWagon. Again. for the third time. I havent stopped but ive onyl been playing on and off now and then. Im lvl16 as of this morning, so im quite taking my time lol. this new "QuestHelper" mod my brother downloaded for me is already helping wonders, so, thanks to himi might not ave to waste so much time looking for obscene things for hours on end.

CourtEngine: Production has officially been ceased for more prospective projects, such as:

ShellEngine: This is a new project, using highly modified technology from CourtEngine to transform from a desktop application to a web authoring environment, details are secret, but its a BIG project. ©DigitalAG

not much else past this point,

later days

-k

(ps. The Weekenders is still an AWESOME cartoon)

My Top 10 Reasons I'm Glad I Switched to Vista

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 15:56:00 +0000

Normally id number these, but i like each of these features all the same.

- none of XPs Automatic updates requiring automatic Restarts
On way more than a bunch of occasions i left work with my computer locked so i can easily return to the job at hand i had to do, but upon returning, i could only gaze in awe as i see the blue Windows Login screen instead. Yup, XP had downloaded an update automatically, and then restarted my computer. Effectively killing off everything i had been doing the night previously.
Seriously, WHY? I cant understand why they force the restart so furiously, even when your ON the computer and it come sup, it never gives you the option to "Restart manually Later" instead it gives you a countdown to restart and your allowed to "delay" it a little bit longer. Balls.
- Integrated Search and Run built into Start Menu.
if your like me, you barely use the Windows Explorer to find your shit, as a tech nerd, you just KNOW where you've put your FunnyPix/ folder deep down in drive F somewhere, and thus find it easier to press Win+R and type in the path manually.
Now alls i have to do is click the windows logo as my start menu and type my path into "Search" and it'll do the same thing? even launch programs WITH parameters? Also allows me to look up key words for files and the start menu jsut starts listing shit with the same relative name As you type? frigging genius man!
- Voice Recognition. *
Ever have that dream of talking to your computer and itll do your shit for you automatically? well I have, shut up. So when i found out about Vistas buitl in Voice tool, allowing me to shout various commands to my computer via headset mic and allow me to write based on what it hears me say, i could write angry things to troll bait on youTube while pouring myself a cup o 'joe in the morning, or playing my Sega Saturn. Perfect!
* ok so its not exactly perfect, you should still run your voiced text by a Spell checker so you dont look like a retard online, cause online rep means everything you know.
- DirectX10.
OOHH i can hear the screaming OGL fanboys now "opengl is so much better" "directx is a plague upon which i can only wish upon my highschool bully", and still waiting on OGL3. Lets get something straight, i like OGL, and John Carmack is my alltime hero alright? But you have to admit, say you have an operating system which only allows OGL3 and all other OSs before it wont get it. Its that kind of empowering feeling that your 256x256 bumpmaps will look sharper and crisper, and thus have more meaning, then those other poor pitiful peasants with a color overlay of green, for envy. Plus as a 3D animator, ebing able to see real time shaders on my animated objects within my animation environment (XSI/Maya) is just hilariously cool (and useful).
- Pretty Interface
I use XP at work, and Vista at home. Both have high resolution LCD flatscreen monitors, and both have dual screen displays. Work has a decent graphics card 9we work with Flash here, no need for much bigger), and home has an 8800GT.
When i go home and work on Vista im greeted with the slick Aero interface, the transparent window borders which casually blur out anything behind them, and have that cool sheen effect when you move the windows, the glowy buttons, and black glass appeal, and the reworked Control Panel and other meaningful windows useful to geeks like me who care about this sort of thing. Its got a certain appeal, and while the Widgets may be a direct plagiarism to a certain other OS, they work and look nice.
When i get to work and see XP, its sort of demoralizing going from a serene and inspiring interface, to something that reminds me of blueberry bubblegum or children's playground Playskool plastics.
Don't get me wrong, XPs interface looks a hell of alot better than any other windows before it, im just saying, if your computer has the balls to do it properly, Aero whips the snot out of it.
- SP1
Ok I'll admit the first iteration of Vista was a balls experience, and i feel for those who did this and got permanently scarred and went backwards in time. but good things happen to those who wait and stick it out, and adapt to change every now and then. When Vista first came out, there was nothing compatible with it, but as time has progressed, almost everything worth anything is Vista compatible now. And now with Sp1, all those vanilla versions bugs seem to have magically disappeared. I urge anyone whos suffered through vanilla Vista to give SP1 a chance, cause while the minor annoyances still exist (UAC, just turn it off in your User management control panel), all the bugs and crashing issues seem to have.. calmly disappeared.
To put it shortly: Ive been running vista since SP1s release, i know its almost unheard of, but its NEVER crashed on me once, and i run that thing like its my bitch, and my friend who've witnessed me do this, can attest. Vista SP1, is very solid. If its crashing on you, your doing something wrong so stop visiting those porn sites, they only spell problems.
- Future Proof
Games for Windows Live. The fact some games already are Vista exclusive in OS compatibility, means the trend can only continue with all sorts of software. Sorry to those who wish to stick in the past with what they're used to, they're gonna miss on the next generation of PC titles/software. I could of course, be wrong about this, but i like to call it "Being prepared for the future" which is the exact reason i got a Quad core instead of a dual. its only a matter of time before all four cores will be used in gaming, but for right now, the cores do fine for Video rendering :)
Oh as for software compatability with older programs, sorry, i like to upgrade, shiny new things make me feel better about what im using (not that ALL upgrades are a good thing mind you, let us not forget about Adobe CS3 *shivers*)
- Plug and play, just works
yeah XPs got it and i believe so does 2000, but ive never seen it so flawlessly before. Plugging in all sorts of objects into a USB slot used to be a nightmare, as well as micromanaging and remember which USB slot i associated with various bits of hardware. For some reason with me, if i plugged my Webcam into a different USB slot than its used to, it'll require a reinstallation. Maybe i did something wrong or XPs just a bastard about figuring out that you just unplugged it from its normal slot 2 minutes ago.
I plugged in my MadCatz Xbox360 controller in, and in seconds its up and running and fully calibrated.
Mouse, Keyboard, Wireless Receiver, Webcam, every controller ic an hook up to it, etc. Ive never had to search for drivers myself. it just, heh, works!
- Inspiring
Whenever i sit in front of my computer at home running Vista Ultimate SP1, im inspired to do creative things, not just be lazy. More often than not im animating, or working in Flash, or screwing around in Photoshop putting mustaches on various Women and posting it to 4chan. Vista, if you'll allow it, can bring out your creative senses, and that in itself, just feels euphoric.
- Windows 7.
Its a little early to be talking about the next iteration of Windows. But to anyone who's seen the vids of it, know what it is: Vista on steroids and with Wingardium Leviosa cast upon it (don't cry Harry Potter fans, i dont read it). Win7 looks like vista, acts like vista, but its gigabytes smaller, and has better features, and supposedly compatible with everything. Plus being able to natively run a build of any previous version of windows for TRUE backwards compatibility, just rocks! Now you CAN have your cake, and eat it too!

im not here to change your mind about vista, honestly, i use what i want to use because the fraction of reasons listed above, appeal to me greatly. But this should answer the string of questions i get constantly on "Vista? WHY?!?!". now i at least have a link i can send those bastards.

Is there anything i dont like about vista? of course: its a memory and resource hog, it kills off any Dualboot you may have hoped to have (it likes to try and be your one and only true love), and Aero Lite looks like ass. Theres many others but nothing can be perfect, right? Even MGS4 has its flaws.

Thank you and good night.

OH speaking of high speculation: check this out

mmm Smexy.

-k

LOL MGS4 LOL

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 16:41:00 +0000

Ok so to understand how weird this sounds, let me divulge a few small facts:

1. Im a HUGE fan of counter-terrorism and stealth
2. the entire MGS series while tactical and espionage and always good, always had poor control mechanics when it came to shooting
3. I still play the crap out of Vegas2 for its near perfect cover mechanics and excelelnt blend of shooting controls and precision
4. Game sliek Splinter Cell i eat up
5. i still like my action games like GRAW and COD4
6. im a sucker for graphics
7. i play paintball to get that tactical feel out in real life without getting myself killed for real.

So, with this in mind:

We got MGS4 and waited till around 5:30 to order some pizza, pop the game in, and get everyone in gear for some Metal gear Action. For some reason we decided on Big Boss Hard Mode initially and without knowing the controls, lol.
So we blast through the cinematics, and some gameplay segments, i got to shoot a few dudes, and i felt instantly dissapointed that i had no silencer, but whatever, i can work with what i got.
The soldiers must have superior fucking sight because they can see me way before i even get the chance to see them. But anyways, thats MGS for ya.

So i was invited upstairs to see a website while Jami and Peter took over, being on hard mdoe and seeing how they were doing previous to my leaving, i dind't honestly expect ALOT of progress, maybe a little, but still. What i saw captivated me. Good airsoft guns, are finally legal in these here parts. And whats better, were finding some good guns for nice prices.
So me and Cole started fantasizing about buying which guns for what price, which attachments to throw on, our strategies and positions, and even what tactical gear we wante dto buy, and tried to get a couple others in on this too.

To be honest: i COMPLETELY forgot about MGS4 going on downstairs. It wasn't until i was told that they made some serious progress and ive missed pivitol plot points, that, i couldn't bring myself to go back down and play it. Id be lost, and i want the full experience in order.

So anyways, im so far a go for this AirSoft malarky, and i need to start a new file on MGS4 to play through lol.

Sorry Kojima...

pure extacy

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 23:29:00 +0000

4 little words: se eif you can peice them together
Gear, Solid, Metal, Four

ill give ya a hint: its Metal Gear Solid 4.

Stillwater represent, yo

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 18:36:00 +0000

My god, Saints Row 2 looks incredibly badass.

I dont even need to say anything jsut chekc out these two trailers:

Sure its a GTA knockoff. But it does it SO well, that i dont care. These activities are badass!

Ramblings: Do i have Red on me?

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 16:53:00 +0000

So i finally broke down and called Xbox Support, i should have a new 360 within 3 weeks time.

*sigh*

Ramblings: Scary guy was scary

noreply@blogger.com (Kyle Harrison) — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 17:41:00 +0000

I was driving home from work yesterday when i came to an intersection like any intersection. Except at this intersection was something of likes which isn't entiely new or anything but was kinda freaky all the same.

This guy had to have been maybe 29 or so, fairly adult gentleman. He had green hair. A Mohawk with spikes liek the picture to the right, except each spike was fricking GINORMOUS. I SWEAR to god each spike was about arms LENGTH. They were HUUUGE. Now only that but he wore a spiked collar and chain leash. The leash, he was holding himself as if he was 'walking himself' or something. He wore a pure black wifebeater and black slacks about 14 sizes too big (but unlike the G-unit trend, at least he wore a belt to keep the pants up). i couldn't see the shoes, nor wouold i have rely been able to as i was in my car. K, thats not all, he wore ring piercings on the side of his mouth, in his nose, and on both eyebrows.

K, so in Canadian culture, most of this is normal run-of-the-mill rebel stuff. The things that really caught my asttention were the huge spikes and the 29yo less-then-perfect physique. What was it that creeped me out? He glared at me, and me specifically. He watched my car make the stop at the red light, and he stared directly at me in my driver seat. He then GROWLED at me in a manner i could hear with my eyes, and his fricking EYES TWITCHED.
He kept staring at me the entire time he walked in front of my car as he crossed the intersection. When he got to the other side he turned and left.

I was worried he was going to pounce on my car or something, to say the least it sorta left me shaken. Why me?
Im in a white 1992 Dodge Daytona, all that can be seen of me is my black t-shirt, my backwards black UnderArmor baseball cap, and my shades. Theres nothing to catch the eye of in regards to me that day.

Anyways, just thought id share caus ei got nothing else better to say.

-k