Artful Oddities

Douglas Adams and the Importance of Baths

2011-09-21T05:34:00.000-07:00

Every day we are exposed to a huge amount of input. More than ever with it now being so accessible in so many forms.

All of this input is fantastic and we can learn many interesting things, but there is one major flaw to it all. Brain noise. Brain noise is that soup of ideas and memories all zapping from one synapse to another with no real direction, like a huge brewing thunderstorm. So much input has gone in that it needs output. But what output?

This is a huge problem when you're trying to create something. There are many blogs, books and lectures about focus and motivation and "just doing it", some of which hit the nail on the head very well. So why is getting over that doing hurdle so difficult? In part it's to do with brain noise. You want to "just do it" but you have so many ideas that picking one is like finding a needle in a haystack of needles. The only thing left to do is to try to sort the noise out and get on with it. Many people can never leave the literal brain storm stage. I just hit a wall and try to get over it.

Because of constant daily input, quite often the only downtime for the brain to handle all the noise is during sleep, which is actually not as useful as it sounds. There is plenty of research to suggest dreams and "sleeping on it" is a very important part of the brain's cycle to disseminate information, but it doesn't really give much of a feedback loop to the conscious mind.

Meditation is supposed to help clear the head, but the problem with that is many meditation practices require you to empty your mind, getting rid of the noise entirely and then letting it come back later to give the brain a break.

So what is the middle ground? This is where Douglas Adams comes in.

If you're a fan of Douglas Adams you will probably know he had a wonderful ability to not get anything written on time. Like most authors (I hate using the word "creatives", because everyone is creative) he knew the battle of the blank page. You can insert canvas, presentation slide, ball of wool, paper, clay block etc. as you see fit, but authors tend to have days when they are struggling for every single word, and other days when sentences flow like water.

Douglas Adams was notorious for missing deadlines due to this struggle. He's even famously quoted as saying "I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by."
During the writing process however he was also known for taking an extraordinary amount of baths. Baths were very important to Adams. It was so ingrained in the idea process that they eventually sold his bathtub for the Save the Rhino charity.

It seemed that baths helped sort out his struggle. Not to mention the whole towel thing.

I've generally always been a shower person so I'd never tested the theory out. Then today, it all changed.

In the process of getting fit again i've hit the usual problem of overdoing it. Today was particularly hard on my shocked body, so I did the sensible thing and ran a bath with some muscle soothing salts.
Because I was so completely exhausted I probably lay there for about half an hour not attempting to move.

The thing about sitting anywhere for any length of time is your mind starts to drift. My thoughts fuzzled and whirled and then slowly coalesced into daydreaming. The thought cloud drifted to the place in my head where a creative project i'm currently working on sat and nestled nicely into the gaps that were missing.

I didn't think about what had happened until I pulled the plug. I'd just solved a few major roadblocks in my project.

So what is the difference between that and just taking some time out to daydream? Baths provide a great antidote to information input: They're not friendly to electronic devices or paper. Input is limited. I did of course think of bringing in an audio book or podcast set far away from the water (yes, I'm that bad at shutting off the flow of information), but I scratched the idea since I had only intended to be there for a short time. I wasn't, and the result was marvellous.

My mind had no choice but to cling to solid ideas for stability in the stormy seas.

Your situation may be entirely different. You may not have the problem of shutting off the noise or taking in too much.

Nevertheless, a bath seems to do wonders for the creative process.

Top 5 Friday - Blog feeds

2011-07-22T07:10:00.000-07:00

I love RSS feeds. I follow way too many. Here's a top 5 i'm enjoying at the moment:

Austin Kleon's Scrapbook blog: Austin already has a a great blog of his own work, but he's also got a tumblr feed where he posts interesting and inspiring stuff he finds.

XKCD: Don't let the simple stick-figures fool you. This is one of the best online comic strips today. Make sure to hover your mouse over the image for the alt text closing words.

Derren Brown: Illusionist and painter. What makes his blog great however is that it doesn't just cover magic and painting. He has a very dedicated team (predominantly two called Phillis and Abeo) who post numerous interesting articles across a range of curious topics.

Parka Blogs: A great art book review site. What separates his review style from most is the amount of images he posts of the pages alongside a video of actually flipping through the book content. When you're thinking of purchasing an art book this is very useful.

MAKE Magazine: Because I just love the maker community. So many cool and fun projects going on with everything from art to technology.

Improtastic

2011-05-13T21:56:00.000-07:00

For those that don't know, I tend to lean towards the theatrical. I traipsed the boards in musicals for many years before giving it up for a long time due to a heavy work load and other projects popping up.

Shortly after moving to London however, I hit upon an amazing group known as Hoopla, and suddenly an addiction was born.

For those that are unaware of the delightful art form known as Improvisational Theatre ("Impro" to some, "Improv" to others), there's a tiny clue in the name. Everything is improvised on the spot. No script, no rehearsals. Rather than take you through every type of what it is and how it works, I recommend you read the wiki entry mentioned above.

Impro is not as simple as taking a suggestion and running with it. Performing a show is somewhat like cooking when you don't have a recipe book. There are still rules you have to follow to make it work well, or the end result may vary between a delicious treat and a tasteless slop. It all depends on your skill of using what ever you find in the cupboard (maybe I'm taking the cooking analogy too far).

Good improvisers can take any offer they are given by an audience member or a fellow actor on stage and turn into something wonderful. More importantly they know how to serve the scene, not themselves. Most importantly however they have a unique skill that can take a long time to sink in.

Fear of failure (a theme you will see come up often in my writing) is the first roadblock a beginning improviser has to get over. Beginners always try to hard to be clever, funny, or control the scene. Usually when this occurs nothing flows and the scene fails. The beginner hesitates, gets frustrated and can feel a bit stupid when they can't think of anything.

Here's the secret knowledge that helps you to go from bad to good in impro. Are you ready?

It's okay to screw up.

No really. That's it.

There are other helpful rules obviously ("Always say 'yes'", "Don't block an offer" etc) but improvisation is essentially about reaction and flow. Something happens, you react and move the scene forwards. Not much thinking is required. Sometimes thinking is actually the worst thing you can do. When something fails, it's okay. You keep moving on and learn from what you did. Often a screw up can end up making a scene even better.

If you're already involved in impro, I suggest these excellent articles on how improve your craft:

How to get Better at Improvising written by Heather Urquhart.

Fear is a 4 letter word, so is good. by Patti Stiles.

Most comedy performers are scared of making people laugh. by Steve Roe.

I actually highly recommend you put the kettle on and read the entire contents of all three of the blogs above, but this will be a good starting point.

Happy improvising.

Creativity and Mediocrity

2010-11-03T23:42:00.000-07:00

I realised the other day I hadn't turned on a television for 3 months. At some point my brain just decided it had had enough soft white fluffy carbs. Since then my productivity has soared and I am immensely happier.

There is a vast gap between what is comfortable and what should be strived for. I wonder how many people notice it.

Paul Arden summed it up best when he said "Why Strive For Excellence when Mediocrity is required?"

Why? Because right now we need anything but mediocrity. Arden understood it then, as most artists* understand it now: The last thing the world needs is more bridal reality television, cookie-cutter romantic comedies and magazine articles on who is slightly heavier than they were yesterday.

Of course, if we follow Arden's reasoning to completion, he also says it may be a bad thing if mediocrity didn't exist, because creatives need something to rebel against. While I agree with the sentiment, it seems that the mediocre is more common than the unique, purely because as soon as a new idea bursts through, suddenly everyone immediately has to make multicoloured copies of the same thing, and it's forced down into mediocrity once more.

The rapid growth of "Me too" is partly to blame. A desirable product, fashion or internet site catches on and everyone has to have it. Companies then take that unique idea and distort it, trying to make it their own, but still appealing to the original idea. I'm all for remixing ideas, but not at the expense of creativity.

Creativity is something that should be nutured, and yet it is slowly being educated out of children. They are taught that answers are to be learned by rote, and are given work merely to satisfy a curriculum, rather than teaching them to think for themselves and solve real world problems. Popular critics of this epidemic (Ken Robinson, Seth Godin and Chris Guillebeau to mention a few) all agree that in general the problem isn't the teachers. It's the system they have to work under.

The perception of "you won't get a job doing that" is huge. This means that many wonderful, intelligent people leave school depressed and insecure, all because their natural talents haven't been nurtured, or worse, ridiculed as being useless in the "real world".

If someone could talk to a class of teenagers and tell them that their passions are something they should follow, I wonder how many of them would listen. I wonder if it's too late. They've already been told that it's great to follow that dream of being a musician but have a back-up plan in accounting "just in case" (for those whose passion actually is accounting, I am honestly very happy for you).

A word on television: I'm not against it. On the contrary, it can be exceptionally entertaining and some great ideas are generated through it. I think I have a problem with watching it because it's just there. I still watch movies, TV series, and play games. I just prefer to watch them outside of television programming.

The point i'm trying to make is this: I'd love it if everyone finished the week feeling just as good about the week ahead as they do about their weekend. Too many people settle for less.

*By artist I mean anyone with creativity, be they painters, arborists or electricians

Ultrablast has finally arrived!

2010-05-21T13:23:00.000-07:00

After intense development and testing in the Retroflux labs, the old-school futuristic shooter Ultrablast is finally ready for play on the iPhone/iTouch. Classic shoot-em up action at it's best, with a hint of devilish strategy to keep you on your toes.

You can go direct to the iTunes store here to check Ultrablast out and buy for a tiny, tiny price: http://itunes.com/apps/retroflux/ultrablast

Ultrablast

2009-11-30T16:08:00.000-08:00

I've been helping out with some additional art and design on the upcoming Retroflux iPhone game Ultrablast:

Classic strategic shootery goodness at it's best!

Apologies

2009-09-19T04:32:00.001-07:00

Sorry for the lack of posts! I recently started a new job at Imagineer Systems, so have been hell-bent on absorbing information as quickly as possible! Regular updates will return shortly.

Mushroom God

2009-08-23T15:40:00.000-07:00

Fell out of my brain during the week. Still a bit muddy, but a little better than my usual guff.

Monday Monster - Does devil like ice cream?

2009-08-10T15:08:00.000-07:00

Wednesday sketch

2009-07-29T15:36:00.000-07:00

I'm regressing back to my cartoon days...

Monday Monster... on tuesday

2009-07-28T02:54:00.001-07:00

I'm going to experiment with getting a quick sketch out on every other weekday.

fxphd July 09 term overview

2009-07-26T18:26:00.000-07:00

A look over the awesome stuff fxphd has going on this term:

fxphd.com July09 Term Overview from fxphd.com on Vimeo.

5 Secs - Old Video Games

2009-07-05T18:37:00.000-07:00

5 Secs - Old Video Games from Martin Brennand on Vimeo.

A new 5 seconds challenge entry for the Gorilla.

Recent sketches

2009-06-01T14:22:00.000-07:00

Simple, rough sketches to play with light a bit. The outer two are studies from reference, the middle one just sort of happened (and ended up a bit... propotionally challenged). I'm a lot more comfortable now that i've got the wacom hooked up to the laptop. I think I relax a bit more when I can sketch on the couch!

Demo Reel 2009

2009-03-12T18:35:00.000-07:00

Demo Reel 2009 from Martin Brennand on Vimeo.

My new reel for the year. Kudos to Gotye for letting me use his track!

5 Seconds of Orange

2009-03-11T05:17:00.000-07:00

Martin: 5 Seconds of Orange from Martin Brennand on Vimeo.

Did this for Nick Campbel's open challenge. Small experiments with 5 seconds.

Lego Typography animation

2009-02-16T21:44:00.000-08:00

Was playing around with some Lego for a spot on Typography. I actually like the rough look of it, but I really need to get myself a proper SLR for stuff like this.

EDIT: Here's shooting setup if you're interested. Yeah... high tech! :P

Alphabet Sketches - A - Final 50

2009-02-14T05:38:00.000-08:00

The next 50 is done! Rough and sketchy, but done. Now onto B....

Interview with Yuko Shimizi

2009-01-23T04:31:00.001-08:00

A very inspring interview with illustrator Yuko Shimizi, for all those people who think it's "too late" for a career change!

http://illustrationfriday.com/blog/2008/03/20/if-interview-yuko-shimizu/

Alphabet Sketches - A - First 50

2009-01-13T18:53:00.000-08:00

I've been doing some quick sketch studies with a friend based on 100 items in a category we don't normally draw often. We're doing one category for each letter of the alphabet. "A" was for Automobiles, so here's the first batch on that journey. Fairly rough, but it's been interesting.

Creature 001

2008-12-10T05:10:00.000-08:00

This little guy came from a centre of frustration about work and life in general. He's my own personal baboon-monkey-monster-emotion.....thing.

Strange how he still looks cuddly.

Silhouette 4

2008-11-27T04:06:00.000-08:00

Looks like my imagination (left) wins against reference (right) once again.

Random from head sketchy

2008-10-22T06:22:00.000-07:00

Felt like drawing while listening to Stephen Fry's podgrams this evening. This individual turned up. I have to stop doing deadpan faces. :)

Silhouette and so on

2008-10-21T06:41:00.000-07:00

Playing with silhouette again. By playing I mean "Not actually intending to draw anything in particular". :)

Post-It 009

2008-09-21T00:41:00.001-07:00

Watching too much Ghibli this weekend!

----------------
Now playing: Carmen Agra Deedy - TEDTalks : Spinning a story of Mama - Carmen Agra Deedy (2005)
via FoxyTunes

Digi Post-It 008

2008-09-15T07:31:00.000-07:00

Still doing the rough ones. I'll find some time to sit down and do a more impressive study at some point. :)

Digital Post It 007

2008-09-14T07:05:00.000-07:00

Quicky for this evening. Not even sure why I post these doodles. Probably for my own morbid self-reflection later.

----------------
Now playing: 大島ミチル - Castle In The Mist
via FoxyTunes

Daily Digital Post-It.

2008-09-12T19:05:00.001-07:00

It probably won't be daily, but I've got the whim.

Oh the neglect!

2008-09-10T01:38:00.000-07:00

Couple of sketches over the last few days... i'm very out of practice! I've been playing with a looser "warm up" approach, which is far more relaxing that trying to get a great result. Of course that's no excuse for shoddy work. :)

Motionographer 2.0

2008-07-27T02:04:00.000-07:00

One of my favourites sites in the world just got a face lift:

http://motionographer.com/

Steph Laberis and the awesomeness

2008-06-29T08:33:00.000-07:00

Steph Laberis has her new artbook coming out soon, Don't Flash the Octopus!

If you like crazy-cool art with a pleasantly cute flair, check out the work on her blog. You can't stop smiling when looking at it. :)

Treelike

2008-06-29T06:38:00.000-07:00

Quick forest sketch for today.

Cavernous

2008-06-29T04:59:00.000-07:00

A cavern I really should have spent 3 times as long on.. but I learned a few things on the way, so that's encouraging!

Graphics Exchange

2008-05-27T17:17:00.000-07:00

Fabien Barral has one of the most inspiring sites for design I have ever experienced:
http://www.graphic-exchange.com/home.html

A designer himself, he collects and exchanges inspirational print and digital media with other designers, then presents them to the public, along with his own design discoveries.

A stickler for good site design as well, he purposely has no RSS feed. Now that's old school.

Interview with Andrew Gordon of Pixar Animation Studios

2008-04-29T16:46:00.000-07:00

Let's get one thing clear: Andrew Gordon is awesome.
I had the chance to chat with him recently on animation, life, spline doctors and the future.

Read the article here:
http://features.cgsociety.org/story_custom.php?story_id=4500&referer=cgnews

Arguement to Beethoven's 5th

2008-04-16T06:19:00.000-07:00

Perfect:

(via Dark Roasted Blend)

A sad day

2008-04-15T06:32:00.000-07:00

Ollie Johnston passed away today. Take a moment to consider how awesome he was.

2008-04-07T03:55:00.000-07:00

Tram sketches... I never do enough.

That is all. :)

Breif respite = studiess

2008-03-16T04:41:00.001-07:00

I've been really busy recently so i've had very little chance to do anything artwise. Here's a few quick silhouettes I drew from the brain to get my mind relaxing again.

Happy days are here again

2008-03-08T03:55:00.000-08:00

Here's a still from a teeny short i'm working on. No point to it other than blatant "Let's cheer people up with something colourful and cute" sort of thing. I figure there needs to be more of that in the world recently...

Director 11 - Finally announced

2008-02-19T06:07:00.000-08:00

The press release is finally here.

As expected, the 3d doesn't look like it's going to get much of a boost, apart from the inclusion of the Ageia™ PhysX™ physics engine and some dx9 compatibility.

Still, since this is the first Adobe release of the product, perhaps we shall see more regular updates in future. We already know a version 12 (and possibly 13) is in the works from last years Chicago conference.

It's not quite dead to me, as i'll reserve judgment for when I see it actually running, but hopefully this release will give Director the boost it needs to become a decent product once again.

Give that Mocha some sugar!

2008-02-17T07:01:00.000-08:00

Well hot darn it, if sometimes software surprises me. I recently got into the Imagineer suite of tools via fxPhd, slightly skeptical of their planar tracking methodology. I was pleasantly, if not abundantly blown away by the power and speed of the apps. So much so that I purchased the After Effects version of Mocha right away.

The ease of use is abundant. It makes you want to fall to your knees holding your 4-point pixel tracker in the rain and cry.

Well, maybe that's overdoing it a bit. At any rate, well done Imagineer!

Quick thumb

2008-02-11T21:05:00.001-08:00

Waiting for render + ref = thumb.

Another quick landscape

2008-02-11T17:21:00.000-08:00

While I was on hold, I knocked about with this study.

Speedy landscape

2008-01-31T20:10:00.000-08:00

I really have to do more landscape studies... doing them from my head always ends up being "hilly thing with mountains and a river".

Moving right along....

Colour Study progress

2008-01-30T18:22:00.001-08:00

I've been a bit quiet on the art front while setting up a new pc and ISP, so here's a study i've been hacking away at during lunches. Still a lot to do (check out those edges! Bleh!), but it's progressing.

Gorilla Artfare - Spread the love

2008-01-28T15:21:00.001-08:00

Gorilla artfare is a collaborative blog for some of the best concept artists out there. Subscribe now and love it forever. Although i'm a member, I don't have the stones quite yet to post my meagre art amongst the awesomeness. :)

More Director Mumblings

2008-01-23T16:32:00.000-08:00

Raman Pfaff over at Director@Night has just posted an interesting update in the Director world.

It seems Director may just be around the corner with the new Shockwaves blog starting up and a possible renewing of the Director Podcast.

Perhaps I should stop being so cynical about it. :)

Director 11- The invisible carrot

2008-01-22T15:42:00.001-08:00

You may recall my Director 11 post recently where I said the release date was pushed back again and again. Well guess what?

Adobe has not published an official time frame for the next release of Director and generally does not disclose details of new releases more than 30 days before a product is expected to ship. However, our current planning assumption is that the next major release of Director will be announced in February 2008.

(from Director FAQs)

I guess they're going to happily tell us every month it's the next month until we get too tired to care any more. Perhaps if they actually were giving us something worthwhile in the new release we'd actually kick up more of a fuss.

Flow with the go, Gridiron style.

2008-01-16T14:17:00.001-08:00

If you've ever worked in a reasonably sized media company (games, film, broadcast etc), you're bound to have run into the nightmare that is asset management. It's tedious, it's restrictive and it's up there as the least fun thing you can do at work short of documentation.

So when a company says it's going to make that go away, you can't help but get giddy.

Gridiron software say that Flow will make designers and artists happier than Cinderella before midnight (i'm paraphrasing of course). Even John Nack, the forefront of Adobe bloggers, is getting more than a little excited by the concept.

Read the links and feel a little joy warm the cockles of your heart. Although why a bunch of burrowing molluscs reside in your heart is beyond me.

Happy New something something

2008-01-15T14:01:00.000-08:00

I'm not one for new year resolutions... I tend to start them a few weeks before. Why wait for new year when you can do it right now?

Anyhoo... Another fxPhd term is upon us, I highly recommend you go check them out, and if you DO enroll, kindly plug my username "Erilaz" into the referral box. I'd love an extra class or two. :D

I haven't had home internet for over a month now and it's killing me. Hopefully you'll see more posts when it's finally resolved.

Have I mentioned the internet in Australia sucks? Well it does.

Adobe Director 11 is still waiting in the wings

2007-12-17T18:35:00.000-08:00

It's not like I'm surprised, but the release of Adobe Director has been pushed back yet again:

Adobe has not published an official time frame for the next release of Director and generally does not disclose details of new releases more than 30 days before a product is expected to ship. However, our current planning assumption is that the next major release of Director will be announced in January 2008.

(from Director FAQs)

From the recent Adobe Max videos, it doesn't look much chop anyway. Since Adobe has been so focused on Flash, AIR and all the other funky development tools, Director is looking very lackluster at this stage.

Meanwhile...

2007-12-10T14:14:00.000-08:00

Just a brief interlude to say I love this desk.

That is all. :)

2007-12-04T18:35:00.000-08:00

This here's a quick atmospheric perspective study I did while procrastinating. Hey, at least i'm doing something! :D

Craig Mullins where art thou?

2007-12-03T18:35:00.000-08:00

I've been regularly checking out Mr. Mullins site for over a year now, but no new art has presented itself in that time. Has anyone seen where he's at?

Last Man Standing 3

2007-11-11T23:07:00.000-08:00

It is SO on!

If you've been living under a large rock, you may not be aware of the Last Man Standing, an awesome tiered head-to-head art competition. Get into it.
I'm glad I checked out Min's site today, or I might have missed registration!

The reward? The pure adrenalin of seeing the best of the best slam each other with amazing concept art. This is what all competitions should be like. I will be creamed early on, if not in the first round, but gosh darn it it's worth it for the rush. :D

Spicy!

2007-11-10T06:02:00.000-08:00

This awesome pipe/tube/thing was sitting out the front of my work this week. It immediately brought to mind giant space worms. I love it when art presents itself to you by accident... unless some crafty builder was reading Dune at the time or something. Either way, it made my morning.

Blank and it's scary addendum

2007-11-07T15:42:00.000-08:00

Following on from what I said yesterday, my good friend Rebecca Kimmel also pointed out one of the easiest ways to get past blank page fear is to get someone else to tell you to stop being such a big wuss!

Well, what she actually said was take a life-drawing class (or similar), but I agree with the sentiment all the same. :)

It's blank and it's scary

2007-11-06T19:14:00.000-08:00

I'm going to talk about something everyone has experienced from time to time: Blank page fear.

Some people call it "new sketchbook fear", "white canvas fear", "empty notepad fear", but it all boils down to the same thing: A fresh clean space is looming before us and we don't want to mar the surface.

I experience this about once every couple of months when I buy a new Moleskine sketchbook. These books are so well made and so pretty that opening the cover and putting pencil to the first page is something of a fearful moment. Why? Because I don't want to ruin that page with some horrible doodle or half-baked idea.

Therein lies the problem. Many artists, be it designers, writers, illustrators, painters, 3d modellers, musicians and so forth are paralysed by the notion of failure: The all powerful mistake.

From the outset this is ludicrous. I buy the sketchbook for the very purpose of filling it with mistakes. I'll repeat that: I buy sketchbooks for the very purpose of filling them with mistakes!

Some smart cookie once said we learn from our mistakes. Another more well known one said “Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”. So why do we still fear failure if our mistakes are what make us better?

Sir Ken Robinson has a theory and I tend to agree with it (watch the talk, it's amazing). Our culture has developed into an industrial mindset of failure being the worst possible thing you can do. Education can kill creativity by instilling the notion that mistakes are useless and should be avoided at all costs.

So how do we get past this? Fear ultimately does one of two things: It drives us or it halts us in our tracks. Let's look at that in the light of the sketchbook example. I can either draw something or not. Not doing anything leaves a blank page and i've learned nothing. Doing anything at all means i've done something either good, which I can be proud of, or horrendous, which I can learn from.

Digital art programs and writing applications means we almost have no excuse for not at least trying. I've halted many times in Photoshop with a slate of blank pixels and then thought "It doesn't really matter what I do since I can always try again or paint over it."

Trial and error should be the norm of creativity. Why let little things like mistakes get in the way of your creations?

2007-10-09T20:03:00.000-07:00

Saw this one on the work fridge today. This will either be showing once again my ignorance or absorption of kerning, so get your pitchforks and marshmallows on standby!

Is it just me, or does the text here seem cramped and icky?

I had a quick hack (ie. chop and move), and here's what I thought felt a bit better:

A bit more breathing room seemed to help. Am I wrong? Enlighten me! :)

Animation Mentor Autumn Reel

2007-10-08T20:05:00.000-07:00

www.AnimationMentor.com have just posted their autumn student reel:
http://www.animationmentor.com/quicktime/fallshowcase/index.htm

Hot DAMN they do great work.

Maxscript challenge 18

2007-10-01T06:52:00.000-07:00

I've posted up the new MAXscript challenge over at CG Society.

If you're unaware, I started the MAXscript challenge a little over 2 years ago to help new users get comfortable with coding for actual projects, and for intermediate to advanced scripters to give themselves a chance to experiment with new ideas.

I'm always looking for feedback on the challenges and how they're run, so if you have ideas and comments, feel free to post them here.

Scary...

2007-09-30T06:41:00.000-07:00

It's October already and I feel like I only started the year a few weeks back. I'm just passing through to say if you haven't looked at http://www.motionographer.com recently go check it out. Still one of my favourite resources for inspiration in motion graphics and animation.

(Note that although the post is DATED the 30th of September it is in fact October the 1st. Australia is from the future!)

Cute vandalism!

2007-09-27T05:27:00.000-07:00

I found this little guy on the side of a house while walking to the gym this evening. I love it when graffiti is simple, stylish and cute. :)
It's so great to see artwork in public spaces that delight rather than make you cringe. I'm not sure the owner of the house would be happy about it, but at least it wasn't some kind of lame-ass tag.

Unsung heroes of art - Rebecca Kimmel

2007-09-23T18:23:00.000-07:00

Although some may call it nepotism, I have to point out the amazing and tireless efforts of one Rebecca Kimmel. Not only was she a catalyst in my own art development, she has relentlessly pursued the improvement of drawing in hundreds, if not thousands of people. This has been achieved in no small part by her massive contribution to the CG Society forums, online workshops and the start of her own figurative art site.

Unsurprisingly, Rebecca now also teaches live classes in Los Angeles. I don't know where she gets all the energy!

If you've ever wanted to learn figurative drawing or need a touch up in areas you feel you are lacking, she's your gal, whether online or in person.

Typography: A world of it's own

2007-09-22T20:28:00.000-07:00

I recently got drawn into the wonderful and strange world of typography, of which I am completely inexperienced and in awe of. As such, from time to time i'll try and post some of my study in the area. For example, which looks better?

This:

Or this?:

The difference is subtle, but the first image is a sign I shot on the street this morning, and the second is with the kerning adjusted on the "FE" pair. Now, being no expert on the subject, I may have it horribly wrong, but now that I am noticing type everywhere, this popped up immediately in my "looks a bit wrong" alarm centre.

Feel free to educate me. :)

2007-07-05T19:34:00.002-07:00

First post! woot.