These Ten Rules for Web Startups seem reasonable enough, although I have to admit that I've violated some of them. The most egregious would have to be the #1 rule "Be Narrow," which advocates specialization. At my own startup (Transparent Media) I've done everything from small web sites to educational software, utilities, web applications, and short animated films. The only thing tying them all together is that they're things I'm interested in and can do with some level of facility. I'm sure a consultant (not to mention the writer of the rules) would tell me to pick an area and stick with it (oh, and while I'm at it get rid of the commas and "and" in the web site tagline that give away the distinct lack of focus), but absent that I'll keep bouncing around from project to project. After all variety is the spice of life, right? Even if it doesn't get you fame and fortune.
As I've noted before, I don't have access to a render farm along the lines of what Pixar or Weta use. However, I do have a handful of computers that are capable of rendering at a reasonable speed. I've looked at some of the options available to me for managing rendering jobs, but they all either cost money or require enough configuration work that I haven't been terribly enthusiastic about taking them on. So-- I spent a good part of the last couple days working on a small application I'm calling "Render Garden," that will store information about the scenes I need to render (file name, frames, output name, etc.), and ultimately either generate or run the render commands, or split up the render jobs to be run on whatever number of computers I have available to do the job. It's probably going to be more manual labor than what an ideal system would entail, but overall I'm pleased with the app. When it's done I'll probably post it on the Transparent Media site.
Juan Cole looks at stories circulating that Bush wanted to target Al-Jazeera. This is one of those things I don't want to believe.
I've been sitting on these for over a week, and meant to say something pithy, but really it just boils down to "I've read some of the stuff on these lists, and might oughta want to check out the rest."
How to Get Your Girl to Read Comics (This doesn't sound like a list, but she suggests a number of comics to weasel into your honey-bunny's hands.)
Salon.com Life | Broadsheet: "Isn't the point of a good boob job to look 'real'?"
One of the key bits in the new film is going to be the transformation of one robot into a number of different roles. I'm still working out the details of how this is going to work, but one of the key pieces in showing the viewer what role the robot is taking on will be the transformation of his headgear. This line-up shows the hats for the roles I'm anticipating the protagonist will have at one point or another.
The fun thing about this particular collection of hats is that they're all based on the same original model (the lower-left derby to be precise). That means I can morph between any of the chapeaux shown here at will. It may even be possible to generate new variations based on combinations of these, but I haven't tested that and would really only consider that a bonus feature.
Well, that didn't work very well. Just tried upgrading Movable Type, and instead of getting new features I ended up with a blog that wouldn't add new entries without a bunch of hand-holding. I don't want to mess with figuring the damn thing out right now, so I guess I'll stick with the old version for now...
So there are more reports of Dubya coming apart at the seams. Kevin Drum has a good summary of the history of these reports, and some are already expressing alarm at the thought of the man with his finger on the button being under the influence. I was talking with my wife last night, and she also expressed concern.
Me, I'm thrilled at the prospect of Bush falling of the wagon, or holing up with his mother-figures in a snug little maternal cocoon somewhere in the corner of the White House. Normally we only get to hear about batshit-crazy leaders in history books, Shakespeare, or bad Sci-Fi shows. I love that we might actually get to live through a period where our own Dear Leader joins the likes of one of the many in-bred monarchs of old in going off the deep end.
I suppose I should feel bad for the man, but I have to say that I can't find it in me. Someone who's gone blithely through life trashing one business after another, finally doing his number on the U.S., who's responsible for the deaths of thousands at home and abroad, and who doesn't care enough about the lives of others to return from vacation or even stay up past beddy-bye time to focus on the issues at hand is frankly not worthy of sympathy. I hope that it's finally sinking in just how big a screw-up he is, and if the only way he can deal with it is to be bottle-fed bourbon by his surrogate mommies, then so be it. Just let me know when the movie version comes out.
This goes in the category of things I would like to pursue, but probably never will. I've got about a dozen songs done in GarageBand, and I'm sure a couple would be suitably danceable, but I doubt I'll ever get around to doing the work to import them into the game.
Isn't this a bit like referring to rape as an "enhanced seduction technique"?
Time for another progress update. I'm currently deep in the process of building rough versions of all the "stuff" that I'll need for the film. This includes the main characters, a minimum number of props to rough things out, and the sets. If I was smart, I would have scripted no more than two or three sets, but instead I've got closer to a dozen. The folks at Pixar have noted that everything in their films is lovingly hand-crafted by computer, and that applies to this as well. This image shows just a random smattering of test renders for models that I've been working on so far.
I had hoped that I was close to the point where I could start on a rough animatic, but it just dawned on me that with everything shaded the default 50% grey it's going to be pretty tough to see what's going on. So...it looks like before I can start making things move I need to go back and apply some simple textures to these things so that I can see what's what in the rendered output. Oh, well. Gives me something to do while we watch "Gilmore Girls."
In between keeping up with clients today, Chandra & I took a walk to the nearby music store to indulge my urge to play with some new guitars. I've been saving for a while and am toying with an upgrade. Thankfully the salespeople were off somewhere else, so we were left alone in a room full of guitars to pluck and prod. After removing the "Please ask for assistance" tags, I tried number of Ovations, a couple L'arrivees, a couple Takamines, a godawful sounding Dean resonator (stay far away!), and ultimately discovered two really nice-sounding Taylors. Unfortunately, these instruments did not have price tags on them, so we had to ask a sales guy to look them up for us. Even more unfortunately, the guitars I liked the best were also 30th anniversary special editions, and were $2700 and $2800 respectively. So I apparently have an expensive ear. Needless to say, I did not walk out of the store with either instrument.
Sigh.
"We do not torture." (Via The Washington Monthly.)
Now there's been a lot of talk recently about whether and when Bush and his cronies tell the truth, but come on-- we all know this is a lie. Every time I see or hear him speak I get the sensation of forks jabbing at my head and melon-ballers trying to scoop out my eyes in disgust. I'm not alone, either. If that's not torture, I don't know what is.
A look at the tradition of realism in American diplomacy. It resists easy excerpting, but it's worth a read
StrangeBanana: Computer-generated webpage design
This is a trip-- a series of comic strips from the 30s featuring a suicidal Mickey Mouse.
