It has been almost three years now running on my current web site design. Sure I've changed elements here and there, mostly due to changing underlying software, yet it is starting to feel a bit old to me. The problem to me is where to start. Is it color? Is it it form?
Well, as of today my GeoCities site of the last 12 years is no more. I’m a bit saddened as it has been a place of comfort, seeing me through different ISP’s and such. It is because of GeoCities that I use Yahoo! mail, even if Yahoo! then turned around and removed the best features of GeoCities. I still feel that GeoCities was killed many years ago by Yahoo! and that it was only kept around due to its legacy. I’m not surprised by its shuttering in these times of Web 2.0 and the emergence of the Social Internet site.
Yahoo! will be shutting down Geocities tomorrow, 10/26/09, which means an end to my old LEGO and ZX81 website. Although I hadn’t updated those sites much since Yahoo! turned off ftp access, Geocities had remained my presence on the web for almost 12 years. Sad to say, it will be sad to see it go.
I was playing around with World Machine and thought I’d add the height field to my Power Station image. I think it really conveys the overall scale of the scene. I also added a better star field that shows up under anti-aliasing (best seen in large version). Note that the image has been color corrected and converted to JPEG using Picasa.
I had read a bit about the new iTunes 9’s home feature. Unfortunately, trying to use it is a different matter. First off, using it requires you to log into your iTunes account. I’m assuming this is so you can transfer your old non-iTunes plus DRM laden music.
Well, seems a few resourceful folks are still getting by my spam filter. Not sure if they are real people solving the Captcha or something automated. My guess is that it is real people. I'm seeing only a couple of posts on random articles causing me to go hunt down and delete the offending stuff.
I’ve finished rendering 21005 Fallingwater in POV-Ray. Only 3 new bricks needed to be modeled so most of the time was spent inputing brick positions. I like this angle as it really shows off the waterfall.
I don’t normally post “work in progress” but this one is pretty large and I wanted to show off what I had so far. It may not look like much yet, but I’ve finished my favorite part of the 21005 Fallingwater model: the waterfall.
LEGO has launched a new Architecture line and I have to note that they are pretty impressive. So impressive, that I spent some time on vacation modeling the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in POV-ray.
Well, seems my vacation has run into a tiny bit of a wet spree? While where I left roasts in 100+ degree weather, I’m enjoying a balmy high 60ish rainy day. I can take comfort in knowing that at least I’m not at work.
Well, it is summer and the family decided to “take it on the road” so to speak. Our day started late as I still had to work, but we were able to get on the road around 1PM. I thought I’d snap a picture while driving through Utah and share it with everyone.
Ran across some interesting images built using Structure Synth and rendered in POV-Ray. Thought it’d be cool to try some myself. I was playing some of the demo scenes, exporting them to POV-Ray for a high quality render. The image looked like hair and made me think LEGO minifig! I’ll definitely need to try some other stuff.
Needless to say, one of the many reasons I started Reid’s For Fun was because of Yahoo!’s neutering of GeoCities: removal of ftp and a paltry 4.2MB hourly limit. It was, however, my friend in the hey day of Internet growth and I am saddened at its (un)timely demise.
Seems my lizard has been covered by some minor growth. I ran across this great ivy macro by hobBIT while hanging around the pov-ray.org forums and had to give it a try.
Between blogging about digital TV (it’s all over) and playing Halo 2 (finished campaign on legendary) I’ve been working on a new dynamic userbar. This time, I’m generating a weather userbar showing the current conditions and temperature.
Well, less than a day left and the old NTSC-M broadcast signal will almost be gone. I say almost because a few low power stations can still broadcast and I’m sure a few places will get by. But, by and large, it’s all over for our old analog receivers.
Well, two days left and I’m good to go for the digital TV conversion.
Okay, Safari 4 is out, showed up in my update today. I was a bit surprised as I thought I already had 4 installed, but it didn’t take more than a quick peek at my existing Safari to realize it was the non-beta version. Like a kid opening a present, I quickly cut out of what I was doing and hit the Install button. A short time later, I was ready to load the latest experience. That was when disappointment set in.
I’m still playing around with recreating old LEGO models. I spent time today modeling more road plates with the intention of creating a large town image. Unfortunately, after finishing the road plates, I got side tracked on completing the old space crater plate that for me, at the time, was a gray baseplate.
I have radiosity fever of late, converting or creating a number of new LEGO images utilizing POV-Ray 3.7 beta. Below are two new renders.
This is a “sort-of” recreation of the original cow image with the “Moo!” bubble. Unlike the original, this is a true brick cow and I’ve tried to make it more “realistic” then the original “flat” and shiny version. I had added the bubble with Paint Shop Pro on the first version. This time, I’m using CSG to do the same thing all in POV-Ray. Enjoy!
I ran across some interesting Iterative Imaging Code that creates interesting fractal like graphics using POV-Ray. Basically, it creates the image and then uses that image to create the next one.
Ran across this really interesting LEGO set and I just “had” to render it. I needed to model a few parts I didn’t have in my library. I also threw it into the same background I used on one of my Fire Truck renders. I might change the scene a bit to better show the texture on the front slope. In all not bad for a first render.
Spent some time last weekend doing some additional renders using the latest 3.7 beta.
I ran across this wonderful little macro by Jaime Vives Piquere to do Pseudo-HDRI lighting. I ran the macro with both POV-Ray 3.6 and 3.7 beta 31. I actually liked the 3.7 better. However, the image map I used is a bit lower resolution then I would like causing the pixilation in the background.