I woke up this morning and spent some time trying to decide what I was going to today.
While I was deciding I sat down and watched some TV and found that this period of inactivity had carried me to noon, at which point I decided that I had to do something.
Of the options available to me, taking a nap was the most attractive, so it was back to bed for about an hour, until the stupid yappy dog across the street – the temperature was relatively low and there was a nice breeze, so I had the window open – and some kid pointlessly bouncing a basketball in one place over and over again made napping impossible.
As soon as I got up my mom called. After talking to her for less than a half an hour, the battery on my phone started to die. That battery has been proving less and less capable of holding a charge lately, and the display on the other phone is kind of messed up, so this inspired me to go out into the world and buy some new phones.
Additionally I stopped at Home Depot to get some weed killer, as it’s weeds and not grass that are making the backyard look like an overgrown mess, and some kind of heavy-duty insecticide, as it’s pretty much impossible to take a step in any direction on my patio without walking through a spider web.
If there are two surfaces available, a spider will run a line connecting them. As nothing else I’ve tried seems to have any effect, I decided I needed something potent.
I made a half-hearted attempt at trying to find a new latch for my fence, but I couldn’t find any, and wasn’t interested enough in buying one to ask for assistance.
From there I went to Target, where I stood looking at the phones and silently cursing.
I wanted to get a dual handset cordless phone, which you might think would be simple enough.
It wasn’t as simple as it should have been, as all I could find were systems that came with three handsets, which is one more than I need. Still, I was willing to go that route, except that every set I looked at also came with a built-in digital answering machine, which I really don’t need, so I couldn’t see my way clear to pay the extra money for a superfluous handset and a superfluous answering machine.
As I was about to give up and head to Best Buy to look at their selection, I finally noticed a reasonably priced dual handset unit.
Somewhat ironically, I discovered when I got home from phone shopping that I’d gotten a phone call.
It was Kevin, returning a call I’d made last night after getting a message from him on Facebook saying that I should give him a call when I had a chance. As I had a chance after reading said message, I decided to do just that, but got his voicemail.
Naturally, because that’s how The Universe works, he returned my call during the brief period in which I wasn’t home today, and of course when I called him back I got his voicemail again.
Ah well.
After leaving a message, I set to the task of increasing the overall toxicity of my backyard and patio.
I followed that up with some time spent doing nothing in particular, and then sat down to write this. I honestly have no recollection of what I did between the yard spraying and writing this. Maybe I just zoned out.
Actually, I think I did some random Web surfing, and I seem to recall that I finally got around to actually eating something beyond the yogurt and Fig Newtons I had this morning.
But really, how can I be expected to keep up with all of the exciting moments of my day when it’s such a whirlwind of activity?
Saturday, August 09, 2008
Friday, August 08, 2008
Cashed In, Inspected, Changed, And...Now What?
I woke up this morning sometime after 9 and thought about just staying in bed a while longer, but then I thought, “You’ve got plenty of time off; you can just take a nap if you want to after you get up and do stuff.”
This argument made sense to me, so I got out of bed, did some sitting around doing nothing in particular, then showered, dressed, and headed out into the world.
My first order of business was to go to the bank to cash in my change. I think this is the first time I’ve ever cashed in my change just to satisfy my curiosity rather than because I actually needed the money. Still, my urn full of change was, well, full of change, so, seeing as how (also for the first time ever) it was almost full to overflowing, I was curious to see how much that amounted to.
For the curious among you, and particularly any of you who have actually seen my urn full of change, the total was $222.12, not counting the handful of coins that the counter rejected.
After that I drove past a place in Leesburg that does state inspections, but the line was far too long, so I headed over to Wal-Mart to at least get the oil change done. My reasoning was that I have the remainder of the month to get the inspection done, but the oil change was way, way, WAY overdue.
As noted in the previous entry, I wasn’t able to get it done there, so I headed out find another place. I knew that the Shopper’s plaza in Ashburn has a place that does oil changes and inspections, so I headed there, but noticed a Goodyear place along the way that didn’t look too busy, so I stopped there.
The inspection and oil change took under an hour, and no major problems were found. If I’d gone to the dealership, I guarantee they would have found something that “needed” to be repaired or replaced. At Goodyear the total cost was under $100, and that’s with the full synthetic package that allows me to go 10,000 miles or 10 months without an oil change, which, given my propensity for going long stretches of time between oil changes, is ideal. So my next scheduled oil change isn’t until June of next year. With the low mileage I put on the car – I’ve had it for more than five and a half years and am still under 40,000 miles – I could probably get away with going a full year and waiting until inspection time again.
Even if it had been more expensive than that it would have been worth it because of the time I saved, as I’m sure that at the dealership I would have been without my car for a couple of days…and ended up owing like a grand or something.
I hadn’t done any shopping at Wal-Mart, but I did get myself some blunch at the McDonald’s inside the store. My Big Mac was on some kind of retarded bun that fell completely apart in my hands. I thought about complaining, but decided it wasn’t worth it. Maybe I should have called 911.
On my way home I got stuck behind a slow-moving wrecker that, like Visa, was everywhere I wanted to be, but as I was following it down to my street, I decided that I actually wanted it to take the turn and head towards my house.
Why? Well, sometime Wednesday night some woman parked her car in front of my house – badly; she’s at least two feet away from the curb – and the car hasn’t moved since. I don’t know if she even lives on my street, but even if she does, she has no business parking in one of my spaces. And again, it’s not the point that I don’t actually need the additional spaces; they’re my parking spaces.
So I was hoping that the wrecker was coming to haul her car away, but alas, such was not the case.
Now, I could, and probably should, call to complain about this – after all, every house on the street recently got a flyer from the HOA specifically saying “Don’t park in front of someone else’s house” – but the thing is, I don’t actually have the required sticker on my car.
When I first moved in, I called the number for getting a sticker, but I had to first get my registration changed to reflect my current address. When I called back after doing that, I got an answering machine and left a message, but never heard back, and then I forgot about it.
The person I originally talked to had taken my information, though, and said that he’s the one who makes the decision about whether or not cars get towed, and didn’t seem overly concerned about the potential loss of $1 of revenue if I didn’t get a sticker.
I suppose I could call and get the sticker, and then complain about the other car.
We’ll see.
Monday Verizon is coming out to hook me up with a CableCARD for my digital TV tuner, so I’ll be able to watch and record TV on my computer, and, more importantly, HD TV.
Now that the biggest tasks have been accomplished, I’m not sure what else to do with my time off. I mean, I have things that I could do, but the question of what, if any, of those things I will do arises.
I suppose I could do some yard work, but…meh. The backyard is pretty overgrown, but the front and side look fine. I’ve been thinking about buying a new latch for my fence door, but the stickiness of the current latch is really only an issue on Mondays when I get home from work and have to bring my empty trash can back behind the house.
Still, it wouldn’t cost much in terms of time or money.
Then again, not doing it is easier.
Decisions, decisions…
This argument made sense to me, so I got out of bed, did some sitting around doing nothing in particular, then showered, dressed, and headed out into the world.
My first order of business was to go to the bank to cash in my change. I think this is the first time I’ve ever cashed in my change just to satisfy my curiosity rather than because I actually needed the money. Still, my urn full of change was, well, full of change, so, seeing as how (also for the first time ever) it was almost full to overflowing, I was curious to see how much that amounted to.
For the curious among you, and particularly any of you who have actually seen my urn full of change, the total was $222.12, not counting the handful of coins that the counter rejected.
After that I drove past a place in Leesburg that does state inspections, but the line was far too long, so I headed over to Wal-Mart to at least get the oil change done. My reasoning was that I have the remainder of the month to get the inspection done, but the oil change was way, way, WAY overdue.
As noted in the previous entry, I wasn’t able to get it done there, so I headed out find another place. I knew that the Shopper’s plaza in Ashburn has a place that does oil changes and inspections, so I headed there, but noticed a Goodyear place along the way that didn’t look too busy, so I stopped there.
The inspection and oil change took under an hour, and no major problems were found. If I’d gone to the dealership, I guarantee they would have found something that “needed” to be repaired or replaced. At Goodyear the total cost was under $100, and that’s with the full synthetic package that allows me to go 10,000 miles or 10 months without an oil change, which, given my propensity for going long stretches of time between oil changes, is ideal. So my next scheduled oil change isn’t until June of next year. With the low mileage I put on the car – I’ve had it for more than five and a half years and am still under 40,000 miles – I could probably get away with going a full year and waiting until inspection time again.
Even if it had been more expensive than that it would have been worth it because of the time I saved, as I’m sure that at the dealership I would have been without my car for a couple of days…and ended up owing like a grand or something.
I hadn’t done any shopping at Wal-Mart, but I did get myself some blunch at the McDonald’s inside the store. My Big Mac was on some kind of retarded bun that fell completely apart in my hands. I thought about complaining, but decided it wasn’t worth it. Maybe I should have called 911.
On my way home I got stuck behind a slow-moving wrecker that, like Visa, was everywhere I wanted to be, but as I was following it down to my street, I decided that I actually wanted it to take the turn and head towards my house.
Why? Well, sometime Wednesday night some woman parked her car in front of my house – badly; she’s at least two feet away from the curb – and the car hasn’t moved since. I don’t know if she even lives on my street, but even if she does, she has no business parking in one of my spaces. And again, it’s not the point that I don’t actually need the additional spaces; they’re my parking spaces.
So I was hoping that the wrecker was coming to haul her car away, but alas, such was not the case.
Now, I could, and probably should, call to complain about this – after all, every house on the street recently got a flyer from the HOA specifically saying “Don’t park in front of someone else’s house” – but the thing is, I don’t actually have the required sticker on my car.
When I first moved in, I called the number for getting a sticker, but I had to first get my registration changed to reflect my current address. When I called back after doing that, I got an answering machine and left a message, but never heard back, and then I forgot about it.
The person I originally talked to had taken my information, though, and said that he’s the one who makes the decision about whether or not cars get towed, and didn’t seem overly concerned about the potential loss of $1 of revenue if I didn’t get a sticker.
I suppose I could call and get the sticker, and then complain about the other car.
We’ll see.
Monday Verizon is coming out to hook me up with a CableCARD for my digital TV tuner, so I’ll be able to watch and record TV on my computer, and, more importantly, HD TV.
Now that the biggest tasks have been accomplished, I’m not sure what else to do with my time off. I mean, I have things that I could do, but the question of what, if any, of those things I will do arises.
I suppose I could do some yard work, but…meh. The backyard is pretty overgrown, but the front and side look fine. I’ve been thinking about buying a new latch for my fence door, but the stickiness of the current latch is really only an issue on Mondays when I get home from work and have to bring my empty trash can back behind the house.
Still, it wouldn’t cost much in terms of time or money.
Then again, not doing it is easier.
Decisions, decisions…
The Universe Never Forgets
"Hey Jon, it's me, The Universe."
"Hey."
"So, at Wal-Mart, huh?"
"Yeah, all the places that do state inspections have huge lines, so I figured I'd at least get the oil change done at their 'Tire and Lube Express,' but they said I'd have to wait two hours."
"Two hours? When does the 'Express' part come into play?"
"That's what I said."
"Really?"
"Well, no, but that's what I thought."
"Oh. Hey, remember when you were at IHOP and a Whitney Houston song came on and you were grateful that at least it wasn't the song from The Bodyguard?"
"...yeah?"
"Listen!"
"Oh, dammit!"
"Suck it! Did you think I'd forget?"
"*Sigh* No, I knew you wouldn't."
"Hey."
"So, at Wal-Mart, huh?"
"Yeah, all the places that do state inspections have huge lines, so I figured I'd at least get the oil change done at their 'Tire and Lube Express,' but they said I'd have to wait two hours."
"Two hours? When does the 'Express' part come into play?"
"That's what I said."
"Really?"
"Well, no, but that's what I thought."
"Oh. Hey, remember when you were at IHOP and a Whitney Houston song came on and you were grateful that at least it wasn't the song from The Bodyguard?"
"...yeah?"
"Listen!"
"Oh, dammit!"
"Suck it! Did you think I'd forget?"
"*Sigh* No, I knew you wouldn't."
Thursday, August 07, 2008
Not Today
It was payday today, which means that I got to experience all the thrills and chills of paying the bills. Hey, that rhymed! I guess it really was exciting.
(It so wasn’t.)
What was exciting, though, was leaving work and realizing that I don’t have to be back until Tuesday. Yeah! Whoo! Party!
Or, you know, get an oil change and state inspection and spend the rest of the time not doing much of anything in particular.
Either way.
On the way home I stopped at the comic shop to pick up yesterday’s comics, then stopped at Target to pick up a couple of things and something to have for dinner.
When I got home, though, I decided that I didn’t really want what I’d bought for dinner and ended up eating some waffles.
I ate said waffles while finally getting around to watching Tuesday night’s episode of Eureka.
After that it was time to do the aforementioned bill paying.
One of these days I’ll write a substantial entry that will actually have some value beyond simply reporting the extraordinarily boring minutiae of my mundane existence.
Today isn’t going to be that day.
(It so wasn’t.)
What was exciting, though, was leaving work and realizing that I don’t have to be back until Tuesday. Yeah! Whoo! Party!
Or, you know, get an oil change and state inspection and spend the rest of the time not doing much of anything in particular.
Either way.
On the way home I stopped at the comic shop to pick up yesterday’s comics, then stopped at Target to pick up a couple of things and something to have for dinner.
When I got home, though, I decided that I didn’t really want what I’d bought for dinner and ended up eating some waffles.
I ate said waffles while finally getting around to watching Tuesday night’s episode of Eureka.
After that it was time to do the aforementioned bill paying.
One of these days I’ll write a substantial entry that will actually have some value beyond simply reporting the extraordinarily boring minutiae of my mundane existence.
Today isn’t going to be that day.
Wednesday, August 06, 2008
Too Damn Tired
Yesterday I was going to post an entry about how I was too damn tired to post a proper entry, but as it turns out I was too damn tired to even do that.
After struggling to stay awake while watching The Daily Show and The Colbert Report on my DVR, I said “To hell with it” and took a nap.
That just made things worse, and I ended up going to bed at 9:30. I fell asleep almost immediately, slept straight through to 5 AM, got up and went to the bathroom, then got back in bed and slept for two more hours, and was still exhausted.
I developed slightly more energy throughout the day, but not much.
I ended up leaving work late thanks to a call that I had at 4, so traffic was truly awful, and I decided to forego stopping at the comic shop as I just wanted to be home.
Fortunately I have a four day weekend ahead of me during which I can hopefully get some rest, as I’m taking Friday and Monday off.
Besides just needing a break, I need some weekday time to get things done, like getting an oil change and my state inspection. Maybe I’ll even do some proper grocery shopping while the store is relatively empty instead of the get in get out guerrilla shopping I’ve been doing during the busiest hours.
Exciting stuff, I know.
In any case, there are a couple of things I need to do before getting in some TV watching, so I guess that will do it for this entry.
After struggling to stay awake while watching The Daily Show and The Colbert Report on my DVR, I said “To hell with it” and took a nap.
That just made things worse, and I ended up going to bed at 9:30. I fell asleep almost immediately, slept straight through to 5 AM, got up and went to the bathroom, then got back in bed and slept for two more hours, and was still exhausted.
I developed slightly more energy throughout the day, but not much.
I ended up leaving work late thanks to a call that I had at 4, so traffic was truly awful, and I decided to forego stopping at the comic shop as I just wanted to be home.
Fortunately I have a four day weekend ahead of me during which I can hopefully get some rest, as I’m taking Friday and Monday off.
Besides just needing a break, I need some weekday time to get things done, like getting an oil change and my state inspection. Maybe I’ll even do some proper grocery shopping while the store is relatively empty instead of the get in get out guerrilla shopping I’ve been doing during the busiest hours.
Exciting stuff, I know.
In any case, there are a couple of things I need to do before getting in some TV watching, so I guess that will do it for this entry.
Monday, August 04, 2008
The Universe Needs A Lovely Assistant
“Hey Jon, it’s me, The Universe.”
“*Sigh* Hello.”
“I could do without the sigh.”
“So could I.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Did you need something?”
“Of course not; I’m The Universe. Did you forget?”
“How could I?”
“So, driving home, huh?”
“Observant as always.”
“Well, it’s easy to observe things when you encompass everything.”
“I suppose so.”
“Say, do you like magic?”
“Not especially.”
“No? You were never interested in magic tricks when you were a kid?”
“No. I knew I wouldn’t have a talent for it. My hands were too slight for sleight of hand.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Never mind.”
“Okay. Anyway, I like magic. I’m quite the amateur prestidigitator, actually.”
“Good for you. Everyone should have a hobby…and I appreciate anything that takes your focus off of me.”
“What?”
“Nothing. You were saying?”
“Do you want to see a magic trick?”
“If it involves making a pencil disappear*, absolutely not. Even if it doesn’t, I’m still leaning towards no.”
“Oh come on, it’ll be fun!”
“I’m sure it will be for you. Anyway, I’m trying to drive here.”
“But that’s part of the trick! Look over to your right. See the good-looking guy driving the expensive convertible.”
“I’m not sure about the good—looking part, but yeah, I see him. Looks like the kind of guy who never has to struggle with anything in life. Probably has hot and cold running women, too.”
“Now Jon, it’s not really fair to judge people based on appearances. For all you know, his life could be a constant struggle to overcome adversity, and serve as a testament to the power of hard work and perseverance.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”
“That’s better. But seriously, yeah, the guy’s life is a cakewalk. Everything just falls into his lap. Never has to work at anything. And the women…phew!”
“Okay, enough already. What’s the trick?”
“Oh, right. Well, see that really slow-moving minivan in front of him?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, watch carefully…ala kazam, abra cadabra, hocus pocus! And voila; now it’s a slow-moving minivan in front of you!”
“Dammit!”
“Hey, watch it with the sudden braking!”
“I didn’t really have much choice in the matter.”
“Well, you missed the second part of the trick; I made the guy in the convertible vanish!”
“It was pretty easy for him to do once the minivan veered out of his way.”
“Oh come on; it was magic!”
“Hmm, well you did manage to make something magically disappear.”
“What’s that?”
“My patience.”
*See The Dark Knight. No, I mean it; go see it!
“*Sigh* Hello.”
“I could do without the sigh.”
“So could I.”
“What?”
“Nothing. Did you need something?”
“Of course not; I’m The Universe. Did you forget?”
“How could I?”
“So, driving home, huh?”
“Observant as always.”
“Well, it’s easy to observe things when you encompass everything.”
“I suppose so.”
“Say, do you like magic?”
“Not especially.”
“No? You were never interested in magic tricks when you were a kid?”
“No. I knew I wouldn’t have a talent for it. My hands were too slight for sleight of hand.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Never mind.”
“Okay. Anyway, I like magic. I’m quite the amateur prestidigitator, actually.”
“Good for you. Everyone should have a hobby…and I appreciate anything that takes your focus off of me.”
“What?”
“Nothing. You were saying?”
“Do you want to see a magic trick?”
“If it involves making a pencil disappear*, absolutely not. Even if it doesn’t, I’m still leaning towards no.”
“Oh come on, it’ll be fun!”
“I’m sure it will be for you. Anyway, I’m trying to drive here.”
“But that’s part of the trick! Look over to your right. See the good-looking guy driving the expensive convertible.”
“I’m not sure about the good—looking part, but yeah, I see him. Looks like the kind of guy who never has to struggle with anything in life. Probably has hot and cold running women, too.”
“Now Jon, it’s not really fair to judge people based on appearances. For all you know, his life could be a constant struggle to overcome adversity, and serve as a testament to the power of hard work and perseverance.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”
“That’s better. But seriously, yeah, the guy’s life is a cakewalk. Everything just falls into his lap. Never has to work at anything. And the women…phew!”
“Okay, enough already. What’s the trick?”
“Oh, right. Well, see that really slow-moving minivan in front of him?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, watch carefully…ala kazam, abra cadabra, hocus pocus! And voila; now it’s a slow-moving minivan in front of you!”
“Dammit!”
“Hey, watch it with the sudden braking!”
“I didn’t really have much choice in the matter.”
“Well, you missed the second part of the trick; I made the guy in the convertible vanish!”
“It was pretty easy for him to do once the minivan veered out of his way.”
“Oh come on; it was magic!”
“Hmm, well you did manage to make something magically disappear.”
“What’s that?”
“My patience.”
*See The Dark Knight. No, I mean it; go see it!
A Funny Reminder And Some Nonsense
On its own, the image of actress Hayden Panettiere taken at the most recent San Diego Comic-Con, featured at Topless Robot pretty much says it all, but the added text does amplify the point.
By way of presenting a balanced view, there's this article at Wired listing The 10 Real Reasons Why Geeks Make Better Lovers.
I'm thinking the Topless Robot bit has greater veracity.
By way of presenting a balanced view, there's this article at Wired listing The 10 Real Reasons Why Geeks Make Better Lovers.
I'm thinking the Topless Robot bit has greater veracity.
Sunday, August 03, 2008
Stuck In A 2D World
I didn’t accomplish much of anything yesterday. I did some sketches for an idea I had, but nothing much came of it, other than some really crappy sketches, each one worse than the last, annd each one bearing little resemblance to the last; consistency: I don’t has it.
Well, not in a good way, at least.
Today I’ve been a bit more productive, but only on the totally pragmatic, non-creative side of things.
I went out into the world and gassed up, then did some grocery shopping. Now I’m doing the laundry.
So yeah, it’s not some artistic masterpiece or the great American novel, but it’s important stuff that needs to get done, and, more importantly, it’s important stuff that I can actually accomplish.
Oh, one thing I did yesterday was finally get around to signing up with Facebook.
There’s no real reason for me to do so – I’ll probably just ignore it the way I do MySpace – but I figured I might as well, and I’ve been meaning to do it for a while.
Really the only reason I thought I should was so that I could have another spot on the Web to post a link to Heroic Portraits, not that doing so on MySpace has done me any good.
Anyway, if you’re on Facebook, you can look me up to add me as one of your friends. I sent out requests to a few people that I know are on it, but beyond that I haven’t made any effort to increase my number of friends (so far my niece Jourdan is my only friend).
But like I said, I’ll most likely just ignore the thing and will only check it when I see that some spammer has asked to be my friend or if someone leaves a comment or something, but I won’t be on there every day pimping my page or sending out various virtual whatnots to people or anything like that.
Social networks aren’t really that compelling to people who are anti-social.
Speaking of Heroic Portraits and my half-assed efforts to promote it, yesterday I ordered some business cards for it. I’m sure that will generate me all kinds of business.
There are a lot of things I would like to do with Heroic Portraits, but I’m not really able to because I lack the money, ambition, and skills to do them, and ultimately, I’m not sure my efforts would be worthwhile. At this point – especially if you consider the time invested into it – I’m well into the negative numbers as far as money goes. The profit from my one sale has been offset by the costs of hosting and printing.
So I can’t help but wonder which is the better approach: spending more time and money on it, or spending less?
Anyway, now that I mention the business cards, I guess I accomplished a little bit more yesterday than I thought, at least for some broadly-defined value of “accomplished.”
Every so often I get it into my head that I should do more stuff with 3D modeling software, which is to say that I get it into my head that I should do something with 3D modeling software.
Off and on over the years I’ve messed around with a program called Poser, which lets you render and pose 3D figures of humans and various animals.
Given that I don’t have anyone to model for me, I’m generally forced to rely on reference images that I can find online (or conjure in my head) when I draw, which is sort of limiting, in that if I have a particular pose in mind, I have to try to find a reference image of someone in that particular position and hope that if I do find an image of someone suitably posed, she (this is, after all, me that we’re talking about; it’s pretty much always going to be a “she”) has the body type that I’m looking for, and that there isn’t a bunch of distracting crap, like weird props, a puppy – there are far too many pictures of hot celebrities holding puppies – or some attempt at “artistry” by the photographer that involves using grainy, black and white photography and covering the model with some kind of dirt.
(This is, by the way, a common tactic used by photographers for Playboy. If a famous actress or model poses for Playboy, it’s almost guaranteed that the pictures will involve her being covered from head to toe in mud, and they’ll appear to have been taken using a Civil War-era camera.)
So, yeah, it would be very cool if I could generate my own fully-poseable 3D models.
In any case, yesterday I found a free human modeling program that I decided to try out, hoping that it would be easier to use and be an improvement over Poser.
No dice.
The biggest problem I’ve had with 3D apps is that the interface is appalling and as counter-intuitive as possible. For example, you might think, “Okay, if I click onto her hand and drag it up, it should raise her arm,” but you find that doing this somehow pushes the figure completely off “camera,” and there’s no way to find where it went or to bring it back.
The other problem comes up after you manage to figure out what the various tools in the interface actually do (as opposed to what you think they ought to do), the results are usually grotesque, as the program doesn’t seem to have any sort of built-in collision detection. So, for example, if you pose a figure of a woman so that she’s standing with her hands at her sides, there’s a good chance that her arms will have merged with her ribcage, and her fingers are buried into her thighs. Oh, and if you try bending her knee and rotating it slightly, the skin will twist around like the she’s gotten the world’s most severe Indian Burn.
Now, clearly there are ways around these limitations – otherwise CGI characters in movies would look like they have some mutant form of arthritis and their skin is melting – but I don’t know what they are, and my level of frustration skyrockets the second I try to lift a figure’s arm slightly and it ends up bent all the way over to the other side and sticking through its head and so it becomes difficult to try to force myself to learn, and the solution is never immediately, or even eventually, apparent.
Anyway, this new program I tried doesn’t seem to be any easier to use or provide substantially better results than anything else I’ve tried.
So I guess I’ll be sticking to using reference photos for the foreseeable future.
Well, not in a good way, at least.
Today I’ve been a bit more productive, but only on the totally pragmatic, non-creative side of things.
I went out into the world and gassed up, then did some grocery shopping. Now I’m doing the laundry.
So yeah, it’s not some artistic masterpiece or the great American novel, but it’s important stuff that needs to get done, and, more importantly, it’s important stuff that I can actually accomplish.
Oh, one thing I did yesterday was finally get around to signing up with Facebook.
There’s no real reason for me to do so – I’ll probably just ignore it the way I do MySpace – but I figured I might as well, and I’ve been meaning to do it for a while.
Really the only reason I thought I should was so that I could have another spot on the Web to post a link to Heroic Portraits, not that doing so on MySpace has done me any good.
Anyway, if you’re on Facebook, you can look me up to add me as one of your friends. I sent out requests to a few people that I know are on it, but beyond that I haven’t made any effort to increase my number of friends (so far my niece Jourdan is my only friend).
But like I said, I’ll most likely just ignore the thing and will only check it when I see that some spammer has asked to be my friend or if someone leaves a comment or something, but I won’t be on there every day pimping my page or sending out various virtual whatnots to people or anything like that.
Social networks aren’t really that compelling to people who are anti-social.
Speaking of Heroic Portraits and my half-assed efforts to promote it, yesterday I ordered some business cards for it. I’m sure that will generate me all kinds of business.
There are a lot of things I would like to do with Heroic Portraits, but I’m not really able to because I lack the money, ambition, and skills to do them, and ultimately, I’m not sure my efforts would be worthwhile. At this point – especially if you consider the time invested into it – I’m well into the negative numbers as far as money goes. The profit from my one sale has been offset by the costs of hosting and printing.
So I can’t help but wonder which is the better approach: spending more time and money on it, or spending less?
Anyway, now that I mention the business cards, I guess I accomplished a little bit more yesterday than I thought, at least for some broadly-defined value of “accomplished.”
Every so often I get it into my head that I should do more stuff with 3D modeling software, which is to say that I get it into my head that I should do something with 3D modeling software.
Off and on over the years I’ve messed around with a program called Poser, which lets you render and pose 3D figures of humans and various animals.
Given that I don’t have anyone to model for me, I’m generally forced to rely on reference images that I can find online (or conjure in my head) when I draw, which is sort of limiting, in that if I have a particular pose in mind, I have to try to find a reference image of someone in that particular position and hope that if I do find an image of someone suitably posed, she (this is, after all, me that we’re talking about; it’s pretty much always going to be a “she”) has the body type that I’m looking for, and that there isn’t a bunch of distracting crap, like weird props, a puppy – there are far too many pictures of hot celebrities holding puppies – or some attempt at “artistry” by the photographer that involves using grainy, black and white photography and covering the model with some kind of dirt.
(This is, by the way, a common tactic used by photographers for Playboy. If a famous actress or model poses for Playboy, it’s almost guaranteed that the pictures will involve her being covered from head to toe in mud, and they’ll appear to have been taken using a Civil War-era camera.)
So, yeah, it would be very cool if I could generate my own fully-poseable 3D models.
In any case, yesterday I found a free human modeling program that I decided to try out, hoping that it would be easier to use and be an improvement over Poser.
No dice.
The biggest problem I’ve had with 3D apps is that the interface is appalling and as counter-intuitive as possible. For example, you might think, “Okay, if I click onto her hand and drag it up, it should raise her arm,” but you find that doing this somehow pushes the figure completely off “camera,” and there’s no way to find where it went or to bring it back.
The other problem comes up after you manage to figure out what the various tools in the interface actually do (as opposed to what you think they ought to do), the results are usually grotesque, as the program doesn’t seem to have any sort of built-in collision detection. So, for example, if you pose a figure of a woman so that she’s standing with her hands at her sides, there’s a good chance that her arms will have merged with her ribcage, and her fingers are buried into her thighs. Oh, and if you try bending her knee and rotating it slightly, the skin will twist around like the she’s gotten the world’s most severe Indian Burn.
Now, clearly there are ways around these limitations – otherwise CGI characters in movies would look like they have some mutant form of arthritis and their skin is melting – but I don’t know what they are, and my level of frustration skyrockets the second I try to lift a figure’s arm slightly and it ends up bent all the way over to the other side and sticking through its head and so it becomes difficult to try to force myself to learn, and the solution is never immediately, or even eventually, apparent.
Anyway, this new program I tried doesn’t seem to be any easier to use or provide substantially better results than anything else I’ve tried.
So I guess I’ll be sticking to using reference photos for the foreseeable future.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
