I finally decided on the gunner's rifle weapon. Not textured yet. He'll also have a pistol as a secondary weapon.
Monday, July 21, 2008
Gunner Rifle Weapon
I finally decided on the gunner's rifle weapon. Not textured yet. He'll also have a pistol as a secondary weapon.
Sunday, July 13, 2008
BLARGH Text Editor File Save Dialog Box GUI
This is a mock-up concept of BLARGH's File Save GUI that I've made so far. It should work almost like a standard file browser program. While in the File Save GUI, the upper screen should still show the text editor, and you can still switch between other opened text files.
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
wrist rot problem fixed
After a long time, I tried working on the gunner's wrist problem once more. I bothered downloading The Mancandy FAQ only to find out it didn't explain how the rigging in the wrist worked.
I tried searching in BlenderArtists and found a solution in a thread. It was this blend file in particular (made by doncuan) that gave me the idea. However, I did realize that I had modeled my character's mesh without giving forethought to wrist rotation. This other blend file (made by Vertex Pusher) demonstrates a much better forearm mesh designed to twist properly. I'll study it in detail when I make a new character.
I also modeled and rigged the gunner's weapon. Its not textured yet. After looking at it, I decided it looked too much like a fireman's hose, so I'm going to make a different model.
I tried searching in BlenderArtists and found a solution in a thread. It was this blend file in particular (made by doncuan) that gave me the idea. However, I did realize that I had modeled my character's mesh without giving forethought to wrist rotation. This other blend file (made by Vertex Pusher) demonstrates a much better forearm mesh designed to twist properly. I'll study it in detail when I make a new character.
I also modeled and rigged the gunner's weapon. Its not textured yet. After looking at it, I decided it looked too much like a fireman's hose, so I'm going to make a different model.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
The Girl in Byakkoya
Paprika
Movie - 90 minutes running time
Final Verdict: You know "The Cell"? The one with Jennifer Lopez? That sucks compared to this movie. If you haven't seen it, then this is the movie that you should have watched back in 2007.
Don't forget to download the ending theme music from http://www.teslakite.com/freemp3s/e/paprika/. Its been made free for personal use by the music artist. He wants you to read the license before downloading it.
The film was directed by Satoshi Kon, same guy who made Paranoia Agent. This film is his latest (released) work as of 2008.
Paprika was created by Yasutaka Tsutsui. It was originally a short story in a Japanese women's magazine, which he later turned into a full blown novel.
Unfortunately, http://www.radioclub.jp gives a 404 error.
And you need a DC mini to access it.
Movie - 90 minutes running time
Final Verdict: You know "The Cell"? The one with Jennifer Lopez? That sucks compared to this movie. If you haven't seen it, then this is the movie that you should have watched back in 2007.
Don't forget to download the ending theme music from http://www.teslakite.com/freemp3s/e/paprika/. Its been made free for personal use by the music artist. He wants you to read the license before downloading it.
The film was directed by Satoshi Kon, same guy who made Paranoia Agent. This film is his latest (released) work as of 2008.
Paprika was created by Yasutaka Tsutsui. It was originally a short story in a Japanese women's magazine, which he later turned into a full blown novel.
Unfortunately, http://www.radioclub.jp gives a 404 error.
And you need a DC mini to access it.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Kamen Rider Kiva
I watched Kamen Rider Kiva Episode 1 and I have to say, I had hoped it'd be something I could watch in earnest, but these shows are still mainly for kids. But since its only the first episode, I'm willing to watch more of it first.
BLARGH Text Editor is moving along at a slow pace, only a few bugfixes and refactoring being done right now. A lot of things being done under the hood.
In the meantime I am thinking of:
1This is odd though. The version of GCIDE from the GNU ftp server (latest version 0.46) is about 53 MB in size when uncompressed. In contrast, the version that comes in the StarDict website is 156 MB when uncompressed, about 103 MB bigger (about two-thirds bigger).
The stardict version reports its wordcount is 174,222 words (coming from the .ifo file). The version from the GNU ftp server reports its wordcount is 125,445 words (coming from a grep -c "<hw>" cide.*). The StarDict version has 48,777 more words. Its quite odd though that the additional 48,777 words would take up 103 MB (approx. 66% of the file size) while 125,445 words would take up only 53 MB (34% of the file size). So it probably means other than the addition of 48,777 more words, more content have been added to the old words.
Coming from the .ifo file, the stardict version was last modified in 2003, May 13 (most likely outdated information), while from the GNU ftp server, version 0.46 was last modified in 2002, April 15.
This is making me think that the GNU ftp server is probably outdated. A certain Linux dictionary reader software has a GCIDE version 0.48, released last 2007, December 20.
BLARGH Text Editor is moving along at a slow pace, only a few bugfixes and refactoring being done right now. A lot of things being done under the hood.
In the meantime I am thinking of:
- saving/loading files to/from a pc via wifi (using libdswifi, and perhaps somehow porting UFTP to ARM executable NDS code)
- additional on-screen keyboards: OPTI and Quikwrite
- dictionary lookup, using perhaps code from NewDictS. The GNU Collaborative International Dictionary of English packaged in StartDict format is roughly 150 MB big when uncompressed1 (and NewDictS needs it uncompressed), so I want to improve it by compressing the .dict file in either QuickLZ or LZO.
1This is odd though. The version of GCIDE from the GNU ftp server (latest version 0.46) is about 53 MB in size when uncompressed. In contrast, the version that comes in the StarDict website is 156 MB when uncompressed, about 103 MB bigger (about two-thirds bigger).
The stardict version reports its wordcount is 174,222 words (coming from the .ifo file). The version from the GNU ftp server reports its wordcount is 125,445 words (coming from a grep -c "<hw>" cide.*). The StarDict version has 48,777 more words. Its quite odd though that the additional 48,777 words would take up 103 MB (approx. 66% of the file size) while 125,445 words would take up only 53 MB (34% of the file size). So it probably means other than the addition of 48,777 more words, more content have been added to the old words.
Coming from the .ifo file, the stardict version was last modified in 2003, May 13 (most likely outdated information), while from the GNU ftp server, version 0.46 was last modified in 2002, April 15.
This is making me think that the GNU ftp server is probably outdated. A certain Linux dictionary reader software has a GCIDE version 0.48, released last 2007, December 20.
Monday, April 21, 2008
ENTER LIL' SLUGGER
Paranoia Agent
TV Series - 13 episodes
Final Verdict: Riddled with symbolisms, this animé mini-series is not for people who don't like thinking.
Don't forget to read Nichi Bei Times article "Entertainment Re-oriented: Atomic Pop Pt. II: Hello Kitty and the Rape of Nanking" for more explanations on the symbolisms.
I think the most well thought-out stories are episodes 2 and 3 (The Golden Shoes, and Double Lips): fear of getting wrongly accused, and fear of losing self-control.
Taeko's story on the other hand, I would say the creation of her story was hurried up, or the presentation of it was summarized too much. Nevertheless, its depiction was just as dramatic as the other stories/episodes. She is presented as a victim of the events around her. Unlike other characters, she does not have any apparent flaw in her nature (Yuichi had delsuions of fame, Harumi had a split personality, Hirukawa was a hypocite, and so on..). But I like how when she wished to become nothing (something far-fetched, how can a person become "nothing"?), it resulted in her getting amnesia (ahh, makes more sense now).
Shonen Bat is a tulpa (synonymous to thoughtform), a tangible manifestation of mental energy, albeit in this case, he was created from the overall repressed negative feelings of the city's populace.
The first half of the story depicts him being a hero whose actions were misinterpreted by the people: saving individuals suffering from extreme emotional/mental breakdowns by hospitalizing them, lolz.
But really, there is some truth to that. It could be said that death grants a person the final, ultimate peace: since the worst thing that could possibly happen to you already happened (i.e. you died), then what's more to be worried about (with regards to yourself)?
That way of thinking, that feeling, was what Shonen Bat's victims experienced. Its as if God "pressed the reset button" for your whole life; you get a second chance (although you don't know its your second one).
In the later half of the story though, Shonen Bat's role turns into something more sadistic.
Since he is a tulpa, he is given form by what people perceive him to be. Rumors of Shonen Bat's indiscriminate assaults on whoever left people thinking "Would I be next?".
Rumors exagerate facts: "I heard he's not human.", turns into "I heard he's inhuman, like some monster.", which turns into "I heard he's a monster." And, well, since the word monster is simple enough to understand, it is also very ambiguous. People are left to their imagination as to how he really looks like, given the words "baseball bat", "inline skates", and "monster" as clues.
So people saw him as a monster, and since he is a tulpa, what people perceive him to be is what he becomes. And so, rather humorously, his appearance turned into something reminiscent of a run-of-the-mill Role-paying Game monster, which is what more or less people think him to be (typical of teenagers, since they play video games).
IMO I liked his original form better: a mad grinning boy who prefers to speak only on a monthly-basis and lets the baseball bat do the communication. It depicts more sadism than an RPG monster
Why did the storywriter shift the story this way? My guess is that, they want to resolve the story in a climactic struggle. They needed an obviously apparent antagonist.
Some may be perplexed why Mitsuhiro (the younger detective) suddenly turned into a weirdo who thinks he's a RPG hero. It makes sense, Shonen Bat, being what people perceive him to be, turned into a monster. What better way to fight him in equal terms than to step into that perception too? In fact, I think it was really the only way that had a fighting chance to defeat him (other than if his creator chose to uncreate him).
"The populace became angry and the society turned into anarchy because.. they ran out of stock for plushie toys?" I could remember that scene, a man in a business suit was pounding the door to the store screaming for that Maromi doll. I don't think this was another symbolism, it was really happening in the real world in that story. It supposedly represents the populace's dependency on dolls. I don't buy that. Lots of people don't care about Hello Kitty, nor even heard of it. I know Japan has dependencies on kawaii stuff (Nichi Bei Times article "Entertainment Re-oriented: Atomic Pop Pt. II: Hello Kitty and the Rape of Nanking" and The Escapist article "Hail to the Kitty"). But for people to turn into raving lunatics for it? I mean, I'd doubt you'd find a Japanese street gang sporting Hello Kitty keychains or a Hello Kitty AR-15 Rifle.
In western philosophy, growing up means "throwing away your old toys", a sort of rite-of-passage if you will, from young teenager to adulthood. On the other end, in Japanese culture, growing up means keeping what you have and simply adding more to them. Personally, I go somewhere in between, choosing to continually screen the old stuff through a filter: "Ok, this one, do I keep it?"
The storywriter should have made up a more reasonable cause for the anarchism (my guess is that they needed the setting of the world to be in anarchy for the final part of the story, as emphasis to the gravity of the situation).
The black ooze overrunning the whole city is fine (I think its the tulpa in an extremely unstable and saturated state), just.. they should have a better reason than out of stock plushie toys, or perhaps some other thing in conjunction with it.
TV Series - 13 episodes
Final Verdict: Riddled with symbolisms, this animé mini-series is not for people who don't like thinking.
Don't forget to read Nichi Bei Times article "Entertainment Re-oriented: Atomic Pop Pt. II: Hello Kitty and the Rape of Nanking" for more explanations on the symbolisms.
I think the most well thought-out stories are episodes 2 and 3 (The Golden Shoes, and Double Lips): fear of getting wrongly accused, and fear of losing self-control.
Taeko's story on the other hand, I would say the creation of her story was hurried up, or the presentation of it was summarized too much. Nevertheless, its depiction was just as dramatic as the other stories/episodes. She is presented as a victim of the events around her. Unlike other characters, she does not have any apparent flaw in her nature (Yuichi had delsuions of fame, Harumi had a split personality, Hirukawa was a hypocite, and so on..). But I like how when she wished to become nothing (something far-fetched, how can a person become "nothing"?), it resulted in her getting amnesia (ahh, makes more sense now).
Shonen Bat is a tulpa (synonymous to thoughtform), a tangible manifestation of mental energy, albeit in this case, he was created from the overall repressed negative feelings of the city's populace.
The first half of the story depicts him being a hero whose actions were misinterpreted by the people: saving individuals suffering from extreme emotional/mental breakdowns by hospitalizing them, lolz.
But really, there is some truth to that. It could be said that death grants a person the final, ultimate peace: since the worst thing that could possibly happen to you already happened (i.e. you died), then what's more to be worried about (with regards to yourself)?
That way of thinking, that feeling, was what Shonen Bat's victims experienced. Its as if God "pressed the reset button" for your whole life; you get a second chance (although you don't know its your second one).
In the later half of the story though, Shonen Bat's role turns into something more sadistic.
Since he is a tulpa, he is given form by what people perceive him to be. Rumors of Shonen Bat's indiscriminate assaults on whoever left people thinking "Would I be next?".
Rumors exagerate facts: "I heard he's not human.", turns into "I heard he's inhuman, like some monster.", which turns into "I heard he's a monster." And, well, since the word monster is simple enough to understand, it is also very ambiguous. People are left to their imagination as to how he really looks like, given the words "baseball bat", "inline skates", and "monster" as clues.
So people saw him as a monster, and since he is a tulpa, what people perceive him to be is what he becomes. And so, rather humorously, his appearance turned into something reminiscent of a run-of-the-mill Role-paying Game monster, which is what more or less people think him to be (typical of teenagers, since they play video games).
IMO I liked his original form better: a mad grinning boy who prefers to speak only on a monthly-basis and lets the baseball bat do the communication. It depicts more sadism than an RPG monster
Why did the storywriter shift the story this way? My guess is that, they want to resolve the story in a climactic struggle. They needed an obviously apparent antagonist.
Some may be perplexed why Mitsuhiro (the younger detective) suddenly turned into a weirdo who thinks he's a RPG hero. It makes sense, Shonen Bat, being what people perceive him to be, turned into a monster. What better way to fight him in equal terms than to step into that perception too? In fact, I think it was really the only way that had a fighting chance to defeat him (other than if his creator chose to uncreate him).
"The populace became angry and the society turned into anarchy because.. they ran out of stock for plushie toys?" I could remember that scene, a man in a business suit was pounding the door to the store screaming for that Maromi doll. I don't think this was another symbolism, it was really happening in the real world in that story. It supposedly represents the populace's dependency on dolls. I don't buy that. Lots of people don't care about Hello Kitty, nor even heard of it. I know Japan has dependencies on kawaii stuff (Nichi Bei Times article "Entertainment Re-oriented: Atomic Pop Pt. II: Hello Kitty and the Rape of Nanking" and The Escapist article "Hail to the Kitty"). But for people to turn into raving lunatics for it? I mean, I'd doubt you'd find a Japanese street gang sporting Hello Kitty keychains or a Hello Kitty AR-15 Rifle.
In western philosophy, growing up means "throwing away your old toys", a sort of rite-of-passage if you will, from young teenager to adulthood. On the other end, in Japanese culture, growing up means keeping what you have and simply adding more to them. Personally, I go somewhere in between, choosing to continually screen the old stuff through a filter: "Ok, this one, do I keep it?"
The storywriter should have made up a more reasonable cause for the anarchism (my guess is that they needed the setting of the world to be in anarchy for the final part of the story, as emphasis to the gravity of the situation).
The black ooze overrunning the whole city is fine (I think its the tulpa in an extremely unstable and saturated state), just.. they should have a better reason than out of stock plushie toys, or perhaps some other thing in conjunction with it.
Wednesday, April 9, 2008
QUONG now hosted in sharesource.org
Its now in http://sharesource.org/project/blarghtexteditor/
I want to port it to Mercurial, but hg convert crashes on Windows XP, and hg convert on Ubuntu doesn't work since the python-svn bindings is outdated (requiring a complete recompile of subversion to update it, which is beyond me).
So it'll be in SVN format for now. However, I can't import my repo to sharesource, since there's no such feature yet, so you guys will have to wait.
QUONGKeyboardDS or BLARGH Text Editor, is a Nintendo DS homebrew text editor program that makes use of HexInput and QUONGThe source code repository is not up yet, but a snapshot of the source is available (using the head revision 62).
I want to port it to Mercurial, but hg convert crashes on Windows XP, and hg convert on Ubuntu doesn't work since the python-svn bindings is outdated (requiring a complete recompile of subversion to update it, which is beyond me).
So it'll be in SVN format for now. However, I can't import my repo to sharesource, since there's no such feature yet, so you guys will have to wait.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Quong
Some more development is done. The new link is http://www.pinoyforum.net/v2forum/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=1796.0;attach=684
Now I'm thinking of hosting my project in http://www.sharesource.org. To my dismay, the site was Yahoo!ed, bought by Yahoo corp, now its got red letters all over its front page. ZOMG!!!! Shit man, I can't believe I've been April-fooled on that one. I'll use it since it supports a Mercurial back-end, although I'll host my code in other free Mercurial hosting sites too.
This means I'm going to learn Mercurial and use it over Subversion, which I'm currently using. Open source projects get to make more use of decentralized version control systems.
This also means I'm making my project open source. I'll use GPL v3.
Now if you didn't understand any of the bullshit I've been saying so far (it happens to me too sometimes), it simply means I'm just setting things up.
Now I'm thinking of hosting my project in http://www.sharesource.org. To my dismay, the site was Yahoo!ed, bought by Yahoo corp, now its got red letters all over its front page. ZOMG!!!! Shit man, I can't believe I've been April-fooled on that one. I'll use it since it supports a Mercurial back-end, although I'll host my code in other free Mercurial hosting sites too.
This means I'm going to learn Mercurial and use it over Subversion, which I'm currently using. Open source projects get to make more use of decentralized version control systems.
This also means I'm making my project open source. I'll use GPL v3.
Now if you didn't understand any of the bullshit I've been saying so far (it happens to me too sometimes), it simply means I'm just setting things up.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
QUONG
I've started to make use of a unit test library UnitTest++. Its really nice, just after a day of adding unit tests and I've found bugs I wouldn't have otherwise. I recommend it to anyone making code in C++.
Monday, March 17, 2008
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Quong Development
I'm working on the proper moving of text cursor for the non-monospaced text. It's turning out to be more and more difficult the more I code it.
Thursday, March 6, 2008
More Quong
The only significant changes I've made to the Quong keyboard demo is that:
- it displays a bitmap of the on-screen keyboard in the lower screen
- it now displays non-monospaced text (not shown in image), but its incomplete (no word-wrap yet).
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
More Quong DS Development
I've made a small demo for the hex keyboard, the problem is I haven't gotten around to how to render the keyboard graphics yet. Should I use a large bitmap? That wouldn't make it reconfigurable. Should I use the hardware-accelerated sprites display? If only there were more up-to-date documentations and tutorials for libnds.
If anyone wants the .nds file, post a comment and I'll host it somewhere.
If anyone wants the .nds file, post a comment and I'll host it somewhere.
Friday, February 22, 2008
Quong, and the ever elusive ideal firearm weapon for the gunner
Look at that. Look at that weird beehive looking... thing, which most of you will probably not bother looking at anyway. Its the quong hex keyboard layout but modified a bit 'cause I felt like it. I've been making up the code to make a hex keyboard in the Nintendo DS. Soon enough, I was outlaying a simple GUI library for it. That pic's just the concept layout though.
Ultimately, I want to make a homebrew app for the DS that's similar to Tiddlywiki: some sort of guerrilla wiki for the DS.
Moving on, I was about to make animations for the gunner soldier when I realized he doesn't have the props. So I've been making new concepts for fictional guns/rifles (which I will not show yet). So much reference images I've downloaded from the Web, and yet its still pretty hard to be creative when you're lazy, and prefer to spend the weekend fapping to porn instead, which means I'm not finished yet.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
wrist rot problem
See, this is the problem.
Its like you take a piece of paper, roll it to a tube, then twist it. It'll lose volume and shape. I need to make a way to have a wrist bone that will deform the mesh properly. I've looked over Mancandy and it uses an approach I never saw before. I'll try it in the weekend.
Its like you take a piece of paper, roll it to a tube, then twist it. It'll lose volume and shape. I need to make a way to have a wrist bone that will deform the mesh properly. I've looked over Mancandy and it uses an approach I never saw before. I'll try it in the weekend.
Wednesday, February 6, 2008
Monday, 4 February 2008 20:16:25 PHT
Got sick. Hadn't done much. I was also trying out homebrew dev on a Nintendo DS.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Sunday, 27 January 2008 23:38:35 PHT
I hadn't expected painting textures would take so much time. Two days and this is the only thing I made. Still not used to it. Nevertheless, its good that I've made something close to average quality considering its been a long time (2+ years?) since I did CG.
In other news: ಠ_ಠ
In other news: ಠ_ಠ
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Monday, 21 January 2008 21:19:33 PHT
Not much work was done.
I spent the Saturday buying a new 400 GB hard drive (which has practically only 372.61 GB of space). It turned out to be a Western Digital Caviar SE.
The only problem was that the store had no stock of SATA data cables, so it took me quite a while scouring shops for one. I got one for PHP 30.00 (roughly USD 0.75).
Then I tested the new hard drive for defects, reorganized my files, made some DVD backups, and that was it. The weekend was over before I noticed.
Changed the inner shirt's color. I think this one suits him better. His color scheme should be monotonous and unextravagant.
I realized I made the mistake of giving tiny objects (the belt buckles) more UV texture space, which was practically useless since they're only a few pixels big compared to the other parts of the gunner 3d model.
Even the head's UV texture is using up too much space. The glove's texture is the one that needs more space, so maybe next time I'll readjust the UVs.
In other news, a man's family was involuntarily abducted by 14th century feudal Japanese assassins. He is currently seeking ways to finance a rescue operation.
I spent the Saturday buying a new 400 GB hard drive (which has practically only 372.61 GB of space). It turned out to be a Western Digital Caviar SE.
The only problem was that the store had no stock of SATA data cables, so it took me quite a while scouring shops for one. I got one for PHP 30.00 (roughly USD 0.75).
Then I tested the new hard drive for defects, reorganized my files, made some DVD backups, and that was it. The weekend was over before I noticed.
Changed the inner shirt's color. I think this one suits him better. His color scheme should be monotonous and unextravagant.
I realized I made the mistake of giving tiny objects (the belt buckles) more UV texture space, which was practically useless since they're only a few pixels big compared to the other parts of the gunner 3d model.
Even the head's UV texture is using up too much space. The glove's texture is the one that needs more space, so maybe next time I'll readjust the UVs.
In other news, a man's family was involuntarily abducted by 14th century feudal Japanese assassins. He is currently seeking ways to finance a rescue operation.
Monday, January 14, 2008
Saturday, 12 January, 2008 21:55:27 PHT
So I heard over here that keeping a journal about the stuff that you do helps to force you focus on what you're doing. Well, I was getting lazy, and I thought to myself, instead of continuing to spend weekends just fapping to porn, this'll be what I'm doing.
I still have no Internet connection in my home computer, so updates will be slow. Weekly, probably.
The gunner model is the first task. I'm working on the textures right now. I figure buying a Wacom tablet would speed up the process (after learning how to use it), but I just don't want to spend right now.
After that:
I just found out that Blender actually does allow textured meshes to recieve lighting, and the feature was there, ever since the ancient 2.2x versions. The only problem is that the lamps should be in the same layer as the mesh object in question. Nevertheless, this thing should have been on by default.
In other news, King Leonidas of the Spartans announces his next preferred place of dining.
I still have no Internet connection in my home computer, so updates will be slow. Weekly, probably.
The gunner model is the first task. I'm working on the textures right now. I figure buying a Wacom tablet would speed up the process (after learning how to use it), but I just don't want to spend right now.
After that:
- fix wrist bone
- model/texture weapons
- idle and move animation
- off to coding
- ???
- PROFIT
I just found out that Blender actually does allow textured meshes to recieve lighting, and the feature was there, ever since the ancient 2.2x versions. The only problem is that the lamps should be in the same layer as the mesh object in question. Nevertheless, this thing should have been on by default.
In other news, King Leonidas of the Spartans announces his next preferred place of dining.
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