The grind
By Mike DalyDecember 7th, 2004
I've been working furiously to be a furious worker at work these days. I'm learning lots of cool stuff. One of the coolest things I worked on recently was writing some pixel and vertex shaders. For those of you who don't know, pixel and vertex shaders are micro programs that are executed entirely on the graphics card. The shader programs process a single vertex or pixel, and get executed over and over for each pixel and vertex in the scene.
At this point, I'd like to say that I know nobody probably cares about this, but it's been a while since my last update, so I'd like to put something else up, and I haven't been doing anything else interesting. So tough it and enjoy your shader lecture.
So I wanted to put together a shader that looked like a transparent ghost. This can be done without shaders, but the problem is that parts of the geometry that should be obscured aren't. For example, if you are looking at someone standing sideways, you could see his far armpit through his transparent body, or the inside of his mouth which looks like crap. With mine, that's not a problem. Enough blaber, here's a screenshot:
Spectral Glow with Alpha
Ok, so maybe that was kind of an anticlimax. Deal with it.
I was looking around the galleries today, and I noticed that some nice person thumbnailed and galleried all of the costume party pictures. You have probably already seen them, but I'll point it out anyway:
Costume Party Gallery
And here is my personal favorite:
You tell 'em, Amber
I have a recent top-secret project I'm working on that I should be done with in about a week, so tune in later to check that out. Other than that, I got nothing.
Oh yeah, I almost forgot random link. Can't forget that.
At this point, I'd like to say that I know nobody probably cares about this, but it's been a while since my last update, so I'd like to put something else up, and I haven't been doing anything else interesting. So tough it and enjoy your shader lecture.
So I wanted to put together a shader that looked like a transparent ghost. This can be done without shaders, but the problem is that parts of the geometry that should be obscured aren't. For example, if you are looking at someone standing sideways, you could see his far armpit through his transparent body, or the inside of his mouth which looks like crap. With mine, that's not a problem. Enough blaber, here's a screenshot:
Spectral Glow with Alpha
Ok, so maybe that was kind of an anticlimax. Deal with it.
I was looking around the galleries today, and I noticed that some nice person thumbnailed and galleried all of the costume party pictures. You have probably already seen them, but I'll point it out anyway:
Costume Party Gallery
And here is my personal favorite:
You tell 'em, Amber
I have a recent top-secret project I'm working on that I should be done with in about a week, so tune in later to check that out. Other than that, I got nothing.
Oh yeah, I almost forgot random link. Can't forget that.
Comments
Viva la tequila!
By WastrelDecember 13th, 2004
Quin lo sabia? Pero yo
finalmente fui a Mexico.
So this monkey decided to infiltrate yet another country, and add another notch to the belt, during Thanksgiving. And how do you celebrate Thanksgiving in Mexico? With lots of Tequila and Tortillas of course!
In case you didn't know, they actually don't celebrate Thanksgiving, but none-the-less we still followed tradition and ate a Thanksgiving dinner (ok so really it was baby back ribs, but at least everyone came out and we ate a huge meal), and shopped on Friday.
So this monkey decided to infiltrate yet another country, and add another notch to the belt, during Thanksgiving. And how do you celebrate Thanksgiving in Mexico? With lots of Tequila and Tortillas of course!
In case you didn't know, they actually don't celebrate Thanksgiving, but none-the-less we still followed tradition and ate a Thanksgiving dinner (ok so really it was baby back ribs, but at least everyone came out and we ate a huge meal), and shopped on Friday.
Really I went to Monterrey, the third largest, and richest
mexican city there is. Thus the prices compared similarly with
Raleigh, and really there was nothing to see except for the
Cola de Caballo 'Horses Tail'. Therefore mexico, for
me, was simply a change in sceneray and friends and a relaxing
time going out to clubs/bars!
On a parl� fran�ais, un poco espa�ol, and of course because of
jason (who uses italian come on) english. So it was fun and
mentally tiring switching between all the languages.
Anyway enough rambling, look at the
pictures! And catch up on some spanish by reading calvin and
hobbes en
espanol
If you want to hear more detail about the trip, with Austin, Texas
included, then just ask
me.
In other news, I've been kept busy and away from content making
through the daily grind at Acronym central EPA in RTP working as a
contractor in the ORD-APPCD (I swear you can make a rap song out
of these), and spending my sundays bartending. This leaves
little free time when you throw in applications to graduate school,
and just trying to hang out with friends I hardly ever get to see!
But pictures are easy and I'm a wastrel so that's my content!
-peace
Comments
If you can't get help here, please get help somewhere
By Mike DalyDecember 18th, 2004
Today I will warn you of the horrible dangers involved in cycling. On the street, cycling is known as 'riding the bike'. Well, hopefully you already don't do bike, but if you do, you may find the following materials enlightening.
Cyclaholics Anonymous panel 1
Cyclaholics Anonymous panel 2
Cyclaholics Anonymous panel 3
I hope you enjoyed that. To give it some context, I made up that pamphlet as a gag gift for a co-worker who is really into biking. In it's original form it was printed on one sheet front and back with three panels each side. I arranged the panels into the order you would read them on the pamphlets when I put them up here.
I would also like to post a rant about Kinko's but I'm too lazy to write one. Besides, they don't even deserve it they are so crappy. You don't want to know how much I had to pay to get that damn thing printed out.
I'm going to be heading out of town as of this coming thursday. After that, I'll be away from any means of updating for a long time. There is a chance that Wayne will have a little suprise for you by then, but if you don't see it soon, you can consider the front page of Dueling Monkeys closed for the holidays (by all means continue using the messageboard) There is a small chance, however, that you might hear an update from me coming from the sunny state of Hawaii! I'll be chillin with Wheedle for about 10 days at the beginning of January.
Extra thanks to Sam and Cynthia for hosting a great party last Saturday. Wayne and I are going to dive into some tasty cheese and sausage as soon as he gets home tonight.
I'm going to do more than finish this post off with a plain old random link. I seem to recall that on Saturday there was a discussion on what webcomics were good. At the time, I think I had a little bit too much honey lager in me to recall all of mine so I'll do you all the favor of posting them here. Following are all of my favorite webcomics in no particular order.
VG Cats!
The 10k Commotion!
A Modest Destiny
Sinfest!
Penny Arcade
Mac Hall
Girly
Chugworth Academy
Apple Geeks
and finally...
Angel Moxie
If you find enough free time to start any of those from the beginning, I think you'd be doing yourself a favor. Especially Sinfest, I love that one.
Cyclaholics Anonymous panel 1
Cyclaholics Anonymous panel 2
Cyclaholics Anonymous panel 3
I hope you enjoyed that. To give it some context, I made up that pamphlet as a gag gift for a co-worker who is really into biking. In it's original form it was printed on one sheet front and back with three panels each side. I arranged the panels into the order you would read them on the pamphlets when I put them up here.
I would also like to post a rant about Kinko's but I'm too lazy to write one. Besides, they don't even deserve it they are so crappy. You don't want to know how much I had to pay to get that damn thing printed out.
I'm going to be heading out of town as of this coming thursday. After that, I'll be away from any means of updating for a long time. There is a chance that Wayne will have a little suprise for you by then, but if you don't see it soon, you can consider the front page of Dueling Monkeys closed for the holidays (by all means continue using the messageboard) There is a small chance, however, that you might hear an update from me coming from the sunny state of Hawaii! I'll be chillin with Wheedle for about 10 days at the beginning of January.
Extra thanks to Sam and Cynthia for hosting a great party last Saturday. Wayne and I are going to dive into some tasty cheese and sausage as soon as he gets home tonight.
I'm going to do more than finish this post off with a plain old random link. I seem to recall that on Saturday there was a discussion on what webcomics were good. At the time, I think I had a little bit too much honey lager in me to recall all of mine so I'll do you all the favor of posting them here. Following are all of my favorite webcomics in no particular order.
VG Cats!
The 10k Commotion!
A Modest Destiny
Sinfest!
Penny Arcade
Mac Hall
Girly
Chugworth Academy
Apple Geeks
and finally...
Angel Moxie
If you find enough free time to start any of those from the beginning, I think you'd be doing yourself a favor. Especially Sinfest, I love that one.
Comments
Merry Christmas!
ByDecember 22nd, 2004
Merry Christmas Everyone!
Our gift to you this Christmas is that new design we've been promising for the past year. You'll notice that there are a few thrown-together-at-the-last-minute things, but its a gradual process.One thing that is pretty tacky is that the Art Gallery, Photo Gallery, and Theater all link to the same old gallery. I'll split them up later, when I rewrite the gallery. No sense in doing extra work that is going to be deleted soon anyway. Also the old style "menu-on-the-left" thing doesn't work since we have no menu on the left, so it will look a little odd.
However, I think most will agree that the coolness of Willow's new design will overcome these petty blemishes. If you find any problems, please post them in the New Site Design thread in the messageboard. Thanks!
P.S. I GOT A NEW JOB!
Comments