86 Words

My last post showed the Spray Paint art of Ryan Thomas from a local event I attended recently. I was so impressed with the techniques that I decided to try it for myself.

I can’t say that I’ve been completely successful, but I’ve learned new things with each of the five paintings I’ve done so far. I don’t think they’re terrible either - let me know what you think.

This was my first one - it looks very 1950’s scifi illustration-ish to me. I still have a LOT to learn!

This is my second one (and suffers a bit from glossy reflections). I’m finding the spraying of the shiny spot on the planets particularly difficult to pull off!

Attempt #3: (again with reflections). I’m using too many stars, and my atmosphere on the one planet needs work. I should be sticking with the simple stuff, but I can’t stand the idea of doing NOTHING new over and over - hence the about-to-colide, massive meteor.

This is #4, and I’m starting to learn a lot of the basics. I really like the dark fringe at the top of the green planet, and the shiny spots are looking better. I don’t really like the new planet technique I used for the texture on the green planet.

5th and last one (so far).  Too many stars again, and I don’t like the effects of any of the planets - again, I keep trying new stuff, and each time I learn something, so not a total loss. I do kinda like the orange planet, actually.

That’s all for now. Don’t worry, I don’t plan on turning into a talk-about-me blog, it just happened that this was relavent (and caused by) the previous post so I thought it might make sense. Let me know if you have any thoughts on the topic.

Tags: Collections, Reference, Current Events, Virtual, Geek Stuff, Art / Visual, General by Jai
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I recently attended a kickoff party for the Geauga Observatory.

One of the events was an artist, Ryan Thomas, doing on-the-spot work creating space paintings using only cans of spray paint and some random objects for shaping and masking. It was interesting to watch, and his results were spectacular!

Ryan and his partner, Edward Hengoed, will have a website soon, but in the mean time, they can be reached at 440-241-7474 for events or custom work.

Here’s a custom piece I had Ryan do for me - the image is a bit distored because I took it at an angle, but it gives a good idea.

Here’s the beginning of the process of making my custom piece…

At this point, he has the basic elements in place and is finishing off the third (red/pink) planet…

This is the view just before the "reveal" of the final image - all of the planets are covered while he adds the space background and the nebulous clouds…

And finally, here’s Ryian showing off the final work (which will soon be hanging in my computer room)!

Tags: Current Events, Reference, Just Cool, Art / Visual, Geek Stuff, General by Jai
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This isn’t really a post in the normal sense that we do them, bit it’s also a bit more than a POTRTP (Picture Of The Random Time Period). Still, it was too cool to pass up.

The picture below is a mock-up of what astronomers say our sky will look like in about 1,000,000,000,000 years as we get nearer to our gravitic collision course with the Andromeda galaxy.

Details aren’t provided, but I suspect the gravitic attraction will be a major problem by this point, but hey, at least it looks cool!

Tags: Virtual, Reference, Just Cool, Science, Geek Stuff, Art / Visual, General by Jai
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Yes, today (Aug 6, 2011) is my wife’s birthday (Happy Birthday, Honey!), but it’s also the 20th anniversary of the very first web page ever made (by the "creator" of the web, Tim Berners Lee).

If anyone ever asks, the web started on Aug. 6, 1991.

Happy Birthday, WWW!

A screenshot of the web on the day it was born! Isn’t it cute?!?

- Historical Duplicate of Baby Web at the w3 site -

Tags: Weird, Retro, Reference, Just Cool, Net Life, Geek Stuff, Links, General by Jai
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Make no mistake, this is an action game! You get a bit of adjustment time to start, but after that, it’s massive scramble!

There are a lot of cool things about this game, including very cool, 8-bit style graphics (I don’t know why that’s cool, but it is!).

Let me ’splain.

No, it’s too much; let me sum up.

CHECK THIS GAME OUT!!!

As I mentioned in the write-up, the graphics are styled after 8-bit graphics; they add a lot to the feel of the game. It works, man!

One unusual feature is that playing other character types beyond your starting wizard are rewards you earn through play. It sounds limiting, but like everything else in this game, it adds to the quick-play aspect (you’re in and playing in under a minute - including registration!).

While there are (many) other players in the game, the play style almost discourages being part of a group. The one place you’ll see A LOT of people is in "The Nexus" - the starting area (city) where you choose which realm you want to explore (the gray/black portals in the screens hot).

- Realm of the Mad God -

Tags: Virtual, Just Cool, Weird, Retro, Reference, Net Life, Art / Visual, Geek Stuff, Software, Gaming, Video Gaming, General by Jai
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Since I played my first Tower Defense game (called, oddly enough, "Tower Defense"), I have pretty much liked them. They’ve never really gripped me, but I’ve always thought they were pretty cool for a casual game category.

Kingdom Rush is one of the better one’s I’ve come across (with some neat twists on the standard recipe), and it’s free!

One negative though, it does require Flash.

Each level / map / step along the path through your kingdom starts out empty (in this case, I’ve added a single archer bunker). Each of the small signs are a location that you can place one of your defenses.

Each game level is a different piece of the path through your kingdom. Sometimes the enemy has multiple routes that you have to protect…

Whenever a new enemy becomes involved, you can click on a popup icon to see details (this also goes for "Tips" in play).

- Play Kingdom Rush on Armorgames.com -

Tags: Just Cool, Virtual, Reference, Net Life, Video Gaming, Geek Stuff, Software, Gaming, General by Jai
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