Posted on December 30, 2002

• Added “Confluence” to the gallery today. I’m not sure many of you will want to use it as a wallpaper (Jessie greeted it with a “Ewwww”), but it’s what I’ve been working on for the past couple of days so I felt I should post it.

  One might think that I’ve been reading too many pregnancy books lately, and that would be correct assumption. This image, however, was inspired by a different book that Jessie gave me for Christmas called ” Heaven & Earth: Unseen by the Naked Eye“. Anyway, I hope you enjoy looking at it (even if it doesn’t make it onto your desktop).

  As a technical note I want to mention that “Confluence” was created completely using Lightwave “Hypervoxels” (with transparency and full refraction). I wanted to test out my new system’s rendering speed (this verdict: fast).

Posted on December 28, 2002

• I’ve added a dual-monitor version of “Aquamarine” to the 2X gallery (due to many requests).

Posted on December 27, 2002

• I finally finished “moving in” to my new workstation yesterday so today I spent doing some Lightwave work. I started some new projects, but it remains to be seen whether they will be keepers or not. I also went through all of the comments I received regarding “Polaris” and made a few changes. You’ll find a new, blue, version on the New Images page (the original green version is in the Pickle Jar). I hope you approve of the changes.

• My Dad, Thurman, recently got back together with his old college band, “The Fratiers”, and cut a CD. A few months ago they played a reunion show at their alma mater, Illinois Wesleyan, and brought down the house (or so I hear). He’s been playing in rock bands for as long as I can remember (my favorite was called “Thurmo-Nuclear and the Fallouts”) and his guitar skills are still pretty sharp.

  Don’t believe me? Check out this link my brother sent me the other day. It’s an interview with one of the band members done for the school magazine. That’s my Dad on the far left of the photo. Scroll to the bottom of the page and you can hear their rendition of “Louie, Louie” with my Dad on lead guitar. He’s going to be 58 this year, but he still rocks!

Posted on December 24, 2002

• My work with “Aquamarine” and “Blue Christmas 2002” made it painfully clear to me that my workstation with no longer up to snuff. Each of those images was delayed 2 or 3 days simply because the renders kept crashing! I’ve been using the same dual 1-Ghz box for over 2 years now and now I’ve decided it’s time to upgrade.

  The new box from Dell was delivered this morning (I ordered it on the 11th) and I’ve been working all day migrating to the new system. It’s a pretty nice setup: dual 2.8 Ghz, 2 GB RAM, 148 GB SCSI HDD, DVD+RW, QUADRO 900, and (gulp!) Windows XP Pro. The best part about the new system is the 20″ Dell 2000FP flat-panel display. I’m in love!

  Hopefully the new box will mean faster renders and more timely updates for you.

  Anyway, I’ll be taking the next couple of days off for the holidays. We’re staying put this year. We’ll go to midnight mass Christmas Eve and hang out with our friends on Christmas. I’m going to really miss seeing my family though.

  I hope you all are where you want to be for the holidays. Jessie and I really appreciate the support you’ve given us and we both want to wish you all the best for the Holidays and for 2003!

Posted on December 21, 2002

• Added “Polaris” to the gallery today. I still have a few things I want to tweak with this image (as I’ve been doing for the past 2 or 3 days), but I think it’s to a point where it’s good enough to be seen in public. I’d also like to hear what suggestions/comments, if any, you folks might have. I’ll probably have another version of this posted before the end of the day and all of the renders will be available in the Pickle Jar.

  UPDATE:I’ve posted another update to Polaris on the new images page (just tweaking the aurora a bit).

  UPDATE II:I’ve posted a dual-monitor version of Polaris on the 2X page.