Sick and Weak Week

I’ve been battling a cold for the past week. It hit me the night before Thanksgiving, and got progressively worst through Monday night. Even though I took the day off from work Monday, Tuesday I felt well enough to head back into the office. Unfortunately, the aching, soar throat and congestion caught back up with me today.

So, in general, Thanksgiving went off well. I went and picked my mom, sister and brother-in-law up and they stayed up at our place for the entire day. I dropped them back off later that night. We had the usual turkey, stuffing, pashed potatoes and gravy, green bean casserole and rutabagas. There was delicious pumpkin and apple pies for dessert.

On Black Friday, I took the day off, partly because I needed a break from work, partly because I was sick (I still did work from home most of the day). I ventured out to GameStop and decided to buy Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock. Wow. What a great game. At some point I’ll update the DA up here with that game and Mario Party 8 (the other game I recently bought for the Wii). I ended up playing a lot of the game Friday, but was just too darned sick to play since. I’m definitely hooked, tho.

Jeff’s book is finished. As a matter of fact, it’s already been printed and I have a copy of it. If you’re interested in getting a copy for a loved one (or even a pure enemy), you can buy it at Amazon.com or Barnes and Noble’s website. It’s a lot of fun!

The Suncoast Studios site is under renovation. Over the next couple of days, you’ll see it offline. When it comes back up, it’ll be prepped and ready for Jeff’s book.

In other SCS news, the Tangible logo is nearly done. I have some Photoshop work to do tomorrow night and then I’ll just burn the files to DVDs and get them off to Brendan. Next up after that is the work for Eman, and finally Millard. I need to organize all the projects on my plate and make sure I understand the priorities…

Sick Thought of the Day: Tissue of (thorat) mucous.

Abstract Thought

Sickly sweet Pepsi. Acrid black coffee. Almost empty water bottle. Belly hunger gone for now, cashews helping.

Upgrading suncoaststudios.com. Backing up data. Will upload DNN package. FTP. Book done. Render almost done. Increase farm.

Moved websites. SQL Server started. Need to run cabling. Who buys the fax machine? Hank helping later today. Network switches are loud. Got spare mouse. Yelled at end-user. Tested video cards. Ordered power supply. Waiting on hard drives. Move coming soon. Need desks. Condition battery. Keys in the top drawer. DLL today. New voicemail! Stacking cables. Where’s VoIP? Tired.

Sick Thought of the Day: Undigested mucous plug in the base of the throat. Gargle phlegm.

Inspired By Robots

I went out yesterday to run some errands and ended up buying Transformers on DVD. I haven’t watched the movie yet (I saw it in the theater), but I watched the behind-the-scenes bonus disc. I have to say that it was very inspiring to see all that. They went over the rendering process and how the shots were blocked for the special effects which, in my opinion, are the most fun of all – to see how a director or visual effects supervisor figures out all that stuff. So, now I feel like shooting a movie. But, I’ve got so many things going on that I don’t have the time. I really need to look at all my projects today and figure out some sense of order and start banging them out.

Here’s what I need to do today:

  • Clean and organize my desk. I’ve let it turn into a pigsty, which I completely hate.
  • Pay some bills
  • Organize all the Suncoast Studios projects

I’m sure that the third bullet point will unfold into a decent sized list.

Sick Thought of the Day: Pieces of rectum on the broken Coke bottle.

Send In The Renders

Ah, the weekend. I am ever so glad it’s here. It’s a time to wash away the stresses of the week and turn your energies inward, hopefully accomplishing some housework, finishing some projects, or just being entertained. I’m about to lay out my master plan for the next two days… Here we go…

I’m currently outputting the final 35mm render for Tangible Entertainment. Some interesting specs on the project:

  • 467 frames of animation
  • 24 frames per second
  • 19.45 seconds of footage
  • Final output resolution: 4,096 x 1,968 pixels
  • 1.85:1 aspect ratio (Flat/Academy Aperture)
  • Current total render time (approximated): 6 days

I’ve been contacted by another filmmaker out in L.A., who wants me to do a title animation for him as well. I’m not going to let the cat out of the bag yet, but he’s pretty well-known in certain internet circles, and I’m sure people in Hollywood know him. We’re going to touch base in the next few days over the phone and discuss what he needs. I’ll dive right into the project as soon as the Tangible render is done.

On another note, we’re very, VERY close to getting Jeff’s book done. I spend about 18 hours with him last Saturday finishing all of the illustrations. We proofread the entire book this past week, and the only real thing left is to read through the requirements from the publisher and see if the cover art needs to be tweaked at all. I may have to redesign the book’s spine, but that should be very simple. I think everything will be done this weekend.

Last Sunday Shauna and I went to a co-worker’s house for the day for a Halloween party. There was a ton of great food, and a bunch of people from the office showed up. Doretha and Ninel were there (Ninel brought the kids; I hadn’t met her older son until then, and haven’t seen the baby since the hospital). We all sat and talked, had fun watching the kids make their own cookies and carve pumpkins, and ultimately just relaxed.

Millard has a new weekly audio podcast, Spam Musubi, where he sits and eats dinner with Will Maier and Eman Laerton each week and they just talk about what they’re up to and their views on things. I find it quite fun to listen to them.

I’m going to pay some bills today, clean the apartment, get a haircut, and wash the car. At some point I’ll also watch some DVDs (Planet Terror, The Ant Bully, and Hostel: Part II came in from my good friends at NetFlix).

I’m in the process of writing my very first song. When it’s done, I’m not going to release it to the public, but I’ll most likely use it in a short or feature I’ll produce. I was surprised when I stumbled across it several days ago on my guitar and had to start working on it. I’m not trained and can’t transcribe it, so I have to rely on memory. At some point I’ll record it in the studio here and bring it into Audition. It’s a very weird thing for me to hear this song (sans lyrics so far) in my head. It’s even weirder that I’m able to slowly find it in the guitar and play it. I’m such a fucking virtuoso.

Oh, I need to go to the store today too.

Sick Thought of the Day: Blood blister under the sack; weeping with puss.