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Sine: Collective Minds

I had a very wild dream this morning. It could very well turn into an interesting book/movie/TV series/game. In the dream a group of people started trying to develop a new and unique operating system for computers. However, they began work with incorporating technology and the human consciousness. The first thing they realized was that if they got people to unify their thoughts that they could communicate telepathically. Eventually they discovered that getting enough minds to work in unison gave the group the ability to use certain psychic/metaphysical abilities. In order to facilitate the unison of minds, they developed a chip that could easily be installed in the back of the neck. This chip allowed the person to “connect” with everyone else who wore the chip. Essentially this produced one collective mind, or rather used everyone in the “network” as a node in a biological super computer… which resembled one mind. This made them all super smart and by directing their thoughts on one purpose, they could use abilities like pyrokinesis, telekinesis, etc… The name of the chip was the Sine (Not sure why… I think it had something to do with the signal it transmitted). There was also a biological agent that they had to infect a person with in order for the chip to work properly. Some where resistant or immune to the virus that made up this agent, these people formed the resistance against the Sine.

The Sine didn’t care about anything but making the connection stronger and increasing their power. They only ate to sustain themselves but skipped “civilized” steps such as slaughtering and cooking their meat. They did have certain nodes who worked solely improving current or creating new technology but for the most part, the rest of the Sine spent their time trying to expand “The wave” by “recruiting” more nodes. If you where resistant to the agent they could still enslave your mind but you couldn’t think for yourself and thusly couldn’t actually act as a decent node. These people where used for hard labor. Individuals who the Sine found to be completely immune to the agent where killed on the spot. Imagine a world where technology has gotten to the point to where people ignore all things civilized and essentially become beasts and machines. There is no love, only power. The entire world was rather post-apocalyptic in appearance except for the few automated Sine cities. They used robots and the enslaved to maintain them. Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been noticing an amazing trend in games over the years. As technology advances, we are better able to create more and more realistic games. Graphically games are becoming more and more advanced with high resolution textures and models, great animation and extensive storyline. One would think that this would mean better games right? Wrong! In my opinion, games are starting to lose their “fun” qualities and take on more “entertaining” qualities. Essentially, game developers seem to be forgetting the most important thing about games: They’re games! I’m just tired of being tricked into buying interactive movies when I want to play a game. The biggest letdown I’ve had over the past few years was the Max Payne series, they where FAR too linear. The game played very straight forward as the story unfolded. Now, the game was great, the gameplay was fun… but the ridged structure of it just felt like I was being forced into things instead of making choices.

Personally, I think that many game development companies are too focused on how a game looks and not focused enough on how the game plays. As games become better and better looking, they seem to lend less to the realm of game play. Almost as if the player is forced to sit and watch the artists show off their work instead of playing a game.

I used to program games on my TI-83+ graphing calculator. These where ugly games, written in a very limited programming language. But I made them fun. Why? Because if they weren’t fun, no one would play them! I didn’t have the fancy graphics and options that modern games have because of the language limitations. However, that didn’t stop me from making very addictive versions of tic-tac-toe, slolum, FPS, maze, guessing, and memory games. I had a blast, and so did the students who I gave the games to. So much so, that the teachers tried to erase all the programs from every calculator in an effort to curb these distractions. Good thing we had them backed up on our computers… or they might have been lost forever. My point here is that even an ugly, option-low game can be very fun and addictive. Games don’t need to be pretty, they don’t need extensive storyline, THEY NEED TO BE FUN!

That being said, graphics and storyline are VERY important for the immersion of a game. Games like Halo 3, Bioshock, and Heavenly Sword are all examples of engaging graphics and storyline. They’re also extremely fun to play (I’ve only personally played Halo 3 and read very good reviews about the other two). Hopefully, as graphics becomes easier for us to utilize and making games pretty becomes super easy, we will be able to focus better on making games fun again. I’ve got good hopes for the game industry. Also… if I ever manage to break into the game industry, I can guarantee that my main focus will be on fun… unless I’m an artist. Nah, fun is king.

Let me just put it this way: People didn’t wait so long in line for Halo3 just so they can see how neat the graphics where. They waited that long so that they could buy the game and blow stuff up in cool new ways! End of story.

Rant to you later,
~Nathaniel

Readers beware, there has been a long, on-going scam dealing with the flu vaccine. Many health care facilities have been pocketing your hard earned money by injecting you with immunologically useless, and often dangerous materials. Be very cautious with considering getting the flu vaccine. What’s going on you ask? Have some groups replaced the actual flu vaccine with something else in order to make money? Not really, in fact you might be safer if they had!
Read the rest of this entry »

Alright, I’m going to post another rant. This one is directed at the gothic subculture. Now, don’t worry, I’m not going to alienate anyone. Let me start out by saying that I identify with the gothic subculture very well. I understand the need for individualism and even the fascination with all things morbid. However, I don’t listen to just angry death metal (I enjoy listening to everything but country and rap), I do not wear all black (but I do prefer dark colors) and I have no piercings or tattoos (although I’ve always dreamed of getting full sleeves). That being said, I am not labeled as “goth” by anyone seeking to stereotype me. Now, just because I don’t appear gothic, doesn’t mean that I can’t identify with them. Now, I’m also not going to label myself as goth either. Because I am not a label. If anything, I’m just that creepy, nerdy, artist guy.
Read the rest of this entry »

I remember the good ole’ days of my being in a college apartment. I didn’t have a job and was surviving off of the $100 a month that my father could spare for me. It was tough not having much money for food, but I manged to get by. I’m going to share some simple tips for super low budget food to help keep the college goer (any anyone else for that matter) at stay least alive. Read the rest of this entry »

This category (dream journal) is dedicated to my subconscious mind. Herein I will be a detailed dream journal. I’m essentially just using this part of my blog as an easy place to keep all of this crud in my brain. I would suggest that everyone create their own dream journals. They can be a useful therapeutic tool. Psychologist Carl G. Jung (1875-1971) believed that dreams where conduits to our unconscious minds. Keeping track of our dreams may help us understand the messages that this relatively unused portion of our brain may be trying to send us. Dreams also tend to be fairly entertaining, both to ourselves and to anyone else who hears them. They are odd and seemingly random although steeped in symbolism. You can pretty much guarantee that your unconscious mind will come up with a story you’ve never heard before. Dreams can also be a great source of inspiration. Many artists, composers, song writers, singers, etc… credit their dreams with inspiring them to create great things (including myself). In any case, the average person will sleep away one third of their life. During this time we dream and upon waking a great many of us forget the experiences we had during this time. Knowing this, it’s crazy that we actually forget about one third of our life experiences. Writing them down seems like a small effort with huge benefits if you ask me.

Expect much more,
Type to you later,
~Nathaniel

I know this doesn’t really fit in, but I figured that I could just as easily give people advice on top of all the other intellectual nuggets I’m likely to express (yes that was a reference to poo). To break open this new category, I’m going to start out with two ways to cure the hiccups, works almost every time.

Some will tell you to do all sorts of crazy things from drinking water from the wrong end of the glass, to standing on your head, getting hit between the shoulder blades, or holding your breath until you pass out. However, I’m going to tell you a two step cure for the hiccups that has been passed down through my family for generations.

Step 1: Take a spoon and get a spoonful of Peanut butter (creamy)
Step 2: Eat that spoonful of peanut butter
Result: Hiccups are gone.

yep, that’s all there is to it. Now if you happen to be allergic to peanuts… well, then it stinks to be you now doesn’t it? The next cure may not suit you either… in fact, it will suit very few.

Step 1: Light a cigarette
Step 2: Smoke the cigarette
Resut: No more Hiccups

Yep that works too. Nicotine actually helps to regulate the muscles of the digestive tract. I worked with a girl who had the hiccups for two weeks. After I suggested she smoke a cigarette (and she did so) the hiccups stopped. Believe it or not, nicotine has many benefits… but they don’t really talk about them too much. But that’s for another post… perhaps a rant.

Please note that smoking peanut butter or eating cigarettes does not cure the hiccups. The former is likely to cause a cough, and the later will actually cause all the symptoms of appendicitis (what you do with that information is none of my business).

Hope that helps, I know the Hiccups can be one of the most annoying bodily functions. Now perhaps it won’t be so bad for you anymore.

Type to you later,
~Nathaniel

When it comes to art, I love it all. Well… all except 2D animation. I really have a ton of respect for those who can survive hour after hour of drawing the same thing… only slightly different… for a living. Seriously, 2D animation has to be one of the most tedius tasks a person can ever undertake.

Lets break down exactly what is needed for 2D animation to occur:

1. In animation, there are 30 frames per second
2. In 2D animation we animate on twos. This means that we’re actually only working with 15 frames per second.
3. That’s 15 Drawings for every second of animation.
4. The average cartoon show is 15-20 minuets long (once you cut out commercials)
5. That’s 13,500-18,000 drawings for your average cartoon show.
6. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (the first animated full-length English color film) is 83 minuets long
7. Thats 74,700 drawings. To save time these guys actually traced stills from video of actual people. That’s why the movement and proportions look to realistic.

This brings me to my conclusion. Based on the experience I have had with making short 3-5 second animations, and judging by the amount of work needed to produce such things, I have decided that EVERY SINGLE SOLITARY 2D ANIMATOR IS INSANE! Yep, they’re all crazy, every last one of them. I’m actually so certain of this that I would bet that every last 2D animator would agree with me completely. These people must really like punishment… not that this fact makes them crazy, but rather that it doesn’t help things at all. These facts are backed up by pretty much everyone in the same art program as I. It’s fairly unanimous, not everyone thinks it’s evil (although most do), but we can all agree that it sucks your soul out through your finger tips. This is likely the cause of the severe cramping that results from drawing thousands of pictures of the same thing over and over and over and over again.

Just keep in mind, next time you’re watching a cartoon that it was created by a bunch of raving loonies.

Type to you later,
~Nathaniel

Yep, I’m going to rant about death now. Humanity seems to have quite the obsession with death. It always has and I suppose it always will. The finality and certainty of its occurrence coupled with the uncertainty of its outcome has lead quite a few to obsess over it, develop their own theories, and almost always fear it. My opinion of death is a simple one, I don’t care for it. I try to not concern myself too much with death for the simple fact that I know it will come eventually, I will not be ready, it will not be fair, but it will happen all the same. In short, although we should prepare for our deaths (wills, no-resuscitation permission, etc…) death should be dealt with when it comes.

My mother taught me a very important lesson about mortality when I was about seven years old. One of our dogs had just recently had puppies. One of the puppies had a larger head and smaller body than the rest and just generally didn’t act the same as the others. It died after being alive for only three days. I was a curious child and I wanted to know. So I asked my mother “Why did that puppy die?” She told me that she had seen the same thing before (she worked at an animal care clinic as a veterinary technician), the puppy had water on the brain.” I knew that couldn’t be too good and I accepted this as a reason for the puppy’s death. A few days later another puppy died, but this one had appeared to be perfectly healthy before. When I asked about this one my mother simply said “Sometimes… puppies just die.” This one phrase pretty much sums up my view on death. I learned in that instance that death can come at any time, to anyone, it is never fair, and rarely makes sense, and you will never be ready for it. I credit this conversation with my being able to handle my own mother’s death when I was nineteen. I cried, I was very upset, but I got to the point to where I could function again very quickly. I did not dwell on her death or ask questions like “why her?” because I already knew that there are no answers.

I honestly believe that excessive mourning is selfish. We mourn because we will no longer enjoy the person’s presence. We do not mourn what they lost, but rather what we lost. Soon after a death, this is expected. It is important to have a small degree of selfishness in order to survive. However, one day, we will be visited by death, and it is best not to spend our time suffering over the inevitable. In short, focus on life, not death. Don’t focus on your own death, or the deaths of those around you. Focus on your life, the lives of those around you, and the lives of those we’ve lost. Life is what is important, death is only a small part of it.

I will end this post with one of my own quotes:
“Fear not death. Fear that you never truly lived.”

~Nathaniel

Also, in celebration of our mortality, and in memory of my departed mother, I am now selling Dead Puppies Merchandise.

I’m going to start off this blog with an article on offense. Much of what I say can be considered by some to be offensive. That’s why I figured I’d start off with a bang and let people know what I think of that. The truth of the matter is that people are far too easily offended now-a-days. It’s ridiculous. Read the rest of this entry »