Only Human

Woke up early today. Of all the minutes of this night, i woke up a humble minute before a friends misplaced cellphone alarm went off. And i'm awake! I wish i could wake up like that on a work-day, instead of having to slowly wake up, a process which takes up to 30 minutes!

Possible solution: The Sleeptracker Elite! I'll report my results.

Edit 20.10.2011: First night testing it. Didn't go well, because i barely slept. No use having an alarm wake me if i'm already awake. And the strap is a bit sweaty when wearing it.

Edit 24.10.2011: A success so far! It's easier to wake up in the morning, as the alarm always goes of when i'm almost awake (that happens oftener than i thought). If these results keep up the whole week, it will be the best 1000,- i've ever spent.

I've started using Maya instead of 3d Studio Max, and after 8 hours of tutorials from 3dBuzz: so far i am loving this 3d application. It is easier and it is more customizable, its faster and more precise, and a better (but messier) UI.

The only issue i've encountered so far is that Maya seems incapable of importing other 3d formats. By using plugins i managed to import *.FBX files, but right out of the box it only support native formats.

I've yet to set it up against the real challenge; character rigging, my great white whale. Character rigging was impossibly difficult in 3d Studio Max and is why my game project have been held up for more than a year. It was always an issue stopping me from continue, and soon i dreaded searching the web for why things was happening against all my logic. Like importing my animation and half my character suddenly moving the left leg 30 degrees forward. WHY?! It made me uninstall 3d Studio Max in a fit of rage. Hopefully Maya wont have these problems.

Wish me luck. :)

All movies i watch, i vote on at IMDB, because i just love to track what i do. But voting with numbers are very subjective, and i strive to vote as accurately as possible. In that effort, i've found a system i use to decide what number i will vote on a one to ten scale.

This list was not made by me, but by someone at nwvault forums for voting for Neverwinter Nights modules. I have adapted them for movie voting.

Right now it feels like it is game drought and as a result I've started playing MMO. First I tested Lord of the Rings Online and got two friends to join me on this. Then another friend persuaded me to try Champions Online. Both games are Free-To-Play, and both games cost me about 80 NOK each month, and they cost nothing to buy. They was both good enough that I found it worth paying at least for a month.

It is winter time, and you might want to make it snow on your website. Let's try to make it in jQuery!

Creating the snow

Create two pictures with snow in some picture editor. It has to be saved in a picture format supporting transparency. 24 bit PNG is a good choice. Make the snow, and make the background transparent. Size doesn't matter, but the picture must be tile-able.