CLICK-> [link]

This has gotta be one of my most favorite songs right now, and has been for some time. It has a really, really nice music video, too.
This is the kind of stuff that really gets my brain going strong. I really wish they had more than 2 albums released.

Watch / listen to it! Seriously! You won't regret it.

Wow how about that rant the other day, eh? Thanks for the conversation, everyone -- very insightful. (What would my college have to say about all that I wonder?)

Anyhow, not that this is a very big deal to you guys, but I finally got my new portfolio website up. Plastic Shards is gone, now replaced (for better or worse) by my new site ORIANART.

So click the link above to see it or if you're feeling lazy just click here: [link]

Not too radically different from the old one, except that this layout is far more unique to myself while maintaining the "all on one page" JQuery trickery. Plus I developed this version to be very iPad friendly! Let me know if any of you spot any rendering issues in your browser. I only developed this using Chrome, FireFox and an iPad afterall.

EDIT: Check out this alternate version of the site using a completely different JQuery plugin for accordion making -- [link] -- does it run any smoother than the original link above? (Note: upon further testing I found that all javascript runs pretty damn slow in Chrome and Safari. IE and Firefox run both versions of this script flawlessly. Doh.)

Hey everyone, thanks for the info on San Francisco for those who live in / near there. It's a big thing for me to still be thinking about, so I'll definitely be coming in for a visit before I make any final decisions.

Elsewhere, I've been meaning to do a short rant dealing with how I feel retrospectively having gone to art school. I've talked about having gone before, and I've given some advice about choosing a school that's right for you should you choose to go. But you know, having been out for a couple years now, there are a few glaring problems I see not just from the school I attended, but apparently from many schools nationwide. And this deals with offering students a clear path of study for the often specialized career they are looking to get into. Areas of art such as (concept) design, animation, comics/storyboarding/sequential, full-time freelance, and all-over jobs related to working in industry-level professional positions, or in a teamwork-oriented studio setting. (This rant almost exclusively applies to this group, and as you'll come to detect, is almost completely targeted at my own school, so expect many specific accounts and frustrations.)

Let me begin by saying, (in my opinion,) that illustration is inherently a type of art that one does to convey information and ideas and otherwise done as a profession, job, for publishing, source of income, or personal project, etc. Not typically something to be created and hung in a gallery like how fine art usually is. Illustration is more consumed on a greater, reproduced scale.

I have no doubt in my mind that there are many students right now studying in their school's illustration department with the perceived notion that they will receive all the training they'll need to work professionally in a studio. These students know what they want to do and are looking for the instruction to get there -- but there's a good chance they're not going to get it.

I was one of them, and my school completely failed to instruct me on what I needed, and indeed even failed to inform me that the type of instruction I was looking for was not offered in their curriculum. (I should note, however, that I was a bit socially awkward and also didn't talk much to my school about what I was looking to get out of my time there. But, I also know too well that had I talked more, they wouldn't have told me I had come to the wrong place, either. So my conviction remains. The only thing I could've done was do a serious amount of research on the school first, but I'll get to that.) By the time I graduated, I have to admit I left with a deeper understanding and appreciation for illustration -- and some new skills along the way -- but was that enrichment worth over $80K? Having graduated without being offered any teamwork-based "model-studio" style classes or technique & concept building beyond the basics, I felt like my time there should've been only worth 1/3 that at most.

"Well, you see, you get out of it what you put into it! You just have to morph those undesired classes into something more relevant to yourself!" some say. I agree, I've said that too. But when you stop to think about it, when you're paying a huge amount of money to be instructed on subjects that you know you want in your future, shouldn't you never have to take a class that is completely irrelevant to you? What are you paying all that money for, by that point? To do work you'd do on your own outside of class anyway? If you want to broaden your horizons, you should choose to take those classes, not be forced to and waste your time. Although sometimes we don't have a choice. One of my main goals when I was at school was to focus in digital medium. Photoshop, digital panting, 3D, etc. I knew that based on where I wanted to head with my career, it'd be perhaps the only medium I'd ever use (and even be asked to use.) It's frustrating thinking back, and in all my four years there I was able to only take 3 digital related courses. Because only 3 were offered. Digital Basics (a rough introduction to PS, IL, and ID,) Advanced Photoshop (focused more on using the program and its various tools than technique and workflow,) and Painter (again, using painter to make images.) It was all pretty wishy-washy, sort of like a study hall with intermittent explanations, to the point where I fear that most of the students who aren't familiar working with digital forgot everything they learned in those classes as fast as they did "How to play the Recorder" in their 4th grade music class. Instead, we literally had everything thrown at us, especially during the second and third years, at such pace that it came off as side-tracking and useless. "We're going to learn how to use acrylics for the next 5 classes. Alright, now we're doing oils. Alright now we're doing watercolor. Alright now we're doing sculpture. Alright now we're doing collage" -- like this all in one semester. "All right, now we will never speak to you about any of these mediums ever again for your remainder in this school. Congrats, you're all certified to have been introduced to EVERYTHING and be a master of nothing."

"But it's about broadening your horizons! Maybe you never thought of using acrylics before?" is a common rebuttal. Which is true, although for me not as much specifically because I knew for a fact I never wanted to. It's a matter of focus, that there's a complete lack of it. What about the kids who DID want to learn and master acrylic paint? (Or painting in general for that matter.) I don't know about other schools out there, but the classes we were offered taught the base fundamentals of how the medium worked and then kinda left us to figure out the rest ourselves if we chose to use it for each assignment from that point on. They'd have to move over to the fine art department if they wanted further instruction on technique and workflow. For me, I just made all those assignments fit my digital medium goals -- "turn those useless classes into something personally relevant" indeed. Had there been more specialization in place to teach these students exactly what their core interests were, they would grow on their own exponentially after receiving the total foundation for their focus, rather than fragmented bits and bobs from every focus.

Not all students know what their focus will be for their first year in school, of course, I understand that. (I have other thoughts on this, see below in a moment.) However, some may not know even by the time their fourth year rolls around, which to me certainly sounds like the school is failing if the student still has no clue what it is they want to do with their career by then. Perhaps the "throw everything at the wall, see what sticks," technique isn't working and is perhaps only confusing these students further. So this is sort of what this entire rant is about -- it's a warning for lots of you who are considering art school. Heed these personally recommended warnings:

1: RESEARCH THE SCHOOL YOU WANT TO ATTEND
Look into it much closer than just it's campus layout, tuition costs, and samples of previous students work in the promotional guidebook. Look at the offered curriculum. Is your school part of a larger university? Mine was. Know what that means? More distractions! Aside from my art courses, I was also required to take utterly useless (literally high-school level) academic courses inbetween the art in order to get a BFA certificate. These classes were so terribly distracting, on a COMPLETELY DIFFERENT campus in an adjacent city, that I paid almost no attention to them and got terrible grades, grades that can land a person on academic probation if they're not careful. When you're trying to build a portfolio, it's just not something you want to be dealing with. Check to make sure if the school even offers relevant classes to what you want to do. Want to model 3D for games and animation? It's a pretty essential skill if you want to work for a game studio. My school offers nothing of the sort. Had they, I would've undoubtedly taken it. Ask the school you're considering what these classes offer. Leave no doubt in your mind that it will be able to satisfy you if you know what you want.

2: THINK ABOUT WHETHER OR NOT IT'S WORTH YOUR MONEY
This can be taken two ways: is the school worth YOUR money? Or is your money worth spending on art school? Both are important. If you're not in college right now, remember that it isn't required RIGHT after high school. You have time to think about things, even see how you fare 100% on your own. That could be worth being debt-free, but you'd have to have strong self-discipline. This, by the way, leads to...

3: BFA DIPLOMA
It's hard to tell how important a BFA is these days if your work is good enough to stand on its own merit, especially if you have a work ethic and personality to match. There are many specialized schools which teach for only one year, but do so in such a focused manner that you learn everything you'd need within one year of full-time hard work. These schools don't get you a BFA, but they can potentially give you more experience than all the instruction you'd get in a 4-year institution for only one year's cost. If you're getting hired for your skills as an artist and a creative thinker, that experience should be all you need, and all that a smart studio should be looking for. This isn't to say that you shouldn't have one, or shouldn't need one -- after all, if you haven't gone to school yet how do you know how much you'll improve by the time you graduate to make it worthwhile? If you choose to, though, it IS possible to work professionally without even having gone to school. You just have to beat your own ass to get there.

And lastly,
4: DON'T CONSIDER GOING TO MY SCHOOL.


_______________________________________________________________________________________________
OTHER GRIPES

What's up with grading in art schools? How do instructors grade art? "D. This did not meet my personal tastes. Try again." I understand that it's probably more of a mark to tell the student how much effort the teacher perceived, but telling the student that in critique (like how all art should be reviewed) is likely to be far more effective because it's done in front of all your peers where you feel pressured to perform better next time, you learn some crucial humility to crush your cockiness from thinking you could've gotten away with such poor effort. Grades just reinforce the feeling that you're a student. A student. With homework. Homework that you'll procrastinate on because it's HOMEWORK. Art students shouldn't be treated like students, but instead like employees, and their work taken as seriously as a job, and if they don't perform they eventually get fired (from the class.) And if they want back in to try again, they need to re-interview with the teacher as to why they'd be a good fit to be part of the team again.

This rant has not been proofread because I'm rambling. This has obviously been bothering me for some time, hahah. Your mileage will vary on this.

Hey all! This journal will only apply to a few of you who live in the San Francisco Bay area. And even then only to an even smaller subset of you.

So here's what's up: I need to get out of Boston. It's art-related job market has been... slow to say the least. Boston is great if you're a graphic designer or marketing analyst, (shit loads of jobs here for web design and advertising,) but not a whole lot to choose from in terms of art professional production / studio jobs. Here we only have a couple game studios, all of which are either 1) big-big-name studios so if an artist position opens up, competition is impossibly fierce and (nail-in-my-coffin) require 3D modelling and texturing, or 2) they are also studios I don't want to work for. (See: Rockstar, EPIC, Zynga. Irrational Games would be cool, but again -- the whole 3D requirement thing and fierce competition.) I'm also getting a bit tired of Boston and New England's ridiculous climate. I also just plain want to live in San Francisco for at least a part of my life, so now is the right time or never.

Now, moving to the very other side of the country is an exciting and daunting prospect. It's exciting because I've never traveled very far on my own, let alone move to some place outside my own state, and I love finding new places to explore and acclimate to. (I've scoured every inch of Boston by this point, let me tell you.) I would also be moving with almost nothing except my bare necessities, also an exciting thought since I've been trying to minimize my possessions lately. (I don't like feeling weighed down by owning a lot of junk. Looking forward to selling my furniture hahah.) Then of course, there's relations: I obviously know next to know one in San Francisco. I have one relative who lives in the city, whom I will no doubt get quite a bit of help from, but aside from maybe one other person, my social network is more or less going to start off blank.

So, this is kinda where you guys (those of you who live there) come in. Any of you who are willing to help out, I'd love any (insiders?) information about SF you think I should know about, places I should focus around, or even things like potential job leads you might by chance know of or something, or a room if you know you're gonna be having a spare place to stay in the future! I'd also just plain like to meet some new people and rebuild a local network. (Almost everyone I knew in Boston has left the city in the last two years, hahaha, so I'm definitely up for meeting new people.)

So if you're in the area and you can help me out at all don't be afraid to comment / note me!

I'm planning on moving most likely within a year, or just after a year. Definitely no later than the end of August 2013. (Gotta save up some more money.) I'll be coming this late spring/early summer to visit for a week or two and scope things out for myself. Also ss far as cost goes, I know San Francisco itself is expensive. But, remember, I've been living in Boston (a city always on a top-10 most expensive list) for almost 7 years now off of retail job money, and while it's on average 13% cheaper in rent prices compared to San Francisco, pay rates are also a good 15% less or more, so it nearly evens out. Aside from the tax increase, it shouldn't feel much different to me. Thanks any/everyone!

Edit 1: So Oakland is pretty much, as far as I can gather, the equivalence of Dorchester for me. In MA, Dorchester and Roxbury are cheaper places to live compared to other Boston neighborhoods, but also offer up ridiculously high crime rates and some undesirable conditions. (Nearly 50% of all murders in Boston occur in Roxbury and Dorchester.) One look at Universal Hub [link] will find an article about a shooting, bank robbery, or some other crime in Dorchester almost immediately. (Note: I just took a look and it took till page 3 or 4 to find an article about a man getting shot. You've been behaving lately I see!) I never wanted to live in these towns, so I definitely wouldn't be looking at Oakland XD

[ReadMe: Alright guys, get ready for this wall of text rant tonight. (Note: this is NOT a review of the Vita. You can get that from any major game review network.) This is just a rant I had to rant about because I'm a nerd, and it's fully opinionated, despite I talking like what I'm saying is pseudo-factual. Your agreement with me may vary, though this is pretty inconsequential stuff.]

So lately I've been hearing a lot of people eager to look at their watch and pronounce the precise time that portable gaming has passed. I don't have any crazy statistical facts or deep market research on the matter, but I don't entirely think portable gaming on dedicated devices such as the 3DS and Vita is in decline like headlines constantly make it seem -- it's likely still growing (or at the very least remaining rather level.) It's just that compared to NON-dedicated-device gaming such as on smartphones and tablets, the dedicated market is beginning to pale in comparison. (I could be wrong about this, but these are just my thoughts as an observer.) Here in Boston, you seriously can't walk a block on any sidewalk without seeing someone using an iPhone 4 (yes, specifically the 4,) so its no wonder that many of them probably make a small game purchase here and there adding to the overall market share in software sales. The prices in the App Store and Android Market are so low at $0.99 to $4.99 on average, it tempts people to buy their game purely on low-cost impulsive nature. So now that we have both Sony and Nintendo with their latest modern handhelds out, man $20 to $35 is tough to look at in comparison these days.

I personally greatly dislike iOS/Android gaming. Well, I should say I don't have a problem playing an iOS/Android game and enjoying it, it's more a matter of engagement. I'm rarely (if ever) engaged to the point of wanting to go back and revisit those titles again for a second playthrough (if I ever even played all the way through it to begin with.) "But hey, they were like a buck or two, so whatever I got my money's worth, right? I'll just go get another one and play that one for a little bit." This style of playing games creates a really low-cost market, lots of cheap games available all the time. Likewise, it promotes the creation of a lot of "cheap" games as well -- games that were cheap to develop and put out the door for profit. (Of course there are major exceptions to this -- some smaller collaborative projects of games get published for pocket change prices since the team was more focused on getting their name out there instead of monetary gain, which is definitely cool.) But for the most part, a game that launches at $2.99 is going to have $2.99 gameplay. (This is why puzzle style games are a dime a dozen on these app stores -- they're the easiest genre to develop an intriguing, addictive gameplay for that appeals to the most people, not to mention being the easiest to just jump into for a quick minute and then get on with life. Handy, that.) Games that publish to these markets sometimes launch at high prices, upwards of $14.99, and they try to offer serious gaming experiences usually only found on home consoles or dedicated handhelds. Their sales likely don't fly right out the gate. Again if only because of its price which bars a lot of the trigger-impulsives. So it's usually not long before the price of that game drops as much as 50% to compete more with the sea of impulse titles. So where does that company go from there? It's a different story for each game -- some companies find great success, develop a sequel, and drop the price of the first upon release of the second. Some end up breaking even (or worse) and figure it's better to switch gears on a different project than risk that all over again (which can be saddening especially if it was a legitimately good title, but just plain flew under the radar from complete lack of hype.)

So what bothers me about all that up there is that as phone/tablet gaming is becoming more and more popular, people are looking at the 3DS and (more specifically) PS Vita and expecting that the trends of the App Store should carry over to these devices too. But I don't fully get why. Mobile phone and tablet games are, for the most part, developed as quick-fix time-fillers whereas games for dedicated devices are mostly developed as "experiences." That is, games with greater amounts of freedom, depth, story, plot, character, longevity -- you know, the stuff found in console games. I don't want to say that dedicated portables are in a different league than phones, (especially since the Vita offers bite-size "Minis" which are iOS ports or similar style titles,) but it does become a bit hard to directly compare the two. I'm not even going to say that BUTTONS make the difference, because honestly a group of intuitive, smart people can develop engaging control schemes on touchscreen devices that take into account the natural difference of the input method -- rather than just slapping virtual button overlays. Just about any game can be adapted effectively to a touch screen / gyro input combo if enough time is spent on developing the perfect configuration. It just feels as though the effort found in dedicated-device games is rare to come across in iOS/Android titles partly because the market there has revealed itself to be possibly quite lucrative in the impulse-buy price range. The other part is likely due to the fact that a majority of people who play games on-the-go just aren't looking for super-engrossing hardcore epic titles to get lost in for hours on-end. (even accidentally.)

So what am I ranting about? Well, I bought a PS Vita a few weeks ago because I legitimately want to support the platform. I'm not a console gamer anymore, though this is purely because of lifestyle changes and not a dislike of consoles. (I may as well not even own a TV because I haven't used it in years.) So portable gaming like the Vita is something I was looking forward to, because as a pure Steam user on my desktop PC, the Vita (should be) capable of providing some pretty deep gaming experiences while I'm out, visiting home, on my bed, etc. I've always had a bit more interest in dedicated portable gaming since I was a little kid, anyway -- starting off with the good ol' brick Game Boy 1992 (I was 5.) I had a Pocket, Color, Advance SP and DS Lite. I got a PSP on launch-week and used that perhaps the most out of all my other portables. (I certainly owned the most games for the PSP. Probably because it was so easy to just go out and buy a game myself by that point. Crazy to think that during my whole time owning a Game Boy, I only had about 8 to 9 games for it.) So for me, by now, picking up a Vita was sort of a no-brainer. And it's price of $250 is honestly still better than I was expecting Sony to retail it at. The original PSP was $250 at launch. The 3DS was $250 at launch. A pretty standard point-n-shoot camera is $250. A 160GB regular iPod is $250. (Man, still?)

I will admit, it's obvious that Sony is trying to rack up some profit on the Vita's proprietary internal memory cards, which factor into end-cost of the system, but I have no idea why anyone would need larger than the $20~$30 8GB card at the start, especially if all you're really gonna be doing is gaming on it like it's REALLY designed for. The memory will get cheaper later on, even third-party cards for even cheaper. Why get a 32GB card for $100 so early on? If I need the extra space, I can always swap content out, whatever. But if that's just not enough, which won't be soon (and I have 2 full games and a bunch of demos on there at the moment,) I'm sure by that time a cheap option will be available.

I've really been enjoying it a lot, though, and I'm impressed with the system Sony has produced for its price. (Speaks a lot about where we've come since 2004 hardware and manufacturing wise.) I'm a big fan of the Wipeout series, and I'm ecstatic to have 2048 with its unique "where it all began" design concept and (it must be said) killer graphics. Wipeout Pure was my first PSP game. So this was a fitting first choice for the Vita. I also had wanted to play through Rayman Origins for a while, but the prospect of playing such a thoughtful, lengthy platformer on a portable just felt more appealing to me (having played MANY of these lengthy platformers on ye olde Game Boys as well.) I'm not even going to get into how often I've stopped just to pinch-zoom on the screen to view some of that beautiful 2D artwork more closely. So far I'm having a blast on this thing, and I'm looking forward to a bunch of other great experiences in the future on it, I'm just hoping that developers join in and create them, instead of resigning to developing more into the sea of mediocrity found in the app stores. Or at the very least try to break that mediocre standard that's infesting them, if not developing for the Vita.

(disclaimer: yeah, I'm generalizing a bit, of course. there are undoubtedly worthwhile appstore games out there. I just happen to not really notice or care about any of them yet compared to titles developed for dedicated platforms. I want to care, but in my opinion the market just hasn't matured enough for me to.)

Relevant additional comment: What's interesting as well is that this generation of handhelds (DS and PSP onward) were among the first handheld consoles to be aimed at more than just kids. The DS and PSP and now especially the 3DS and PS Vita all feel especially higher grade, to appeal to 20-somethings and up. It's cool because it's as though (say) Nintendo started with me as a kid and worked their way up to much more mature handhelds. Not to say the games matured, (for nintendo,) but the approach to the hardware and appeal certainly did. Mobile gaming on phones and tablets are RIGHT NOW in that infancy stage like the Gameboy was back in 1990. The games at launch were, for the most part, quite casual.

I don't rant very often about real life, but I can't let this one slide. Sorry if this is a useless journal entry for most of you, I just gotta freaking vent.

So the worst thing? Customers who don't understand anything.

So I work in a retail store. We sell equipment. Some of it is very expensive. Sometimes when we sell something to a customer, it gets damaged during its shipping after manufacture. This gets people really mad, and yell at us in the store / over the phone about how they spent all this money and get something that (usually) has a cosmetic blemish or in worse cases a broken piece.

To these customers, it's terrible that you got the luck of the draw, but it's actually just that -- bad luck. We didn't intentionally sell you the product in that damaged state. We rely on the manufacturers of these products and their quality control departments to make sure these products don't wind up in our stock rooms -- because we sure as hell don't open up every one of these huge boxes and inspect every piece for damage before shipping it to you. Sometimes one bad one just makes it through the gate. These manufacturers have warranties for this very reason: to honor you as their customer and to make sure you get the full working product you paid for. We, as the store who sold it to you, can't do jack, (just so you know,) outside of the one thing we can (and will) do to honor you as our customer: to exchange you a new, working-order one for the broken one, or to take it back as a return entirely. Don't demand us to shower you with lots of free stuff JUST because you had a minor (YES, MINOR,) inconvenience for a day. The sooner you accept the fact that shit happens in the everyday world and that things are put in place to resolve that shit, you can be a happier, less stressed-out individual. And the people who are trying to help you will like you more in the process, and be more willing to see you satisfied! Imagine that? Be rest assured, your sob story can be far outdone by people of actual need. And the real kicker is that those people tend to not always feel entitled to it. So humble yourselves.

Man, first world problems.

*Note: I work at a store in one of the wealthiest, most family-oriented parts of Metro Boston. I will say I'm not surprised to put up with this as often as I do. Having lots of money doesn't entitle you to run the store to your liking.

Hey guys, time to lighten the load!

This time around the focus is on my photography gear! I don't use it much anymore. (I favor my smaller lighter option these days -- haven't taken the EOS 40D out for a spin in... over a year? Probably.) I thought I'd toss it up here before ebaying it. I'm an honest seller! Free shipping on anything if you live in the states. I can provide detail photos of any of the things here -- I'm just being lazy at the moment so I'll produce on inquiry.
Here's what I got going on --


Canon EOS 40D Body + 28-135mm IS lens + Accessories :: Asking for $600
My trusty ol' EOS 40D! This guy's a beast. During 2008-2009, it was my best friend during my ventures around Boston. After the summer of 2009, I didn't go out as often, and as a result, it's been in my bag without use. It's got about 9000 actuations on it, a little bit of wear on the rubber grip, and a few little scratches on the screen, but it's otherwise in great and strong working condition. Never been dropped, never taken a nasty bump even! The lens as well, great working condition with no scratches on the glass, no misaligned elements -- all good! Focuses like a champ.
The camera comes with the following:
- The EOS 40D itself
- The EF 28-135mm f:3.5-5.6 IS lens
- 4GB 30MB/s SanDisk Extreme III CF card
- 2 Batteries + Charger
- UV Protection Filter for 28-135 lens (72mm diameter)
- Canon - to - Nikon Mount adapter ring (for manual lenses only)
- Strap
- USB tether cable
- All documentation, installation discs, packaging, original box
- Probably a drawing from me or something for fun
Update: If someone's interested in the body only, I'd sell it for $400 (plus applicable accessories) separately from the lens. $200 for the lens.

Katz Eye Optics EOS 40D, 50D, 60D Split-Prism Focusing Screen :: Asking for $100
This was a cool accessory I bought for my 40D, but I'm not selling it bundled with the camera because of how rare it is to find these things. This screen was treated with their Opti-Brite coating which enhances the transparency of the screen, allowing you to use lenses as slow as f/3.5 without the split-prism blacking out.
It's compatible with the Canon EOS 40D, 50D, and 60D ONLY. It's easy to install without any tools needed. This screen is 100% undamaged in its original holding case. It's as good as new. Check out their website for more info on it: [link]

Canon EF 50mm f1.8 II Lens :: Asking for $70
Best bang-for-buck value on a lens you can ever get. The "Plastic Fantastic" as it's called retails usually for about $110 and takes really decent photos considering how simple of a lens it is. It's in pretty good condition -- focuses fast and accurately, only a small scratch on the exterior casing, perfectly fine otherwise. For any of you EOS owners out there STILL ONLY stuck with your kit lens, this is a great first lens to play with without breaking your bank. Learn about the importance of prime lenses! Zooming is for chumps.
- Comes with top and bottom caps.

As a heads up, I may be selling my PowerShot G12 as well, but not until the 40D is gone. And not until after a little vacation I'm taking later this fall. I'm probably going to be asking for $350 or so for it, so if you're interested in that, let me know and I'll wait list you. (It's in flawless condition, btw. It's not very old, to be honest.)


Note me if you want to set up an arrangement to buy! Paypal is my preferred payment method, and I'd prefer to ship this internally within the US, but if you're willing to pay shipping we may be able to do an international deal through USPS flat rate or something. (The box for the 40D is pretty small, so it should fit in a flat rate box quite easily.)

(God you'd swear I work for Wacom or something.) I've sure owned enough of their products, though. I picked up a super cheap ACAD version of the Int4 Wireless for my laptop, since my Cintiq isn't exactly portable, and I liked the prospect of not having to always use a cable.

There are lots of reviews of the Intuos4 Medium Wireless out there, but they don't talk about a few key points that I'm sure a number of prospective buyers would like to know about. So this isn't going to be a full-on review -- this is an Intuos4 so EVERYTHING about it is standard fare intuos4ness. I'll just talk about some of the notable differences between this and the standard wired medium.

1) The Wireless version's active area is smaller than the Medium's, and smaller than the drawing surface indicates. The ACTUAL detectable area on the tablet is inset about a quarter inch on each side from the edge of the drawing surface, on top of the surface already being a bit smaller than the Medium already. It's a very particular little problem. You can feel the perimeter of the drawing surface with your wrist or the pen nib when you hit it. Yet, the cursor hits the edge of your screen far sooner than the pen will. I'm still not fully adjusted to how odd this is in actual use. (On all prior Intuos tablets I've owned, the detectable area was always slightly LARGER than the drawing surface, which made using scroll bars really easy since if your pen passed over the surface perimeter, you know you're at the edge of the screen.) This isn't a problem for drawing, really. It's more annoying for navigating menus and things related to the edges of the screen. It feels like I'm always overshooting everything because I'm STILL expecting to have to move the pen just the little bit more to click "File" for example. What's strange is that the pen continues to be tracked even as far as a half-inch away from the OUTSIDE of the drawing surface. So the cursor just glides around the edges of the screen for what feels like a pretty substantial portion of the active area. It's not a deal-breaker or anything, it'll just take some getting used to. After all, I measured the actual working area of the tablet, and it IS what Wacom advertises.

2) The wireless mode works -- really well in fact. And on the first try! It's worth noting that the only machine I've used it with is my MacBook Pro, but I can't imagine it being any less reliable in Windows. A lot of people voice concern over weather or not the wireless mode exhibits more lag compared to wired mode -- and the answer is not at all. The only thing that changes in wireless mode is the refresh rate of the cursor. It drops to about half as quickly updated than wired. (Like, 30 fps for wireless, 60 fps for wired.) This doesn't add any lag, though, seriously. (Unless you try to wake it from sleep if you leave it alone for like 5 minutes.) I believe the reduction in refresh rate is just some power-saving method.

3) It's a better option if you're looking for power efficiency on a laptop. So when I unplug my MacBook Pro, wireless on, 3/4 brightness, I always start off with about 6:20 on the battery clock. When I plug in a normal wired Intuos4, (or the wireless one here over USB,) that time immediately plummets to around 4:30 and never gets higher than that after several refreshes. Indeed, over USB, a tablet eats quite a bit of power. However, I was interested to see that wireless fares MUCH better. Your bluetooth radio consumes far less energy than a powered USB connection, so while your Bluetooth is turned on -- Intuos4 connected or not -- your laptop's battery life will remain constant. After all, wirelessly the Intuos4 has its own on-board power source to consume. Just keep it charged, and you can see as much as an entire extra hour of use on a MacBook Pro. (Indeed, the battery clock reports 5:50 after unplugging the USB cable and flipping on the bluetooth radio.) Also it's interesting to note that the Intuos4 literally uses something similar to a cellphone battery. It sure lasts a hell of a long time, and charges pretty quick too.

That's all I got on this. Look up other reviews online if you want to find out more about the other usual stuff!

3D modelling (especially for the purposes of low-poly/video game industry,) does greatly interest me. I've been wanting to learn how to effectively model for years now. I think such a skill would make me more valuable in the job market, as various studios require 3D modelling abilities to bring sketches up to finished usable assets. I have access to 3DS Max at the moment, which as far as I know is one of the industry standard modelling apps. My goal is to learn how to model environments, props, etc. (Not characters, rigging, animation, etc. ....... yet, anyway.)

So now, I'm turning to you guys to see if any of you are 3D modelers and have any resources you can suggest to help me learn effectively. I'd like to see what I can learn around the net first before I resort to something like taking classes or a gigantic 1000+ page bible on the subject. I'm willing to spend money on some excellent teaching resources (like videos, books, etc,) if you know they're incredible learning tools.

A few questions off the bat:
- How to effectively model objects. (subquestions: does EVERYTHING need to be made of tris and quads to be acceptable? Does an object have to be made from one single mesh? Or can it be multiple that make up the whole somehow? If that makes sense.)
- How to texture an object with UVW mapping.
- What is the actual difference between 3DS Max and Maya aside from "minor things / personal tastes"?
- What's the difference between choosing "Convert to editable Mesh" and "Editable Poly" when modelling?
- I'm sure many more will arise when I start seriously learning, though hahaha.

Any feedback from any of you modelers out there would be supremely appreciated!

Wacom has been very busy since the release of its last Cintiq, the 21UX (what I have.) New small models, introduction of a wireless intuos, a capacitive tablet pen + apps, and the new inkling.



But damn, look at what they just came out with: [link]
It's mighty impressive. And mighty huge. And mighty expensive. Watch the video on Engadget to see what that funky new stand can do.

The new IPS screen is a nice new feature, as is the over-the-edge-drop-down stand -- but one thing that I'm glad to see finally come back are the multi-sized, arranged expresskeys (similar to the old Intuos3 layouts,) which are just plain easier and more ergonomic to use. The Intuos4 "in-line" layouts work, but just aren't as smooth in actual operation -- it's easy to hit the wrong key a lot of the time.

While the new features are great, there's one thing that appears to be notably lacking which is killer for me: rotation. While drawing on my 21UX, I rotate the tablet on its stand ALL THE TIME just as easily as a sketchbook on a desk. This allows me to tilt the "paper" to the right angle to get a more comfortable, more accurate stroke from the pen. Wacom may have forgone this feature from the new Cintiq because all software these days can rotate the canvas virtually. For me personally, though, I've just never been fond of rotating the canvas like that. It's not the most intuitive thing to do in the world since you have to use a macro or a specific tool to do it. Plus rotating often makes the pixels look fuzzy, especially if you don't rotate back to perfect 0-degrees again. I'd take physical rotation over virtual rotation any day. (Maybe it's just me -- I like using the parallel edges of the cintiq to gauge the angle of my strokes. I can't do that with virtual rotation since it becomes more difficult to tell.) -- (Also it weighs 65 lbs. My 21UX is a beast at 27 lbs as it is, and I move it alllll around my desk. Dunno what I'd do with this thing.)

I would kill for that color gamut and IPS screen, though. Not sure how much I care about widescreen, but I will admit that the 21UX screen could be much better than it is.

Anyway, for any of you guys saving up for a new Cintiq 12WX, I'd suggest holding off a little longer -- Wacom's been on a roll lately so hopefully they'll release a new version that won't have such a strangely colored screen. I could be wrong, though, and you'd end up waiting like 2 years. For any of you guys saving up for a 21UX, well damn, you just got a whole new somethin' to look forward to now.

So, Wacom has announced a new product recently called the "Inkling." [link]

Video here: [link]

It's some sort of 3D-Space reading device that you clip to a piece of paper that reads the exact location of a special pen. As you draw on paper, those movements are saved to the small device, along with pressure sensitivity. Finish your drawing, hook it up to the computer via USB, and upload your drawings to a program of a choice such as Photoshop. Your sketches appear as vector data or pixel data, fully editable.

Now, I have to admit, to me this is a bit unexpected from Wacom, to try making a tablet like experience ... without the tablet. (An especially unexpected product launch considering the Cintiq 12WX hasn't seen an update since its launch almost 4 years ago.) It looks extremely niche, though. Even more niche than the Bamboo Touch tablet. I can't entirely wrap my head around the total usefulness of this device. From what I can tell, even by Wacom's own words, it's designed for doodles, rough sketches, and quick "brainstorming" like drawings. You probably won't be pumping out the final inks for a comic with this thing. So for $200, it allows you to instantly get quick sketches on your computer... for what, exactly? Maybe if you have a doodle blog and you post EVERY SINGLE THING you doodle on there, this could be a tremendous time saver over scanning everything. (From the looks of it, the device seems well accurate enough to reproduce doodles quite well, but you might have to do some minor tweaking to maintain true-to-life likeness.) But if you don't need to do this, then... you'd probably be better off doodling in a sketchbook normally and scanning / photographing whatever looked good later. Especially if you're worrying about creating good finished digital versions of your doodles, spend the $200 on a Bamboo Craft to get some good spacious inking control, or get a normal Bamboo Pen tablet and Tool SAI if you don't have a program to draw with. At least that way 1) you can work off scanned doodles in the computer with accuracy and 2) you can doodle on paper with any pen you want without an extra piece of hardware.

I'm not sure if I'm missing the point of this thing, or some greater use for it that I'm not recognizing?

The Microsoft Courier would have been far more interesting to doodle with if you were concerned about digital doodle conversion. Too bad that thing was vaporware, though. (I still have not forgiven you for that, microsoft.)

UPDATE: You know this thing would actually be really useful for rough animation and animatics. You could hit the little "new layer" button for each new frame of animation. That could be a GREAT time saver from photographing each frame individually.

Might want to check out this doozey of an article dealing with the company that owns The Art Institutes and other a few other college "chains."

NY TIMES: "Education Management Corporation Accused of Widespread Fraud"

This should be a pretty good read for anyone who is either currently a student at one of these colleges OR is considering on going to one.

I always had a bad feeling about AI's, that's why I never considered going to one. After reading that, I'm glad I never did. (The college I went to, The Art Institute of Boston (AIB) is in no way associated with the AI's. I don't know how much I can fully recommend going to AIB either, but it'd sure be a hell of a lot better than an AI school.)

[found via ~YanYu]