floating trees

Floating flashlight in the Hunter Camp area, remained even when reloaded back into the area later on. Perhaps spawned with an enemy wave and never cleaned up, or placed for dramatic effect intended to be seen from the water it points at, maybe in a scripted scene, but again not cleaned up properly, thus becoming a feature of the game experience, the floating phantom flashlight. Creepy.

T-Pose soldiers. I suspect these were intended to spawn “dead” as this mission is revisiting an area we’ve previously played through, so odds are the scripter here wanted you to see bodies from your last time through. If these soldiers were already loaded then spawning them “dead” would be cheaper then having dead guy props made if art has time to support that. Every game with dead guys I’ve worked on has had to address this question, do you make prop dead folks, or spawn and kill via script some NPCs? Almost always this question comes down to what is better for memory and who has more time available to support the scripters. Art props will better match the scene, however they’ll likely be easily discernable from NPC models, no matter the texture resolution. You can just tell NPCs apart from set dressing. NPCs spawned and killed by script can do some unpredictable things though, such as sprawl through furniture, or adopt strange / vulgar yoga poses, or simply ignore the kill order and adopt the T pose, a pose that reflects a discrepancy between the states the NPC has in his fight tree and what state / event the scripter tried to call.

Magical levitating cadaver. What would Tim Curry say?

Sloppy prop placement in COD Black Ops. While the pot is a physics prop, this wasn’t knocked into the corner, it propagated there, possibly knocked into the corner when other props spawned into the scene. Intersections and / or jittering happens to everyone using any sort of physics props or gibs in current gen consoles.

Pedestrian pileup reflects sloppy scripting post-spawning cleanup in COD Black Ops

Sloppy prop placement in COD Black Ops

While working on Tribes 2 I had a brief side stint as the colorist, text, & FX guy for a promotional comic written by mighty scribe Blake H. and drawn by ninja wrist Robert C.here’s the tail end of that and some other bits I did along the way.

While working on Tribes 2 I had a brief side stint as the colorist, text, & FX guy for a promotional comic written by mighty scribe Blake H. and drawn by ninja wrist Robert C.

While working on Tribes 2 I had a brief side stint as the colorist, text, & FX guy for a promotional comic written by mighty scribe Blake H. and drawn ninja wrist by Robert C.

allaninnman:

Win a  painting of a Nien Nunb! This was an awesome Kenner action figure from Return of the Jedi.

Over the next several weeks/months I’ll be giving away my artwork! Yay! For free! I have some small works on paper that I’d like to give away. One lucky follower will get a free painting…albeit a small one. All you gotta do is “Follow me.” And “Reblog” this blurb. And I’ll choose one of you, and mail it to you.

In about two or three weeks I’ll choose a winner. How does that sound?

Only US or Canada residents. (Sorry!)

Happy Reblogging! And Good luck!
I love you guys!

-allan

What do I believe?

I believe firearms should be outlawed in the U.S. At least anything not legitimately tied to hunting, and constrained to what firearms were capable of in 1875. Anything faster, more powerful, or more sporting should be banned.

All public offices should have 2 term limits. PAC donations should be illegal. Salaries should be capped.

Electoral college should be abolished and all votes should reflect the population directly. Voting should be easy, clean, universally consistent, accessible, and required by law.

I think health care and education should be a right, socialized, and a part of a citizenship that should be actively maintained.

I believe taxes should pay for social services, infrastructure, and caring for our young, disadvantaged, and elderly.

I believe junkies and repeat criminals have demonstrated their lack of accountability for their own well being and should become wards of the state until such time as they demonstrate the ability to again care from themselves. Part of path to clean and sober should be working to benefit community and environment, instead of revolving doors into and out of prisons and clinics.

Corporations should not be protected by the rights afforded individuals, because they are not human.

I believe factory and long line fishing should be banned, as should seal clubbing, shark finning, and whale hunting. The populations aren’t sustainable, and the methods of execution currently aren’t humane.

Every youth should spend 2 years serving in humanitarian, social, or military services, though those years could be garnered thorough summers growing up, or between high school and college. College, or fully equivalent, should be available for all citizens.

A healthier, more educated, more accountable populace is a populace worth living with and contributing too. And worth defending. Even if only with fists and strong language.

Admittedly, I am so totally naive.

e

(via nerdinlove)

Men Who Stare at Goats (3/5) & Whiteout (2/5):two films with very little in common except moments of isolation and adversity from others hoping to beat their respective systems and put down anything getting in their way.

Men Who Stare at Goats has considerable star power, authentic looking locations, historical flashbacks, and an ending that’s easy to have mixed feelings about. Did seeing Ewan leap through a wall break the fourth wall and jeopardize what little suspension of disbelief I might’ve still had to offer? Or bring a smile at the message that with enough belief and out of box thinking, boxes can be breached and miracles manufactured?

Whiteout has little star power, relies heavily on green-screens and rendered environments, has a couple historical flashbacks, and an ending I almost have mixed feelings about, largely a mix between boredom and apathy. Written for screen by the people at Dark Castle, a group that once ago made one of my all time favorite games called 7th Guest (4.5/5) Started out strong enough with their bold leap to film, Ghost Ship (3/5) and 13 Ghosts (3.5/5) weren’t perfect narratives on the whole, yet both were littered with numerous compelling components, visually and narrative beats. After those Dark Castle put Holly Berry in a film (0.5/5) seems to have been sadly downhill every since.  Based on a comic of same name from alt-fanboy favorite Oni Press that I rather quite liked, the film straight away punishes any fan of the comic by replacing a key character (3.5/5) who would go on to have her own Eisner winning series, some of which were drawn by my good friend Mr. Steve Rolston (5/5). The film cites the comic creator & writer Greg Rucka (3/5) as an executive producer, so I’m left to think he must have known that one of the two keynote characters of his comic, one of the two women, had been replaced in the film with a man. Perhaps he’s trying to get that character her own Sandbaggers (haven’t seen yet) style film and didn’t want her icy origins to confuse anyone, maybe? Mr. Rucka is a guy I’ve seen on a couple Comicon (3.5/5) panels and after parties and fans just love him so who am I to argue? Regardless, lost from the film is the lesbian tension in the comic, and the rest of the film limps along like an insult. Also, and perhaps this is my Scarface history showing, but the flashback of her partner in Miami’s portrayal irritates me to no end, from the wallpaper to the corrupt white cop. Stale, cliche, and that Vaseline  (3/5) blur on all the flashbacks is seriously ill advised.

A-Team (3.5 / 5) & Losers (3.5 / 5), both USA. Both should have under delivered on their respective potential far more than than Episode 1 (1/5). Instead, both films manage to wonderfully nod to their origins, one a campy 80’s show my Mom wasn’t keen on my watching, the other a delectable comic book series the gifted Brit artist Jock (4.5/5) chiefly drew. These films have great casting, Crank-y (3.5/5) craftsmanship, tickle-me tone, and slippery when sassy soundtracks. I hope both sequel, preferably as a single 3 hour epic cross-over, followed by several 6 episode chunks of British style mini-series on Channel 4, Showtime, HBO, or A&E.