Timing and Spacing

Well, I'm at Siggraph. I've made it through the registration gauntlet. I got to the convention center about two hours early to hop on the free wireless. The Hyatt wants $10 a day for wireless access; I think I'll try and do most of my web access from the convention center. Anyway, registration closes at 8:00, and there are still at least several hundred people waiting to get into the hall to register. Not sure they'll all make it; there may be a riot if they don't.

One special exhibit this year is a teapot exhibit. I thought it would just be a large number of pictures of teapots, renders of teapots, sculptures of teapots, etc. Rather mundane (unless you really like teapot art). For the most part, that's what it is. However, there's a really cool virtual teapot. There's a pen with force feedback on it that allows you to move the pen around an "Air Teapot". While you do so, a voice sings "I'm a little teapot". When you hit the spout, it sings "Here is my spout". Same for the handle. It's really cool. Stop by and give it a try. If you don't see (or hear) someone using it, it's easy to miss.

Posted by David at 04:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's been really hot for the last few days here in Seattle, so going to movies has been a popular way to cool down. I wonder what the movie attendence spike has looked like? Anyway, I went to go see "The Lady in the Water" last night. Before the movie, I saw this awesome commercial for Coca Cola. This is a link to a decent quality Quicktime version. Below, I'm going to attempt to embed the lesser quality YouTube version (just to give it a whirl). Psyop did the work, and the QT page has some more credits on the 3D artists who did the work.

Oh, the movie? Meh. I was hoping for so much more. Not bad, but not up to my expectations. Maybe more about it later.

Posted by David at 12:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I finally made some decisions about what I was going to do while I'm at Siggraph this year. There were a few days where I had a really difficult time deciding. Tuesday was particulary difficult: I had to choose between a series of sketches, a full-day course on Renderman and a full-day course on advanced real-time rendering. Too many choices. I finally fell back on my rule about seeing what probably won't be on the DVD.

Anyway, you can see where I'll be by looking on Google Calendar here (all times appear to be EST converted to your local time, at least that's what's going on with me...).

Posted by David at 10:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here's a few five minute life drawing sketches I did with the tablet.

I'm still having difficulty with my line widths and drawing too dark, but I have that problem with pencil and paper, so... there you are.

I'm also still getting my tools setup and accessible. I've got a custom palette with scripts that will create portrait and landscape paper and useful drawing tools, but saving is still a pain. I need to get some colors quickly selectable (and then figure out what the settings are to match conte crayons). I'd love an script that creates a directory with todays date and saves each drawing with a sequential number (if that's even possible).

Posted by David at 12:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Last night at our local Barnes & Noble, my wife found a copy of a British magazine called "Total Film". The current issue (#117 Summer 2006) comes in a cardboard folder and contains a 34 page booklet called "The Art of Pixar".

It's got artwork on every page. Most of it I've seen before, but some only in MOMA exhibit catalog. So, if you don't have that, with this you'll get to see a small percentage of it. The artwork covers the shorts and all the feature films including "Cars".

There's a page and a half Q&A with John Lasseter answering questions sent in by readers (presumably) and short interviews with many Pixar artists: Pete Docter, Andrew Stanton, Bob Petersen, Michael Kass and many others.

Here's a nice sketch of Buzz I haven't seen anywhere else. I like the different eye poses at the bottom.

This is what a lot of the smaller interviews look like. Short answers by Pixar artists and artwork.

Some of the MOMA art.

I don't know long this will be available, so you should grab your copy soon.

All images are © Disney.

Posted by David at 10:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've been installing Windows Live OneCare on the machines around the house. The tablet was one of the last, mainly because I was concerned about the performance cost. So far, the only major cost (and I do mean major) was a large increase in boot time.

As noted earlier, my boot time was 58 seconds. After installing OneCare, that's gone up to an almost unbelievable 95 seconds. Time to unhibernate was about the same (within a second or two) and application performance seems unchanged.

I'll probably leave it on for a while and see how it works out. I feel the need for virus and malware protection on all my machines (particularly one that will be hanging out in public wireless hotspots), but I'll have to see if that comes at too high a cost. So far, I think I can live with. I'll keep you posted.

Posted by David at 11:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Well, I've had the LE1600 for about a week now. Here are some of my first impressions in roughly the order I discovered them.

The handwriting recognition is pretty good. I was pleasantly surprised.

Update: There is a stylus holder in main unit, just underneath the battery. Awesome!

There is no screen protection. I should have realized this earlier, but with a convertible you get some screen protection when the unit is closed. I've stuffed plenty of laptops in my backpack and not worried about it. However, with the tablet I'm really leery of just putting it in my backpack. So now I have a sleeve to put the tablet in before I put it in my backpack. This really increases the bulk, but increases my peace of mind as well.

Out of the box, there's no pressure sensitivity in Corel Painter and Plastic Animation Paper. After an initial bit of panic and then some research, I discovered that you need Wacom drivers (but Wacom pens are not required). After I installed the Wacom drivers, these two apps worked great.

I picked up a Wacom pen with the dual button on the side in case I want to try to use Maya, but I have difficult time getting a dark enough line in PAP with the WACOM pen. The pen that ships with the LE1600 feels better and less "cheap" than the Wacom pen.

I didn't get the View Anywhere screen. I can't use the tablet at all in bright sunlight. It's usable in shade. This won't be a problem for me in general.

I thought I read someone complaining that the boot time was 70 seconds. It didn't seem like it was that long to me, so I did some measurements.

Surprisingly, the boot time was longer than I thought it would be, but I tend to just hibernate the unit most of the time anyway, so I really only see the 28 seconds. All in all, I think the performance is pretty good. For the apps I'm running (Corel Painter, OneNote, and Plastic Animation Paper), the performance is fine.

I've been carrying around the unit with the extended battery hooked up. I haven't measured the uptime for general usage, but I can believe the stated time of 8 hours. That would seem about right. For playing a DVD, I watched for 2 hrs 40 mins and had 25% power left. I was pretty pleased with that.

All in all, I'm really happy so far. Performance is good, battery life is good. Everything else is just minor quibbles. Maybe soon I'll post some sketches or animations. Gotta finish my demo reel for Siggraph first though.

Posted by David at 10:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I just saw this stickfigure animation. It's pretty funny and kind of reminds me of a short I saw at Siggraph called "Attack of the Note Sheep". You can find it here.

The first place I found "Attack of the Note Sheep" was a site called Zango. It looks to be full of spyware... To watch a video, you have to install their software. Never a good sign.

Posted by David at 09:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here are my tips for having a successful Siggraph event. I've not been to every Siggraph, but 2006 will be my eighth Siggraph in all, and fourth consecutive. These are some things I've learned over the years.

Register on Saturday night (6:00 to 8:00 p.m. this year)
This allows you to get your stuff (shirts, dvds, proceedings, etc.) and take it to your hotel room so you don't have to schlep it around all day. As an alternative, you can register on Sunday morning, but don't pick your stuff up until the end of day when you're headed back to the hotel.

Food at the convention center is expensive
Unfortunately, in LA, you don't have a lot of options close by (i.e. walking distance) and you could drop twelve dollars on a sandwich, a piece of fruit and a drink. In San Diego, walk into the Gaslamp and eat there. I don't know about Boston.

Take snacks
Otherwise you end up paying three dollars for an apple. In the past, water has been easy to get. Take an empty bottle with you in the morning.

Wear comfy shoes
'Nuff said.

Start training early
My feet always hurt at the end of the week. This year, I've started walking several miles a couple of times a week to prepare. Hopefully that will help.

Plan ahead
Use the web and see what's going on each day and make a schedule. Prioritize your schedule (I'm usually triple-booked for most of the conference). That way, if you get bored in a session, know where you want to go next After you go to registration on Saturday night, look over the handouts for new additions to the schedule.

Attend the Papers fast forward
I don't usually do the papers. I can read them in the proceedings later, and unless the paper is in an area I know really well, they usually go by too fast for me to keep up with. The fast forward lets you see what's there. You can always change your mind.

Attend sessions that likely won't be on the dvd
Most industry courses and sketches don't make it on to the DVD's you can buy. See the presentations you can only see at the conference while you're there; do the rest on DVD later on. This is probably the major deciding factor for breaking the triple-booking. If I think a session won't be on the DVD, it rises to the top of the priority list.

Use the course notes
Get the course notes off the dvd and take them with you on a laptop. This saves you from having to take so many notes. Another reason to register on Saturday night. You used to be able to buy printed course note for outrageous prices, but I think they stopped doing that last year.

Attending Parties
If you're a man, hang around with women (good advice in general). If you're an attractive woman, you can pretty much get into any party you want with or without an invite. If you're a guy with a woman, you stand a much better chance of getting in. Not that I would really know. I'm such a geek, I've been known to go back to my hotel and write a raytracer after Henrik Wann Jensen's photon mapping course than try and attend a party.

Exhibition purchasing
Buy books in the exhibition hall, they're usually discounted over the ones sold outside the exhibition. Also, most vendors will ship (sometimes for free if you buy in quantity e.g. buy three books) back home for you. This is the advice I almost never follow. Last year, my bag was 48 pounds due to the books I bought. If it had been 50 pounds, I would have had to pay the airline extra.

Here are some other Siggraph tips

Jim Blinn also wrote an article called "How to attend a Siggraph conference" that appeared in Computer Graphics and Applications, Vol 15 Issue 4. I think it was reprinted in his book "Dirty Pixels". I read it quite a number of years ago and think it was pretty good. I couldn't find an online copy. Sorry.

Good luck and I hope to see you at Siggraph!

Posted by David at 02:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After several years of wanting one and doing a lot of window shopping, I've finally bought a tablet PC. I primarily want it to take notes with (probably using OneNote), for art (probably using Corel Painter), and for animation (Plastic Animation Paper). Maya is a would-be-nice, but not a requirement. I also need to go all day without having to plug it in. Okay, I don't need to, but I prefer to leave the AC adapter at home.

I was considering two different models: a pure tablet from Motion Computing or a convertible from Gateway.

Jason really likes the Motion Computing tablet. Jason seems like a really smart guy. If he likes it, it's probably pretty good. It seems like it runs pretty much everything I need it to run. It appeals to me because it's light. I've been lugging around a seven pound laptop to Siggraph and other conferences for a number of years. It sucks. Seven pounds doesn't seem heavy, but it gets heavy fast.

The Gateway looks pretty powerful. A dual-core processer? Awesome, never had one of those. It probably rivals the least powerful of my two desktop machines (the desktop is has a faster CPU, but it's single-proc, single-core). But it weighs 7.6 pounds. More with the extended battery. However, I don't need a new primary machine; I've got two I use daily and they're plenty fast. I want something that I won't leave at home or in the hotel room because it's too much trouble to lug about. So, the Motion Computing looks like the winner. However, you're not getting much computing power for your dollar. And it's not just that it seems underpowered in general, it's also pretty expensive. By the time you get all the accessories you need (memory, DVD drive, keyboard, etc), the Motion Computing tablet is going to be twice as expensive as the Gateway. If it were the same price or just a little more, it would be an easy decision. But it's half as fast, twice as expensive.

However, I finally decided that if I get the cheap one and then leave it at home because it's too much trouble or too heavy, I may as well have not gotten anything at all. So, I went with the Motion Computing LE1600. I got the Centrino processor with 1Gb of memory and the 30 Gb harddrive. I also ordered the bump case, the DVD drive, the DVD cable, an extended battery and the battery charger with an additional standard battery. I really wanted the View Anywhere screen and the 60 Gb harddrive, but I'm already spending more than I can really afford.

Now, bits and pieces are arriving. I have the extended battery, the bump case, and the dvd drive with accessory cable. I'm still waiting on the unit itself, along with recharging station and additional standard battery. Unfortunately, the unit itself will probably be the last to arrive.

I'll post a review once I've played with it a while.

Posted by David at 04:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)