Dogsitting

Hey look! I'm dogsitting!

Hey look what else!

A car drove through the backyard fence last night an hour after I started dogsitting! Awesome. I'm dogsitting 6 dogs (and 3 rats and 2 snakes) in what used to be the Dean's house for TWU. There are a lot of college people and college cars around. One such college people and one such college car had the misfortune of punching a hole in the fence last night, and these six dogs take great joy in escaping.

I've fixed it as best as I can, but unfortunately the tipsy foreign student left me a bogus number last night, so I don't know who is gonna repair the fence now. Notice how one of the posts is completely backwards and sewn in so as to remain standing. Notice how 6 more posts are completely askew and have just been crammed back onto the fence. Notice how two more posts on the edges are irreparably damaged and also need to be replaced.

Also, notice how after all that I still had to lay some chairs in the way so I didn't lose all of the freakin' dogs again. The hole was big enough that even the Saint Bernard mix was able to run straight through the fence without crouching or even thinking about it.

Hey There...

Alright, so I "rebooted" my blog a month and a half ago, then did absolutely nothing on it until now. I'm SORRY, all zero of my viewers. Jeez you can be so harsh sometimes. :-P

Over what's left of today I'll be going back in time and adding entries. See you yesterday!

Screw-Ups.

I also bought something else recently. A 3D mouse. I didn't even know these existed until I bought it! It's made modeling about 5 times faster and WAY more enjoyable. It helped me model, texture, light, render, composite, edit, and complete this camera!

"Kid-Tough Grass"

This was my entrance exam for Modeling & Texturing II at UTD. I screwed up BIG TIME, though, and didn't get in the course. Oh, the modeling was fine (our assignment was to faithfully reproduce the current Fisher Price Kid-Tough Camera, which I actually did better than the photos on its Amazon page) but I messed up the turning in of the assignment.

I 100% thought that the camera was due no later than 11:59:59pm on Friday, June 10th. It was actually due at 11:59:59pm on Friday, June 3rd. I made it to campus in-time after rushing like crazy to finish the model once I realized this on the day-of, but when I got to campus with an hour to spare, EVERY single computer on campus was locked away.I ran around for an hour looking for any computer at all to upload my assignment, and I eventually found one. I found one unlocked door on the engineering building, and within said building I found one unlocked room.

It was a chemical engineering lab with 100's of thousands of dollars of equipment humming away, and several standard desktops hooked up to the equipment. I snuck in, eyes darting out the door every few seconds (I clearly wasn't supposed to be there) and tried my luck at logging on to several of the computers, all of which rejected my username. I wasn't supposed to be there.

At the end of my final hour, approaching my final minute, I went back to the Arts & Technology building for one more go. I discovered a single available computer...the receptionist's computer. I tried logging on and it immediately told me that the computer was monitored by campus staff and that unauthorized use was forbidden and punishable in a court of law. Oh well. I tried.

I emailed the professor the next morning:

Subject: I screwed up

Hi Todd, this is Alex Kleinschmidt. I was in your Lighting/Comp I class last semester. I'm emailing you because I dropped the ball on the Kid Tough camera entry exam. I had it fully completed, but I had it in my head that it was due next Friday for some reason. I realized this last night and made it to campus from McKinney by 11PM but by then all of the computers on campus had been shut down and locked up.

I know there are no exceptions to your guidelines for the assignment and I'm not looking for one. I just wanted to know if this course will be offered at all next Spring (in class you said it's a Fall-only class but I still feel the need to ask.)

Thank you,
Alex

 And he responded:

Send me your submission via email. I want it asap, and no later than tomorrow night.

Todd

So I did! I was home free. Or so I thought. The email bounced back at me a few minutes later with an error regarding my attachment (the file with my exam in it). I tried again with the same result. The third time, I deleted the attachment and instead gave my professor a direct link to my website to download the file.

Come today, the day the accepted applicants are announced, he sent me an email saying that my link didn't work. I had spelled it wrong. Of course.

I sent him the correct link but haven't heard back from him. I think it safe to assume that I just completely screwed up and missed out after my second and third chances. Awesome.

New stuff!

OH MY GOSH I AM SUCH AN IDIOT!!!

So, I've never ever ever been happy with my digital art. I'm still not happy with it...BUT it has just gone up a gajillion times in quality. A week or two ago I finally bought my first-ever graphics tablet. It's a previous-generation, used, entry-level tablet, so I was able to nab it for all of 25 bucks. Safe bet, right?

I've been tentative about these things for ages because of my previous experience with a cheapo tablet brand that essentially acted just like a mouse and did nothing for me. I also thought I was doing alright with just a regular old mouse. Damn I was wrong.

Even though I bought pretty much the smallest, cheapest tablet out there (from a good brand, mind you) the difference in quality is like night and day. A tablet is to a fine paintbrush as a mouse is to a dirty bar of soap.

Here is the best thing I ever drew with a mouse. It took me 8 hours.

"Help?!" - Full painting is 6,200 x 4,064 pixels (25 megapixels)

And now here is the FIRST thing I drew with my new tablet. It took me 4 hours.

"Ginger Spring" - Full painting is 8,000 x 4,500 pixels (36 megapixels)

And thus I feel like a doofus. Two more drawings followed over the last week:

"Tigress" - Full painting is 8,000 x 5,000 pixels (40 megapixels)

"Colossus" - Full painting is 12,600 x 8,400 pixels (106 megapixels)

I have plans for many more! Look for something more cutesy in the next few weeks, something with Dick van Dyke, something else movie related...I have lots of ideas!

I have a new desk! I LOVE IT! It was 89 bucks on Amazon with free 2-day shipping and no tax. Heck yes! You can also see in this photo my new monitor (left), my new 3D mouse, my new tablet, my new case, and my new corner setup! :D