http://www.glest.org/

After some time and quite some expectation, a new version has been released that includes the single most awaited feature in the history of the game: Multiplayer!

At this point the multiplayer feature is reduced to the bare bones, but it works. We are hoping on the community to help us test it

http://aqua.kyucon.com/miniaqua.html

The site above features a very nice collection of mini-aquariums, along with code for you to include them in your own website or blog, may you want to. I tested a miniaqua in nan´s sidebar for a few days, and after “installing” it my browser updated (automatically) the Shockwave player. Then the aquarium ran perfectly, though a friend told me today that he had been unable to open the site, so be careful if you decide to use it. By the way, there´s another version of the aquarium available from the same site, though it´s not as mini

Now, for some real-ly small fishtanks, you may like to take a look at this selection.

Related Article: The megatank!

http://chem.sci.utsunomiya-u.ac.jp/v7n1/nagao/

modelling the structure by means of up-to-date 3 dimensional molding method offers an effective teaching aid.

(Freely “rearranged” from the babelfish translation of the page above.)

I highly recommend that you take a look at this article even if you don´t know japanese, since its pictures (scroll down a bit) beautifully illustrate several techniques currently used to make real objects from 3D models. In this case the subjects are molecular structures: these techniques not only bring them to a human scale but also to the human world, thus helping scientists twice. Furthermore, some of the machines used, like the Roland mdx scanner and milling machine, are getting cheap and easy to use enough that in a near future they may become as common as photocopiers!

http://disney.go.com/disneypictures/cars/

Lightning McQueen, a hotshot rookie race car driven to succeed, discovers that life is about the journey, not the finish line, when he finds himself (…) in the sleepy Route 66 town of Radiator Springs.

For the sake of honesty, I´ll say that I went to see Cars almost forced by a friend. Though I usually love animation films, the way the cars are portrayed looked somehow too bland, too gentle, so to say, and I feared that the whole would share that same spirit.

In fact, while perhaps mild, Cars is nevertheless a good movie. Read the rest of this article »

http://www.craftsmanshipmuseum.com/Ho.htm

http://www.zoho.nl/zoho2.html

the “ultimate puppet” that could duplicate the grace and range of human movement

Mark Ho has recently been spotted in many sites across the Web after his work on the ArtForm No.1, a metal fully poseable robot sculpture. The reasons for this interest? Well, according to a post in digg, Mark is selling a limited series of these sculptures, priced at more than 36000 dollars each. That will raise some eyebrows, but honestly, I think that the price is fair (and it would be even if the series weren´t limited). From a craftsman´s point of view the statue is a masterpiece, comprised of 920 pieces that Read the rest of this article »

Construction of a Menger sponge can be visualized as follows:

1. Begin with a cube.
2. Shrink the cube to 1 / 3 of its original size and make 20 copies of it.
3. Place the copies so they will form a new cube of the same size as the original one but lacking the centerparts, (next image).
4. Repeat the process from step 2 for each of the remaining smaller cubes.

After an infinite number of iterations, a Menger sponge will remain.

from Wikipedia

The Menger Sponge is a fractal particularly appealing to modular origamists, and I believe that for two reasons: it can be made out of Sonobe modules (the very first “brick” that every origamist learns), and given its fractal nature, it can be expanded forever and ever. What follows is a list of origami websites on this fascinating structure: Read the rest of this article »

http://www-ui.is.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~takeo/java/smoothteddy/index.html

You can make round 3D models such as teddy bears quickly, and paint them in an integrated environment.

Smooth Teddy is a small, yet highly amusing program by Takeo Igarashi. A sort of “3D playground”, it allows you to fiddle with 3D models by scribbling shapes that are automatically given volume. Once you have your first amoeba on screen, adding pseudopods is just a matter of painting shapes over it: once a secondary shape is given volume, you can displace it over the first one, clone it if you want, and finally merge the two into a single piece. Modeling in this way becomes an intuitive process, and though it is not very precise nor very quick, the program has a high cuteness factor which will Read the rest of this article »

http://www.glest.org/

In case you haven´t read my previous articles on it, Glest is a Free, open-source 3d Real Time Strategy Game, designed in a way so that it is easy to customize and expand. Glest has been in continuous development for several years, and has received awards in the Art Futura and Mundos Digitales spanish international festivals. Finally we have released the official 2.0 version, which includes many add-ons that we hope will enhance gameplay. Read the rest of this article »

http://www.artbytucho.blogspot.com/

A few days ago my good friend Tucho Fernández opened his new blog, “Art by Tucho”, where he is regularly posting samples of his drawings and 3D models. Tucho and I worked together in the Glest project and he is now also working for the video games company Traganarion Studios. As for his art, the quality of his paintings is elloquent enough. I would add that he´s especially talented for drawing things of an organic nature, especially fantasy creatures and dinosaurs, but in my opinion that´s only because that´s his preference. I have been trying to make him draw robots and spaceships since I first met him, though, and the Battle Machine is the best example that he is equally skillful at drawing almost anything.

http://www.lego.com/eng/factory/

With the free Digital Designer software you can build absolutely anything with virtual LEGO bricks right on your computer. Then you can buy the real bricks to build your creation and you can share it with thousand of other LEGO fans.

One of the problems I used to face every time I wanted to make my own lego models was that I never had enough bricks of the kind I was needing. It must be one of those “murphy´s laws” that the brick you just need is the one you lack!

Until now, there was a partial solution to this issue: the L-cad program allowed you to design your model in the computer so that you could afterwards order the pieces you wanted. This walkaround was (is) very useful, but if there were an easier option to custom design-custom order models which was backed by lego, that would be amazing, and if it were user friendly… whoa!

Well, so a big WHOA! to lego, since they have done exactly that. Besides giving the users an easy way to design models on the computer, they have made it just as easy to order those models as custom sets. Again, WHOA!!

http://www.iceagemovie.com/

The Ice Age is coming to an end, and the animals are delighting in their new world: a melting paradise of water parks, geysers and tar pits.

I liked Ice Age, the first movie, very much. That´s why I was a bit worried when I watched Ice Age: The Meltdown´s trailer for the first time. There was Scratch, the squirrel, searching again for the unattainable seed, there were the same ol´chaps from the first movie escaping again from an inminent danger… I feared that the forecoming movie was to be a sequel made to make some cash by using and abusing all the things that made the original famous. Now I that I finally saw the movie, I´m happy to Read the rest of this article »

http://www.loop.ph/twiki/bin/view/Loop/BioWall

A Synetic building is an airy and lace-like basketry of thin arcs patterned in curvilinear triangulation.

What?

The structure is based on the principle of self-similarity enabling it to work from the nano to the macro scale.

oh… that must be the wall… but, where´s the Bio?

(…) reactive surfaces inspired by botanical life that reflect and Read the rest of this article »

Tags:3D , design , experimental , organic , springs

I hate fighting games. My first contact with them was the Street Fighter 2 coin-op, and already then I thought it was a ridiculous game. That´s strange, because I could finish the first Double Dragon without blinking, but there was no chemistry. It was a game without power-ups, where in order to get the control dynamics you had to Read the rest of this article »

http://www.glest.org/

Since rc3 and rc4 were released very close to each other, I´ll include here both versions´ features:

rc3:

- Final icons for the new units (you will not be able to see that until the data rc3 is uploaded, which should be soon).

- Shared vision for allies: This has a very nice side effect, CPU controlled factions will support each other, this will not always happen though, only when they have enough soldiers on their bases.

- Now you can play in every start location even with 2 or 3 factions in 4 player maps.

- Improved results screen, now it has a score and the team of each faction.

rc4:

This version includes increased projectile accuracy, ranged units now hit moving slow or close enemy units.

Don´t forget to share your thoughts on Glest in the Forum

So far I have dedicated many hours to create a good fistful of tools to develop 3D multimedia applications in real time, that is: video games. After erecting structures for Finite State Machines, scripts, messages and (soon soon) triggers, I decided to merge the whole thing into a single concept, and try to bring out errors, bugs, etc. I thought it would be quick and easy to make “a small game”. I was wrong. Read the rest of this article »