Anyone think this is an

by | Apr 15, 2002 | Imported Entry

Anyone think this is an ok deal? Or how about the parts? Good parts? Feedback?

From AlienWare.com:

Dragon Full Tower Case w/ 340 watt PS – “Conspiracy Blue” colored
AMD Athalon XP 1800+
Cool Master DP5-7H53F Fan/Heatsink
512MB DDR SDRAM (pc-2100)
20GB Seagate Barracuda ATA IV 7200rpm
VisionTek Xtasy GeForce 4 MX 440 w/64MB (duel monitor support)
KoolMaxx Video Card Fan/Heatsink
SoundBlaster Audigy 5.1
16x/48x DVD-ROM
PlexWriter 24x/10x/40x CD-RW
+ the usual extras (keyboard, mouse etc)

Price: $1525.00

Thats not a bad price, especially for an AlienWare system, which are said to be tip-top. Whatcha think guys?

Well, the other shoe dropped.

by | Apr 15, 2002 | Imported Entry

Well, the other shoe dropped. That is to say that the living situation just got weirder. You see, Pete’s friend Brian was in need of another apartment and so Pete more of less decided to try and find an apartment with him for next year. That in itself is completely ok and we’re happy for him. What wasn’t ok was that he didn’t tell us. I always assumed that when you’re changing housing arrangments that people give the other roommates a “heads up.” I’m sure Pete had every intention of doing so, so I’m not placing blame, but even when you’re “thinking about it” you should let people know. His reply when we asked him about it was basically “I wasn’t going to say anything until I was sure.” That’s not the greatest of responses. You see, our lease is up in May and if Pete had waited a week or two, that would have given Jason and I only a few weeks to come up with alternatives and that would have been tough on us. I appreciate his honesty about the subject, I just wish it could have been a little more forth-coming. But, given the situation, Jason and I decided to be direct and said that if he was indeed leaving, we wouldn’t be resigning the lease. It was blunt, but I think Jason was a tad bit upset at that point. I can’t blame him.

It will unfortunatly (and more than likely) create an air of tension in the house, which was something that I wanted to avoid and didn’t want to have happen. But, I guess the reality of the situation is that we’re all moving on. Pete decided to change apartments and we found out before he told us, so in mini-retaliation, we decided to seek alternatives as well. The only reason I’m being blunt and honest here is because I want to avoid bad feelings between anyone. We felt slighted when we heard, even a little upset and disappointed. I can also tell that Pete wouldn’t do anything like that on purpose so nothing is “his fault” persay. I guess since it’s out in the open it can be a “mutual feeling” sort of thing. At least I hope so. At any rate, the search is on for alternative housing.

All that in an afternoon… oi. On to other topics. First up being photography. Nagle gave me a great idea today for a series. A bunch (5) of product shots of different game systems in a studio setting. Namely the SNES, PS, GameCube, Dreamcast and N64. I wish I had access to the original NES or a PS2, but those will have to do. I also want to comtinue my “portrait” series of images. Seeing if I could get Nagle and Pete to pose as well as Lauren and possibly myself. That would make 10 images (5 portraits and 5 systems) which would be enough to complete the next assignment. Whatcha think?

More later.

Another day, another project. Yesterday’s

by | Apr 14, 2002 | Imported Entry

Another day, another project. Yesterday’s photo shoot went well, I’ll be picking up the negatives on Monday. The proof that I pulled from the Poloroid was nifty looking, so if that’s any indication it should be cool. So, that’s 1 down, 9 to go, and only a week left to shoot and print… I’m screwed. I’ve got to have a bunch of ideas and really really quick. I think I might do a series of “morning light” images. I’ve been having that idea for a while. There’s an interesting quality to the light that peaks through window shades early in the morning. I don’t know. I also wanted to do a series about motion, but I don’t see that happening. There was also a series of distortion ideas that I had. Random stuff like “through a bottle” and “underwater”. Those might be neat. But, those aren’t for today. Today it’s time for sequential homework. This assignment sucks. It’s 3-5 comic pages, inked, using only outlines, silouettes and solid forms. Yeah, it sucks. Oh well. I guess it’s time to get cracking.

Current mood: Tired
Current tunes: Sasha & Digweed Essential Mix @ Miami WC -04-06-02

I know, I know. I’ve

by | Apr 12, 2002 | Imported Entry

I know, I know. I’ve been bad this week. I’m sorry. There just wasn’t anything interesting going on. But now there is. Or at least random stuff happened and now I can ramble about it.

First and formost, Chris finally got his domain up and running. Go check out ma’ boy ova’ at Ckelly.net. Nice work my friend. And I’d certainly be willing to give you a hand with anything you needed graphically or interface wise, just lemme know.

Also, my order from B&H finally showed up, which is good because I can now start shooting for assignments this quarter, which I had been aching to do for weeks now. None of this will really make sense to anyone else, but I got some 16×20 Kodak Ultra 3 and Radiance 3 (those are both paper), Portra 160VC, Supra 400, Agfa Optima-2 400, Fugi Provia 160 and Astia 220 (all of which are film). So, now I’m set supply wise, at least until I have to buy Poloroid stuff. Fortunatly, that won’t be for a month or so.

Lets see, what else…

Laurens got herself an apartment. That may not seem like a big deal, but having her in the dorms was a bigger pain in the ass than I care to explain. Now that she’s got an apartment, she doesn’t have to follow any mindless 12:00 curfew. Which, in all my years here at SCAD, I’ve never been able to understand. I mean, 12? WTF? We’re college kids for heaven’s sake, don’t you think we’re planning on being up later than that? But, like I said. It is no more. She’s going to finish out her stay this semester than move in when we break for the summer. She technically already has it, and could move in tomorrow if she wanted, but whats the point of moving in when she doesn’t have any furnature yet?

Oh, and Freedom Force has been taking up far to much of my time. It’s a nifty little Super Hero rpg-ish, action-ish kind of game. It’s really well done. Score another point for Irrational Games, the makers of System-Shock, SS2 and this among others. Good job guys.

Lastly, as far as posting frequency goes, don’t expect it to be regular this quarter. I’m afraid there’s just far to much work ahead of me. Jason and I are also having bandwidth issues and haven’t really been able to check email or be on AIM that often. We know exactly what the problem is and have discussed it with him and hinted at it for sometime, but it doesn’t seem to be getting through. We’re hoping he gets the message and tries to be a little more considerate with our current bandwidth limitations.

I’ve also got a slew of movie reviews to go through and since I’ve got a moment, why not…

SpyGames: Last seasons block-buster spy movie with Pitt and Redford. My main issue with this one is it’s basic style. I have a real distaste for movies told in flash-back sequences. While it works on some occasions, other times it can be downright annoying. I spend a good majority of the time wondering when I’d see action in the “current” time line. It’s not half bad however. Redford is good, he’s always good. Pitt is, well, Pitt. There’s nothing innovative about the character. He’s played the same caracter for 5 or 6 movies. The last time he did any real character work was in Fight Club. Since then he’s just been himself. There’s nothing really wrong with that, but as your watching the movie you’re constantly thinking “what’s going to happen to Brad?” not “what’s going to happen to CIA operative Tom Bishop?” At any rate, it’s not bad, but it’s not fantastic either. It’s another action flick and thats about it.

6.5/10

Curse of the Jade Scorpion: Lauren and I had ourselves a little movie fest earlier this week, and this was one of them. As a fan of Woody Allen movies I have to say that I’m going to be slightly bias here. The movie was good. It was funny in a Woody Allen sort of way, there’s no doubt about that. The main upsides to this one were without a doubt, the witty dialog and the setting/era costumes/music. I lump those together because they really wouldn’t make any sense without each other. What’s the point of having a movie set in the 40s without vintage cars and costumes or without a Jazz/Swing soundtrack for that matter. But, like I said, the dialog and scripting were really the star. The delivery was dead on too. Thanks in no same part to a great cast. If you’re looking for something funny in a sarcastic sort of way, rent this one. If you don’t like Woody Allen’s “meak and stuttering” persona, stay away.

8.5/10

The Last Castle: Another Redford flick. It must be a trend or something. Actually, this one was pretty decent as well. There were a few minor little plot points that kinda struck me as odd and I just couldn’t get past them. Also, the acting of James Gandolfini was a little on the weak side. Not “bad” just not up to the par of more seasoned movie actors. But its also forgivable given his less than lengthy career. But, in the end, I still can’t get over the “little things.” For example, towards the end, there’s a helicopter “attack” in which someone from the ground climbs up a newly attached rope, up into the helicopter, knocks out two soliders and the pilot and then proceeds to take over the controls, swing the roters of the chopper into a guard tower, crash, and walk away from it. Umm… no. I’m sorry, as much as I try, I can’ suspend my disblief for that one. So, it’s not bad, just another action flick. Redford pretty much saves the film acting wise, providing a much needed contrast to other characters.

6.5/10

We also watched Life as a House and One Flew Over tha Cuckoo’s Nest, but I’ll get to those later. That’s about it from Savannah. Not much going on. I’ll do my best to be frequent with my updates, but I can’t promise anything. Us Photo majors are busy folks.

Later.