MalexMedia.Net blogs

Attachment Reminder

Malex — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 18:18:06 -0400

If you're looking for more SIGGRAPH stuff, read the last paragraph.

I recently started experimenting with using Evolution Email as my primary email client. I've had a love/hate relationship with it in the past, but my recent obsession with GPG, coupled with Enigmail's various deficiencies, meant that my Thunderbird experience was drawing to a close.

I'm always tickled when applications try to be smart, especially in unexpected ways. So imagine my delight when I ran across the dialog box in the picture. Of course, any human being will tell you that the text in the message clearly does not refer to a present attachment. But ‘A’ for effort, Evolution!

And really, my ribbing is only half-serious, as I've forgotten to attach a promised file more often than I'd care to admit. So I can seriously see this dialog box saving my behind in the future.

As for new SIGGRAPH-related blog entries. Obviously, SIGGRAPH is over now, and Peter and I have returned home. I do have pictures, and I have every intention of blogging about the trip. It may take a while though, because my week-long absence has left me with a goodly amount of catching-up to do. So keep your RSS reader tuned to this frequency, but don't hold your breath. (All kinds of mangled metaphors! Score!)

ttyl!

--Alex Markley

Blogging at 30,000 Feet

Malex — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 12:51:22 -0400

Whee!

As many of you probably know by now, Peter and I are attending this year's SIGGRAPH conference in Los Angeles, California. What you may not know is that, to this date, neither of us had ever flown in an aircraft.

I don't doubt, from the demeanor of many of my fellow travellers, that the novelty of flying has long since worn off for them. For me, however, I've been quite enthralled by the whole experience. The incredible power of the craft you're sitting in is completely hidden except during takeoff and landing. For me, at least, it's hard not to draw parallels with roller coasters. Except this is the daddy roller coaster. And it has no rails.

By the time you read this, we will surely have arrived safely in LA. But as I write, we're cruising at 30,000 feet. The clouds float below us in a mocking sort of way, and the horizon recedes into a misty haze instead of appearing as a sharp curve like a well-behaved horizon should. In addition, en route to LA we passed over some pretty impressive mountainous terrain – not the least of which was the Grand Canyon – which had me gaping, open-mouthed, for minutes on end.

I've taken pictures, although my camera is still that cheap old snapshot cam. If you're the sort to look, I've attached a few of them to this blog entry. You also might want to explore the gallery.

There's a lot of stuff going down during this trip, most of which will be pretty amazing. I'm planning to blog about much of it, so you'd best stay posted.

ttyl!

--Alex Markley

Glass of Water!

Quartz — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 22:23:14 -0400

I happened to notice one evening, when I set my glass of water down into a beam of sunlight coming in through the window, that the refraction and dispersion cast the most beautiful caustics and rainbow highlights in the shadow of the glass.

I immediately realized that I simply must have a picture of it for my desktop wallpaper. So now you can too!

Malex Minute Quarter 11 Scripted!

Malex — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 22:06:42 -0400

No, you didn't just misread that. All of Malex Minute Quarter 11 is scripted and ready to go. Over half of it has been produced already, and the rest will follow within the week. This is a momentous occasion. We've never had more than two or three Malex Minute episodes in the queue before and now we have episodes queued up through the end of November!

The main reasons for us to get ahead so aggressively are security and peace of mind. We've never missed a week in two and a half years of solid production, and I would like to keep that going for the foreseeable future. Three months of extra padding will help us assure non-stop entertainment for you, even in an emergency where we might need to unexpectedly drop the production schedule for weeks or even months at a time.

Oh, and did I mention that Quarter 11 is absolutely hilarious? It contains some of my best writing ever, and some of Peter's best too. So be sure to stay tuned, there's a lot of great Malex Minute on the horizon!

ttyl

--Alex Markley

High-Quality Junk Mail

Malex — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 13:28:33 -0400

It's kinda funny to me. All you've gotta do is attend SIGGRAPH, and suddenly you're eligible for a whole new caliber of junk mail.

I discovered these two gems in the PO Box yesterday. One is for an ad for, near as I can figure, ATI's booth at SIGGRAPH. Not any of their products per se, just the booth itself. Also, I'm not quite sure where the “Dominate Your Design” slogan came from. Frankly, as an artist, I'd rather not allow any of my tools to dominate anything, regardless of how expensive or flashy they are. (Just in case you were wondering, I was not the instant winner.)

Another is for Wacom, leading manufacturer of graphics tablets. Their ad makes a little more sense, touting specifically their most useful, most flashy, and (of course) most expensive product. And if I can get up the nerve to furtively touch it with my unworthy, trembling hands, they'll give me a free T-Shirt to mark the occasion! Yay!

I'm not sure why these things amuse me as much as they do. Perhaps it's something in the water…

ttyl!

--Alex Markley

Mixxx DJ Software Supports Numark Total Control!

Malex — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 18:02:09 -0400

Yay!

As you may or may not know, I consider myself something of an amateur DJ. I am not among the class of DJs who can mix four+ vinyl records together while juggling sequencers and stacks of effects on the side, but I do enjoy mixing tracks together – especially tracks I've produced.

Recently, in a search for bigger, better DJ mixing software, I discovered Mixxx, a free, open-source DJ mixing program for Linux, OS X, and Windows. It's an amazing program, which easily bests my old software and my buggy CDJ deck combined.

So I had some sweet, sweet software, but despite all its other problems I had fallen in love with my CDJ deck's jog wheels. Also, I hated the idea of continuing to mix with the mouse. So, I purchased a Numark Total Control MIDI surface. Its design is perfect for DJs like myself, as it's portable, rugged, precise, and (best of all) standards-compliant.

But I didn't know it was standards-compliant at the time, so purchasing it was something of a risk. It wasn't until I brought it home and plugged it into my Linux box that I knew for sure it would work. (Score one for standards!) I could now open the control surface on my computer and see lots of numbers scroll by whenever I touched anything.

AlexMarkley.com Updated

Malex — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 19:57:14 -0400

It's about time…

Yes, I've finally updated AlexMarkley.com. It used to be nothing more than a collection of links to Malex Media Network® stuff, but I decided it was finally time to add a bunch more stuff personally relevant to me.

One thing that you guys might be interested in: I posted a collection of high-definition demo reels highlighting my past creative work for the MMN,® including an HD version of The Ruins of Mi'ren. This is the first time it's been available to download in HD, so go get it!

By the Book

Aisling — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 14:16:24 -0400

Yes, I watch children's shows. I'm a babysitter. Get over it.

By the book. It's an odd phrase. It means following instructions, or doing things the way they were mean to be done. It's not a very common phrase. So when I heard it the other day, it caught my attention.

I was watching some children and a nearby television was on, tuned to a children's show channel. A show called “Wow Wow Wubzy” was on and at the end of the episode a “moral of the story” song started. It was called, “By the Book”.

Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along Blog

Malex — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 01:11:15 -0400

Interest piqued? Great!

Doctor Horrible's Sing-Along Blog is a brand new internet mini-series featuring supervillainy, a laundromat, and... singing? It's written/directed by Joss Whedon and stars Neil Patrick Harris, Felicia Day, and Nathan Fillion, so you know it's gotta be good.

The mini-series is in three parts. The first part was released for free on their website today, with the second and third parts following later in the week. If you're going to watch it, you'd better hurry, because it'll vanish off the face of the web by Sunday.

I haven't seen the whole thing yet because, like you, I am not special.

However, I have now seen the first part, and I'm already inexplicably enthralled. Maybe it's the smashing dialog? Perhaps it's the hilarious premise? It could even be the astonishing acting or the criminally catchy cache of tunes! Oh, and did I mention that it's a completely independent production? So I guess my enthusiasm isn't so inexplicable after all.

Fyi, I'd peg the language between a PG and a PG-13 level. It's pretty mild, so unless you're particularly sensitive to such things I'd feel comfortable recommending it. Update: Not anymore. Please see this comment.

ttyl!

--Alex Markley

Premier Party!!

Aisling — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 13:48:59 -0400

It's set in stone now, people!

The Premier Party for the first showing of Prince Melvin the Mediocre is set. The cast and crew and their families are invited. We will be showing what will be pretty close to the final version of Prince Melvin.

A Little Something for the Melvin Crew

Malex — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 18:59:46 -0400

I think you'll all appreciate this.

Swiffer!

ttyl

--Alex

Word Wrapping for Human Beings

Malex — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 23:46:40 -0400

People are people too.

Hardly anybody will be interested in this, but I'm posting it anyway. At the very least, this should prove to you I'm not sitting on my hands all the time.

Today, I finally got sick and tired of the old word wrapping program we've been using around the MMN. I wrote it back when I was first learning C, and while it was somewhat fast (compared to some alternatives) it was a little clunky in some spots, and downright buggy in others. (Choked on input texts > 2GB, needed to fit entire text in RAM, etc..)

Like I said, I got sick of it, so I wrote a new one. Go ahead, it's GPL'd, so feel free to use it. It definitely runs fine on Linux and MacOS X and I can't imagine any good reason why it wouldn't run under Windows if compiled with cygwin or MingW.

My program, Wrap, is a bit more featureful than GNU fold, but is a tiny bit slower. (Although the benchmarking process wasn't very comprehensive, so I guess the jury's still out.)

The Look and Sound of Obsolescence

Malex — Thu, 12 Jun 2008 19:50:09 -0400

Quick, grab it!

A while ago, I promised to write a blog entry about my adventures with HD DVD. Sadly, these sorts of things have a tendency to fade into the abyss of obscurity and doubt. Better late than never though, right?

Overpopulation? I don't think so.

Malex — Tue, 20 May 2008 15:15:24 -0400

Check the number and dial again...

Are you one of the poor saps who's been suckered into believing that the world is overpopulated? I've heard otherwise, but I thought it would be prudent to check the actual numbers:

Prince Caspian

Aisling — Mon, 19 May 2008 13:44:54 -0400

I got to see the newest Narnia movie on Friday. And I was very excited and pleased. It was better than I thought it was going to be.

As many of you may know, I was disappointed in the first Narnia movie. Though it stayed close and true to the book, I thought that they simply did not do Aslan justice visually. Specifically, they did not make Aslan big enough. It's kind of hard to put the power and majesty Aslan deserves, into a creature that comes up to the main character's waist. And though many may disagree with me, I considered that a major downfall of the movie and it disappointed me.

Well, in Prince Caspian, they fixed that.