Gnomon School of Visual Effects

This is a bit off-topic but... I'm currently enrolled in a Maya class at Gnomon. It's a private school that has instructors that work in the Game and Movie Industry. My class is actually taught by my coworker, which is amusing in a way since I tend to give him a hard time in class.

Anyway, I thought it was pretty cool that employees from Blur studios are teaching classes there now. They worked on the Warhammer Online trailer and also the Star Wars: The Old Republic Trailer for E3. Their work is pretty phenomenal. I plan to take more classes in the future as well, but it's really difficult since I basically have no weekend since I have class and homework on top of working full time.




For my final project I have selected the Starship enterprise-D since I'm a Star Trek fan and it's a lot easier to do 'mechanical' objects opposed to organic forms. This is my current progress. I still have a long ways to go :(
Anyway, I highly recommend Gnomon as a school. It's pretty pricey but well worth it. They are a govt. accredited school as well, so I am able to take the class for free since 'the mouse' is paying it for me.

I hate NURBS!!!

UI game design

Currently I am creating the User Interface for the POTCO new inventory system. I can't go into details but it will be a huge upgrade for the game. Do you think it's redundant to have a character page that displays your armor while your character on screen displays the same exact thing? I see it done in Warhammer, WoW, LOTRO, Dragonica and in most games that I have played but I'm not sure if it's the most practical.
I like Warhammer's inventory bags because it stacks together into one panel...where as LOTRO has floating bags, which gets in the way sometimes.

It's been pretty tough to work out the kinks, but I'm curious on how other people feel about game UI's and which ones do you think is the most intuitive.

//warhammer - no wai?

This from last week, but when Order was invading IC, I was solo defending the Monolith BO cuz everyone else was in the center dying. This SM named Reggimus starts attacking me while I was alt tabbed. I tab back and start fighting back. We were at it for a good 5-10 min..and it was getting tiresome. He was barely getting hurt by me and whenever my HP dropped, I just healed myself so it was getting no where fast. Finally, a group of Order shows up and obliterates me. I was kinda glad tho cuz the fight was probably be going on forever. I admit that I'm not the greatest DoK.. I consider myself more of a support job with the way I'm spec'ed but it's good to know I can last against a Swordmaster who was only a few RR levels below me.

P.S. Also to the lamers from Neighborhood Wankers, hope you enjoyed your stay on Iron Rock. You'll be running and cryin' back to DC soon enuff. ;)

// The Lord of the Rings Online - Balrog

LOTRO had a pumpkin carving contest and I entered. I did a sketch first then my hubby did most of the carving of the pumpkin. Didn't win, but here's 3 hours of effort!


My Sketch (pencils to photoshop)


The pumpkin, end result

:D

//Warhammer // I'm in your SC's, Pwning yer arse

So I rolled an Alt Marauder (named Hyoga) for fun in Tier 1 of Iron Rock. I heard about it being busy since a lot of people from DC and trial testers were in there. Order seemed to not know what the hell was going on in the SC's. ORVR seemed a lil better but wow, Destro Roflstomped Order hard in SC after SC. My favorite SC of all time is Khaine's Embrace. So fun and watch ppl get obliterated by Khaine. heh.

Tier 4 is the opposite. Destro PuG's haven't a clue what to do in the SC's I have been in lately. I'm the only one ever at the BO's. >.>

//Warhammer - The Land of the Dead outtakes

I was stuck in the Land of the Dead PQ (hall of heavens) for a good 10 min because we fell into the pool that turns you into skeletons but we didn't die.. wtf..
/stuck didn't work either..so a CSR had to come punt us out..
lol.