Getting there…
I’ve been working the last couple weeks on the SIGMA website. I’ve finally uploaded much of my new updated (and vastly expanded) online portfolio. I just did a rough count and discovered I have over one hundred samples loaded for your examination. With that much work for viewing, there should be something for everyone.
Funny, but when I’m busy going from project to project, it’s easy to forget all the fun stuff I’ve done. Putting together this site has given me the opportunity to look back and assess my progress as a designer and artist. I’m pretty pleased with what I see. I guess I’m not such a hack after all.
Of course, there’s still plenty of room for improvement, professionally and artistically. If there weren’t, I’d retire and go look for a government handout (I hear Obama is handing out fat checks to people left and… well, left).
Speaking of improvement, I still need to do a lot of tweaking to the CSS, and some pages still need content (those empty boxes are annoying – got to do something about that). Generally, it’s shaping up fairly well, though by the time I’m done, I’ll probably want to re-design it.
Anyway, you can check it out right here. Let me know if you find something broken.
Thursday, June 11th, 2009 | Art / Design and stuff | No Comments
So I was shopping for some new underwear…
… when all of a sudden… out of nowhere…
And then, when it was over, we all discovered our wallets were gone.
Wednesday, June 10th, 2009 | Art / Design and stuff, General | No Comments
Beware the Chunder-Ray!
Disabling our enemies with nausea. US firm says handheld puke ray is ready to go
According to Laser Energetics’ statement:
These non-lethal weapons have the ability to control the threat at ranges of 1 meter to 2400 meters (model dependent). The Dazer Laser™ – Light Fighting Technologies – emit a green “eye safe” laser beam, that is shaped into approximately a 1 foot to 8 foot Dazer Zone™ (model dependent) which when focused on the threats eyes, the threats vision is temporarily impaired, their balance is effected, and they become affected by nausea. This controls the threat making it difficult for them to manoeuver. The Ultimate Non – Lethal Weapon.
Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009 | General | No Comments
Automotive service, the government way.
Oh boy!
Monday, June 1st, 2009 | Politics, etc. | No Comments
Stupid Senators! Corn is for whiskey!
From Reason Magazine: Another Reason to Ditch Ethanol: It Ruins Engines.
Ethanol, especially corn-based ethanol, was supposed to be such a good alt-fuel additive! Then it turns out that it costs more energy to produce than it saves; that it distorts world ag markets and helped intensify global food shortages; that it intensified the clearing of trees and other eco-friendly thangs; and even destroyed the tequila market of the future!
The story goes on to tell about how ethanol is melting the plastic fuel lines in many cars, resulting in repairs that average near $1000 per car.
The accompanying 7 minute video is worthwhile for the background it provides on the ethanol industry (Spoiler: it’s a government mandated industry – in other words, it would never survive in the real world without massive subsidies from you and I).
As an added bonus, Drew Carey is the producer of the video.
Tuesday, May 26th, 2009 | Politics, etc. | No Comments
It’s time to blow it up.
The Mariners are pretty much out of contention now. Not mathematically, of course. But with each day, they are beginning to resemble more and more the monstrosity of suckitude that was the 2008 team. As fans, we’ve endured a lot of “give it time” talks from management, and we’ve sat and waited for these bums to “play to their potential” game after game. I’m done waiting.
These guys don’t got it. Blow it up.
I’m not inclined to dump the coaches. They’re new and deserve a chance to establish their management style. Nor would I eliminate the veterans who are performing (Branyan and, well mainly Branyan). And there are some young players who show potential (Gutierrez, Balentien, Chavez, Jak, Olsen, Vargas and a few others). But as for the others:
Ichiro. Deal him outta here. His trade value is high. We should be able to get at least a good starting pitcher out of the deal, probably more. Our minor league system is heavy with outfielders. But you don’t even need to go there, because the current squad has plenty of fielders (Chavez, Gutierrez, Balentien) with speed and decent bats.
Beltre. Deal him. He’s gone at the end of the season anyway. It’s true he’s a great defender, but his bat is a massive sucking hole of emptiness in the middle of the lineup. We’ve waited long enough for his bat to wake up and it never has.
Bedard. Deal him while he’s healthy. Get a few good players in return.
Washburn. Deal him. I like his performance this year, but that just makes his trade value even better.
Betancourt. Trade him for whatever you can get, perhaps a beer vendor or something.
Lopez. Deal him if you can. But keep him if nothing worthwhile surfaces. He’s spotty, but if he can improve his consistency, he’ll be a good middle of the line-up hitter.
Johjima. We’re stuck with him. Sucks. But do we have to play him?
Griffey. Keep him. This year is toast anyway, and he’s still fun to watch at the plate. Play him at DH only. He’s no good in the field anymore.
Hernandez. Keep him for now. He needs to get his mental game figured out, but once he does, he’ll be an ace. He shows flashes of that now, but his performances are sometimes spotty.
It’s time to admit defeat and build for 2011 (not 2010, it will take at least two years to build this team back up).
Wednesday, May 20th, 2009 | Sports | 1 Comment
Windy day in Alaska
Here’s a digital portrait I just finished of my wife. It is based on a photo I took last year when we visited Alaska (here’s a link to a few other photos from that trip). We went on a tour of Prince William Sound on a beautiful sunny day. There was no wind that day, but the boat was going pretty fast (it was one of those tourist double-decker hydrofoil boats – very fun).
Friday, May 15th, 2009 | Art / Design and stuff | No Comments
Good news to the RESCUE!™
I like it when my clients get good press. It sure beats bad press, or no press at all.
Wednesday, May 13th, 2009 | Art / Design and stuff, General | No Comments
In celebration of waxers
I’m not talking about hair removal.
I’m talking about graphic design in the dark ages prior to computers, Apple, Adobe, and Pagemaker. I’m talking about the days of T-squares, non-photo blue, PMT’s, rubylith, and press-type.
I’m talking about the comforting smell of waxers.
Friday, May 8th, 2009 | Art / Design and stuff | No Comments
Our confused daily visitor
Our home has a daylight basement, and one of the rooms towards the back has a window that is just about even with the ground. Lately, a particular wild turkey has taken up a curious obsession with his reflection in that window. Just about every day, he shows up, puffs himself up and prepares to do battle with his reflection. We know he’s there when we hear a series of pecks on the window, like someone pounding nails in our wall.
Often I can walk right into the room and he won’t see me, due to either the strong reflection or his obsession with the phantom turkey that won’t fight back. Once, I even managed to get right up next to the window before he freaked out and ran away. I wonder what thoughts are passing through his small pea-brain when suddenly the image of a human appears right behind his arch-enemy?
Thursday, May 7th, 2009 | General | No Comments
Hits. Please.
It looks like this may be Mariners’ last day in first place for a while.
I’m not jumping ship; just facing facts. They lost the last two games against the Rangers; games they should have won, especially with their two aces, Hernandez and Bedard on the hill. Granted, Hernandez was not at his best, fighting the flu, and was probably a little weak. He made some mistakes and the Rangers made him pay. Bedard, on the other hand, put up another good seven innings, keeping us close, only to watch it destroyed by a poor performance by Stark in the tenth inning.
The fact is, these Mariners have been winning some highly improbable games lately. I’m honestly amazed at some of the wins they’ve pulled off in the last week or so. I’m still excited about watching this team, even though it seems they are starting to level off in the standings. One can never seem to count this team out, and that makes them enormously fun to watch.
That said, I think there is a real big problem with this team: They need to start hitting the damn ball.
In his post today, Geoff Baker of the Seattle Times points out where the M’s are failing in a big way; their two highest paid players are not producing offensively.
As we saw a year ago, the Mariners are now well into May and still waiting for their two highest-paid players to do what they are supposed to. Beltre has yet to hit a home run and he’s struggling to keep his on-base-plus-slugging percentage above .500 — .500! A slap-hitting middle infielder can’t get away with numbers that bad, never mind a clean-up hitter. And moving Beltre to No. 5 isn’t the answer either. If you’re in the middle of the order, you have to hit.
If you were wondering, that OPS total makes Beltre the worst clean-up hitter in all of baseball by roughly 120 points of OPS. In other words, even the next worst guy is in the mid-.600s.
And then there’s Ichiro, who has a .322 on-base percentage at the moment that ties him for second-worst among AL leadoff hitters with at least 50 plate appearances. His OPS is also second-worst, as is his runs total. Now, the runs can be explained away by his early ulcer and lack of games played relative to others. But not those other stats. His batting average is .291, but it’s an empty number. The kind Jose Vidro used to put up. A leadoff hitter has to have an on-base percentage up in the mid-300s and Ichiro’s isn’t there. He’s only 20th best in the majors at the moment and the M’s are paying him big money to do a whole lot more.
You have to be pleased with the way the pitching staff, for the most part, has stepped up their game this year. And a few of the new guys are generally doing well (Gutierrez, Chavez, and Branyan in particular). But the lack of performance from the team leaders is disappointing and will need to change if this team expects to compete going forward.
Wednesday, May 6th, 2009 | Sports | No Comments
The results are in!
Over 51,000 people participated in Bloomsday 2009. That’s over 4,000 more than last year, and the most participants in nine years.
Usually, there is a boost in participation during anniversary years (20th, 25th, 30th running, etc.), but this was the 33rd running, not much of a “must be there” milestone.
Some might point to the very hard winter (a new record for snowfall was established) and people’s desire to finally get outside and enjoy the fresh air. Possibly. But winter last year was almost as bad (officially the third highest snowfall), and Bloomsday’s numbers weren’t up then.
This leaves lots of people scratching their heads and wondering what prompted the increase.
Well, the reason for the increase seems clear to me. It was because of the great ads we put out this year. With cool concepts like this, this, and this, increased excitement and participation is a no-brainer.
Hey, sometimes advertising actually works.
At any rate, today the official Bloomsday Results hit the newsstands. Published by the hip cats at the Inlander, the publication lists every participant and their time, and includes a lot of photos and interesting articles related to Bloomsday 2009.
Best of all (from my point of view) is the cover, which was designed and illustrated by yours truly.
Tuesday, May 5th, 2009 | Art / Design and stuff | 2 Comments
Dealing with The Borg
Now that I have a new Mac Pro with the Intel chip, I am supposedly able to run Windows natively on my computer. This ability is useful because I work on web sites and it’s important to be able to view web pages in various browsers on different platforms in order to make sure the page performs as planned. In the past, I had to use an emulation software package that was slow and clunky, so running Windows without the logjam of emulation should be a much more pleasant experience.
If only I could rise above my loathing of everything Microsoft…
To be fair, I used to love Word. Back in the nineties it was my word processor of choice. It was elegant, relatively simple and yet very powerful. But eventually it was swallowed up by the Borg Collective that Microsoft became. I abandoned Word and swore off all Microsoft products earlier this decade, with the exception of my emulation program, Virtual PC, which I needed in order to view web pages in Windows 2000 (Oh, how it hurt to even type that last sentence!).
That program and operating system is no longer a viable solution, given my new configuration. So today I visited the Microsoft web site to sort out my options, which can be summed up in two words:
Really. Expensive.
The barebones version of Windows Vista (Windows Vista Home Basic) checks in at $200. The highest level version (Windows Vista Ultimate) comes in at a whopping $320. All prices are for a single computer license. If I need more than one license, I can get $20 off on a second license for the Home Basic, so for two computers, I would be set back nearly $400 for the most basic, stripped down version of the Windows operating system.
Just for comparison, I recently purchased the latest Mac OS (10.5.6) in a family pack, which along with the full version of the Leopard OS, included iLife (video, music, and photo applications) and iWork (word processing, spread sheet, and presentation applications) software packages. This family pack came with licenses on full versions of all the software for 5 computers. Cost: $230.
To accomplish the same thing with Microsoft (Windows, Office) for 5 computers would cost around $2500.
And Microsoft wants us to believe that they are the best value?
Monday, May 4th, 2009 | Art / Design and stuff, General | No Comments
Bloomsday weekend quarantine
Usually, on Bloomsday Sunday I make my way downtown loaded with camera equipment to take loads of photos of the event for use in our marketing work with Bloomsday. I enjoy wandering all over the course, taking candid photos and generally attempting to capture a sense of the energy and fun of the yearly Spokane tradition.
This year, however, we are all painfully aware of the threat posed by the swine flu, and many people (whether justifiably or not) are very concerned about the risks of contagion when large numbers of people gather from all over the world. In fact, Bloomsday organizers have asked that any participants and volunteers stay home if they are experiencing flu symptoms.
Well, dag-gumit! I have a cold. I’ve been sick for about three days now and it’s finally moved into my lungs. I’m coughing and blowing my nose constantly.
So in the interest of public safety (I don’t want to cause a panic stampede) I’m staying home.
But even though I won’t be there for the actual event, I can still do my part to promote it. In that spirit, here is the Bloomsday Poster I designed this year. I think it’s a real winner.
So if you do Bloomsday this year, remember, I’ll be sitting at home, knocking back orange juice, cough syrup, trying to focus my medicine head, and rooting you on. And don’t forget your face-mask.
Friday, May 1st, 2009 | Art / Design and stuff, General | No Comments
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