If you’re not a 3D modeler, you can ignore this link-of-the-week.

This class is now closed. There will be another one in October.

I’m working on switching to Blender(a free open-source 3D modeling program that’s actually very powerful, although w/ a high learning curve), and this class for intermediate/advanced users(not me, yet) looks very useful. It’s called The Nature Academy, and is created by the guy at BlenderGuru.com(home of many great free tutorials). I was amazed at how realistic everything was in the previews. The preview tutorial for building mountains(just for his newsletter subscribers, & I think it’s offline now) was great, and even though my computer had troubles halfway through, at that point the mountains already looked realistic, even without having the ground showing through in spots.

Other tutorials in the class show how to make rippling water, flowers, grass, trees, and more. The video showed some VERY realistic scenes with movement. These are very in-depth tutorials & will have you creating realistic nature scenes in Blender within 9 weeks. In addition to the tutorials, it also comes with 138 royalty-free 3d nature models and 636 nature textures(created by the guru himself). The models alone are worth the cost. I’ve seen models like these for sale on sites like TurboSquid and the value he came up with sounds realistic to me. I’ve seen single BOAT models sell for more than the cost of this class! It’s very useful to have a library of plant models on hand to fill in a scene. One person made an entire forest with just the 9 free nature models the newsletter subscribers got.

Signup ends on July 12, so if you’re comfortable using Blender(i.e. not a complete noobie like me) and would like to learn how to create very convincing nature in 3D, go to thenatureacademy.blenderguru.com to find out more information. This info is essential if you do this stuff for a living. I look forward to becoming experienced enough to understand that compositing tool.

There will be another series of classes in October, but the price WILL go up, because he’ll be adding some more tutorials for it. Current students will get free updates.

Oh, and if you’re just curious about what Blender can actually do, see the site and scroll down to the screenshots. They are breathtaking.

Zazzle now has iPod Touch cases(4th generation) and I rushed to get in on that, especially since the first 1,000 cases(not just my cases) get 50% off if you use the promo code “IPODCASEDEAL“. (This deal may have run out by the time you read this, but it’s worth trying.)

Kenny on trampoline by kennychronicles

Smiling Kenny by kennychronicles

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGugj1ym594

Appropriately, I found this because somebody shared it on Google+. Well-done.
If you want to follow ME on Google+, you can find me here. I post links to the new comics there(as well as a few other social networks), and various other things. Twitter is still my main social network, but if I get a flood of followers on Google+ I might change that.

My sleep schedule has been really messed up for the past…. well, several years, but it really caught up with me last night and I couldn’t stay awake during my cartooning time, so I actually went to sleep at a normal time last night after getting ZERO sleep the night before. Since I have work in an hour, I’ve decided to just skip this update and continue with it on Thursday. I could try to be a day late with today’s update, but that would just perpetuate my sleep deprivation.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTOEG3jF-Wk

:-p

I’ll be there, walking around, fanboying around the cartoonists. Jeff Keane, the cartoonist of Family Circus will be there(He’s also the inspiration for little Jeffy, seeing as his father, Bil Keane, is the creator of the comic), as well as a few other cartoonists I’ve never heard of.
More information at Toonfest.net. Full list of artists is here.

I meant to post this a full month in advance, but I just now looked at the calendar and realized it’s only TWO WEEKS AWAY! Yikes. Better late than never.

I was inking tomorrow’s comic when I decided that one of the panels would make a great wallpaper. You’ll notice a few differences from the comic(one reason being that I draw at too low a resolution for wallpapers), but for the most part, this is a sneak-peek at Thursday’s comic. The background was created in Blender specifically for this wallpaper.

Click here to go to the Extras page to download the wallpaper or any of the others available.

(Yep, I’m actually finishing a comic the day before the update day. Going on a trip gives a little motivation. This means that Thursday’s comic will actually update AT MIDNIGHT instead of 7 or 9am.)

I went to Toonfest in Marceline, MO on September 17th. Got to talk to Jeff Keane(The Family Circus), as well. Here is video from the parade, followed by a gallery of photos I took while there.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7nHsSq1VM0

Scientists at UC Berkeley have found a way to basically see what you are seeing via an fMRI machine. The images are lousy right now, but it’s promising what can be accomplished with more computing power and a larger library of videos to compare scans with. They looked at the blood flow in some colleagues’ visual cortexes while they watched a lot of YouTube videos & built a library of what videos cause what kinds of blood flow. When the subjects watched some Hollywood trailers afterward, the blood flow was analyzed and elements of videos that caused the same reactions were composited to form a reconstruction of what was seen. You can clearly tell when they saw a person in the video and where there was movement. I’m excited to find out what the limits of this is, because it certainly seems like with more research and computer power, they will be able to recreate dreams in stunning resolution.
via Gizmodo
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMA23JJ1M1o

So, I guess this technology will be built into the collars on my characters already, considering the comic is set 118 years in the future. Sure, today’s method requires a huge machine with a strong magnet(no ferromagnetic items like necklaces or collars can be worn while in it), but like I said, in Kenny Chronicles, the technology will have advanced 118 years.

I’m scrapping this comic. Instead, I’m taking some more time to build Ook Island. Also, I came up with a better comic. This one is just too depressing.

The “Ghost” part of that title isn’t referring to Kenny and Death, I just spent way too long on the town and I had to ask myself, “Is it worth it to finish this right now?”. No, no it’s not. I figure I have 2-3 hours worth of work remaining and it’s 7am.
I’d spend less time on the town, but they’re going to be spending a lot of time there. I had to find out how far apart docks should be, living nowhere near water. I still don’t know what some of these visible buildings are. There’s already a business district, but I guess the windows in the first panel belong to more businesses. Maybe offices, maybe a bait shop, maybe boat supplies, maybe a Furby store. A lot of the time spent was on houses that aren’t in this comic. I was going to change the entire house arrangement, but found a suitable minor edit.

I’m seriously still not happy with Ook Island’s design. I’m going to work on it a little longer, making the next actual comic either Thursday or Monday. This design is nothing like I originally planned, but with a few tweaks, I can merge my original idea with the “scientifically practical” idea I actually used. Oh, and the in-progress comic I posted yesterday? I’m scrapping it completely. I was too sleepy from building the island. I missed a plot point at the beginning, and mistakenly thought I had no room for Kenny’s quip at the end. I’ve since come up with a better comic, but I must first get the island looking how it’s supposed to look.
(3-4 paragraphs & 2 hours worth of typing & editing deleted here because I rambled, and eventually replaced it with that “scientifically practical” statement above. What needs explained will be explained in-comic.)