Sunday, December 25, 2005
 
Alternative entertainment for those who do not want to leap into the Boxing Day Sales scrum ... BBC7 (the BBC's Internet Radio station - or one of, I've lost track), is playing its radio adaptations of four of the Narnia novels tomorrow, starting at 0800 GMT. I will be extremely disappointed if these are exempted from the Listen Again feature, which allows you to listen to programs gone by until the next week (check the "Listen Again" link on the right).


Thursday, December 22, 2005
Willows, redux
 

I have returned to my mission of creating a perfect willow tree. The last episode ended in vexation with Arbaro hanging every time I tried to export a willow with the default mesh. I had to simplify quite considerably, with spindly results. So when I upgraded computers I was decidedly ticked to run into the same problem with a system that had double the speed and four times the memory. In the meantime, more knowledgable people than myself had encountered the same problem, and Mike's POV-Ray page gave me the solution: give it more memory. Note this command has to be issued from the same directory that arbaro_gui.jar resides in, or one gets a "cannot access jarfile" - more Googling. Best manual index ever invented. Result, willows that are starting to look like willows.


Sunday, December 18, 2005
 
Joe Mahoney

Got up the first of my interviews with members of the SF community in Canada, who may or may not also write, but definitely contribute to the wider net cast by SF lovers in their own, unique way. I was inspired to do something to highlight such cool stuff when I started thinking about the interplay between writing and reading, the role of reviewing, and how the people who are editors, publishers, volunteers etc. are the ones who make it possible for there to be writers.


What I've discovered is that many of those who create the social network that is the "SF community" in Canada are writers: they are writers who also review, or writers who also edit, etc. Some writers have even branched out into publishing, like Robert Sawyer.


The non-writers in the crowd are just as interesting. In fact, since publishers -- in particular -- are rarer than writers, it seemed meaningful to include them. The people who keep communications alive by volunteering in a myriad of ways are also pretty nifty and important beings, whether or not they also write professionally.


I have some ideas for future interviews, but more are always welcome. The goal is to do one interview every other month or so, which means about six a year.



Friday, December 09, 2005
 

Anthology authors (counter clockwise from top) Elizabeth Woods, Sarah Trick and Amanda Da Silva read at the launch for the Okal Rel Universe Anthology 1 held at Books and Company in Prince George. Anthology editor Virginia O'Dine (centre) read from Adam Volk's story and Sarah read from Rick Hoggarth's. We were delighted to have about fifteen people turn out. Two copies of Neo-opis magazine were donated as door prizes plus one copy of Lynda's The Lorel Experiment.


Special thanks to all who supported us. More pictures on the ORU news page.



Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Black Hearth Shield
 

Using Alison's "Nersallian Braid" fractal image as the raw material for the Nersallian dragon claw marks on the Black Hearth shield. Stylistic claw marks, I've always said. Might be plausible. Annoyed to see I trimmed the circle a bit too tight. Bother.



Saturday, December 03, 2005
 

The Courtesan Prince, book #1 in the Okal Rel Universe saga, has the great honor to be named Editor's Choice for Dec 2005 by Deep Magic, an up and coming e-zine, on the strength of its review there by Anne M. Stickel.


Deep Magic is a free-to-download journal. The current edition is always available for download via the homepage. However, if you encounter this message after Dec 31, 2005, you can still access the December 2005 issue (No. 43) via its permalink.



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