Posted on December 24, 2002

• My work with “Aquamarine” and “Blue Christmas 2002” made it painfully clear to me that my workstation with no longer up to snuff. Each of those images was delayed 2 or 3 days simply because the renders kept crashing! I’ve been using the same dual 1-Ghz box for over 2 years now and now I’ve decided it’s time to upgrade.

  The new box from Dell was delivered this morning (I ordered it on the 11th) and I’ve been working all day migrating to the new system. It’s a pretty nice setup: dual 2.8 Ghz, 2 GB RAM, 148 GB SCSI HDD, DVD+RW, QUADRO 900, and (gulp!) Windows XP Pro. The best part about the new system is the 20″ Dell 2000FP flat-panel display. I’m in love!

  Hopefully the new box will mean faster renders and more timely updates for you.

  Anyway, I’ll be taking the next couple of days off for the holidays. We’re staying put this year. We’ll go to midnight mass Christmas Eve and hang out with our friends on Christmas. I’m going to really miss seeing my family though.

  I hope you all are where you want to be for the holidays. Jessie and I really appreciate the support you’ve given us and we both want to wish you all the best for the Holidays and for 2003!

Posted on December 21, 2002

• Added “Polaris” to the gallery today. I still have a few things I want to tweak with this image (as I’ve been doing for the past 2 or 3 days), but I think it’s to a point where it’s good enough to be seen in public. I’d also like to hear what suggestions/comments, if any, you folks might have. I’ll probably have another version of this posted before the end of the day and all of the renders will be available in the Pickle Jar.

  UPDATE:I’ve posted another update to Polaris on the new images page (just tweaking the aurora a bit).

  UPDATE II:I’ve posted a dual-monitor version of Polaris on the 2X page.

Posted on December 20, 2002

• I’d hoped to have my new render ready to go by today, but I don’t think it’s ready yet. I’ll be working on it over the weekend and hopefully I’ll have it up early next week.

Posted on December 15, 2002

• Looking at the render I posted last night I noticed something amiss. The snow falling outside the window just didn’t look right to me, so I set about fixing it. The final final render is now up on the new images page, and I’ll be moving on to something new now.

Posted on December 14, 2002

• I’ve added a final updated render of “Spirit of the Season” on the new images page (the original is still available in the Pickle Jar). Thanks to everyone who wrote in with feedback!