Archive for the 'life' Category

Bow Street Runner

I’ve been insanely busy at work recently, working on a huge Flash game for Channel 4. I’ve kept schtum about it all, with only a few hints to what’s been going on to the outside world.

On the 11th Feb, Channel 4 released a preview of Episode 1 to the world, and it’s been picked up by the blogosphere. My favourite moments so far have been seeing my dead body on the front page of Kotaku, and seeing my fat arse on the front page of my favourite site BoingBoing.

To my fellow programming friends, it’s all ActionScript 3, and no, I didn’t do the entire thing by myself ;)

Be warned, there’s a few bugs in this *preview* release. Oh, and there’s 4 more episodes to come in the very near future.

To show the grandkids, when i’m grey and old:

BoingBoing

Bow Street Runner

Kotaku

Bow Street Runner

Team Littleloud rocks!

Cyriak animation

Cyriak is a Brighton animator whose work is absolutely crazy. And also *extremely* good.
I love his new animation:

There’s a better video on his site, and a load more videos here.

Welcome to Boston - Flashforward

Well we’re here! And Boston really is a lovely place. Thanks again to D+D for sending us!

I’ll upload pictures to Flickr throughout the week, and i’ll blog whether we win the award tonight!

Shoreham Airshow crash photo

UPDATE: The Worthing Herald replies! See below..

When I heard a plane had crashed round the corner from my house, I had to go take a look, although I did feel like I was ‘rubbernecking’ :( I took a few photos of the crash site while I was there.

I just had a comment from someone on Flickr saying that the Worthing Herald is using my photo (it’s the last one in the series) and attributing it to a “Jay Kay Kappa”. You can see the original picture above, or see the flickr page here.

Massive co-incidence? They look identical to me, even the individuals postures and the position of the smoke.

If my photo is wrongly attributed, I wonder any of these photos are actually by “Jay Kay Kappa”?

UPDATE: The Worthing Herald replies!

Jon from The Worthing Herald has been in contact with both Nic and myself, to let us know that they received these photographs through press channels, and they then discussed a fee with Jay.

I can’t believe this guy has been going around collecting photos from the public, then passing them off as his own, thereby profiting from someone’s death!
It’s worth noting that I have been offered a fee, which I will donate to a relevant charity, most likely the Royal Air Forces Association

I’d like to thank The Worthing Herald for helping sort this out quickly and fairly, thanks guys!

We’re going to Flashforward in Boston!


Littleloud are sending Paul and me to Flashforward in Boston, where we’ve been nominated for the Game award! Yey! Fingers crossed.

Last time we were nominated for an award we won it!

I’ll post a few updates on here while i’m over there, and also i’ll update Twitter

Wonder what good things there are to do in Boston?

Lost iPod!

UPDATE: The iPod has been returned! See below..

I found an iPod lying on the street on the way to work this morning.
Personally, if I lost my iPod i’d be gutted, so i’ll do what I can to find the rightful owner and return it to them!
If this fails, i’ll either take it to the Police, or ask Apple if they can help.
In all honesty, if I hand it in to the police, I wouldn’t be suprised if it was “accidentally” lost..

So far i’ve posted to a couple of local mailing lists. I’ve checked out lostipods.com but no luck so far.

The most interesting thing is that the iPod has photos on it - what with Brighton having such a close-knit community, i’m sure that if I post a photo from this iPod, someone is going to recognise them, and might be able to help me find who the iPod belongs to!

I’ll print out some sheets of A4 and stick them up near where I found it.
If you recognise the people in the photo, or can give me some info on this, then email me at: foundipodinbrighton{at}googlemail{dot}com

Now just in case you’re thinking of blagging this and claiming it as your own, don’t even think about it! This iPod is peronalised in so many ways, i’ll be asking anyone who says it’s theirs a lot of questions to help identify it as their own! :)

Ok, here’s the photos:

Recognise them? Get in touch!

[edited to remove one photo as some people thought it was a bit too personal - fair play]

UPDATE: 24 hours later, it’s been returned!

It seems that a post i sent to BNM was seen by a certain Carl Hodler, who happened to see that someone on Facebook had set their status to “…is pining for her lost ipod..” - he then contacted her, she contacted me, and the rest is history!

I met up with Lucy this morning, returned the iPod, and now i’m in the possession of a rather nice bottle of 2003 Merlot Cabernet Sauvignon - thanks Lucy! :) Oh, and most importantly, good karma!

Edit: Actually Al read it from my post on FlashBrighton, who then sent it round Kerb

Second Life

Linden Labs are setting up offices in Brighton, and I see Second Life mentioned almost every day by someone, so I thought I might as well see what all the fuss is about.

I did try to give it a go a long time ago, but was put off when I had to put my card number in, so I bailed. However, they’ve cleverly decided to remove that part of the process, so I signed up, downloaded the client, and logged in..

I’ve played a lot of 3D games over the years, but I realise this isn’t a game, so although comparisons are inevitable, they’re not really that valid. Yes the graphics are of Quake 2 standard. Yes there’s lag. No, the whole thing doesn’t feel that refined. But I kinda like it.

I haven’t signed up yet.. but it’s not that expensive, and it might be interesting to give it a go for a while. I really enjoyed building things in second life (lets not ask what i built), and things can be scripted. I had a quick look at the language, and it doesnt seem that bad.

There’s such huge potential in Second Life and it’s inevitable clones, that it would be madness to ignore or dismiss it. I’ll be logging in again soon, so let me know if you’re already there, or thinking of joining!

Surf’s up.

getting up, originally uploaded by erstcroc.

Fritz left Littleloud to go to Taiwan and surf.

That’s very, very cool.

Flash developers don’t know the web?

Well, that’s what Aral says. Personally, I disagree!

He asks:

  1. Do you know what a mashup is?
  2. Have you ever created a mashup?
  3. Do you know CSS?
  4. Do you use webmail regularly?
  5. How many social networking sites are you on?
  6. How many web applications do you use on a daily basis?
  7. Do you subscribe to RSS feeds?
  8. Do you use SWF Object or UFO?
  9. If you answered yes to the question above, do you know why you use SWF Object or UFO?
  10. Do you blog?

My reply is here. and while I was writing my reply, I saw this on Aral’s site. How web 2.0…

Proving Aral wrong

Blair and Aphex Twin

Aphex Twin:

blair_come_to_daddy_1.jpg

Tony Blair:

blair_come_to_daddy_2.jpg blair_come_to_daddy_3.jpg

Separated at birth? (thanks Dazza!)