Dreamagination » Blog

Mafiosi

Uwe — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 15:01:13 +0000

One of the images from the photo shoot in march.
I’m not sure yet if the combination warm/soft <-> cold/hard is working out. I like the look for now, though.

Models: Leslie & Anne

More to come.

Photoshooting March

Uwe — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 22:44:27 +0000

Last week we had a little photo shooting session, which was a lot of fun. Over the next few weeks I’ll post pictures from that session, any time I get around to work on them. Here’s a little taste for now.

photoshop-weblog.com

Uwe — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 00:17:36 +0000

If you ever had a closer look at Photoshop or looked for a tutorial at some point, you’ll probably have come across the www.photoshop-weblog.de (at least if you’re German). I’ve been reading the blog for the better part of two years now, and I continue to be impressed by how often the author (Dirk Metzmacher) manages to find real gems of Photoshop art. You’ll find tutorials, book recommendations, portfolio tips, and generally cool artworks, but also events and prize competitions all around Photoshop. So I can heartily recommend the blog if you’re into image manipulation of any kind.

Now Dirk has decided to establish an international version of his successful Photoshop blog. I’m responsible for translating all articles into English, and I’m already looking forward to the website’s future. Translating all that content has a great side effect: I’m forced to absorb more knowledge of all kind. Win-win :o)

Multilanguage blog

Uwe — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 14:40:16 +0000

Some of you have noticed that I converted the blog to a new layout at the beginning of the year. It was time to get things in order and push the website more in the direction of a portfolio. By the way, the theme is called Lumin and is available at elegantthemes.

Unfortunately, my previous multilanguage wordpress plugin doesn’t work with the new theme, at least not in the way I want it to. And since Dirty Split is available in several languages, and since a major part of the players/visitors speak English (yes, you guys!), it makes sense to keep the blog both in German and in English. Which means I needed an alternative for maintaining more than one language.

Then I found the qTranslate plugin, which makes it no problem at all to have all content both in German and in English (and even more languages if you want). Works fine so far, and I’m really excited about how easy it is to manage. I can recommend qTranslate to everyone who needs more than one language for their blog.

Although if you don’t trust the automatic translation (I don’t), then you’ll still have to bite the bullet and translate everything by hand.

So long :o)

Underground Animation

Uwe — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 19:06:52 +0000

Click here to view the embedded video.

I wanted to see yesterday’s little mine cart in motion. Short, sweet, HD.

Mine cart

Uwe — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 16:35:46 +0000

The little lonely mine cart is part of a lighting study.

Cinema 4D R11
AR 3
Photoshop

Know-how subscription

Uwe — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 19:57:36 +0000

You might have heard of video2brain, maybe you’ve even bought a DVD or two from these guys. For everybody else: Video2Brain is a company from Graz, Austria, that specializes in video trainings and sells them on DVD and online. A little like The Gnomon Workshop, actually, only with a much broader portfolio. Their range of training products covers many different topics, from photography, image processing and manipulation, 3D modeling, lighting, video editing, motion design up to the huge area of web programming and software development. Each of these DVDs can run for as long as 8 or 9 hours, neatly organized in chapters and broken down into easy-to-swallow 5-minute pieces. The average price for a DVD is about 50 €, and there are a few hundred of them in the shop.

But here’s the kicker: A few weeks ago video2brain started offering the option of annual subscriptions. You pay just under 200 € and gain access to the entire (!) online video catalog. Awesome! It’s like a land of plenty, and I’ve been lost in it already. An additional 100 € gives you the license to download all of the DVDs to your hard drive, including source files and training material if you wish. This way you can watch it all offline, whenever you want.

I’m very curious to see how this thing will develop for video2brain. For a knowledge junkie like me that’s a spectacular offer, especially at such a fair price. The video2brain website calls it an “introduction price”, and I’m anxious to see how the market will accept this concept and how the prices will behave in the future.

So in conclusion: If you’re interested in a particular topic, have a look at their catalog. If there are only one or two DVDs that tickle your fancy, then it won’t be worth the subscription and you’re probably better off buying the DVDs individually. But if you want (or need) a lot of interdisciplinary knowledge – which is a good idea especially in game development – then the subscription should be right up your alley.

Dirty Split in Italian

Uwe — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 17:41:15 +0000

It has taken a while, but now you can play Dirty Split in Italian. If you don’t speak Italian you can still play it and improve your language skills, heh. As always you’ll find it on the download page.

Derby Fever

Uwe — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 15:50:21 +0000

After a long stretch of work we’re proud to present our animated short film ‘Derby Fever’. The film is about two lively seniors measuring their respective soccer club allegiance in an epic battle. The razor sharp wits of two giants collide, and a breathtaking finale resolves once and for all who will prevail.

Or they’re just having a friendly round of chess, whatever you prefer ;o)

Enjoy!

The Team:
Idea, Editing, Sound: Sebastian Landeskroener (www.landeskroener.de)
Idea, Artworks, Animation: Uwe Sittig (www.dreamagination.org)

Server downtime

Uwe — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 16:24:42 +0000

Apparently the download numbers for the latest translation of Dirty Split have exceeded traffic expectations, which is why the Dreamagination server is having problems right now. I’m sorry for the inconvenience and the problems will be resolved shortly.