Mark your calendar and RSVP for these mostly SXSW related parties / events.
I just finished creating a (very) simple command for an existing MEL script bundle for TextMate. It allows MEL scripts to be executed from within TextMate, reducing the need for the rather featureless built-in Script Editor.
A brief overview of using camera projection to create a 3D scene from a single photograph.
I’m going to try to play the classical guitar.
Feb
08
SXSW Events
“Drinks” by Frances BerrimanNot everything here is SXSW-related, but I say it’s all close enough to be listed here. If you have anything to add, send me a message and I’ll post it here!
Friday, March 7, 2008
Friday Night Mix at Six
Official SXSW party — badges required?
6:00 PM
Netflix Presents Super High Me: The After Party
PureVolume Ranch
RSVP
11:00 PM-4:00 AM
Saturday, March 8, 2008

BarCamp Austin III
GSD&M
10:00 AM – 10:00 PM
SXSW Flickr Meet-up!
Cathedral of Junk
4:00 PM – 6:00 PM
Bike Hugger Beer & BBQ
RSVP
North tent of Brush Square Park (near convention center)
4:30 PM – 6:30 PM
GeekAustin SXSW Happy Hour
J Black’s Feel Good Lounge
6:00 PM – 8:00 PM
Local Music Is Sexy 5
PureVolume Ranch
RSVP
8:00 PM – 4:00 AM
Sunday, March 9, 2008
SOCIALTHING! PARTY
PureVolume Ranch
RSVP
8:00 PM – 4:00 AM
Gawker Media (Lifehacker, io9, Valleywag)
Side Bar
9:00 PM – 11:00 PM
MySQL party at La Zona Rosa
With the Smithereens & Seven Mary Three
Visit Sun Microsystems booth (130, 132, 229, 231) for free drink tickets
9:00 PM – 1:00 AM
Monday, March 10, 2008
ROCK.OPERA.SXSW 2008
Stubb’s Ampitheater
[rock] [at] [opera.com]
5:30 PM – 12:00 AM
Nuclear Taco Night at SXSW
Brush Square Park – 5th and Neches
6:00 PM
Austin On Rails SXSW Happy Hour
Buffalo Billiards
6:00 PM – 9:00 PM
[sxsw] [at] [fiveruns.com]
Plutopia! The 8th Annual SXSW Interactive Gathering of Tribes
Scholz Garten
6:00 PM – 11:59 PM
$10 w/o badge, Cash bar
PhizzPop Design Challenge – SXSW Finale
Maggie Mae’s
7:00 PM
The Great British Booze-up
Shakespeare’s Pub
7:30 PM – 10:00 PM
COLORADO INTERACTIVE PARTY
PureVolume Ranch
RSVP
8:00 PM – 4:00 AM
Frrvrr Launch Party
The Mohawk
9:00 PM
Kraut By Southwest
TBA
9:00 PM
SXNW – South by Northwest 3rd Annual Geek Fest Party at SXSW
Iron Cactus
11:00 PM
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
SXSW BBQ Bus
Salt Lick BBQ
The buses will pick people up at 4 p.m. at Trinity Street bus cut out and look for signs on the bus that say Scoble/HP Dinner. Limited to first 100 people on Upcoming.org
4:00 PM – 8:00 PM
The Avalonstar Wii Bowling Extravaganza
Austin Convention Center
7:00 PM
Natural American Spirit’s VIP Party
Featuring the Raveonettes & Autolux
504 Trinity St
8:00 PM – 12:00 AM
Requires VIP pass
The Bigg Digg Digg Shindigg
PureVolume Ranch
RSVP
8:00 PM – 4:00 AM
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Austinist & Gothamist: Gonna Get Down 3
The Mohawk
11:00 AM – 6:00 PM
March Mashup
[partymashup] [at] [hotmail.com]
Walsh Landing (Public Park just past Hula Hut)
It’s on a boat!
5:30 – 9:30 PM
Thursday, March 13, 2008
The Onion’s AV Club SXSW 2008 Party
Emo’s and Emo’s Jr.
12:00 PM – 6:00 PM ?
New Belgium Beer Party
Solar stage @ Counter Cafe
7:00 PM
Saturday, March 15, 2008
Impose Magazine party w/ KVRC radio
No location info yet
1:00 PM
More
British Guestlist Request
RSVP for 7 different events
March 12-15, 2008
More stuff here, but most of it is for badge-holders only.
Oct
07
TextMate and Maya
I just finished creating a (very) simple command for an existing MEL script bundle for TextMate. It allows MEL scripts to be executed from within TextMate, reducing the need for the rather featureless built-in Script Editor.
It is available on the TextMate Subversion repository
Sep
07
Camera Projection Tutorial
Acquire a Source Image
Find a photo with:
- Few overlapping elements
- Simple perspective
- EXIF data from the camera (focal length, distance, other useful information)
Prepare the Image
Bring it into Photoshop and remove any unwanted parts from the image. Then, save an image for each element that will require a unique projected image, such as a foreground plane, sky, background plane, and any object that is partially hidden by another object.
The Scene
Camera
Create a new camera, “cam_projector”. Add an image plane and match focal length & distance from the furthest object.
Set a key at frame 1 to lock down the projecting camera, and duplicate the projecting camera and use this for rendering, “cam_render”.
Models and Shaders
Create simple objects and position them in the approximate locations.
Create a new Lambert shader and add a color map. Choose “As Projection” and pick your file. Projection Type is “Perspective”, and Link to Camera should be set to cam_projector.
Set the ambient color to 1.0 and turn down the diffuse to zero; the photo is already lit, so there’s no need to add any more light.
Duplicate the shader and replace the image as necessary for each object in the scene.
Subdivide the objects and drag points around from various viewpoints to match objects in the source photo. The objects don’t need to be very detailed.
Disable texture filtering for areas where the texture stretches, or adjust the scene so that stretching is not noticeable.
Finishing Up
The scene is now ready for whatever nefarious purposes you have in mind. Insert characters, vehicles, or buildings, and render.
It’s a good idea to split up the scene for several render passes, in case you need to adjust color, background movement, etc. More importantly, you should render new objects and their shadows separately, because shadows will not appear on 100% ambient / 0% diffuse geometry.
For a finished example, see the rendered animation from an older version of this project that I created in XSI.
There’s another great tutorial by Janine Pauke that goes into a little more detail. It’s a tutorial for Cinema 4D, but it should be usable with any other 3D app.



