Archive | PermalinkFuture Player's Companion: Tomorrows' Evolution

The last of the series of three Future Player's Companion books is now released: Future Player's Companion: Tomorrow's Evolution. Written by Gary Astleford, Neil Spicer and Rodney "Moridin" Thompson and co-illustrated by Jacob Elijah Walker, the supplement to Wizards of the Coast's d20 Modern and d20 Future has all you need for advanced sci-fi characters from cybernetic enhancement to new gadgets to effects of drugs and medicine in a science fiction setting.

(Read more at your own risk)

Keywords: artwork,rpg

Archive | PermalinkRoy's Finest Hour

The 250th installment of the Order Of The Stick does not disappoint. I didn't see the two punchlines in the story coming at all and the impact was outstanding... Well at least for me. Check it out here.

Meanwhile in Singapore, according to Reuters via Yahoo! News, "Singapore scientists looking for ways to transmit the sense of touch over the Internet have devised a vibration jacket for chickens and are thinking about electronic children's pyjamas for cyberspace hugs."

Vibration jackets for chickens?

What what in the what, now?

Keywords: the_internets,webcomics

Archive | PermalinkDO NOT WANT!

As reported earlier, screen captures of an atrociously subtitled Revenge of the Sith bootleg was posted at winterson.com. It appears that the image of Vader screaming "Nooooooo!" in despair over the news of Padmé's death, which was subtitled "Do not want" (see image below), has taken a life of its own as an internet meme.

(Read more at your own risk)

Keywords: funny,star_wars,the_internets

Archive | PermalinkCOBRA's Crimson Guard

Here is another painting and deviantArt upload I made in the last couple of days. COBRA's elite Crimson Guard platoon with its leader unmasked, who is based on my pal Shane Welin, companion of Duckie, who's in a G.I. Joe mood this month.

Click on the link under the image below to view its deviantArt page.

Crimson Guard Platoon Leader

Keywords: artwork,friends,gi_joe

Archive | PermalinkNo Gnews Is Good Gnews...

If you can remember Gary Gnu on television from way back when (and some of you should), have a cookie. If not, it's okay... gnobody's perfect. tv

Archive | PermalinkI Painted Over The Weekend

Over the weekend when I'm not in class, I tried painting some more artwork digitally and upload them to my deviantArt site. Here are three of the paintings I did. Two are original works while the third is a frame grab-referenced Gollum from Return of the King. Click on the image title under each picture to view a larger version hosted at deviantArt.

Red Dragon

Cyborg Self Repair

A Happy Sméagol

Keywords: artwork

Archive | PermalinkSpectral Visitors And Other Matters

Irfan's Cik Su F is here until tomorrow, and she's sleeping in the room next to ours.

Some time last night, I was told she woke Emma up, trembling with absolute fear. It seemed that she saw an apparition gliding by where she slept and disappeared out through the iron grilled window. The ghostly figure wore white and its head and face was a mass of long black hair.

It might have been night terrors (though I doubt it), it might have been a dream, it might have been a fear-induced hallucination, or it might have been the real deal. But that was the story told to me this morning by Ain.

Meanwhile in other news:

• Battlestar Galactica was renewed for a third season, and there was much rejoicing. (Just get on with "Resurrection Ship" already)
• It was Alan Moore's birthday yesterday. He wrote a bunch of excellent stories.
• Painting a dragon can be very difficult without a proper reference, and here is the result of many revisions of it.
• According to the subtitles of the Willow Special Edition DVD, the magic word "helgafel" in the movie is spelt exactly the way thought it would be 17 years ago. Struck out for the other words though.

That is all. Thank you very much. You've been a great audience.

Keywords: around_the_house,battlestar_galactica,birthday,movie,the_internets

Archive | PermalinkChronicles of the Wild Gundark Part II

Continuing the saga of the Wild Gundark crew:

Nisa pulled on her control yoke and told her passenger (and her wary crew), "Let's get to work." Similiv turned to the comm board as the ship's nose turned the way Nisa directed it.

And she discovered that a colossal object blocked her entire forward viewport. Something gray. Something wedged shaped. Something over a kilometer and a half in length. Something ominous.

It seemed to them that the ship's cabin temperature dropped several dozen degrees.

"An Imperial Star Destroyer!"

And now the continuation of the story based on the Star Wars RPG campaign:

(Read more at your own risk)

Keywords: fiction,rpg,star_wars

Archive | PermalinkHere's a Moria Orc

... as designed by the cool kids at Weta Workshop, using a solid black Photoshop brush, thickness keyed to stylus pressure. So it's my first fully digital black and white piece posted in these here parts. The reference source is a screen capture of one of the Orcs surrounding the Fellowship just before the appearance of the Balrog in Moria.

«Click here to view the cute little guy»

Keywords: artwork,movie

Archive | PermalinkHarloth Graf, Naboo Guard

Here's a portrait of Harloth Graf the Naboo Guard in the Star Wars RPG Sabredart campaign I posted earlier, using Photoshop to pencil and paint the piece. I wish I had a better photo reference of player Stu Cunningham for it, though. Close enough, Stu? Or more work needed?

Keywords: artwork,friends,rpg,star_wars,swag

Archive | PermalinkScrotal Safety Commission

All you human males, go to the Scrotal Safety Commission to have a read on some really useful information on your, uh.. scrotums. Especially the "Scrotal Safety Tips" such as:

• Due to the aggressive nature of tiny, uncontrollable legs -- baby-sitting may not be a solid career choice for those of you with "fragile scrotums". Sadly, new fathers may not be able to avoid the willy-nilly, groin-magnets that a baby's feet often are. In a case such as this, heavy padding and a generous application of expanding foam (available at your local hardware supplier) will help protect your region.

and

• Enlist one of your friends as a "Crotch-Buddy". Have him concern himself with the safety of your scrotum. Remind him publicly that he is your "Crotch-Buddy". Remind him in front of girls.

Go there, read it. You wont regret it.

Keywords: funny,the_internets

Archive | PermalinkHome Sweet Home, After A Fashion

We're back on the tenth floor of this apartment building. The tiles on the bathroom floor are coming apart. The extra room still reeks of termite poison. We have the smallest TV screen among all the people we know. We are instantly reminded of the bills we have to pay. And it looks like Irfan is feeling lonely after almost two weeks surrounded by lots of family.

But it's home sweet home.

The computer is set up just the way I like it so that when it was activated the setup felt so welcoming. Irfan is quite literally swimming in his books (which he rummaged from his book table, much to Ain's chagrin), and, to anyone who understands what this means, Ain had a fantastic hour sweeping the floor of the house.

It was a great holiday, now it's back to work for all of us.

There might have been a lot of worthwhile lessons that we've learnt over the last week and a half or so... but the only one that sticks to my mind right now is that when I started strumming the guitar at Abah's house, Irfan interjected happily:

"Serenity!!!"

Keywords: around_the_house,irfan

Archive | PermalinkIllustration Friday: Night

Illustration Friday time again, and this time the topic is Night.

Click on the thumbnail below to view a larger image.

Keywords: artwork,illustration_friday

Archive | PermalinkEid Mubarak from Sitiawan

Eid Mubarak, and Selamat Hari Raya from Irfan Shafiq, Khairul Hisham and Nurul Ain. Here are some family photos from the morning of the first day of Aidilfitri. Present are Irfan's grandparents and the family of his Opah Ngah. Unfortunately, Tok Irfan wasn't feeling to good earlier in the morning. He went for a check up at the clinic and discovered his blood pressure was low. So what did the doctor tell him to do?

Go back home, eat as many of the Aidilfitri food as he can. If only the rest of us were that lucky.

Click on the thumbnails below to view the full images.

Group photo of all present in the household on the morning of Aidilfitri.

Irfan with his parents.

Irfan on his bicycle, with his dad on Opah's bicycle.

Irfan with Ummi, but he chose that moment to frown.

The three of us, for now.

Keywords: balik_kampung,hari_raya,irfan,medical

Archive | PermalinkMaryland - Part II

As promised, here's Part II of our trip to Maryland. Aside from fishing, during the day and a half we spent there, we ate our fill in Maryland's pride and joy, the Maryland Blue Crab.

Dean and Dolores who live in Crisfield, MD, live in a house where the back yard opens out into canals which lead to the Chesapeake Bay. So they almost never have to actually purchase the blue crab. Each household is allowed 2 crab pots which they toss into the canal behind their house. Amazing what some chicken wire, a dead fish, and a few hours in the waters of the Chesapeake will get you! It's like magic - the crabs crawl into the pot and they can't come out!

Read on for more blue crab adventures, but if you are squeamish, the truth is we do eventually get to eat the crabs. So yes, there might be some non-G rated pictures during the preparation of the crabs.

(Read more at your own risk)

Keywords: family_outings,food,travel,vacation

Archive | PermalinkPre-Aidilfitri at Pasir Mas

As was blogged earlier, three days before Deepavali were spent at Lubuk Tapah, Pasir Mas. Not only were there the pre-Aidilitri preparations going on, but they were also getting ready for the wedding of Ain's cousin some time after the festivities, which Ain & I will have to miss.

What is there to report at Tok Bah and Tok Ma's house? I really like the solok lada at dinners. Irfan hoarded all the pillows in the house and buried himself under them. Biscuits were baked (picture below). It rained quite a bit, which was pleasant. We didn't even leave the kampung in the day, knowing full well that the traffic in the town of Pasir Mas would be horribly jammed because of the balik kampung season. Irfan discovered the joys of Cartoon Network on Astro.

Here are some of the pics.

(Read more at your own risk)

Keywords: balik_kampung,hari_raya,ramadhan

Archive | PermalinkMaryland - Part I

Hisham's reminiscing has prompted me to finally take action - all this summer I have been procrastinating making some family related entries. Vin's family had several family-related occasions and I have been meaning to blog them. Rather than doing them in chronological order, I am going to organize it a little differently. In early August, Vin and I traveled to Maryland first to Bel Aire to visit with Aunt Joan and Uncle John, then to Crisfield to visit with Aunt Dolores and Uncle Dean. Our visit with Aunt Joan and Uncle John was short and amounted to a quick lunch with them, but stay tuned, there will be more on them in upcoming entries.

In Crisfield, Dean took Vin and I fishing. For the second year in a row, I went fishing with Dean and Vin, and guess what? For the second year in a row, the girl beat the guys hands down on fish fished! In the immortal words of Nelson (from the Simpsons), "eh-heeeeeh."

Anyway, if you are a bit squeamish, better not read on. The fish pictures may be a tad graphic...

(Read more at your own risk)

Keywords: family_outings,food,travel,vacation