“This fantastic two-minute video, from a guy named Rich, neatly explains why the anger and frustration of Trump’s supporters has been growing over time — why the pushback on things like diversity, equity, inclusion, trans rights, and LGBTQ+ issues seems to be increasing and the hate grows more overt. It has to do with an idea called an extinction burst.”
VIA- The always on it Kottke
Found a new thingy I did. CG renders and texture work came out pretty slick I think.
The only way to defeat a narcissistic sociopath is to starve them. Protect yourself from their bullshit, of course, but move away from it. Let them have their stage, but refuse to be their audience.
This isn’t easy. It’s especially difficult because capitalism is an attention economy. The New York Times and The Washington Post love a narcissistic sociopath because they generate clicks and clicks sell ads. Social media loves a narcissistic sociopath for the same reason, but it’s even worse. On social media, we’re the ones carrying their water. Trump says something that he knows will get him attention (i.e. renaming the Gulf of Mexico) and not only does it fire up hundreds of media outlets, who now divert attention to this idiocy, but it also fires up tons of people like me and you, who end up reposting his garbage.
You Can’t Post Your Way Out of Fascism
If there’s one thing I’d hoped people had learned going into the next four years of Donald Trump as president, it’s that spending lots of time online posting about what people in power are saying and doing is not going to accomplish anything. If anything, it’s exactly what they want.
It isn’t quite as simple as “touch grass,” but it also sort of is.
Trusted information networks have existed since long before the internet and mass media. These networks are in every town and city, and at their core are real relationships between neighbors—not their online, parasocial simulacra.
You can discourse and quote-dunk and fact-check until you’re blue in the face, but at a certain point, you have to stop and decide what truth you believe in. The internet has conditioned us to constantly seek new information, as if becoming a sponge of bad news will eventually yield the final piece of a puzzle. But there is also such a thing as having enough information. As the internet continues to enshittify, maybe what we really need is to start trusting each other and our own collective sense of what is true and good.
We don’t need any more irony-poisoned hot takes or cathartic, irreverent snark. We need to collectively decide what kind of world we actually do want, and what we’re willing to do to achieve it.
Doodle time.
“How to turn off Gemini AI in Gmail, Google Workspace
Disabling Gemini is fairly straightforward if you have access to your email domain’s administrator settings. First, access the Admin Console. Next, go to your Menu, select Generative AI, and choose Gemini.
From there, under the section that says Service status, select OFF for everyone.
It’s as simple as that.
If you don’t have access to the admin console, in your personal inbox settings you can go to General and turn off Smart features and personalization.
While that won’t entirely block the feature’s presence in your inbox, it will limit it.”
This kinda ties into something I have been meaning to mention here. Mainly, I am majorly limiting my internet time now so the blog posts here will probably dry up. I started Blogging back in 1998 and kinda kept at it all this time. But the internet is not what it once was and the rot is spreading so god damn fast. Most stuff I look up is AI generated trash or poison pill MAGA crap. So, well, I am just reading more books, doing more art and music. So, take this as my last post for awhile.
DanK- Signing off
Bunch of work we did just went live on the Specialized website. Came out super clean IMO. Holy crap was this a ton of clipping and composites, lol!
Cool break down of some older movies and very old VFX techniques. From the comments:
‘5:47 Removing bluescreens from behind the scenes footage is just wild”
So in my challenge to start using Karma / Solaris more in Houdini I went and did some cloud tests one a cloud I modeled back for the guitar project. Same scale height and settings as close as I could get them. Karma volume settings are just default, no changes. I had to tweak the Redshift Standard Volume Shader a good deal to get it this far. Rendered both out at 1920x 1080. The Karma one looks more like a cloud though while the Redshift one still feels more like smoke to me. Karma on left, Redshift on right. Using Houdini 20.5.410 and Redshift 2025.1.1.
…
There’s no earthly way of knowing
Which direction we are going
There’s no knowing where we’re rowing
Or which way the river’s flowing
Is it raining?
Is it snowing?
Is a hurricane a-blowing?
Not a speck of light is showing
So the danger must be growing
Are the fires of hell a-glowing?
Is the grisly reaper mowing?
Yes, the danger must be growing
‘Cause the rowers keep on rowing
And they’re certainly not showing
Any signs that they are slowing!
Gene Wilder / Mel Stuart’s Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory (1971)
VIA 20th Century Man (nsfw)
So you updated Photoshop and now all your Droplets don’t work. Cool cool…. Yeah, you can still use “Bridge > Tools > Photoshop > Batch” like a primitive or you can fix it. Well, how to fix it you ask? On Windows, run Photoshop as an admin and THEN make your Droplets. Reboot Photoshop OUT of admin mode and they should work. Screenshot here for how to run PS as an admin.
Lovely views.
What a crazy idea….
Made a new band poster for a show and did the artwork for this EP by Manx. Rock and Roll Portland Peoples!
Breakdown of setting up mics for drums. Very detailed.
Just picked up the newest recording of theirs from Bandcamp as well.
Music Fridays! Tortoise perform all of their iconic 1998 album TNT live at the Pitchfork and The Art Institute of Chicago’s Midwinter 2019 for its 21st anniversary.
His book is actually pretty good as an audio book as well.
Wow, this thing is freaking nutso. A bike based on suspension bridges. From the Wiki.
“Pedersen wrote that he developed the hammock style seat first. It provides suspension from road imperfections with much less weight, 4 ounces (110 g) instead of 3 pounds (1.4 kg) of traditional leather and steel spring saddles of the day. Pedersen then developed a frame, a truss assembled from several thin tubes, around his new seat design. He attributed his inspiration to the Whipple-Murphy bridge truss. The design initially did not support seat height adjustment, and even after some adjustability was added, required the manufacture of eight different sizes. The non-standard frame design would not accommodate a traditional front fork. Instead, Pedersen developed a fork that also consisted of thin tubes assembled into a truss, which was attached to the frame with bearings at two distinct points, instead of through a traditional head tube. Pedersen also received patents for a chainwheel and bottom bracket combination and lightweight pedals.[2]”
Just some rando screen grabs from tumblr that are pretty spot on I thought I post.
