Stunning Summertime Sunsets

One of the things I like taking photos of are dynamic skies: from complicated or bizarre cloud formations, to the stunning multi-layered vibrant extravaganzas you get some days at sunset. This summer, we were treated to quite a few stunning displays, fuelled by the unsettled weather we had been having (especially in January, when most of these shots were taken). Here are some highlights from each.

6 December - Rich Blobbies

7 December - Gooey Norwester

3 January - Multilayered

13 January - Pastels

15 January - Fiery Norwester

19 January - Scrappy Glow

22 January - Lumpy Gold

25 January - Lenticular Orbs

Obscure Quirks in Blender's Data Model - Geometry FAQ

In the past few months, there have been a number of instances where people have been stumbling across several obscure parts [1, 2, 3] of Blender's geometry data management design. While these are not exactly new quirks (indeed, most of these are ancient and predate the open source era), they certainly will catch people off guard. For instance, when I first came across some of these while coding the Mask Modifier and Shape Keys remapper, I was quite surprised about the nature of these things.

Blender 2.70 Released

It's taken a few weeks to finalise, but today Blender 2.70 has finally been released at last! Among other things, this release includes features developed for Caminandes 2, and the first round of changes made by the UI team.

In this post, I'll be taking a customary look at the new features and changes introduced for animators and riggers in this release.

Lantern Festival 2014

The annual Lantern Festival was held in Hagley Park over two nights last weekend. As usual, there were a lot of people in attendance, perhaps bolstered by the fact that it had been quite a hot day (31 deg C before midday - this is all the more surprising given that we've just had 3 days of gale force winds and heavy rain).