Coursera.org and Lynda.com

Posted on February 7, 2015 by Caroluna

I’ve been working on a couple of educational ventures lately!

Coursera.org has a series of online courses that you can take for free (it’s also possible to take the courses in another form, where you pay for them and get official certification for having completed them). The courses change every few weeks. It’s not like tutorials on YouTube, where you can watch the videos at any time. For most of the courses, the lectures appear once a week, and there is the option to take quizzes, do peer-graded assignments, and participate in a forum discussion group. The degree of participation is totally up to you.

I have started “Introduction to Music Production”

With the recent introduction of high-quality-low-cost software and hardware, the tools of music production are now available to the masses. Albums are made in bedrooms as well as studios. On the surface this is liberating. Anyone can make an album for the low cost of a couple pieces of gear and a software package. But, if you dig deeper, you will find that it is not so easy. Producing music requires knowledge, dedication, and creativity. Knowledge is where this course comes in. No matter what kind of music you are making, there is a large set of tools that you will need to use.

https://www.coursera.org/course/musicproduction

I’ve also been watching some videos over at Lynda.com. This is a site with paid membership. Caution, once you have signed up, they will keep dinging your credit card every month until you specifically ask them to stop! And they will nag you to upgrade your membership to the costlier version so that you can take advantage of their downloadable homework material. But other than that, I am very happy with the site. The video tutorials are clear and professional; every single one I’ve watched has been high quality. I do love YouTube tutorials, with all their quirky individuality — but the quality is very uneven, and it’s hard to find tutorials that systematically cover a large swath of material by breaking it into manageable chunks.

So, thumbs-up to the folks at Lynda.com and Coursera!

So far my problem with these courses is that after each lecture I’ve said “Wow, that’s really cool! I always wondered what —– was”. But then several hours later I’ve already forgotten the new terminology. Also, I get to a certain point in the lectures where the material gets more difficult / technical, and I… switch over to a new course.

Pluto and Minecraft?

Posted on February 7, 2015 by Caroluna

Space probe LORRI was launched in 2006. She flew by Jupiter in 2007 and has spent the past 8 years in hibernation mode on her way to Pluto. Looks to me like she has spent part of that time playing Minecraft!

NASA’s New Horizons has returned its first images of Pluto and its largest moon, Charon, since the mission entered into the countdown phase of its historic mission. Taken at a distance of 126 million miles (200 million km), it will pale in comparison to the images expected over the coming months.

The images were snapped by New Horizons’ telescopic Long-Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) late last month. The spacecraft will make its closest approach on July 14th.

“Pluto is finally becoming more than just a pinpoint of light,” noted New Horizons team member Hal Weaver in a statement. “LORRI has now resolved Pluto, and the dwarf planet will continue to grow larger and larger in the images as New Horizons spacecraft hurtles toward its targets.”

http://io9.com/our-first-grainy-glimpse-of-pluto-and-charon-as-new-hor-1683929152

Here is an artist’s conception of what LORRI will look like when she reaches Pluto.

The above illustration and other information about LORRI found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Horizons

Adventure Map

Posted on January 26, 2015 by Caroluna

I’m working on an Adventure Map for my Minecraft world “Mystery Snail 4”.

Here is an article which gives an overview of Adventure maps
http://www.wikihow.com/Create-a-Minecraft-Adventure-Map

One of the popular ways to play is through adventure maps. An adventure map in Minecraft is a quest to get from point A to point B, with certain restrictions to follow. Restrictions such as you can only explore the interior of the map, you cannot go into creative, you cannot break blocks unless you have this, and the list can go on.

I’m hoping to have my son and some of his friends do a treasure hunt in Mystery Snail 4. I will be giving them a small map that gives them a general view of the world, enough to let them get their bearings, but without revealing too many details. I don’t want them to know about the Terrifying Abyss, or the Stairs of Doom, or the Caverns of Calamity….!

Here is the original image of Mystery Snail 4 taken from the world-creation software, and then the new version in GIMP, which hides a lot of the features.

Close up

Hey, another GIMP project to check off the list!

New Version of MC Edit soon!!!

Posted on January 26, 2015 by Caroluna

I had a frustrating session with MC Edit this weekend. I had created a world in World Painter that was 4000 blocks across. I wanted to take it into MC Edit so I could add things to it — favorite buildings and features from other Minecraft projects. But, no such luck. MC Edit got about halfway through loading it, then froze up. This happened several times. I’m not sure if it’s a problem with MC Edit, or with my computer. (Maybe it’s time to download some more RAM?) Or user error.

Anyway — this made me wonder if MC Edit had been updated recently — since Minecraft itself has recently updated to a new version. When I looked, I found wonderful news! There is going to be an MC Edit 2!!!

David Vierra, aka codewarriorO, is asking for support as he develops this new software. It’s possible to donate through Paypal, or through a “Patreon” page. I had never heard of Patreon before. I think it’s a great idea!

Here’s his Patreon page:
https://www.patreon.com/mcedit2

Two New GIMP Images

Posted on January 1, 2015 by Caroluna

This is an homage to the Doctor Who Christmas Special (2014).

and here is a “painted-over” version of a Minecraft screen shot.

Here’s a comparison of the original screen cap and what I did with it. There is a particular brush that looks like bunches of leaves, and another brush called “cloud”. I was surprised to find out that your ERASER could also take the shape of these brushes. Erasing with the leaf shape seemed to improve the tree a lot.

One Hundred Images challenge

Posted on December 29, 2014 by Caroluna

For 2015, I challenge myself to create 100 images using the software GIMP. I got an early start and I’m up to image 4.

I’m already starting to feel more at ease with the software, and excited about the things it can do. However, I still feel annoyed when I get stuck. There’s so many things I know how to do in Corel Painter Essentials that I can’t do in GIMP yet.

The background gradient and crescent moon layer are modified from a photo. The blackish vegetation is one of the “texture brushes”, using different sizes of the same brush. There’s 2 layers of vegetation, and I made the tree-ish things in the back layer more faded, using the “opacity” slider.

Just messing around with the different “brushes”! I wanted to try each one, but only got 2/3 of the way through the list before running out of room.

This started with a paisley background, which I found online (Google images “fabric + blue paisley”). To lighten up the left side I used the “dodge” tool, and darkened the right side with the “burn” tool. Then I selected an elliptical area and modified the color (hue, saturation and lightness).

Girls and Minecraft, a quote

Posted on December 29, 2014 by Caroluna

http://www.themarysue.com/aisha-tyler-gamer-culture/

Later in the discussion Tyler also brought up a story she heard on public radio about how playing video games at an early age causes kids to be more interested in computer science when they get older, and how Minecraft in particular is drawing an exceptional number girls because of its focus on creation and world-building. “The more girls that play Minecraft,” she noted, “the more girls get really curious about how these worlds work and how they’re composed.”

Cosmic Happydance

Posted on December 29, 2014 by Caroluna

Hey guys, I’m back! Here’s a cosmic happydance.

Mountain by moonlight

Posted on October 30, 2014 by Caroluna

Click to enlarge

First Project in GIMP

Posted on October 29, 2014 by Caroluna

Here’s my first project in GIMP! I wanted to take a Minecraft screenshot and make it look a little more realistic.

It was a frustrating afternoon’s work. I’m not sure if it was GIMP that was the problem, or if it was not communicating well with my graphics tablet! I would try to move Layer 1, and Layer 2 would move instead (even though Layer 1 was selected). I had layers that disappeared for no apparent reason, and layers that became permanently translucent even though I hadn’t intended to do that. In general, working with the layers was very awkward, compared to my familiar graphics software Corel Painter Essentials.

I did like the different kinds of brushes. There were a lot to choose from and they were actually easier to work with than the brushes in Painter Essentials. I’m really glad that had I watched some of the instructional videos over at Lynda.com — those taught me some of the keyboard shortcuts. To change the brush size, instead of having to click your mouse into a TEENY TINY scroll bar, you can just type left bracket or right bracket.

Another tool that I liked that does not exist in Painter Essentials is “dodge / burn”. These words come from photography terminology, back in the old days when you developed photos in a darkroom using chemicals. In this case, “dodge” meant to take a given color and lighten it (add more white) and “burn” meant to take the color and darken it. This was really good for adding shading to the picture, without having to match the paint hues.

Here is what the GIMP interface looked like. Click the picture to enlarge!