A new abstract I'm working on...

[yaddatrance]

I've been working on some laser software for a while.

While I'm a mostly satisfied Pangolin user, it doesn't have the power or
flexibility I felt it should have... As a display engine, it's wonderful. As
an user interface to programming the laser, there's quite a few things
which could be changed for the better. The main thing is how difficult
it is to get an idea from your head onto the laser just as you imagined it...

One of my pet projects is a "beautiful curves" renderer... In mathematics,
there are a few special simple but stunningly beautiful algorithms...

I'm currently playing with the 110mW maXYZ red module, so I figured
I'd show it off a little...

One show I'm working on is purely mathematical, featuring a "abstract"
butterfly flying through a field of abstract flowers... I'm enclosing a couple
of short movie clips below which display the models I'm working on.

A mathematical flower, This model use something akin to MIP mapping to change the complexity of the flower in realtime based on how close (big) it
is to the camera.

http://scc.sc.wfinet.com/howdy/kson_abstract.AVI

The butterfly, just rotating around for now...

http://scc.sc.wfinet.com/howdy/kson_butter.AVI

Since I'm uploading pictures, check some of these out... I've got the
blanking working...

http://scc.sc.wfinet.com/howdy/nr_maxyz.JPG Get it in 1600x1200!

[Spec]

My god. Flippy riding the rocket... I can barely type now, im still giggling like an asian school girl on meth

I had a friend come over this evening, he brought over his pangolin deck and we ran my deck through its paces. It was truely amazing. I almost dropped the $2000 for an intro deck right there.

We started discussing some of the "limitations" of the software and came to about the same consensus you did. Its not "wonderful" in the usability department. Sadly theres not much that can be done there. All their talk about "We want your comments to improve the software" is just that. Talk.

If your on AIM, ICQ, or MSN shoot me a message. Lets get you a gallery page here so you can upload the images and video.

Good to meet ya by the way

[the_kcar]

'Allo...I've been lax in the replies department...how rude...

I love the pix...told marconi to g'head and use a few for FleaBay.....

He still won't stop giggling...

I'm glad the lil red is doing the job

Okies, welcome aboard, take care, gotta focus around here....

ttys l8rbye

OH ... and Welcome Aboard!!!! Glad y'made it

[yaddatrance]

Glad to be here! Thanks!

Spec: I'd love to get a gallery, I come on IM every once in a while, you
can hit me up as "yaderoth"... I have quite a few cool photos I never
really ever get a chance to show off.

The pangolin folks always seem to be a bit busy building really
expensive plugins. Though I am thinking of picking up one of
their "patented" curved mirrors to do 360 scanning. Not exactly
worth what they want, but they worked on it first so it's worth
some renumeration.

As you've noticed I really like the red!

Some local laser hobbiests and I are working on some software to
take some of the labor out of building shows... It's for basic frame and
object creation and it supports cubic bezier curves and other nifty little
features (groups, stencils, etc) which take a lot of the pain out of building
objects to import into pangolin and other systems.

For example, the frames displayed above were all designed in it! It's
nowhere near ready to show off yet, but it hopefully will in the next few
months.

I also tinker around with building laser related circuits in my free time.
I'll show them off when I get a chance to do a write up on them.