Nomadtoons.com Blog

Stupid stories...

2009-04-21T16:59:00.000-07:00

When I was in middle and high school, me and my best friend Jason H. used to spend lots of time making up really stupid stories which were recorded on a crappy old cassette recorder I'd inherited from my Dad. Here's a few of these "classics":

1: "The tire"

The story of a gigantic tire that grew by running over people, "absorbing" them and magically growing bigger and bigger. The story was influenced by a Boy Scout trip where we found an old truck tire and proceeded to roll it down a huge, steep hill that we later found out led to a road below. It was 11:00 at night so all we heard was the sound of the tire crashing through the woods on its way down. We found it the next day stuck way up in a tree.

2: "Ancient Alien Worms!"

I don't remember much about this one. Something about worms from outer space that had been "awoken" by humans, which of course made them angry. They sought vengence!

3: " Beer Beetles"

A small town in Texas is inundated by beer beetles that are angry because the town's crop of beer flowers- of which they feed- fails to grow becuase of a drought. They seek revenge by flying into resturaunts and stores full of people and spontaneously combusting. The town hires a "beetle detective", aptly named "Mr. Beetleman" to solve the case, which really doesn't get solved. We were recording the story in the car on the way to Florida and passed by some attractive girls in a convertible. The story stops there because I assume we were interested in them.

4: " Playdough dinosaur"

A small boy makes a dinosaur out of playdough. His mother is angry at him ( for some reason) and flushes it down the toilet. The playdough dinasaur grows from all the water and comes back- seeking revenge ( notice a pattern here?) and proceeds to eat the mother, the father, and basically everyone else in the story. It goes on a rampage, breaking into stores collecting more playdough to make itself bigger and bigger!

5: " Snake spaghetti!"

Not much of a story, we just liked to yell "Snake Spaghetti!" a lot. But we made up a story anyway. Basically, people at a fancy resturaunt order spaghetti and it turns into live, poisonous snakes! Oh no!

6:" The Vacuum cleaner"

Inspired by my Grandad's crappy old canister vacuum, one day a vacumm goes bezerk, grinding up a whole family.

7:" Charlie Brown and the alternative people"

Grunge was pretty popular in the early 90's and being the unpopular nerds we were, me and Jason despised these people. So we made up some stupid story about how Charlie Brown ( not sure why he became the character) was the star of a popular computer game ( not sure why that was the case either) but anyway, he "magically" comes out of the computer and goes around insulting all the "alternative people".

8: " The sinister plastic easter egg"

I don't remember much about this one. Something about an evil plastic easter egg of doom that has awful messages stuffed inside it that all come true.

9-?: Various stories involving famous characters. They won't be mentioned for legal reasons. But basically lots of stories about famous fast food and theme park icons that go out and do the same kinds of things that always happened in the rest of our stories: Either a character seeks revenge, grows bigger, or eats people.

10: "Gangster Banana Peels"

Gangsters who are basically just bananas go out at night at offices and throw themselves in the floor, making famous and rich people trip and fall, breaking their necks.

I can't remember all of the stories. We made up A LOT of them.

Live from Grossingers and other forgotten places.

2009-04-13T09:03:00.000-07:00

About 10 years ago I bought a record ( yes an actual vinyl record) at a small flea market in TN for 50 cents. Its a live recording of Tito Puente, the famous Cuban jazz bongo drum player. Even now, its one of my favorite records.

The first track starts off with the accouncer with typical 1950's cigarette-altered voice introducing the band. " Ladies and gentlemen, good evening. Grossinger's Hotel is pleased to bring you Tito Puente and hiw world-famous orchestra." Then the music starts. In the background you can hear glasses tinkling, people talking, and so on. Recording music before a live audience was seldom done in the 50's, so the record is rather interesting in that aspect. Its like a slice of the 50's frozen in time.

I never really thought about the mentioning of Grossinger's Hotel nor the pictures on the back of the album showing images of people swimming, skiing, and golfing at the resort. But just a few days ago I pulled out the album for the first time in a few years and listened as I did some work at home. Out of curiosity, I decided to look up the Grossinger Hotel to see what had become of it and whether it was still in business.

What I found was fascinating. The Grossinger Hotel was only one of hundreds of hotels located in the Catskill mountains of Upstate New York. From the turn of the 20th century up until the late 70's, the area was known as the "Borscht Belt". Primarily Jewish immigrants and their children would leave NYC and New Jersey for the catskills and stay at these primarily Jewish owned resorts. Some of these resorts were enormous. The Grossinger Hotel had over 35 buildings alone, but others were even larger, with as many as 1,500 rooms, large indoor and outdoor heated pools, huge banquet and dance halls, and huge dining rooms that served large quantities of Kosher meals.

But reading further, almost all of the resorts closed their doors by the mid eighties. Grossingers but the dust in 1986. Others like the Pines Hotel as recent as 1998. Only a few remain, namely the Kutsher Hotel, which is still family owned. A large majority of the former resorts lay abandoned and in decay. Its sort of a feeling of sadness to see pictures of these resorts now in ruin.

Its strange to me that in the US in particular, once-popular destinations, towns, or even entire cities can have such dramatic swings in fortune. In the case of the Catskill mountains, their demise was met with the advent of cheap airline travel, where those same families who used to drive from NYC to Upstate NY could for the same price travel to Florida, California, or Hawaii. Its only human nature to seek delight in places most different from our own familiar home turf. Indeed thats why I tend to like desserts versus the lush green areas similar to the humid South that I grew up in. But Nevertheless, what gets left behind in the transition are crumbling monuments of a place and idea that was once deemed sufficient and desireable by another generation.

We as a society are on a neverending road to seek something better than where we have come. My Grandfather is a perfect example. He grew up in a large family of 10 children. His parents were not terribly wealthy. He was expected to work dilligently and purposevely. He bought a house outside of Dayton, TN when he and his Wife retired. It was a small house with basic amenities. Out back were several small sheds full of tools and lawn mowers. He drove a plain blue Ford pickup with vinyl seats and a straight 6 engine. Perhaps by today's standards my Grandfather was a working class individual with limited means. But he was an accomplished man by his own definition, owning his own house, a little bit of land behind it, and a good-running truck. He was proud of the small little town he lived in and I can recall riding with him around it, where he would proudly point to all of the new developments ( Wal-Mart and Mcdonalds). I can also recall that pretty much everybody knew who he was. " Hello Mr Card, how are you?" seemed to be what I heard no matter where we went. Nevermind that Grandad was hard of hearing and couldn't understand half of what people were saying to him. People just like him just the same. I can also recall the more practical approach he took to doing things like planting rose bushes and flowers. That meant large poles with copious amounts of brightly colored green wire would be used to prop them up. To him their survival and health were more important than the outward appearance. For him, with a yard full of strangely doctored plants and trees, it was a scene of success. It was a sense of pride of accumulated work.

Perhaps we could all learn a thing or two from people like my Grandfather. We're all so busy looking for something better, as if we're trying to prove to somebody that we are a success. We- just like all those families who abandoned their former vacation resorts in the Catskills- are continually looking for a never-ending horizon, or somewhere "better". We would be wise to seek the good where we are and appreciate what we now have.

The modern age and the fear of change.

2009-04-02T07:46:00.000-07:00

Parked outside the house I rent are two very different cars. One is a 1955 Mercury Monterey. The second is a 2002 Toyota Prius. The Mercury I've owned for around 7 years. The Prius was inherited from my Wife's Father who passed away a year ago. It became our primary commuter car because we have an insane 45 mile each way commute. We carpool together and since the car gets somewhere around 50MPG freeway, it does actually save us a considerable amount of money.

That said, after having driven it for a year, I've become acutely aware of the amount of outright ridicule these cars seem to get bombarded with. That California was the first state to get the prius where it soon became adopted as the car of choice for more liberal, environmentally sensitive consumers meant that it soon garnered the badge of basically becoming yet another hippy car, along with VW Bugs and Microbuses.

Americans have used cars as a further means to express themselves and their idealology. That's a given. But what's rather troubling to me is that the prius seems to also be the poster child of an epidemic sweeping the country, and that would be the fear of change and the demonizing of new technology.

The typical response from those who hate the Prius are in order of frequency:

A: "Well... they'll be fine until the batteries wear out. Then they'll cost a fortune to replace.
B: " The batteries are full of dangerous chemicals and metals that will get put into landfills.
C: " The mining of materials to make these batteries means there will be a runup on battery cost"

There are other responses as well. But the reason for making these claims is seldom to do with their premise. The message from such statements boils down to one simple attitude which is that the cars are different, and hence not approved. But breaking that down one step further, the underlying reason is getting to the point I was making above: New and misunderstood technology.

I work on all three of our cars. The 55' Mercury is the epitome of mechancial simplicity. But more is required to be serviced from the zillions of grease points versus a modern car's sealed bearings. The carburetor has to be constantly cleaned and adjusted. The points have to be set, and so on. None of these tasks are difficult but requires more time in order to ensure the engine performs well. I also have a 96 Toyota Tacoma. With the addition of a computer, a sophisticated emissions system, and various electronically controlled mechanisms, the truck for the most part runs for years at a time with no meaningful service other than oil changes and occasional throttle body cleaning. But it shares a lot in common with the Mercury in that both have the same basic engine design principles . The Prius on the other hand has a 200 pound battery that sits under the back seat, a 500 volt inverter that feeds current to a large electric motor intergrated into a large transaxle which drives the front wheels. A small 4 cylinder engine is bolted the the transaxle. The engine is the same as you'd find in any small car but the major difference between this drivetrain and that of the other two vehicles is a secondary electric drivetrain that more or less "piggybacks" off the engine. When we first got the car, I had to read lots of service information about how to do even the most rudimentary procedures. The car has two cooling systems- one for the inverter and one for the engine. The transaxle is pressurized and has to be changed every 30,000 miles or so. I recently replaced a faulty PCV valve which unlike most cars, was buried deep within the engine bay, requiring the removal of the entire windshield wiper system.

But after a year of driving it, I have learned how to work on the prius just as easily as the other cars. The point being that despite being different and requiring myself to learn how to work on it, the car is just like any other mechanical object and built to be serviced and understood. In addition, I've learned the true answers to these suspicious concerns of those who dislike them.

A: The battery uses efficient charge/discharge cycle: 40-60% both ways. The result is that the battery lasts for a very long time. Even if one were to fail, their replacement is not difficult ( lifting up the back seat) . Their rate of failure is severely less than the engine failure on a typical car. Plus Toyota has a 150,000 mile warranty on the batteries.

B:The batteries have a sticker on them. Toyota has a buyback program for the batteries. Plus they are not full of lead as many have suggested, which itself is ridiculous since all conventional cars have lead acid batteries, which almost always get recycled anyway. So why would Prius batteries be different if they were to say- be made of lead?

C: The metals used in prius batteries ( Nickel metal hydride) are also used in just about every other electronic device. Economies of scale are already in action.

The attitude in the US today seems to be one of growing suspicion and ridicule when it comes to advances in technology and science. Sometimes this attitude comes from the increasing desire amoungst some chunks of the population to see that religious doctrine trumps science. Perfect example: Stem cell research. A generic wand is waved over all stem cell research as being unethical simply because those against it often don't understand that there are many types of stem cells that come from many places- like skin. It is assumed that ALL stem cell research involves embryonic stem cells. Thus all stem cell research must be a great evil.

This goes back to something I touched on earlier. This fear comes from not knowing the full details or simply from misinformation and the lack of knowledge and education. This lack of information is what makes people mistrust what they do not know either because they percieve it as a threat, or they don't fully understand the meaning and potential impact a given breakthrough could provide.

Perhaps this is ironic, coming from a country that still to this day prides itself in claiming to be the leader in innovation and creativity. Using the 55 Mercury as yet another example is its styling. The whole car is meant to suggest the grace and speed of a modern jet plane. With its large rear "fins", its jet engine like trunk emblem, and even the hood ornament molded into the shape of a plane itself all points to a time when science and advances in technology were heralded as modern miracles. Right after WW2, after having endured a depression along with a war to boot, Americans suddenly found themselves in an era that reaped the benefits of modern technology: TV sets, Stereo Hi-Fi's, High speed transatlantic jet planes, modern paved freeways, nuclear energy, and so on. Phrases like: " The home of tommorow", or " By the year 2010, we will be... ( fill in the blank)", and so on were common. There was this celebration of man and his scientific advances.

But if you look at the 1950's compared to today, much has changed in the way that Americans live. The 50's saw the most stable era in US history. With the GI Bill and college fund, Most families could easily afford a modest family home. Most could afford college. Social programs still worked and many workers kept the same jobs for decades, working in unions that kept those jobs secure. America was a humming, manufacturing, inventing machine. 1957 is noted especially because according to the US Census, was the year in which the level of contentment in the country was at its highest. In an environment like that where stability was king, modern technology was only more frosting on the cake.

Enter the world of today where quite the opposite has occured. Most urban areas have become prohibitively expensive places. Buying a house often means financial risk. College has skyrocketed. Social programs are broke, and in fact, the whole economy is in shambles. The middle class in general has shrunk and whatever level of security it once had is long gone as the companies and unions that employed them distentegrates.

For many in this era, perhaps new technology has become a threat. Since at the same time the very term "Social" has become an evil word along the lines of Communism, the idea of developing science and technology for the greater good- like developing fuel efficient cars- is deemed distasteful as it doesn't mesh well with the overall more conservative belief that any and all socially beneficial advances are deemed wasteful since we must all be responsible for ourselves and the idea of communal cooperation for the benefit of all is once again- against idealology.

In the end, science is mankind's greatest achievement for mainly humanitarian reasons. It is up to us to decide whether we support the idea of developing science for our benefit or to continue letting ignorance and misunderstanding get in the way.

Cast Iron cookware.

2009-03-16T08:04:00.000-07:00

About 6 months ago I decided to buy my Wife a new pan. We enjoy cooking quite a bit ( However, she's considerably better at it than I am), but for years we had what most Americans have: Old ratty non-stick Teflon pans. Of course Teflon is great in many ways, but over the last few years there has been a number of vague warnings that suggest Teflon isn't great for you and can cause health problems. I'd rather not wait for these warnings to become more refined. Thus I decided to look into alternatives.

The first pan I bought her was a very nice All-Clad pan. These are made ( interestingly enough) in Pottstown,PA. If you watch Food Network or any professional Chef, chances are they have a set of these. They're great, cook food evenly, and if used correctly don't have a problem with food burning or sticking to them. The only issue is that they're EXPENSIVE. The pan I got cost $130. Not exactly chump change, but I figured it will last a lifetime.

But more recently, I re-discovered an old tradition used by both of my Grandmothers: cast iron cookware. When I was growing up, I recall my Grandmother's kitchen having a number of ancient cast iron pans and pots. They had thick layers of "crust" accumulated on their outside edges from decades of use. I was told to NEVER clean them. I found that out after using one to make hot chocolate. On Thanksgiving and other occasions, Grandmother would use one to make cornbread. Thus when my Wife and I took a trip to Wal-Mart a few months back, I noticed in the corner was a selection of cast iron cookware. So we bought a smallish skillet and have since bought a few more.

The great thing about cast iron is that the stuff is cheap. The smallest skillet we bought was $10. The largest- a huge 14" pan was $17. Thus the prices are incredibly reasonable, which in this economy is a good thing. Secondly, unlike the vast bulk of cheap throwaway pans made in China, the most predominant producer is a company in Tennessee called Lodge. They sell to Wal-Mart, Cracker Barrel, and even fancy stores that sell the expensive stuff ( even though they tend to mark them way up). Lodge has been around since 1896 and is still family owned.

Additionally, what's great about cast iron is for one, it heats evenely and over time develops a non-stick surface called "seasoning". I'd always thought seasong was just the accumulation of grease and oil from years of use. But its a bit more scientific then that. What actually happens is that over time and with continual heating, iron produces a black oxide which forms a layer of magnetite. The more magnetite forms, the more slick and non-stick the surface becomes. The only thing is that this layer is fairly fragile and thus in order to prevent it from becoming damaged from rust, a thin layer of oil must be wiped onto the surface after each use. Thus every time I get through using it, I wipe it down with vegetable oil.

To me, cast iron brings an old tradition back to the kitchen with the added bonus that it doesn't cost a small fortune to do so. That and pans such as these can be used forever and be handed down generation after generation.

Adobe Fireworks CS3 sucks.

2008-01-15T13:23:00.000-08:00

I'm usually not one to rant about consumer goods, but as a graphic designer who uses Adobe products every single day for a living, I have to say that the latest version of Fireworks is flawed with numerous problems that while not huge, together cause me to lose untold amounts of time in productivity. I'll list just a few.

First of all, if you draw say a straight line with the line tool, you have the option to choose either a soft or hard line. It automatically draw a soft line. If you then change it to a hard line, more often than not, it will shift the line to a different location, usually one pixel up or down. Secondly, the program seems incapable of rendering rounded corners appropriately. If you use auto shape tool and draw a 3 pixel radius square, 50% of the time it'll butcher one of the corners. Often times I have to go in and manually draw the corners.

Other problem include resizing shapes and lines. If you have an auto shape- or any shape for that matter- and manually change the size using the W and H settings, if you have a square for example, the lines will suddenly become slightly crooked.

One highly annoying issue makes zero sense to me. If you create a symbol, resize the symbol in symbol edit mode and then go back to the main stage, the true size of the edited symbol is totally inaccurate which makes reusing symbols to create new components next to useless. Yet another problem with symbols is that if you edit the size of a symbol that has layers, the layers will suddenly become offset even if you use even increments.

Lastly, on numerous occasions including what happened just now is that if you've created a document then save it, sometimes shapes will shift and need to be re-edited later. This makes zero sense to me.

I've used this product for 6 months now and the level of frustration is appalling for a company that produces such stellar products like Flash and Photoshop. I hope that these bugs will be fixed in the future.

Mcmaster catalog search.

2007-12-21T11:51:00.000-08:00

First of all, I've not had time to post anything for awhile. Why? Because after having a year long stint at Oracle, I was hired as the creative director at a small startup in Silicon Valley. So I've been busy!

Anyhow, I am rarely impressed with web sites these days. Occasionally I'll stumble across one that is either really well-designed or perhaps has some 'sexy' aspect to it. Everyone rallies for Google, Apple, and other well-known tech related products. Very rarely do I stumble upon a site that immediately resonates with me as being extremely well done and useful at the same time. One site would be Wikipedia. My most recent find is a site called Mcma ster.com

I'm always looking for parts. The newest racing mower I'm working on is like building a small car and requires many specialized sprockets, pulleys, brake systems, and hardware. Most web sites that sell the stuff are absolutely horrible. I'm not talking design, of which most are painful to look at, but more about good user interface. The Mcmaster site is about the best catalog search web site I've ever seen.

Here's how it works: type in a part or item you're looking for inn the small search box to the right. As you type, it automatically starts showing hints and guesses as to what you're looking for. So if you type in the word: "Sprocket" but only type "Sproc..." it shows you sprockets. That's nothing new, but what it also does is populate the entire page with incredibly useful information about sprockets. It will show diagrams, useful terminology and various types of sprockets. What I liked about it was that it showed you all applicable specs related to the item. For example, I needed a 20 tooth, 3/8" pitch, #35 chain size drive sprocket made out of hardened steel. The set of options I could choose were laid out logically and easily so that I could drill down until the exact item I needed was in front of me.

In a world where sites that give you little frogs and other icons as gifts are hailed as ingenious because they happen to make billions of dollars, I would argue that sites such as the Mcmaster site are far more advanced and getting closer to what the true advantage of the web is, which is to connect people to information and products quickly and easily.

How community based communications changes business and the world we live in.

2007-08-03T14:57:00.000-07:00

I'm reading a rather interesting book these days entitled " Wikinomics" by Don Tapscott and Anthony Williams. So far the book is incredibly fascinating. First of all, Ive been a huge fan of sites like Wikipedia, Flickr, and Youtube for years. In particular-Wikipedia. No topic, no matter how mundane is explained in minute detail and in a manner that is easily comprehensible to the average person. For example, do a search on LEDs( Light emitting Diodes) and you will get several pages of information regarding their history, development, and impacts they provide in the form of lower energy consumption. I'd say I qualify as a somewhat knowledgeable person when it comes to mechanics, various historical events, and favorite corporations like GM, and so far I have found the data posted on Wikipedia is generally accurate.

In my opinion, the formation of easily accessible data for anyone with a PC is incredibly beneficial towards providing free education. While it is true that therein lies the potential for inaccuracy, I believe that most people are passionate and this passion shows in the information on Wikipedia.

Moving on, I can use myself as a broad example of how open discussion, contribution, and interaction from a collection of like-minded people with similar interests can create further comprehension and understanding for the good of the group. 7 Months ago when I joined a Lawn Mower Racing forum, I did not even know how to weld, let alone essentially fabricate a racing chassis that these racing mowers become.The details involve understanding the geometry to create a steering system, gearing ratios and beelt sizes, frame structure, and engine performance improvements. I had very little knowledge of how to construct such a machine. But through 4 months of interacting with other members on the forum whom had various levels of expertise, I was able to eventually construct a racing mower purely from reading information and viewing pictures on the forum. Truly amazing and a real-life example of how shared collaboration works to accelerate knowledge.

This book discusses how mass collaboration and the open sharing of information will eventually transcend all traditional corporate business models. By pooling our knowledge together, we can solve many problems and do better business at the same time.

Lawn Boy...

2007-05-24T07:51:00.000-07:00

All my life I have been a sucker for anything well engineered with an interesting story behind it. A few days ago, I happened to pick up a mower from a neighbor. Now this isn't your typical stamped tin, plastic wheel, throwaway machine they sell by the thousands at Wal-Mart. Nope, this is a genuine 1970's Lawn Boy push mower.

What makes these so special? Well, for one these machines are built above and beyond the quality that most mowers you'll find out there. They're also quirky and weird looking not only visually, but mechanically. They are powered by 2 cycle engines that give them lots of power but a lot less weight. I can pick this thing up pretty easily. I'd say it weighs half of what my other mower does. The company has an interesting history too. It started in the marine engine business ( Evinrude) which was later sold to Briggs and Stratton before coming the Outboard Marine Corporation. When you look at these mowers, you can tell that a boat motor engineer had his hand in there somewhere. These old mowers last so long in many instances that they were passed down sometimes from father to son. You simply don't see that very often anymore in everyday pedestrian products.

What I like most about the mower is the styling. Sort off cross between a manta ray and a space ship. No reason other than just to look futuristic... for an item pushed around the yard by deal old dad in a straw hat. Put it in a museum and call it art. People would believe it. Perhaps I'm just a Krotchety old man in my young age, but I seem to seldom see this kind of attention to detail in the myriads of plasticy bubbly looking mowers on the market today.

MK12, Straight outta' Kansas City.

2007-05-23T09:09:00.000-07:00

I stumbled across these guys a few days ago. They're a design agency out of Kansas City that make a wide variety of film and digital media related stuff for film and TV, their latest being " Stranger than Fiction". They have a very nice original design that blends a lot of kitchy, old-fashioned elements with modern ones. They're working on a project called " The History of America" that looks outright amazing.

As someone from the Southeast, I'm always glad to see design and film agencies succeed in their own way outside of the long-held strongholds of the industry: New York and California. I'm a somewhat firm believer in that people are affected in some ways by their surroundings and where they live. This seems pretty evident in MK12's work which has a very original style and character. In my opinion, a diversifying of America's advertising and film industry all over the country would lead to further innovation and more originality versus everything coming out of Los Angeles. Plus the sheer costs of doing business in California are almost prohibitive in the first place along with simply living there. So I would hope to see more companies like MK12 sprouting up everywhere to give California and New York firms a run for their money.

Take a look at their site. Amazing stuff. http://www.mk12.com

Is Flash for cellphones in the US going to be a sure thing?

2007-05-17T10:18:00.000-07:00

I love flash. The more devices it can be incorporated into, the better. When I learned last year of the potential of Flashlite 2.0 to deliver rich flash content to a phone interface, it souned promising. Then Verizon announced that they would be the first US network to enable a large portion if their phones to play flash content seamlessly. They were able to do so using BREW technology, which enables the consumer to use flash content seamlessly.

So far so good right? We flash guys should be jumping all over this shouldn't we? Not exactly. My two year contract was up with Verizon, hence I was able to get a new phone. I chose the Motorola KRZR, which has the ability to play FL 2.1 content. As I awaited the shipment of this phone with excitement over the ability to create flash content for it, I only then saw what the real deal is.

Developing FL content for Verizon phones requires an agreement between you, Verizon, and Qualcomm, the owner of BREW technology. Ok... but that complicated system of licensing means you will need to fork over $400 for the privelage.

Adobe, Verizon, and Qualcomm are missing the point entirely here. By charging large fees just for the ability of developers to create and test content on their phones, they are essentially cutting off vital channels of creativity. Think about it. If we, who worked our way up the creative ladder would've had to pay $400 to test flash content on our PC's, then it is highly likely that many of us would have never made it that far. Less people who use a product with enthusiasm means less people who will ultimately buy your program, and subsequently contribute to the community that your company owes it's existence to.

This is just one small part of a bigger picture in which developers, graphic designers, and even consumers are nickled and dimed to death for anything that they happen to use or watch on their mobile devices. If the same approach was used for TV's, Radios, and so on, there would have not been the same level of success.

I can understand the seemingly irresistible urge for companies to want to 'cash in' on what could potentially become as lucrative as the web, which as we all saw created untold billions for some and entire industries for others. But those billions came from providing a environment where content, creation, marketing, and usage was entirely open and the costs for doing so incredibly cheap. The same iss not being done for wireless services and this is why the U.S. cellphone market is so far behind those in Europe and Asia. It will continue to be as such until a better approach is taken.

I for one will not be forking over $400 for a license to develop. I'm taking my money and buying a Nokia N series so I can test my content until a US network offers flash content testing capabilities free of charge.

WDVX: quite possibly the best radio station in the US.

2007-05-16T15:43:00.000-07:00

As I sit here at my desk, headphones on, I hear the distinct sound of what I easily recognize as a Southern dialect; East Tennessee to be exact. It is the sound of a radio DJ from the WDVX studio in Knoxville, TN listing off the titles of a few songs just played.

Most of the time when we think of the word:" public radio", we think of stations with serious, dry voices, continuous news, and more than likely- a number of toccata's in E minor played through the afternoon with periodic demands for money. But not so with this one. WDVX is a radio station that doesn't come from the US government, a college, or anything else other than the listeners in the area and online throughout the world.

The music they play ranges from Americana, Bluegrass, Alt country, and blues.
They also play a daily show called the "Blue Plate Special"
where artists from far and wide come and play... sometimes 3 or 4 groups at a time. They play anyone from local bands all the way to bands from other countries. All's fair game and when the mic gets switched on at noon, TN time ( 8:00 Am for me o9ut in California,) The magic of live radio begins.

As many of you know, I am from the Knoxville area originally. When WDVX started way back in 1997, they began life as a tiny station crammed into a small camper. The radio station was an immediate success, bringing back the rich musical element that helped form the TN Valley into what it had become. Prior to this, your only choices was a typical mix of pop, country, classic rock, and alternative stations. There was a weekly 1 hour long show on the local, almost all-symphony public radio station on weekends devoted to regional music. But that was it. WDVX changed all that and in my opinion, brought music back to Knoxville and made it a destination for many. The station brought back an old tradition in Knoxville, long-gone since the farmer's market days of the 30's, 40's, and 50's, when the " Mid day merry-go-round" would feature such future stars like Chet Atkins.

In 2004, WDVX moved to One Vision Plaza on Gay Street in Knoxville, where visitors can stop in for lunch or coffee every weekday at noon to watch a live band. I actually did this last time I was in town to visit my folks, and it was inspiring.

Listening to WDVX makes me realize sometimes how unique Knoxville and TN is in many ways. I am proud to call WDVX my hometown station.

"Nusouth"

2007-05-03T11:23:00.000-07:00

As many of my friends know, I'm slightly proud of my "suthern" heritage. I've had this name and design concept idea for awhile: Nusouth. The name signifies the renaissance of the Southern region as a modern economic powerhouse but still full of the things that make it such a great place. I've been fartin' around with logo ideas and this is an early sketch. It's ok, but the balance feels funny. You be the judge... or by the fact that nobody visits this blog, not at all.

nomadtoons.mobi designed... not loaded.

2007-05-01T13:59:00.000-07:00

The nomadtoons.mobi site is now fully designed. The clinker is how to upload it to a server that will allow phones to access the flash. As it is now, most phones don't browse the same way as a PC. So I am going to try a method involving the index page redirecting to a 'home' swf. We'lls ee. For now, here is a sneak peak.

nomadtoons.mobi all mine!

2007-04-19T09:17:00.000-07:00

As usual, I jumped the gun last year when I went all crazy over flashlite and the ability to produce animated films, sites, and UI stuff for cell phones.I figured that the world was about to go crazy. Everyone will have web sites... ON THEIR PHONES! HOLY CRAP! So far that has not been the case.

But... Last week there was a story on NPR about a bed and breakfast in North Carolina that launched a .mobi site for their business. It has been pretty successful. Something told me that it was time to jump on registering nomadtoons.mobi. For those of you unaware of what I'm talking about, .mobi is the designation address for sites that are made for phones. The layout, UI, and design will be especially for cell phones.

The good news is that I already know how to whip out cell phone sites pretty easily. So all I need to do is sit down and do it. So for anyone trying to make a quick buck by purchasing a .mobi for my site... too bad! I beat ya!

Anyhow, another good thing I noticed is that ALL of Verizons top-selling phones now have flashlite capability. My advice for anyone in my line of work is to JUMP ON IT now. I plan on making nomadtoons.mobi into a true-to-the original companion but it WILL have a number of actual flashlite generated cartoons! hooray! The one thing that really gets me going is new technology and perhaps that's what got me off my ass to actually make some new cartoons.

Oh.. and another flash related thing: It would seem that flash muct now be searchable by browsers. I am actually pretty bad at marketing my site. I'm perhaps one of the worst Shmoozers out there which is kind of the way I prefer things. But having a flash site like mine be totally searchable will probably be pretty helpful.

Lawm Mower Racing mania!

2007-04-18T10:20:00.000-07:00

As Some of you might know, before I became a graphic designer, I had a number of weird unrelated jobs. One was repairing lawn mowers. About 6 months ago, I stumbled upon a sport that really sounded appealing: Lawn Mower Racing! The basic principal is to get a stock riding mower, reinforce the frame, steering, and install beefy brakes, and then swap out the stock engine and transmision pulleys to alter the drive ratio. Result: some of these can go up to 80 MPH. I spent roughly 5 months modifying an old vintage Sears riding mower into a racerific' Mowchine.

This has been a great thing for me personally. I get along with everybody, but as someone who grew up in the South and now living in California, I miss not having friends who truly appreciate the same things as I do: lawn mowers, engines, beer, Tom-T-Hall, tailgates, and BBQ. Try explaining any of those things to the average San Franciscan. Needless to say, I have to get away from all the metropolitan stuff from time to time. This sport has been a great outlet.Anyhow, I've met a whole ton of people who have become great friends. In this sport, it doesn't matter who wins, but rather if you are having fun and meeting new people.

We will be having events all summer along with participating in parades, get togethers, and so on. Our first race is April 28th. email me for more info!

Big ole' ships and a site about them

2007-04-17T16:38:00.000-07:00

Since I was a little boy, I've had a love affair with cruise ships. I've actually never taken a cruise, but dream of the day that I can. Living in the Bay Area near San Francisco, I see these massive ships come and go on my way to work. They look like floating cities pulling up. A few months ago, I actually got to see the Queen Mary 2, which was so massive that all I really saw was a huge mass of black painted metal rising from the sea. When I was really little, I made models of the Titanic out of aluminum foil and floated them down our creek.

Well... I thought I was crazy about them- too much to admit to anyone until I saw this site called maritime matters. The site itself is kind of rough and a mess as far as design and UI goes, but there is an ENORMOUS amount of stories, blogs, photos, histories, and travels on board mainly vintage 1950's and 60's cruise ships. It is saddening to see that a majority of these are actually on their way to being scrapped in India due to new compliance regulations and a recent spike in steel prices. But the people on this site make good on efforts to carefully document their trips on these vessels as well as create ship biographies for ones that have since gone on to cruise ship heaven. There is so much info on this site that any ship lover could spend months reading it. Check it out!

www.maritimematters.com

PS: the ship photo came from their site, so I am giving credit where credit is due.

Flash CS3. It's almost here!

2007-04-12T10:32:00.000-07:00

The new Flash is almost here. After reviewing some of the new features, I have luke-warm feelings about it. I am excited over a number of key features that I feel will make development for mobile devices easier as well as fixing a major problem flash 8 had with exporting quicktimes.

Here's my negative thoughts first. I am not 100% positive that the drawing tools that were in flash 8 will stay the same. New pen tools that function in the same way as Illustrator have been added which will be a great benefit for designers. But for people like me who've been using flash since version 3, I practically learned how to draw with these tools and therfore I would hope they will remain untouched. These 'old' tools include the paintbrush and pencil tools. As seen in the first snapshot, you can actually see the pencil tool, so I assume that this tool will be the same.

Now for the good: Flashlite 2.0 came out just last year. It's implementation for mobile devices was clumsy at best, but this was perfectly acceptable to me simply because there were not many devices that were actually available to accept flash. Now there are many and the new version of flashlite will make development easier for these devices. All I can say is: get yourselves a .mobi site today!

Also of great interest to me was how new improvements have been made to flash's new export features for video and Quicktime. Flash video has for the most part replaced standalone players. I'm not going to go into the politics of things, but I will say that I find it highly suspect that the latest versions of Quicktime come with the " allow flash tracks" feature turned OFF, deep within the settings. Translation: exporting flash as quicktime has meant that MOST people would not be able to see it. With the clear understanding of the fact that FLV is far superior to a plain Quicktime, and one has to wonder if there were motives behind Apple's decision to conveniently turn flash options off in their players. What I saw in the Adobe demo looked promising. It appears that exporting as a Quicktime has been addressed. It also appears that exporting in general might be easier. As with the drawing tools, I will have to see firsthand.

Overall, a very enticing product indeed. I personally cannot wait to try it out!

PS: to all the spammers putting crap on my blog. please stop.

using public opinion to change your company via corporate blogs

2006-12-17T18:17:00.000-08:00

I've recently been very impressed with the changes mainly domestic car makers have been making to their marketing stratedgies. The two largest US automotive groups both have taken some daring and painful strides towards reaching out to the general public in a transparent manner.

Most impresive in my opinion is the Ford Bold Moves online documentary campaign. There are roughly 30 episodes with more on the way that cut to the truth of Ford's misfortunes, freely admitting their mistakes and in other ways make efforts to describe how they plan to turn their company around. These video documentaries are incredibly well done and could stand up on its own in the cinema. The other part of this campaign involves a blog where consumers can comment on the films, cars, corporate affairs or environmental concerns. With the exception of offensive language and so forth, almost all comments are accepted, either good or bad.

The result is a blog that serves to inform the Ford upper management of what public perception is of their product. Some of the comments are actually picked out and answered by Ford- another amazing sign of a company making a step forward to listen and make their company more transparent, and ultimately more trustworthy for the consumer. I am sure this was their intent and if so, the campaign is an amazing sucess.

GM too now has a 'fastlane' blog in which new products, news, thouhts, and ideas are shared with the public. Bloggers can comment and again- both positive and negative reactions are posted showing a wide variety of opinion. What is clear is that most who blog on these sites actually care for these companies and want them to suceed. There is also a surprising amount of great ideas shared throughout. Who knows- perhaps armed with this knowledge, companies will actually listen.

Think of that- products that are driven by consumers...

Links: http://fastlane.gmblogs.com/
http://www.fordboldmoves.com/default.aspx

Pandora online radio tool: One of the coolest things in years.

2006-11-30T14:25:00.000-08:00

I'm not exactly a big fan of certain music players like Real Player, Windows Media Player, or even Quicktime.The reason is because they are either too polluted with ads, proprietary, or unreliable. That and they want you to do one thing: pay pay pay!
But the Pandora player is something else all on it's own. Simply put, it is perhaps the coolest thing out there for people that simply want to listen to their music- any kind of music- free of charge, and at their own discretion.

I'll admit that at first I was skeptical of the tool, but after using it for a solid day, I'm hooked. The way it works is simple: Just enter an artist or musical genre you like. The player will pull up a song on an album from that artist. If you like the song or album, you can vote via a simple thumbs up, thumbs down, or by skipping it. You can also tell the player that you'd like to hear more music that is of this "quality". So over time, the player can tailor itself to your preferences.
Of coure there are strings, mainly in that you cannot skip more than a certain number of songs per hour. It is in essence a radio, but one that you have infinite control over.

lastly, the entire application is made in Flash. For some of you action script guys, this is an astounding piece of Action Scripting. It just comes to show how amazing Flash really is and all of the diverse purposes it is capable of performing.

if you haven't tried it out, see for yourself here: www.pandora.com

Animated cartoon " Backyard Critters" ready for download

2006-08-22T08:05:00.000-07:00

The first 3 episodes of " Backyard Critters" is now ready to be downloaded to your phone directly from the nomadtoons web site. A new section was also added to the site just for flashlite content. if you do not have a phone equipped with flashlite, you can still watch them by opening up the individual swfs one by one. if you DO have a phone equipped with flashlite 2.0, then drag the entire folder into your phone's memory. You will usually find the flashlite folder in the same folder as the web browser engine. Download it here.

Repairing Tecumseh carburators.

2006-08-15T07:55:00.000-07:00

Some of you might be confused as to why I have tips on repairing an engine. Before I became a graphic designer, I repaired lawn mowers for a living, and still do on the side as a hobby. So.. for those of you who are interested in learning how to repair Tecumseh carburators, here goes nothin'
I made a post about this because Tecumseh engines all use the same somewhat inferior Carb design. The flaw is mostly user initiated. Unlike Briggs and Stratton engines which use a painfully simple diaphram for a carb, with no bowl and very few moving parts, Tecumseh engines use a delicate, more elaborate carb with a bowl and worst of all, a carb body with a permanently sealed check valve( ball bearing) that tends to get stuck. These carbs pose an almost reliable list of specific problem areas. Luckily, most can be fixed if you're patient and willing to spend about an hour or so repairing them.
The most common problem these carbs have is a tendency for the bowl to eventually be filled with gum deposits from old gas which sits in it all winter long. These deposits will clog the gas inlet located in the large brass bolt that holds the bowl onto the carb. You can see it pictured in the diagram. Notice that there is a small pinhole on the side. This almost always gets clogged up, and when it does, the engine will not start. You can perform this fix with the carb on the engine as long as you make sure to either drain the gas or make sure the gas line is pulled from the gas tank. I usually remove the tank entirely since they usally just clip on the side of the engine blower housing.
Another common problem is the butterfly valve will sometimes get stuck due to gum deposits as well. Manually twist the butterfly valve( located on top of the carb as seen in the picture with the spring) and make sure it moves easily. If not, then you're probably going to be better off removing the carb.
Most Tecumsehs have the carb held in place with 2 screws near the exhaust. Some of the newer ones are located so close to the muffler that you will have to remove the muffler too. Before you do this, drain the gas or remove the gas tank. Then CAREFULLY pull the carb off of the engine while making a mental note of how the linkage attached to the engine. Be careful NOT to stretch the governor spring. If you do, the engine will run erratically.
Once you have the carb off of the engine, find a clean place to work where you can take it apart and inspect all the parts. Remove the bowl and notice the brass float as pictured above. There is a little pin that holds it into place. Slide that out and gently lift the float out. The needle valve will come out at the same time, which is hung loosely from the float. Next remove the elbow piece that goes from the intake to the side of the carb body. Now that you have it all apart, do a number of simple tests. Gently shake the float. if you hear fluid sloshing around, then it has a leak. These floats are like 4 bucks, so get another one. I've also found that if you can spot the hole, you can solder it and it will work just fine. Next, clean the entire carb body with carb spray. I'd suggest wearing gloves because the spray is nasty stuff. Just watch it eat your gloves to see what I mean. With the body clean, hold the butterfly valve with a finger so it doesn't move and shake it. if you hear what sounds like a ball bearing rattling inside, then you're in good shape. if not, then that's a problem. One of the biggest problems people have with these mowers is that they will accelerate out of control. I've seen many tecumsehs that simply blew up. This is caused by a stuck check valve allowing too much fuel to be thrown into the engine. So you can do one of 2 things: Either get a new carb, or soak the old one for a few days in parts cleaner. You'll have to remove the rubber primer bulb, but I seem to almost always ruin them getting the things out, so while you're at it, order a bew primer bulb. The cleaner will eat anything made out of rubber or plastic, so make sure and remove the gaskets, rubber,etc.
So now that you've got it all cleaned out, put it all back together and see if she'll run. Sometimes they'll start on the first pull, and sometimes it takes all day to get it to run right. This last point being made brings up my last point, which is that if you have a choice between a briggs powered mower and one with a Tecumseh... go with the Briggs for god's sake or else you'll have to do all the stuff I mentioned above. I also wanted to mentioned that I borrowed a few pics of carbs from a few web sites, so thanks in advance. I meant to take my own but the batteries in my camera died, and I'm too lazy on Sundays to run to the store.

Prototype, flashlite entertainment combo.

2006-08-07T19:38:00.000-07:00

This is the latest flashlite 2.0 project I have been working on. The basic principal is to have a full feature animated film that will load on almost any Symbian phone and come with a full compliment of additional materials. This particular example has 3 animated episodes, roughly 1:30 each for a total of 3 minutes of fully animated cartoons. This proved to be the most challenging aspect of the piece. The characters have full speaking parts, sound effects, and somewhat rich backgrounds. I wanted to create animation that was comparable to your typical online flash cartoon. I did this using a combination of Audacity, a freeware sound program, and a secondary sound processor called winLAME, a sound compressing tool that has special output selections for mobile devices. Basically, the program had setting to reduce the MP3 file sizes to roughly 30% of their original size. As a result, none of the episodes were more than 130kb, which is quite small for even flash animation.
The final project will allow the user to play games, download ringtones, graphics, get updates to the series, and perhaps even join in on a message board. All in all, there are around 12 sections, each loading and unloading each other so it doesn't crash the phone. Since I'm not a great programmer, this was a little tricky and getting all these intertwined sections to load and not load on top of one another was a challenge. Mapping out their paths in advance was the best solution. Otherwise it got confusing fairly quickly.
My spefic goal of the project was to see just how much content can be loaded onto a phone and bring an entertainment aspect to the medium that rivals that of the online equivelant. It proved to me that flashlite 2 will become every bit as effective at becoming a new marketing, entertainment, and self management tool as any laptop or desktop environment. The phone that it was tested on is a Nokia 6682, so not the most powerful phone, but the program still worked without a hitch.

First Launch of flashlite application succesful!

2006-06-23T15:45:00.000-07:00

While I cannot show the application I made for the company I work at, my first application produced for mobile phones was tested and it works! The app loads and plays videos, music, images, and flash animation. I basically hacked a bunch of things that I found together and reverse-engineered the script to work with the specifics I needed.
The application was tested on a variety of phones: The N90, N70, and 6682 from Nokia. The fact that flash lite is very flexible and accesible to flash developers means a new era for flash designers, animators, and programmers.
My next plan is to convert a number of top nomadtoons animated films to the new flashlite 2.0 format and make them available for download. It will be interesting to see how well these old classics do on a brand new media outlet.
I plan on putting a new link on the nomadtoons site for flashlite content pertaining to these films. Stay tuned.

Flashlite 2.0 will be the next big thing in wireless.

2006-06-16T07:10:00.000-07:00

Simply put, flash lite is a version of the .swf ( flash) player that works on mobile phones. This means quite an enormous potential for content developers. The current media interface used by cell phones is primarily java. Flash offers all the development possibilities and speed of the desktop version of flash. The biggest diffrence is that cell phones are not yet as widely available with this technology except in Japan and Europe.
The limitation is also in current processor speeds of even the most up to date phone: A little over 300 mgz. This means that current applications must be somewhat more restrained so the phone can actually play the apps efficiently.
From a developer's standpoint, the biggest change is the diffrence in code. One must set and assign actions for the phone's keypad. This can be done using either the default settings or customizing the key functions. For someone like myself- more of a designer than a programmer, the challenge lies in the fact that there is very little information pertaining to flash lite. Most of the refrences are from other programmers, which as usual tend to leave out approximatly half the needed information. The single most helpful source at this point is the Adobe site, which while confusing due to their rather sprawly UI, still provides a wealth of information and tutorials that make sense for even the least informed.
This technology is exciting because as anyone can easily see, there are 10 times th number of cell phones over PC's. When flash became widely accepted online, it created a huge demand for flash developers, which has more or less normalized.
Hopefully, flash lite might be the next "Boom" that makes us all rich... in case you missed the last one.

Batman gets doooown!

2006-06-06T13:38:00.000-07:00

I nearly came close to pissing my pants watching this thing. Sometimes, things that take 2 minutes ot produce are the best things!
Watch it here

Fixing Activex embeds in IE7

2006-06-06T07:41:00.000-07:00

What a pain in the ass! As many of you flash designers know, Microsoft lost a suit against them brought on by a small midwestern company. They lost, the winning company walked away with 500 million bucks, and millions of flash designers got stuck with a problem: If you embed flash inside a page, IE7 will require you to click the flash first before it will work. Not the end of the world, but a nasty problem for people that blend flash and traditional graphics with html, or for people that have flash that plays automatically.
The fix is actually simple, but it took me awhile to figure out mainly because I'm not a programmer, and as many of you designers know, programmers tend to leave out 50% of the required knowledge in order to address a problem. So I'm going to give you the fix in "designer's" language. They are as follows:

1: If you have the latest version of Dreamweaver, then proceed to step 2. If not, upgrade.
2: On the Adobe site( formerly Macromedia) there is a update section. Find the updates for
Dreamweaver.
3: Download update 8.0.2.
4: Install.
5: When you open your old Dreamweaver documents, there will be a window that tells you
that your page has activex elements that might not work with IE7. Would you like to
fix them? yes.
6: Dreamweaver will automatically update the page and create a "scripts" folder. Re-upload
your corrected files and make sure to INCLUDE THE SCRIPTS FOLDER within the same
directory as your file. For example, if you have all your flash movies in one folder, make
sure you place a copy of the scripts folder in there with them. The scripts folder is generic
so once you have one copy, you can use it for every single directory.
7: One last thing: Just like a refrence to an image in HTML, there will be a refrence to the
script. Make sure this is correct.


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Welcome to the new Nomadtoons!

2006-06-06T07:38:00.000-07:00

Hey folks,
While there are still a few small kinks in the site, Nomadtoons has been relaunched! There's a lot of new work you can take a peek at, along with some old classics. More changes are on the way, along with new work to be continually added. In addition, there will eventually be a companion site that will be more heavily stylized to accompany this one. You can get a sneak peek at it on the " Site design" section of the site. More to come soon!