I occasionally take it upon myself to ramble about how great Blender is. As soon as the 2.5 release is finished I’m sure I’ll have a lot more to talk about, though production-wise I’m locked into using 2.49 for a few more months, for safety and compatibility’s sake.

I’ve toyed around with Blender’s Video Sequence Editor (aka video editor) previously, but not much. I used it for a slide show once, I used it to put a watermark on a video, but nothing more complicated than that.

It wasn’t until this week that I actually used it to do some heavy-duty editing. An 11 minute video, broken up by scenes, and I used Blender’s VSE to stitch it all together and tweak the timing.

Celtx version 2.5.1 was released on November 15th. I want to talk about it, but I really hate being an asshole.

Okay, I’ll talk about it.

A few notes all across the board.

First, a while ago I read this interview with Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. He expresses confusion that Google seems to be abandoning Android as a netbook OS in favor of Chrome OS. I was a little confused about that too, but Chrome OS does make more sense on a non-touch screen netbook than Android does. Also, the idea that an OS is really a browser is something Ubuntu needs to start thinking about. Windows 7′s search-able start menu is arguably their best feature (yes, Vista had it too).

On my honor, I was just thinking about this very thing, a watch that could connect to a smartphone via bluetooth. This prototype is for Blackberry only, it isn’t available now but may be someday. With the very long range of Bluetooth 2.0 this is a really good idea.

Verizon is blasting the iPhone in their new “Droid Can” ads in favor of the Android OS. Now it’s rumored a 4G iPhone might pop up on Verizon. At least you’re not burning any bridges…

Android is getting the advantage in the cell phone market now. It’s not locked to any hardware, so people can access the large app base with the form factor they most want. Even Maemo, which I think is better, only shows up on Nokia phones despite it’s being open source. I was hoping the Nokia N900 would position itself against the iPhone the way Verizon is doing with the Droid ads, but Nokia might already be a lost cause. Their last quarter reports are pretty bad. With smartphones, at least.

Android really is the techno-hydra. It’s non-exclusive and I don’t think Nokia can beat it in the US when their smartphone will only be fully compatible with one carrier. I mean really, the N900′s success in the US seems to be dependent on how well T-Mobile’s Project Dark goes. I don’t know if I like that very much.

I’m fine with using Android over Windows Mobile or the iPhone, but I really, really would like to see Nokia and Maemo get the success it deserves.

Lark

So I’m switching outliners, from the more recent and regularly updated The Guide to the ancient yet still very functional KeyNote.

By the way, I meant to mention this in my last post, but I suppose it’s easier to find by itself.

Celtx’s auto-complete (character’s names and locations) is a real pain. Sometimes I’m ahead of Celtx, sometimes it’s ahead of me, so sometimes I need one return, sometime I need two–one for auto-complete (to accept the name you’ve already finished typing) and another to start a new line. Celtx doesn’t have an option to turn that off yet, but I discovered that keeping the cursor in front of a symbol or punctuation mark completely confounds auto-complete, and keeps it from suggesting anything, letting you consistently get to the next line with only one press of ‘enter’.

To clarify, write a question mark, hit the left arrow key once so the cursor is behind it, and then for the bulk of your writing you “push” the question mark in front of your text. The only problems so far are with parenthesis (this method messes with the cool way parenthesis wrap around what you type), and scene headings (hitting ‘enter’ on a blank line makes that line a scene heading, but with a symbol already in that line, Celtx just adds another blank line). Complications included I still think it’s easier than battling with auto-complete every time I have a character speak.

Hope it’s helpful,

Lark

Yes, I’m still on version 0.9.9.6 of Celtx, even though they’re all the way to 2.0.1 now. My reasons? After the fold.

Hey kids, do you like cool adventure games like Legend of Zelda and Diablo? Do you like comedy? You should check out Dink Smallwood.

Dink Smallwood is an old freeware game (actually it’s been open sourced). The graphics are outdated, but the humor more than makes up for it.

Let me set this up for you. You, Dink Smallwood, desperately want to be a hero. Unfortunately, you are a pig farmer. You’re dropped into this boring life and eventually find the path to warrior-dom. That’s not the cool part. The cool part is the how you can make the choice to be dick in a genre full of do-gooders. For instance, a neighbor is out looking for her pet duck. When you find it, you can yell at it to make it go home…or, you can kill it. Later on in the game, you get the option to tell a local girl that you killed it. Then you watch her freak out and run away in fear.

Your mom dies (totally not your fault…) and you go to live with your aunt and abusive uncle. If you try to stop the abuse, you get killed. If you learn how to exploit a little glitch, and kill him, well then you end up in charge, making passes at your aunt. I know this sounds creepy, but in the context of the gamme, and directly compared with games like Zelda, it’s pretty funny. (I just noticed all the funny stuff in this game involves killing.

In most games like this, you end up hitting bookcases and the like while looking for hidden items. In this game, if you try that, Dink will shout things such as “Stupid bookcases”. The coolness wears off fast, but it is a nice touch. I don’t want to give much more away. Seriously, if you like dark humor, killing ducks and using magic, Dink Smallwood is the game for you.

(BTW, I almost forgot, there are a lot of other “episodes” after you complete the game, lots of people have made their own stories and some of them are pretty good.)