The Morevna Project

Yes! Finally! Praise God! My first real article has been accepted to BlenderNation (BlenderNation is the central news site for Blender, the free open source 3D content creation suite.[1])

Read the article now!

I am so glad and highly appreciative that my article as been accepted. I have been endeavoring to get an article submitted for some time now, and had somewhat given up hope (for a time) that I would ever get something submitted. But Bart (Bart Veldhuizen, BlenderNation’s primary contributor and founder) has been cleaning out the backup of article suggestions that the Blender open source community has been sending in. A recent addition to BlenderNation has been the “Rapid Fire” articles, shooting off multiple, short article suggestions and links. A wonderful idea!

So, I am very thankful for Bart accepting my article! And I am also thankful to Zelgadis (Head of the Morevna Project) for leading the open source community of Synfig in an endeavor to create this open source animé film and for letting me know my article had been submitted (I hadn’t found out yet!) Also many thanks to the Morevna Project open source community contributors and all the open source developers, artists, and enthusiasts of many kinds spanning the globe.

See the Morevna Project official website
See the project wiki

God bless and best wishes,
-b

New blog theme and header – sweet!

Praise God!  The new blog header design is done, and, viola!  I chose a different them – much darker colors and better fitting for that “media look”.

See a screenshot the Minosa Films “ninja moon” themed header (below.)

"Ninja Moon" new header theme for the Minosa Films blog - screenshot of Blender

I did the project in the free, open source Blender (www.blender.org,) with post work (adding copyright I forgot) in the GIMP (www.gimp.org.)

For those of you who are not familiar with Minosa Films and what it used to look like, please see the below image of what the Minosa Films blog looked like a few hours ago.

The old look of the Minosa Films blog

For video editing, etc., I’ve been looking into Apple FinalCut Pro.  Looks pretty sweet.

Feeling techy, looking forward to the future.  Praise God.

Hope all is well, fellow film makers!

-b

Alright, OK, uh huh

It has come to my attention that I have not been preparing for film making as well as I should.  You see, I need to be getting ready, writing scripts, ironing out my work cycle, and most of all, making sure my enthuisastic fellow film makers are contacted and up-to-date.  Most of all, really, I need to put God first.

So, here I am.  I plan to take a whack at – no, better, conquer – this filming delima and help solve the mystery of the ages… uh, that is, solve the problems involved in making a film.  😉

If you are dedicated to me, I will endeavor to be dedicated to you.  We work together to accomplish a common goal, a single aim, to suceed in whatever we set our mind, and hands, to.

We will conquer.

Now, let’s see what can be done this afternoon about all those film making delimas… please pray, this may be hard.

Thanks for listening,

-b

P.S. You can see some of what I have been doing from previous blogs.

Current Project: “Electronmicrograph: Simulation of Life” – Blender

My current personal project that I am working on is Electronmicrograph: Simulation of Life.  It is an image of a fictional organism as seen through an electronmicroscope.  Made in Blender, I have the option to animate the scene and create a video from it.  But that may be very operating intensive, and as good as it may turn out, I may not end up doing it, sadly.

As I am not finished with the image and I do not want copyright infringement, I will not be posting any hi-res version I have of it so far.  I will post a screenshot instead.  That way you will get to see what it looks like in the program and in the render preview.

I started this project two days ago.  The first night I created the basic model.  The next day I added more detail to the mesh, and also added the material information.  And today, I hope to work on the full scene. (Previously I had only worked on the main organism, now I plan to create an entire scene – that is, with background and some foreground.)

I need to compare my work to actual electronmicroscope photographs to see if my materials look realistic.  This is one of my best works so far.

Thanks for listening,

God bless,

-b

P.S. All images copyrighted

Testing

No films yet.  No footage edited.  But that’s OK, because “necessity is the mother of invention”, and “where there is a will there is a way”.  I will figure it out, or some other solution, precarious to others, perhaps, will present itself a necessity.

Since the camcorder saves the video files in a  .tod proprietary file format, I am not directly able to edit the footage I shoot.  But now, just as I spoke of that I remembered a video I had seen, and the concept of making films excites me greatly.

Anything of quality takes hard work.

So, we’ll see what the days ahead bring… right now, I am converting a .tod video file of Dr. Narendra Singh being interviewed (by me.)

Dr. Narendra Singh - smiling during interview

I hope to be able to edit once it is done.

There is so much I could create, so much we could share … but I only have so much time, I must, in the end, choose which way I will go; what journey I will pursue; which river I will run.

Oh, so many wonderful, fantastical things to be created!  Worlds to be known!

Please keep me, my destiny, and Minosa Films in your prayers – in the days ahead, and hopefully, always.

God bless,

Thanks for listening,

-b

P.S. Never give up

Working Towards Rewards

As of the past three weeks I have been working towards getting a DV camcorder.  I am looking at the Everio GZ-HD7 (http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/479003-REG/JVC_GZHD7US_GZ_HD7_Everio_60GB_Hard.html) which is much more expensive than anything I had imagined I would look for at this time.

So, with working, events, and living, I find myself in moments of solitude, set apart for God and thinking.  Thinking “do I even want to get that camera?  I’m no sure I care…”, wondering, and praying some.

I will probably get this camera, (praise the Lord!,) I will likely endeavor doing interviews, making films with the members of Minosa Films, my friends and family, and even some commercial work.

But in every new step up in the tower of life, I must recall my duties and check my burdens – have I accomplished all that people have required of me to this moment?  Am I free to move on?  And I must decide and make action upon that conclusion.

I do not want to abandon the talents that have dogged my life so divenely my whole life, but I am eager and curious to move forward in this direction of film making.

Thank you for listening and God bless!

Can’t wait till the future, wondering about it all,

-b

Life Interviews: Your Story

The title may be misleading, but today I had the privilege to talk to someone who gave me the idea (in part) for this.  Life Interviews: Your Story (or whatever the title may end up being) is an attempt to capture a moment of someone’s life on video through a day-long interview.

I hope to follow someone for about one day, asking them questions and just hanging out as they show me what they do.  What is their job?  Where are they from?  What are their beliefs?  All these questions await to be answered.

Note: since these interviews deal with particular people and their life story some interviews may not be posted online.

I hope you enjoy these interviews and whatever else we may come up with.

God bless,

Banor