Hypershot Renderer in Hand: Let the Late Nights Begin.
My major, Liberal Arts and Engineering Studies, just purchased an educational license of Hypershot. Allow me to explain why this is incredible. 1. Hypershot makes hyper-realistic renderings of a large number of 3D model formats. By hyper-realistic I mean, more awesome than photos. Like professional studio photography, but without imperfections. 2. They have a plug-in for Rhino3D, my modeler. This means, I can add materials directly within Rhino and check it out via a small pre-render. 3. Hypershot includes some procedural materials. For instance, the leather material IS a material, with thickness,...
Ray Scherr Business Plan Competition: The Wrap-Up
Last month, we finished up the Ray Scherr Business Plan Competition. The Ray Scherr Business Plan competition is put on with the help of SIFE, Cal Poly, and Ray Scherr, the founder of Guitar Center. The cash pot was $10,000, divvied up among 3 winners. We were stoked to be among the finalists, and had a great time at the last pitch session. I wish I’d taken pictures or video, but we were so amped we forgot to. We ended up not making it to the last round, but I got to stick around and see who won. The winners were as follows: 1st Place: Brian Riley and Andrew Ouellet with an anti-lock...
Site Redesign
After about a year with the classic Revolution theme, I decided to change up the site’s design to be a touch more graphics-centric and more focused on Stealth Design. To this end, I have updated the look with the sweet Magazeen theme created by the design team at WeFunction.com. As soon as I saw it, I had to have it. Like a good dark chocolate bar, but without the anti-oxidants. So let me point out a couple of the new features for your browsing convenience. First off, the Latest Posts dock up top. Probably my favorite part, this will display the article image from the most recent...
First press mention!
Yay! First press mention in the Mustang Daily! On December 2nd, we got a nice article in Cal Poly’s Mustang Daily, written by a professional and ambitious Journalism major named Lauren Rabaino. It goes into good detail about our story and has some of our original concept art on the front page. A huge thanks to Lauren and to the Mustang Daily! [View with PicLens] Read More →
Installed. Functioning. Awesome.
Yesterday, MJ Robotham and I installed the lift in the desk and did a test run to make sure it did its thing vertically too. It performed like a champ. The lift fits flush to the underside of the desk, like it was made for it. And here’s MJ cutting out the hole in the top. So we are a day ahead of schedule, and will have a complete test run with the monitor on the lift tomorrow evening. We’re going to order T-shirts and celebrate with a nice dinner somewhere. I’m very grateful for all the help the team has given towards the project. Go team! Read More →
The Eagle Has Landed
Today I got our lift for the prototype at about 6:45pm this evening. I’m extremely stoked to finally have an operational lift after numerous attempts at getting corporate sponsorship for one of the more expensive options. This lift is a great LCD lift from Wood Technology that runs about $400, and is very quiet. You can check out it’s spec’s on their website, and see some examples of their lifts incorporated into designs. They came to CEDIA this year, and put on a good showing. They definitely have the most economical offering in the screen lift market. I took a video of our lift’s...
The Rise of Stealth Design
Computers began the ubiquity stage in the mid-80’s. The Woz’s Apple I showed people that computers could actually be small enough to be useful in the home and office. There was only one problem. They were hideous. Initially, this wasn’t that big of a deal. The mere fact that you owned a computer was cool enough to make up for the bulging beige pile of components you needed. Cut to 2008. Design is king. Dell’s computers look like mini-sculpture. Apple’s laptops are lust-inducing. In short, people are clamoring for computers that don’t look like computers....
Kate White: Seamstress Extraordinaire
A few months ago I walked into Central Coast Surf Shop in downtown San Luis Obispo to buy a candle. Right. Not exactly customary surf shop buying habits, but as I was being rung up I noticed a scissor tattoo on the girl’s wrist. Intrigued, I asked her if there was a story behind it. She replied simply “I’m a seamstress”. Needing some tailoring anyway, I half-jokingly asked her if she wouldn’t mind tailoring some shirts for me. She replied “Of course”. And now, 6 shirts in, I wear them almost exclusively compared to the rest of my wardrobe. I found...
A Smattering of Pictures
Here are my photo gallery links in order of size. Flickr (aka personal photo dump) = http://flickr.com/photos/ninjaweasel Picasa = http://picasaweb.google.com/billtrammel Webshots (oldies but goodies) = http://community.webshots.com/user/billtrammel1 Enjoy! Read More →
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