I've always been fascinated by the people behind all the wonderful characters we see in movies, television, comic books, video games, etc. Character Design at blogspot is a promising new blog that interviews some of these character designers and I encourage anyone looking to break into the biz to read through all the interviews for to get the insider dish.

Example artists: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

I usually don't get too excited about product design, but these spiffy little flash drives really got me thinking.  Companies like Apple have pushed industrial design with elegance and we are all better off for it (those nasty beige PC cases were a blight on society).  Unfortunately, there just hasn't been much improvement in making tech products with personality. "Elegance" can sometimes just be code for "boring".

Why can't tech equipment be colorful and fun?  

Added the fun frappr pixeljoint map as a permanent link under "Community" in the navigation. Also added a font customization box on the front page so you can adjust the font size and font family.

Started heavy work on reworking the rating system so members can gain additional available points for rating based on their seniority and activity.  Also started work on making the highest rated pieces based on date/average rating rather than just rating. Who knows how long this will take, but I think it's definitely a positive step.

If you thought A New Hope was the shizz nizzle, check out The Empire Strikes Back in all its simplistic pixelled glory!

Check it!

Brought to you from http://www.barbelith.co.uk/

Garry's Mod is a Half-Life 2 toolset that lets you treat Valve's Source engine as a kind of virtual sandbox. People have been stacking the good crate (the crutch of the lazy FPS level designer) into pixel art creations. 

Mario | Shammus (Metroid) | Sonic | SpongeBob

Thought it was interesting that someone took the time to recreate this classic Star Wars movie as an animated gif!

Check it out right here

Rubikcubism: Avant garde artistic movement that appeared in the XXI Century by using Rubik's cubes as a medium to create art. The French artist known by the pseudonym Invader is at the origin of this movement.

Another great "live" pixel art project. Check eeeeet!

Frapper is a neat little site where you can quickly add a group map.  I added a pixeljoint map just for fun.  If enough people add their locations to it I'll post a permanent link on Pixel Joint.  Add your location!

I love these little personality tests. Take the test and see which nerd icon you are!  Check it!

Holy crap I'm getting old. It seems like it was just yesterday when I first turned on my NES. The best gift I've ever received in my life to this day has to be getting the NES for Christmas -- it cemented my love for videogames and all things "techie" (or "nerdie" if you want to be a dick about it).

The single biggest jump in game quality for me has always been the Atari 2600 to the Nintendo Entertainment System. Suddenly the music, sound effects and graphics were completely clear. No more guessing what that six pixel blob and monotone bleeping is supposed to represent. With games like Super Mario Brothers, Metroid, Legend of Zelda, Mega Man and the amazing River City Ransom there's little doubt in my mind that the NES was the first gaming console to rival the arcade gaming experience. 

Read on and post your favorite NES memories here if you like.

This amazing breakdancer just blows my mind.  His exploits were posted on PJ awhile back and it's a must see if you want to see what the human body is capable of. The no foot pushups are impressive but it's even more impressive when he does it with his back folded!  Super-freaking-human.

There's a ton of other cool vids available on That Video Site with a very simple and convenient browsing system. If you must know I found the site while searching for Merv the Perv clips from SNL.

Edit: Found a neat breakdancing site -- STYLE2OUF

Ico for the PS2 is one of the finest examples of elevating video games to an art form and I was super stoked to see that their follow up game, Shadow of the Colossus, is getting glowing reviews from several gaming websites.  If it's anywhere near as good as Ico I'm sold.

The Pixelween 2005 website is all finished.  Take a look at the rules and the gallery and don't forget to submit your own horror masterpiece!  There's only 18 days left!

I am gearing up to switch back to Netflix after a long hard trip with Blockbuster. Since I've used both the Netflix and Blockbuster online rental services recently I thought I'd help potential customers make an informed decision on which service to go for.  The pricing for Netflix and Blockbuster is nearly identical so it really comes down to features...

Intelligent design my ass. Guinness proves once and for all that evolution is the bomb.

Note: Sorry to bring up religion (a taboo subject here), but in my opinion Guinness should be served in schools before that "intelligent design" hogwash makes it in.

What do you get when you take the idea of a Litebrite and mix it with just another reason classic gaming still rocks? .S! (dot S) While most of the following site is in Japanese, I'm sure you can easily navigate your way through it. Create your own classic video game characters by pushing the pins through the holes (you can do it, I know you can!) Actually, when viewing the actual product in some pictures, it looks quite lame, but I thought it was worth showing anyways.

Oh, the wonders of technology. For those of you looking to reenact the Princess Leia hologram messages from Star Wars there's now a spiffy heliodisplay that lets you interact with your monitor in a three dimensional fashion.  Another kicking UI that'll let you play with your hands is this tactile display (kind of like Minority Report).

If either of these technologies ever becomes widespread the smutty possibilities are endless.

Blizzard might have accidentally stumbled upon the disaster modeling market. Apparently the virus unleashed on virtual players in the World of Warcraft MMORPG might have some practical applications. 

Hopefully Blizzard will get moving on an earthquake disaster model soon because I think we're due for a big one in California any day now.

Here's proof that people will spend mad cash on just about anything for their pets.  Gregg Miller of Boston won an Ig Nobel award (laugh then think) for selling fake balls for neutered dogs.

Great quote... "Considering my parents thought I was an idiot when I was a kid, this is a great honor."

Found a bunch of great stuff on the excellent illustration blog Drawn this morning. The following are a nice variety of animated music videos featured at the Ottawa International Animation Festival.

• Phoenix Foundation 'Hitchcock'
• The Muffs 'Don't Pick on Me'
• Die Toten Hosen ‘Walkampf’ (only clips)  

There is now a write up and official section up at deviantART about the Pixelween contest, a joint effort between our two awesome sites.

For those who don't know, Pixelween 2005 is our Halloween contest this year. Members are asked to create a scene from or inspired from their favourite Halloween/Horror movie inside the provided template. Make sure you read the rules

PRIZES:

• 1st: 1-year dA subscription, $40 in deviantDOLLARS*, dA t-shirt of your choice**
  
• 2nd: 3-month dA subscription, $20 in deviantDOLLARS*
  
• 3rd: 3-month dA subscription, $10 in deviantDOLLARS*

Entries will be judged on the usual criteria: quality, creativity, how well the rules are followed, and how your skills blow us away.

Both experienced pixelists and pixel-virgins are welcome to enter into the contest! It's all for fun, first and foremost. We can't wait to see what you guys have to show us.

I told y'all there'd be prizes... w00t!

Check eeet!

* - deviantDOLLARS can be used anywhere, such as at the dA print store or getting more subs for yourself or others if you choose to share the love!

** - Due to the limited edition nature of deviantWEAR t-shirts, it may not be the shirt your heart desired because of availability issues. It has to be in stock at the time of your winning, in other words.

Added a dropdown menu for member links and for your own profile (at the top of the page under your user name) to make it easier to get to certain tools.   Added a personal message count at the top of the page so you can quickly see if you have new messages.  

Created a script to clean up favorites count and keep it accurate from now on. When people would remove a piece from their favorites there was the potential to screw up the count with numerous page refreshes.  Not to worry... all data was secure -- it was just messing up the cached favorites count for a piece.

Stoned Florida scientists figured out that dolphins can sing cheesy TV theme songs!  Well, it didn't go down exactly like that, but it sure seems like something you'd figure out while high/drunk.

I wonder which musician will be the first to incorporate dolphin vocals into their music.  My money is on Beck or Paul Simon.

A quoi ça sert l’amour? is a beautiful little animation by the French animation studio Cube. It follows the rocky relationship of a stick figure couple set against a jazzy song.

Yet another gem found on Drawn!

While I still don't fully understand all the nuts and bolts of the recent Wired article covering the breatkthrough in quantum computing, I can tell this is going to be big.  Possibly bigger than the recent Nick and Jessica split. That's right, I said it.

We've got some handy craft pixel art for ya this fine morning. A couple Flickr users have posted pictures of their videogame quilts. There's three sets: Mario, Tetris, Space Invaders

Found on boingboing.net.

These fighter sprites are huge -- over 200 pixels tall.

http://ggxlol.highervoltage.net/

Since All Hallows Eve is coming up soon, we have decided to hold a contest in conjunction with the folks over at deviantART.

The contest is pretty straight forward. Create an scene from or inspired from your favourite Halloween/horror themed movie in the template provided.

Ch-Ch-Check it out