Escapology....

Local news programme..complete with copper

You know I've been promissing those interested in my life before 3D some actual proof that I wasn't making up the fact I worked all over the world as an escape artist for a long time now over a decade in fact. (I only stopped due to a health problem that made it dangerous...well more dangerous.) So as I spent till 4am converting from old VHS one of the tapes of tv apearances I have to AVI here's a few screen grabs. I've lost count of how many people have asked about this over the years both in person and in interviews...so here yougo...better late than never..... Up till now not even close freinds in 3D knew much about this period of my life.

a thing with Tom o Connor

As this was long before the internet and back starting in 1987 for the 1st screen grab (I dont have a recording ofmy 1st time on TV aged 11), the only stuff about me as an escape artist online is what I have put there...ie next to nothing. Thus proving that things are infact still true even if you can't find out about them on the internet lol.

Last but one show Eammon Andrews ever did before he died.

Why am I converting them? Well the tapes are degrading fast and I want to have a record of all the things I achieved back then for my kids,and maybe one day decades for now... grandkids. Plus I'm also proud of what I managed to achieve back then. Maybe I'll stick one or two of the old tv spots up at some point..... but either way I'd sstill be embaressed to hell to see myself aged 14 onwards online lol.

Kids TV show called 'knock knock'

...Oh and here's a few of the hundreds of press clippings of mine I have from back in the day....many are missing though :(




So there you go...that should do you all for a while.

Additional:

Got to say the reaction to this has been off the scale lol. Now I realise its far more interesting to others than it is to me. So I'll answer the more common questions from today so I dont type them out a zillion times....

• In the photos shown I range from about 14 or so to about 18 (I think)..I do have one from press cutting aged 11 but not showing that yet...if ever lol
  
• Yes I still hold the world record, yes people have tried to break it and no its not in the guiness book anymore as they consider it 'unbreakable' (which is total and utter crap, as in practice I regulalry did 2.5 seconds lol).
• Yes I can pick locks,no I wont open your cupboard , car , safe etc..... that you've lost the key to for you PMSL.
• My talent was 1st spotted aged 2.....if you can call it that.
• I was asked to write and published books and articles from age 14 that are apparently considered standards in the field (no I dont get royalties for them anymore....)
• Yes I can 'still do that stuff' and part of my gear is in boxes in my office where it has been for long time. yes from time to time when no one is in the house I do get it out and have a go...no I will not show you.
• No I will not go back to doing that....... its far to risky a feild for a guy with a wife and two kids to be taking those sort so risks every day....plus at 40 I'm a wee bit old and fat these days.
  
• Yes I held a special explosives license from aged 17, which you have to have if your doing any escapes that are dicking around with high explosives...and yes I did do those. But I let that license lapse over 10 years ago.
• No this is not the only thing I haven't made known in 3D up till now that I have done.
  

Now obviously I dont want this to take over from the art side as to be blunt I've been doing it far longer part of my life now. But I did promise rather a lot of people over the last decade or so to show some of this stuff.....just took me a decade to find the bloody time to actually do it thats all lol

Tree's and Waterfalls

Waterfalls and all elements added...still a work in progress though ;)

Update to the 3d scene from the MOD302 '3D Digital Environments' course I'm giving at FXPHD this term, this is from week 5 (next week) and sort of a teaser. Unfortunately I can't show the animation I've ran a test render on, but I have to say that it looks very nice with those waterfalls added. Although it was sort of a cheat render as using a still for the scene elements so I can test the waterfall integration.

10 min cheats can be fun

Also as I had the elements lying around as a result of the above I knocked out in 10 mins the following crazy trees render....for shits and giggles. There is a rather obvious problem with the above shot if you can spot it and no its not the girls scale...any smaller and you'd not see her and think she was a branch lol

More Mattes

No waterfalls yet....(there will be two)

A couple of mattes, the 1st is a late work in progress for my next couple of FXPHD classes. Its been nightmare to do as I'm seriously pushing Vue way beyond what it is designed for. Although people in the class won't need to, as I'm the only bugger who has to be able to load it all into one scene so you guys know what your aiming for lol. The final scene will be split across 3-4 scene files and composite.

This is just begging for a caption lol

and the other a mess around..... its a full 3D matte thats got my old mate Joep Van der Steen in it comped from a photo from EUE lol. See now its either begging for a caption or something added on the left on that sand bank lol.

Levelling up

For those of you that may be interested there's an article in the new issue of 3D artist magazine I wrote (there's another next month as well). This month covers 'easy texturing in Mudbox' of a tree stump. You can buy it from www.3dartistonline.com or 'all good book stores' as they always say on the adverts.

A test frame from MY version of the cathedral animation

I'm also at the moment sorting out a couple of full 3d mattes / scenes for the Joan of Arc short being made by FXPHD as part of my MOD302 course. One of these is an absolute doozy of a shot, that will mix both practical effects and digital 3d mattes. In fact I have a timing shot with low res geo rendering out as I type this.

Also the lads over at Breitbild VFX in Germany are kindly letting me use their ender farm in between using it themselves to render out a load of stuff. So as well as some stuff you've not seen, there will also be my own personal version of the cathedral shots (with a few of my own added), some photoreal full 3 external environments and a bit of character stuff as well.

I've also been giving the cathedral a few tweaks as it was finished back at the end of September last year and so wanted to give everything a once over before adding it to a reel as even though the animation hasn't been seen yet, it's an old model ironically. So there are changes I've made to my own personal version that are different to the one covered in MOD301.

In case you hadn't guessed this is for a new reel, mainly as my non environment reel is seriously showing its age now after a year. It also gives me an excuse to show clients some more impressive stuff in actual shots. Now there is no way in hell I would be able to render this stuff out without a render farm...and even then some are having to be seriously optimised to not blow up the Breitbild VFX farm lol. So big thanks to the lads.

Also I'm amazed at the reaction to the free videos... I hope you found them useful and I'll up more once things calm down in a week or two.

Free Zbrush Hair to Spline's plugin for 3D Max

'Wayne's Poly to Splines' 3D Max plug-in (Free)

Link: www.psychocore.com/WaynesPolyToSpline.zip

Well as a personal thank you to all the zbrush users that were so positive about the mudbox videos and realised they are just as useful to them, and also didn't insult me or start ww3.... Here's a little thank you for those of you that use 3D Max. Its something I knocked out in an hour tonight that takes imported zbrush hair and converts it into splines so that they can be used with to comb max hair and fur. This of course gives you dynamics and opens the whole thing up to animation. Its single click and works fast...oh and free.

It operates in a single click and includes a very basic installation and usage PDF....if there are any spelling mistakes or typos don't blame me as I wrote the damn thing in 5 mins lol. As mudbox users have sort of had a monopoly on me of late I felt it would be a nice way to say thanks to the zbrush users who often get sidelined in my freebie releases.

I can't stick this on zb central as I've been banned for 'daring to use mudbox' now for over 3 1/2 years lol. So pass the word amongst yourselves as I cannot.

...and so it is done.

It's taken well over a week of uploading day and night on my slow rural internet connection and fitting it around constant client work, but all the DVD's I own copyright to are now available for free. Plus a few other videos that have either been lost over the years, spread in strange places no one but a few knew about or simply higher res versions.

There are many other videos I've done that as I don't own copyright I can't make free such as the 3d creative magazine ones I've done over the years (that could easily double this); and ones for 3D artist magazine coming up and of course the paid more recent FXPHD ones. But at over 46 1/2hours of free DVD's and videos isn't bad going for you all I think. I've no idea how much it would cost to buy them all...a fair bit though.

I do have one or two other things I want to still upload when I have time, but I'm going to take a well earned rest from uploading to the site for a while now. Let's not get this wrong this was a massive undertaking and one that has never been done before. No one has put their entire DVD back catalogue out for free..and certainly not on a very slow rural internet connection like I have. There are times over the last week I would have given my left nut for a faster upload speed. All videos have been uploaded with no help from anyone.... I don't think 3d palace wanted to kill their upload for a week lol.

There have been about 1% of predictable people with a problem, but to be frank I couldn't care less and neither could the vast majority of digital sculptors across the board of both Mudbox and Zbrush persuasion. This was not done for me, or them it was done to help people period. There's not even a proper back link to my main site www.DashDotSlash.net on it lol.

So enjoy the videos and PLEASE remember they are not representative of my current standard of work as some are very old models that were used...even back then. Never say I don't do nice things for you all every now and again. ;) Now it's over to the rest of the industry and see if they can start and build on this idea of mine.