Attached Link: http://www.wacom.com/overstock/serial.cfm

Thanks for the info. I'll go with the smaller size, then. It will probably fit on my crowded desk better, anyhow. The $100 difference in price can go into my "Lightwave" fund. Heh. (...) OK, I've done the deed and have some additional info: There was a $10 handling fee. No shipping charge. Total was $139 for a refurbished serial port 6 x 8 tablet. --Terri

AzChip, there's no rule that says I have to be logical about blaming people, you know. And you can't blame me for your phone bill, it very clearly states above that I am blameless, so there. Harbinger, I'm torn between the 6 x 8, the 9 x 12 and the 12 x 12. How does the 6 x 8 feel? I mostly move my hand in small movements, so the smaller size might be fine, as well as fit my desk better. And of course the price is nice. I just wonder how likely it is that down the road I'll wish that I had splurged and gotten the larger size. Opinons, anyone? --Terri

Cell shaders are fun to play with. I bought the Toon shader for Carrara, and used it to make Tarot Cards. Anyway, lately I've been seeing version 5.5 Lightwaves pop up on ebay (some still sealed in the box) for an affordable, so I imagine that's the direction I'll go in. I haven't seen the same sort of deal for 3DMax (aside from -spit- warez), but then, it's more expensive to start with. Buying software on eBay can be risky, but I have had good luck by limiting purchases to things that are still shrink-wrapped. It sounds like Lightwave has nice modeling tools, and that's what I need the most help with. --Terri

I have thought of a suitable revenge: Next time I am at the store I shall buy a bunch of CHEDDAR and mail it to you in small, unmarked envelopes! (For those who don't know... cheddar upsets litst; turns him into the incredible hulk or something).

Hmm. This has been an interesting discussion. I was thinking about buying Lightwave myself. Right now I'm using Carrara, but plan on upgrading some day. I've played with Max some, but I think Lightwave is more attainable budget- wise (I just missed winning a bid on eBay for sealed-in-the-box 6.5; I think it went for $720 or so, argh). My main interest is cartooning/comics, and I wondered if any of you have used Lightwave for that sort of thing.

The roll is a nice touch, as is the camera pan. I think next I'm going to play with the tweener properties, and see if I can do a "slow in", so the box looks like is skidding, then stopping (slowing down to due to friction). Maybe a bit of rotate. And then I'm going to try the "duplicate with symmetry" in the sequencer tray, so see if I can get it to slide back. Perhaps I should follow your lead and add a floor, that really seems to make your animation look a lot more solid. Or maybe it was the textures. For some reason, although Animated Gif is an available selection, I got a message about it being "write only", and it didn't want to save. Luckily, download.com came to the rescue (it's the first place I look for freeware) with UnFREEz. Not a fancy program, but it did the trick, and it was not a very large program.

Attached Link: http://download.cnet.com/downloads/0-10072-100-3893223.html?tag=st.dl.10001-103-3.lst-1-7.3893223

Well, my plan is to do this as I work along with the book, so the first few challenges at least will be easy ones, with the focus being more on getting familiar with the tools, rather than the actual animation. I'll go ahead an post my first "Point A to Point B" challenge, and we'll see how it goes. I'll try and write it up with some Carrara hints on my lunch hour, but if anyone ones to go ahead and start, the challenge will be as I described above: Make an animated GIF of an object (your choice) moving from Point A to Point B, using only two keyframes, and letting the program do the tweening. --Terri

Well, I was thinking along the line of simple, small animated gifs. I think Carrara can output those. And if they stay small enough (maybe litst could suggest a file size limit), we could just post them here, like any other image. If you have been doing a lot of animating, the kind of challenges I have in mind may be too beginner-level to be interesting to you. Like, for example, the first challenge might be to move a primitive object from point A to point B, using two keyframes and letting Carrara do the rest (this is similar to the first project in the book I'm working from). But the idea is to build on each challenge so that the projects become more interesting as time goes by, so maybe we'll catch up to you. On the otherhand, if you animate 90% of your work, this may mean you are the resident expert, so maybe you'll have to explain everything to us beginners! (See... my evil plan worked... now we all know who to bug when we run into problems with the Carrara animation tools... mwahahahahaha <== evil laughter).

Pretty cool. The exhuast and lights work very well. The only thing I would suggest is a brighter color, so you can see it better against the background of space (though maybe that just my monitor).

The hair looks good, and really adds to his personality.

I think the image on the paperweight looks like a face.(Of the person sitting at the desk? Or a ghost?) Or maybe it's a test, to see what deep dark secrets are revealed by what we see in the paperweight. Maybe EliteGoliath is working on a psychology paper, and we're the guinea pigs! Seeing the image as a face gives the pic (for me, at least) a sort of haunted feel. But then, I've been reading horror comics all weekend, so take that with a grain of salt.

Yeah, I think it had a neat little sci-fi feel as well. Nice work.