Where to start but more importantly where to stop!
Who is ‘Elle Tridente’ (The Trident) – Well, quite simply it’s me, Mairtin Uisean Mac Giolla Brighde or Vincent or Vin to my friends. (boy am I glad I didn't have to go to school in Ireland, it would have taken all day just to write my name) English born of Irish Parents, Mum from the West, Dad from the North both with extremely deep roots.
I was originally given the nom-de-plume (Tag) by some chaps for services rendered to the Maserati Club it. I am unashamedly an owner and an enthusiast of this once great Marque, and have been since the age of 7 when Red became my favourite colour, (it used to be Grey until my father told me that Maserati’s were “Red Son - Blood Red†and Fangio and Sir Sterling my Life-Long Hero’s. (Just some of my toys featured above.))
My Backrouground is in Architecture and Construction, (now retired – It suddenly dawned on me on turning 50, that there had to be more to life than what I was doing, so I gave up a good position, salary, company car and all the rest of that materialism nonsense and packed it all in, after all “You work to live, not live to work!†and there's only so much enjoyment that 12hour days and money can bring you - lifes far to short!)
I’m now in rest mode, doing whatever I want to do, no longer orchestrated by demanding Clients and their whims and fancies, deadlines, or contractors hagling over final accounts and interim payments. Amongst my accomplishment’s I will name just two; my meetings with Pope John Paul II on his visit to Manchester and similarly HM Queen Elizabeth II – both extremely memorable days!
I am using a ‘State of the Art’ (for now) Dell Studio xps Desktop with more gigs that I can count, and enough Terabytes of something or other to service an entire office block, with another 500 Gig on tap via an external Hard Drive. (Where I store my files) A High Res 23†Flat Panel Monitor (I was going to purchase two but my desk decided against it).  High Def. Dolby 7.1+2 (?) Sound system, with a Dynamic Projection Sound Bar, usually turned to the off position, so that’s a fat lot of good!
On the operational side of things I’m 'fully loaded' with a Windows 7 Pro operating system (and nothing works; scanner – No! Printer - No! A4 Tablet – No!)  Isn’t technological progress wonderful? and what does work has completely changed even Word needs a manual to use it! Current Software packages includes:
Adobe CS5 Master Suite (My salvation I regularly use Potoshop, occasionally Illustrator and After effects I've used just twice on 'Vanalia' and 'Dizzy' which was a bit of a disaster. The rest of the suite remains unopened.
Daz 3D Studio Pro (Unopened)
Poser Pro 2010 (with Poser-Fusion for Lightwave, whatever that is?)
Daz Mimic (still in the box)
Realillusion Crazy Talk (Boxed)
Realillusion iClone (Boxed - Just in case I do some animation work, you can only go so far with a Gif.)
3D Max and (Max Design - Boxed)
Cinema 4D (Boxed) and
A couple of ‘Text to Speech’ engines, the best of which by Light-years is ‘Loquendo’ produced by Telecom Italia.it, which I’m currently trailing. (The boys are going to be running out of ideas for the old mans presents soon. Oh how wonderful a new piece of software - it's the thought that counts).
Oh - I almost forgot to mention my beloved BT Internet Connection, which is comparable to an ‘Acme’ contraption, consisting of a piece of string tied between two tin cans, and fails ever time it rains. Even ‘Gmail’ appears to take great delight in letting me know it's loading for ‘Slow Connections’ (2.8 download and  0.48 upload are achievable on a good day).
I’ve always had a fascination with images and drawing, whether it be; Art, Architectural, Interior or Graphic. ‘Lines on paper’ I used to refer to it as! It still amazes me to this day what a few simple lines can represent. I've been scribling since before I could talk, as a teenager I was the only pupil ever at my school to receive an ‘A+’ from the art teacher a Mr Bernard Noone (God Bless you ’Sir’ In case he’s looking in) for my Art Homework, not once but twice. Some years later I again met up with Mr Noone at a parents evening, much to the embarrassment of my two sons. When Mr Noone told them of my accomplishments, he not only remembered me but both the two images, and this was some 20 years or so later.  The hardest/Strictest teacher you could ever wish to meet, but boy, did he bring any potential to the surface, in a lot of respects I have achieved as much as I have, thanks to hm.
Now I’m entering a new and totally unknown realm that of 3D, a world of morphs, textures and renders, of manipulation and mannequins.  (My younger son describes it as dressing up dolls and thinks the old mans gone “Do-Lallyâ€) I can throw away my roetrings, pencils, drawing board set squares and the like and become immersed in a world of Illusion and Fantasy.
To me this is about as big a departure from my ‘Comfort Zone’ as I can probably get.  I would rather be back conceptualising/designing a muti million pound buildings,  than facing the prospect of taking this step. I’ve already stuck my toe in the water with the ‘Le Femme’ image, but there again I reverted to Photoshop for salvation and comfort. Which did nothing for my confidence, but it’s a step I had to take, one I’m committed to if only to justify the capital outlay!
And ‘Missie’ the cursor chasing Cat agrees, if she ever gets off my keyboard.
My biggest problem/stumbling block would appear to be a recuring one, that of mentality, mind-set, in that I pose myself the question 'why use some software to do what I can do, without'? I had the same problem with adapting to 'AutoCad' when that was first introduced in the late 70's early 80's. Are we in danger of becomming too reliant upon the use of technology and loosing our basic skills? A bit like the calculator, or is this simply progress and therefore inevitable?
Oh, to hell with it, it's now or never!