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Tuesday, 08:31 pm, 07 September 2004 Some New Noble Warfare News... Sunday afternoon I worked solidly to create a sprite designer. It is actually a 3d voxel cell to 2d sprite design program. It's very useful because none of the volume is lost as the sprites rotate. The downside is editing voxels in the sprite development is quite time consuming. So what kind of sprites will I be developing in the near future? The shortlist is; Archer (a 3d favourite) Knight (on foot) Spearman Wolf/Hound The voxel area is 16x16x16 with 8 animation cells. Getting the anatomy right in such a small area is quite challenging. I'm starting from a generic human. The movement animations are; Move Charge Stand Attack Asset management will be the next step. I'm interested in seeing the 3d effect of combatants on the battlefield. Figure Updates... I heard from Tammy Haye today. The plan seems to be to catch up with both Tammy and Chris out of Games Day itself. Tammy reinforced my concern about the event being stuffy and the crowds of screaming kids being quite overwhelming. It seems really strange that these issues aren't addressed. I guess it is designed to be a fun day for kids primarily. But if the event is known universally as being a stinking screamfest... The chance of meeting Chris, Tammy and Fred Reed - that is what is important. Classic WeFunk I listened to Show 225 of WeFunk Radio today for the first time in more than a year. It's a classic show featuring the extended WeFunk family and Lone Catalyst. It typifies the golden years of WeFunk. Lone Catalyst are the college radio hip hop sweet-hearts. Butta does the beat boxing. It's a classic WeFunk show. I followed it up with one of the closely followed funding drive shows. WeFunk - in terms of freestyles - has dropped off in the past year. The most recent funding drive shows didn't have the mayhem the previous years have experienced. I don't know whether it is ageing freestylers? People moving out of Montreal. I put to Loes, when he emailed me a while ago, that he should put the time in and do as many WeFunk shows as he possibly can. The freestylers add a dimension to WeFunk that is really needed. I woke up last night for a glass of water and found myself reciting an Olaf funding drive freestyle. I walked into the studio, a couple of minutes ago, And they said, 'O, can you drop a freestyle flow?' I said, 'That you know, just give me a beat or tempo...' Good night. Saturday, 07:00 am, 04 September 2004 It's been a while since I last called Nick. I was up early this morning, thanks to an early night, and tuned in to a 30 minute funk set from Nick on WeFunk. It required a prop/catch-up call. Regulars to the Log will remember the Butta Beats track that has been discussed on and off for the past year or so. It is still an occasional topic. Just a brief call but enough to catch up. Got a shout-out at the conclusion of the show. Can't complain. Property Variables I'm looking for less hard-coding in Noble Warfare. Part of that is making a number of the fluid battle variables open rather than constant. It is not a trivial problem. Tabletop wargames are very good at providing a number of variables that tie to things. I have been debating with Chris Bryant, creator of the Alienstar games, that there are too many duplicate effect variables in modern wargames. It is about reassurance to the player rather than actual effect. Chris is a one email every-other-month type of fellow, so I will let all know in November about the continuation of this discussion. In any case, Noble Warfare has five identified battle values that represent the fluidity of battle. Things like when formation is broken for the 'entry'(?) into close combat. But there are a couple of more subtle values. My aim is to link the five to two named variables. So every user can identify, this unit needs N quidjibos. MIA and Soon to be MIA? Speaking of MIA, I have been trying to track down Tammy Haye for about three weeks. The last email from her said, basically, 'Photos of latest work to be sent t'row.' She isn't on email and her eBay account has been closed. Following a good telephone chat with Chris Blair over the week, I thought I would give Tammy a call. But she isn't listed. Chatting to Chris Blair was actually good fun. Worked out which figures are his in the new 40k manual. I'm interested in one of them. Possibly an additional squad. But I'm not really into plastic. I'm attending Games Workshop's Games Day in Birmingham in just under a month. It seemed insane not to go down and meet Fred, Chris and Tammy. The last time I was surrounded by a group of wargame folks, I dropped any interest in it for about fourteen years. So I am expecting this could be a similar experience. The reality of getting seasonal parcels of painted miniatures in contrast with the smell and noise of actual wargamers is something I am trying to brace myself for. Perhaps too harsh. Good morning! Wednesday, 08:07 pm, 01 September 2004 Top Searches Last month, Canada came up once again as one of the top searches on Barbalet's Log. In fact, Butta Beats and Chilan were high on the search list. I'm not sure if Chilan went to Cuba. But Butta went to Cuba recently and this could have spawned the search interest. I often wonder the ebbs and flows on searches. Tammy Haye scored highly. Tammy has been out of contact for a couple of weeks. This is to be expected with figure painters. I have thought about writing an extended entry about how to find good commission painters. As this is the first entry for the month I might write about it here. Finding Commission Miniature Painters The first rule is find a painter whose work you like. Find a painter who compliments your interests in figures. There is a good spread of figures painters of various styles and rates in the US, the UK and the rest of Europe. eBay is a great resource for finding commission painters. I have found most of my commission painters through eBay. It provides examples of their work and painters who offer commissions on eBay will always correspond promptly. Resources like CoolMiniOrNot enable you to see commission painters' works before you get in contact. There is a vast divergence in prices for commissions. If you want an army painted, you should look for a different kind of painter than if you want a couple of display figures. I don't like putting numbers online. But you can pay between UKP1.50 and about UKP200 for the commission of a humanoid 28mm figure. I have never paid more than UKP120 for a standard 28mm figure. I can count on one hand the number of figures I have commissioned for more than UKP80 each. They are all top quality collector figures. If you are interested, the UKP120 was the first Tammy Haye Paint-a-thon figure. The remaining figures are Tammy Haye and Chris Blair figures. In contrast, I have never paid more than UKP35 for a Fred Reed figure. In general, I pay Fred about UKP10 per figure. As this Log shows, Fred's work is stunning. In the case of Fred, Tammy and Chris, I pay for time. Fred never takes more than half a day on each 28mm figure. Tammy and Chris spend a lot more time per figure. If you are interested in collecting stunning painted figures, pick figures that the painter wants to paint. My greenskin collection of fantasy and futuristic orcs has been amassed through getting Fred Reed to paint figures he likes painting and he produces stunning paint jobs. Tammy likes painting Chaos figures. Chris likes humanoid figures. I wouldn't send Chris or Tammy a greenskin. Three points to note. (1) Painters have good and bad figures. Even top painters have a bad day. (2) Painting is not an exact science. You can't predict how long it will take to paint a figure. (3) Figure painters may not be the best folks on email. Don't expect regular correspondence. During a commission, I will drop an email every couple of weeks to see how things are going. Sometimes these emails go unanswered. This is to be expected. Noble Warfare Manual Update For the past couple of evenings, I have been working on the Noble Warfare manual update. It is now online. Good night. [ Previous Log ]
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