Introducing the latest member of our family, Rosebud! This is Corina’s new 4-legged sister, which she met to her complete surprise when we got back from Florida.

Rosebud, named after Rosebud (The only female puppy) in the cute “Buddy” movie series with the little Golden Retriever puppies, is a Native American Village Dog purchased at Indian Valley Kennels. This is my daughter’s dog, so we gave her complete freedom to choose the name… personally I liked Shasta but Corina had zero intentions of hearing my suggestions. When Simba was returned to Mira (some of you might remember we were a sponsor family for Mira Guide Dogs and we volunteer to raise one of their puppies until 1 year old) Corina was obviously devastated and has been crying for a dog since. With my wife mildly allergic to dogs and not really wanting another dog in the first place it wasn’t looking too good. But with Corina and I badgering the crap out of her, Terri and I sat down and started looking at Hypoallergenic dogs. Aside from the “Doodle” type dogs such as Labradoodles, all the hypoallergenic dogs were those little annoying yappy type dogs that I can’t stand until we found a picture of what appeared to be a gorgeous wolf! Further research got me in touch with Carla at IVK and that’s when I found out about this remarkable breed of dog know as NAIDS, Native American Indian Dogs or in Carla’s breeding program, Native American Village Dogs.

These GORGEOUS dogs only shed their winter coat in the spring so there is no fur all over the house, they have no doggy odor and best of all, some lines have shown to be hypoallergenic! A test sample of fur from the dam and sire confirmed Terri had no reaction whatsoever! With Simba’s fur, her eyes would get itchy and feel nasty and irritate her skin a bit. With the test swatches, there was absolutely no reaction at all, we were amazed!

I immediately placed by downpayment and reserved a puppy and last week we met Carla in person in New York to pick up our gorgeous little girl and Corina was completely shocked and speechless, she had zero clue we were getting her. I had even bought all the supplies and hid them in my office.

So now she is 10 weeks old and proving to be an extremely smart and loving little miss, and her behavior is calm and very gentle. I thought Simba was pretty calm but he was the Tazmanian Devil compared to this one. We’re all very happy with her and love her to bits!

So, if I sound cranky on the P2L forums, it’s because of the late night bathroom wake-up calls

Dan

Spring is in the air, and what better way to spend the rain soaked, mosquito infested, manure scented days of spring than working on the head-splitting task of updating Pixel2life? Actually, I think jamming a hot poker in my eye socket would be less painful to be honest, but I think it’s time for a change. A BIG change. I’ve been very busy in my personal life and actually spending less time on the PC and I’ve also been working on my little import business, which is thriving quite well. In a twist of fate, P2L went from my only real sustaining source of income and fulltime employment to a side hobby that actually costs more to run than it makes. To put it bluntly, I’m bored with P2L and it has become increasingly difficult to justify keeping it as part of my life, and I think it’s probably showing.

So once you come to realize that something you BUSTED YOUR ASS to bring to life has become nothing more than a tedious chore to you, it’s time to make some decisions. In my case, giving up is pretty much non-existent in my vocabulary, and with P2L drawing thirty thousands visitors a day, it’s hardly a site worth trashing. So I sat down and thought long and hard about what to do, and I came to the decision that it was time to create one last version to see if it could re-stimulate my interest and get me back to my P2L roots. But this can’t just be another upgrade to something a bit different or add a few new goodies like was done for v2 to v3 and v3 to v4… this needed to be major, something along the lines of v1 to v2, which was a total and complete ground-breaking change for us.

The first thing I knew we needed was a new layout, no question. Not a layout based on what we’ve been using since v2, we needed something totally new. So I started talking to all kinds of design sites… I contacted high-end studios like 2Advanced, I spoke to freelance designers and I went to smaller design places. I felt that in order to get away from the stagnant design, I needed someone ELSE to design the layout… some fresh eyes and hands to get some perspective on the new direction P2L needed to take. Much to my disappointment, people either didn’t want to work, wanted retarded amounts of money for a single PSD layout or simply submitted designs that were so God awful that I covered my ears and ran screaming for my life. Even Nick (NGPixel) handed over a design that wasn’t bad, but I still wasn’t “feeling it dawg”.

All the while, I had to work out a way of making P2L different… obviously we’re still going to be the huge tutorial portal that we’ve always been, kicking the crap out of the competition and all that good stuff, but that’s secondary now. I needed it to be new to ME, and in a world where the general feeling is that it’s all been done, that’s no easy task. I want the experience of using P2L to be different, and I want people to love using the site while still finding the tutorials they want. I also want to give members a reason to be members, and have fun performing a variety of tasks on the site. That’s when the light-bulb went off and some plans started to take shape… I talked with Nick, Jamie and Donna and shared some of the ideas I had cooking in the oven and they all seemed to think it had some serious possibilities. Then Nick came up with a boatload of other cool goodies he wanted to include, and some of them would be a BLAST to do, and that definitely had my undivided attention.

So now we had our direction, we just needed a layout… I was then forced to take matters in to my own hands. I decided to clear my head and not even look at the old designs, and I roughed in something I thought would look cool. I worked on it for a couple of hours and this basic outline I had put together looked… well.. pretty darn cool! I sent it in to Nick to flesh it all out and add the details, and he absolutely RAN with it and knocked my socks off with the extras he added on to it. Yes ladies and gents, we had our layout, and Nick is da fuggin man!

So fast forward to now, and development has been going on for several weeks now and it’s really starting to take shape. Nick is working constantly on the coding for now and Jaime and Adam will be brought on later to work on their respective parts plus I’ve hired some extra talented folks to help with the additional media we’ll need for the site. Overall I think you guys are going to LOVE this new site and while I’m sure there will be the usual moaning and groaning from the haters of change, the vast majority will be too busy having fun with the new goodies. This will be a massive change in two ways… visually the new site is stunning (I think anyhow) and second, the new member related services (sorry, it’s hard to describe anything that we’re doing without it becoming fairly obvious what we’re talking about).

I can honestly say that this is the most excited I have ever been about a new release and I can not wait to get back in to working on P2L and being super active with the community again! I spoke to Nick this afternoon and we sort of passed around a July release, so at the moment that is our target release date.

So thanks again everyone for your tremendous support throughout the years and I can not wait to welcome you to Pixel2life Version 5 this summer!

Dan

Hi all!

Phew, I have been MAD busy with P2L and the Predatorstuff.com website (AvP-R was recently released in theaters so everyone has Predators and Aliens on the brain), but I hope everyone had a great Christmas and I wish you and your families all the very best in the new year. I would especially like to thank the P2L crew for all of their very hard work in the past year and I look forward to working with you guys in 2008! We’ve got a lot in the planning so it should be quite the summer.

Anyhow, I wanted to share with you guys a fun little experiment I did this morning for a photo review… I wanted to try something with small detailed backdrops on one of my kits and I think it came out pretty sweet so I thought I’d share this with you photography buffs to try it out. Here’s how it turned out:

You can check out the rest of the pics from this experiment in the Predatorstuff Gallery.

It was a fairly simple trick, but I love how dramatic it looks… first thing you need to do is find your backdrop images. I went on DeviantArt and did a search for “1920×1200″ and it showed me a list of TONS of high resolution wallpapers and artwork. I picked out a few that I liked and printed them with my inkjet on some Cannon Matte Photo Paper (It’s important to use a matte finish, not glossy or high gloss or you’ll get shines and reflections from your lights) with my borderless printer. I let them sit for about 30 minutes to ensure they dried completely and I started to set up by photography table, light tent and lights. I then placed a light at the back of the tent and pointed it forward towards the camera. I used a clamp to position the printed backdrop upright directly in front of the light fixture and you immediately get this cool backdrop effect where the darks stay black and the lighter areas of the print out are glowing brightly with clean diffused light. Then I just place my kit in front of the backlit backdrop and it’s photo time!

The only limitation is that by printing on a 8.5″ x 11″ you only have a tiny backdrop, so I couldn’t get complete kit shots, but I managed to pull off some very nice close-ups. The end result was the Predalien standing in front of a fire or explosion in a very natural looking photo without any post editing in Photoshop. Why mess with photo editors if you can do it straight with the camera?

Anyhow, that was my little experiment today and I thought it came out pretty cool… I’ll need to order some large prints from DeviantArt so I can have larger backdrops and use them to photograph larger pieces. Give it a try to spice up your photos, it’s a fun way to spruce up your product and macro shots.

Dan

Hi gang,

Wow it’s been a little while since I’ve had a minute to post, but the fun never stops. Truth be told, my schedule sucks and I just can’t get the time in that I used to despite having a TON of new projects I want to get going. Seems like all I can is struggle to keep my head above water at this point. But, all depressing thoughts of self-loathing aside, HALLOWEEN IS HERE! This weekend most of us will be out at Halloween parties and such, so here’s an early greeting from Simba, who is now 5 months old and already nearing 60lbs! Oh, and this is my pumpkin Ned. Ned says hi!

Corina and I worked on some pumpkins this weekend while Terri handled pumpkin seed duty… for those of you missing out on this, baked pumpkin seeds are DA BOMB! Seriously, if you’ve never had pumpkin seeds before, you are missing out on a seriously good treat. Not those store bought nasty things that taste like small bits of salt, but I mean do it yourself seeds right out of the pumpkin!

Actually for those of you that want to seriously try this, here’s how I do it:

1. Get a decent sized pumpkin and cut a big round hole in the top and remove the lid. Then with a big metal spoon, scrape out the guts and then separate the seeds from the gunk and put them in a bowl.

2. Lay the seeds out on some cookie sheets (non stick or put some baking parchment underneath) and make sure you don’t pile them over each other.. you want them flat and not covered by other seeds. Don’t worry about orange residue from the pumpkin guts… that will all dry up and vanish.

3. Pop the tray(s) in the oven and let them dry overnight (no need to turn on the oven). Check them the next morning, you might have to flip them a bit.

4. Once dry, spray the seeds a bit with cooking spray or olive oil and salt them.

5. Pop them in the oven at 300F for 15 minutes or until they start to get golden brown and you’re done!

6. Eat them before other people find out you made delicious seeds!

You might find other recipes that say to boil them in water all this other stuff… that’s nonsense, just go with the dry route, they rock!

Now who says this is just a tech blog

Hey guys! There’s been quite a bit of activity lately and I’ve been sort of dabbling in all kinds of spots… So here’s a quick round-up of what’s new, what I’ve been up to and all that jazz. First off, I want to show you a little splash page I made for a friend of mine. As some of you may know, I’m pretty heavy in to the Garage Kit community and one of my good friends and favorite artists in the community is Joe Dunaway, who is especially famous for his insanely awesome Predator model kit build-ups. Anyhow, I host a gallery page for him and he asked me to hook him up with a new front Splash page for him. Here’s what I came up with:

You can check out the full thing at www.modelzone.com

I really liked the way this came out, and I really liked the way the ripple effect on the reflection turned out, making the logo look like it’s sitting in water. Call me bias, but I thought this turned out really cool. So then I was puttering around thinking of a new tutorial to write when I thought maybe folks would like to know how I made that cracked text effect and the rippled reflection. You can apply that cracked effect to anything actually.. text, objects, photos etc. So, I decided to divide this up in to a 2-part tutorial, starting with how to create cracked text and objects in Corel Photopaint.

This tutorial is once again published on the Pixel2life Publishing System, and I invite you to come check out my latest lesson HERE! This tutorial covers how to apply cracks and other textures to a variety of surfaces in a technique that is as easy as pie!

In a couple of weeks I’ll also be posting the second part that shows how I made the ripple reflection part, so stay tuned for that.

It’s also been pretty busy for me because Halloween is fast approaching and one of my new services on Predatorstuff.com is my costume sales. I’ve teamed up with Kre8-FX and the talented Pete Mander to create the ultimate Predator costume and this is our first Halloween round and it’s been MADNESS! We’re actually shipping out the first suits next week and I am REALLY stoked at showing off the final pics. Here’s a photo of the upper torso of an AvP Predator costume we released a couple of weeks ago:

If you want to see more about these suits we’re doing, check out the post on www.predatorstuff.com.

And you thought I only did tutorials? HAR!

And on an entertainment note, is anyone else out there completely obsessed with how kick-ass Rescue Me is? I’ve been a Dennis Leary fan for years and his Fireman TV series is absolutely his best work and one of the best television series I have EVER seen.

If you have no idea what I’m talking about, Rescue me is an edgy adult TV series about the lives of various FNDY firefighters post 9/11 and how badly their lives have turned since that tragic day. It’s EXTREMELY gritty and isn’t carried on regular stations, it’s only on speciality stations like Fox’s action showcase channel. There’s loads of swearing, sexual content and has quite often had me in tears from laughing so hard. The 4th season JUST wrapped up and you can find the first 3 series on DVD all over the place. I HIGHLY recommend you check out this show, it’s every bit as good as reviewers say it is. I personally think television SUCKS and 99% of TV shows are absolute garbage, especially reality shows and all that nonsense. There’s only a couple of series I enjoy, like Third Watch (sucks it’s over), Prison Break (although that’s starting to get tedious now), but Rescue Me is probably the best thing since MacGyver!

You can also check out their official website at www.fxnetwork.com for showtimes and details about the production and cast.

The other day some P2L community members were talking about various ideas to boost the forum participation up and one of them jokingly poked a jab saying maybe we should start talking about version 5 of P2L, even though we just released v4. Well, I didn’t say anything he’d be surprised how close he came to the mark, because I am indeed already mulling over ideas and concepts for the 5th version of the site. There’s nothing SOLID down yet, but one of the things we are looking at is the possibility of a complete redesign and leaving behind the look we’ve more or less carried around since v2. This would be one of the biggest things we’ve done on the site actually as a new layout can be a make-it-or-break-it move. I’ve already been working with Nick and 2 other professional design groups, which will remain unnamed for the time being, on some concept designs, but I haven’t decided on anything yet. I just figured that being the guy that has designed everything on the site for the last 4 years, maybe it’s time we had a fresh set of eyes look at a design and freshen things up completely.

So nothing concrete on this yet, but I thought I’d mention it here for the few of you that read my blog, let alone read enough of this post to make it to this point.

So that’s about it for me… very busy on all kinds of projects and trying to have some fun in between. Take care gang and we’ll see you next post!

Dan