Animated drawing 1 - A tree

Been a while...

Have been practicing drawing a lot. Today I found that the really interesting "animated drawing" feature is easily embedded in a blog as well. From the site ratemydrawing.com comes this drawing of mine - a tree by the sea (no ref.):

YouTube Videos featuring master artist Glenn Vilppu added!

Today I am proud to present a couple of videos featuring the master artist Glenn Vilppu (I'm improving my drawing by following his "Vilppu Drawing Manual" at the moment) that I found on YouTube. Hope they can inspire readers of this blog as much as they inspire me.

My Digital Art Gallery at Renderosity

During the last few months I have rediscovered my interest in Digital Art. Just the other day I found a really good community about this - Renderosity. Having registered I now have my own digital art gallery on the site.

So far I have uploaded some old pictures I made last year with the Windows program Paint and one picture I finished today using the freeware art program Paint.NET (See link in the right column)

The direct link to my gallery (also found in the right column) is:

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/browse.php?username=mindbendermind

A Nice Site for Writing Choose-your-path Stories

Today I registered at a site for writing branching stories, on your own or together with other members.

Obviously I couldn't resist starting two simple ones - one only I can continue, one that anyone may continue.

The site in question:
Infinite Story

Highly recommended if you like interactive writing

Site update: New link collection created

Added a link collection with links to my favorite quotes from books by different authors. Many of these will probably be inspiring for writing.

Begun Writing Gamebook Today

Today I have begun writing a really simple gamebook at Online Gamebooks. Just to try the Book Creation Area and test how it works. Seems like it is really easy to create nice adventures there and many features can be found.

Now the question is whether to continue working on this "A very little adventure" I started today or if I should start thinking about a more interesting story.

Site update: New game (by me and my son) added

Added the 2nd game I made with my son on Sploder. Link can be found in the right column

Site update: New game (by me and my son) added

Added a new link collection and a link to the game I made with my son today. Enjoy.

My First "Game" With the Sploder Game Maker

I decided to begin with creating some games at the game making community Sploder and registered earlier today.

My first finished game (have started another and have ideas for at least two after that) is more some kind of experimental attempt at interactive art than a game (although it is playable and actually very simple). It's called "Our search for mening" and should be seen as some kind of symbolic picture of life.

Here it is:

(control the ship with arrow buttons)

Note: If the game doesn't show, the game link is HERE

Make Your Own Game

Game Maker, Sploder or text-based - the best start?

I am thinking about starting with a game creation program that requires (at least close to) no programming. Game maker seem to be a popular choice among most hobby game crafters - and is a program I have tried a little before, have downloaded and even begun making a game on.

There seem to be, however, an even simpler way of reaching the goal of creating my first computer game: The page called Sploder where you simply edit and work with an already existing source of sprites, effects, events etc.

I haven't decided yet for which to try first. There is also the option of trying to make a simple RPG with one of the many RPG makers out there. Or - perhaps the easiest way - to begin with a simple text-based game.

A great link collection for all of these resources can be found at:

http://www.ambrosine.com/resource.html

A Blog about Pursuing your Creative Dreams

Recently, as I have been developing my most popular blog - Fantasytree - I have more and more felt an old dream returning; The dream of making my own computer game. I have started a couple of times earlier but never actually finished any of the projects I have begun.

I decided that I wanted to write about this creative longing, and that the easiest way was to blog about it. First I considered adding game creation links to Fantasytree - but I felt that it was a somewhat different subject, demanding different kinds of link collections. I also wanted to have the option available to broaden the creative perspective to any of the creative interests I have. These interests include:

- Computer game making
- Writing (I have begun writing a fantasy novel, some short stories and poetry - and of course blog on a daily basis)
- Music (I'm a musician and have written a couple of songs, just for family and friends)
- Drawing and Painting

This blog will be about any creative project of mine that I feel like writing about (or publishing online). The initial focus will probably be computer game making however, since that is the thing I'm most interested in at the moment. It can actually be regarded as a combination of all the other art forms.

I hope you will feel like joining me on this creative journey and that you can learn from and be inspired by it when working on your own projects. As always I am truly grateful for any feedback on this blog. Let the creative process begin...