The Visual Effects for Pacific Rim

Here's a short video clip showing off some of the visual effects process that went into Pacific Rim. It's kind of cool to see how all the computer effects are layered on top of each other to create the finished product.

Pacific Rim was on my list of movies I wanted for Christmas but I didn't get it. No big deal, I got a couple Amazon gift cards so I can get it whenever I'd like. I'm thinking about buying a digital copy as opposed to the DVD. I don't have a blu ray player and if I buy it through Amazon video I can get the HD download for as much as the DVD costs. This is the way of the future anyway, right? I'm not sure if I'm happy or sad that I've been able to completely skip the blu ray format.

Steam Machines are pretty

Normally I'm not the kind of blogger who just grabs another blog's content and repurposes it as my own. I'm the kind of blogger who just finds a youtube clip or a cartoon and will say a couple funny lines about it. With that in mind here's a bunch of stuff I took from Destructiod's coverage of CES. I mean I didn't just take everything so you should take the time to check out Destructiod's gallery of Steam Machines. They also have really basic spec and price info on all the units plus a few more I didn't include.

A couple interesting things we've learned. The machines shown will retail for $499 to a staggering $6,000. The cheapest look to be your average Intel i5s with 8 gigs of Ram. The fanciest get real fancy real quick. i7 processors, 16 gigs of RAM, dual video cards, solid state hard drives, pretty much the works.

So here's where we're at. If you buy a Steam Machine you're essentially buying a Valve branded gaming computer. There's really no getting around that. Some of these cases are pretty slick but you can tell most of the guts are straight off the shelf, although it is the Newegg shelf not the Best Buy shelf, so they've got that going for them.

This is interesting development in that it's really sort of a non-development. A lot of people have claimed that the Steam Machine will bring PC gaming to the masses. If it does it's doesn't look like it's going to do it with any tricks or gimmicks. These are pretty straight forward gaming PCs. And some of them even seem to be a good value. I'd be hard pressed putting together as nice of a computer as the Zotac or the CyberPower at their prices ($599 and $499) especially is such a dapper case (personally I love the fact that the Zotac looks like an old wireless router).

I still feel like it's going to be the software side of things that makes or breaks these. If Valve has found a way to make Linux easy to use and develop for, I have a feeling these will get real attractive to gamers really quick.

Wordburglar: Rap Viper

Last year Wordburglar, my favorite rapper from Halifax, dropped a sick album titled Welcome to Cobra Island. Sadly I haven't had a lot of time to listen to it yet. I'm driving a new/old car that doesn't have a USB hook up so I have to burn CDs like a caveman to listen to anything and It's been hard to find that time or motivation to do that. I hear the album at work every once in a while when it comes on at random but I try to keep the sweet beats turned down so my office doesn't get to hyphy.

What I'm trying to get at is that you should watch this video. I promise you it's better than GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra.

The top 10 Worst Video Game Consoles

One of the best things about growing up in the '80s and to a lesser extent the '90s was being exposed to all sorts of weird video game consoles. Back in the day a couple of yahoos in a garage could con a big company like Magnavox that everyone was going to want to tape plastic sheets on their TVs so they could play the worst Hockey game you've ever seen. What a time to be alive.

also the Apple Pippin.... lol

License those Links

Marvel To Publish Star Wars Comics In 2015. This is big news. Bigger News if you were a comic book reader in the '80s. Back then Marvel made boat loads of money by printing books based on Toy and Movie Licences. Star Wars, GI Joe & Transformers were all best sellers. Somewhere in the '90s they let those licences go to Dark Horse, Image and a couple other smaller publishers. Currently the Star Wars books Image publishes are pretty darn good so it will be interesting to see if Marvel really rolls out the red carpet and gives the titles they publish top notch creative teams.

Shia LaBeouf: "Should God Sue Me if I Paint a River?". Wow... just wow. Shia LaBeouf is a special kind of crazy. The kind that comes from being in hollywood for your whole life. He's like Corey Feldman but instead of drugs he's immersed himself in "art".

If you're not familiar with the story, The Beef made a short film that was essentially a adaption of a comic book by Daniel Clowes (Ghost World). Of course he did it without telling Clowes and without telling anyone else it was an adaption of a previous work. When he was first caught he apologized. Kind of. Every apology he tweeted was taken from a google search for apologies. Now he's spewing crazy on what is art and what is intellectual property. Seriously, the kid is cray cray.

Sexy Wonder Woman and Triforce Aprons. WooWoo.. now I know what I'm getting my wife for Christmas 2014.

I Was An NFL Player Until I Was Fired By Two Cowards And A Bigot. If you didn't hear about this yesterday you're probably living under a rock. Or somewhere that doesn't get sports talk radio. Chris Kluwe the greatest punter in Vikings history was let go at the beginning of the season. He makes a pretty good case that it wasn't due to his performance but because he's outspoken on the issue of gay rights. It's an interesting read, especially in a post Ducky Dynasty newscycle.

I had two takeaways on the article. First off if Adrian Peterson had said the same things Kluwe did there's no way he would have been let go. Kluwe's words and actions aren't that controversial. I just believe they're too controversial in relation to his ability and that's the reason he hasn't found another job in the league. Why would a team want to deal with even a small distraction just to sign the 19th best punter in the league?

Second is that if Kluwe can be taken at his word, the special teams coach for the Vikings is a horrible person. If you ever want to know why most gay athletes don't come out until their careers are over you have to look no further than the guy the Vikings are seriously considering as a head coach.

Six Awesome Facts about the Sega Dreamcast

Here's 2 minutes of teardown footage of a Sega Dreamcast along with a few facts you may or may not know about the system. I wish it was a bit longer and had more facts but the Dreamcast was my favorite console of all time so maybe I'm a bit biased.

True Story time: I pre-ordered a Sega Dreamcast direct from Sega so I could get my hot little hands on it on 9/9/99 (Sega guaranteed shipment on launch day). Well what Sega does the Post Office Ninten-don't. 9/9/99 came and went and my Dreamcast hadn't arrived. So what did I do? I went to a small videogame store way out in the middle of nowhere and bought a system just so I could play it that weekend with all my friends. So until the following Monday when my pre-ordered Dreamcast arrived and I sold it to a friend I was the proud owner of two launch day Sega Dreamcasts. What a world...

Star Wars the 1980s Anime

I'll give whoever at NachoPunch put together this Star Wars 1980s anime some credit. I mean I'm not going to give them a ton of credit but I'll give them some. The idea of Luke's X-wing turning into a giant mech is pretty inspired. However, if you're going to pass this off as "lost" footage don't half ass it. Either make the title screen genuine (hint: not many cartoons from the '80s actually said they were from the 80s) and transfer it onto and off a real VHS tape a couple times or don't bother getting cute. Everyone knows you made this on a MacBook Pro.

The Raid 2: Berandal, the trailer

The Raid: Redemption is easily the best action movie I've seen in like.. I don't know. How old am I? 37 years? Yeah, let's go with 37 years. So the Raid 2: Berandal has a lot to live up to.

I like that this looks like it's an actual sequel to the first movie. Not some sort of Tony Jaa, everyone's riding on elephants for no reason kind of sequel. Also if this somehow helps get us a Dredd sequel that would be all the better.