HAPPY NEW YEAR.

 On balance I enjoyed 2021, I remember a couple of friends who died but with those excepted it was a good year.

Here is a video.

All the best for the coming year.

BERTIE.

 Nothing much going on here so I thought I'd post a silly bell.

This is Bertie and he is learning to speak. If you would like to hear him then watch the video.

I have several bits of things animated for a New Year video but as non go with the others I'll pick one and polish it up.

It's warm and damp here, miserable if you let it get to you.

Have fun.

BAUBLES.

 Baubles or balls, take your pick. 

I am away for a couple of days from tomorrow as the dogs and I have been invited to the stables for Christmas. I'll have some cooking to do and if I don't look busy some horse feeding, I'll do the latter anyway as I enjoy the horses. 

The cold snap never materialised, it's just wet, chilly and horrid. Alf is still here and seems a bit brighter, he's very thin but eating well so he'll get to wear his new Christmas jacket with any amount of luck. 

They almost make me wish I had a Christmas tree but as I'm surrounded by them perhaps not.

Have a great day, Tay FM are depressing so they will struggle. It's wall to wall NH(NO)S broadcasts. Let's hope this blows up in the next year and we either see cadavers in the streets or their bluff is called and we can line up the Covid pushers and have them hung.

WINDING DOWN FOR CHRISTMAS.

 I have decided to slow down this week as I don't want to be overtired on Christmas day. I am going over to the stables for dinner which is coincidently appropriate, no donkey, half a dozen horses and a pony but one can't expect miracles. The forecasters can't make their minds up as to whether the weather will be freezio or damp and horrid. No worries I have my winter tyres on so no slip slidey into ditchy for Adrian.

I am just making a vegan vegetable stew with beef in. Whilst it cooks I thought to make a start on the New Year video. The stew is a full pot full so will see me until Christmas Eve. I've not much to show for several hours thinking and an hour making a mess but I'll sort it.

Don't worry I'll make much bigger messes before I restore some semblance of order.

It's Saint Doubting Thomas day today.

Here is Caravaggio's wonderful depiction of him giving Jesus a poke. I suspect his picture was a mess before he got all the colours and light sorted.

This little girl is a prodigy she must be an expert on Italian art.

In other news I had my hair cut for Christmas. She won't do my beard as the bits fly down her shirt and make her tits itch. Not to worry, I did offer to blow them out but I'll do the facial hair myself. She has had new guide lines for 'The Mask Wearing Of.' diktat. She is supposed to wear one as she is standing up but I don't have to as I'm sitting down. Now call me an idiot but who or WHO is making this shit up? I didn't have a mask so just as well I was seated. She took hers off when I explained our noses were at the same elevation and I had doubts that a virus could tell she was supported on her feet and I was on my arse. (I would have preferred things visa versa but age is a terrible thing to bear.).

 A virus is opportunistic but not intelligent, which sums up the health experts beholden to the dollars of Pfizer. Pfizer make billions selling crap so if I were in their shoes I'd be tempted to give folk something that doesn't work and then give them the same again and again and again. All the while they assume they are protected from the consequences. Happen they are but it's going to pop a dent in their profits when they have to keep paying for protection.

Never give in to extortionists. I include governments, they are the worst. Taxes go up to fund their lifestyles but never come down when they fail us. They don't believe this covid crap, they keep on partying like it's 1994.

 

 Whilst I've got my Whitty hat on has anyone looked at this.

This is the level of virtue signalling. If we had, not a balmy day but a cold one then the system would collapse. I can see us going back to the Socialist seventies. Again no worries, it might just freeze a few idiots. We are spending fifty billion a year importing coal, gas and oil when we could be exporting the same and have fuel security. 

Have fun, this is fun.

IT'S BEEN ANOTHER FUNNY WEEK.

 Last Tuesday I was just about to upload another scintillating post when my EE mobile, Wi-Fi whatsit decided it didn't want to play. It's been iffy for a while but unless I have my wits about me it's difficult to tell whether it's EE arseing about with the aerial, snow, fog or my receiver. It was definitely my end, I couldn't even switch the Mini Wi-Fi hub off.

Wednesday morning I thought the easiest option would be to drive down to Halbeath and visit PCWorld. Just get a new unit, swap the SIM card and I'd be all singing and dancing by lunchtime. I was standing at the service desk bit, where there was little evidence of any service when the manager chap strolled up. Put your mask on, I haven't got one as I had a bit of a whoopsie some years ago and I'm not allowed to wear one. What do you want? I want a new one of these. I said whilst holding out the knackered technology. I'll get someone to sort you out. Ten minutes later the someone rolled up. Did you buy it from us? I can't recall, I think so but it's years out of any guarantee, I just want to buy new one. I don't know anything about these, I'll get the expert. Another ten minutes and the expert arrived, I explained the problem and off he trotted, he came back clutching a new one. I can't sell you this if you already have one. With a stuff it up your arse then. I departed.

I had to go to the stables with my laptop. I got a new one Thursday evening.

The new one came direct from EE. In fact, as I failed the security questions on a borrowed phone the first time, the lassie said well I can't send one so instead of messing, I just went online and ordered another. The another's questions I passed with flying colours. I assumed having buggered up my first attempt that that order was cancelled. No, another arrived yesterday. I'm thinking of ordering some more. I can fail security questions in my sleep. I bet I could get enough to start a shop.

It turned out well in the end as replacements from EE are free and my charge has dropped from £36 and a bit to £20.00p/month. They dropped my 50GB allowance by 20% but as I never use more than half of it, no worries. The moral is never buy from a third party. The only reason I did was because I just don't understand the computer malarkey.

Blender Three is great and I've been playing with camera tracking.

This model is not mine but I found her more interesting than a Primative for experimentation. She is free from Mixamo which is an Adobe offshoot. The creator must deal with horsey ladies, they are all a bit pear shaped. Here is the video.

I focussed the camera on her neck bone. It works and by crafty parenting I can make it look as if it's shot through a Selfie Stick. That's no good like most selfies. 

Have a great week.

A CHRISTMAS CAROL.

I have been playing about with a ghost. Charles Dickens had four ghosts visit Ebenezer Scrooge in his short novel A Christmas Carol. I suspect what he had was an excess of the falling down water but whatever it makes for a good story.

I'm still not very good at sculpting but I'll keep practising. This is my latest ghost.

Now, now. Control your mirth. I recognise it needs a tad more work but considering it starts with a single vertex, a dot like a period or full stop it's come a fair way in ten minutes. This is 'The Ghost of Christmas Future.' Seems appropriate to the times we are living in where a significant number of folk are fixated with death. Posh people call it thanatophobia, it causes irrational behaviour and is caused by watching too much television and listening to politicians.

Now I want a semi transparent ghost, I think that once it is moving it will do, the outline is a bit sharp but I suspect when it is animated no one will notice.

Probably wouldn't notice anyway for worrying if they have a clean mask to wear or if their jags are up to date. Pharma profits aren't generated by accident you know.

Have a good week.

PS. This I have just noticed.

Andrew Lawrence is banned from most venues in the UK.

 I have also just seen a live Facebook post from the stunning Jacinda in New Zealand. It didn't go well for the poor pony. I wish I could share it but Preachers FaceBrook seems to have taken it down. Poor wee filly burst into tears live and not for anything serious. Teach her to get in the real world and out of her lefty bubble now and again. Get a skin Dobbin or forget Marxism. 
 

A FUNNY OLD WEEK.

 I've had very little time for the Bs, Blender and Blogger, this week. No real reason apart from apathy, a touch of Man Flu and lots of annoying bitty jobs which all required getting frozen fingers and hot aches.

I'm trying to learn to sculpt in Blender and it isn't going well. I have an idea for an animated Casper type character.

Something on the lines of this but with a shorter tail.

I have got something and even got it rigged with an armature so that it can be animated. 

As you can see it's proving a bit of a challenge.  Not to worry if I can't make it look better I'll have it whizzing around on a very foggy night.

Have a good weekend.

TIME TO SPARE.

 It's a funny day. early doors I was greeted by a beautiful starry sky, I came in for breakfast and it was sleeting hard, by the time I'd finished my toast it had turned to heavy rain and now it's sunny and icing over in the shade. I would say it's normal for December but I'm no expert. I'm a long way short of being an expert as I have neither a private plane nor Aston Martin.

I've not had too much Blendering  but have been sculpting a head. Blender 3.0 seems fine it's much faster but I keep having trouble with the workspace shifting and swapping about unexpectedly. It's annoying but it could be I keep my finger on the buttons too long, what with the new fast interface and all that.

Blender is not an easy bit of software to learn and it can do far more than I'm capable of making it do.

Here is Bust MKII.

Good for a laugh if for little else. I am not expecting to be called to the Royal Academy just yet but I bet were I a Black, Lesbian, Vegan, with one eye and one leg I'd be considered. I think the colouring in could be better. Come to think I might be a Lesbian, there are not many women I don't fancy.

I was driving back from the horses yesterday and had Forth Radio playing Christmas songs interspersed with adverts from the SNHS asking that I don't bother them, a couple of months ago they were advising me to go and get checked for stuff I haven't got. I may of course have them but I'll guarantee if they find something they'll make it worse. Then Fairy Tale of New York came on, Whay Hay, volume up and I'm singing along to my favourite Christmas song, banging the steering wheel with one hand and the side window with the other while Shane gives it What Ho. It got to Kirsty's bit and I thought I'd been wrong for years, She sings. " You cheap lousy Hogget." Now Shane is many weird things but a sheep he isn't. Never suspected him of being a Faggot either but I heard it again this morning and the bastards have changed the words, he is now a young sheep. I bet some faggot deemed it hate speech and the words had to be changed. What did strike me as inconsistent was that the song is still called Fairy Tale and not Hogget Tale. I have been wrong about song lyrics before, it wasn't until a year ago that I thought K. T. Tunstall was singing Southend-on-Sea. I think I can be excused as a Black Horse and a Cherry Tree are not things one would normally associate. If you haven't heard K.T. Tunstall then have a listen she is a one person band and uses sampling and looping, great looking and I can't even begin to work out how she does it without cocking up..... Perhaps she's a lesbian. Whatever she is she's brilliant.

That's it for today.   

Not quite, here is K.T. Tunstall

Nearly on par with Uma Thurman. 

AN EARLY PRESENT.

 After several delays Blender have released version 3.0. As talking heads are occupying my little grey cells at the moment I decided to model a different head, if I can't make it's mouth move I'll pretend it's suffering from Covid psychosis and pop a mask on it.

This is Blender 3.0, it looks much the same as always but has lots of new things and dozens of improvements to old things.

This looks a little strange but it's just half the character.

Here it is in it's entirety, it still looks a little odd. I'm away horsing about soon but will try and make it speak later, I'll also colour it in. 

My internet is slow at the moment but Blogger is slower still, I suspect that Google will ditch it before much longer. They have never really seemed to give it the benefit of their expertise. Not to worry YouTube gets better every day and will do the job equally well for me.

Have a great week.

SNOWMAN CAN SPEAK.

 It was Lidl day today, not a bad shop, they had plenty of £1.50p veg boxes. Not bad value and a reasonable selection if one ignores the fact they snuck a pomegranate in.

Earlier I spent an hour or so attempting to make a snowman talk. I really do wonder about myself.

As you can probably tell I didn't waste to much time modelling.

I used Shape Keys and a driver to animate the mouth. I think I'll try using a proper armature next time and model a better head.

Here is the movie,

I won't have time to play tomorrow so enjoy the weekend.

MERRY CHRISTMAS.

 I got it done and I'll have you know uploading to Blogger is a pain. It's worse than Keith at Redsumit could imagine. It's worse than the Pudding swapping his template without saving the original first. I notice the latter won't swap again in a hurry.

 To everybody else here is a Merry Christmas. You may get another greeting as I'm trying to make a talking snowman. The talking snowman is a real bugger to do I can tell you. This I didn't find easy peasy, had to use special words.

This is a still from the movie. It looks a bit ghoulish but I like dark. I don't work well with bright light. Here is your Christmas video.

Have a great time. Ignore the idiots that spout doom and gloom. We have managed so far.