Thoughtful Preparations: Media Spin Blog

The photography exhibition with 60 photos framed and more in bins at the Habitat Restore, 818 Greenville Avenue, Staunton, VA 24401 opened on April 13th, 2024 and will continue indefinitely until all the photos are sold and removed from the wall.

Thanks for the constant “updates” and software revisions WordPress.org. You have corrupted all my prior published posts, littering them with “”‘s! Fookin’ Â’s!!!

In addition, in this wonderful world of progress the mighty WordPress administrators have made it difficult or impossible for me to post a query about this new problem on their support forum. It was not this way in the good old days.

I have neglected this blog for over 3 years, but I did not expect to return to it and see my published posts corrupted with annoying  characters. So, I searched wordpress.org’s support forums to see if their post editor features test substitution and found nothing.

Highly disappointed in the direction WordPress has gone. Not good.

Plenty of good advice here!

https://screencraft.org/2014/06/30/pixars-22-rules-storytelling-with-movie-stills/

Bitcoin and other new “altcoins” are all the rage, so here’s a good starting point reference chart.  If you follow all the links provided within this one page’s listings, you might spend days of research.  Go to https://coinmarketcap.com/ and learn for yourself what all the excitement is about.

[Originally written in 2015, this post has been updated Feb. 28, 2022. Obviously, the logo artwork is no longer “new” and I have no knowledge whether or not it is presently in use. – HG]

In the beginning, there was the 32 x 32 Cyclone 7 icon, the only logo artwork available.  This image had been used for a number of generations of Leica Geosystems’ 3D point cloud processing software, Cyclone.  With the launch of Cyclone version 8, it was high time for a new look, and new logo to accompany the powerful new 3D software update.  So began the search for a new look, a refreshed identity embodied in a graphical symbol, a new logo.

My first inclination was to explore completely new concepts and looks, showing that Cyclone’s connection to the 3D world and playing off of the cyclone, tornado, whirlwind concept.

Using Autodesk Maya and Adobe Illustrator, I tinkered with a conical theme, keeping in mind that Cyclone’s letter “C” might be worked into it.

Not being completely sold on the cones, it was time to revisit the original icon, and break down what it was about.  Outlining the artwork in Illustrator, it became clear that the logo was a pair of letter “C”s with a red dot, viewed in 3D perspective.  I decided to try and recreate this using a 3D camera view in Maya.

Here we see two C’s extruded, with a cylindrical dot placed in the center.  Getting on the right track for 3D software now!  More refinement to be done.

Here a slight rounded bevel has been added to the extrusion, and textures to the 3D geometry.  Time to explore more surface treatments, lighting and rendering.

The rendering on the left has a few more directional lights added to the Maya screen preceding it.  The rendering on the right is the result of adding a brushed metal, stainless steel style texture and bump map to the rendering.  The camera was changed to a wider angle lens setting, to force a more oblique, dynamic perspective, closely matching the original Cyclone 7 logo.  The next test would be to composite the new logo into the Cyclone 8.0 splash screen.

With this, the small product management group  felt we had a winner, and were anxious to release the new software.  Upon further review, we had not yet scored a goal, and so gave it another shot along with helpful suggestions.  The final logo is brighter and easier to read and interpret, and still holds true to the 3D software roots of Cyclone.  The new logo was launched proudly with Cyclone 8.

The logo design lives on in the current Cyclone version 9.1.  The style has been adopted for branding Leica’s CloudWorx for AutoCAD software, and the JetStream high point cloud rendering system.

Perhaps the best R.E.M. documentary to date, R.E.M. by MTV,  is now showing on MTV and its sister networks VH1 and Palladia.  Rhino Entertainments’ photo researcher, Lee Rosen, contacted me about including a couple of my photos of R.E.M. from 1981 into their project.  I was happy to do so, and happy to see the results broadcast.  In the documentary, the photo above is cropped to only show Peter Buck and Michael Stipe.  My entire output from that shoot may be seen on my website at http://www.mediaspin.com/rem/rem_main.html

In October of 1977 I was on a road trip across the American southwest and made a stop in Taos, New Mexico to look around the pueblos and the area made famous by an art colony early in the 20th century.  I did not like the way many tourists were casually snapping photos without respect for the inhabitants, the Taos Pueblo Indians.  When I felt the right time had come to take a few photos, I asked these two friends if I could take their picture.  They said, OK, if I would give them a ride into town, which I agreed to.  I think the photo is the best achievement, and my oil painting from it I do enjoy looking at in my own collection of paintings.  I spent a little more time with these two fellows, since their trip to town involved visiting a liquor store.  Then they wanted to go out to a big field to drink and look at a herd of buffalo belonging to the Taos Indians.  After that, we returned to the Taos village and entered the area for residents only.  One of them invited me to sleep over at his home, but I was afraid and decided to leave.  Anyway, the Yankees were in the World Series at that time and I wanted to go listen to that on my car radio.  I kind of doubt that I missed out on a spiritual experience with a drunk Indian, but you never know.

There is a longer, more detailed account of this in my diary of that time, but this is an online blog, so that’s all you get.

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