Monday, July 23, 2007

Making Games with Freeware

Free Resources to Make Games

At a recent panel discussion at the Eiteljorg Museum, fellow artist Steve Sanderson (creator of the Darkness Calls comic) and I commented on how Native American youth - especially those on reservation-type and other rural areas surrounding Indigenous lands - may not even realise their full potential, based on socio-economic factors.
With that in mind, there are a number of free resources available online which Native American youth (and anyone else) could use to hone their artistic and technical skills. Using these resources as a springboard, one could easily create an workshop to introduce these tools to Native kids. Doing so would allow them to realise they do indeed have creative options for their future...and maybe with that, some additional hope.
Listed here are some various freeware solutions along with some comments. All of these programs have the specific goal of video game creation and design - however, many of these can be used for other purposes, such as digital art. Keep in mind, these are in no particular order.
Alice
"The focus of the Alice project is now to provide the best possible first exposure to programming for students ranging from middle schoolers to college students."
I think this is a great program, especially for those individuals really interested in the nuts and bolts of how video games work. The video tutorials and interface are somewhat intuitive and easy to use.

Blender 3D/
"Blender is the free open source 3D content creation suite, available for all major operating systems under the GNU General Public License."
This is one of the best resources for individuals to get hands-on experience creating 3D content. Certainly, there is a particular learning curve to this software (some of which is intuitive and some is not). However, there are tons of online resources, communities, galleries, and tutorials. So, with a little patience and reading, one can actually create usable 3D content.
Another great thing about Blender is its availability for commercial use...meaning, that you are able to do anything you want with the stuff you create (including commercial use). For those that don't have the financial resources to purchase software like Maya (which is a professional industry standard for 3D), Blender is welcome and affordable miracle.
GIMP
"GIMP is an acronym for GNU Image Manipulation Program. It is a freely distributed program for such tasks as photo retouching, image composition and image authoring. It has many capabilities. It can be used as a simple paint program, an expert quality photo retouching program, an online batch processing system, a mass production image renderer, an image format converter, etc."
The layout is simple and easy to understand. Using GIMP can easily prepare individuals on the basics of what more professional packages, like Photoshop, can offer. This is an excellent resource for anyone interested in image manipulation. With GIMP, you can create textures for 3D models, touch up photos, digital paint your drawings and sketches, and even create professional-looking comic books and other art.
GameDev
"The Scrolling Game Development Kit ("GameDev") is a free / freeware open source tool for 2-D game development. It is designed for the Windows 9x/DirectX platform, and targeted at people spanning a range of skill levels. It can be used by the beginner to become familiar with the structure of computer games and to create complete games that don't require any coding. It also has applications for the experienced developer who perhaps simply wants to use the program to draw the graphics or define maps. And in the middle there's applications for creating a game and controlling it through scripting."
This software comes with some down-to-earth tutorials on how to get started making working 2D games. GameDev is an excellent resource to get individuals involved in the video game making process. Everything is "drag and drop", so there is no need for prior programming knowledge.

Monday, July 16, 2007

Good News - New Contracts!

aNm Services

It's been quite eventful few months so far, but we're not through yet!

I am pleased to announce that aNm has not only acquired a contract with Chickasaw Nation Industries ("CNI") from late last year (2006), but we have also been awarded contracts with the Caddo Nation (May 2007) and All Points Logistics, Inc. ("APL" June 2007) for various aspects of website design and maintenance.

Look for changes on both the Caddo website as well as APL's "FirstSource" website associated with a US Government Department!

Also, do please keep alterNative Media in mind with any creative project you may need. Remember, we can take a variety of different artistic and creative projects - including (but never limited to) sculpture, illustration, sketchwork, 2D animation, 3D modeling, and yes, even 3D simulations (that's "video games," for us regular folk!). Contact us today to see how we can make your project a reality.

Thursday, July 12, 2007

CGSociety - New Membership

Professional Membership

I am now a member of CGSociety, the "Society of Digital Artists"! This global society offers to connect artists and celebrate the medium digital of digital art.

In addition to other benefits, I have a portfolio page to display my digital art. Check it out and view some of the other great CGSociety artists as well.
CGPortfolio - Michael Sheyahshe

Friday, July 06, 2007

Check out Mike Kennedy's FB Page!

 

Comic Artist at SC

The recent SoonerCon '07 experience was really great. There were a lot of vendors, artists, fans, and everything in between. (We could've used more singers at the karaoke bar, but more songs for me!)

Mike Kennedy was one of the featured artists at SoonerCon and we were able to participate in a few panel discussions here and there.

In addition to being a really great guy as well as a vast information source about comic books and their creation, Mike is working on his newest project, Rough Cut, a "indie" comic book series.

Check out Mike's illustrative work at his Facebook page, read his blog, and maybe leave some comments. Good stuff.
https://www.facebook.com/mike.kennedy.3597