Aug 19, 2008

Weta in North America.

I think my house has Cave Weta.
According to wikipedia, they live only in New Zealand, but my house has.

Actually I'm not sure what they are.
1. They don't have any wing, so I don't think they are cricket.
2. I have never heard they make sound, and only cave weta among all kind of wetas doesn't have ears.
3. They appear usually at night, and weta is nocturnal.
4. They look like grasshopper, but they have too small eyes; actually I cannot see their eyes.
5. I suspect they come from basement of my house, which feels like cave.
6. They are easy to be caught; they don't run away much. I guess this means their eyes are so bad.

Only one strange thing is all of web pages says they live only in New Zealand. But I'm living in North America. This might be a big discovery in Entomology.

Aug 12, 2008

Pixel and Inch in Adobe Photoshop

When we talk about image size in computer graphics, we generally use Pixel measurement.
One pixel is a dot, which only includes a color information, RBG.

The concept of Pixel is friendly to most of programmers. The problem, however, is it is not familiar to most of graphic designers. They are familiar with Inches.

It is because by default Adobe Photoshop, which is the most famous graphic design tool, use inches instead of pixel.

Then how large is 1 inch? The meaning is clear to designer, because it is 1 inch when they print out the picture; it is misunderstand that 1 inch is for the size on their screen. But it is depending on how much delicate the printer is. The more precise printer is, the more detailed picture they can print out.

So this is real question for a programmer. How many pixels is 1 inch? Because programmer should understand when a designer talk in inches world. A programmer need to know DPI, Dot Per Inch. For instance, 300 DPI printer can print out 300 pixels in 1 inch. That means 1 inch is 300 pixel.

Then how could we know how much DPI a designer is talking about? The photoshop show the DPI setting whenever we create a new canvas

Here this screen shot shows 72 DPI, which means 1 inch is 72 pixels; "Resolution" on this screen shot means DPI.Considering game developing, we shouldn't use inch measurement, because inch is for printing out, and most of gamers like to enjoy on screen not on paper.

Aug 1, 2008

Team Fortress 2

Today I bought X-Box live Gold member ship card.
So I have played Team Fortress 2.
It was quite fun. I have enjoyed a lot.
I like medic and soldier.

There are total 9 classes.
Medic gives me the feeling we are cooperating.
Soldier gives me the rocket launcher; I live this.
Spy was a little bit strange; they looks ally, but enemy.

I'm gonna play a little bit more.