Matt Hackmann

MattHackmann

The thoughts and goings-on of some programmer dad.

Racing the Clock for a Code Release

Pushing it a bit close tonight, but that's what happens when you go to a once in a lifetime screening of the extended cut of Two Towers in the theater and it's nearly four hours long. But, whatever.

Download: Source

Some time ago, a coworker passed along a link to this very nifty Colour Clock which displays the time and uses the values of said time to drive the background color. It's really quite pretty and nifty. Back when he linked me, there was the flash version on the site and a download for an OS X screen saver. No Windows love.

So, I fired up my copy of Visual Studio and set about correcting this sadness. I never really polished it to the extent I wanted, which is why I'm putting it up as a source code release. There is a binary in there, but no installer or anything.

Also, before I created this version, I also conjured up a JavaScript one as well, which you can see here.

Procrastinatorium

Some time ago I put up my list of New Year's resolutions. On the whole, I'm not doing terrible. I'm exercising more, I've gotten an apartment and I promptly gave up in Final Fantasy X-2, a decision we all agree is better for my sanity. On the art front, however, things are less than stellar; I can probably count on two hands the amount of times I've set pencil to paper to do anything. I blame it all on this one piece I've bee "working on" since February.

After I completed that one commission, I got another one similar only it involved multiple characters from a source I'm not familiar with. But, in the spirit of ganbare, I gave it a shot. And now, four months later, it's stuck in development hell somewhere between the coloring and shading phase:

These are the first and last of what is supposed to be four panels. I like the last one there, not so keen on the first and am less so of the one's in between (which is why they've not been colored yet.

All this said, I hereby change my New Year's resolution of draw more to "finish this goddamn piece before the end of the year."

Even I am unsure of whether I can keep it...

A Bit of Genericism

Been kind of a shitty week and I'm all out of witty at the moment.therefor, I shall just kind of give a general life update.

Bros came over this weekend, always good times to be had there. We've been watching anime, aging games and doing tragic us amounts of asking. Probably five to six miles today alone. We visited the usual nerd places and hit up a thrift store I pursuit of cosplay items.

Speaking of costly, I've gotten quite a bit farther on my costume and it's not looking terrible. The more I do is the easier it's becoming, so that's always encouraging. I would post a picture, but that would ruin the surprise or something.

I've been our using OkCupid again and realize why I kind of dropped it in e first ace: it's full of hyper Christians who also happen to be young, single moms. I don't mean to judge, but that seems a tad contradictory...

Tonight, my bros snood I are going to cool off at the pool and, as we wait for said pool to drain of people, I am sitting her writing a blog post. That brings us to now.

In Pursuit of Deliciousness

So, contrary to what one might believe, my at home eatings do not consist solely of hot pockets and ramen noodles (contrary to what my mother's blog might lead you to believe). Being that I actually have culinary skills, I've made some pretty bitchin' things. There was the potato salad, of course, but here are some other things that have graced my table and stomach.

I used to make a lot of pancakes in college (with various extras) because they're freakin' easy and cheap. Remembering that, relived the experience my first week in the apartment. Also decided to toss in some eggs and sausage because they are quite delicious. The eggs are a little dirty looking because I scrambled them in the sausage grease. Mmmmm......

A couple weeks ago, I got this crazy hankering for a good salad. Just tossed around some lettuce, tomatoes and cheese along with some deli meat I had lying around (it'd have gone bad soon, anyways). It was pretty awesome, but there was actually more than I could handle over the course of several days and the rest had to be tossed. Not used to cooking small quantities, am I.

My supper last night. This is a dish affectionately known in my family as "turkey balls". It's really nothing more than slightly browned balls of ground turkey simmered in some cream of mushroom soup and milk. I also mixed an egg and some breadcrumbs into the ground turkey. On top of rice, this is a pretty awesome meal.

A Tale of Peep Destruction

I went digging through the darker recesses of my 1TB hard drive today and came across some more old video. I was, at one point, going to film several little skits or vignettes about the untimely demise of Peeps, but really only finished one. However, for the first time ever, you can see the unfinished, unreleased opening!

youtube video

youtube video