Talk Binary » Featured http://talkbinary.com Programming Resources, Technology, Computers Fri, 30 Jul 2010 18:22:57 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 Blender – Free Open Source 3D Content Creation Suitehttp://talkbinary.com/featured/blender-free-open-source-3d-content-creation-suite/ http://talkbinary.com/featured/blender-free-open-source-3d-content-creation-suite/#comments Fri, 16 Jul 2010 17:51:12 +0000 Diego http://talkbinary.com/?p=2751 Blender is a free open source 3D content creation suite for all major operation systems under the GNU General Public License. It can be used for modeling, animating, texturing, UV unwrapping, rendering, simulations, and for creating interactive 3D applications such as videos, video games, and visual effects. Blender competes fairly with commercial software such as Maya due to its feature set since it leads in a few features but lacking in others.



Source: Blender – Features


Blender – Education & Help is a great resource since it contains a Wiki User Manual, Docs and Videos, FAQ, Demo Files, Support forum and chat, amongst other resources. When I started using it alongside SIO2 3D Game Engine I checked out the Blender – Tutorials section and got started right away. With the large variety of tutorials for Blender, you can always find something you are looking for. I remember taking my senior graduate video game course in college and was amazed by people’s ability to use Blender. When I asked how they did it, they would always mention they would follow the video tutorials online and after that, let their creativity soar.

Blender’s Gallery of Content

Still not impressed? Check out their Blender – Art Gallery and take a look at a video below created in Blender. Also be sure to check out my iPhone Development Flickr set where you can see my creations in Blender.

Kajimba – snippets from Kajimba on Vimeo.

A compilation of old and new for all the fans and the uninitiated.

http://www.kajimba.com

Overview of Blender

For those wanting to get into 3D modeling, animating rendering, or making films, Blender is a great place to start. Sure, the UI isn’t that intuitive in the beginning, but once your check out the tutorial videos found on their website, you’ll learn that learning the keyboard shortcuts is your best bet. Just have patience and let your imagination do the work.

Blender
Blender – Art Gallery
Blender – Tutorials
Blender – Features
iPhone Development Flickr set
SIO2 3D Game Engine

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]]> http://talkbinary.com/featured/blender-free-open-source-3d-content-creation-suite/feed/ 2 Get a Free Year of Amazon Prime with .edu Email Addresshttp://talkbinary.com/featured/get-a-free-year-of-amazon-prime-with-edu-email-address/ http://talkbinary.com/featured/get-a-free-year-of-amazon-prime-with-edu-email-address/#comments Tue, 13 Jul 2010 15:07:06 +0000 Diego http://talkbinary.com/?p=2712

Ah, it feels good be a student right? All you have to do is sign up by providing your school and major and you are good to go.

What does Amazon Prime offer?

  • Unlimited Free Two-Day Shipping on Textbooks and millions of other items
  • No minimum order size
  • Upgrades to One-Day shipping for $3.99/item

So head on over and sign up with your .edu address.

Amazon Student

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]]> http://talkbinary.com/featured/get-a-free-year-of-amazon-prime-with-edu-email-address/feed/ 1 Wubi – Ubuntu Installer for Windowshttp://talkbinary.com/linux/wubi-ubuntu-installer-for-windows/ http://talkbinary.com/linux/wubi-ubuntu-installer-for-windows/#comments Tue, 06 Jul 2010 06:05:58 +0000 Diego http://talkbinary.com/?p=2622 Ever wanted to try Linux but afraid of the complex installation process? Worry no more. Wubi is an officially supported Ubuntu installer for Windows users than brings Linux to anyone with a simple installer as any other Windows application. I’d say, Wubi is the best and easiest way to get started with Linux.

So how does it work? Simply run the Wubi installer, enter a password for the account, choose some basic options, and click “Install”. Yes, it’s that simple. It’s not going to take any modifying of your partitions or boot loader. It just works like any other application. Yes, it’s that simple. If you don’t like it, simple uninstall it like any other application. Best of all, it’s free.

I’ve used it and to be honest, it’s great. Wubi is hassle free and extremely easy to use. Like mentioned, it’s extremely easy to uninstall and no need to worry about something going wrong.

What to know about Wubi

Below are somethings that you should know about Wubi before you try it out.

  • Read the Wubi FAQ if you want to know how it works and answers to many of your questions
  • To make it easier, pre-download the ISO and save it to the same directory where Wubi is extracted. That way, the installer doesn’t need to download it every time you run it.
  • You can force Wubi to use a 32-bit verison of Ubuntu if you follow the previous step
  • All you need is 256MB of RAM and an 1GHz or faster Intel/AMD processor is recommended for optimal performance. Installation requires 5GB. Bought your computer within the past 3 years? You should be fine.

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]]> http://talkbinary.com/linux/wubi-ubuntu-installer-for-windows/feed/ 0 Project Euler – Mathematical/Computer Programming Related Questionshttp://talkbinary.com/programming/project-euler-mathematicalcomputer-programming-related-questions/ http://talkbinary.com/programming/project-euler-mathematicalcomputer-programming-related-questions/#comments Wed, 01 Apr 2009 04:43:37 +0000 Diego http://talkbinary.com/?p=1633 Project Euler provides you with a series of mathematical problems that require some computer programming skills to solve. It aims at making the user dive into new areas in order to learn new concepts for fun.

projecteuler

Let’s take a look at their first problem.

Find the sum of all the multiples of 3 or 5 below 1000.

So, what do you think? Do you have what it takes? Solving the initial questions will allow you to easier understand more complex questions. At first you might not realize why someone would want to bother with these questions. Well, keep reading. I’ll tell you why.

math

Serves as great practice for interviewing for positions

Believe it or not, but all the interviews I’ve had have required me to solve at least one mathematical question using computer programming. How else do you think I became an Amazon Code Ninja? I solved a mathematical question involving fibonacci, recursion, and C++! When I interviewed with Google, that’s the first thing I encountered as well, another mathematical question! Unfortunately I wasn’t prepared (or the time allotted wasn’t sufficient and the fact it was over the phone didn’t help). Either way, I wish I had started practicing earlier.

That is why I recommend Project Euler. I’ll be diving into these questions and potentially going over them on Talk Binary later on. So if you need a buddy to solve the problems with, let’s do it together. This will allow you to develop and learn new concepts that might prove useful in the future. It also might be something fun to play around with on your spare time.

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]]> http://talkbinary.com/programming/project-euler-mathematicalcomputer-programming-related-questions/feed/ 3 Classic Pong Source Code Releasedhttp://talkbinary.com/programming/opengl/classic-pong-source-code-released/ http://talkbinary.com/programming/opengl/classic-pong-source-code-released/#comments Tue, 19 Aug 2008 03:00:17 +0000 Diego http://talkbinary.com/?p=668
Note: Version of Pong had to be taken down to legal issues with the graphics package. I should be releasing my own version sometime soon! Be patient. Thank you.



I finally got around to finish my version of Pong. It isn’t true to the original game, but resembles it somewhat in game play. This isn’t supposed to be a deep game, simply a downloadable game that you can modify in order to learn how to make a simple video game.

How to get started

You simply need to know C++ in order to start!

Codeblocks with SDL support – Check out this post in order to learn how to set up your environment in Windows using CodeBlocks

Download Pong – and get started right away!

So what do I do?

Simply open the project file once you extracted the files.

This will open the project in CodeBlocks. You can run the game by pressing F9. The game is also found under the bin/Release folder as an executable. If you want to give simply the game, just zip up the Release folder and you should be good!

What files to modify?

The only files you need to modify are paddle, ball, and game class to modify the existing game.

To add additional keyboard support, fonts, images, music, and more, refer to the other classes.

What now?

Visit the post on the forum for help or comments! Also, show us your creation! We’d like to see what you can come up with!

I hope everyone enjoys this. Tell me what you think!

Thanks to

Thanks to Roby Atadero’s comments and great OpenGL/SDL package! Couldn’t have done it without him.

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]]> http://talkbinary.com/programming/opengl/classic-pong-source-code-released/feed/ 3 10 Interesting Articles from this past week!http://talkbinary.com/featured/10-interesting-articles-from-this-past-week-2/ http://talkbinary.com/featured/10-interesting-articles-from-this-past-week-2/#comments Sun, 13 Jul 2008 15:55:50 +0000 Diego http://talkbinary.com/?p=188 These are articles and a video I star on my Google Reader and I tend to enjoy reading and viewing them! Hopefully everyone will do the same!

Engadget – Bill Gates demonstrates his frustrations of XP through an e-mail – Bill Gates? Complaining about Windows? Got to be kidding me! No, its true.

ScoreHero – GameInformer article on Rock Band 2 – Check out the new peripherals for the upcoming Rock Band 2! The special edition drum kit looks so much better than Guitar Heroes! As a fan, I’m waiting for this to come out to purchase it!

Cracked – 5 most baffling explosions in history! – Hollywood does show some really weird stunts on the big screen! Thing is, the audience never says a thing! An example, a wooden cart blowing up after a collision!? Insane!

Cracked – 5 Terrible Lessons Hollywood Teaches You – Hollywood like always tends to put a bunch of gibberish out there. As a hot guy always falls in love with a hot girl, etc kinda thing. Check this out!

College Humor – Cyanide and Happiness – Gotta love these web comics!

College Humor – People and their non understanding of technology… – Older people and technology…pshh! They don’t know what burning a cd means or what the internet really is…

LifeHacker – How to make Windows Vista a little less annoying – How to get rid of all the RAM eating nonsense and tidbits that make you pull out your hair when you are asked if you are sure if what you clicked on was really it…

TechCrunch – 20k Reasons to Stay in the Basement – Make video games in Flash? Make 20k if you make it right! Check it out!

Gaming Blog – Call of Duty World at Way Screens – Will World at War be as successful or more than Modern Warfare? Let’s hope so!

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]]> http://talkbinary.com/featured/10-interesting-articles-from-this-past-week-2/feed/ 0 Installing Yellow Dog Linux on a PS3 (with video)http://talkbinary.com/linux/installing-yellow-dog-linux-on-a-ps3-with-video/ http://talkbinary.com/linux/installing-yellow-dog-linux-on-a-ps3-with-video/#comments Wed, 09 Jul 2008 02:38:20 +0000 Diego http://talkbinary.com/?p=176 Hello to everyone! As Diego mentioned in an earlier post, I (Andy) will start posting on Talk Binary and after a small crash course on how to post, here is my very first post for everyone to enjoy. This is a quick and easy video tutorial on how to setup Yellow Dog Linux on your Play Station 3. This tutorial assumes you have experience installing a Linux operating system. I do not go over the install process but simply teach you how to get there. Enjoy, and feel free to post comments or ask questions in our forums.

Check List

1. Yellow Dog Linux Image: Terra Soft Download Section

2. A blank DVD to Burn the image.

3. Some Sort of External Media to Back-up Game Saves, Music, Pics, and Vids.

4. A High Definition TV



Once you see this on your screen:

Penguin Peguin

The next step is to Run through the install process and your done!

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]]> http://talkbinary.com/linux/installing-yellow-dog-linux-on-a-ps3-with-video/feed/ 6 10 Interesting Articles From this Past Weekhttp://talkbinary.com/featured/10-interesting-articles-from-this-past-week/ http://talkbinary.com/featured/10-interesting-articles-from-this-past-week/#comments Fri, 27 Jun 2008 23:30:46 +0000 Diego http://talkbinary.com/?p=147 I’ll be sharing with all of you some interesting stories on the internet that I’ve stumbled on or have been referred to other users. Hopefully you’ll enjoy them as much as I do! If you have any suggestions on what else you might want to see, just drop me a line!


Speed Testing The Latest Web Broswers – Ok, people using IE, READ THIS. I’m tired of hearing people say, IE has always worked, why change? It’s like having Christopher Columbus deciding to stay home, why does he need to find a new continent!?


Extreme Lifehacker Home Office Makeover – I’m pretty sure many of you feel the same way about your desk from time to time…it may be too cluttered!! This article provides some good tips on how to clean it out and make it look more spacious and more time efficient as a messy desk is usually referred to an unproductive one! (Does not apply in ALL cases.)


Five Best Desktop Media Players – Hoorah! Winamp made the list, unfortunately it isn’t that great as it’s gone through many changes. Fortunately, there is a great support from the community! Others include iTunes, VLC, and more.


Clippy Helps Write a Love Letter – Remember Clippy? The one from Word? Well, he apparently has a lot of history behind him.


Diablo 3 Announcement Coming Soon!? – What!? Diablo 3!? I hope it happens. Starcraft and Diablo are the two franchises from Blizzard that keep me drooling for more.


PC Gaming Going Down the Road Arcades Did – PC Gaming is dieing? Main culprit to blaim is piracy. I say, make games good enough people would buy! We are tired of half-@$$ ports of games that still display the X-Box 360 Controller in there Help Menu ( Lost Planet ) or tell you to press a button that doesn’t correspond to your keyboard ( Resident Evil )!


Stickies – Have Stickies on your Windows Desktop! Great small program that is great for reminders.


Five Ways to Keep your Car Running at Peek Fuel Efficiency – Now this one is a must for those WHO drive.


Lego Digital Designer – Build your Lego dream with this windows application! Have all the pieces ordered and shipped to your home to build the model of your dreams!!


In Game Advertisement – Ok come on…this one must be a joke. I understand one or two, but all over the place!?

You might also find these interesting

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