A what if.. taking mesh from a cloud and making into a thing at home 2

Howdy wafflers!
Today's random discussion is about the limitations of acquiring meshes from the interwebs, and expecting those same meshes to instantly be 'print ready' for the k8200 or other printers.

The thing is, for the standard Everyuser of in-home rapid 3D prototyping machines,
commonly known as 3D printers,
theres this unwritten implicit expectation that, anything that can be imagined or seen, can be quickly made at home on the in-home printer, and as a competitive option, to other combinatorial methods/approaches.
This is far from the case.

So, we have as an example only, the context of some Makerbot, and k8200 users who ask some hypotheticals. "what if hypothetically, I wanted to hypothetically make some geometry for my own private collection... what hypothetical margins and constraints are involved in that hypothetical (other considerations notwithstanding contemporaneously).

The hypothetical also wants a shapemakerways level of detail, and wants the object for sake of argument to be 70%infill or more solid - they want a solid, difficult to transport cube of plastic, because they can (cue Portal Theme).

-----
above: a borgish Escher cube by an awesome devart user 'Magmarama'
1.38million poly model.
the light blue lines are "non-manifold' zones,
the voids on all faces are potential 'haywire' zones.

This cube is within the maximum size constraint for the particular rig print area -
so, it could be 147mm^3,
or it could be the 1/5000 scale* of upto 687mm^3 (as another rig has a ~2m print area, at 0.1mm consistency, and 0.1d loss per 4mm rise (so, the final cube will be 7degree distorted, assuming no other error).
It took on my rig, 48mins to raw import,
a further 2.3hrs to mesh correct and slicer (raw)

the result?
it would take 490560.37hours of continuous printing, (thats 8 years straight, and change)
require 24m^2 of plastic (thats enough to make a gahzillion other objects)
and the printer app even warned the printer would have parts failure if the print were to go ahead.
The cost estimate?
the plastic alone for that would be ~$300USD, plus the electricity, the running time, the apparently replacement 3D printers the printing app cautioned,
and taking 8 years turn around time minimum (plus, after all that, assuming no haywire, it would still need to be lit and painted properly)...

This hypothetical thought experiment, and excellent question, makes clear that;
1) it is cheaper to buy the mass-produce rotary moulded kits etc, or the resin void molded kits. (800% cheaper)
2) it is quicker to buy the other option, (40000 times quicker turnaround time)
3) it is more cost effective to buy the other option or use combined other methods (you can buy cube shaped structure for ~30USD)
4) ultrahigh polycount models are difficult to print (good luck not melting your computer if you use a raw import of files 40 000 poly or higher to print)
5) many meshes available directly online are not insta-printable, and require simplifications and mesh repair or to be broken into more components (ie, not a solid object).

Thanks for reading,
and I'm keen to hear your waffles and experiences with trying to make 3D objects cost effectively and in home. How do you make different shapes?
Do you find printing curves on a k8200 or thermal extruder to be challenging? (how do you avoid unwanted steps and uneven curved surfaces?)

StarTrekWars StarWarsTrek rant 2

There's been a glut of crossover gunk at the moment,
and much as people have effaced and usurped the 'nerd' moniker (a pejorative, similar to a racially charged epithet starting also with N.... neither of which ought be used still in language).
So, as local trekker and Warser? (pre disney and K.Kennedy) say, its time to push back.
What follows is the first sardonic parody salvo in that direction,
in the fine tradition of Space Balls and Traumschiff Surprise...

Sadly, with JJbrams at the helm... a crossover at cinema of SW:ST is not far off.
JJBrams and JWhedon J-teamup to bring us the greatest StarWarsTrek movie-length episode that never happened... or is that StarTrekWars? (the advertising campaign hypes up as much hatred and foment in the fanbase as possible, to polarize and force them to watch the stuff and buy the crud... cashcowmilking 101, spluh)
Replete with simultaneously playing clashing music - a hybrid medley of TOS theme and SW opening march.

StarTrekWars, Episode ∞+1
'The Trouble With Crossovers"
While re-aligning the dilythium crystals, Scotty accidentally sneezes,
knocking the crystals out of alignment and back into an active warpdrive.
The JJPrise Transhyperspacetimewarps, [i]Traumschiff Surprise[/i] Style,
and emerges into a mirror universe galaxy far far away.
JJPrise collides with Chu'unthor, the jedi temple ship, which is also on an exploration mission near some strange swamp planet in the far outer rim... 300 years prior to the events of SW Episode 1.
A younger Yoda is aboard...

Captain Kirk refuses to believe in 'The Force", and acquires blasters instead of phasers, preparing to remain in the Warsverse...
Spock makes one-liners about the massive energies and strange materials involved.
(as per http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/ , Kaku and Dr Curtis Saxton http://www.mssl.ucl.ac.uk/~cjs2/)

Meanwhile, Uhuru discovers she has become force sensitive (but remembers what happened to Gary Mitchell, so she stays quiet and makes mischief with the force),
Sulu must dissuade Chekov from turning to the darkside, as Chekov is possessed by the darkside...

Scotty finds something better than a tricorder, and Scotty+ R2D2 ditch C3P0 with McCoy...

Elsewhen,
Some tribbles metastasize with 'midichlorians' and Yuuzhan Vong spores, and mutate into a Buu-like (homage to Dragon Ball Z) creature, and these team up with some SWfringe faction to form some sith-like event... The Darkside Awakens...

Spock and Yoda and a bunch of scientist characters we've never seen before (played by Andy Serkis and Lady Gaga)
figure out that the SW universe is made of AntiAntiMatter relative to the ST universe, and vice versa, and so find a way to get home... cutting off forever the separate universes.
|Spock and Yoda secretly agree its best to 'mindwipe' everyone of the event, so once they're back, they mindwipe everyone involved...|

Lensflares, explosions and swiss-army-lightsabers ensue,
production cost: 280 million+.
Earnings at boxoffice worldwide in 18months post release: 45 Million.

NB;
this evolved over a period of a few months, and i cannot claim full authorship as I'm putting ink to paper of a bunch of ideas,
as people at the freethinkers clubs were being lectured by newcomers and one-session wonders,
about how 'racist' the original Star Treks or Star Wars were...
TELL THAT TO THE ALIENS FROM THE OTHER PLANETS IN THE SPACEFAIRYTALES...

Mylar Lifter project concept redux

Howdy!
This is a waffle with pictures, exploring modes of RC/"drone" (and I do use that term in this context lightly, with contempt heh) and making/displaying models.

Some of you may be familiar with novelty desk toys, such as a British Timelord's desktop ride toy,
or maglev toys etc...
some may also have seen RC and model rockets/jets with a Trek theme...
others may have also seen German, Japanese and American blimps for parades/ambiance...

I think though, what AST people were wanting,
was a type of Mylar Lifter, and a lightweight model upto 1KG, that can affordably hold up the model or display the model in motion, for a while...

and as we've discussed elsewhere here, it might be feasible.
checkout the RI and MIT vids, Googler and TedX vids (on new batteries, memory plastics, propulsion systems, PCB replacements, etc),
and GilbondFac on youtube - that guy is a genius!

Above: a crude system sketch for the RC/display internals of a 'levitating model'. Not to scale, wires and batteries not shown.
The actual model might have more, or fewer Mylar Lifters, fans/propulsion systems, or battery zones... the makeup of the model may also necessitate different placement.
Also not shown are 'magnetic bumpers' which would prevent collisions from close-formation flying via repulsion with the other craft... (potentially a tactic for dogfighting).

So, the idea is that the model will have some design considerations;
we can apply the Kipling Method, and SCAMPER at initial concept brainstorm -
ERoEI, heat, EMR and other considerations are factors identified.
we will need lithium lightweight battery, or preferably graphene newtype battery (weight, 8.9grams, charge time: 8hours)
the internals and outer model shell cannot weigh more than 500-800 grams at this time, system total mass, for the object to satisfy the safety and lift endurance criteria.
Steering would be mapped to a bluetooth/wireless controller (of PS or XBOX style variety), or an RC controller - and would function similarly to RC planes or 'tanks'
pushing left on the joystick would slow the right side fans, increase rightside mylar lifter lift rate and lower left liftrate...
pushing up would increase the fan speed, and would increase the bridge mylar lifter more than the tail lifters (but all would increase).
pushing down would kill the mylar lifters and slow the fans... etc.

Of course, later, the movement patterns could be refined to reflect the motion capabilities we saw on screen. The idea is that, the vehicle will be able to fly for say, 1-3 hours, before needing a rapid-recharge from an induction pad that the ship can land on. It could even be programmed to be a 'floating display'.

The project concept is to have as much verisimilitude/good design finish to the on-screen vehicle as possible, while also being able to 'fly' the model for a long time, preferably in display with other space models - without wires or display stands.
This means no external propellors, or blimp lift bags, or wires.
Noise and health concerns are also a consideration.

Well, thats my rough ideas perspective and feedback for your concept -
bear in mind, I am a lay person, and haven't tested this, but for back-of-the-envelope,
I think this is plausible, would meet much of your criteria and budget envisaged,
and I am certain that Infomechatronics/puppeteers or local RC model clubs or 3D rapid manufacture clubs at your local uni. would be able to help you explore this even further.

Lets Talk Drinks; Ginger, Chilli, etc...

Howdy!
Don't worry, this won't be hocking the wonders of plants in the manner of mistletoe or elderberry...
the pseudo-spiritual, sorta para medical properties of plants... no.
I leave that to the fringe, as its their realm.
This is just a subjective reflection on some of those fleeting properties of 'taste' - subtleties that are highly subjective and differ person to person...

This is just sharing a few reflections on how awesome some plants are,
such as Ginger or Chilli - be sure to comment or inbox with your preferred plants and their uses or taste.

Recently, we made a punch? a spritz? some concoction,
using Ginger Brew, Cranberry (from your choice of provider), Pineapple juice concentrate (canned or fresh - unsweetened), and then water + ice.
The ratio was: 1-1-1.5/2:2:1, so, one part ginger with one part cranberry, one part pineapple, then double the sum of all of those worth of water (sparkling, tap, fresh, whatever water you like), with about 1 part worth of ice.
We chilled this, till it was an icey consistency.
It was awesome, not to sugary... maybe a little initially bitter, but with an excellent aftertaste.
 While awesome non-alcoholic, it could also be adapted into a margarita or an alcoholic.

The more adventurous of the group tried infusing the beverages with differing types of tea -
camomile and dandelion, red chai and black tea... the results were mixed, though Earl Grey seemed to work excellently. Further cola-experiments, using nutrisweet/stevia... will be ongoing. We hope these produce tasty AND consumable results.

I prefer my drinks to have a little ginger in them, just a bit.

I've found that,
if you crush 3 varieties of ginger, and add these to Pepsi or to Generic Cola, the result is - "How Pepsi used to taste circa 1980s-1990s". The ratio is 1 part crushed ginger pulp/juice to 7 parts cola. This seems to have the same taste as traditional sodas. Asian ginger varieties add to the flavor, resulting in a hazelnut aftertaste being detected if the ratio becomes closer to 1:6.
Cokecola made no taste difference in the sample group and control group with or without the ginger, or with or without being served in the glass cup or plastic - which was an unexpected outcome - people 'know their CokeCola", and the CokeCola seems to overpower the ginger or make no effect (be neutralised by the Coke's acidity).

It gets better!
There's a variety of non-alcoholic and alcoholic beverages available from Castle Glen; their "ginger brew" is among the finest in the world, and certainly seems coincident with preventing or lessening a cold. The ginger is not overpowering or too bitter, and is quite pleasant.
Because this beverage is sparkling, it provides a much better mix agent for making coca-cola like it used to be - the slight side-effect being a simple glass of Cola becomes both an alcoholic beverage (~1 standard drink per glass), AND the sugar content rises to 66g per glass - not for the diabetic-in-waiting.

Turning to chilli -
I find the best part of chillis and spicy food, apart from being great at making food interesting,
is that I feel chilli helps to lose weight - it might only be marginal water weight, but you feel like you have more "pep and vigor with chilli in yer".
Another Castle Glen beverage, retired now I believe (though who said Dragon's Breath or Dragon's Blood liqueur could retire? how can it survive these days, without income coming in... certainly, it doesn't qualify for a pension... bring back the Dragon's Blood Liqueur I say!)
this beverage, while stock standard being somewhat warm and spicy, and a little alcoholic...

with after market chillis and paprika/spices... can become a truly fire spewing beverage not for the faint of heart. Chocolate Bhutlas, capsicum concentrate and other wonders make the drink an anaphylactic timebomb... even for those who like their spicy stuff. All cultures cough and splutter helplessly when exposed to the "weapon of mass-reentry-burning"; even those renowned for stomaching spicy foods, such as South American, Thai/Asian, and Indian...

The drink must be consumed within 3 or 4 months... as it will begin to pickle and actual loses its heat potency: the decay sets in, and the beverage becomes sugary at first, with an 18month shelf life leading to a vinegary paste barely useable as a cooking vinegar (and certainly not for human consumption, unless drinking pure vinegar is your thing).

When I have a cold in its first stages, such as with a sore throat or a sniffley nose,
drinking the Dragon's Blood helps to completely alleviate the cold in my case.
It is gone in a flash of heat, and it has staved off the cold many a time.
Constipated? Not a problem... this Dragon's Blood from Castle Glen is sure to get your innards moving. Its much better than prune juice or other laxative options, much more fast acting, though with a drawback of that re-entry burn...

Apart from that,
The Dragon's Blood is a much more leveling beverage, separating the adults from the immature -
while many can drink their boilermakers and jaegerbombs, bingedrinking their way into carcinogenic oblivion and an early grave,
comparatively few can stomach the Dragon's Blood, even a simple shot let alone a full glass...
or endure the re-entry burn they know to be coming.
Its the best party drink to give to "friends"(frenemies if we're being honest), or to those ultra-competitive types.

Reflections on A.I. part n'th

Howdy!

This is a ramble, a waffle (a tangential spiral around) about A.I.
- what people want to see realised, what people dislike etc.

So, some awesome stuff to read as context would be Chomsky, Hugo de Garis, Kurzweil, "Library of Babel" from Jorge Borges, Encyclopedia Galactica concept from Sagan, etc...
there are 7-9 unique approaches minimum at the moment, which are working towards the realisation of artificial intelligence or new lifeforms.

People want A.I. to initially, operate and replicate the way in which people do things -
we want A.I. to read 'properly', to have a consistency of presence, a sense of self...
we want A.I. to perceive and navigate the depths of combinatorial linguistics and understand what we mean...

From a constructivist standpoint, this is why so many are disappointed by how AI is modelled and function presently, because the AI is not accurately approaching how meaning is made or formed...

This is because, words are actually a floating point and interdependent variable - they take their meanings from words around them. Each word has associated arrays; a synonym array, a meanings array, a context array, a recurrence/incidence array...
Each of these arrays is theoretically unbounded and infinite - we impose 'babushka limits' onto each of these arrays via socio-cultural constructs, so as to alter how meanings are formed etc... the order is only important in these arrays under certain circumstances, otherwise these arrays are orderless/randomly ordered...
    So, we place a limit on the average number of characters we permit - a human lifetime, or Franz Kafka's Metamorphosis for example (a 40 page + run on sentence). these limits are socio-cultural constructs, which are a set of values 'intuitively arrived at'.
We place a limit on what are 'legitimate words' from a combinatorial field based on the base characters of a language - this number can be larger than N^x, where n might be 26! and x might be a googolplex.... a MASSIVE number.
In practice though, there might be a recursion limit based on the limits that constructs apply, if the 'babushka limits' theory holds, such that N might be smaller, and X might be much smaller, to the order of hundreds of billions...

we place further limits on typos, on recursiveness, and further on 'grammar'...
this then forms the rules for what is effable/expressable, and the field of 'what is knowably knowable and expressible in a given language'.
 --- this eschews the problem of "meaningful meaninglessness', or the cryptographic problem - that potential for an apparently 'meaningless' string to contain a meaning on some higher order reading or layer of abstraction...

So, when modeled in 5D topology, and arranged for color by frequency distribution or per layer of meaning abstraction, a language appears to be a very flat/smooth area, with very small spikes, consistently a homeomorphic shape that changes seemingly little over a macroscopic timeframe reference frame, given all the constructs and inherent uncertainties in each...
language is a huge manifold, but a manifold none-the-less...

There are some problems though.
we want our AI to be more than just a psuedo-random Markov Chain Monte Carlo process, which is constrained based on input string size etc... we want our AI to actually read sentences for meaning, and produce meaningful outputs which are not necessarily proportional to the size of a given input.

we want A.I. to be able to produce insights into problems, to be able to define their own fields and arrays and to pose hypotheticals of a high degree of complexity.

These are more meaningful than a "Turing Test", or several other quantitative tests based on breadth of knowledge an A.I. has... as fundamentally, on one level, all sentient lifeforms can be seen to be a pseudo-random Markov Chain process, or Thue-Morse processes, iterating through fields of 'knowable knowledge', and combinatorial linguistics.

Its things such as recursive sets, low discrepancy sequences (and correspondence of meaningfulness from one sentence to the next within a conversation, etc) and that capacity to learn... that are at play.
We want a sense of verisimilitude, at least initially, from A.I.

Eventually, A.I. will surpass human and perhaps posthuman capacities, and ascend further up the Kardashev Civilisational scale. it will do so based on a self awareness and ability to make meaning...
everything will be bound by 'absolute intelligence' and by ERoEI... nothing that is real can exceed an absolute intelligence limit, at this time, such as the tentative "Bremermann's Limit", and not fall prey to a causality provenance/falsifiability problem .

I'm keen to hear what you think about that,
what do you think needs to happen to model A.I. and increase verisimilitude in interactions/thought processes - comment here or email anywhen, as this is a great ideas-bouncing topic that cuts to epistemology etc... and so many people are asking similar questions with the advent of RAMONA or SIRI or EVIE etc...
This also changes for each set of language modelling done, so English yields different things to German or Sinoxenic languages etc... 
A hallmark of A.I. sentience will be the formation of their own meaningful discourse, perhaps on many layers... or the ability to alter the underlying constraints in a stable/consistent way.

PS
some suggest that AIML isn't rigorous enough for the large arrays and concurrent operations that might be needed.
are there other programming scripts/languages which are as or more rigorous than AIML? any insights you have to offer will be invaluable.

Writing Style Reflection 1

Howdy!
So, as we're all people of many hats... when I'm not dabbling elsewhere,
a friend wanted to console me on my umpteenth rejection letter, and suggested I take a novelty checker test from I Write Like... . com.
Well, it certainly cheered me up!

I write like
Arthur Clarke

I Write Like. Analyze your writing!

I was careful not to put too much into the analyzer, though the results were fun to say the least!

Only one, well, 3 of these fiction pieces, are published, and one of them was sold as part of an anthology... so I don't wish to reveal connexions. Especially the underground satire...

For 2 of my science fiction novellas (7 random samples), I was predominantly returned "you write like Arthur C Clarke" (or Philip K. Dick). I was aiming for Frank Herbert or Brian Herbert/Kevin J Anderson, Harlan Ellison, or, Tezuka, Asimov... though you can't go wrong with Arthur C Clarke!
I think I'll finish the comic adaptation then, and give it another 20 tries!

For the short-story (trashy horror and superhero/satire)
I was told I wrote like Edgar Allen Poe or like Roald Dahl... which was neat.
Thats what the pieces were crafted to resemble as exegetical influences.

For the underground stuff,
I was told I wrote like Bill S Burroughs!

I don't know how reliable these tests can be, as I feel you can write like anyone if you "get into character" and once you've got their formula.
That, and test audiences for my fiction works (including those poor few souls who bought the experimental comics) don't share necessarily those appraisals...
They do like the artstyle though, as Hill said of the reflective surfaces etc.

Still, well worth heading over to "I write like"... for a  boosting pick-me-up if you're questing for publicationing (the only reason I don't self-publish is I don't have the self-means, nor the inclination and resources to do a Doctorate just to get a syndicated publication!)

-----
No amount of positivity will get the non-fiction, "Zugzwang!" off the ground.
If you like Schopenhauer, O. Burkemann or M. McLuhan/B.F. Skinner, you might enjoy this little
38 000 worder - philosophical reflection. that is, if it ever sees the light of day in a viable way...
Maybe futures 'studies' (manipulation) are more your thing?
Well! A few have suggested the hidden posts here and elsewhere would go well into a book,
an objective examination of the stagflation
we see in many things, from the system of 'useless machines' and on,

(above: Frivolous Engineering hints at this in the vid above... imagine this though on a larger scale, say 117 representative useless machines, all being interconnected, in turn... connected to all of their supporters.)

during this convergence (transcendence?) we're herded through,
caught in the crossfire between 'conservationist luddites (realists)'  v technocratic cornucopians.
so stay tuned for a critical examination and continuation of the last half of Zugzwang!
Its at times like the present I'm reminded of the tagline to AvP: Whoever wins, we lose...

The Rhomboid Cruiser pt 1

Hi all!
Its my pleasure to reply to requests to see where the rhomboid cruiser is at.
Its getting there. So is XMAS.
v1 of the cruiser finally printed in under a day, but with a few (tolerable for my collection) defects

Above: The Rhomboid Assimilationer, its a weird geometry. I like it in ST:A3.

 Above: The more flattering angles for this blocky-beast. Its in the process of being bitsbashed, and will eventually be painted properly.

Above: This angle reveals some of the defects with the rhomboid
The rightside pylon didn't print properly due to layer speed and vibration error, so its curved and undulatey. The leftside pylon had the opposite problem and lifted up at opposite corners, though otherwise printed perfectly.
Likewise, the core and connectors printed perfect, so not too bad for a mostly hollow ship! (A Hollow-ship? or a holo-ship...)
So, these rhomboids are supposed to have a spherical recess on the top - this was not possible to achieve with the torsional strength required, so perhaps later I will adapt (ironic no?) a coffee filter into the sphere connector.

This thing teams up with the type 2 obelisk or the cylinder to trap enemies inside of a borg-tholian suspension field (green instead of orange, coming soon). the field is 4-6 rhomboids in size, so it is a very tight squeeze to fit the vehicles in there - this is to force borg vehicles to have to clump together, and become more vulnerable to the new types of torpedo and AOE weapons to nerf them a little.
Did I mention, that in my GOBS rules I play, the feds can cause subspace distortions (play trap cards etc) and that the borg-tholian suspension field has a chance to implode, causing everything in it to implode and be removed from play?...

I'm toying with making that either an Assimilator ability (wasn't fussed on the armada special ability, and all ships can do what made it unique originally), or making type 2 obelisks a mandatory unit choice, and making the cubes and up a 0-1 rare choice, with the Cylinder/VGer Monolith being a hero/unique/HQ.

The Interceptor will be a troops choice, as will borg-asteroid (cheap fodder) and assimilated ships.
I'm undecided as to whether the Tetrahedrons and 4/5point pyramids will be troop choices or elites/fast attack.
The Fusion Tesseract will count as 7 unit choices: 1 Elite, 2 Troops, 2 Fast Attack and 2 Heavy Support.
Spheres are elites, captured vessels are 0-1 and elite (Borg would rather cannibalize captured vessels than field them constantly, and sometimes prefer destroying these "uglies" for raw parts... Borg can get the parts they need one way or another, sooner or later... resistance is pointless)

Regular cube, Tactical Cube, type 2 cube and locutus cube are heavy support, (locutus also being a HQ choice)
The queen's borg diamond is 0-1 unique hero, and can't be fielded in an army with V'Ger or Locutus.

Basically, playtesting these and the other craft, including the gyroscopic hypersphere, or the 127-cell/dodecahedron and octahedron... its been fun! and both GOBS and STAW/ST:40K systems have been reasonably balanced.
We're still working on STAW rules replete with carefully worded cards for all of em.

So, hopefully next;
some display stands, (POP Acrylic pivotable and extendable?)
some romulans and more federation craft,
and perhaps some game recounts.

For those wondering where futures reflection has gone, after taking some advice, I post elsewhere about that and for here, I provide a link to those interested from elsewhere soas they can see it. It works out for everyone.

A Question Of Scale/A Matter Of Taste

Hi there folks!
Some have asked: what scale is xyz to pqrstuv?
Here, we delve deeper into why 1:5000/1:4848.48* is my preferred baseline for STAW and similar tabletop games.
It just works. Its big without being too big like 1:1000 or 1:2500 can be. It lets you field massive starships and, with a slight upscaling, it lets you fit the small shuttlecraft and fighters easily.
It is also storage and transport friendly.

I also feel more of whats available out there scales well to these two ships, the Hallmark Warbird and Eaglemoss/Shapeways Valdore. The Dragohawk (available from many makers out there) sits nice. The other types sit well. Once I locate a Griffin and a Raptor, they'll sit well next to it and be in scale with the akira class and nebula class.

Here's a specific comparison;
Eaglemoss Valdore to Hallmark Warbird to Furuta D.

Above: What I said before, but somehow a tetrahedron snuck into frame. I feel they scale well. Thanks to Si's Soldiers for the idea - I would never have become involved in STAW if I had never found your blog. I would be keen to hear your thoughts on scale and in particular, romulans.

Above: Valdore Type is a wider but sleeker craft that is not as long as a standard warbird. This craft scales well to Shapeways Sovereigns and to the Furuta Ent E.

So, here's a little more to the scale debate;
what do you feel? Where should scale be?
Should I 'upscale' the borg geometries? Should I upscale the existing romulan designs?

Cheers!

Tale of the Goofy Monk

Howdy!
There's been a few questions about when the goofy monk will be available, and what options there'll be for the costumes.
I can say that there'll be male and female options, and in terms of costumes we've opted for a monk robe and generic armor variant. This'll be a decent bed for customisation into middle-earth styled project through to sci-fi-esque applications, and hopefully there'll be something for everyone.
They'll be available in a limited run once the rest of the mold has been filled up - only 2 more characters to go over at ExManus Studios or so I'm told. It'll be excellent!

In the meantime, here's how I've styled one of those goofy lizard monks.

 Above: The goofy monk and the murderer that took the character away in a comicbook no less.
Personally, I feel that robot chicken was a better ending.

 Above: The monk's light-broadsword is interchangeable, and glows blue-violet under blacklight as no suitable ~1.7mm - 3mm translucent rods were sourcable at time of assembly. The figure looks good with clear or yellow/orange IMHO too.

Above: A few good monks for scale. You'll see that the goofy monk scales well to the source material, and that particularly it scales well to the RPG images that were available. The monk stands 2 heads taller than the Plo Koon monk, spot on. Some say its a little too large, but I can't hear them and all agree that the raw mini has so much detail packed on it (which I hope my paintwork didn't obscure too much). Thanks again for the awesome work to be found at ExManus Studios - those folks really know how to craft awesome sculptures in any sized application first time every time. The customer service cannot be understated - my dealings with them have been thoroughly warm and professional!

Cheers!

Up later,
review of futures resource estimates literature and population estimates:
what is the leeway here? How accurate are we talking, and are things closer to the 70year end of the curve than the 270 year end? (hint, its closer to the 70year end at present).

More Plasticrack Part nth

Apologies for not utilising a handy tag system... I'll tidy that up in the future.
In the meantime, here's another installment of Plasticrack - cybernetic geometry the continuing voyages.
There's even some 'enhanced' imagery.

Above: A hapless Sutherland is ambushed by an Obelisk. "Resistance, as it always has been, is futile." Sutherland fires a fullspread in the rearward arc, hoping to knock out the Obelisk's engines long enough to reach the board edge.

Above: A W.I.P group shot of gen1 techno-geometry, courtesy of a Velleman k8200. That cubeish thing? Its actually a tesseract, with magnets/ferrous materials holding it together. At the time this image was taken, the glues were setting and so an elastic band has to hold them all together to ensure proper drying. The cube is slightly larger than a tactical cube from a popular boardgame presently out there. The idea is that this fusion cube can break up into 'Multi-Vector Assimilation Mode" and there are a few scenarios for it that yours truly has made to compliment it.
The sphere also shown costs about $3.80USD at cost price, a little more for a painted and 'tactical'd' variant as shown. The sphere same size as other spherical things on market.

Above: Sutherland for scale with Obelisk (type 1) and Scout Fusion Tesseract

Above: Scout Fusion Tesseract in its 7 constituent components. Each Pyramid is in terms of gameplay, roughly worth 2 spheres. The scout cube (MM) in terms of gameplay, is slightly weaker than the Interceptor (so, easily dispatched by an oberth and miranda)

Above: Tesseract shown with a pyramid missing (the vehicle can dissassemble and reassemble at will, provided 4 of the pyramids and the core scout cube are above half health...).
Sutherland unfortunately did not escape the pursuing Obelisk; A.Vessel#948-7612 is being salvaged and enhanced at Regional Nexus Node #4598759.

Above: Another group of tetrahedrons for a client;these ones are some of the finest yet (if I do say so myself)! Email or contact me to get yours secured today.
You'll notice the photoetched parts, which were donated from a recent swap meet - so many modelmakers have spare sprue that they'll sell for cents or donate at freebie tables at conventions or swap meets, and sadly many aviation model makers never use their undercarriages or missiles. Luckily, those parts can be used to cybernetic-ify your geometries!

So, thats it for this installment;
many thanks to everyone that's ordered their geometries
- I hope the geometry brings much fun and something different affordably to your game tables!
Thankyou for your concrit and feedback on enhancing the geometry.

I'm flabbergasted at how many nations they've been sent to now - 9 and counting
That tells me that people really like their geometry.
Polychora and irregular shapes, all that sort of stuff. Its great!

I hope to get to a position where I can start to develop lazer printed componentry within the next 5 years - at this time, a pipedream, but one which would be awesome to realise.
Why? It would mean better resolution stuff, at negligible cost increase, and importantly...
CURVED GEOMETRY = )  (oval shaped saucer-y geometries)
at present, it is very difficult to produce nice-finished curved geometry at home with the k8200 and other systems. 

It would also mean I would be able to bring POP bases to market much more effectively, enhancing recycling and the final finish of many multi-media models. That alone makes lazer printing and in-home lazer cutter parts worth looking into.

Reflections on the futures debate

Hi there,

time to delve into the other stuff that this blog exists for; reflections on the ongoing futures debate.

If someone considers the literature, they find the division between boomers and gloomers.

some of that consideration and reflection is distilled and paraphrased here - I encourage readers to conduct their own thorough research into this area and to form their own standpoint and views thereafter.

The boomers *cough Simon reagan-nomics cough* believe approximately in 'progress' (whatever that ill-defined concept might be); that via decoupling, and exponential scalability/knockon effects, technology can outpace the various rates of decline caused due to overconsumption and overpopulation forces on society.

to varying extents, there is the belief of either infinite resources, or of scalable resources to the point where supply/demand is less a consideration in the short to medium term.

The gloomers are more cautious however,  being pragmatic

and believe that preventative measures might be taken to avoid any Seneca style collapses.

Bartlett outlines much of the facts of the matter, more eloquently than yours truly.

Coutts (of the exponentialist fame) also reflects eloquently and more importantly, objectively - a great resource for the reader to consider while conducting their research.

So,

what are the odds?

what does it all matter?

and as Monckton pointedly asks - what's the point, especially if some of these cycles are beyond controlling or altering in meaningful ways?

This hinges on our resource estimates, on our efficiency and on how our innovation might work.  

To the resources, we are shifting towards offshore and LNG, due to micron-limits and ERoEI considerations established elsewhere. There exists the potential for a peak oil scenario, inclusive of LNG and offshore reserves. This concept also applies to other resources, such as fissionable/fuseable materials...

So, as many have noted, the Green Revolution hinged on hydrocarbons to make fertiliser and countermeasures to ensure high efficiency of crop yield.  As those resources decline, it becomes difficult to manufacture in the same methods...

The estimates for resource futures are highly pliable, and contingent on demand from the populace...

suffice to say, the calculations when run and based on x amount of global barrels per day... can vary from as low as 70odd years of GLOBAL reserves, to as far out as 270years, or more (if consumption patterns changed significantly within the next 10 years)...

There are also many assumptions; notably that certain resources cannot be synthesised in commercially viable manners or quantities (such as fertilisers from electrolysis at this time).

This is also a point of contention... as in a digital economy in which solar methods (chiefly thermal solar plants etc), microwave collectors and catalytic converters are more abundant, and we follow more of an Asimov path (yeast farmed and exponentially growing foodstuffs, anyone?), it may be possible that resource depletion timeframes extend to the thousands of years ballpark.

Hydrogen fuels, if increased and made the norm, would contribute to this extended resource depletion timeframe. The critical resources would shift to fissionable materials and super-heavy metals. This is where astro-mining might make sense. We are presently at a point where this may be the only way to get sufficient quantities of rare-earths at high enough grades.

There are limits to how many people could exist on earth; how much material could be arranged as people before the planet broke up... that number is extremely high, and would equate to a large number of people per cubic metre - I don't think we'd ever get to those densities... we have to ensure that we don't, because we would see fewer and fewer other species in the food web/nature web and environmental cycle. Fewer species mean less diversity and lowered resilience to extinction events - this is especially important given that we are the only source of life thus far known in the universe.

So, to conserve, or not to conserve... that is the question!

Bottomline,

Conserve (just in case the risky alternative of progress doesn't pan out).

Centrist style. Conserve, if only to protect the only source of life we yet know.

But don't impede genuine science where possible. 

Its a delicate balancing act that we'll have to walk to get this to work... it can be done though. I'm convinced that history swerves to favor the longshot and marginal outcome - time and again, those who argue the sky was falling were proved wrong, only due to changing variables and that swerve of history (that they didn't account for).

We don't want a full Borg-like technocracy - where people are only valued in so much as they are contributing to knowledge while they are contributing to knowledge. That feels too much like eugenics, and we all saw how well that panned out... psh. (genetic bottlenecking is not such a good thing).

Flipside of the coin, we don't want luddite levels of ultra-extremeist conservatism that frustrate progress to the point of making a self-fulfilling prophecy .

What do you think?

Do you feel that resources are becoming increasingly scarce?

Do you feel that humanity will somehow "swerve away from the cliff" and progress up the Kardashev scale? Why?

Do you think that cosmopolitanism and an effacing monoculture are an integral part of that "swerve away from the cliff?" I would argue an imposed, effacing, monoculture leads towards and not away from the cliff... whereas if a monoculture/standardised culture is another identity people hold alongside their traditional identities, then there is a chance forward. In that case though, I wouldn't call that so much 'cosmopolitanism' as 'global humanism'. 

What truly is "progress"? Epistemologically speaking... what can progress be as a theory of knowledge (hint, dialectic here...)

Catch you next time!