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This doesn’t happen to me very often

Thuan — Wed, 23 Jan 2008 05:24:18 +0000

It’s pretty awesome to find yourself in a positive article of a national newspaper:

Industry feels pinch as numbers of IT grads plummet

If you’re too lazy to read it, at least check out the last few paragraphs of it.

Interesting thought: EB Games hiring females now

Thuan — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 20:49:43 +0000

Over the holidays and during this past fall, I noticed something different about the local EB Games as I walked in at Dufferin Mall and the Eaton Centre – they hired some female staff! I think this was the first time ever, out of the many times I’ve been to EB Games, seeing females working in the front lines of the video game retailer. I don’t know if EB Games has (intentionally or not) discriminated against hiring females or that there are now a greater number of females willing to work for EB Games, but I think it’s a good sign of changes that are happening in the games industry.

Whoa… the light bulb went on.

Thuan — Sun, 09 Sep 2007 08:11:48 +0000

After speaking to a particular interesting student at the club fair, a light bulb went up in my head. Playing video games is one thing. Making them is another. Some are just hardcore game players. Some are craftsmen who rarely play any video games. I realize that I fall into the latter category, which explains why I have a backlog of unopened and yet-to-be played games I’ve collected over the years. And I thought I was a sad case of someone who likes to make video games but don’t play them (that often at least…). I’ve become a casual gamer.

Conferences on a Budget: for students

Thuan — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 04:15:41 +0000

Last month, Adam Goucher wrote some tips for people who go to conferences and are on a budget, which I saw from Greg Wilson’s blog.

One other thing too add to Adam’s budget tips: if you’re a student, consider volunteering at the conference! That’s what I did at SIGGRAPH this year, if it isn’t obvious enough already from my recent entries. In exchange for some of your hours of service, you can usually get things like:

Free pass to the full conference
Free or discounted hotel rates
Potential free swag for volunteers. (See some of the free stuff I got from SIGGRAPH 2007 here)
And best of all: you’ll get to meet other like-minded students and make contacts to advance your career.

I was a little disappointed back in May of this year when most of my friends already graduated while I still have another school year to suffer through but now I’m actually glad that I’m taking my time to finish school. If I hadn’t, then I wouldn’t be able to volunteer at any upcoming conferences. Here are couple that I’d like to volunteer for within the next year:

Game Developer’s Conference 2008: happens annually around March. Student volunteer registration starts in the fall.
SIGGRAPH 2008 in L.A: Student application deadline is Feb 28, 2008.

Mighty Morphing Image Machine

Thuan — Fri, 03 Aug 2007 21:34:14 +0000

My flight leaves in a little over 12 hours and I haven’t gotten around to packing up yet. Speaking of SIGGRAPH, I just finished the last assignment of one of my courses I’m taking this summer: CSC320 Intro to Visual Computing. This last assignment let’s us write a program that can morph two images, from one into the other, using a morphing technique introduced in this SIGGRAPH ‘92 paper: Feature-Based Image Metamorphosis.

The results of the morph are pretty funky. Here’s a morph of Sasuke from his regular self to using the LVL1 Cursed Seal using the program that I wrote in 12 frames (rendering took 45 minutes !)

Hello World!

Thuan — Sun, 17 Jun 2007 02:47:27 +0000

I remember attempting to learn the C programming language for the very first time just a little under 10 years ago in the summer of ‘98, although I didn’t get too far. I was learning off the very popular C for Dummies Vol. 1 & 2 by Dan Gookin and the very first command line program that I wrote in C was a variant of the “Hello World” cliche program. Dan tried to be funny and witty so he called it his “Good bye cruel world!” program instead. I can’t believe a decade has almost gone by since…

Anyway, this blog will be mainly focused on my main interest and passion: video games, game development & programming, and the gamedev scene and community in Toronto. I’ve been hooked on the subject for over ten years now ever since I read the Dec ‘95 issue of Nintendo Power. It featured an interview with the Shigeru Miyamoto, creator of the Mario and Zelda series and commonly referred to as the “Spielberg of video games“. It was that interview article in Nintendo Power that inspired me to get to where I am today, and for the next few years ahead.

I hope you enjoy your stay.