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Academy of Super-Heroes #105 - Rival Schools Part 5: Chasing ADA - It's time to put up or shut up, as Netwalker puts his plan in motion to rescue the Advanced Difference-Engine Autosophont! Meanwhile, a shadow falls across Slovakia....

It's always a little awkward the week after the NCAA finals, when local news sportscasters try to act like people are just as interested in college baseball as they were in college basketball.

( MySpace Comics Presents and Invincible Returns, that's it. )

   Dave Van Domelen, "Feh. Villains." - Invincible

"Doctor Dave" is a Grav/Rad Controller who's as close to looking like me as I could manage with the costume generator. This is a drawing of that, so it's a self-portrait through two filters. :)
( Drawing of Doctor Dave behind cut )

Okay, granted, I don't have a LOT of use for this mod (although I have modded one pair of 3D glasses to better fit over my glasses), but the idea tickled my fancy so I did it once I found a cheap enough set of flip-up shades to take apart for the clip.
( Probably worth the effort just for the looks it will garner from other patrons. )

Maybe it's just been bad luck or a dry patch, but lately it seems like a lot more of the movies I like come out on DVDs that I just don't feel the desire to buy. Either they're significantly more expensive, almost totally lacking in bonus features, or both. Perhaps it's an industry plot to get people to give up on DVDs and finish migrating to BluRay so we can re-buy all our collections.
( Expanding on the point under the cut. )

The plan was to just get a new white Starter-brand "Dri-Star" cap (my previous one is getting a little nasty-looking despite washing) and sew the NEST Global Alliance patch that came with the Bumblebee/Soundwave two-pack onto it. But this year's version of the Dri-Star caps has a much larger Starter logo embroidered into the front, and it's too big for the NEST patch to cover. And it's stitched through the whole way, so I couldn't just rip a few stitches and remove a patch. So out came the Dremel, I found that the sander head worked best (after trying the wire brush and cutter wheel first), sending fuzz all over the place and stripping out stitches at a high rate. Once I'd cleared enough of the original embroidery off, THEN I could sew the NEST patch on. I figure that counts as kitbashing as much as anything else. :)
( Piccy! )

And no, no flying power was on. :)

ETA: This sort of thing works because all objects are actually defined as primitives (rectangular solids, spheres, ovals, etc) with a partially transparent skin laid over them and various rules for solidity (for instance, a cobweb is a planar object that doesn't block motion, while the banners on the sides of buildings are planar objects that DO block motion). Characters reside in a cylinder, more or less, regardless of the size and shape of the image. This leads not only to stuff like the image above, but also to tiny characters being unable to fit through gaps larger than they are, and huge characters slipping through gaps they shouldn't be able to...they all have the same size primitive.

My older niece got to play with one of these Bee-Bots the other day and really liked it, and my mom was asking if I could find something similar but not, you know, a couple hundred bucks (after accessories). Marah is pretty precocious toywise, but probably won't be ready for Mindstorms for a few years yet. Anyone have suggestions for something like the Bee-Bot or a simplified Mindstorms-style build-and-program toy? I know there's toy cars you can push buttons to program the path, but I think my mom's interested in something a touch more complicated.