Here’s a quickie that I came up with in photoshop today. I was experimenting with using photo textures and some finger-painting techniques.
The hair is from a horse’s mane and the clothing is from a burlap texture. The hair actually turned out pretty good…has somewhat of a 3rd dimension to it.
Kind of interesting to watch the biggest rocket launch in history take place today. Grab your cup of coffee and go to CNN or NASA live site and watch it live…it should be blasting off in the next 1/2 hour or so.
Info from CNN:
NASA is set to launch the world’s largest rocket Tuesday, a test flight for the vehicle that may be used to return astronauts to the moon.
The 327-foot rocket, called the Ares I-X, is set to launch at 8 a.m. ET from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, NASA said. The unmanned rocket will help NASA collect information for future missions.
“Ares I-X will bring NASA one step closer to its exploration goals to return to the moon for ambitious exploration,” NASA said in statement.
The launch, which NASA is calling a test, is among four test launches of Ares I-X that will go on until 2012.
The space agency hopes the rocket eventually will replace the aging space shuttle and conduct voyages to the moon and Mars.
NASA researchers have said that a trip to the moon could not happen before 2015.
The launch comes at a critical time, when NASA is waiting for President Obama to decide future funding for the agency.
An independent committee reviewing the future of space flight recently reported that the U.S. space program appears to be pursuing goals that exceed current funding.
The committee also recommended to the White House that funding for NASA’s under-construction international space station should be extended until 2020.
Though the launch of Ares I-X is scheduled for early Tuesday, weather could cause the space agency to delay.
Late Monday, the agency said it had a 40 percent chance at launch because of bad weather. If weather conditions do not improve, NASA will launch Wednesday.
Source: http://www.cnn.com/2009/TECH/space/10/27/ares.nasa.rocket/index.html
I’ve been retouching and cleaning up photos all day long and feel like my neck and back are going to snap in half due to my poor posture. I took a quick break and doodled a sketch on how I think that I look like sitting at the desk…
The Orionid meteor shower is expected to put on a good show tonight for viewers across North America, lasting well into the predawn hours Wednesday — weather permitting.
This annual meteor shower is created when Earth passes through trails of comet debris left in space long ago by Halley’s Comet. The “shooting stars” develop when bits typically no larger than a pea, and mostly sand-grain-sized, vaporize in Earth’s upper atmosphere.
“Flakes of comet dust hitting the atmosphere should give us dozens of meteors per hour,” said Bill Cooke of NASA’s Meteoroid Environment Office.
The best time to watch will be between 1 a.m. and dawn local time Wednesday morning, regardless of your location. That’s when the patch of Earth you are standing on is barreling headlong into space on Earth’s orbital track, and meteors get scooped up like bugs on a windshield.
Article Source: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,568712,00.html
I was out on break earlier and noticed this unique ladybug without any spots…So I snapped the photo! There are literally thousands of them all over the sidewalk, cars and building right now.
The time when Asian lady beetles swarm up the sunny sides of tall or prominent buildings looking for winter shelter, preferably full of food, otherwise known as your house.
These ladybugs are natives of eastern Asia, and were originally introduced in California in 1964 by the U.S. Department of Agriculture as a biological control for pecan aphids.
Additional releases from 1978-1982 established them in the southern and eastern United States. Although they were never released in Indiana, they have migrated here from other areas and have now established themselves in our fields and our homes.
They seem to be attracted to buildings with contrasting light and dark areas, and are found in larger numbers on buildings adjacent to wooded areas.
They begin to emerge on the second day of temperatures above 65 degrees following freezing or near freezing temperatures. Usually, these conditions occur between late September and late October.
Thirty-two planets have been discovered outside Earth’s solar system through the use of a high-precision instrument installed at a Chilean telescope, an international team announced Monday.
This artist’s rendering shows one of the so-called exoplanets, or planets outside our solar system.This artist’s rendering shows one of the so-called exoplanets, or planets outside our solar system.
The existence of the so-called exoplanets — planets outside our solar system — was announced at the European Southern Observatory/Center for Astrophysics, University of Porto conference in Porto, Portugal, according to a statement issued by the observatory.
The announcement was made by a consortium of international researchers, headed by the Geneva Observatory, who built the High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher, or HARPS. The device can detect slight wobbles of stars as they respond to tugs from exoplanets’ gravity. That tactic, known as the radial velocity method, “has been the most prolific method in the search for exoplanets,” according to the European Southern Observatory statement.
The instrument detects movements as small as 3.5 km/hr (2.1 mph), a slow walking pace, the observatory said.
And yes, I have thought about this long time ago…just can’t pull if off due to the payday and money issue.
“ Some slackers among us see a silver lining to the global swine flu pandemic: a rock-solid excuse for getting out of absolutely anything.
We’ve been told day after day that millions of Americans are going to be battered by the H1N1 virus this flu season — and now the germ is spreading so fast that even the nation’s top health officials have quit keeping track of the number of cases.
For a diabolical few, all of this raises the question: Who would ever know if you faked it? “
Read the rest here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33347533/ns/health-swine_flu/