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| The Ground rules : | Ok, I'll do my best to answer questions but if I don't reply to you straight away, then please don't
be offended. It's not that I don't care what you think and I do read all of the mail that I get. The problem I have is that working a fulltime
job, then coming home to 20 or 30 e-mails, well I'm sure that you can understand it can take time to respond. Plus if I respond to everyone's
emails, then I don't have any time to create new images for the gallery. That said, I'll do my best to reply. Have a read here to see if your
question has already been answered before sending that email. |
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| Who are you? : | My real name is Neil Hutchison. I have gone under the alias of 'The Juggler' for
around 5 years now. I do juggle in real life so the nickname does make sense. |
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| What do you do for a living? : | I'm a qualified Software Engineer and work full time for Aspects Software in the UK. |
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| Do you have a degree in Computer Art? : | The simple answer is 'No'. I graduated from Strathclyde University in 1999 with a BSc Hons in Computer Science. I've never done any Art / 3D course and to be brutally honest, I can't really draw! |
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| Where do you live?: | I'm from Scotland (UK) and live in Stirling. I'm currently looking for a house. |
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| How much time do you spend Rendering? : | Not as much as I'd like to! I spend approximately 30 hours a week rendering new images for the gallery. Admittedly, this varies depending on whether I'm in the mood or not. On top of a fulltime job, that's quite a lot but I enjoy rendering and since it helps me relax and unwind after a long day at work, I don't really see it as being a lot of time. I'd love to be able to spend longer working on my rendering but I have to sleep at some point! |
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| How did you learn to Render? : Where can I learn ? : |
As I said earlier, I graduated from Strathclyde University with a Computer Science Degree. Although the
course touched briefly on some 3D Rendering techniques and algorithms, it did not teach me how to Render. There are Universities who run courses on 3D
art, just check the prospectuses. I got into 3D Rendering when I was about 16, using Lightwave 3D on an Amiga 600. (Now that's going back a fair few years!) There's no magic formula that I can give you as to how to start rendering. Just get your hands on a copy of one of the low cost packages such as Bryce (the package I've used for most of my work up till now - although I am using 3DSMax rather a lot now) and have some fun. I often sketch ideas of an image out on paper first but don't let that fool you or put you off, I'm no artist and I can't draw to save myself with a pencil and paper. I just play around with the ideas and often my inspiration comes from reading or the things we see around us every day. Just experiment and have fun. |
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| What setup do you have for rendering? : | My PC has changed a lot over the years but here goes. I've only listed the Specs that matter for rendering so
that's why there no sound card etc. listed : My first PC : Pentium 133 4Mb Diamond Stealth 2D Graphics Card 3Dfx Voodoo 2 32Mb Ram (later upgraded to 64Mb) 3.7Gb Hard Drive Windows 95 14" Monitor My current PC : Pentium III 800 64Mb Geforce Quadro2 Pro (Nvidia 2d/3D Grahics card with Hardwate T&L) Voodoo 2 2Gb Ram (2x)160Gb 7200 Hard Drive Windows 2000 21" Monitor My slave PC (for network rendering): This PC is on my home LAN and is used purely to speed up the process of rendering a final image / animation. I use 3DSMax's Network Rendering support to split the work over the 3 machines on the LAN. Pentium III 600 TNT Riva 128Mb Ram 40Gb Hard Drive Windows 2000 No Monitor |
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| What software do you use to create the images on 'thejuggler.net?': | For the Modeling work, mainly Bryce and 3DStudio Max, however I also use Terragen. To add signatures and do all the image manipulation work (i.e. the interface to the website), I use Adobe Photoshop 6 and Paint Shop Pro 7 (NOTE: I do not do any post-rendering touchups of the images I create. All work appears the way the 3D package rendered it.) All the thumbnails are created using Two Thumbs Up I don't use any packages to generate the html/scripts for the website. It's all done in Notepad! (Hi-tech or what?) |
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| Could you send me *** model?: | Sorry, no. The images I create contain original models and as such I don't hand them out no matter
how much you ask. So don't ask. It's not that I don't want to share, I just don't want to see someone else displaying an image on their site, and
claiming it's their's. (Unfortunately I've had this happen in the past and learnt the hard way!) However, have a look in the tutorials
section as I have full tutorials including models and scene files there. |
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| Can I download and use you images on my own pages? : | Since this is a gallery of Wallpaper images, feel free to dowload any of the images
you see here and use them as wallpapers for your PC. However if you intend to use the images on your own site or in screensavers etc.
Please ask first. If you do decide that you can't be bothered to ask then please at least acknowledge my work and use the following code to link back to 'thejuggler.net'
<p>
Original images from 'http://thejuggler.net'
If I do find my work displayed anywhere and you are claiming it is your work,
be warned, all images on the site are copyrighted for thejuggler.net 1998 - 2002. |
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| Can I use your images for commercial puropses? : | If you want to use the images for commercial purposes, then I'd like a bit of thanks for the work. At the very least,
a mention in the credits of your product and it would be nice to receive some cash for the use of the image. After all if you're making money out of it ... Just mail
me sales@thejuggler.net with details of the project and I'll get back to you. If you want a specific image created then talk to me.
I can't guarantee anything but we can see. |
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| Can I buy mousemats / mugs / images of your work?: | Yes. Go to the Shop menu at the top of this page for all the details! |
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| Do you have any tutorials to help me with ***? : | Yes. Follow the Tutorials menu to the package you would like
tutorials on and find out what I have. If there's anything you'd specifically like to see then write to me and I'll see what I can do. |
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| This link / picture is not working / displayed. Fix it. : | If you find any broken links etc, then please let me know. I try my best to ensure that everything is working correctly
but as with any big site, I can miss things. Send the details to gallery@thejuggler.net |
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| Can you render *** image at YYY Resolution? : | No. I am currently working on rendering all my images at 1024x768, 1600x1200
and 1152x864. I do not intend to render them at any other sizes. If you need the image at a different size, then use a package such a Paint Shop Pro to
resize the images to whatever size you need. |
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| Why are all your images in JPG format? : | All of the images are put onto the site in JPG format because the format retains the 24bit colour that I render the images at
and allows for reasonable compression with a controlable loss of quality of the image. That means that I can put more images online and it takes less time for you to
display and download them. The other reason is that I have very high quality versions of all the images which I use when I sell an image. This means that if you buy an image, the quality will be much better than the one on the site, won't have the corner signatures and it prevents people from downloading them and using them for commercial purposes. Again, if you want them in BMP format to use as a backdrop, then use a package like Paint Shop Pro to convert them. Alternatively, right click on any of the images and select 'Set As Background' to automatically set it to the background image. |
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Well that's it for now. Send me your questions and I'll update this page as necessary. Later, ......The Juggler |
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