The genAI artwork for Daydream Network was pretty abstract. Monochrome smoke (or something) overlaid with some thin angled lines reminiscent of an phosphor vector display like you’d see on an old-school oscilloscope, except black instead of green or white.
I liked that art well enough, but decided to be thorough about ditching the genAI. So here’s my new version:
The grey/pink features were generated from random noise, blurred and processed and zoomed in and blurred and processed and… etc. until I had some really interesting texture. In full saturation it was crazy psychedelic and I almost went with that. Toned down, it was somewhat reminiscent of the deep maroon/pink and green blobs that I mostly see when I close my eyes, and I almost went with that. But splitting the image into separate RGB channels, the green was this lovely grey texture, and after some deliberation I decided that was mostly what I wanted. It better matches the original monochrome and grey/pink is reminiscent of the brain. I softly erased a little of that layer on the bottom so some of the color version could come through.
The lines atop it were generated in the software that I develop in my day job — I created a bicone, generated a mesh for it, viewed the wireframe, and zoomed the camera into its midst, finding a position I was happy with. Some edge processing and blurring got it where I liked it. I found I preferred it as a light overlay rather than a dark one this time.
The big image is at https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a3394782237_10.jpg .
I haven’t just been remaking the cover art. Zeroes is one track away from being finished (plus the mastering, art, and the notes). I want to do something a little different with the notes, and talk more about technique rather than specific gear.
I’ve been reading Long Live Evil, an isekai where a young woman dying of cancer is given the chance to take over the body of a condemned villainess in a super-cheesy fantasy story. She’s not utterly without ethics herself, it’s just that she believes that the characters in the book aren’t real and therefore leaning into evil to get what she wants (the means to heal her real body and return) is totally fine. It’s mostly goofy and hilarious, aside of course from the cancer, which reads like bitter personal experience.
I’ve also rerolled another Guild Wars 2 character. My Asura warrior, Justice Upon Them, is replaced by an Asura elementalist, Synergist Staxi. She’s going for the Celestial Quickness Catalyst build on Metabattle, which should be nicely tanky for dealing with Champions. It’s a somewhat slow burn (…and freeze, and zap, and crush) while still using core specializations and no access to the Jade Bot enhancements; the defense is inconsistent. But a wizard who charges in and swings a warhammer… never let it be said that GW2 sticks blindly to fantasy RPG stereotypes.
The end of the Kemetic calendar year comes approximately at the end of July, and the start of the next is a few days later (they used a 360-day calendar). The end of the year and the space between is said to be more chaotic and dangerous than usual as the world is kind of coming spiritually unwound. Those between-days are also holy days, and the temple has things planned for that time. I’m taking some time off work to be able to enjoy it (and also just relax).
As far as other summer plans go? People keep asking me this but I don’t really have anything. We want to do some kind of daytrip stuff with my parents, possibly in the fall instead of summer. My brother and his wife plan to plan a visit in September, and my in-laws also want to visit sometime in the fall. I’ll also take some me-time off around Thanksgiving as usual, whether or not we’re going anywhere.