NetjerSoft’s Eye

March is always one of the hardest months for me. My tops is November, as I’m trying to get presents for family. This month, it’s strictly for me. Every single 3d vendor on the planet puts on sales this month. STEEP sales. Daz is doing theirs. Get this: They throw up 1 to 3 products for 65 to 80% off. For each of those products you buy, you get a $1 voucher credited back to your account AND a 50% off coupon for the sale category of the day. Sometimes, you spend $1.80 on something, and since you get $1 back, it’s like buying it for $0.80. Nifty.

Not so much for those of us who are struggling – and I’m perpetually struggling. A lot of people think it’s glamorous that I’m “doing what I want to do”, and that I’m trying to make a game, be an artist, and that I get to work in a field I love. It’s great. Except the times when I can’t buy anything because I have no money. Most people do this “on a shoestring”, which means that they work a full-time, day job, and do this sort of thing at night till they get off the ground. Well… take away the day job, and you get the picture. (Have I mentioned I take donations via PayPal? lol)

Still, I’ve managed to scrape together a few things, and one of them, is this lovely character. I need to find a hairstyle that fits with the historical theme of the game, but other than that, I really love her. Her name is Madelaine Hargrove, and she’s Dr. Whittaker’s secretary. I may age her a bit, I’m not sure yet, but I just loved the old-fashioned style of this character. Here’s a render with the unaltered character, wearing some 20s garb.

If you want to see the full size version, click here: (I still haven’t figured out how to link back to the smaller image from the post. Sorry!)

Greetings to everyone on this sort of cold and dreary day! I’ve talked to the people at the web-hosting company, and the issues with the website will be resolved soon! Thanks for all the patience, I know it’s frustrating when you try several times throughout the day to get to the site, and it’s offline for some reason. As they haven’t had any other server-side complaints, I’m suspecting it’s something hinky with my site, and hopefully they’ll figure it out soon.

I’m going to see if I can get with a friend within the next few days, and have him poke through some of the .css in WordPress. I’d really like to get the blog finished, and it needs matching fonts, and a few other tweaks before I’ll feel comfortable making it the front page.

I’m also working hard to get the Art Gallery online, so soon it will be easier to track the work on games, and follow some of my learning process, if you’re interested in that sort of thing. I know a lot of you come around to see how my drawing is progressing, and while some of you like the words, some others just like the pictures. This will allow you a way to see the pictures as a group, not just as individual pieces with commentary.

Have a great day!

Finally getting around to some of the site changes I’ve been wanting to make. First on the list: updating the blog. I wanted to change it’s look, bring it more in line with the website colors, but give it a little pizazz as well. I think the new style shows a bit of my personality. I’ve managed to get the look updated and the colors mostly how I want, although I’m still not thrilled with the white border – if only for the fact that it isn’t a thin border around elements, but a background that’s empty farther down.

Next on the list is to fix the fonts. I’ve been at that for the last hour, but I can’t figure out how to make it work. I *think* I need to change the available fonts in the base styles somewhere, but I’m not certain. The site uses Papyrus for most of the text and titles, and that’s what I’d like to carry on the blog. The last step will be to move the blog to the homepage, and to get the menu working so that you can actually go other places from the blog. Right now, it’s sort of it’s own little island.

Well, the hurricanes are pummeling us here. Actually, it’s just the one: Fay. She has become the Hated One, the Nemesis. She has already caused massive flooding just south of here, and is sitting like an ominous faerie right over Palm Coast, cackling with madness and dropping spittle all over town.

Seriously, she made landfall in Tampa two days ago. She was moving 15mph, and slowed to a crawl through 7.5mph, then 5mph, then 2mph. She was finally stationary over Brevard County and they got pummeled by rain for EIGHT HOURS! They got over THREE FEET of rain, and people are being evacuated from homes, by boat. They’re without power, and sewage is backing up into houses. Further, the heavy water is harboring fish, alligators and water moccasins, which are invisible until they bite you! Scary stuff. The governor of Florida has called for a state of emergency, and is requesting aid from the President.

Meanwhile, Palm Coast has received steady rain, with no sign of it stopping. We’re experiencing winds of up to 50mph, and over 2800 people are without power as we speak. Flagler Pier is shaking like it’s going to come apart, and we’ve been sitting in the eye of the storm since 8am this morning. The whole thing is a huge mess. The skies are leaden grey as far as the eye can see, and the air feels dangerous. The storm is expected to regroup for yet a third time, and continue west across Palm Coast and up through the northwest part of the state. Hopefully, we won’t experience more power outtages, but the power’s already been out three times since yesterday.

If for some reason this site is down, or you place an order for a Gemstone Texture Pack and don’t receive an immediate response, please be advised that certain areas have been without power for days, and are expected to continue to be so. We *will* get you your download AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, but there’s no telling if we’ll even be somewhere with computer access. Depending on how bad things get in the coming hours, evacuation may become a real possibility.

Thanks for the patience!

     Being a single-person company comes with it’s own set of difficulties – you can’t farm out work to assistants, you can’t ask someone else to update the webpage, and you have to wear all the hats and carry all the responsibility.  Finally, if personal disaster strikes, everything has to be shuffled, reorganized, or just put on-hold until the crisis passes.

      Earlier this year, NetjerSoft faced just such a crisis, as a very close relative was diagnosed with cancer.  Needless-to-say, I dug in with the family - spending time together and helping to carry weight that couldn’t be shouldered by our ailing family member.  I missed every conference and seminar planned for this year, and was kept busy doing the round of doctor’s appointments and treatments, and dealing with a host of other responsibilities and issues one never thinks about until such a time.

      I made the decision, at that time, to stop work on the Crystal Texture Pack, halt art production on Pharaoh’s Frenzy, and programming on Bring Back Music, and to cease all education.  My focus had to be family, and the stresses we were all undergoing; and it was.

      Now, the first round of treatment is behind us – and with luck, there won’t be any others.  We’re doing a round of checkups and followups, and helping as our loved-one recovers from the physical stress and illness of the radiation therapy.  It’s a good time to begin picking up with projects, and starting some new ones.  

What’s Coming Up

Ongoing Education - Classes and tutorials to expand our texturing repetoire, and increase our skillset with modeling and design.

FREE Sims2 Content - We’ll be creating custom Sims2 content, and posting it for free to our Sims-loving customers.  (If you’re interested in creating your own Sims2 content, ModTheSims2 (www.modthesims2.com) is rich with all kinds of tutorials and information for texturing, modeling and creating clothing, items and people for your game.)

Crystal Texture Pack - Work will begin on the Crystal Texture Pack, another pack of textures for web-work, game development, and art.  This pack will include non-gemstone quality crystals like Malachite.

NetjerSoft hopes to serve you in the future, and will continue to provide texture packs, game development content and insights into the unique problems facing a single-person company. Thanks for staying with us through everything.

You can now visit Our Store, and purchase our products directly from our site.  We’re using PayPal’s Shopping Cart system, so your shopping experience is always easy, and your personal information is secure.  We never receive information like credit card numbers, so you don’t have to worry about how we handle them.  We’ve also updated the links, because certain browsers were causing followed links to darken too much against the black background.  Feel free to tell us what you think at netjersoft@gmail.com!

We’ve updated all the contact pages to reflect the new email address.  Hopefully our web host will have the email issue sorted out soon.  The new contact email is NetjerSoft@gmail.com.  Please make a note of it.  All “Contact” and “Contact Us” links should go to a page saying to use this email.  If you happen to spot a broken link, please let us know.  (Itemized emails – for instance “Blog: blog @ netjersoft.com, Projects: projects @ netjersoft.com” – should be considered broken links.  No pages should point there.)  Thanks!

GarageGames has decided not to publish the Gemstone Texture Pack, as it’s not ‘game development specific enough’.  NetjerSoft will be selling the pack through email contact, and will be looking at other sites, such as TurboSquid, for further distribution.  For those ordering direct through email, the price will be $9.99.  If you choose to get it through another site, the price will be higher to cover distribution royalties, etc.

Email us at netjersoft@gmail.com for further information. If you tried to get the GTP during pre-release, please accept our apologies.  Our web hosting company has been having difficulty with the email servers, as they attempt to relocate everyone to a server bank in Miami (they’re currently in Vero Beach).  Please send a copy of your original email to the new email address above, and we’ll get back to you as soon as possible.  Thanks for your patience!

     Updated the Contact page to include all the appropriate email addresses.  You can now contact us about the Gemstone Texture Pack, or other questions/projects you may have.

     We’re currently in talks with GarageGames about a formal release of the GTP.  Will keep everyone posted as things progress.  However, there is a possibility that if GG is interested in the GTP and we sign a contract with them, that the GTP will no longer be available through our pre-release email offer.  If you’re interested in the texture pack for the pre-release price, contact us immediately.

     Finally, spoke to the guys at AllState Computers (who provide our nifty web hosting deals).  They’ll be moving servers to a larger warehouse in Miami this weekend, so our site might be down sometime over the weekend.  If you can’t get through, please try again.  We apologize in advance for any inconvenience this may cause.

The Project page is now complete, with full pages for both Pharaoh’s Frenzy, our commercial game, and Bring Back Music, our freeware game.