Miniponics DIY Aquaponics for under 10$

Vinil is a friend from way back.. we both along with another friend set up the office aquariums at the studio we worked at.. Vinil continued his passion with aquaponics..



visit his blog and Facebook page for more details and dates for workshops he conducts around Bangalore.

The Evolution of Games Graphics

From naïve origins to the rise of cinematic realism: an account of graphical milestones in video games.

A fun and informative 5part series by Ahoy

Got Lollipop last night

Got the much awaited Lollipop update last night.. er.. early morning at 2:10am. I checked the phone for what sounded like a Vine alert.. and saw the system update notification right on top..  

It was a 479.5mb download so i connected it to the charger and let it download..

Then the installation took about an hour.. because i have all these apps and games that had to be "optimised" .. 

Voila! Lollipop in all its glory.. that flappy bird'esque game is frikkin difficult though!

That stunning wallpaper is 

Yellowjacket Incinerator by Scebiqu on deviantART

get it at http://scebiqu.deviantart.com/art/Yellowjacket-Incinerator-299783664

Holding the power button just gives you one elegant option now- a confirmation to shut down.

On rebooting i was welcomed by the new lockscreen.. i usually prefer to stick to custom lockscreens using GoLocker.. but have disabled that for a few days to see how the Lollipop lockscreen does.

Unlocking it brought me to my Nova Launcher home screen.. all widgets and the theme still functional.. 

quickly switched to the Lollipop homescreen and realised its still lacking the icon density customisability that i expect from a homescreen.. after using launchers like nova and Go i can't go back to the measly 4 icon rows on a full hd screen.. so will not be using this homescreen.

The obvous compromise will be with quick launching voice features and search.. which i didn't really use on Kitkat anyway. The other thing missing will be all the slick animations and stuff.. 

As a designer i do appreciate the work they put into all the new graphics and animations .. but after a few hours i'd had enough. will play with it a bit later.. but i just cant go back to 

a 4 icon grid. 

The rotation toggle was actually missing! For those who were looking for it i already had a power toggle app installed that did that for me.. but with lollipop one can actually make do with the built in toggles. There is no customisability.. so i forsee installing a power toggle app again https://play.google.com/store/search?q=power%20toggle

Anyway a quick visit to accessability settings and turning "Auto-rotate screen" off and on again.. enabled the toggle.

now to test my games and stuff.. will post an update on performance soon.

UPDATE (20|11|2014  7:42): 
bugs.. 
1) when someone calls me.. am unable to slide-to-unlock the lockscreen and answer the call! this happened 3 times.. have now uninstalled go locker incase that was interfereing.. (although it was disabled anyway).

2) weird glytch where the entire screen locks out except for the menu/task manager button which can be pressed to bring up the carousal of running tasks.. but nothing is clickable. have to reboot. After this occured 3 times.. ive now disabled Nova Launcher as well.. lets see if it happens in the android launcher.

A different kind of war based game

This War Of Mine provides an experience of war seen from an entirely new angle. For the very first time you do not play as an elite soldier, rather a group of civilians trying to survive in a besieged city. 

During the day snipers outside stop you from leaving your refuge, so you need to focus on maintaining your hideout. At night you get a chance to scavenge nearby locations for items that will help you stay alive.

Make life-and-death decisions driven by your conscience. Try to protect everybody from your shelter or sacrifice some of them to endure the hardships. During war, there are no good or bad decisions; there is only survival. The sooner you realize that, the better.

Heres the other poignant trailer featuring a survivor of the conflict in Sarajevo

available on Steam at http://store.steampowered.com/app/282070/
compatible with Windows, Mac and Linux/SteamOS

Puch 250 SGS Twisted version

Done entirely in Blender. A modified version of my old Puch model

Puch 250 Sgs Bent by Chaitanya Krishnan on Sketchfab

heres the old one

puch 250 sgs 014 by Chaitanya Krishnan on Sketchfab

and the full post about it is at http://chaitanyakrishnan.blogspot.in/2014/03/puch-250-sgs.html

Interstellar

Saw it last night in a regular theatre(non 3d non imax) and it was good enough. Of course i won't have a frame of reference unless i go see it again in imax/3d(hmm i don't know if its in 3d).. but i really can't sit through it again. 

Still my verdict - ✩✩✩✩★ 
let me explain why i can't give it a 5✩ rating

Caution.. spoilers start here:

1st✩
The science was good.. the Escher-esque time-bookshelf-tapestry was mindblowing.. This was the one movie that treated time dilation realistically and made it a seriously heartbreaking part of the plot.

2nd✩
The characters were mostly well developed.. though the robots seemed to have tons more personality than the other crew members.

3rd✩
The robots were brilliant. Took me a few scenes to get used to their weird monolythic form.. 

but like i already mentioned.. what they lacked in form they made up for in spades of personality. I'd watch a movie with just these weird robots in it.

4th✩
The ship and space sequences were great.. all the cg was pretty faultless.. except for the trippy event horizon shots..when you get really  really close to the distortion it tended to look like bad cg.. to anyone not familiar with the science its trying to depict. 

Minus★
The damn flash back bits.. did every bookshelf sequence have to be rewatched? got tedious and seemed like a dumbed down way of showing time/travel/contact.. 
Also what bugged me is when Murf runs upto Tom waving the watch around and yelling "it was him" ... just after setting fire to poor Tom's farm. The guy seriously looked like he was about to kill somebody.
The final reunion between Coop and Murf was .. so weird.. theyre meeting after decades.. and it lasts a few seconds of  "it was me"s and "it was you"s  and then she tells him to take a hike, she's got her own kids to spend time with now.. er.. wha?



Final Thoughts.. I loved it for the most part.. wish it had ended a full half hour earlier.. but ok.. i can live with the ending.. i guess. I do recommend it to anyone interested in Science Fiction, space travel and Leaving this messed up eco-disaster of a planet for greener pastures.

Stage themed board game

Stage themed snakes and ladders game level..done a long time ago.. never got used for the actual game..

    Stage themed board game
    by Chaitanya Krishnan
    on Sketchfab

a GI(global Illumination) test render of the more or less finished set

the final render with numbers, textures and lighting..ready to go to Flash

 a game of chance, where you roll an onscreen dice to make your character move to the next square.. simillar to snakes and ladders, but with a rock show theme