creativeinsanity.net Main Page!
You've probably stumbled upon this site somehow - hello!
This is a really minimal page these days, because most of my content is on sub-sites and random pages. In other words, it's like a splash page, but instead of pretty but useless images or some obnoxious Flash thing that plays techno*, it's got links, both to my stuff and other people's stuff.
That tacky striped background? I've had it since 2002 when the site first went online, and I can't bring myself to get rid of it. Perhaps I should give it a name.
* I actually like techno. It's the principle of the thing.
Quick Jump: About Me - Art - Writing - Zoids - Joined & Adopted - Links - Contact
About Me
Nosy, are you? I have profiles on LiveJournal, my Zoids site, last.fm (music), and Flickr (photography).
If you don't want to bother reading all that and just want to know what this weirdo looks like, here's a picture of me wearing AKG K81 DJ headphones. My other true loves are a pair of Sennheiser PX-100s. There's also this picture, which Google seems to like.
Art
I am lazy, and so all my art can be browsed in directory form, and that's about it. I move stuff around a lot (mostly in the form of punting it to the sketches directory), but rarely delete, so there's some pretty embarrassingly bad work still up. It's more fun that way!
To follow sketches and random crap as I make them (beware outdated links!), check out my journal as filtered to show the art and/or sketches tags.
If you dig Zoids fanart, I've got a proper archive of most of mine on Liger's Union, and a few select pieces on DeviantArt.
Writing
Now Wordpress-tastic and organized! Amazing. Next on my to-do list: an archive of weird dreams and related plots.
Zoids
Kickass animal mecha model kits. Why do you need more than that?
Well, okay: I collect these things. They're a fascinating, moving, well-engineered crossbreed of model and toy. Instead of looking like humanoid whatsits, they're shaped like animals and dinosaurs. Some of them are even shiny.
The line itself has a written backstory and a number of anime and game tieins, so there's fanworks here beyond models and photography. I write stuff, even.
Joined & Adopted
Links
Want to link to me? Text links are fine, but if you want to use an image, I've got a couple. For Zoids-related link banners and links, check out my Zoids links page.
Japanese language
Japanese-English Dictionary The kanji lookup speaks SKIP. Very customizable. Don't like my settings? Make your own!Jim Breen's WWWJDIC The translate words in Japanese text feature is particularly handy, as is the multi-radical lookup.
nihongoresources.com Multiple dictionaries plus all sorts of resources...in your choice of colors.
Kiki's Kanji Dictionary Good for when you can pick out a radical but are lost on stroke count, or for when you just want to browse kanji.
Tae Kim's Japanese guide to Japanese grammar One of the better grammar references I've found - and downloadable!
Tim's Takamatsu Japanese language and culture info. Lots on verbs and adjectives, in particular. (Beware the romaji, though.)
The Kanji Game A javascript game for memorizing kanji, both by reading and by English meaning. Also includes kana!
Babelfish Mocked for its (funny) gibberish, it's still pretty useful for navigating sites. Things it doesn't understand get left in Japanese.
Excite translation The Japanese answer to Babelfish, and usually better with prose. Sometimes implodes in a pile of ellipses.
Convert characters to Unicode Or rather, convert Chinese (and Japanese, including kana) to those funky &number; things.
Engrish How not to make your products look cool, along with funny signs and other odd translations.
Hanzi Smatter The other way around - how not to use Chinese characters to look cool. Beware tattoo "artists" bearing gibberish fonts!
OS and software
Ubuntu Linux is not Windows, but it comes in a ton of flavors, and it's free for the mucking about with. Ubuntu and its breeds are a bit tempermental in my experience, but also rather newbie-friendly. See also its Minty cousin for a different look and more media stuff preinstalled.Knoppix I haven't used it personally, but Knoppix is specifically made to work off a Live CD, and is thus useful for those "my hard drive broke too much to boot the OS, but I know there's files on there I can save" situations.
Damn Small Linux Another haven't used it personally thing, but their mission amuses me. Teeny OS :D.
Rockbox Open-sorce firmware for your mp3 player...with tons of plugins and replaygain support. A bit wobbly sometimes, but so was my default firmware.
foobar2000 Speaking of replaygain and your music, foobar is refreshingly simple, and works natively in Windows and pretty well in Wine (other than the equalizer). I love this thing so much.
Amarok Or if you want something more complex in the style of iTunes or WMP (but not crap), there's Amarok. Yes, it's Linux-only...sorta. For now.
Pidgin Multiple IM clients in one customizable program. No ads, no spyware, no failure at chats.
GIMP (aka The GNU Image Manipulation Program, also for Windows). My program of choice for photo editing. Want thing X or Y? There's probably a plugin for that. Do not expect it to look like Photoshop, however, unless you...get a plugin for that.
ArtRage ArtRage sports oil paint with tasty blending (especially with a tablet) and other real media-mimic tools. The free version is usable, and the full version cheap. Works readily in Wine.
Notepad++ Like Notepad and tabs had babies, with syntax highlighting and many other features useful for coding. Also works readily in Wine.
Lynx installer for Windows Lynx, besides being made of plain text and win, is a good way to test sites.
Opera Everybody and their dog's heard of Firefox now, but if you don't run any extensions in Firefox and want speed (or you just want something different), Opera may be more to your liking. I found it noticibly more zippy on my old XP compy.
Terragen Ever wanted to make cheesy CGI terrain for backgrounds? Now you can.
µTorrent Small, lightweight, and functional.
CSS, (X)HTML, and website stuff
The WC3's (X)HTML and CSS validators, aka the first things to check when your page breaks.A List Apart Articles and info on a great many topics.
Position Is Everything Something broken in your layout? PIE may well have the answer in its list of issues and fixes for multiple browsers.
CSSplay Many examples of what one can do with CSS, including menus. Most are free to use, and can make great reference.
CSS Zen Garden Proof standards-compliant code can do pretty and flexible—same HTML, many layouts.
CSS Color Chart For when you want to find colors by name and shade rather than fiddling with a graphics program.
NineChime Software Home of Wacintaki, one of the better oekaki scripts out there.
Simple Machines Forums aka SMF. I prefer these to phpBB, though it's a worthy free solution too. Both are very moddable.
Random Useful Things
Keepvid, one of many ways to save things off Flash video sites. Try the .mp4/high-quality versions of Youtube files!RIAA Radar Check if that CD you wanna buy is Big Evil Label or not, and find smaller independent stuff.
Measurement Units Conversion ...for just about everything.
LEO Dictionary German to and from a number of languages, English included. Also in English, but that's less fun.
Digimon Card Album Scans of Japanese Digimon cards, all organized by set.
A Teaspoon and an Open Mind Lots of Doctor Who fanfic in a more sortable and searchable form than fanfiction.net.
Doctor Who Ebooks From the BBC. Free
Wikipedia: Silly Things are what they say on the tin. Not so much useful as funny, but I wanted them here.
How To Be Funny And Not Just Stupid Courtesy of Uncyclopedia, but applicable to much humor writing.