BLOGS

Lecturing at CTN Expo: "I don't want to see your degree - I want to see what you can do!"

CNN Light Years: NASA: Meteor over California and Nevada was size of minivan

30,000,000 years of Tritium!

This section is to provide info on various learning opportunities that are available of various topics.

http://www.blacksciencefictionsociety.com/forum/categories/education-learning/listForCategory

I am working on an ongoing art project in circular forms. Reminds me of diviners and tea leaf readers. A collage of paper shapes on a plate. I stumbled upon some curious configurations, one lights the whole room, one whirls like a tempest in a tea cup. Each form destructs or constructs or transtructs. Been getting strange emails of late asking me to sale the forms for 10 qzots and 50 quantizims. I was worried about alien abduction er thugs but one email had a disclaimer about the rite of passing permissions and unlawful energy flow access strictly enforced. Am I legit after all I stumbled upon this thing, this phenomenon, energy wells and shafts. I glanced in the mirror and saw a glowing mark on my right ear. I touched the mark while gazing in the mirror, a heads-up display appeared with records of procedure, sales and of course my diploma from Megagalactic Tech where I majored in multi polar quansits and quantim metacircular transforms. Sales have been down and I am spending time in my transient impersonation on vacation. I guess I like it too much and forgot myself. On this side of the galaxy I'm called "eBe", the energy bender. Anyway circular transforns are all the rage. Next year we are venturing into squares, yeah it's old school but folks like that edge of the universe feeling they get whizzing through the quantimhood. Qzots, you know the exchange rate into dollars is insane. Better off insisting on Quantizims, as they can be transduced into any currency in this universe. Did you note anything starting with a "q" sounds quosmic?

My writing is taking a back seat as I prepare for the first of two solar eclipses this year. On May 20th there will be an annular eclipse of the Sun. During an annular eclipse the moon moves in front of the Sun, but part of the Sun remains visible. It is necessary to wear protective eyewear at all times. Here is a short video showing the January 6, 2011 annular eclipse as recorded by the Hinode Satellite. 

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/index.html?media_id=49165671

For the annular eclipse I will be in Tokyo, Japan, making a documentary film. The documentary titled "Black Sun" is about two African American astrophysicists and their upcoming observations of the solar eclipses in 2012. We are raising funds for the filming in Tokyo via a Kickstarter Campaign. 

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/677592353/black-sun-documentary-film-about-the-2012-solar-ec

I am passionate about this project because it shows a different part of the African American community, a part normally not seen. We made a short five-minute promotional film of our two stars: Alphonse Sterling and Hakeem Oluseyi. 

http://blackcommunityentertainment.com/videos/1345/black-sun-five-minute-short

The annular eclipse will be visible from the western United States. Remember to protect your eyes.

Wish me luck on the campaign!

ATTN: Sci-fi and Fantasy authors, here is a free course given by the University of Michigan: Fantasy and Science Fiction: The Human Mind, Our Modern World https://www.coursera.org/#course/fantasysf

The Hierophants is back up for sale at these fine retailers

The Hierophants @ ComicsMonkey

The Hierophants @ Indy Planet

There are three extremely important elements of story creation. Therefore, it is  highly important that all aspiring writers hone their skills in these three areas of fictional writing.  These three elements are important for any type of story regardless of the story’s length be it a short story, novella, or novel.  This three elements are: the beginning, the point-of-no-return, and the climax. Each of these elements has an important function in crafting a story and can either make or break it. If either of these story elements are lacking, nonsensical, or not present, the audience/reader of that story will either quickly forget it or worst – feel like they have wasted their time!

What is the story’s beginning?

There are numerous and varied definitions for a story’s ‘beginning’. However, I think the most helpful of ways an author can think of a beginning is this - the establishment of the promise of your story. Every story makes a promise to its reader, and that promise can be anything! (This is why there are so many different genres of fiction!) Depending on the type of fictional story you are writing (for example: a romance promises a love story or a thriller promises excitement), your promise will vary. However, in the end, that’s really what a beginning of the story is: crafting and setting up a promise to your readers.

What is the point-of-no-return? 

The point-of-no-return is the scene, act, or chapter of a story that ‘seals the character(s) fate’. This is generally were the middle of a novel starts. It’s the scene were the audience/reader realizes that the characters can’t go back and must face whatever trials and problems that await them during the tale.

What is the climax?

Most aspiring writers mistakenly believe that the climax is the end of the tale. Wrong! The climax is where the beginning’s promise is fulfilled. If you are a romance’s writer – that character must find love, or you’ve failed your readers. If you’re a mystery writer – the main character must solve the crime. Failure to fulfill those initial promises in your stories will only make your readers feel disgusted or cheated.  Therefore, your story has reached its climax when the story’s beginning promise is fulfilled.

So remember – whenever writing a fictional story, make sure that these three elements, the beginning’s promise, the point-of-no-return, and the climax,  are well established because these three elements will determine if your story becomes a classic or is tossed into the trash!

Three weeks ago my fiction and poetry collection, How to Recognize a Demon Has Become Your Friend received a Bram Stoker Award!!!! Amazing! The competition was all good so I'm honored to have received it.

Then two poems from the collection are on the Honorable Mention List for Best Horror of the Year, volume 4 (by Ellen Datlow)
[http://ellen-datlow.livejournal.com/391918.html]

Feeling real blessed here...linda

Kepler...and Tatooine. They went there.

The Christian Science Monitor: NASA's Kepler observatory to continue hunt for strange new worlds

Governor-General Jaqualik could have delegated command of the Silhouette battle ship he was on board to a capable subordinate. He huffed at the thought. As the one hundred ships of his vaunted Border Fleet neared the rebel occupied moon called Ponrek Point, Jaqualik gave in to a tingle of joy. How many years had it been since he had personally commanded a mission as pivotable to his career as this one? Dribik succeeded in eliminating a notorious terrorist and traitor. Now it was left to Jaqualik to wipe out the organization that its deseased leader had spawned.

            “Surface readings are active,” an officer at the scan station announced. “I’m getting massive vehicle mobilizations and heightened power surges indicative of weapons going online.”

            Jaqualik, standing beside his command post at the lowest level of the bridge, looked up at the elevated scan station. “Excellent,” he said to the station’s occupant. Any doubt he may have had as to whether the GLFF base was actually on that drab looking slab of a moon had been effectively put to rest.

            Of course where the Watch Department and its director were concerned, Jaqualik shouldn’t have had a morsel of doubt to begin with.

            “Weapons range in ten seconds,” Olek, his first officer reported, glancing up from the table top near-space status screen. “Orbital defense satellites are deploying.”

            No sooner had he said that did Ponrek Point’s higher orbital plain light up with the flaring discharges of over three thousand satellite-mounted pulse cannons. Highly condensed bursts of energy whipped out into space, streaking toward the inbound Opheren ships like a horde of avenging angels.

            The Silhouettes at the forefront of the formation opened up with responding volleys. First, they fired molecular missiles in the paths of the energy bursts. The missiles detonated at mid point, releasing vaperous compounds. Well over ninety percent of the energy bursts plunged into white cloudy mists formed by the molecular missiles and dissipated as if they were doused in an ocean. Which, essentially is what the compounds were: heavily fortified water capable of negating the effects of energy based weapons.

            A rapidly forming cloud from thousands of pulse/missile impacts billowed across the front of the Silhouette line. Dozens of ships disappeared in the artificial cumulus, reappearing on the other side or as parts of the cloud began to fade.

            The Silhouettes fired a second wave of missiles, targeting the satellites. Brutally simplistic affairs those missiles were. The missiles exploded when in close proximity to their targets. Only, instead of releasing water clouds, they released swarms of ball bearings. Every satellite directed toward the invading fleet was flayed to its core components in a savage typhoon of hyper accelerated metal spheres. In seconds, the satellite ring girding Ponrek Point fell apart like an unsnapped belt and died in a churning compression of hot reactor-spawned fury.

            “Arm planet missiles,” Jaqualik commanded. He fixed a borderline crazed look on his second-in-command. “Have you pinpointed their piss hole of a base?”

            “We have,” replied Olek.

            “Good, open fire!”

            Triangular missiles the size of heavy fighter craft and armed with neutron warheads exited every ship in the Opheren force. They descended upon the moon, their guidance computers directing them toward the target that sprawled beneath its atmospheric shroud.

Have you ever been been playing video games and woundered how in the world they make these stunning levels? It almost seems magical how the levels in the game are made, but its far from magic! A Lot of blood,sweat, and tears are poured into those levels. But, there are major tools that make this process easy somewhat. I'm taking about the game engines baby! A game engine is set of tools already programmed out the box! Simaler to a framework for the internet coders like jQuery or jQuery moblie. I'm going to talk about three of these engines, but be forewarned. Even though these are pre-programmed tools for game development use, these engines are very powerful and can be very hard understand without broud understanding of multiple disciplens in the digital and fine arts. Before any polygon is layed out, a lot of work goes into the planning stages (or pre-production). It's best to splash out all of your ideas in a mind-mapping format. Once your ideas are out of your head and onto paper you can start layout your map.

Now with you're data planed out you need to start blocking in the your level, lets look at the easiest engine to use and then the most powerful!

http://unity3d.com/

The Unity Game Engine is one of the most flexible game engines on the market. It has support for many 3D modeling programs like 3Ds Max and Maya. Along with this great terrian creation tools, support for shaders and normal maps, programming in JavaScipt, C#, and Boo. There is also support many audio and video formats, great particle effects tools, and much more! Unity is also free to use, but there is also pro addition worth $1,500. This such a great entry level engine its hard not to reccomend it!

http://mycryengine.com/

When Unity begins to get small for you (really?) then check out the Cry Engine! They named this engine right because of the sheer graphical power this thing has is unbelievable! Like Unity, the Cry Engine has support Maya and such programs, but at much stricter and more powerful way for example; a more powerful audio system (7.1 anyone?) S-3D veiwing, the sandbox editer, and more!

http://www.unrealengine.com/

The Unreal Engine is pretty much the most popular engine to date. Epic Games really put a lot of pain into making this engine avalible to all that wish it. The Unreal Enigne is just as powerful as the Cry Engine, but Unreal is used for more game productions then Cry. This has ton of features, but also has support for Adobe Flash! Yes, the means that all Ureal developed games can be exportable to Flash in full 3D Glory!

As you can you can see, these are very powerful tools! I think it's a good idea for you to take each tool step-by-step, and be ready to have an understanding of programming fundamentals. These tools give you a great chance to make amazing games! Make sure you done your're homework by going to sites like http://www.worldofleveldesign.com/. Be safe and keep gaming!

All Links:

http://www.worldofleveldesign.com/

http://unity3d.com/

http://mycryengine.com/

http://www.unrealengine.com/

"He said: 'Baby you know what I like, and I love showing you time after time. Let me give you my lips—anywhere I want to put them on you, so romantic and very intimate.'
She said: 'Daddy, I love doing what’s right to you—giving you all of me—being freaky and naughty to make you happy.'
Unexpectedly, she lifted up her miniskirt: showing her thick, smooth thighs and fire-engine red panties and boots. She walked slowly over to him, and put her arms around his neck..."
Come into the garden of United Souls. With his second volume Quinton Veal gives us erotic fiction and poetry just for lovers.
Sit back, relax and enjoy...
Cover art and design by Quinton Veal

Check out my new book United Souls: Stories and Poetry of Seduction contact me at quintonveal@hotmail.com

available too at amazon & barnes and noble