Lamin Martin’s first professional show

A little while ago, we were happy to have a very promising artist come through the in-house artist program at Oddly Studios.

Lamin Martin is a concept artist, incredible draftsman, and more recently digital colorist.  Recently he became a fulltime illustrator, leaving his regular job behind to focus on what he loves doing the most.  Lamin has an amazing ability to draw anything he can imagine, and imagine he does, as is evidenced by the incredible drawings he makes, inspired by legend and folklore.

Oddly Studios was very happy to host Lamin’s first show as a fulltime professional illustrator, and covered the walls of the OddPod with original works from Lamin’s collection, both from his latest book released at FanExpo, and from his previous popular works.

The picture above is of a happy Lamin Martin chilling on the rooftop lounge at the OddPod, along with members of his publishing team.  In the back you can just make out the gang from Studio 407, who among other studios came to check out the incredible artwork.

All of us at Oddly Studios wish Lamin the very best of luck and look forward to seeing much more great work.

I snapped this pic sitting fireside at “Camp C”, billed as probably the best interactive event ever.

It’s actually a really great idea come to life thanks to the generosity of Andrew Tedford, professor at Seneca’s School of Communication Arts.  Andrew makes arrangements for various teachers and industry professionals to get out of town for a weekend of fresh air and exercise (something we can usually all use) and to just have fun and compare notes about what is going on with education and the the business of interactive media.  This year three of the Oddly gang went and we all had a very good time, coming back with lots of good ideas and recharged to take on the sometimes hectic world of new media.

I hope there will be many more Camp C in the future.

Thank you Andrew.

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Telus SmartFit Puzzle Game

There are a lot of gamers at Oddly.  We like puzzles, FPS, MMORPG…and lots of other acronyms.  In modern times, branded games have become a great way for companies to engage their users, rivaling even social media in terms of creating brand recognition.

When our team was approached by the awesome designers at Teehan+Lax to create a rich media puzzle game for the Telus Smart Fit campaign, we jumped at the chance.

The SmartFit puzzle is designed to be served up in a rich media campaign, and in this case was presented through Video Egg.  We did a lot of user testing and used the feedback to build in nice little features that increase the user’s enjoyment of the game.  The puzzle pieces have a nice pliable feel to them and we spent a good deal of time tweaking the way they follow the cursor when grabbed.

The ‘snapping’ movement of the pieces when they find a position was a nice way of upping the affordance for the user – they just feel right.  And we created positive feedback by providing a ‘hint’ to the user.  Some constraints around the edge of the playable area complete the user experience – pieces slow when dragged near the edge, and can not be flung away.

We were aiming for a game that could be played in under a minute and would give a lot of enjoyment to the user.  On both counts, the Telus Smartfit puzzle game delivers.

Is it just me, or do the economics of audio books not make sense?

Recently I was cruising around on the iTunes store.  I like to catch a few podcasts from there, such as Digg Nation.  It is nice to take a bit of entertainment with you on the go.  I also get apps from time to time and I like to see what is out there, being a developer myself.

But while I was there recently I started wondering about the price of audio books.  Do they make any sense at all?

As an example, an audiobook from the Eragon series sells for $36.  Thirty six dollars!  I can not remember the last time I paid that much for any kind of audio recording.  Add to that the fact that the same book, the very same one, is available brand new on Amazon for eight dollars.

Yet the printed book has all the costs associated with it, much of which have to do with the disposal of books that do not actually sell.  We are talking about a physical product here with all the expense that entails.  And yet, it costs only one quarter what the audio recording does.  Eh?  I don’t get it.

Obviously, there must be something I’m missing here.  But if I’m missing it, perhaps there are a lot more people who would not fully grasp why an audiobook would be so expensive, compared with the good ‘ole fashioned kind.  These days anyone with a decent voice and a microphone can record audio and distribute it with ease.  So I ask again, why the hefty pricetag?