Daniel Johnson, Jr.

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via Bill Trammel

I’ve been playing Real Time Strategy (RTS) games for about 10 months now. Thanks to a former coworker, I started playing Starcraft 2 (SC2). Thanks to Daniel Lewis, I also recently started playing Lord of Ultima (LoU).

Both of these games have multiple processes going on at once, and good game play requires adequate attention be given where needed; i.e., a good combo of micro-management and macro-management. For example, in StarCraft 2 you have to get your economy up and going at the beginning. Once you get that going well, you begin building the rest of your base and your battle forces. Eventually, you go in for the attack. At every step you have to make sure your economy is still going strong. When you’re sending troops to attack, you have to make sure your troop production is still going.

I’ve only been playing Lord of Ultima for a couple weeks now, and yet again, timing is key. You have to get your resources going, so you build and upgrade Wood Huts, Cottages, Quarries, and Iron Mines, for example. But you only have so many build and upgrade orders you can issue at any one time, and the higher the upgrade, the longer the process will be.

Similarly, you have a recruitment cap. You can only recruit troops based on the levels of your barracks, training grounds, and other related buildings. When you want to issue commands to raid dungeons, you can specify a mix of troops, but it takes time for them to travel to and from.

It’s like building and managing community. (more…)

Some might say that working in the soundbooth at church has ruined the way I look at movies, TV programs, and any other productions. I never realized how much goes on behind the scenes at church until Chuck, my friend and brother in Christ, invited me to start working with him back in the A/V room at church. I hadn’t noticed lighting changes with scenes, for example. I had never worked with ANY mixing board before, much less the 40-track one we have. MediaSHOUT, the system we use to send content through the projector and mixing board was just as daunting.

In 2006 I had been creating content through my own podcasts and blogs, and Chuck was well aware of it. In September 2005, after podcasting for less than a month, I recorded and produced audio from a domestic violence awareness walk we participated in. Ever have one of those projects you’ve worked on that you felt just had to be told?  Chuck heard this episode and complimented me on it. He said it reminded him of something he might hear on NPR. You can judge for yourself The Cheryl Dawson Memorial Walkathon.

I’ve been spending time in this specific behind the scenes environment for five years now, but for as long as I can remember I’ve been fascinated by what it takes to tell great stories that resonate with others.

You might say it’s ruined my DVD watching. Well, not my DVD watching. I put the disc in and immediately go to the Special Features so that I can see the “making of” featurette. My family, on the other hand, would much rather I just play the film. Or I’ll look up the Trivia page for it on IMDB.com and share it with my wife, who then says, “Can’t we just watch the movie?”

Seeing how others create inspires me to create more myself.

Can you relate?

This post was written entirely on my Droid phone. Another experiment in content creation!

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Cover via Amazon

I don’t know why, but ever since I got a copy of No More Mondays, Dan Miller’s follow-up to 48 Days to the Work You Love, I kept it sitting among the other books in my collection (Thanks, Brent!). It had been calling to me, like any one of those things you know you should do but keep putting off.

Updating my reading list

Seriously. I went to the library awhile back and checked out a couple handfuls of books. I even began reading some other books I’d gotten over the past six months.

But this book kept staring at me. (more…)

Image via Wikipedia

If you grew up watching Sesame Street in the 70′s like I did, you might remember the segment called “One of these things is not like the other. One of these things does not belong.” The point of it was to have us pick out which one didn’t fit.

Typing as a College Prep Course

Among the other classes that were availble in the College Prep (C/P) curriculum in high school, Typing seemed at first like it didn’t belong. It might seem like a no-brainer here in the 21st century, but at the time, it didn’t.  Algebra, Trigonometry, Calculus, English, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, American History – those were the ones we’d expect as college prep classes.

But Typing? Seriously? (more…)

Imagine if you woke up one morning, and your hearing was gone. Would you be able to listen with your eyes and other senses?

Learn To Read People

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been fascinated with how we communicate. It probably goes back to my time an awkward, insecure kid, looking for as many ways I could relate and understand people better. At a book fair in fifth grade, for example, I got a book about handwriting analysis; i.e., what our handwriting tells us about ourselves.  In junior high school, I read a book called Face Language, which talked about how you can discern things from people from their faces. There was another book, I think, called Body Language.  Suffice it to say, I’ve been a lifelong student of reading people. I’m still learning.

Listen With Your Eyes

Have you ever heard of method acting? Many actors, in preparing for a role, do things to put themselves in situations like the characters they are portraying. Francis Ford Coppola wanted Matt Dillon to understand what life in jail was like. To help prepare him for his role as “Dallas” in “The Outsiders“, Coppola had him spend the night in jail.

This past Saturday, my family and I went to the “All About Deaf Kids Fair” at Cincinnati Christian University, put on by the Deaf Institute, and it was a great time.  The theme was how we communicate in ways that are not just with our ears. They even had earplugs that us hearing people could wear to force us to “hear” with our eyes more. (more…)