Back in the early days of computer gaming one may remember the Comanche flight simulator. The simple 3D engine used for this and other games is based on a so called voxel rendering engine. Searching the Internet for this technique I found this nice article from Alex Champandard and this one from Codermind. Putting two and two together, again I paid attention to the WriteableBitmap class that is part of Silverlight 3.

To emphasize the .NET Open Space 2009 that is starting tomorrow here in Leipzig, I used a special background texture for the sky. Just press the start button and use W-A-S-D of your keyboard to fly around the terrain. I will clean up the sources after the upcoming and put it here on my blog. So stay tuned.

Playing around with the new WriteableBitmap class in Silverlight 3 I remembered the time I started with VGA programming in assembler. After a quick research I found this simple algorithm to visualize the effect. I added the interactivity via mouse click and keyboard input to create new fire initiators.

The source is available for free: FireEffect.zip (12 kB)

Another small sample using dynamic generated animations in Silverlight.

The source are available for free: TunnelAnimation.zip (7 kB)

Some more photos to be used as wallpaper:

Bee.jpg (1600x1200)
Bee.jpg (1920x1200)
Bee.jpg (2560x1600)

Country-Side.jpg (1600x1200)
Country-Side.jpg (1920x1200)
Country-Side.jpg (2560x1600)

Flower-Sky.jpg (1600x1200)
Flower-Sky.jpg (1920x1200)
Flower-Sky.jpg (2560x1600)

Allium-Giganteum.jpg (1600x1200)
Allium-Giganteum.jpg (1920x1200)
Allium-Giganteum.jpg (2560x1600)

Sparkling-Fire.jpg (1600x1200)
Sparkling-Fire.jpg (1920x1200)
Sparkling-Fire.jpg (2560x1600)

Tree-Light.jpg (1600x1200)
Tree-Light.jpg (1920x1200)
Tree-Light.jpg (2560x1600)

After a long run on a bumpy road our Trian.Whiteboard finally found it's way to the MSDN Code Gallery. Even if Microsoft Silverlight 3 is knocking on our doors this smart sample is a good start to get in touch with this technology. It shows how to use XAML to create a Rich Internet Application that communicates with a Windows Communication Foundation service in the background.

Check it out: http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/whiteboard
Play with it: http://playground.pixelplastic.de

The results of a short trip through the dark park.

As I saw the following short film (due to a tweet of zumpe) I remembered the TiltShift style photographs I wrote about months ago. And now I'm thinking of buying such a lens. I like it.

Are those the first signs of spring?

Shot last week, walking around in the park.

Just found in my photo archive.

Am 20. März 2009 wird unter meiner Regie das dritte .NET Bootcamp der .NET User Group Leipzig stattfinden. Wie sollte es anders sein, geht es dabei um Microsoft Silverlight und die WPF. Die Registrierung ist ab heute aktiviert. Die Plätze sind limitiert, daher schnell anmelden. Falls ihr nicht wisst, was hinter den Bootcamps steckt und wie diese ablaufen, kann ich diesen Artikel von Torsten empfehlen.