zorexx@blog

Regarding My Projects

2013-01-02T20:49:00.000+08:00

Hello everyone,

This took longer than it should have, but I've finally ported my projects, sfMidi, sfMod, and SSFile (C++ and C#) to VS2012.

What about sfTheora?
Well, unfortunately, it's currently bugged, and I can't seem to solve it yet now, so I'll put it on hold for now. I can't tell when it will be fixed so if your project requires playing video, please visit the SFML forums, there are some pretty good video playback libraries available there.

That concludes porting my projects to VS2012.
But since the title of this post is "Regarding My Projects", maybe I should announce my plans regarding my projects as well.

As you can see, I haven't done any updates to them for more than half a year. This will probably continue for quite some time, so I thought that I might as well consider them as final versions. Meaning that, I will only fix them when they stop working due to some updates in the dependencies.

If you have any questions, please leave them in the comment box below.

Signing off.

Small Update

2012-12-16T17:35:00.000+08:00

Wow, it's been more than 8 months since I last posted something here.
Sorry for the long hiatus, but I've been really busy for the past 8 months (and will still be busy for quite some time).

Either way, the main purpose of this post is to announce that the compiled binaries I've provided for VS2010 will not be updated anymore since I've moved to VS2012, I've updated the list in the downloads section as well to replace the VS2010 files with VS2012 files. There are a few which I decided not to update and hence removed them completely, and also added a few ones.

Please visit the download page here: http://www.zorexxlkl.com/downloads
to view the updated list.

If you're still looking for the old VS2010 ones, you can still find them here: http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/vs2010

Also, I have not updated my own projects to VS2012 yet, those will still need some time before they get their update. And since my hands are still full right now, the update may not come very soon, but I will try my best to get them done this year or early January next year.

That's all for the small update.

sfMidi 1.1

2012-04-05T13:44:00.000+08:00

What is sfMidi?
sfMidi is a static library for playing MIDI files with SoundFont 2 in SFML (http://www.sfml-dev.org/).
sfMidi uses FluidSynth (http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/fluidsynth/) to load SoundFont 2 and MIDI files.

Project page:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/sfmidi

Discussion in SFML forums:
http://www.sfml-dev.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7119

Latest version:
1.1.0

Last update:
Changed namespace to sfmidi.
Changed naming conventions of functions to camelCase.
Added error functions.
Fixed compatibility with latest SFML version (mainly naming conventions).
Dropped SFML 1.6 support.

Note:
FluidSynth does not support seeking by itself, therefore, in order to seek forward, sfMidi reads and ignores the audio data from FluidSynth until it reaches the desired offset.
However, in order to seek backwards, sfMidi has to reload the MIDI data, and seek forward from the beginning again, hence, seeking backwards will be slower than seeking forward.

Naturally, stopping is considered seeking to the beginning and playing it again, which means the MIDI data has to be reloaded again if we want to stop the MIDI. Thankfully, reloading the MIDI data doesn't take much time.

Also, for looping, I've tried using both the SFML and FluidSynth's loop feature, but unfortunately they did not work at all, so I had to implement my own loop function, which again, requires reloading the MIDI data.

Edit:
I've added a feature to preload MIDI data into audio samples in version 1.0.1, this means you can load the entire MIDI data into memory as audio samples, and this will result in faster and more efficient playback (no more problems with seeking).
Preloading takes quite some time to load, so be careful in choosing whether to preload or not.
Of course, preloading the MIDI data into audio sample means you get to unload the sound font, so you get to save quite some memory, unless your song is long enough to be larger than the sound font.
Preloading takes about 10MB of memory per minute.

Download:
Clean package (only everything you need to use sfMidi):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMidi-1.1.0.zip

Full package (includes an example and the VS 2010 project files):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMidi-1.1.0-full.zip

CMake package:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMidi-1.1.0-CMake.zip

More info + tutorial available on project page (http://www.zorexxlkl.com/sfmidi).

If you're still using SFML 1.6, sfMidi 1.0.2 (the last version that still supports SFML 1.6) is still available for download, visit the project page for the links.

sfMod 1.1

2012-04-05T13:43:00.000+08:00

What is sfMod?
sfMod is a static library for playing module files (tracker musics) in SFML (http://www.sfml-dev.org/).
sfMod uses libmodplug, and can play any format that is supported by libmodplug.

Project page:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/sfmod

Discussion in SFML forums:
http://en.sfml-dev.org/forums/index.php?topic=6178.0

Latest version:
1.1.0

Last update:
Changed namespace to sfmod.
Changed naming conventions of functions to camelCase.
Added error functions.
Changed release() to unload().
Fixed compatibility with latest SFML version (mainly naming conventions).
Dropped SFML 1.6 support.

Download:
Clean package (only everything you need to use sfMod):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMod-1.1.0.zip

Full package (includes an example and the VS 2010 project files):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMod-1.1.0-full.zip

CMake package:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMod-1.1.0-CMake.zip

More info + tutorial available on project page (http://www.zorexxlkl.com/sfmod).

If you're still using SFML 1.6, sfMod 1.0.2 (the last version that still supports SFML 1.6) is still available for download, visit the project page for the links.

sfTheora 1.4

2012-04-05T13:40:00.001+08:00

What is sfTheora?
sfTheora (previously known as SFMLTheora) is a static library for loading and playing Theora videos on SFML (http://www.sfml-dev.org/) with the help of libtheoraplayer (http://libtheoraplayer.sourceforge.net/).

Project page:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/sftheora

Discussion in SFML forums:
http://en.sfml-dev.org/forums/index.php?topic=4448.0

Latest version:
1.4.0

Last update:
Renamed SFMLTheora to sfTheora.
Changed namespace to sftheora.
Changed naming conventions of functions to camelCase.
Added error functions.
Allowed loading videos directly from constructor.
Moved MemoryLoader to MemoryLoader.h and MemoryLoader.cpp.
Removed Init and Release functions. (Moving them into the constructor and destructor)
Renamed LoadClip to load.
Added getDuration() and getTime() to Video class.
Added bound-checking to seek (in Video class).
Fixed compatibility with latest SFML version (mainly naming conventions).
Dropped SFML 1.6 support.
Fixed compatibility with latest libtheoraplayer revision (insertData parameter).

Download:
Clean package (only everything you need to use sfTheora):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfTheora-1.4.0.zip

Full package (includes an example and the VS 2010 project files):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfTheora-1.4.0-full.zip

CMake package:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfTheora-1.4.0-CMake.zip

More info + tutorial available on project page (http://www.zorexxlkl.com/sftheora).

If you're still using SFML 1.6, SFMLTheora 1.3.5 (the last version that still supports SFML 1.6) is still available for download, visit the project page for the links.

Screenshot:

SSFile for Java and Python

2012-03-30T20:27:00.001+08:00

SSFile for Java and Python are released.

Please visit http://www.zorexxlkl.com/solidshaper to download them.

SSFBox2DTest

2012-03-25T16:11:00.001+08:00

SSFBox2DTest is a sample that demonstrates loading shape from an ssf file into Box2D bodies and displaying it with SFML shapes.
Properties for bodies and shapes can be set from SolidShaper directly, including density, friction, color, etc.

Here's a video of it in action:

And, here's the source code:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/SSFBox2DTest-1.0.1.zip

SolidShaper

2012-03-15T13:12:00.000+08:00

Hi everyone!

I'm here to announce the release of my software, SolidShaper.

What's it for?
When using a collision detection or physics engine, we may encounter a problem, how do we create the shapes to be used in the engine?
We may of course generate them from existing tile maps or so, but this method may not be very efficient when you have a complex or abstract map.
We can also choose to use a vector graphics software like Inkscape, export them as svg, and load them in our game. However, writing an svg reader is quite a hassle, and since it's meant for vector graphics, it contains a lot of information that are useless for our games.

Here, I present to you SolidShaper.
With SolidShaper, you can create shapes in a simple and straightforward way, and export them as shape data (.ssf).
The file format is so simple you can just read and edit it with notepad if you wish to.
To make things even simpler, I've also written an import library for C++ and C#, and will do so too for Python and Java, and maybe a few other languages soon.

Please visit the project page for more information and of course, to download it:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/solidshaper/

The import libraries are also available on the same page (SSFile).

Here are some screenshots (more screenshots available on project page):

Settings:

Editing:

References:

sfMidi 1.0

2012-02-25T02:32:00.003+08:00

What is sfMidi?
sfMidi is a static library for playing MIDI files with SoundFont 2 in SFML (http://www.sfml-dev.org/).
sfMidi uses FluidSynth (http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/fluidsynth/) to load SoundFont 2 and MIDI files.

Project page:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/sfmidi

Discussion in SFML forums:
http://www.sfml-dev.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7119

Latest version:
1.0.2

Last update:
Minor bugfix for compiling with SFML 1.6 (in Music.cpp).

Note:
FluidSynth does not support seeking by itself, therefore, in order to seek forward, sfMidi reads and ignores the audio data from FluidSynth until it reaches the desired offset.
However, in order to seek backwards, sfMidi has to reload the MIDI data, and seek forward from the beginning again, hence, seeking backwards will be slower than seeking forward.

Naturally, stopping is considered seeking to the beginning and playing it again, which means the MIDI data has to be reloaded again if we want to stop the MIDI. Thankfully, reloading the MIDI data doesn't take much time.

Also, for looping, I've tried using both the SFML and FluidSynth's loop feature, but unfortunately they did not work at all, so I had to implement my own loop function, which again, requires reloading the MIDI data.

Edit:
I've added a feature to preload MIDI data into audio samples in version 1.0.1, this means you can load the entire MIDI data into memory as audio samples, and this will result in faster and more efficient playback (no more problems with seeking).
Preloading takes quite some time to load, so be careful in choosing whether to preload or not.
Of course, preloading the MIDI data into audio sample means you get to unload the sound font, so you get to save quite some memory, unless your song is long enough to be larger than the sound font.
Preloading takes about 10MB of memory per minute.

Download:
Clean package (only everything you need to use sfMidi):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMidi-1.0.2.zip

Full package (includes an example and the VS 2010 project files):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMidi-1.0.2-full.zip

CMake package:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMidi-1.0.2-CMake.zip

Install:
1. Download the "Clean package".
2. Extract the contents to "C:\" (You can extract it to anywhere you want, but I'll use "C:\" for this example)
3. Add the include and lib paths to your compiler.
4. Copy the contents of the "dependencies" folder into your project folder (where your executable is).
5. You're set!

Short tutorial:
sfMidi is very easy and straight forward to use, first, create a Midi instance:
sfMidi::Midi testMidi;

Then load your module:
testMidi.LoadSoundFontFromFile("GeneralUser GS FluidSynth v1.44.sf2");
testMidi.LoadMidiFromFile("All Night Long.mid");

or even simpler:
sfMidi::Midi testMidi("GeneralUser GS FluidSynth v1.44.sf2",
"All Night Long.mid");

you may want to check if the Midi instance is properly initialized:
if (!testMidi.Initialized())
return 1; // Failed to initialize

Now, just play it like a regular SFML music instance!
testMidi.Play();

And... that's it!

To preload the MIDI instead:

sfMidi::Music testMidi;

{
  sfMidi::Loader loader("GeneralUser GS FluidSynth v1.44.sf2");
  if (!loader.Initialized())
    return 1; // Failed to initialize

  testMidi.LoadMidiFromFile(loader, "All Night Long.mid");
}

Compiled FluidSynth

2012-02-25T02:16:00.000+08:00

Compiled without any audio drivers (bare minimum), as usual, with Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Express.

Download:
FluidSynth 1.1.5:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/fluidsynth-1.1.5.zip

Kagamine Len's Headphones

2011-11-22T22:08:00.001+08:00

Sup folks!

I've been listening to some Vocaloid songs recently (for those who don't know what Vocaloid is, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vocaloid), and suddenly felt like modelling Kagamine Rin's headphones.

After modelling the main parts of the headphones, it's finally time for her ribbon, but I can't find a good (or easy) way to model her ribbons (or maybe I'm just too lazy =P). Then I found out Len's headphones are exactly the same except without the ribbon. Perfect.
So I just renamed it to Kagamine Len's Headphones and consider it done =D.

Here's the render:

That's all for today, signing off.

zorexx

sfMod 1.0

2011-10-29T18:59:00.006+08:00

What is sfMod?
sfMod is a static library for playing module files (tracker musics) in SFML (http://www.sfml-dev.org/).
sfMod uses libmodplug, and can play any format that is supported by libmodplug.

Project page:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/sfmod

Discussion in SFML forums:
http://www.sfml-dev.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=6178

Latest version:
1.0.2

Last update:
Changed NbSamples (for sf::SoundStream::Chunk) to SampleCount.
Changed OnSeek(sf::Uint32) to OnSeek(sf::Time).

Download:
Clean package (only everything you need to use sfMod):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMod-1.0.2.zip

Full package (includes an example and the VS 2010 project files):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMod-1.0.2-full.zip

CMake package:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/sfMod-1.0.2-CMake.zip

Install:
1. Download the "Clean package".
2. Extract the contents to "C:\" (You can extract it to anywhere you want, but I'll use "C:\" for this example)
3. Add the include and lib paths to your compiler.
4. You're set!

Short tutorial:
sfMod is very easy and straight forward to use, first, create a Mod instance:
sfMod::Mod testMod;

Then load your module:
testMod.LoadFromFile("rainysum.mod");

or even simpler:
sfMod::Mod testMod("rainysum.mod");

Now, just play it like a regular SFML music instance!
testMod.Play();

Can it be any simpler?

Note: This tutorial only shows the basic usage of the sfMod library, please refer to sfMod.h for more details.

Website!

2011-10-20T19:44:00.000+08:00

Hi all!

Just announcing here that I have created a website (zorexx@site), and http://www.zorexxlkl.com will now lead to the website, while the blog is now at http://blog.zorexxlkl.com.

I've moved all my files from my previous file host to the web host as well, and will upload the links on the blog soon.
The "Games", "Other Projects", and "Other Downloads" page will be removed from the blog, and will be replaced with links to the relevant pages on the main site.

Thanks for reading this post, I hope you'll enjoy the new website.

zorexx

Compiled tolua++

2011-10-12T10:18:00.002+08:00

I've compiled this a while back and planned to upload it, but since I haven't got the time to test it, it got delayed until today.
Anyway, here it is. (As usual, compiled with Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Express.)

Note: Since there was no project files for Visual Studio 2010 in the original source, and the Visual Studio 2008 project file is only for the tolua++.exe and not the tolua++.lib, I ended up making my own project files, hence, I've uploaded 3 packages:
No suffix: Clean package, containing just the files required to get you going.
"full" suffix: Full package, has the source and vs2010 project files, ready for compiling
"vs2010" suffix: Just the project files, copy these into the tolua++ source/root folder (where the README file is) and compile. I did not assign any version to this package because it should work with future versions of tolua++ as well, unless there's any major change to tolua++.

Download:
tolua++ 1.0.93 (Clean):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/tolua++-1.0.93.zip

tolua++ 1.0.93 (Full):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/tolua++-1.0.93-full.zip

tolua++ Visual Studio 2010 project files:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/tolua++-vs2010.zip

Changed File Host (DriveHQ)

2011-09-14T14:14:00.002+08:00

Hi all!

Sorry for killing my blog, I have no intention on doing so, but I just don't have anything worth posting (or maybe I'm just lazy to blog *whistles*).

Anyway, this is just a short update, I've changed to use DriveHQ's ftp service to host my files, mainly because you'll have to wait 60 seconds before downloading each file, and 30 minutes before downloading another file on hotfile.

So, for your convenience, I am now using DriveHQ. Older files will still be available on hotfile (as a mirror link), just in case anyone still want to download from there.

SFMLTheora 1.3

2011-09-14T12:00:00.025+08:00

What is SFMLTheora?
SFMLTheora is a static library for loading and playing Theora videos on SFML (http://www.sfml-dev.org/) with the help of libtheoraplayer (http://libtheoraplayer.sourceforge.net/).

Project page:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/sfmltheora

Discussion in SFML forums:
http://www.sfml-dev.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4448

Latest version:
1.3.5

Last update:
Included libtheoraplayer's header files in distribution.

Download:
Clean package (only everything you need to use SFMLTheora):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/SFMLTheora-1.3.5.zip

Full package (includes an example and the VS 2010 project files):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/SFMLTheora-1.3.5-full.zip

CMake package:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/SFMLTheora-1.3.5-CMake.zip

If you're using SFML 1.6, you may need this fix:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/fixed_sfml-1.6.zip

Install:
1. Download the "Clean package".
2. Extract the contents to "C:\" (You can extract it to anywhere you want, but I'll use "C:\" for this example)
3. Add the include and lib paths to your compiler.
4. Copy the contents of the "dependencies" folder into your project folder (where your executable is).
5. You're set!

Note:
If you're using the CMake package, you'll have to link libtheoraplayer to your project.

Short tutorial:
SFMLTheora is very easy and straight forward to use, first, create an Video instance:
SFMLTheora::Video testVid;

for SFML 2, you'll have to create a clock instance:
sf::Clock clock;

Then load your video:
testVid.LoadClip("bunny.ogg");

Now, in your game loop, add this line:
testVid.Update(clock.Restart());

or if you're using SFML 1.6:
testVid.Update(sfApp.GetFrameTime());

or, if you use a fixed framerate (e.g. 60 fps):
testVid.Update(1.0f / 60.0f);

Draw it! (in your game loop where you draw other things)
renderWindow.Draw(testVid);

That's it! Create, Load, Update, Draw, just that simple.

Screenshot:

GLEW Compiled for Visual C++ 2010

2011-07-28T16:14:00.004+08:00

GLEW 1.7.0:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/glew-1.7.0.zip

HDD Painted

2011-07-26T15:04:00.000+08:00

It's been quite some time since I last posted, mainly because I don't have anything worth posting so far (or maybe I'm just being lazy =P).

So anyway, I bought a Western Digital My Passport (Essential) some time ago. Originally, I was looking for a white one, a matte white one, or at least something matte so I won't have to bother about my finger prints and small scratches all over the hdd. Unfortunately, the WD My Passports are all in gloss, but I still want to stick with WD My Passport. So anyway I thought that I'd just buy it and give it a paint job or something.

After many weeks of procrastination, I finally decided to paint it yesterday, and here it is:

p.s.: I don't have a good camera, so sorry for the low quality photos =)

Basically, it's spray painted matte white, fluorescent blue for the star (yes, it glows under UV light), and finally coated with Krylon Matte Finish.
The star was painted with a stencil I made with Inkscape. I printed it out, secured it on a piece of OHP film, and used a precision knife to cut the shape out. The OHP film was used as the stencil.

There are minor imperfections here and there, but I'm satisfied with the final product. =D

Bye bye scratches and fingerprints!

Aside from painting my hdd, I also went for my US visa interview yesterday morning and got my visa approved. Now all there's left to do is to wait for my passport with the visa to be mailed back to me, and prepare to fly to the US. =D

Minor Changes To Blog

2011-06-21T23:36:00.000+08:00

Hi,

Just a short update here, I've changed my search box (from google search to just plain blog search, and from that to a nicer looking one =D).
Also, I've changed the feed icon into a bigger one (from 16x16 to 32x32).

That's all.
Really.

Some new compiled binaries for Visual C++ 2010

2011-05-30T16:40:00.006+08:00

As usual, compiled with Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Express.

SDL-1.2.14 (Comes with SDL_image, SDL_ttf, SDL_mixer, and SDL_net):
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/SDL-1.2.14.zip
Mirror: http://hotfile.com/dl/123707729/dd78c7b/SDL-1.2.14.zip.html

OpenAL-soft-1.13:
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/openal-soft-1.13.zip
Mirror: http://hotfile.com/dl/123707740/39d6fc1/openal-soft-1.13.zip.html

zorexx.

Australia

2011-05-26T14:26:00.001+08:00

So... I'm supposed to post this day before yesterday (before the previous post), but I was kinda lazy and procrastinated until today since it's going to be a long post.

Last week, I went to Australia to attend my sister's convocation, which is in Melbourne. Well, the convocation is only one day, but going all the way to Australia just for the convocation? Nah, no way. So we decided to go for a vacation as well. My sister went earlier, on the 2nd of May, while my mother and I went on the 15th.

We arrived in Melbourne at bout 7am Australian time (16th May). My sister's friend picked us up and fetched us all the way to our apartment (yes, apartment, not hotel, for various reasons). It's a 2 bedroom apartment, so my mother and sister shared the master bedroom while I get the other smaller (really small) one. Here's my room:

The wardrobe is to the left of the photo and is really small, but at least it's enough for me. =)

It's a pretty nice room.

So the first thing I saw when I open my luggage was... A disaster.

Really.

My shampoo/body wash spilled.

I guess my luggage was being crushed by others on the plane, that's what you get for checking in early. =(

I wouldn't actually call it a real disaster if it's just my shampoo spilling with my clothes in there. The problem here is, I have some books in there!

My Japanese text book and exercise books. They were right beside the shampoo so... you can imagine what happened, I didn't take a photo of it, but I'll just say it's pretty bad. I don't mind the clothes getting shampooed, since I can wash them anyway, but I can't wash my books!

I tried using tissues to wipe them off, they don't seem to go away. Tried using a wet cloth, well it's better but not going away as well. Finally I decided to just put it beside the window and dry it for a day. Okay, it dried, with traces. y textbook was pretty much cleaned though, but my exercise books have shampoo traces on them now, if I put some water on it it'll be slippery once again, and now they have shampoo smell. =( Shampoo books. I don't actually mind the smell, but really, it looks horrible, since the ink (my name) got smudged around.

Okay I'll stop complaining, let's move on.

After settling down, we went to buy some prepaid sim cards so that we could contact each other in Australia (without using roaming, which is expensive). We found this really nice solution: Lebara Mobile.

Here's the rate:

A$0.25 for international calls, flat rate.

A$0.15 per minute for local calls.

A$0.15 per sms, same for international and local.

As you can see, it's pretty much meant for international calls, I mean, A$0.25 no matter how long you talked? That's really cheap! If you make a local call for more than a minute, the international call is actually cheaper than the local, weird, but awesome.

That night I talked on the phone with my friend here in Malaysia for half an hour. =D

A$0.25 confirmed.

However, for international call, the A$0.25 is charged the moment you make the call, regardless of whether the person picked up the phone or not. Well I don't mind this anyway, it's understandable. (I still have A$6.xx when I came back to Malaysia =X )

On the second day, We went to this bakery called Giant Steps in Healesville to have lunch. The food there was really good. We ordered some sour bread, lamb shoulders, mushroom pizza, etc.

After that, we went to a winery called Domaine Chandon. This marks the place I first drank wine. =D

We went for wine tasting. I couldn't really tell if the wine is good or bad since it's the first time I've drank wine. But to me, they all tasted bad. =P

Actually I just don't like alcohols, they are bitter, and I hate bitter stuffs.

All the wines were bitter to me, even the ones my sister said was very sweet, wonder if this is normal. o.O

I didn't take many photos while I was in Melbourne, but here are some from when I went to the winery.

The last 2 photos are perfect for a wallpaper. =D

Unfortunately the last one is kinda out of focus. =(

On the 18th, we went for my sister's convocation. Woke up early in the morning to attend the convocation, it was a very cold morning. After that it's just the usual convocation stuffs. After the convocation, we had lunch with some of my sister's friends. And finally we headed home.

Nothing special happened on the next day, my sister had to something to do in the evening so my mother and I just went for a walk around the city. We didn't go anywhere far actually, just around our apartment. We went to a shop called, Pancake Parlour, recommended by my sister.

This is what I ordered:

And my mother ordered this:

Look delicious? =P

Let's move on.

The next morning, we got to the airport and headed to Sydney. The first thing that caught our attention was, the taxi. Really.

The 2 cars in the photo are taxis.

At first glance, I was pretty sure what I saw was a police car, or something along those lines. If you're wondering, no, those are not airport taxis, or any special taxis, those are the average taxis you'd see all over Sydney.

What's not a taxi:

See?

This is an accidental shot, I was trying to get a clearer view of just one taxi, and when I saw this car pass by in my camera viewport and thought it was a taxi, and... yea, that's how I got this photo.

For Sydney, we'll be staying in my aunt's house.

My aunt fetched us from the airport to her house.

Just like in Melbourne, my mother and sister shared a bigger room, and I get the small one for myself.

This is where I sleep in Sydney:

It's a really nice room. The floor was wooden by the way, with a carpet between the bed and the desk. =)

The first place we visited in Sydney was the Opera House, I'm sure you've heard of it.

On the way there, we saw this really interesting statue:

See that statue there? (click photo to zoom) Just a plain old statue of a sitting man? Not quite.

So what happened was, after putting some money in that little box down there by his feet, the statue greeting me and shook hands with me. =D

No, it's not a machine or whatsoever, it's a real human. It's a kind of street performance.

We did see another one (a more realistic one in my opinion) in Melbourne, but we were in a hurry that time so I didn't take a photo of it. =(

Sydney Harbour Bridge

Sydney Opera House

A Random Bird, just thought it looks suitable for some kind of meme. =P

Night Shot of Sydney Harbour Bridge

Night Shot of the City

The next day, we went to Blue Mountain.

We visited the Three Sisters.

The Three Sisters

A Closer Look (Zoomed In)

We walked down the Giant Stairway. Well, not the whole thing, just a part of it, I walked half way and suddenly I saw nobody around, since I had no idea when will it end, I decided to give up and climb back up. =D But man, those stairs were steep.

An Even Closer Look of One of the Three Sisters (the other two are blocked by this one, shot from the Giant Stairway)

After that, we had picnic lunch (still on Blue Mountain). Some sandwiches, tea from aunt's house, etc.

Here's a nice silhouette photo taken from the bench I was sitting on for picnic:

After lunch, we (just my sister and I actually) went for this sightseeing thing.

We got the Scenic ticket, which is as follow:

Skyway -> Skyway (back to starting point) -> Scenic Railway -> Scenic Walkway -> Cableway (back to starting point).

Skyway

Inside the Skyway Cable Car

Looking Through the Glass Floor in The Skyway Cable Car

Stairs to the Waterfall

The Waterfall

Scenic Railway, at some point you'll feel like you're actually falling vertically

Cableway, too crowded, didn't get a chance to shoot from inside

That concludes our trip to Blue Mountain.

Now, the next day.

We head out early in the morning to meet up with our cousin (from Canada, currently in Australia), then headed to Darling Harbour.

Halfway through we got thirsty and decided to stop by a cafe to get some drinks. I got myself a cup of hot chocolate. When my hot chocolate came, I was like, "This is my hot chocolate?". Okay... What am I supposed to do with it?

I know that, for tea, it's normally served as a tea bag, some sugar, and some milk. But not hot chocolate. Hot chocolates are usually served ready made! (or maybe I just didn't know)

I pondered for some time, until I thought, maybe I should just try pouring the molten chocolate in.

"Oh crap! Am I supposed to pour them all in?"

Ahh... Who cares.

In goes the milk.

As a result, I had a lot of spare milk.

Here's the result:

As expected, it tasted like... pure molten chocolate, just imagine how sweet it was.

So I drank a bit, and add more milk, drank about half, add more milk, and keep repeating until I finished the milk. =D

Anyway, it's still too sweet all the way the end. The milk was sweet too. =X

After a walk around Darling Harbour, we went to the fish market for lunch. Sydney Fish Market that is.

"You call this a fish market? It's more like a hawker center!"

Sorry for the blur photo, I don't own a good camera =X

Totally out of my expectation, now I get why we're having lunch here.

Anyway, this is our lunch, it's a serving for 4 people, but even with the 5 of us, we still couldn't finish it.

Yummy

It was really crowded there, but thanks to some kind Korean ladies, we get to share a table with them. We had to squeeze a bit, but it's a lot better than eating on the floor, right? The Korean ladies even gave us some Korean delicacies they brought from home! =)

As for the food, it was really good. Aside from what you see in the photo, we also ordered some raw oysters and some sashimis. Those were pretty good as well, probably the freshest I've eaten.

We went to Chinatown, my mother got some lanolins there. We also bought roast duck for dinner. Other than that, nothing much, just some window shopping.

Chinatown Entrance

Finally, our last day in Australia.

We went to Bondi Beach. We spotted some really nice graffiti there (real graffiti art, not like the ones in the previous post).

My Favorite

This one's a little creepy =X

We did a coastal walk and I found this really economical swimming pool.

Basically, when the tide rise, the sea water fills the swimming pool, and when the tide lowers down, the pool is open. =D

There were quite a number of this kind of pool along the beach, so I suppose it's not that rare, but still kinda interesting in some way.

Here are some photos I've taken in Bondi Beach and along the coastal walk.

Reminds you of a certain operating system's default wallpaper?

Couldn't decide which one's better

Notice the rainbow by the waves, Mother Nature is beautiful =)

After that, we had lunch, went back to rest for the remaining of the day, and finally head to the airport in the evening. There was a lot of turbulence during our flight back to Malaysia, but it landed safely. =) Oh and we landed 30 mins earlier than scheduled. It was announced before take off, weird.

That concludes my trip to Australia. All photos in this post is taken by my Canon Powershot A470, with a scratched lens, which is the reason why I try my best not to use the zoom at all.

Thanks for reading this looooooooong post. =D

zorexx.

What Have I Been Doing

2011-05-10T20:37:00.006+08:00

I noticed my blog is kinda dead since I posted about dropping Going To School!!. (It wasn't an active blog in the first place anyway, oh well.)
So, I decided to update it a little by posting about what have I been doing since I've dropped Going To School!!.

3D

Okay, you're probably thinking about the new 3D displays and all right now, maybe the Nintendo 3DS, or some 3D phones.
Unfortunately (or fortunately), I'm not talking about that 3D, I'm just talking about the 3D-computer-graphics 3D, like 3D modelling, 3D programming and all.

I've recently picked up 3D modelling with Blender.
For those who don't know about Blender, here: http://www.blender.org/.
I really like the interface of the new Blender 2.5, especially when compared to the old Blender 2.4 interface. It makes things very straightforward and easy to navigate, especially with the new spacebar menu.
The picture above was done in Blender and only in Blender (except for the resizing, it was originally rendered in 1920x1080).

Anyway, I've also gained some interest in 3D programming. I'll start doing some 3D programing with Ogre3D (http://www.ogre3d.org/) once the version 1.7.3 prebuilt SDK is out (I'm kinda lazy to compile this one myself =P).

By the way, this doesn't mean I'm completely shifting over to 3D, I still love 2D as I always do. =D

zorexx.

Going To School!! Dropped

2011-05-01T13:13:00.003+08:00

Bad news, but I'm dropping my Going To School!! project. There are several reasons for this, but it's mainly because I pretty much lost the interest in making it.
I might pick up this project again in the future since it's already like, 40% done.

Anyway, for now, I decided to take a break from making games until I have a good idea for a new game.

To those who were looking forward to this game, please accept my apology for the disappointment. =)

Some Compiled Binaries for Microsoft Visual C++ 2010

2011-04-29T11:37:00.019+08:00

Hi, I've decided to upload some compiled binaries of some projects. I often find compiling dependencies pretty troublesome, so I decided to share the love by uploading my compiled versions. =D

These are compiled with Microsoft Visual C++ 2010 Express, if you're using another compiler, don't bother downloading these.

Anyway, here are the files, enjoy:

Downloads:
zlib 1.2.5
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/zlib125.zip
Mirror: http://hotfile.com/dl/116140589/18695f9/zlib125.zip.html

libogg 1.3.0
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/libogg-1.3.0.zip
Mirror: http://hotfile.com/dl/129400825/c74a11c/libogg-1.3.0.zip.html

libvorbis 1.3.2
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/libvorbis-1.3.2.zip
Mirror: http://hotfile.com/dl/129400926/9ca4f8e/libvorbis-1.3.2.zip.html

libtheora 1.1.1
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/libtheora-1.1.1.zip
Mirror: http://hotfile.com/dl/129400916/996a5ee/libtheora-1.1.1.zip.html

libtheoraplayer (from SVN, version unknown, but at time of compile, the latest binary version available from the main site is 1.0 RC2, compiled on 03/03/2012)
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/libtheoraplayer_030312.zip

SFML 1.6
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/SFML-1.6.zip
Mirror: http://hotfile.com/dl/129329043/167c061/SFML-1.6.zip.html

SFML 2.0 (from Github, unstable version) (Compiled on: 02/04/2012)
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/SFML-2.0_020412.zip

Box2D 2.2.1
http://www.zorexxlkl.com/files/downloads/Box2D-2.2.1.zip

Note: I'm not the author of these projects, I just compiled them for convenience.

Custom Pages and Changed Link

2011-04-21T00:24:00.005+08:00

Hello,

Just a short update: I've added custom pages to my blog. Currently I've only added "Games" and "Other Projects". I hope this will make my blog easier to navigate!

The new navigation bar is located right below the header/banner.

Also, I've changed my blog link again, from http://blog.zorexxlkl.com to http://www.zorexxlkl.com.
http://blog.zorexxlkl.com will now redirect to http://www.zorexxlkl.com (same goes to http://zorexxlkl.blogspot.com and http://zorexxlkl.com).

zorexx.