Everything you have been taught about the history of our planet is wrong

 
To see more go here:

http://www.farsight.org/

Failure to pay attention to this means extinction. Watch the video and explore the website with an open mind. Investigate what they are saying on Google Earth yourself. Ask yourself why has this information been hidden from you. Always question, without exception. Share with others what you learn.

The Witcher Report - Chapter 1

UPDATED 7-18-2014

Some of this stuff may be considered spoiler material, even though I tried not to give too much away, so if you are a stickler for that sort of thing this post, and any following it, will not be for you.

So I have been playing The Witcher on my PC. I had some issues with it starting out, and I still do. If you are considering buying this, be warned it is based off the Neverwinter Nights engine. It is a 3D Isometric view point 'n click RPG by default. However, it was modded to have an over-the-shoulder view, that can be switched to either side, and this view is a close as you get to the kind of experience you have controlling the character in something like Oblivion or Risen.

Also be aware this is a Bioware game. Bioware = no 3D movement and interactivity. What do I mean by that? No Bioware game, to my knowledge, has jumping, climbing or any sort of z-axis movement. All worlds designed with a Bioware engine feature terrain that has slanted or sloping paths. You don't have rocks you can jump on or cliffs you can step over. The folks at Bioware do not believe in the necessity of full 3D movement. I know this because they told me this at their forums some years ago, around the time of the release of the Mass Effect game, which until I learned how these people thought I was excited about. Whole planets you can explore! Awesome! No wait, you are going to go to uninhabited, undeveloped planets and find sloping surfaces to drive around on. PASS!

Anyhow, keep those things in mind if you are thinking about buying it. If these things don't bother you, or if you prefer your games to be like this, then you will enjoy The Witcher. As I am playing through it for the first time, I thought I would share some tips. Perhaps someone out there will appreciate the information. My guess is that few people, if anyone, will care. But I will leave it out here, on the web, just in case.

TIP #1 - SOS (Save Often Silly.) Keep an archive of at least 16 saves as you play this game. Save before every conversation, after every battle, before every battle when you know one is coming up, before making any decision, before entering any new location as well as after leaving it.

You want to save like this for two reasons. 1 - the game crashes occasionally, at least on Windows 7 64bit, and I am using the Enhanced Edition, which is the most stable. 2 - If you say the wrong thing to the wrong NPC you're screwed forever. They will refuse to talk to you anymore.

Keeping a save archive like this will help you, especially if you have to go way back, as I did, to correct something.

TIP #2 - The final boss battle with The Beast will kick your ass so be prepared. Seriously, even on Normal difficulty.

My first time fighting it somehow both I and the sorceress survived. I had no idea at that time the battle was supposed to be hard. But I discovered that once you enter Vizima you can never go back to the outskirts, and if you make the choices that leave you with the sorceress in the final boss battle there will be nobody left alive to do anything with, so all the quests have to be completed before you enter the trap door in the Salamandra quest. Yes, another classic RPG mistake, there is no going back. When you leave the outskirts, as far as I know it is for good. I never found a way back out of Vizima.

Once I figured out that I had some incomplete quests, and I could not return to the Vizima Outskirts, I used my save archive to go back, way back, before the boss battle. I went back again, before I entered the trapdoor, so I could level my character up and fully develop the Ard sign.

Before you go near that trapdoor, prepare yourself by upgrading your Ard (wind) sign completely and your Intelligence to. Levels 1&2. Get at need at least one grindstone and have a Necrophage and Specter oil at the ready.

If you die you will have to go through a huge conversation as you exit the cave and will only be able to leave it when he says he is going back into the cave to get the sorceress.

TIP #3 - Goes with the previous tip. Part of preparing yourself is doing the Huntsman quests. For me they didn't really show up in my quest log. I was grinding along, getting ready to level up and earn some bronze, when I fought a bigger Drowner type creature than before - a Drowned Dead I believe. Killing that (be careful, it is very powerful) earned me 200 oren when I reported it to the Royal Hunsman (not far from the inn.) It also earned me a LOT of experience and some ingredients I needed.

Then I was reading through stuff in the Journal and found the bit about walls hiding the rich people's burial sites, and I took that as a hint. I returned to the Crypt and found a whole new area! A bunch of Ghouls, defeated using Ard and Strong Style, a few walls I had to blow up, and a whoile lot of treasure. An Algoul at the end, another 200 oren from the Huntsman, more experience, more treasure, more ingredients.

Only after doing these could I make the Thunderbolt. I leveled up my Ard completely and am now ready to tackle the Hellhound again. I will report back with my progress.

TIP #4 - Talk to everyone, the golden rule of the RPG. If you do you may find, for example, a random stranger giving you gold, a woman who will give you a tip about an ambush, and other useful things.

TIP #5 - The first books to get are the alchemy texts from the alchemy seller located around the area of the inn, or inside. Once you have these you can harvest ingredients from the vegetation both outside and inside caves.

TIP #6 - Take care in the Echnipops cave! This is about the same difficulty as the final battle. Read about the plant and use the information. Strike, strike, strike, hit with Igni, un away and hide behind something until your heath regenerates. Kill the outermost ones first, the furthest away from the others. If you dive right into the middle you will be attacked from all sides. Keep some distance between you and the other plants.

Going through this quest is the only way to access the church. There is a surprise waiting for you, based on your response, and a valuable item waiting.

TIP #7 - Consider no area to be static. At least three areas changed here in the first chapter.

I am about to return to this cave one last time to see if any other areas have opened up here. I will say I find these areas suddenly being opened or changed disconcerting. But now that I know to look for such things, I will use that information.

There is no reason to return, and the Echnipops respawn, so unless you want the experience, or are a glutton for punishment, there is no reason to return.

TIP #8 - Even though it is as scary as hell, run all around the water's edge and through the roads at night. If you manage to survive you will gain a lot of experience, and once your Intelligence is maxed out, a lot of awesome ingredients.

7-18-2014
I have finished the boss battle for the first area, the Outskirts of Vizima. I didn't even use the Necrophage Oil or the Grindstone. In my rush to the battle I forgot. I still had some Specter Oil applied. I drank the Thunderbolt, used the Ard on the Hellhound, stunned it, and killed it.

Everything happened so fast the game messed up. A villager approached, in blue, not an enemy yet, and I was able to kill him. The the whole dark screen knockout thing, then I wasted the lot of them. The Sorceress survived.

It was even easier to beat this boss this time than the first time I beat it. I am still in shock. So now you know the key.

Laying That First Brick...

I am writing this after watching a little inspirational video I found at YouTube:

 
I have a question for Will Smith, and others, that say skill comes from beating on your craft. What do you do, when you have beat on your craft, for over a decade, and have nothing left to show for it?

I know the easy answer is to say something like maybe that isn't what I am supposed to do, or maybe I don't have the talent for it, or something. Maybe there is some truth here. But what if this is something I used to be passionate about, something I enjoy doing?

When I started out sometime between 1999-2001 I was working with Deathmatch Maker. I can't remember the specifics, what brought me there, I think I saw the box and purchased it because it intrigued me. I was really into Quake at the time. The point is, I taught myself this editor. There were few tutorials, and no YouTube to go to.

Then I changed to Unreal, and Unreal Tournament, then UT 2003-2004. I taught myself UnrealED. Still no YouTube, but a few written tutorials here and there. Here's the thing... I understood what needed to be done, to make a map, to design a level. I knew what something, done right, should look like. I was able to help two mappers I know of get into the game industry. With my constrictive criticism their work in UnrealED improved exponentially. But my own work suffered...

I moved on again, to Morrowind and then I dabbled with Oblivion. I did make some very creative things at this time, Valenwood and Amaya Lodge. But you need to understand, I had been at this for a few years now, and I was still unable to do anything good in UnrealED. I taught myself Max around this time as well. Think I depended on written tutorials to begin with. 

I wanted to be involved in the game industry. I wanted to make games, or levels, or maps, or something. I tried many GCSs but lost whatever it was that allowed me to pick up the other programs I had been using. Tried to get into Blender, failed. Tried to get into programming - went to college, failed. Tried and failed and tried and failed again to get into programming.

Learned Photoshop - I relied heavily on others to learn 3DS Max and Photoshop. Time passed, my passion waned, and now I sit here, and the romance is dead. I no longer love video games. But I miss playing them. I no longer love to map and model. But I miss doing these things. I stopped trying to program. I may be ablout to take it up again. Because I saw something, the other day, someone who did it all, made their own game, its assets - everything. So many times I heard this couldn't be done. Bullshit! Improbable maybe even impractical, but not impossible. Here is the link to this person's work:
http://merdalinteractive.com/

For years I believed that I could so something like this. I had a vision of a few games I wanted to make, and even a creating environment. I have always believed that with the right tools you can do anything. I have always believed that anyone can make a 3D video game, that it does not require years of experience, work, and hordes of people. Hell I read that book about John Carmack and how he started out! I have never believed in this thing called skill or talent. I just think some people pick stuff up faster then others. I am, unfortunately, one of the slower ones now. Maybe I didn't use to be.

I guess all that happened to me wore me down. I grew up online, without a properly supportive environment, and I suppose when I lost my website, that I had earned with my initial work with Unreal, it was the straw that broke the camel's back, so-to-speak.

Now I see the new games, even played a few, see the new tools out there, and it just seems too hard. Programming seems too hard. I know the basics, I understand things like loops. OOE, polymorphism. But where do I go from here? Mr. Smith says lay that first brick. Programmers say make a small program or game, that it will suck. But make it small, so you can make another, and another. Beating on your craft. But what do you do when you have enough knowledge to understand programming, but not enough to make a small game or application?

I think there is something wrong here. It should not be this hard. I think part of this is on me. I have changed so much these last few years, dropped that aspect of my identity, my personality, that was a gamer. I think maybe I have sabotaged myself somehow, programmed myself somehow to be unable to just sit down and work on that first brick.

But I think part of this, a large part, is on society. It's on everyone who supports the idea that making a game is hard. Making a level is hard. That it has to be hard. That it has to be work. The focus is on the difficulty. Nobody is focusing on the creative, fun aspects. Maybe because everyone else went to college, suffered through a shitty programming course, and emerged into the world, jaded.

No, I challenge the idea that you have to beat on your craft. Doing the same thing over and over but expecting a different result is the accepted definition of insanity. Still I admire Will Smith for saying that, and there is some truth here to laying one brick at a time. I appreciate that. But you don't need to bleed, you don't need a degree, you don't need to kill yourself off making bricks. Making bricks, speaking figuratively, should be easy, or at least seam easy. The gamer playing the video game that everyone says is too hard, who is enjoying themselves, who is truly having fun, moment by moment as they play, never notices the difficulty.

The mindset has to change. There are no such thing as the blessed lucky or special ones, and then the rest. We all have equal access to all of this. We have to stop buying into what others tell us, what our friends say, what the forumers say, what our parents say, what our churches say, what our society says. We have to stop listening to the garbage and tune in to only that which supports us, encourages us, and helps us.

Until we do that people like me, waking up after 10 years beating on their craft, are going to think they wasted their time. that it was all for nothing. that all the negative crap they hear was right, and if one of us suffers in this way, we all suffer.

Pursue your dream, your passion, those things which speak to you. Listen to your heart, tune into that voice inside. Follow that guidance, ignore all else. Support one another in your individual supports. Even as you walk the path of your success, help those around you walk theirs. Work together for each other's highest good. Then watch society change for the better..

Do you really want Monsanto involved in any way with your food?

I saw something tonight that disturbed me. It was an episode of Lost Worlds, and it was about the lost world of the Manhattan project. One scene in particular caught my eye - I will provide a screenshot later. An old sign, white with black lettering, that said, "Monsanto Chemical Company."

Yes, it's true, Monsanto was involved with the Manhattan Project in World War 2. The same people trying to force feed us GMOs (Genetically Modified Organisms) and making farmers use genetically altered seeds was also involved in nuclear development. You can see for yourself here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto

Do you really want a company with a foundation in chemical production and nuclear development putting food on your table? Do you really want your children to put anything that company is even remotely responsible for making in their mouth?

Another thing... Monsanto has survived through both World Wars. It is a 110 or so year old company. How is it that it has survived this long? Simple, doesn't take a genius to figure it out, The company is funded by the government. It had to have been back when it was involved in the Manhattan Project, and for the company to still be around today it's a fair bet it still is.

Your government and Monsanto are working together to feed the American people, in general, GMOs. Not the rich, or the powerful. The president and his family are protected from any GMO foods. No, this is strictly for the main populace.

I can guess why, knowing what I know now about meat production. It takes 7 pounds of grain to make 1 pound of beef. The government is currently subsidizing your dairy and meat products. But America is in debt well past its eyeballs (no wonder, the Manhattan Project alone cost the equivalent of several hundred billion dollars in today's money), and Obama has barely managed to squeak is past another recession. It has to cut costs somewhere. It is simply too expensive to continue subsidizing our foods, and it is literally eating up our crops to do so.

In short, just like we will see in this upcoming movie Interstellar, we are running out of food and water. We are destroying our planet to eat what we eat and live the way we live. Either the population must be decreased, or a cheap food source must be provided. GMOs are the current answer, at least as far as the government is concerned.

So next time you see a poll from me or someone else asking for your support, your vote against what Monsanto is doing, I strongly advise you to add your voice to the rest of us. They may have the money and power, but we have the numbers. In the end its the sheer numbers that win. But only if we stand together, against these things we do not want.

It is time to shut Monsanto down, and tell the government to go back to the drawing board. I am going to start providing information here, on Google+, about places where you can add your vote, donate if you are willing, and help out in whatever way speaks to you. I will start by giving you these links:

Avaaz
http://www.avaaz.org/en/

Change.org
https://www.change.org/

Demand Progress
http://act.demandprogress.org/

Sierra Club
http://www.sierraclub.org/

SOPA Watch
http://www.soaw.org/

Sum of Us
http://sumofus.org/

Watchdog.net
http://act.watchdog.net/

Politics1
http://www.politics1.com/

We The People
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/

Worldwide March Against Monsanto
http://rt.com/news/161184-march-against-monsanto-updates/
 

Some Thoughts About UFOs and A Few Other Things...

So I just watched some episodes of National Geographic American Paranormal and Weird or What. It's more my dad's sort of thing than mine. Anyhow I had a few thoughts about things I wanted to share.

To start with this huge, flying V everyone saw some years back in Arizona. I was really disappointed with the theories they presented. Since they didn't mention this, I thought I would. Now, before I begin, please note. I am not a scientist. I was home-schooled and the science material was scarce, as well as Christian influenced. I have never cracked open a physics book to my knowledge, although I tell myself that someday I will. So we're going on simple logic here, based on what little I do know. OK?

So the earth has a pull called gravity. The more mass an object has, the stronger the pull. That's why throwing an ant off the Empire State Building will probably do nothing but cause the critter to fly for a while. However throwing off an elephant will create quite a mess.

If there is an energy pulling down, then there must exist its opposite, an energy pushing up. Not only that, but it will be the exact equivalent. So the key is to reverse the pulling energy, turning it into pushing energy. Use the earth's gravity. This is my idea of what anti-gravity is. This is how I would define it. Probably not scientifically accurate. But the basics should be correct.

That means a 1/3 mile object flying above the earth's surface, weighing a helluva lot, has, but its very mass, the ability to push itself above the earth's surface using the planet's gravity. All that has to be done is figure out how to power this, and of course how to reverse the pull of gravity.

This also easily explains the abilities of the craft, sudden acceleration and 90 degree turns. The energy pushing up only has to be directed in the opposite direction of desired travel, and the use of something like flaps, as you see on airplane wings, would enhance the steering, much like a small rudder controls a large ship at sea.

It also explains how any living organism(s) inside could survive. Obviously if you can reverse the pull of gravity to power and propel your ship, you can reverse the effects of g-force, maybe even using the same systems. Neutralize the pushing back with a pulling ahead. Probably very much like a shield, although most likely not visible, around the ship, protecting it and its occupants.

Finally that light behind it, before it accelerated away? That was a charge-up. The lights have something to do with how it transforms the pull of gravity into a push, and what we see here is the exhaust, so-to-speak. Red would be the color after a power up for a sudden acceleration, it is most likely generated between the wings, explaining the design. If scientists understood how this system worked, the design would then make perfect sense.

Oh and the see-through effect? More than likely something like a light bending effect, maybe the result of the shield around the craft, which would also explain the haze around it.

Very simply explanation, and I didn't need a PHD to come up with it, so why was this not mentioned? You do know that anti-gravity is being worked with, right now, don't you? But this brings me to my next thought.

I have no facts or figures to back this up, and I am not saying we are doomed or the situation is hopeless. Understand that I try to live fully in the present moment, and any though given to the future is one of man living harmoniously with each other and the planet.

Recent research has come to light that vast amounts of money, I can't remember the word for it, black-something, has been put towards keeping everyone in the dark about the actual state of the environment. This is money that can not be traced to any source. Apparently the earth is in far worse shape than we thought.

This troubled me, not for the obvious reason, but for another one. If the wealthy and powerful, and one has to assume the wealthy and powerful are behind this, want to keep us in the dark about the actual state of our planet, want to keep us being consumers right up to the very end, what is their end game? Aren't they doomed like the rest of us? I mean if the planet dies, we all die, end of story. So why would they hasten their own destruction? I can't believe they're stupid enough to believe something like if they ignore it it will go away. What is their agenda, their escape plan?

I might have put it together tonight. Let's assume for a moment that none of the UFOs we have seen are of alien origin. That they are instead from earth. Well this theory has a strong possibility of holding up simply due to the fact of all the classified, destroyed, hidden and suppressed technology out there. There are gigs of the stuff on the internet, free energy information, all kinds of inventors, but their work has been kept from the public eye. Some of Nikola Tesla's works has been classified, and it is rumored that he was developing a system of sending power wirelessly. He was able to light up a field of light bulbs at a time roughly 100 years ago when the tech for this did not exist.

So here is my theory... There is a group or a collective or several groups or collectives that have been stockpiling advanced technology. They then continue to develop and research this technology. They operate outside of the government and the military, although they may have some arrangement where they share military tech to remain autonomous. Chances are our political leaders know nothing about them, that only a few in the military do.

They began testing various crafts and propulsion systems in the 1950s. Our first UFOs. They allowed rumors to spread such as Rosewill, but they have little, if any, connection to the military. Their bases are well hidden and probably protected by billions of dollars, as well as possible technology that hides them from satellites, or simply having control of satellites over their area. My guess is that they started underground somewhere, and have since developed the tech to cloak themselves, much like the light bending shield that made the flying V appear transparent.

They started then, maybe even earlier, but perhaps the 50's was when they rolled out their first craft. My guess is the design has something to do with the craft's propulsion. They have been rolling out craft, with newer and newer tech, as they perfect the technology. The final goal is not for military ends. At least not directly. They intend to leave.

Whether they want to leave the earth because they saw, years ago, the way things would go - perhaps had some technology that revealed this to them, or if they started with an idea to venture out into space and now they are escalating things because of the condition of the environment, I don't know. But my guess is that this group of collective is preparing to leave the earth, and only the cream of the crop, by their definition, is going with them.

These tests of theirs would also explain the denials from the military. Obviously they can't have us panicking. There is an invader here, and until they know what the hell is going on, they will keep the civilian population in the dark. But it explains the occasional dog fight between the air force and these craft. There is no way the air force could succeed. These craft, for the most part, block, jam or simply do not appear on radar, and we can safely assume most other forms of military tracking are useless. Any missile fired would strike the shield and do no damage, assuming the missile could even track or lock onto the target.

So there you have it folks. I am by no means saying aliens aren't out there. But all the alien encounters I have heard of sound exactly like testing. Human subjects being tested for various purposes, in preparation of space flight, and craft with advanced propulsion systems being tested for the same reason. The whole alien thing and the raging fire of conspiracy theories that surround it only serve to mask what is really going on. Makes it easier to hide what you are doing on earth when everyone is staring at the stars. It's just magician slight of hand. Draw our collective attention over here, while the trick is performed over there.

So what are your thoughts on this? On my theory here? Feel free to comment!

UPDATE: So after watching another episode of Weird or What I think I know what their plan may be. Apparently there is something called, "Time Dilation." Essentially if you took a craft out, fast enough, for a tour around the edges of our galaxy, something like 23 years would pass for you. However here on earth something like 150,000 years would have gone by. Long enough for an ice age and for the planet to renew itself I'll bet. Especially if they took some plant and animal seeds with them. They could come back and start over.

So what do you think? Could this be their plan?

C++ Without Fear by Brian Overland - Exercise 04.01.01 - Corrected Code

If you are working through this book, before you look at the code, I encourage you to download the source files yourself, from here:
http://www.informit.com/store/c-plus-plus-without-fear-a-beginners-guide-that-makes-9780132673266

The source code is found in the Downloads tab, where you click on the word here. Do not click on the website link, as it goes to an unrelated website.

Study the code for this exercise after you have tried to work through it on your own. HINT, you will need to use a function! See if you can get it to work on your own. If you remain unable to do so, refer back to this post.

Here is the corrected Source Code:
#include <iostream>

using namespace std;

int factorial(int num);

int main() {
    int n;

    cout << "Enter a number and press ENTER: ";
    cin >> n;

    cout << "Function returned " << factorial(n) << endl;
    return 0;
}

int factorial(int n) {
    int product = 1;

    for (int i = 1; i <= n; i++)
        product = product * i;
    return product;
}

I will post any additional exercises or assignments that need correction as I work through the book.

Some Observations About Blender

I just wanted to share a few of my observations as I proceed through Neal Hirsig's Blender Tutorials. I thought it might be an interesting read, and may be even a little enlightening.

I should mention that I used 3DS Max exclusively for roughly a decade. Since version 5 to about version 8, with some dabbling in the new 2010 release, I have made models for a village in the trees and architectural pieces for my Unreal Tournament 2004 levels.

I should also mention that my first exposure to Blender, outside of watching my friend try to use it some years ago, was Blender 2.49. It was a nightmare and I came to hate the program that seemed to, on purpose, do everything backwards. I tried writing a book as I attempted to learn this iteration of Blender, had an editor and everything lined up, but I could bot follow through. It left a bad taste in my mouth. I think I even stated somewhere that I would never use Blender again, probably with a fair sprinkling of expletives.

Things have changed. I have changed. I am not physically, if scientists are to be believed, completely the same person I was back in 2006-2008. Cells grow and die in the physical body. I was a Christian then, I have since left the Christian faith and all religions. I learned how to lucid dream, astral project, and see the world in a different way. I stopped mapping and modeling, I change my user name and presence on the web. I used to be depressed all the time, and I was angry, occasionally lashing out in rage. I contemplated suicide. I thought there was no reason for me to live, no hope.

I came out of all of that, and the work I made with these mindsets, beliefs and thoughts, to this point in my life. Just starting to get interested in level design and modeling again. Looking forward to seeing what I can make with my current mindset. Trying to use all free tools.

The free tools also changed. Gimp is pretty much on par with Photoshop now. Blender's interface no longer makes me want to run away in terror. The UDK, CryEngine 3 and Unity 3D are all freely available to use with a few limitations. If I want to make music I have LMMS and Audacity. There are actual books on Blender and Gimp as well as video tutorials at YouTube.

The old way of searching for help, joining forums, asking questions and hoping for a timely, relevant answer are fading. Now everyone is making tutorials, sharing their knowledge. It's just a lot easier to get help and to learn things. Back when I started with Unreal I had to get the ball rolling on the tutorials. There was very little information out there as I recall. I made my tutorials series for a site I ran then, called UnrealED Exordium, and that earned me a place at Gamespy. I ran several versions of the Nucleus, added to the tutorials I had done, and even, towards the end. made a few video tutorials.

Now UnrealED Exordium, The Nucleus, Nali City and a bunch of other familiar things have come and gone. Gamespy stopped hosting, I lost my website. I moved, stopped playing games so much, I started years ago playing Quake online. But my focus changed from playing games to making my own things. And now we come to the subject of this post, Blender.

My initial return to Blender came about in my interest in using software legitimately. I found the remains of the Uru community and I wanted to start making my own ages. I think I still do by my focus has changed. I tried DelED and Platinum Arts Sandbox (Qube 2) before that.

To make an age for Uru you have to, essentially, use Blender as your level editor. It has been tough and I am glad I found Neal's tutorials. Because as of yesterday, following his 3D Design Course, I found myself suddenly able to understand this formerly cryptic program.

For so many years I worked in a Quad View, staring with Deathmatch Maker for Quake, continuing to Unreal, and 3DS Max. When I tried to learn Blender 2.49 my first struggle was getting that view the way I wanted. But over the last few days I realized something. I don't need that quad view anymore!

Over and over in all the Blender Tutorials of any quality you find that teach you the program, they tell you to learn the shortcut keys. This is valuable advice, and the key to unlocking everything. Because now I know I can simply press NUM7 for a Top View, and NUM5 to make it Orthographic. I can work with a single window, allowing me to see a lot more and giving me much more workspace, and anytime I need another view I can simply select it with the NUM keys.

Tool menus, as of the newer versions of Blender, are accessed with the press of a T or N. Easy. Panning is Middle-Click + Shift and drag. Still learning my way around the camera. But again, its shortcut keys that are the key.

Menus are also brought up with a simple sequence of keys, occasionally a complex set of them, but its still less tedious than Max. I used to be a menu guy. But Blender is not really a menu program. I mean the menus are there, but its designed more for shortcut key usage than menus. Well Blender, as far as I know, was not originally a Windows program, and Windows, as an OS, has always been menu driven. Blender is shortcut driven, and the sooner yo figure that out the better off you will be.

Next thing is configuring Blender. My advice - don't! Now I have to have my normal Left Mouse click instead of the Right Mouse. But more and more, all the things I had to do to configure Blender the way I wanted, it just makes things more difficult. Blender will let you do things your way to a certain extent, but you will suffer the consequences!

For example I used to enable the snaps. I was also always an "on the grid" guy. I remember in my reviews of Unreal Tournament maps I would always check to see if the mapper placed things on the grid. I don't know the driving motivation or mindset here. Why things had to be on the grid for me. I think perhaps I used to be that way, in a sense, in life as well. Was I afraid of getting lost?

Blender is designed for the artist that used to be the two-year old who liked to color outside the lines and use red to color whales. The sooner you understand this, the better. I have found that leaving the snaps off I don't actually miss it! I can always press and hold CTRL, but generally I no longer use snaps! Now this may change when I am trying to build a house model or something. But I am more relaxed now and able to leave things at their defaults.

Same for viewing the wireframe of a model. Just press Z. Bam! I tried to so hard for so long to make Blender work like UnrealED. But that's really like trying to mate a cow with a horse. Maybe it will work, I don' know, but generally we can assume that they are two different beasts! So no more turning faces off as I instructed in my Blender Age Builder series. In fact that whole series is fast becoming irrelevant and I may have to scrap the thing and start over. We'll see.

More and more it's just becoming easier with Blender as I let go of my old ways of thinking and doing things. I used to spend hours making and extruding complex shapes to make my meshes. As I follow Neal's tutorials I am slowly coming to understand Box modeling, which is really what Blender specializes in. Again I can do shape modeling in Blender, bend it to my will, but I will end up spending hours searching for help to obscure problems and trying to make something. If I would just use Blender as designed I could make the same thing in less time and just as well!

I hope these words give you something to think about if you starting out in Blender or struggling with it. I will be, in time, making a variety of tutorials for this program, starting a I think with a set of spiral stairs. I think I know how I can do them in Blender, quick and easy. But the main thing I want to bring across in my teachings, starting now, is that you should try, as much as possible, to use Blender the way it was designed.

You may not like that at first. It may bug you. It bugged me. But if you can't bend you will break, plain and simple. I strongly encourage you to learn how to be flexible, in body, mind and spirit. Just because you have thought one way about something doesn't mean there aren't other, perhaps better, ways to think about it. Just because you have always done something in a certain way is no reason to try a different way. Force uses a lot of energy and will wear you down. Flow uses little energy, beyond the will applied, and will wear down whatever opposes indirectly over time.

In all your work, whether it be mapping, modeling or the job you go to every day, think water rather than wrecking ball. If you are a wrecking ball, throwing yourself against all opposition, you will get beat up. Sure you will tear down, destroy, turn your opposition into rubble. But you will damage yourself in the process, and it takes longer to rebuild from rubble than to use what already exists. Better to be water, flowing around, over, and under your opposition, leaving little if any trace behind, using little energy, yet having the power to wear away all obstacles in your path. You use less energy, in fact you even use your opponent's energy against them, and you overcome without having to destroy.

Remember Destruction is the antithesis of Creation and an expression of Hate. Creation is the antitheses of Destruction, and an expression of Love. If you operate on destructive energy, like I did, you hurt yourself and others. But if you operate on create energy, you help yourself, and others. Approach all your pursuits in life with creativity as the driving force and your motivation. Seek to create, not to destroy. You will be a much happier person, of that I can speak from experience.

Namaste!