A:M Nostalgia/old projects

[Michael Brennan]

On 5/13/2025 at 1:53 AM, a.quaihoi said:

 Ray Dream Designer / Studio  😂 . .  I remember that ! Infini-D too 

 

I tried Ray Dream Studio 5 recently for the nostalgia of it and it made me realize why I
was so happy to find A:M. just moving the camera around alone was so tedious. 

[Michael Brennan]

In 2002, my friend Paul and I started our own 3D animation studio
using the old office that Streamline Media originally occupied.
It was one of the most exciting yet stressful times of my life
I never thought keeping a sleeping bag in the office closet would
be a good idea until then.

We were trying many things to promote the studio, Focus Chaos Inc.
so I submitted my Valentine's Hash image contest entry to 3D World
magazine and then completely forgot about it.

It wasn’t until our friend Steve, who rented us the office came in
one day and told me he saw my image in a magazine at the bookstore!

I still have a copy of the magazine, 3D World May 2002.

 

 

[a.quaihoi]

I think we had ( Art School ) Ray Dream first, then Moved to Infini D . . . then Lightwave, ( wasnt a big fan ), some of our lecturers were employed by companies and universities using Softimage on SGI gear I was like man can we go to your work and play to which they replied, only if you want to make 3D with command prompts - eeecch!!  I thought the isometric graph interface would be good transitioning from graph paper drawings for Ray Dream . . . but it was not and it was slooooowwwww on the schools Macs . . . I picked up AM when I started my first job in advertising, we had to produce some ads and infini d wasnt cutting it, one of the guys at our company told us about Dylan Perry from then Momentum, he made a call and Dylan dropped past with AM 96 / 98 I think, gave us a 15 minute quick start guide . . . I produced 2 x 30 second TVC's  like in a couple of hours, the modelling was exactly how it ought to be, the rendering, rigging was so intuative . . .  rendering, rigging, the works ! best app ever, ran fast on macs and pcs but it did crash a lot back then ha ha  . . . so did you eve use Bryce 3D or Poser lol   

[a.quaihoi]

love your work man 🤘 That's beautiful 

[Michael Brennan]

4 minutes ago, a.quaihoi said:

I think we had ( Art School ) Ray Dream first, then Moved to Infini D . . . then Lightwave, ( wasnt a big fan ), some of our lecturers were employed by companies and universities using Softimage on SGI gear I was like man can we go to your work and play to which they replied, only if you want to make 3D with command prompts - eeecch!!  I thought the isometric graph interface would be good transitioning from graph paper drawings for Ray Dream . . . but it was not and it was slooooowwwww on the schools Macs . . . I picked up AM when I started my first job in advertising, we had to produce some ads and infini d wasnt cutting it, one of the guys at our company told us about Dylan Perry from then Momentum, he made a call and Dylan dropped past with AM 96 / 98 I think, gave us a 15 minute quick start guide . . . I produced 2 x 30 second TVC's  like in a couple of hours, the modelling was exactly how it ought to be, the rendering, rigging was so intuative . . .  rendering, rigging, the works ! best app ever, ran fast on macs and pcs but it did crash a lot back then ha ha  . . . so did you eve use Bryce 3D or Poser lol   

 

It's cool to hear other peoples stories,  all roads lead to A:M!  

I played around with Bryce and Poser, but the novelty wore off when
needed something other than a procedural landscape with clouds and water. 😜

 

[a.quaihoi]

lawl . . . all the greatest techno / trance record covers of that time . . .  Bryce + Poser yep novelty at best and the god awful rendering speed line by line by line 

[Michael Brennan]

In 2001, I was commissioned by a designer friend to create a book illustration
for a novel called Angry Young Spaceman. A few years earlier, I had done the back cover
illustration for Flyboy Action Figure Comes with Gasmask by Jim Munroe.
For this next novel, I got to illustrate the front and back cover and even created a short
looping animation, which we made available as a screensaver.

It's always so fun to work on book illustrations and then go into bookstores and
see your work on the shelves.

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