FIRST Robotics Competition 2017 Digital Animation Award sponsored by Automation Direct

It’s back! Check out all the details here. Submissions are due 11:59PM Eastern Time on Tuesday, Jan 31, 2017. Let’s see those animation skills and creativity! And special thanks to Automation Direct for sponsoring this award and once again doing our game animation for the upcoming season! You’ll remember the fabulous job they did for FIRST STRONGHOLD. Unbelievable – that video has been viewed over 375,000 times.

Downloadable Content Pack (DLC) Pack 2 Coming Out Today

We’ve got some freshly made, buttered, and syruped FIRST STEAMWORKS hotcakes being delivered to your door today at 7PM Eastern Time. And no need to tip the delivery guy! As we said in this blog, we’re including some special community-created content in this release, and we’d love to see your submissions for possible inclusion in the next one!

I think you’ll like this DLC Pack. There’s one element that’s, well, at least a little bit of a puzzle.

My YUGE Weekend

My personal plans for the weekend:

Attend the 20th Anniversary of the River Rage off-season FRC event at Memorial High School, in Manchester, New Hampshire, USA. This event is hosted by FRC Teams 131 (my Alma Mater!), 238 and 501. Yeah, 20 years! It’s the oldest continuous off-season event in FRC, and I’m realizing as I’m writing this that for many of you it’s been going on longer than you’ve been alive. And, if you’ve ever heard that FRC “started in a New Hampshire High School Gym in 1992”, this is that High School.* Have a few slices of pizza and a refreshing beverage Watch the newly released Black and Chrome version of Mad Max: Fury Road**

Note: This is not the official Black and Chrome version trailer, but a fan-made version.

So, an off-season event, some pizza, and a little Mad Max. That’s what I call a weekend!

Frank

*Even more good news – I just checked the event info packet and they will have corn dogs.

** George Miller, Director of the film, decided to rely heavily on ‘practical effects’ in the making of the movie. This means much of what you see on screen is real, not CGI. Yep, even the Doof Wagon, guitar/flame-thrower and all. This is science and engineering in the service of art. And, I’m pretty sure, ‘art’ it is. It’s more than just a car chase film (if I remember, there is a short car chase in the middle of the movie, but you could probably skip that part if you wanted to). Some have called it a ‘feminist masterpiece’. I’m qualified to judge neither if this movie is ‘feminist’ nor a ‘masterpiece’, but I can tell you, in my opinion, it’s a great ride.