Kismet Games

@kismetgames.bsky.social

Indie game publisher out of Athens, GA. Kismet Games creates immersive tabletop RPG experiences that blend rich storytelling, innovative mechanics, and unforgettable worlds. https://www.kismet.games/

I can’t believe I’d never seen this quote before, but looking at my generation, especially my fellow gamers, it captures something I’ve often felt: “We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.”

I have indeed lived multiple childhood dreams. Of course, some of them involved cursing at SCSI terminators, nervously renaming 400 TIFF files, troubleshooting dongles, and putting Post-It notes on monitors that read "Rendering frames 26-50. Do not interrupt!" Hollywood glamor!

On this 60th anniversary of #StarTrek, I am especially proud that my first film credit was on Star Trek: First Contact, or Star Trek 8, as we called it at Industrial Light & Magic. My official ILM credit is "Rebel Unit Production Manager." My team provided digital spaceships and effects.

My role was primarily to design and implement an alternate production pipleline, and to integrate our Mac-created assets and final shots into ILM's SGI IRIX infrastructure. Here is our "Render Petting Zoo" complete with Jaz cartridges and hot-swappable SCSI Data Dock drives!

A group of Macintosh computers circa 1995

I also managed day-to-day operations, and the care and feeding of our multi-discipline artists. Each were tasked with modeling, texturing, look development, animation, lighting, multi-pass rendering and compositing. Most other digital artists at ILM were responsible for just one of these roles.

During production of First Contact, I also grew my own 3D and 2D skills, learning from the incredible artists on our team and across ILM. I had a chance to contribute directly to First Contact, as a Digital Matte Artist, working with Matt Hendershot on dozens of elements of the Earth.

Our amazing compositing department asked that we render these background elements at very high resolution, often from a wider angle than the final shot. Lots of data! I learned a ton about what Earth looks like from orbit, which would come in handy years later, working on Space Cowboys 🤠

Star Trek has always been a big part of my life. I saw TOS marathons on TV. I cried with my friends In 1982, watching Wrath of Khan. I watched TNG every week. I own a bunch of little Star Trek people, spaceships, tricorders and tribbles. And I even got to work on an even-numbered Star Trek movie!

Our ships were all created using Macintosh hardware and off-the-shelf hardware, and they shared the screen with the beautiful, practical USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-E) and Borg cube miniatures. Several of those ships are original designs by Alex Jaeger, including my favorite, the Akira class.

Concept art of the Akira Class starship by Alex Jaeger

Nonstop ride at Strategicon yesterday. Ran Vaesen in the morning, Weird Frontiers in the afternoon, watched a live XCrawl AP right after, then played The Spark Devil with an excellent keeper into the wee hours. No time to indulge in the spirits, which meant no Burrito Blanket horror come morning. 😅

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As per usual, pretty desperate for money. Being unemployed will do that to you, so decided to add some more originals to the shop. First look here but will upload by end of day. DM for details, but I have to ask a little something for them especially the paintings. Handmade art

Uploaded this painting today to my top tier patrons! As I don't have many subscribers, I'm posting here as a means to advertise. Really need to grow that Gouache, watercolor on paper, about 25 hrs. Plan to upload 1 of these style 6x9 paintings a month. The size lets it be a cover or full page illo.

painting of lich on throne, with animating skeletons, treasure pile, staff glowing purple