And Tadaa... I started myself a new blog for my art and stuff. Okay no stuff, just art. It is for THIS reason that it has the more categorical name  "MikeMurrillArt.Blogspot.com" instead of just "MikeMurrill." It certainly has NOTHING to do with the fact that the more likely and preferable name "MikeMurrill.Blogspot.com" was taken by another person with my name. Nnooooo... okay yes. Thieving bastich. Also I've been making more time for drawing and it's a refreshing change from the norm. It's always soooo soothing for me. Like getting hooked up to a tranquility drip.

New favorite artist!! I found them on Deviant Art, where there is no shortage of brilliant artists, but the home site is BaraChan(dot)com. I do have a profile on Deviant but I haven't really uploaded anything. It's mostly just to see good art and be inspired. Maybe I should actually JOIN the goings on of that community instead of being a wallflower. meh.

I've been updating my site lately with a few images of personal work. Mostly just creating stuff in Z-brush, since it HAS been a while, and they've made lots of improvements.

Beansy and I just got back from a trip to Israel, Turkey, and Greece. Awesome, except the heat was unbearable and I was reminded why I like traveling in the spring and fall. We got to stay in a cave though. A CAVE!! ...well, for part of the trip anyway. It was enough to cool off in the dry desert air, and in the middle of nowhere no less. Cappadoccia, btw.

Busy busy lately, as always. I slaved mercilessly the last couple of months on a futile deadline. Sometimes it feels like I'm spinning the tires in the sand. The deadline accidentally aligned timing wise with some trip plans I made some 5 months ago and worked out perfectly.

Things finally slowing down a bit. We shipped Uncharted 2 in a whirlwind finish, then I enjoyed some much needed time off and took the woman I love to see some Europe hotness beginning in Rome, up the Italian boot, and from thence to Paris. To my surprise travelling with a companion was a delight. Neither of us are high-maintenance, and this became a key component for ease and happiness. I put some images of us two kids on Facebook but the "intention" is to put the bulk onto Flickr, so we'll see how that goes.

Sony baby! SONY!! I moved to Santa Monica, California to work at Naughty Dog, a company filled with the most talented geniuses I've ever met. Since January I've been working on Uncharted 2, a game highly anticipated, especially since we showed at E3 recently. Midway Studios, my former employer having financial difficulties, has all but closed up shop and has reduced itself to a more bare-bones operation, cancelling projects, shutting down studios, and laying off all the employees. So, parallel to finding a new job I made plans to do a smidge of travelling. I spent a few weeks exploring India, an incredible country with many beautiful places to see and so many kind people to meet. I'll be posting photos on Flickr at some point, but let's face it, I have too many other priorities right now. Even the "oh so important duty" of updating my website has taken a backseat.

This Holiday weekend I thought it would be fun to dig out some ancient artwork from my archive of backups and post a few on my site. As these are work related, you will find them posted on the bottom of the digital page of my portfolio. This also caused me to reorder some of the contents in general. My Digital page is now slightly resembling my resume except in a visual format rather than icky text.

Okay I've been working extra hard on my site lately, especially this weekend, changing this and that, but mostly posting my latest 3D works.

A whole year has passed. Where does the time go?! So much has happened. Last thanksgiving I took a trip to Egypt and Israel which was freaking fantastic. Then, a short month later, over Christmas and New-Year's I took a mega trip to Indonesia, Cambodia, and Singapore. Although I didn't post many photos from that trip, I was sure to post the pix of the pinnacle (and main reason for going in the first place), which was Ankor Wat. Both these trips were everything I could've asked for and more. Once I returned, my entire time has been spent working on the next Mortal Kombat: MKvsDC. My weekends are spent on more personal projects like modeling a techy priestess character with tough ass-kicking ability. I'll post some progress shots at some point in the near future.

I've continued adding some more color paintings, and put up some of my most recent stuff from work onto my digital page. This includes some statue modeling in Z-brush. I swear I've used my Wacom tablet more in the last two weeks than I have in two years. If this keeps up, I may end up preferring the stylus to the click of a mouse. Naw! That couldn't happen.

Cool stuff! I just added a new picture to the COLOR page of my portfolio. So check it out already peoples! This is my slow-poke approach to filling that page with NEW stuff, replacing out those pesky old pics. So ta-da! go see.

Stranglehold is so close to being finished and submitted. The word is it's going to be near the end of this month, which means it hits the market August-ish. The game itself is stunning ...ask me not to be biased on this. Go ahead. =) No it actually is though, with plenty of explosions and gunplay and whatnot. True to director John Woo's name for sure.

Well I'm back from a quick venture to Japan. I've got some spanktacular photos. What a beautiful place! We've been working insane hours so I decided to use my meager comp time to do something worthwhile. I used the excuse that since I've never been anywhere in Asia, it was time for me to dabble. So dabble I did. Plus I needed some extra recovery time as I just got PRK laser surgery on my eyes, and healing via straining myself on my computer screen versus vacationing isn't even a contest.

OH! I almost forgot to mention, I booked myself a week in the Virgin Islands for Christmas. I'm dying already 'cause it's so freaking cold here! I can't wait. I SOOO need some sand between my toes.

Christmas party tonight for my company aboard the 'Spirit of Chicago'. I'm going to use the opportunity to get some shots of the Chicago skyline from out on Lake Michigan. And should the opportunity present itself... maybe some blackmail pictures of my co-workers. =)

Holy crap! I figured out something that is so amazing. I can't really say right now because I have to hammer-out the details and ramifications. But my whole view of the universe has changed. Scientifically, not religiously. It's the key to the whole damn process. I fully realize I could be wrong, but I'm busting just the same from the mere possibility of this being correct. SO, until I publish my papers in some scientific journal a few years from now, remember this day as the time the unifying theory of everything was solved, and my head exploded.

Well, I'm back from my much needed break. What a great time I had! I've put most of my pix up on flickr... www.flickr.com/photos/plumpchump is my permanent account. I have a few more cities to post. I'm trying to limit it to a hundred or so pictures for each place I visited. Once I get them all up, I'll write comments and stuff for them. My favorite places would have to include Mont San Michele and St. Paul de Vence. I dunno, though, Barcelona was beautiful too but in a very busy big city way. And that Gaudi architecture was forking nuts! Monaco was right out of a James Bond film. Berlin was so 'up-and-coming' and modern while sweeping that whole Nazi thing under the rug. The ravages of Socialism and Communism was still quite evident in the Eastern European countries, but I was inspired to see their hope and progress now that they're free. I seriously doubt most Americans REALLY understand what oppression is. On a lighter note, I was propositioned for sex more than once. I felt dirty. Vienna was brilliant. Mozart could still be living there and I wouldn't be a bit surprised. I did leave my new jacket there sadly. Amsterdam is a shithole, beautiful, but a shithole.

I'm so excited! In less than a month I'm going to spend 3 weeks in Europe, completely emptying my saved up vacation time. I'm doing what I did last time as far as flying into one place and out of another, and sort of making my way in-between. This trip will be into Budapest and out of Madrid. I'm going to hit all the places I haven't seen, so I'm going to head northish to Vienna, Auschwitz, Prague, and Berlin. Then across the top of Europe to Amsterdam, Brussels, Normandy beaches, and Mont Saint Michel. Then it's southward to Spain's Barcelona, Granada, and Madrid. I'm maintaining an 'adustable' section of my trip based on whether I move too fast through the other places. If that's the case, I'll stop in the south of France hitting Bordeaux, Carcassone, Cannes, Nice, and Monaco. Those last three are sort of out of the way, but I would really like to see them. We'll see. I can only be in one place at a time... or can I... ? Maybe I can make a duplicate me to cover twice the ground in half the time. Or would that take four Mikes? Ouchy, math makes my brain hurt...

I finally finished my book on Enoch. Nibbley Rocks. It was very enlightening. I'm not quite half way through my other book by Steven Hawking. It was written a few years ago, and I get the impression there have been a few new advancements in physics and string theory. Also, I finished my latest xbox360 game Prey. It turns out it was more a combination between a first-person shooter and (surprisingly) a platformer. The gameplay was innovative and the artwork was beautiful. Now I gotta go find a new game to play though. I played through it a little faster then I had anticipated.

I turned thirty-four already. It wasn't so bad. Take THAT father freakin' time!!

I took a few days off this past week and drove around Illinois. I got to see the mighty Mississippi. I spent some time in Nauvoo and Carthage seeing where all that historical LDS church stuff happened. I also made my way over to Springfield, home of President Lincoln. I even saw some of those amber waves of grain like the song says. Now, normally I'm crazy-opposed to taking tours of any kind and prefer to mosie at my own pace taking pictures and what-not, I don't suffer boredom lightly. But on this trip I really enjoyed hearing all the facts and historical events (certainly not my best school subject to be sure). Anyhoo, I'll be posting the more pretty of my photos of my trip on my Flickr account presently. My Flickr.com account name is PLUMPCHUMP. I only have a free account for now, but the address is www.flickr.com/photos/76368342@N00/

I've gone ahead and purchased an early birthday present for myself. I decided I would step up my hobby a notch by getting the biggest and most intimidating camera I can find. Actually, I've done months of research on the internet to find the right one for me. The commitment on my part weakens my knees a little. It's not too unlike marriage, and my bride is a beautiful Nikon D2x. She's got a sexy body, marvelous interpersonal response and interaction, and I'll admit... she strikes a little fear into my heart when I hold her in my arms. =)

Big news for me! For most of next week I'll be down in sunny LA for the E3 show. I'm climbing the walls with excitement. I've been to other shows, but never an E3. And how incredible for my first one to be when we're displaying Stranglehold for the world to see. I admit I'm biased. I'm also very proud. You don't get to work on a game like this everyday.

Today's helpful tidbit: It's erotic to use a feather, but it's kinky to use the whole chicken. =)

I just made some changes to my site's main banner and a few color updates to couch it more appropriately. The thing about digging around the roots of my website's structure is that I'm reminded about all the changes I want to make. And YES, there are a lot.

Sweet Lou! I finally got an Xbox 360. The first game I got to break in this glorious piece of hardware? Quake 4. It is, for all intents and purposes, just Doom 3.5, and that in a good way. However, playing a game on a console instead of on a PC has it's perks... like the benefit of sitting in my comfey leather chair. And the Xbox 360 is HD only, so blasting alien guts on a big screen is that much more fun, and extremely satisfying. Once Oblivion comes out, I'll gladly add in the pleasure of hacking-up monsters and the undead to the list.

Valentine's day? yeah, right.

The topic of time-travel came up recently at work. What I always found amazing about this idea is WHAT IF, instead of moving a person from point ‘A’ to point ‘B’ at light-speed, you could ‘vibrate’ the atoms of a person at light-speed. The same principles would apply. You’d have a person who could walk around or whatever, who doesn’t age. As an additional bonus, atomic particles begin to glow as they approach the speed of light, so you would have a person who looks like he’s made of light. My NON-mathematical guess is that it would be something quite impressive.

I managed to accomplish the impossible recently!! I decided to pick up my half finished copy of Nibley's book Temple and Cosmos, and read the rest of it. All six hundred pages. Reading books, for me, is an incredibly mind-numbing chore, but I actually was able to finish it. Anyhoo, I'm proud of me.

It is inevitable that as scientific knowledge and understanding is revealed through the ages, it will find itself circling back around and plugging into the very ass-end of religion, clearing up a whole lot of questions. Perhaps even more than people would like. Personally I have a ton of questions I want to ask God, but I think if I were to be confronted by Him, I might just forget them all.

So the topic recently came up of how there's a thousand ways to skin a cat. My take on it is sign me up for all of them. Variety, after all, is the spice of life. And just think... if every cat really has nine lives, think of the mileage you get. That's like nine thousand ways to get jiggy on da' kitty.

How is it that early settlers came through this area , many moons, ago and decided, "why don't we 'park it' here, where it's so brutally cold durring the winters that our cow's tongues freeze to the salt lick?" I, for one, would have supported such a brilliant plan. ...ahem... But, here we are! A flourishing city with goods-a-plenty, and Jack Frost kicking my teeth in.

Since my last update, I've had MAJOR upheavals and changes in my life. I moved to the great city of Chicago. Everyone here calls it 'Chicagoland' , which sounds so old-hat. It conjures imagery of well-oiled Tommy guns, double-breasted suits with little carnations pinned to their lapels, wide brimmed Fadoras, and cigars, Gambling. Corruption. The meat-packing district. I'm here working for Midway Games. I'm on the team that did Psy-Ops. Sadly, the game I'm working on is still under wraps, but I'll give all those juicy details when the 'gag order' is lifted.

Finally, I narrowed the Doom3 probs my computer had down to a couple lousie plasma-gun normal maps. Corrupt from birth? perhaps. But I just replaced them with jimmy-rigged ones, and POOF-O-PRESTO! Now my Doom runs like hot greased mustard!

What is it about Zombies? Why are they so cool? They gross me out, they scare me, yet I can't look away. Perhaps it's a fascination with the profane thown into a bucket with some shadenfreude. Interestingly, too, in games where I have a futuristic arsenal of high-tech weapons at my disposal, I find it's more fun to make zombie-hamburger with a simple chainsaw.

I saw Resident Evil this past weekend. Sweet! Now... I know, it's easy for critics to yap and bitch about sci-fi movies; but consider, these are the people who can't make their own, so they cut on others who can. Besides, as I've said before, when you step back from it all, what do you have? Sexy women with big guns strapped to their bare thighs, doing flips and blowing shit up. Not enough for you? How about we throw in some scientists from a dark organization, doing your basic bio-engineering to make a beefy leather-clad mutant who has a thing for chain-guns and butcher aprons. Oh yeah, and the side-effects of the technology? It happens to re-animate the dead. OOPSIE!

Sunday again. I've officially determined my computer has jealousy issues with Doom3. There's been a feud from the get-go. Sure it hasn't had the time to brew like the Hatfields and McCoys, but there's still a fight that flames up like a wolfy ass-rash under a full moon.

So there I was, late last night, flipping through channels in search of fun, when WAIT!, Buffy the yum-yum slayer appears! Well, far-be-it from me to pass up eye candy when a dish is offered. Then of course there's Willow. She's soooo cute. and what's this? she's got a cute friend. Now all that's missing is a little kissing , and maybe some girl-on-girl hand-holding!! =) Is that so wrong? Perhaps some huggy-wuggies by candle light?

A few words of wisdom for my fellow peeps: If you find yourself with an unsettled stomach, and are meeting your happy chums at the local pizzaria to lunch-it-up, DON'T get the all you can eat buffet. Your sour tummy will thank you in a *huck-a-licious* way.

We've got the opening cerimonies of the Greek Olympics today. Very cool! There's gotta be a ton of pride over there, having part of their culture return home like that. Too, it was great to hear the cheers for the Iraqi atheletes. And, of course, who could be more proud to be an American when our guys came in and the stadium errupted in cheers. Who says friday the thirteenth is a 'bad' day?

I'm back on my game after my webpage detour. I'm fiddling around with the tons of texture reference shots I took of buildings. What's more fun than that?

Sweet! I just implemented this little scrolling cell that allows ss... scrolling. Hence the name, I guess. You see, I knew I needed something like it, but I didn't know how. So I found a close match on a donor-site, and brought it back to my laboratory and ripped it apart like a bear on Tupperware. Then I implanted it right into the chest of my homepage, with surprisingly little blood-loss........

Well, It seems increasingly likely that I may just 'pull-off' this whole website bit! The fact that I even have thumbnails that link where they're intended is a miracle in and of itself. We all know I'm no chef of this 'web cuisine', but I'm extremely proud of this grilled-cheese sandwich!

Today is my BIRTHDAY!!! Yay! Happy birthday, Mike! Your the greatest!

So then. Apparently, a website is a precious commodity these days, and as little as I know about the whole... web... thing, I've decided to build one and put my artwork out there. In addition, maybe a little info about myself will be disseminated along the way. So, with a crack of the bottle on the bow of my site's shiney new hull, I welcome you all. (mind the sawdust and hammering)