07/28/08 - Wow it's been a long time! That's not to say I haven't been busy, in fact it's quite the opposite. I've been constantly working on the site and coding although I haven't had time to update this front page. Since I built this site to be static, it isn't easy to update sadly. Although, I am an active blogger and you can typically find daily updates from me at the following:

http://www.geekswithblogs.net/CodeBlog

In other related news, I'll be speaking at a few events later this year. Both will cover shaders and I highly suggest you stop by for some awesome discussions about HLSL! Hope to see you there!

Title: A Crash Course in HLSL
Abstract: Microsoft’s High-Level Shader Language (HLSL) is a shading language developed to give graphics programmers complete control over the graphics in their applications. This talk starts at the very basics explaining what a shader is, how it works, how to write one, and why they’re so important in the future of next-gen graphics.
Date: Sept. 11, 2008
Location: Magenic Technologies

Title: Lighten Up! Lighting a 3D World with HLSL
Abstract: The basics of Microsoft’s high-level shading language (HLSL) are introduced, including a basic overview of the rendering pipeline, through the creation of a point light shader. HLSL allows graphics programmers to create realistic graphics through the use of a combination of math algorithms and the hardware they are processed on. Around the time of DirectX 8, shaders were implemented to allow changes per geometric shape, vertex, and pixel during a frame render. As one of the items comes to render on the graphics device, the math algorithm written into the shader file is applied to the respective object and is rendered to the screen. Current technology has reached the point where shaders are a necessity for any graphics developer, considering graphics libraries such as Microsoft’s XNA have removed support for a non-programmed, ‘fixed’ graphics pipeline. A simple shader is built to emulate a point light while each step includes reasoning behind the code and relevance to the theory of a point light. A conclusion is given explaining other uses for shaders.
Date: Oct. 11, 2008
Location: New Horizons
Pre-Registration: Pre-Register Here

Keep Gaming.

02/29/08 - Look everyone, new site! I've decided to update this site with a more 'colorful' layout. I'm using Visual Studio 2008 Professional and the site is in ASP 2.0. Hopefully this will help me update it a bit more (it only took me a few days to create the whole site). Also, the change was half based on users who thought XNA tutorials should be hosted on a site written using a Microsoft Product and I thought that was a good idea as well.

I've been really busy lately, working on school, work, and 3 other projects not including this site rewrite (this is the only one that was finished quickly!). One of those other projects are the tutorials so make sure you bookmark or continuously check the tutorials page for the latest and greatest.

Keep Gaming.