Author: Doug Groves

dougplanet.com is his personal blog, which is withering on the vine. If you poke around it, you’ll find out that he’s an animator and broadcast designer by trade, usually pushing pixels in either After Effects or Lightwave 3D. If he absolutely had to pick a favourite all time writer, it would be Harlan Ellison more days than any other. If you don’t know who Ellison is, then Doug weeps for you. Doug also likes long walks on the beach, mainly to collect improperly discarded medical waste for an undisclosed project of epic proportions.

Crackdown 2 Demo available now

June 21, 2010 Doug Groves Billy Thomson, Crackdown 2, demo, Ruffian Games, Xbox 360, Xbox Live3 Comments

The public demo for Ruffian Games’ Crackdown 2 launched today, with a few interesting twists. Besides providing both single player and 4 player co-op modes, if you’re also a Facebook user, they’ve got a tie in game called Chuck’s Ducks 2, a carnival style game that allows players to earn and activate special sticky bombs, for use in the retail game. You can check out our hands on impression with the game last month, as well as our interview Ruffian Games creative director Billy Thomson. In brief, Crackdown 2 is…

DSLR talk back from RED founder Jim Jannard

June 21, 2010June 21, 2010 Doug Groves DSLR, HD DSLR, Jim Jannard, Red, RED One, reduser, Scarlet, Zacuto, Zacuto Shootout4 Comments

Just last week, I was having a discussion with with a co-worker about video recording on the new breed of DSLRs, and mentioned that if RED doesn’t get it’s butt in gear, they could very well concede the prosumer market to the likes of Canon and Nikon. As more pro filmmakers start putting the DSLRs through stress tests, they’ve finding time and again that the results are much better than initially expected. It’s not surprising that a similar discussion has been going on in the reduser forums, in which RED…

A New Twist In The Rogers “Cheaters” Lawsuit… Others Claim To have The Same Issue With Rogers

June 18, 2010 Doug Groves billing, cheater, IT Nerd, Nagy, Rogers11 Comments

[The following is an IT Nerd commentary…] You’ll recall that a woman is suing Rogers for $600,000 claiming that Rogers exposed her affair by consolidating her Rogers cell phone bill with her now ex-husband’s and that I didn’t think her chances of winning were all that high. The plaintiff held a news conference yesterday and claims that others have had the same issue that she has had with Rogers:

E3 2010 – keynote round up.

June 18, 2010 Doug Groves 3DS, E3, E3 2010, EA, Electronic Arts, Kinect, Microsoft, Nintendo, PS3, Sony, Ubisoft, Wii, Xbox 3606 Comments

Even though you may have seen live blogs of the major keynotes from E3 this year, you may have missed some of the details, or even the nuance of having something told to you second hand. Luckily most of those keynotes can still be seen online. Now you can play the Sony and Microsoft keynotes side by side and decide who looks goofier, someone using Kinect, or someone using Move. In order of appearence: Microsoft – Electronic Arts – Ubisoft Nintendo – Sony – Kinect

New slim Xbox 360 to hit Canada on Sunday

June 17, 2010June 17, 2010 Doug Groves Best Buy, Futureshop, launch, Xbox 360, Xbox 360 Slim2 Comments

Announced at E3 earlier this week, the newly upgraded ‘whisper quiet’ version of the Xbox 360, which also more than doubles the hard drive capacity to 250GB, is slated to hit Canada’s two biggest electronics retailers Sunday June 20th, for $299.99. With the release coming so soon after the E3 announcement, I’m guessing the supply chain for the original design has been very much controlled for some time now, to minimize the number of orphaned original 360s. I have a few unused electronics gift cards sitting on my desk at…

NXNE daily dispatch

June 17, 2010June 17, 2010 Doug Groves Mudhoney, NXNE, NXNE 2010, This Movie Is Broken, X1 Comment

There’s so much to see at NXNE that it’s hard to pick and choose, so here’s a daily look at what’s happening. Starting with the free stuff, NXPO is a free-to-the-public music-lifestyle exposition which includes a daystage, vendors, and a bar, the latter not free, is open the 17th and 18th from noon to 8pm at the Hyatt Regency Toronto – 370 King St. W. The free Yonge-Dundas Square shows start at 6pm today, and include headliners Mudhoney at 9pm, and So-Cal punk legends X at 10pm.

Crowd sourced funding and distribution brings Pioneer One TV series to life

June 17, 2010June 17, 2010 Doug Groves bit torrent, crowd sourcing, Kickstarter, P2P, Pioneer One, torrent, VODO, vodo.net4 Comments

It was just yesterday at NXNEi that we were talking with Perry Chen, one of the founders of Kickstarter about how the site has really helped facilitate crowd sourcing funding for creative projects, and how it can really help independent creators off the ground. Even as we were talking to him, a Kickstarter funded TV project called Pioneer One saw the premiere of it’s pilot episode (includes .torrent link), via crowd sourced distribution network VODO.net. Pioneer One, which is political thriller with a science fiction element as it’s jumping off…

NXNE – fairly interactive

June 16, 2010June 16, 2010 Doug Groves Evan Ratliff, Interaxon, Kickstarter, NXNE, NXNE 2010, NXNEi, Perry Chen, Vanished, Ze Frank, zefrank5 Comments

As the inaugural year for NXNE interactive (NXNEi), the annual festival played it fairly small, with the focus being on a number of panels and conferences leading into the much larger music and film component. With a number of fascinating panels, from brain-computer-interfaces by Interaxon to established internet artists such as zefrank and a presentation from Kickstarter, which crowd sources funding for art projects across many disciplines, NXNEi was definitely about establishing online connections, not just in the business sense, but on a more personal and human level. Sometimes it…

Astroturf Bill C-32 groups started by CRIA

June 16, 2010 Doug Groves astroturf, Balanced Copyright For Canada, bill C-32, copyright, CRIA, DMCA, Michael Geist, RIAA1 Comment

There are a number of citizen’s groups that have formed around the new Canadian copyright bill C-32, nicknamed the DMCA for Canada. Most of these groups are real people concerned about changes to Canadian copyright policies in the digital age. Now, via Michael Geist, comes the story of Balanced Copyright for Canada, a group preteneding to be ordinary citizens, but apparently created by the CRIA (Canadian Record Industry Association don’t you know). They’re making use of the same social media tools that grassroots organizations on either side of the argument…

PS3 E3 2010 keynote highlights

June 15, 2010 Doug Groves 3D, E3, E3 2010, inFAMOUS 2, Killzone 3, Motorstorm, Move, Navigation Controller, NBA 2K11, Playstation Eye, Playstation Plus, PS3, PSN, Sly Cooper, Sony, Tron2 Comments

The Sony keynote at E3 2010 stood in stark contrast to Microsoft’s and in some ways it’s like a mirror universe version. Which console wore the goatee this year is entirely dependent upon your fanboy predilections. Why is that? In the past, Microsoft more than Sony caught a lot of heat for paying for exclusive content on cross-platform titles, though that’s their prerogative. This year was Sony’s time to shine with additional content from titles like Medal of Honor, Dead Space 2 (including compatibility with the Move – more on…

Portal 2 E3 trailer

June 15, 2010 Doug Groves E3, E3 2010, Gabe Newell, Portal 2, PS3, Sony, Valve1 Comment

Portal 2, the oft-teased and well-ARGed sequel to the sleeper hit from Valve, finally got a real teaser trailer. It’s not much on details, but does feature the ever wry GladOS giving the player a welcome back greeting in her own special way. It did make it’s premiere at the Sony keynote, suggesting that maybe there’s a bit of a thaw between Gabe Newell and the PS3… we’ll be waiting for some time though, as Portal 2 is looking at a 2011 ship date.

NXNE 2010 kicks into gear

June 15, 2010 Doug Groves Film, Iggy And The Stooges, interactive, Music, North By Northwest, NXNE, NXNE 2010, NXNEi, Toronto2 Comments

It was a different world when Toronto’s NXNE (North By Northwest don’t you know) started out in 1994 as a music festival, based on the model by sister event SXSW (South By Southwest, natch). Even in the early days, NXNE was an ambitious affair with dozens of venues and enough bands, and music lovers, to fill them up. Since then the festival has grown and evolved, adding the film component in 2001, and most recently introducing NXNE interactive. Although nothing so big is expected here, it was at SXSW interactive…