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About Chris Howard
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Blog postDown with the LMC–let me hear you say Large Magellanic Cloud. I took some wide field images of a small portion of the LMC, centered on the Dragon’s Head Nebula (NGC2035), that colorful stretch of star-forming cloudiness in the middle of the pic. Astro specs: 8 stacked 300 sec exposures, Takahashi SKY90 APO, SBIG ST2000 XMC camera, Paramount PME. Now, before you go thinking that I’ve teleported to the southern hemisphere, which is where you have to be to see our nebulous galactic neighbor, the
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Blog postI spent a few hours this morning installing Ubuntu Mate on a Raspberry Pi3, along with the full Ekos toolset and foundational INDI libraries. And now I’m talking to every piece of astronomical equipment remotely from the Mac–and I mean everything: the Atlas EQ-G mount, Atik CCD, Atik filter wheel, focuser, ZWO CCD guide camera, even the freakin’ Weather Underground API. I leaned heavily on the docs written by James Taylor–find those here: http://www.indilib.org/support/tutorials/169-ekos-on-r
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Blog postI started this aquarium downsizing and automation project a couple months ago, and it’s going to take at least another four to five months to complete–maybe longer. Even if all the equipment is ready, there’s no hurrying the life behind the glass–you never want to rush the beginning of a new habitat. You have to let it come to life first, let it settle down, find its balance–and that can take anywhere from a couple months to a year. This may actually be the most difficult part of this h
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Blog postHere are a couple free copies of Teller–just click one of the links below and get the book for your Kindle–the actual device and the app. (If the first one doesn’t work, try the second. These are one-time use passes. When they’re gone they’re gone).
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/gift-redemption/B0056QJEGE/GSWBHSANRD97BVP,Unused https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/gift-redemption/B0056QJEGE/GSSPCVPPYX683JV,Unused
I have four books on sale for 99 cents through the m -
Blog postI have been painting panels for the next issue of Salvage (Issue #2), and I am leaning toward a more painterly style, no hard lines, no pencils visible. Issue #1 on Comixology: https://www.comixology.com/Salvage-1/digital-comic/175314 –Based on the book Salvage (Masque Books, 2013) http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00ED0081O
http://SaltwaterWitch.com
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Blog postSaltwater Witch audio book chapter 1 test reading (Yeah, this is what I sound like). http://saltwaterwitch.com/a/switch01.mp3 #saltwaterwitch #audiobook
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Blog postI shot my favorite nebula tonight, the Orion Nebula (M42), using the Astro-Tech 6″ f/9 Ritchey-Chrétien–prime focus with the Nikon D750, all of it sitting on an Orion Atlas EQ-G mount. 40 stacked frames, 30 second exposures. And I was doing all of this camera and telescope stuff in a nice brisk 15°F/-9.4°C, has to be the coldest night I’ve been out with a telescope.
Orion Nebula (M42)
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Blog postI finally got around to putting together some interesting industrial shots I took around the Gulf of Mexico–mostly shipping and oil industry stuff.
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I spent a good chunk of the weekend painting, most of it on the cover art for Mike Reeves-McMillan’s novel Auckland Allies. Here’s a side-by-side comparison of my original concept sketch and something close to the final painting on the right. I’m very late on this one, but I love the way it’s turned out!
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Blog postI’m just starting out on this astrophotography adventure, with a nice camera and a nice scope. I’ve been using Nikon DSLRs for a while, moving up to my current main camera, a D750–full-frame, 24MP. I just got a William Optics GT-81 refractor, a beautiful piece of equipment. I’ve added a pic of my camera before putting it on the scope in case you’re wondering what I’m using for the setup. The second pic is my GT81 set up for viewing, with red dot finder, mounted on the AltAzimuth–that’s what I
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Blog postGoodreads Book Giveaway Saltwater Witch by Chris Howard Giveaway ends March 08, 2013.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.
Enter to win -
Blog post...have illustrations. Here's a peek at some of them! Some of these are re-works of my original character sketches while writing Nanowhere. Check out the ebook edition at Amazon, B&N, iBooks, and elsewhere, complete with some of Jon Andreden's research papers on building an artificial intelligence, teleology, and other fun stuff.
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Blog postFood wasn’t high on the list of difficulties to tackle for a series of books about people from the sea, with at least half the action taking place deep underwater. If I divided up my world-building time for the Seaborn books more than half of it would go to undersea combat and the kinds of powers, “bleeds”, magic, breathing, as well as sorting out their limitations, how they are passed to children, and other details. Most of the other half was in cultural development, cities, history, i
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Blog postDid some drawing this afternoon, a couple more panels for chapter 13. Done and posted. Check it all out here: http://www.saltwaterwitch.com
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Blog postSketched out the two panels for page three this morning, lined and colored them this afternoon, and just finished the lettering, balloons, and other details. It's posted. Check out page 3 here: http://www.saltwaterwitch.com/switch
Here's the linework for the two panels:
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Blog postFinally...
Sorry, I've been writing like a demon over the last two months--finishing up the first book in an all new Seaborn series, and haven't even picked up a pencil to do more than a couple quick sketches. Here's a look at today's progress, from sketching, coloring, to the link to chapter 13. Hope you like!
Sketch of the second panel:
Both panels with colors:
Check out all the chapters of the Saltwater Witch comic -
Blog postThe end! Finished another book, fifty-two chapters, a little under a hundred thousand words, working title is Salvage. This is another Seaborn book--the first in a new series, sort of a tech-thriller/fantasy cross-over, if you can imagine that. The plan is to let it sit, steep like bad tea for a month, do one more edit pass, and get the manuscript to my agent mid-January. We'll see where it goes from there.
In the meantime--although I'm tired, I am clearly not too tired -
Blog postZombie Road – promo piece for Saltwater Witch. Click the image for the full view. http://www.SaltwaterWitch.com
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Blog postGoodreads Book Giveaway Saltwater Witch by Chris Howard Giveaway ends December 08, 2012.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.
Enter to win -
Blog postI built another app over the weekend. This is one of those things that’s been in the back of my head for a couple years. I just thought it would be cool to make a mobile app that goes along with my book Teller, with a complete usable tarot—all 78 of the original 1909 Rider-Waite tarot deck, the most popular deck in the US. I also wanted the ability to identify the cards, the meanings, reverse meanings, and other interesting stuff from A. E. Waite’s “Pictorial Key to the Tarot” (published i
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Blog postI was looking at the amazing 2012 election maps created by Robert J. Vanderbei (Princeton) and Mark Newman (Department of Physics and Center for the Study of Complex Systems, University of Michigan), and although there is a very interesting blended voting map (Most of the country is some shade of purple, a varied blend of Democrat blue and Republican red) what I really wanted was this blended map with a population density overlay. Because what really stands out is how red the nation seems
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Blog postOctober's fantasy round table post was on fantasy/horror crossover, or how horror has influenced the genre of fantasy. Good stuff from Deborah J. Ross, Warren Rochelle, Valjeanne Jeffers, Theresa Crater, Andrea K Höst, Carole McDonnell, Sylvia Kelso, and me. Check it out here: http://the0phrastus.typepad.com/the0phrastus/2012/10/the-great-traveling-round-table-fantasy-guest-blog.html
If this looks like I'm creating a new post to -
Blog postOctober: Fantasy/Horror Crossover Deborah J. Ross, Warren Rochelle , Valjeanne Jeffers, Theresa Crater,
Andrea K Höst , Carole McDonnell, Sylvia Kelso, Chris Howard
Chris Howard The Generosity of Horror As a genre horror has always seemed to move easily among fantasy, SF, romance, thrillers, and mysteries, influencing them, spilling tropes, blood, and useful plot devices along the way. I don’t consider myself much of a horror reader, not since the eighties and nineties anyway. -
Blog postThey're not waterproof, but they are official Bicycle Playing Cards. I imagine a game would go pretty well for players who happen to like Kassandra. The real question is what would Kassandra's game be? Poker, blackjack, go fish? A game with extremely high stakes?
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Blog postOr what I really want to see when I use Google Earth. I spent 5 - 6 hours on this one over the weekend, and did some detail work to finish up last night.
Click for the full view.
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Blog postThis isn’t about whether or not we’re going to have or how often we’re going to be reading eBooks in the next few years, because I assume that’s been thoroughly answered to everyone’s satisfaction.
This is a little view into what they may look like in the next few years, focusing on one cool feature: pop-up glossary or footnote data inside your books. Before you run off saying this isn’t for fiction, think about how often you’ve been in the middle of a complex SF or fantasy novel an -
Blog postIf you’re writing short stories or books—and let’s face it, who’s not?—I have a few tools for you, character name generators (contemporary and Seaborn names) and a word pair list generator, all of which I use for my own work. One of the greatest things about fantasy and science fiction as a genre is that so many F&SF readers are also writers. I don't think you'll find that in thrillers, murder mysteries, romance, or anywhere else.
The contemporary name generator -
Blog postThis just kicked off at GoodReads for readers in the US, UK, Australia, and Japan!
Enter to win. It's free!
Goodreads Book Giveaway Saltwater Witch by Chris Howard Giveaway ends October 01, 2012.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.
Enter to win -
Blog postKassandra with her scale armor coming apart and floating away. I worked on this last night, finished up the type for some prints over lunch today. It's actually a good sized piece, about 26 inches tall. Check out the full-sized image, because it looks a bit fuzzy in the reduced size.
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Blog postThis is the cover for the upcoming mass-market paperback edition of Nanowhere. Forgot to post this last week. Some minor tweaking to go, but it's pretty much this:
Titles By Chris Howard
