META: Hiatus

After almost a decade of a wonderful partnership, as of January 1, 2012, UGO and HeroMachine are parting ways. My contract with them is up and will not be renewed, which means it's time for me to move on into the next great adventure.

We're still talking about what to do with the program and this site, and while I'm hopeful you'll continue being able to enjoy the use of the program as you always have, we have yet to finalize anything.

As of this writing, UGO still owns all of the HeroMachine intellectual property. Since I am no longer employed by them, I don't feel comfortable, legally, posting new content here. Until we get things squared away, therefore, I won't be updating this site.

For now the HeroMachine 3 Alpha will remain freely available here, and all of the existing HeroMachine content on UGO.com (including the forums) will stay up as well. I can't guarantee how long that will be the case, however, so I urge you (as always ) to create both text and image backups of all of your creations.

Whatever happens in the future, I want to thank everyone who's either used the program in one of its many incarnations, or who has participated in this blog site. You're a funny, creative, awesome group of folks and you are a large part of what has helped make this the best experience of my life.

I am also extremely grateful to UGO, a fantastic company and a great group of people who truly made all of this possible. I remain optimistic that we'll be able to come to a long-term solution that results in the continued ability to bring your imagination to life with this set of tools. Regardless, I have nothing but good will towards them and will remain eternally and sincerely thankful for their support and partnership.

Caption Contest 114 Winners

Here are the Winners of Caption Contest 114! As with the last Character Contest I won't pick an overall winner so no one gets a prize, but all of you are winners in my book. The panel was:

And here are your Winners!

  • Gero: “Okay, I’m starting to think you’re not the real Santa…”
  • skybandit: …and a new Batarang, and some Bat Ponies, and a Bat choo-choo…
  • Gabe Puratekuta: “My second greatest fear has come to life!”
  • TheNate:
    1) You fly around the world, you can see everyone, you live in the North Pole – admit it, you’re Superman’s secret identity!
    2) Please don’t bring out the gimp!
  • Abraxas: Oh Santa, this is everything I wished for.
  • McKnight57: You realize, this puts you on MY naughty list right?
  • Syntax: Oh stop squirming Robin, you’ve been tied up by stranger men.
  • DubbleYoo: Just to be clear… whose Christmas wish is this?
  • X-stacy: Oh, gosh, this is embarrassing. I got him the exact same thing!

Thanks for playing along, folks!

We gotta get a better grade of moron around here

(From "Red Band Comics" number 1, 1944.)

HM3: Tech boots

I've just posted a new set of items, "Foot-Right-Male-Tech" for HeroMachine 3. I marked them as Male but they're really unisex:

If you don't see the new set on the list, clear your browser cache and it ought to show. Enjoy!

Happy New Year's Eve!

Consider this an open thread, to discuss anything you like -- memories of 2011, hopes for 2012, which upcoming super-hero related movie has you most excited, requests for the blog, etc. Whatever you like!

As for me, I just want to express once again my sincere gratitude for your ongoing participation in the HeroMachine project, and my intense appreciation for your humor, talent, creativity, and imagination. I am awed by how gracious so many of you are to your fellow creators, how generous with your time, and how willing you are to give your feedback. It humbles me, and I thank you for it, one and all.

And, of course, Happy New Year!

And that was the last they ever saw of Captain Balloon Head

(From "V Comics" number 1, 1942.)

HM3 Challenge!

I'm going to just throw this out there -- who can come up with the best "deep space" background illustration? You know, with the stars and the nebulae and the hoo-hoo and the ha-ha, all colored up all pretty? The winner gets a valuable "No Prize"!

Open Critique Day #31

Folks, it's time for another Open Critique Day!

If you have a HeroMachine illustration or another piece of artwork you've done that you'd like some help with, post a link to it in comments along with your thoughts on it -- what you think is working, what you're struggling with, etc. I will post my critique of the piece, hopefully giving some tips on how to improve it.

Of course everyone is welcome to post their critiques as well, keeping in mind the following rules:

  • Make sure your criticism is constructive. Just saying "This sucks" is both rude and unhelpful without giving specific reasons why you think it sucks and, ideally, some advice on how to make it better.
  • Each person should only post one illustration for critique to make sure everyone who wants feedback has a chance.
  • I will not critique characters entered in any currently running contest, as that doesn't seem fair to the other entrants. You can still post it if you like for the other visitors to critique, but I will not do so.

That's it! Hopefully we can get some good interaction going here and help everyone (me included!) learn a little bit today.

Before Stella could get her groove back, she needed …

(From "V-Comics" number 1, 1942.)

borntobealoser is one smart Highway Warrior!

Apparently you still have to know math even after the Apocalypse, which frankly is a big time bummer. Luckily we have borntobealoser on our side, as he utterly dominated the keypad puzzle facing us in front of the Big Steel Door at the local university. Here was his solution:

Right, I’ve literally only looked at the puzzle for a few seconds, and I’m shouting the first thought that came into my head. Forgive me if I’m wrong, but don’t you get the last number of each row if you add the first 2 numbers of each row and take away the third number in the row?

Like this:
2 + 12 = 14, 14 – 5 = 9.
4 + 20 = 24, 24 – 7 = 17.

So, going on that, surely it’s:
12 + 12 = 24, 24 – 4 = 20.

If that’s wrong, I’m going to look like a total idiot…

Guess what? You do not look like an idiot, you look like a genius!

This solution was a lot better than my "Click randomly on every possible number" approach, the legacy of a university education much heavier on English and Art than was probably good for me.

We already have a Geiger counter, fortunately, but I went ahead and loaded up on the rest of the stuff.

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