Raven Bower's Blog, page 2

Movie Review ~ Shark Night (Horror)

 

 

 

Title: Shark Night

Director: David R. Ellis

Genre: Horror, creature feature

Rating: 3 bats

The blurb for this shark fest doesn’t do the movie justice. In fact, I almost didn’t bother watching it because of the ‘so what?’ factor.

Maybe they ought to have at least mentioned that the group of friends are trapped on an island in shark infested water. Or perhaps hinted that there was more than nature’s will behind the rampant sharks. That would have been accurate and a better lead in to this fun shark movie.

Anyway, as mentioned, a group of friends heads to an island home in a large saltwater lake. When one of them is attacked, they discover that the lake is infested with sharks. Without giving too much more away, they’re eventually stranded on the island where no cell phones work.

Much of what the characters did was a little far-fetched and on the stupid side. They also don’t question a few things the locals do that are obvious clues that things are not kosher. If you can ignore those, the movie has a nice twist to it and is enjoyable to watch.

They also have a cool scene featuring one of the smaller sharks – you’ll know it when you come to it! * Hint, there’s a net enclosure used *

Not the best of shark movies but certainly not the worst.

 

 

Aquatics ~ 20g Desk Tank!

 

 

Introducing the 20g desk tank!

After dealing with the annoyance of a 5g tank on my desk (smaller tanks really ARE harder to keep), I opted for a 20g rectangular tank that sits to the left of my computer. It’s easier to keep and far more interesting to watch!

 

 

 

The above two photos are the front view.

 

 

Here’s the king of the 20g – Neptune the German blue ram! He’s putting his beg on. I swear, he acts like a dog! He’ll even come to the surface to eat treats (blood worms) from my fingers. He was shy at first and took longer to get comfy than the tetras, but once settled in rams are quite interactive. On maintenance days, he’s so curious that I have to try not to accidentally catch him in my hand because he loves to get so close and sometimes plays in fingers – as if they’re some sort of impromptu obstacle course.

You can also see one of the female amanos harvesting algae off the Ambulia.

 

 

The above is a side shot, looking out into the study.

 

 

This is the other side, looking towards the writing area.  There’s an open area here where I’ve tried a few plants that just didn’t work for me. So, need to find others to put there. I’m considering propagating the mermaid weed and starting a stand of it on this end too.

 

 

Here’s the ember tetras and a stray glow light tetra, hanging out in the forest.

 

 

Shot of the male amano shrimp.

 

This is the fat oto cat, of the two he keeps the plumpest and sometimes looks like he’s going to pop!

Because of the high light from the T5s over a 20g there were many algae issues at the beginning. I’m glad to say they’ve now abated! The magic combo of algae eradication was dosing Excel, choosing some faster growing plants like the tiger val (which wasn’t originally in the tank) and adding the oto cats and amano shrimp once there was enough algae for them to thrive on. Now I  supplement feed them an algae flake here and there to ensure they’re getting enough food.

Tank specs:

Hardware: 20g glass tank, glass cover,  AquaticLife T5 dual bulb system, Marineland HOB filter and Tetra heater

Substrate: EcoComplete

Livestock: German blue ram, ember tetras, glow light tetras, oto cats, amano shrimp, assassin snails

Plants: Ambulia, chain swords, tiger val, mermaid weed, Hygro angustifolia, Crypt balansae,  Rotalia indica

Tank, cover, driftwood, substrate, all livestock and plants are from Blue Fish Aquarium in Grandville MI

Movie Review ~ Dean Teaster’s Ghost Town (Western)

 

 

 

Title: Dean Teaster’s Ghost Town

Director: Dean West & Jeff Kennedy

Genre: Western, action

Rating: 4 bats

This is a nice, ditty of a western. The characters were interesting and it had a lot of history, which created a solid world. The strife, remorse and desire for revenge (on both the goodie and baddie side) were grounded in the character’s very beings. Great job!

There wasn’t a ton of action, but what was there was done well. It’s refreshing to watch a movie that isn’t so heavy on the special effects that it takes away from the storyline.

The main reason this didn’t get 5 bats is the flashbacks * sigh * – there were way too many and the ‘ghost’ shots would have been more effective if there were fewer.

They also killed my favorite  character in this entire film at the end, so that kinda irked me.

Those aside, this is a fun western to watch. Fairly clean, lots of tension and lawlessness!

Aquatics Review ~ Gulf Coast Ecosystems Rocks!

 

 

 

Company: Gulf Coast Ecosystems aka GCE

Products: Mostly marine macro algae, also some marine foods and snails.

Rating: 5 bats

This was my first experience with GCE and certainly won’t be my last!

My prime concern with dealing with aquatics is the knowledge and availability of their staff/owners. I wanted to make sure the algae I’d chosen would thrive in my system (big difference between ‘thriving’ and ‘surviving’) so I contacted their sales email. Russ contacted me personally and promptly with answers to my questions. He was also able to work with me to get the cotton candy algae, which showed as out of stock but he was able to wrangle up a bit for me anyway!

So in knowledge and prompt replies they are stellar.

It’s difficult to get macros in my area so I was left with little choice but to order them online and when you order from a company online, you really never know what will show up in the mail. Turns out, I had nothing to fret about!

Shipping was fast (2 days), the box was sturdy and well insulated as you can see from the above photo. I also appreciated how they wrapped the cooling packs in newspaper as you can see below. I’m sure we’ve all had incidences when we’ve had to apply cold packs to our body parts right? Know how it hurts when you apply the cold pack directly to your skin instead of wrapped in a towel? Yeah, same thing happens to plants and animals. GCE realizes this and buffered the algae and snails from direct cold. Score!

 

 

I was impressed at this point, but still leery of what the algae and snails would be like. Unwrapping further I was delighted to find ample, healthy bags of algae! That’s right. None of those little twiggy macros people try to pawn off on Ebay. Nope. The bags were packed full and the plants were actually grown, not clippings! Each bag, btw, was double bagged to prevent leakage. Another score in customer care for GCE!

 

 

(Please note, in the photo above I already removed the rest of the packing material, they were well packed so that they didn’t jostle around)

The first thing I looked at were the Pods because I’d read so many bad reviews of customers from OTHER stores receiving pods that weren’t the same as pictured and that their pods were either past their ‘use by’ date or nearly so  (they only have a 4 week shelf life). The pods GCE sent were exactly as they pictured on their website. Pack date was the same as the ship date – so they were fresh! A nice clump of algae in there too to keep the pods happy.

 

 

(I’ll review the pods separately)

Now on to the algae!

 

 

This is a lovely, deep red Cryptonemia – nice sized, as you can see and attached to a plug for easy weighting and placing. Overall it was healthy with just a tiny bit of leaf edges that were rather worse for wear. That was easy to fix with a bit of trimming.

This is a bag stuffed full of one of my favorite macros, Gracilaria Hayi – when this algae is released – it is simply beautiful! Completely healthy in one large portion and one medium portion.

This is another full bag of Gracilaria sp. it’s looking to be parvispora  if my ID skills are up to par (and not saying they are!). Again, one large portion and one medium – both healthy, requiring no trimming.

This is Hetereosiphona gibessii  aka cotton candy algae. He was out of most of it, so this was one good sized portion. Really love the soft feel this brings to the reef tank. It gives a fluffy feel to the backdrop of sand and rough live rock. Mostly healthy, requiring just light trimming.

These are the dwarf Cerith snails – awesome little guys! GCE packed quite  a few more than I ordered which is fantastic! Thanks GCE! I was able to stock my 30g and 5g with Ceriths    They were all alive, well and currently oozing about the tanks.

On top of all this spiffy stuff, Russ also has a site dedicated to macros and their culture called Marine Plants in the Aquarium that gives information that is lacking in much of the marine world about these wonderful additions to our salty tanks.

So Gulf Coast Ecosystems receives my highest rating of 5 bats! They’re great to do business with and I can’t wait to make another order. Ochtodes and Hayi and Eucheuma oh my!

Free eBooks at Hydra Publications Summer Bash!

 

Hydra Publications is celebrating summer with a Summer Bash! Free eBooks to fit any reader’s tastes! The freebies are available today (7/16) and tomorrow (7/17)

Check out our saucy, gritty urban fantasy novel, Primal for free! It’s Book 1 of the Vengeance series.

Also available are:

Chronicle of Destiny by Etta Jean

The Exile’s Violin by R.S Hunter

Ethos Morning Star by Desiree Finkbeiner

Gnosis by Tom Wallace

Anon by Peter Giglio

Eternal Patrol by Michael Wallace

The Universal Mirror by Gwen Perkins

The Heart Denied by Linda Anne Wulf

Virginia Creeper by Blaine Pardoe

The Parrot Told Me by Rachael Rawlings

Andraste by Marisa Mills

The Know-it-all Girl by Joanna Foreman

Deception Peak by Dianne Gardner

Ukishima by Nigel Sellars

Empyreal Fate by Rachel Hunter

Bridgeworld by Travis McBee

The Hand of God by Tony Acree

Reality Check by Eric Garrison

Dearly Departed by Rachel Rawlings

Tale Spinner by David Donaghe

Into the Spiral by Erin Danzer

Love Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me By Lyndi Alexander

Blood of the Highland Moon by Morinda Montgomery

Raising Riley By Brick Marlin

Bounty Hunter by Kate Lynd

 

 

 

 

Hydra Games Launches! Pathfinder Compatable RPG Mod!

 

 

Dun dun dun!

Hydra Games introduces our first Pathfinder Roleplaying Game compatible game module!

The peace of Crestview is shattered. One by one, the crew of a fishing ship, The Slippery Eel, have been disappearing – their bodies found torn and brutalized.

Are the murders the work of an angry sea hag? Or is there a more sinister element lurking below the town’s normally placid façade?

A seaside adventure for 2nd – 3rd level characters that includes new tek gadgets and items.

Written by Raven & Lain Bower, art by Joel DuQue

Roll Initiative!   3: )

 

Warrioress Shalya Dormyr’s Art Reveal!

 

This is a little late in coming – got sidetracked with Hydra Games 

Anyway, Lain and I are proud to show off the absolutely AWESOME artwork and armor for Weeping Dark: Bleeding Edge’s main character – the spunky warrioress  Shayla Dormyr!

The artist is Carlos Diaz, one of our Hydra Games artists who has also done all of the artwork for the Andronia: Region of Turmoil world guide (coming soon!) and he’s currently working on the huge art list for Primal Earth, Hydra Games’ urban fantasy rpg setting. His artwork is superb, his insight into flow and movement is just amazing.

Instead of continuing to blather I’ll let his artwork speak for itself -

Rasputin the Betta

Since Lain is on vacation this week, he was sweet and decided to whisk us off to Grand Rapids yesterday for an early Mother’s Day – sans kids  *grin*

Soooo…for Mother’s day we went out to a nice lunch and then to Blue Fish Aquarium, where he got me the most awesome Mother’s Day gift – my next project, the 20g! And…Rasputin the half-moon betta!

 

 

Love bettas but I’m also very picky about bettas (and all my fish, actually, but anywhoooo) so every time we went to Blue Fish checking their betta selection was standard procedure. But the search ended when we saw him hovering in his bowl and showing off his fins.

 

 

He’s in the 20 g., more pics of that to come later, so the water is still cloudy.

 

 

But not nearly as bad as when he was introduced to the tank, yesterday, after putting the Eco-Complete substrate in. Granted, for some reason the water didn’t get quite as murky with this 20g as it did with the 55g hex. (also in the above shot, the assassin snail of doom!)

 

 

*points up* That was last night, about oh, an hour or two after most of the debris settled. Nice shot of Rasputin’s translucent fins though 

 

55 Hex ~ First Attempt at Aquascaping

If you follow my blathering on Facebook, you’ve probably heard a lot about my bedroom tank – the 55 hex. Now you can see it for yourself 

Be kind – this is my first real attempt at pulling together a permanent tank, my others are temporary and usually in states of flux – when they become permanent, then I’ll post more! This is what the tank looked like when I purchased it from a gentleman who was moving and didn’t want the hassle of moving the tank with him:

 

 

It had blue, pink and white rocks with lots of artificial buildings. Since brown doesn’t go with my bedroom decor, the stand and edges of the tank are now a metallic pewter with silver swirls. After cleaning the daylights out of the tank with a water & vinegar mix, we thoroughly rinsed it and had to reseal all the corners because the gentleman scraped all the silicone off at the advice of VIP Pets *grimace*, then we  set in the corner of our bedroom.

It now looks like this:

The above photo is what the tank looks like from the side, when you enter the room. As a note, the rotala indica will be moved to the new high light 20g on my desk – once it’s set up. It’s doing okay in the hex but the tetra swarm are too rambunctious so there’s always leaves torn and floating in the tank and it’s growing leggy, as you can see because of the lower light environment. I knew it was chancy when I put it in there and still, it’s not doing horribly, just not as well as I’d like.

 

 

The above view is more from the front, what you’d see from the bed and middle of the room.

 

 

This is a brighter picture from the side, when you walk into the room. The silver shows, the rotala is easier to see and the purple from the walls reflecting off the other side    The bottom plants are crypt wendtii bronze – they’ve doubled in size and amount size putting them in. Very pleased! Attached to the driftwood are bunches of lace java fern and java moss.  In the back to the left there’s an anubias attached to a rock. Also getting in the photo are some diamond tetras and emperor tetras.

 

 

This is a brighter pic of the front, visible from the bed and middle of the room. There’s a better image of the diamonds and emperors, plus the cardinal tetras are getting some action at the top rear. Also visible are the crypt usteriana which are also doing stellar (they’re the big long leaved plants to the left and rear – the deep red at the bottom of the leaves (not visible in the pic) is fantastic!

 

 

A central picture showing both prime sides. the back is still a bit bare until the vals (the grass like pants in the background) grow in. Eventually they’ll form a jungle thicket back there and reach the surface of the water, gracefully draping over it. Just takes time.

 

 

Love the way the diamond tetras shine! It’s unfortunately difficult to capture the colors of the emperors though. Grr.

 

 

Better pic of the usteriana and the red underbelly. These two will get far larger and have more leaves in time.

 

 

After multiple attempts to get a decent picture of Ramiel, the black angel fish, this is the best I could do. He just fidgets too much and his dark mahogany coloring is difficult to capture. Along with him are a diamond and the cardinal tetras.

Anywho, those are the ones that I could catch on camera. There’s others in there but they’re a little shy and the plants aren’t fully grown in yet but *shrug* they will be!

All plants, fish and the driftwood are from Blue Fish Aquarium in Grand Rapids, MI which is the only place I purchase livestock from. Substrate is Carib Sea Eco-Complete – highly recommended however, when their package says your water will turn cloudy they LIE! It doesn’t turn ‘cloudy’ it turns into a darned mire and looks like you just siphoned water into your tank from some ancient mucky swamp. It takes about 24 hours for it to settle and finally get ‘cloudy’ and that’s with filters running. Another note, some people rinse it – please don’t do that. Part of the reason of getting this particular substrate and ones like it is for the beneficial bacteria impregnated within.

Anyway, it was a fun venture and we’re still not 100% done. We’re in the process of designing a custom LED light system for it that is plant compatible.  I’m trying to talk Lain into designing the exterior of the fixture to look like a UFO or the star ship Enterprise  *grin*, it probably won’t fly (no pun intended) but worth a try!

 

Hydra Games Open Call! Attention GMs, Writers and Artists!

 

Open Call at Hydra Games!

We are accepting proposals for the following worlds:

 

 

Andronia: a high fantasy hybrid world rife with magic, chaos and adventure

 

 

Primal Earth: a gritty urban fantasy world filled with darkness, danger and sensuality

We highly recommend that anyone who is interested in writing for Hydra Games, or any publisher for that matter, read James L. Sutter’s article 9 Ways to Piss Off an Editor HERE.

Potential Novel, RPG Supplement and Module Writers

Please send a cover letter with contact information and publishing credits, plus 10-20 page fiction writing sample in standard manuscript format (double spaced, 12 pt times new roman font, header with your name, title and page number) to raven [AT] hydrapublications [DOT] com

Writers must be able to work under deadline, sign our NDA and follow instructions.

Current Needs: Though we’re taking submissions for both worlds, there are more openings for the Primal Earth world than Andronia.

Artists

We’re interested in artists to join our team in creating vivid worlds. Please send a cover letter with contact information and a link to your gallery to: raven [AT] hydrapublications [DOT] com

Editors

If you’re interested in applying for an editorial position, please send a cover letter with contact information and qualifications to: raven [AT] hydrapublications [DOT] com

Rules Gurus

We are also looking for GMs and Players who are familiar with the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game system and rule set for Quality Control positions. The tasks of this job include but are not limited to: creating stats for creatures, NPCs, items etc., translating our writers’ creations into stats, ensuring compliance to the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game rules and/or Hydra Games specific rules on modules and world guides, creating new rules that are Pathfinder Roleplaying game compatible and/or Hydra Games sub-rules compatible.

If interested in this position please send a cover letter with your experience with the Pathfinder system along with what world(s) you prefer to raven [AT] hydrapublications [DOT] com

GMs

We have GM Prestige Packs for intrepid GMs willing to run Pathfinder games with our compatible content at conventions across the US and the world. To join us in this adventure please contact Frank – frank [AT] hydrapublications [DOT] com for details on the perks and opportunities available.