Animated GIFs with ScreenToGif

With platforms like Twitter, Slack or Microsoft Teams, animated GIFs have been revived. In addition to emojis, animated GIFs seem to be the way to express yourself on the web. In case you are in the need to create your own animated GIFs, check out ScreenToGIF.

This tool allows you to record a selected area of your screen, live feed from your webcam or live drawings from a sketchboard. Afterwards, you can edit and save the animation as a gif or video. 

It comes with a nice screen recorder frame and a whole list of features to create animated GIFs, Videos and so on. You can record your screen, capture the webcam or whiteboard drawing.s

ScreenToGif Capture Frame

It also comes as a single file, which easily allows you to deploy it almost everywhere, even to keep it on a USB stick.

Homepage: https://www.screentogif.com/
GitHub Project: https://github.com/NickeManarin/ScreenToGif

Distant Worlds 2 – Been There. Seen It.

After three months of gameplay participating in the Distant Worlds 2 expedition in Elite Dangerous, I managed to arrive at Beagle Point, one of the farthest systems in the galaxy.

INV Deep Space I in the Beagle Point System

This included several thousand jumps (each jump takes about one to two minutes), scooping fuel, repairing the ship and such things. There was a tough schedule by the organizers, including several waypoints on the expedition.

There is already a in-game sickness called Space Madness.

Space madness is a psychological condition that some pilots get while traveling in deep space for long periods. It’s a bit like vertigo, and is caused by being adrift without any reference points.

Once you get there you will have an incredible view of our galaxy.

As far as I know, the simulation behind the game creates systems when being visited the very first time. There seem to be some awesome algorithms. E.g. when Kepler 425reb was discovered, the simulation already had a similar system generated before and was updated accordingly with the real data.

I finally arrived there with a delay of two weeks behind the official schedule. All pilots arriving there, are rewarded with a certificate of completion, which I can proudly present.

Distant Worlds 2 Completion Certificate

There is also an in-game reward, an emblem to be shown on your ship. This, however, can be only equipped when being docked at a spaceport. This will take another few months to arrive at the nearest station.

A few thousand gamers went there and back. If you want to follow my trip back, you can have a look at my Twich channel where I stream my way back when being in the game.

Build your own Octocat

You don’t know what an Octocat is? If you don’t there is probably no need to read on, just enjoy my Octocat.

aheil's Octocat
aheil’s Octocat

If you want to know, let me help you. That’s what Wikipedia says:

GitHub’s mascot is an anthropomorphized “octocat” with five octopus-like arms.

The character was created by graphic designer Simon Oxley as clip art to sell on iStock, a website that enables designers to market royalty-free digital images.

GitHub became interested in Oxley’s work after Twitter selected a bird that he designed for their own logo. The illustration GitHub chose was a character that Oxley had named Octopuss. Since GitHub wanted Octopuss for their logo (a use that the iStock license disallows), they negotiated with Oxley to buy exclusive rights to the image.

GitHub renamed Octopuss to Octocat, and trademarked the character along with the new name. Later, GitHub hired illustrator Cameron McEfee to adapt Octocat for different purposes on the website and promotional materials; McEfee and various GitHub users have since created hundreds of variations of the character, which are available on The Octodex

If you want, you can get you very own Octocat at https://myoctocat.com/ and customize the hell out of it:

Take a break from your build and create an Octocat that’s all you, from whisker tip to tail.

Link: https://myoctocat.com