A Brief Update

To my followers, I apologize for a lack of updates, Job hunting, birthday and the final class for this term have been keeping a bit busy. Anyways, enough excuses, something fun I found is this:

http://l33t.razerzone.com/index.php?user_dtl=e48b185060fb0ff49be6da43e69e624b

Razer is having a big giveaway! For all you fellow PC gamers, this is a refer a friend style sweepstakes, so I greatly appreciate anyone who registers through me. There are lots of big prizes to win, tons of swag and all that good stuff.

A Modest Tribute - The Virtual Jurassic Park (so to speak)

Some may be aware that in this large network of tubes that we call the internet, there exists virtual worlds. Literally. The largest and most successful being Second Life, a grid of sims (simulated islands and continents) make up a large and diverse existence.

Residents (users of Second Life) roam these different landscapes taking in sights and meeting people. From post-apocalyptic wastelands, large shopping malls, and private islands owned by corporations such as HP, there's something for everybody in Second Life.

What I'll discuss today is the existence of a private island called Dinosaurs Park, owned and operated by resident Nargus Asturias. The home of Nargus Lab, a creator of feral and anthropomorphic dinosaur avatars. An avatar is, simply put, you. What you look like to everybody else in SL.

Dinosaurs Park is also where the Dinosaurs Alliance began, the largest group of dinosaur enthusiasts and avatar users in Second Life. I myself am a part of this group and do some moderating and administrating for it now and then.

The parks exterior is currently pending a revamp to match the new facility. The large outdoor area and the 3 original domes still welcome visitors

However, if you venture to the new gate, a nice surprise awaits you

Nestled nicely beneath a mountain, the new facility is indeed a solid tribute to style of Jurassic Park. Much of it is now open, but some parts are still under development.

The park is ever growing, it's broad range of dinosaur Avatars expanding. With more and more people venturing into the virtual world, the park remains a notable asset to the world, a wonderful place to visit.

New Jurassic Park Games?

First read about this is Game Informer a month or 2 back, but it appears that the same team who had been working on Sam and Max are going to be taking on the Jurassic Park franchise in the gaming industry:

Escapist Magazine Article
Game Informer Article

The last game I'm aware of would be Operation Genisis, a Roller Coaster tycoon style Jurassic Park builder that came out on Xbox, PS2, and maybe PC? I can't remember. Anyhow, I'm excited to maybe be playing some JP style adventure on something other than a Sega.

Now lets hope this is the kickoff for the long awaited, dumped, picked back up, scripted, and re-scripted Jurassic Park IV.

For us gamers, there's been a fair few games and mods to meet our dino needs, form Turok, to Primal Carniage, there's a good dino shooter every now and then, but  to see the Jurassic Park franchise put  out something new will be refreshing... or not, who knows. I feel the same way about the fabled Jurassic Park IV

My fave of the 3

I can't pick one!

The first movie had the best story because it followed the book pretty closely with only a few deviations. This was the early 90s though and CGI was rather limited. For it's time, it was quite a breakthrough, never before had they used computer input puppets to get the rough animation for all the dinos.

The second had the best acting, although this may just be my bias because of how much i <3 Goldblum

Other than that, The Lost World also had a lot more action than the other 2. However we didn't see a whole lot of different dinos, nothing wrong with that though.

Jurassic Park III had the worst story and action, but the best dinos. I don't think raptors ever looked cooler than how they did in JPIII. Not to mention with CGI, they were able to play off the pack hunting mentality a lot more.

All in all, I like all three movies, but if i had to pick just one... I couldn't. How about some cool pictures of the JPIII raptors? :D

Mmmm... Raptors



















Sorry, I'm a huge rpator fanboy!

The site of the Jurassic Park Gate

One sad thing about the Jurassic Park production in Kauai was the unfortunate timing. Friday, September 11, 1992, almost all the scenes they needed to shoot on the island were complete, except for a backdrop scene for the Galimimus scene. It was that day the Hurricane Iniki struck Kauai with winds form 165-180MP/h. Predicted to be a force 5 hurricane, the worst to hit Kauai in the century.

The massive hurricane destroyed all the facades in Kauai, the Jurassic Park gate, the Visitor Center, Raptor pen, etc. etc. It was just lucky that Spielberg enforced a tight production schedule and had all the vital scenes done by then. For us fans, this means we don't get to see these sites beyond what was captured in production images and footage. 

(image: Jurassic Park Gate today)

An interesting story came out of this though, the crew of Jurassic Park was holed up in a hotel in Kauai while the hurricane blazed around them, they were scheduled to fly out the next day, but that obviously wasn't going to happen. Their chartered jet was directed to stay far away from the island. By 3PM they were all in the Hotel ballroom, power was out, and the sound of wind and rain blasted around outside. The hotel lost it's roof, and after 7 and a half hours of waiting, the guests were finally allowed to go back to their rooms. 

The following morning, Spielberg said, "Iniki had gone through Kauai like the big bad wolf at the house made of straw. Every single structure was in shambles; roofs and walls were torn away; telephone poles and trees were down as far as the eye could see. It was the worst devastation i had ever personally witnessed."

Producer Kathy Kennedy made a run to the airport, finding that it was mostly closed down, the air control tower having been destroyed. She brought this news back to the folks at the hotel.

"By that time, our crew had helped in getting some of the roads cleared. they had also been able to hook up the electricity because we had oru own generators. Four of us went back to the airport in a little jeep. When we got there, we say that they had set up a makeshift tower, and some military planes and a little Piper Cub carrying some Salvation Army people had landed. I arranged to hitch a ride with the Piper Cub pilot when he flew back to Honolulu so I could tyr to track down the studio jet we'd called before the storm hit. When i got to Honolulu, i found the jet-but I still didn't know how we were going to get it into Kauai, because the airport there was still restricted to military transport only."

While making arrangements with Hawaiian Airlines, Kennedy was astounded when she found help for a surprising source. 

"A guy came up to me and said, 'Do you know who I am?' And I said, 'No.' And he said, 'Does the line "That's my pet snake Reggie," mean anything to you?' It was the pilot from The raiders of the Lost Ark! I couldn't believe it, he had been flying a DC-3 in and out of Kauai, loaded with medical personnel and supplies. So he and i worked out a plan with the National Guard-we would fly to Kauai with doctors and nurses on the studio jet and with medical supplies on a Hawaiian Airlines DC-8, and we'd get the crew out on those jets. And that's what we did. Everybody was out within forty-eight hours after the storm, and we lost only one day of shooting." 

The day they lost they were able to make up in Oahu, a minor setback compared to what could have happened.

-Jurassic Park gate Image source: http://gohawaii.about.com/od/kauailand/ss/movie_tours_8.htm

-Story was paraphrased and direct Quotes were taken form The Making of Jurassic Park  by Don Shay and Jody Dungan.   

Jurassic Park Jeep Forum

Lately I've been enamored with the Jeeps that appear in the first Jurassic Park film, I had been for quite some time, but never knew that a community existed for such enthusiasts. Someday I hope to own a YJ of my own and begin work on converting it into a JP Jeep, in the meantime, I just browse around the forums, quite  a nice community!

http://www.jurassicparkjeep.com/forum/

Many folks here have completed their conversions, others are still in the build process, it's really cool to see the progress of peoples projects, from custom spin-offs to screen replicas, they are quite the valuable resource.

Fave song right now

MMM... Incubutts

REEEEAAAACH!

K, off topic, but Halo Reach came out last week, I've been playing it like crazy. I had totally burned out on Halo 3, and ODST was kinda "meh" imo, but Reach blew me away. However, I am sad that this marks the last Halo game from Bungie... Oh well, everyone needs to move on to bigger and better things someday.

For a final game though, they really outdid themselves, the multilayer and story are both quite amazing. I'll be in front of my tv if anyone needs me.

About this Blog...

This is a fanblog regarding the Jurassic Park series in general. The name Isla Sorna comes for the second island in the story, site B of INgen's project.

I've been a huge fan of the Jurassic Park movies and books for a long time, this is just a way to meet and talk with other folks who share the same interest.

This is also a personal blog, so expect to see a few random things!

All posts regarding the Jurassic Park series are welcomed and encouraged :)