Listening to the Today programme's Carnyx feature on Radio 4 this morning reminded me of.... Carnyx Jazz Club

My folks in Aberdeenshire are telling me things are pretty bad up there, with deep snow drifts making rural roads impassable, and local shops are out of essentials and unable to restock. I lived up there 30 years and remember some epic winters, but they're saying this is the worst they've ever seen.

Not riding my regular bike at the moment due to work commitments and the need for new prescription sports glasses. So, it's indoor cycling via the Rouvy app instead, which is becoming seriously addictive - esp. riding (virtually) in other countries, and the new feature to upload saved GPX routes.

Money for Nothing. Dire Straits. Inspired by its groundbreaking video, I told my high school art teachers that I wanted to produce computer graphics, and they scoffed at me. Here I am four decades later with a whole career built on pursuing that dream. RIP MTV

Despite some upsets, 2025 turned out to be rather enjoyable, with visits to some fantastic heritage sites. Hoping for more of the same in 2026; the site visits, not the upsets! Wishing you all a great New Year!

Loving this time of the year where I grab the rare opportunity to appreciate the animated films made by big teams of super-talented CGI artists - the likes of which I can only dream of hiring to help me with the projects I am trying to tackle singlehandedly with a barely negligible budget!

Wishing all my followers a pleasant and peaceful festive break. See you all on the other side. 🎄

I've experienced quite few rough sailings on the overnight ferry to Shetland, but never quite this rough. Some days I think generative AI should only be used by people with a license.

Hope the Dalkeith motorcyclist I assisted late last night got home okay. Came off his bike on treacherously icy, untreated back roads near where I live. Not sure I'd be riding two wheels of any kind under such conditions.

Next year I'm starting a side project about old-school book illustrators. Does anyone know if there's an online database where I can search for all the books a person has illustrated? I've looked in archive.org, worldcat.org with limited results. Thanks! #books #booksky #illustration #illustrator

You will be visited by Three Spirits. In a material world?

Working an AGFA Repromaster photo-mechanical transfer camera in a busy ad agency darkroom, pre-digital era. My artwork had to be finalised, signed-off, correctly exposed, developed, dried with a hairdryer, and handed to the dispatch rider in time to make the newspaper publishing deadline each day.

I have spent today, Sunday, building a 17th-century timber church in Blender 3D and used a sim to set it on fire for a scene prop. Lord, forgive me for my sins.

Labours of the Months: December…. ….enjoying the fruits of August’s labours. Wild blackberry and apple crumble was completely delicious!

📢 Archaeological Illustrators 👇 Urras nan Tursachan (The Standing Stones Trust) is seeking new illustrations for its Calanais Standing Stones Visitor Centre. Full brief at calanais.org/exhibition-i... Tender application deadline: 18 Dec 25 Please share

No thanks, Waterstones 🤦‍♂️

I pity the poor critter. Life's tough at the moment. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

My St Andrews Day 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 ‘Broch’ tower of Haggis (v), Neeps, and Tatties with a caramelised red onion gravy. Roll on Burns Night so I can make this again 😋

This short course run by the Institute of Classical Studies, from 13 to 17 Apr 2026 in London, looks like a great intro to 3D Imaging and Modelling for Cultural Heritage. 👇 ics.sas.ac.uk/news-events/...

Can’t believe I made all these yesterday and I only got one before the others vanished quickly. Recipe courtesy of @meganfoodhistorian.bsky.social

Attenborough o’clock! Essential Sunday TV viewing for 🐈. #Kingdom

Comfort food season. Vegetable soup.

I'm heading off on a voyage this weekend.... An absolutely stunning book, @ianmcque.bsky.social 👏

So many great new features!

Grateful to be busy again only a few months after resuming freelance work, but I feel far more stressed than I did before. With me, every project has to be better than my last one, and raising the bar a little higher each time is hard when faced with ever diminishing budgets and punishing deadlines.

Too cloudy here last night to enjoy the northern lights, but it looks like Shetland got the best view of the 'Mirrie Dancers' again. Image credit: www.shetlandwebcams.com

Please, archaeology & heritage folks, add alt text to your images. It's just describing the photo so that people who can't see it can still engage with the post. Describing things is a key skill in archaeology & heritage. I'm tired of seeing lovely images that I can't share

You simply don't get a sense of the hidden architecture lurking beneath Edinburgh's South Bridge from street level until you look at the cross-sectional view. retrospectjournal.com/2024/11/10/a...

Game designers bring Scotland's mysterious Picts to life. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

The Radical Road needs a radical plan. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

The new #SirDavidAttenborough series #Kingdom is a BIG hit with my cat tonight. He’s been glued to the TV right since the start. 🐅

I've just seen the Baltersan Castle reconstruction (I won't share it on here, go check it on Faecebook) that's clearly been made with gen AI. Bartizan is entirely out of proportion to its true dimensions on the present ruin, central chimney width wrong, roof tiles wrong, crowsteps wrong. It hurts! 🤦

HELP US PRINT: ‘Rhynie, A Powerful Place of Pictland’ This nationally important monograph by Professor Gordon Noble FSAScot will only be printed if we hit our crowdfunding target by 6 December. Please support the campaign by registering your interest: www.kickstarter.com/projects/soc...

I am unable to comprehend numbers and dates unless I can visualise them as patterns, shapes, or points in a sequence. This condition is called Spatial-Sequence Synesthesia or SSS. It affects my mental arithmetic. I'm interested to hear from others who have it. synesthesia-test.com/spatial-sequ...

My reconstruction of Allen Smelt Mill (2017) is a good contender for being among my most challenging visualisation projects. It required months of effort, research, and problem-solving with the aid of 3D models. I wrote an article about the experience.... bob-marshall.blogspot.com/2018/01/reco...

Yes! 👇

¡Últimas plazas! El próximo lunes 3 de noviembre comenzamos un nuevo curso online y práctico que os permitirá aprender a recrear en 3D ciudades históricas con Blender. ¿Te lo vas a perder?

Castle Gloom, a.k.a. Castle Campbell, Clackmannanshire. 🏰 📷 My own. Happy All Hallows' Eve, folks.

Post a perfect album from 1989. A perfect music year.

Good morning. Caught an early ferry from Inverclyde over to Dunoon for a few castle visits today. ☀️🏰

Couldn't resist sharing this because CBP don't have a Bluesky account yet. Isn't this just completely AWESOME?!!! I feel obliged to point out that authentic Iron Age Brochs didn't have car parking, however. 🤣 #Brochs

Some great news coming out of Caithness!

#HillfortsWednesday #DogsAtHillforts My much-adored, and greatly missed Jack Russell terrier inspects Traprain Law Hillfort in #EastLothian back in 2008. Remote sensing data, imported into Blender 3D, shows the hillfort's topography and quarried-out northeast slopes. #RemoteSensingData #Digital3D

Needed some good news today. Absolutely elated.

Join the official Blender Survey 2025! Let's get a picture of the community and help shape the future of Blender together. 🧡 www.blender.org/news/blender... #b3d #DevFund

At a time when we are all being told to use less power and reduce our carbon footprint, the race to incorporate AI into every part of our digital lives seems so grossly absurd.

Two years ago, I embarked on an ambitious 3D reconstruction model of Dover Castle, recreating how it might have looked at the time of the Great Siege in 1216. Working with a team of architectural and military historians, the digital model and 3D renders took over five months to develop. #Blender3D

It's sometimes easy to forget to add ALT text to Bluesky posts. To remind you each time, head to Settings, Accessibility, and enable the feature 'Require alt text before posting'. ;)

Hi #PortfolioDay! I'm an Architectural Illustrator from Edinburgh. I visually reconstruct heritage buildings and monuments in #Blender3D guided by archaeology, measured survey data, and by working in collaboration with historians and archaeologists. Website: bobmarshall.co.uk