Monster Mash

This past January I had the incredible good fortune to fall sideways into a wonderful graphics research project. How it came about is pure serendipity: I had coffee with my advisor from UW, who’d recently started at Google. He asked if I’d like to test out some experimental sketch-based animation software one of his summer interns was developing. I said sure, thinking I might spend an hour or two… but the software was so much fun to use, I couldn’t stop playing with it. One thing led to another, and now we have a paper in SIGGRAPH Asia 2020!

Have you ever wished you could just jot down a 3D character and animate it super quick, without all that tedious modeling, rigging and keyframing? That’s what Monster Mash is for: casual 3D animation. Here’s how it works:

Bread and Butter Pickles

When life gives you gherkins, you make bread-and-butter pickles. At least, that’s what I’ve been doing. I started with this recipe, but as usual, had to modify it based on what we happened to have in our spice rack. I made a few rookie moves, like using the mandoline bare-handed (and let me tell you, that’s a mistake you’ll only make once. Those things are vicious!) But the pickles are so worth it. Sweet and spicy, great with a sandwich, or just straight out of the jar in your pyjamas (not that I’d ever do that, no sir.)

Four gherkins picked fresh from the vine.
These fresh gherkins have an amazing flavor, almost sweet, even the weird-looking yellow ones.
Sliced gherkins in a bowl.
Finally got an excuse to use the zigzag blade on the mandoline!
Spices and vinegar in the saucepan.
Cinnamon, turmeric, clove, cardamom, mustard seed, white peppercorns, chili flakes.
Gherkins and onions simmering in the pickling syrup.
3 pint jars of bread-and-butter pickles.
Two 5-inch gherkins, with 1/2 cup of pickling syrup, will just about fill one pint jar.