Zodiac - First Website
The Zodiac Circle was a project I did for my Aunt. It was painted on a transparent plastic circle so that it could turn and position the Zodiac animal for the year to the top. It would be mounted on the entrance to their Restaurant. I was around 16 or even younger at the time. I'm unsure what has happened to it. This design also became my first website and was designed to link to various material that I was interested in.
I don't think the concept of bookmarks had really taken off and I didn't even have internet dial up at home on my PC (Pentium 100 ). Hence I created this web site to store material that would allow me access to whenever I had internet access (College and eventually University). I also stored a few of my favourite things including some poems I enjoyed, stories I had written at school and my own drawings. Anime, Games, RPG and Models contained links to various other websites including Games Workshop! Vivian Chow is a Chinese singer and was at that time my infatuation.
I still have the content of this website and reading through it brings back nice memories from my childhood. I started writing stories quite young. One of the first was called "Witch and Warlock". I was brought up on cartoons such as "Dungeon and Dragons" and also "Thundercats" that inspired me to write. None of it was any good until I was around 16 when I wrote "Creeping Fear" based on Games Workshop Genestealers and then stories based on a RPG company called "Palladium Books". It was a different time as I had less computer games to play and no internet access.
It was also around the age of 13 when I spotted one of the other students on the bus heading to school reading a magazine with painted model figures. The memory is still strong and vivid, but I'm unsure of the events after that and how I eventually got my own copy of the White Dwarf. This opened up my world as my first box set was the Epic Space Marine Army. I didn't have the correct paint and was a matter of slapping orange onto some to form one army and red on another to form another army. I still to this day have a couple of these.
Despite the interest in Warhammer 40K, it was limited due to lack of painting skill and pocket money. Due to having to help my parents in the Chinese Takeaway, I had plenty of time waiting for customers to turn up, but had no access to the computer games I was playing (Spectrum 128k) nor my figures to paint. So I had time to draw. I had a talent, just not the imagination. I had to copy other drawings (not trace) as I could nor draw from my imagination. I had to be able to see it to then draw it. My main interest was in Palladium Books' creation called Rifts and their futuristic technology... robots and power armour.