A few days ago I wrote about Kerkythea.  Well, today I’m going to share another fun bit of free software – Rainmeter.  Rainmeter is useful for anyone who wants to personalize their desktop beyond Windows’ capabilities, and get some useful information from it as well.  So what is Rainmeter?

This add-on program is a non-resource intensive program that pulls information from within Windows and displays it on your desktop in any number of cool and imaginative displays.  If your creative side can think of a way you would to show something, Rainmeter can probably make it happen.  I use Rainmeter to show my CPU usage, RAM and Network Traffic right on my desktop.  But, the best part is that you can also use it to show RSS feeds, weather forecasts, and even your iTunes player right on your background.  It’s fully customizable, and when mixed with an interesting background image, can turn your boring desktop into a useful, functional, beautiful work of art.  In fact, the biggest disadvantage of Rainmeter is that you aren’t going to want to have your programs open – you’re going to want to keep everything closed so that you can see your desktop! 

Now, it’s a bit tricky to actually code the meters the way you want, but once you get the hang of it, it’s relatively easy to do. The most time consuming parts are going to be figuring out what you want to see on your desktop and creating the perfect display.

The Rainmeter site has some tutorials to walk you through the meter-making. Of course, as always, you can drop us a line at A2 Studio, and we’ll be happy to help turn your boring, drab desktop into something you are actually happy to see when you get to work in the morning…

Here are a few examples of what Rainmeter can do…

Have you ever wanted to take your SketchUp renderings to a more photo-realistic level?  In today’s economy (or any, for that matter), it would be nice to be able to do that without breaking the bank.  Our recommendation:  Kerkythea.  This software is FREE, and integrates very well with SketchUp and other modeling programs.

First, take a look at their gallery (gallery), to get a sense of what can be done with the software.  A good portion of the architectural images were rendered from SketchUp models (also a FREE program…)  While a basic 3D model gets your point across, there’s often a need for a more polished rendering to get a client excited about their project.  Obviously, Kerkythea fits that bill.

Installation of Kerkythea is pretty simple.  Download the installation program (installation), and run it.  To integrate with SketchUp, download and install the appropriate files (add-ons).

Finally, there’s a pretty good gallery of materials here (materials).  These, and your light sources, are going to really make your renderings shine.  It’s actually pretty easy to set up these renderings once you have your SketchUp model.   Paint your materials, insert your light sources into SketchUp, import the model into Kerkythea, and render it.

Of course, A2 Studio would be happy to help you get set up with Kerkythea and show you how to use it.  Or, if you would prefer, we’ll take your SketchUp model and do the renderings for you.