ISIDTA 7 : Christmas Tragedy

ISIDTA 7 : Christmas Tragedy
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

Better late than never. Kit, if you're reading this later this week, please understand that there must be something wrong with the system clock on Blogger. This was posted WELL before 10:00 am this morning. And, um...don't bother reading that earlier post.

This really happened, and it gets brought up every Christmas (and usually other times during the year as well). I do tend to be a morose and worrisome fellow, as well as being amazingly literal.

This was laid out with photo references, then several sketches were made in my official ISIDTA Moleskine before I pencilled it on the Bristol in a blue Col-Erase. I inked on top of that with several different Tachikawa nibs (the 44, the 357, and the school pen for details like my grandparents). I used a nib holder my mom gave me for Christmas, one of the ones she used in art school (I love it so much more than these modern crap-pens.) Something else new this week: I used a ruler to make the house and the road straight, as well as a nice attempt at speed lines for the truck.

After I finished this, I realized I drew my hair wrong. My hair wasn't that long when I was four. I did have the ridiculous bangs, though.

See the full picture here.
See past ISIDTAs here.
See Kit's entry for today here. And read about the origin of the name of his strip! NOT a hoax! NOT an imaginary story! NOT a dream! This is part of Kit canon!

Gold Plumbing

Here's an amusing PSA that depicts visual representations of various slang terms. Can people help me identify them all? I think I must be missing about half of them. (I don't want to mention the ones I know here; that'd ruin the surprise of what the PSA is about.) Watch it through one time and laugh, then go back and see how many terms you can recognize.

ISIDTA (Almost)

christmas layout
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

Well, Kit was late last week, so maybe it's not a complete tragedy that I'm late this week. Maybe it's my gift to Kit, to show him it was okay to be a little tardy. Yeah, that's it, it's a GIFT! Hmm...or maybe I'll just take this post down later before he can see it, and swear you all to secrecy.

So I should've had plenty of time to do this week's strip, what with Tuesday being a vacation day and all, but I blame the overindulgence in turkey, the trip to Cary to buy a cake (and the subsequent getting-lost-and-ending-up-in-Wake-Forest), the one-night-only appearance of Ethan Kaye, and a reuniting with an old internet friend. OF course, the REAL reason this week's drawing didn't get done on time is because I'm a bad planner and a great procrastinator.

So what we have here is the panel layout and photo references I'll be using for this week's strip. I've also written the script and lettered the captions, measured and pencilled the borders on the Bristol board, and hand-lettered the title. At lunch today, I plan on sketching out the figures, and after work, I'll blueline the whole thing and ink it, and have it up tonight. C'mon back.

Animals Feel The Danger

Razor Ramon HG is one of the more hilarious and entertaining Japanese stars currently going through his fifteen minutes of fame. In a country of over-the-top media stars, Razor Ramon HG is the over-the-toppest. He's a standup comedian, that plays the part of a pro wrestler, that also does tv magazine segements wandering around Japanese cities acting like a lunatic. His trademark cry is "Hooooo!!!" which he screams aloud as he gyrates his leather-clad crotch at people. Oh, and the HG stands for "Hard Gay".

I just discovered a video I hadn't seen before, "Father's Day", which cracked me up. There's a lot more of his stuff on YouTube. If you haven't seen HG's "Trip to the Yahoo Offices", you must stop by and check it out. He shows up announced at the Yahoo Japan headquarters, claiming they stole his "Hooooo!!" catchphrase. It's always hilarious to see conservative people embarrassed by the very colourful Razor Ramon HG.

Only in Japan.

Mr. M*crophone

This is hilarious. A microphone with a little plastic window that "mosaics" you, like you were on Cops or something. Only in Japan!

Ain't He Unglamourous?

The opening credits for the famously bad Marvel cartoons of 1966:

• The Mighty Thor
• The Sub-Mariner
• Captain America
• Iron Man
• The Hulk
  
• compilation of all of them

This guy has some of the Hulk cartoons for viewing. Amazing, state-of-the-art animation. (Hey, at least they used the cool Kirby art!)

Quinn Martinesque

So I stumbled across some great YouTubeness. Here we have a selection of trailers and opening sequences for 1960s and 70s British tv series, many of which are in the Quinn Martin vein. I love 'em.

• Before the X-Files, there was...Department S!
• I love the silhouette-y effects in the opening to Seaway.
• The Saint has a classic Saul Bass-type feel to it.
• I've never been a big fan of Supermarionation, but have always liked Gerry Anderson's design ideas. The end titles to Joe 90 are enticing because of their crisp colour and use of iconic props from the show.
• The Avengers always had a classy, arty beginning. Good use of still photos.
  

ISIDTA Week 6 : Thanks Joe

Thanks Joe
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

This week's I'm Sorry I'll Draw That Again sort of had to be a tribute to Joe Barbera, who passed away this week. The three big influences of my childhood were comic books, pro wrestling, and Hanna-Barbera cartoons. So here we have a really weak portrait of Joe, surrounded by some of my favourite Hanna-Barbera characters.

Click here for the full-size picture
Click here to see the inks.
Click here for Kit's offering for today's ISIDTA.

UPDATE: Rogers sent me this amusing article.

PCQOTD : 12-20-06

Plebian:
"Ask the local gentry and they will say it's elementary."

Erudite 1:
"Wants a girl who's dreamy, wants a girl who's creamy."

PCQOTD : 12-19-06

Plebian:
"This is life, the one you get, so go and have a ball."

Erudite:
"I brought my pencil. Gimme something to write on, man."

PCQOTD : 12-18-06

Plebian:
"Why do we always come here? I guess we'll never know."

Erudite:
"Dance into the fire to fatal sounds of broken dreams."

Rorshach's Nightmares

I just came across a mention of Stefan G. Bucher's Daily Monster and thought I'd share it here. I love the idea of "forced motivation" and having a requirement or rules that push you towards being creative. (That's what the whole I'm Sorry, I'll Draw That Again weekly project is based on!) In The Daily Monster, Bucher drops some ink on a page and blows on it, then examines the resulting squiggles and draws a monster based on the design. The really great thing is, he videotapes the whole process and shares it with us each day. Very cool.

PCQOTD : 12-15-06

Plebian:
"Can two divorced men share an apartment without driving each other crazy?"

Erudite:
"The whole world is a circus if you know how to look at it."

Corey Brown Is Funnier Than I Am

Corey Brown comes up with another one of his fun ninja cartoons. I love the little details in this one, and the final panel reminds me of early Zonker from Doonesbury.

I needs to find me a regular subject for my cartoons soon. Corey's doing exactly what I'd like to be doing, in many ways.

BONUS Guest PCQOTD : 12-14-06

>From: "H. Wade Minter"
>Sent: Dec 14, 2006 1:03 PM
>To: "Ted Hobgood"
>Subject: Pop culture quote of the day
>
>I don't know why this just popped into my head, but I thought I'd
>send it your way.
>
>Plebian: "No! No! I want an Official Red Ryder Carbine-Action Two-
>Hundred-Shot Range Model Air Rifle!"
>
>Erudite: "E Pluribus Unum"
>
>Can you make the connection?

Wayd Minter stumped me. Can anyone do better than me?

Super Tuxedo

Only Ray will have the slightest clue why this is included here. For everyone else, just enjoy the weirdness that is tv commercials from the 1960s.

PCQOTD : 12-14-06

Plebian:
"The way she looked was way beyond compare."

Erudite:
"'Children, behave!' That's what they say when we're together."

PCQOTD : 12-13-06

I completely forgot to post this this morning.

Plebian:
"When you were young and your heart was an open book."

Erudite:
"You put your hand on your head, put your foot in the air, then you hop around in the room in your underwear."

ISIDTA Week 5: ISIRTA

ISIDTA: Death By Lethal Inflection
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

This week involves a lot of experiments. First of all, Kit and I got together last week and each drew a header, and then had to do a comic based on what the other person came up with. After thinking about the title Kit gave me ("Death By Lethal Inflection") I was inspired to use an existing script from a sketch called "The Murder of the English Language," culled, interestingly enough, from the 1968 radio show I'm Sorry, I'll Read That Again from whence Kit and I got the name of our challenge.

Another experiment this week involves using very few drawings. I wanted to see what repetition looked like, and this comic was made using only four drawings resized and moved about. And finally, I tried inking with a brush pen instead of my trusted Tachikawa 44. I like the variation in line width you get with the brush, but can't control it for shit.

The full-size version of this comic can be found here.
If you'd like to listen to the original radio sketch that this was taken from, I've uploaded it as an mp3 here.
Past cartoons are here.
Kit's ISIDTA offering is here.

PS: Corey Brown is now starting to make his own webcomic! Check out his first as-yet-unnamed strip here.

Cereal Violence

I just discovered this webcomic. Very clever. Nice layouts, good art. Creepy and nostalgic. Breakfast of the Gods.

PCQOTD : 12-12-06

Plebian:
"Riddle me this, boy wonder!"

Erudite:
"Scotch was invented by a little old lady from Leningrad. "

PCQOTD : 12-11-06

After a self-imposed vacation, we're back.

Plebian:
"I wanna wake up in a city that doesn't sleep."

Erudite:
"That boy ain't right."

Ryloc

Ryan Locante has a new film up. Ryan amuses and astounds me. I wish I could be as seemingly carefree as him.

Also see his previous film here.

I wish I could see him win on Wheel Of Fortune, but I have no tv.

Another Inking/Colouring Tutorial

Here we have another inking and colouring tutorial in Photoshop, this one with a voiceover explaining his tools and methods. This one is fairly extensive, broken into ten parts.

Tutorial: How PVP Is Coloured

Here's a GREAT video of how Scott Kurtz colours his webcomic, PVP. The demonstration of how he adds shading is particularly intriguing. He's actually got another colouring video and a drawing video here, and both are well worth watching. Through his YouTube homepage, I found this fabulous demonstration of digital inking by CWGabe. I wish I knew how he got such even line variation in his Photoshopping. I want to learn how to do that.

Digital Art Tutorial: Bob MacNeil

Here's another interesting art tutorial, focusing on how Bob MacNeil goes about tackling a project on the computer. He has sketches and Photoshop captures, and has more illustrations of his process on his blog.

Jackson, I think you'll like his style. Sort of Mary Blairish.

C'est Animation Excellente

This guy has some great videos on YouTube; old animated commercials from Europe and Africa from the 1950s. My favourites so far are this fanciful tour of the Orangina factory, and this rollicking commercial for Azur Gasoline.

Another Trove Of Information

I've got a number of drawing and animation resources bookmarked, and I'm trying to include them here on The Transmutation Effect for others to enjoy and learn from. The Temple of The Seven Golden Camels is, first of all, a really cool name for a blog. However, that alone would not merit inclusion here. The contents of said blog, however, are fabulous. The masthead describes The Temple as being "everything I know about the art of storyboarding", but really, there's so much more here. I'm particularly drawn to an insightful article about using colour to distinguish figures and draw the eye to the focus of a scene. Great reading; highly recommended.

The Motherlode

This is the motherlode of animation information. The International Animated Film Society is building a webpage of information that is unparalleled. If all they had online were scans of Norman Rockwell's Famous Artists Course, well, it would still be the best web resource ever. But they have so much more. John Kricfalusi is joining up with this site to produce the $100,000 Animation Drawing Course, featuring scans of classic Preston Blair instruction books. The course is worth $100,000, but it is in fact free. And Kricfalusi will critique your work online. Jesus.

That's not all. The site also features art from classic Golden Books (I'm looking at you now, Jackson!), layouts and model sheets (some of my favourite things), classic newspaper cartoons and comics, interviews and biographies, downloadable classic cartoons (I'm getting Chiquita Banana right now), and tons more.

Run, don't walk.

How To Make Comics

Scott McCloud's books are pretty much required reading for anybody interested in comic books, whether you read them or create them. He started off with Understanding Comics, expanded his vision in Reinventing Comics, and then capped it all off with his most recent work, a fabulous treatise on how to create comics and graphic novels, Making Comics. I don't make a lot of "must have" recommendations, but I would say that if you enjoy comics, or want to make your own comics, you really should own all of these. Don't borrow them, buy them. They're worth having at hand.

This week, McCloud finally released his promised online "Chapter 5 1/2" for Making Comics, which specifically deals with webcomics and the unique needs and processes that this form deals with. Well worth a read.

Hanna-Barbera Backgrounds

John Kricfalusi is the creator of (among a zillion other things) Ren & Stimpy, and that would be more than enough to make him a cool guy. IN addition to all that, however, he has a kickass blog where he frequently spotlights how animation art is made. His scans of old art instruction manuals are truly fabulous, and should all be downloaded and studied. (There are bunches more; just look for 'em.) In yesterday's entry, John has an article by Hanna-Barbera background artist Art Lozzi, explaining how he created backgrounds for such cartoons as Yogi Bear and Huckleberry Hound. Animation background art is one of the frequently-overlooked joys of cartoons, and having a peek behind the curtain at how these were made is a treat. This article was written by Lozzi in response to an earlier post from Kricfalusi which is also well worth reading.

Basically, everything John Kricfalusi puts on his blog is worth reading. Do it now.

Watching Hirschfeld

An amazing and inspiring, yet very simple video. The video camera watches master caricaturist Al Hirschfeld sketch and ink a Paul Newman portrait. Very interesting to see how he works and how he draws.

Check it out here.

ISIDTA: Woody Allen The Shrimp

It's Wednesday, and that means it's time for another edition of I'm Sorry, I'll Draw That Again, the cartoon challenge that drives myself and Kit FitzSimons each and every week.

First, view the cartoon here.

This week's is an odd one. I had an idea for something to do this week, but it quickly drew to something that couldn't be done on deadline. So I was stuck, and went out to dinner with a friend of mine. Telling him of my woes, he said "Do a cartoon about a sweet-and-sour shrimp trying to escape a Chinese restaurant." I said, "And what is my punchline supposed to be." He replies, "Improv one up. Okay, make the shrimp think he's Woody Allen if you can't come up with a punchline." No, I have no idea where that combination of ideas came from either, but here it is.

This time I made it black and white on purpose. I had actually planned to lay it out four panels across, but forgot to do that when I scanned it. I think the layout looks better this way anyway, what with the huge title and all. This week's experiment was to draw the strip in Col-Erase blue pencil, and I was really happy with the way it turned out. The blue pencil, as advertised, does not scan at all. Inking was done with the Tachikawa 44 and a Winsor-Newton Brush, and the panel borders were done with a ratty old bamboo pen. Another experiment this week was the lettering, which was done by dragging a low-res copy of the strip into Macromedia FreeHand, drawing the balloons there, and then copy-and-pasting them back into the original Photoshop file. This worked fabulously, and I'm very happy with the results. I used a Photoshop mask to put the balloon "behind" the pirate's hand and crop it at the panel border.

Oh, and I'm stunned at how well Pegleg Pete turned out. Stunned.

The full size version of this strip can be seen here.
Past ISIDTA entries can be found here.
Kit's ISIDTA entries are here.

Mashin' It With Grandma Flava

This is an excellent mashup of Public Enemy and Herb Alpert, with an excellent video. Grandma bakes a cake, punctuated by fly b&w graphics.

Pretty much everything the Evolution Control Committee does is great, though. I first learned of them through the amazing Rocked By Rape, and was hooked. Download their mp3s, and buy their albums. I did.

Ahggghhhh!!!

This page has links to several interesting articles on sound effects in film. The most interesting is the famous, frequently-used cry known as "The Wilhelm Scream". It's been used in everything from "Star Wars" to "Toy Story" to "Beauty and the Beast". It's become sort of an in-joke among soundmen, and a funny cliche to stick into your films. PT, we're definitely using this for Telegraph Road.

Jack Mackson FINAL

jackmackson_final
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

Okay, so hours and hours later, here's the (basically) final version of this week's I'm Sorry, I'll Draw That Again strip. Why I think I can crank out a full page pencilled, inked, coloured, and lettered comic on deadline, I have no idea.

Anyway, click the image to go to the Flickr page where you can see it at full size. (Or just click here for the full size version.)

The experiment this week was to work from a photo reference. My good buddy Jason was happy to put on a too-small jacket and wield a pistol from the Dollar Store. Unfortunately, I had no idea what the script was going to be, so we just shot a series of semirandom pictures, and then I muddled over them until I came up with what you see here.

You can see the original photo layout here, laid out in the wonderful Comic Life program. I may try to lay out a whole comic in this program sometime.

You can see the pencils for Jack Mackson here.
The inks are here. They actually look pretty neat.
The colour layer is sort of fun to look at by itself, and can be found here.
Kit's ISIDTA offering is here. Oo, zombies!

Today's Beaver and Steve has a wonderful quote on making comics.
"Drawing a comic is a lot like passing a particularly uncomfortable stool. You strain and struggle with it for hours and hours, occasionally breaking down and weeping like a child, until eventually, with a grunt of relief, it's done. And though you might worry that it's pretty small for the amount of effort you put into it, and you're not sure it really ought to be that colour, you can't help but feel a swell of pride as you stand there looking down at the shining new creation you've brought into the world. Then you scan it in and put it on the internet."
Amen.

(If you aren't reading Beaver and Steve regularly, you should be.)

Jack Mackson pencils

Jack Mackson pencils
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

A little late this morning; I'm on vacation and overslept.

This week's experiment involved using photo references. Doesn't seem to have effected my poor ability to keep figures looking consistent.

Finished strip with captions will be up this afternoon when the ink's dried. Stay tuned.

One Gun Jackson

One Gun Jackson
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

In preparation for tomorrow's I'm Sorry, I'll Draw That Again entry, I had Jason pose for a couple of reference shots. He's the happiest gunman in town! Yippee!

Rolling Bomber Special

Many people probably know that I love Japanese popular culture, and particularly love the odd-sounding english names they come up with for attacks in pro wrestling and Godzilla-type movies. (Case in point, my fabulous wrestling move name generator, The Randominator.) Today I stumbled over this wonderful little short film from Japan that features some of that sort of fun. It's a parody of the Power Rangers, and hits that nail head on. Strangely enough, it also has a tinge of that Japanese sense of personal isolation that is so common in the culture. Anyway, if you know anything about the Power Ranger cliches, give it a try.

Rolling Bomber Special! Go!

Frosted Maggots

This site entertains me a great deal. I love it when people reinvent or reinterpret old characters or stories (like Kit did today for his ISIDTA entry), and this idea was stellar: Von Kreep made his "Cereal Killers" challenge, where he asked artists to illustrate spooky cereal boxes. Most of them were done in the classic cereal box art style, which as Cartoon Brew points out, is some of the most inspirational art out there. Good stuff.

And speaking of Cartoon Brew, if anybody wants to get me a present, I just looked at the Cartoon Brew author's new book, Cartoon Modern, and it's fabulous. Thanks!

ISIDTA Week 2: My New Monitor

ISIDTA Week 2: My New Monitor
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

I'm still doing the research for the continuation of the AWA strip, so this week I just tried an experiment in panel arrangement and drawing real objects. I just bought a new Mac Pro system, with a 30" HD Cinema Display. It's so big, it won't fit on either of my computer desks, so I'm relegated to just sitting it on my big worktable. This strip was the first thing I created on my new system.

I did thumbnails in my official ISIDTA Moleskine notebook, then used a ruler and a pyrex baking dish to lay out the pencils on Bristol board. I inked the drawings using this amazing Tachikawa #44 nib that Jackson got me (I'm going to try the fabled Deleter G-Pen, but I can't imagine how it could be better than the Tachikawa; this thing feels like an extension of my hand!) The panel borders were done with a bamboo dip pen, which makes a surprisingly smooth and nicely thick line. The whole thing was scanned into Photoshop and hastily coloured using the Wacom tablet.

You can see the full size strip here, and the bare inks here.
As always with the ISIDTA challenge, you can see Kit's submission here.

PCQOTD : 11-22-06

Plebian:
"Badder than old King Kong."

Erudite:
"Are you happy? Are you satisfied? How long can you stand the heat."


Just for the record, I don't think anybody will get this Connection. Well, Wade might, or Larry. But this is a hard one, only accessible to those privy to a certain realm of knowledge.

PCQOTD : 11-21-06

Plebian:
"Come aboard, we're expecting you."

Erudite:
"Then put your little hand in mine
There ain't no hill or mountain we can't climb."

PCQOTD : 11-20-06

Plebian:
"Through early morning fog I see visions of the things to be."

Erudite:
"I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help me me."

PCQOTD : 11-17-06

Plebian:
"Or simple as do-re-mi."

Erudite:
"And in my hour of darkness, she is standing right in front of me."

PCQOTD : 11-16-06

Not feeling it today.

I'm Sorry, I'll Draw That Again

awa001_72_straight
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

So Kit FitzSimons and I have decided to challenge each other to produce a webcomic each and every Wednesday morning (so tune in each week for that...er, this.) We're calling our little challenge, our little publishing company, what have you, "I'm Sorry, I'll Draw That Again". It seems to fit our...idiom.

And here is my first effort. It's not finished yet, but as Kit has reminded me, we need to stick to our deadlines and have something up, no matter what state it's in. I've promised myself I'd have my piece up by 10:00 am today (and Kit, it WAS up by 10:00...on Flickr. I'm still composing this blog entry at 10:01.)

This has no title yet, because the title is supposed to be the climax that is revealed in the fourth panel. Buuuuut, the fourth panel is empty. Because I haven't drawn it yet. I also haven't coloured the piece yet. I'll try to get that done tonight, with any luck, and will make another post then.

This is my first attempt at drawing a comic since I was, well, maybe 10 or so. (I think I still have that monstrosity laying about somewhere. If I can find it, I'll post it here.) I've been reading scads of books about writing/drawing/inking/lettering/making comics for years, but thanks to the TedKit Challenge, I've finally gotten my ass and made an attempt. It's no great art, but it's a start, and that's what ISIDTA is all about.

The initial idea was sketched out on the back of a magazine at Time Out, as well as in my Official ISIDTA Sketchbook. I then pencilled it on Bristol board (good move) with a red pencil (bad move--next time, use a soft pencil and then erase the pencil lines). I scanned it into the computer (need to do a better job of that next time) and made the borders in Photoshop (I hate PS's line tools; maybe do those in FreeHand next time?). The lettering was done in Photoshop, using Blambot's "WebLetterer" font.

You can see the strip bigger here. A closeup of on of the panels can be seen here. Click the "original sizes" link to see it even bigger.
And you can check out Kit's side of ISIDTA here.

Let the TedKit Challenge continue! Long live I'm Sorry, I'll Draw That Again!

PCQOTD : 11-15-06

Plebian:
"Never heard the word impossible. This time, there’s no stopping us."

Erudite:
"Shazbot."

PCQOTD : 11-14-06

I just realized that, since I was sick on Friday, I missed a momentous event. November 10th marked the one year anniversary of the Popular Culture Quote Of The Day here on The Transmutation effect. Here's the very first one. A whole year of (hopefully) entertaining your brain. Furthermore, yesterday, November 13th, was the TWO year anniversary of the print version of the Popular Culture Quote OF The Day that I do here at work (it just includes the Plebian version). One year and two years, right next to each other. Now somebody buy me a chocolate croissant with a candle in it.

First Online Plebian:
"You cannot break the spirit of a Winchester."

First Paper Plebian:
"If you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce, it tastes much more like prunes than rhubarb does."

Regular Ol' Plebian:
"Neat, sweet, a groovy song."

New Erudite For First Online Plebian:
"Objection! Incompetent, irrelevant, and immaterial!"

New Erudite For First Paper Plebian:
"Your money or your life!....Well?"
"I'm thinking it over!"

Erudite For Regular Ol' Plebian:
"His brain is gone."

Anamination Is Cool

Beavis and Butthead were never a favourite of mine, but some of it grows on you, much though you try to resist. I find myself doing Cornholio impressions on occasion. ANYWAY, this episode is about animation, which is an interest of mine, and it amused me.

PCQOTD : 11-13-06

Plebian:
"If you strike me down, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine."

Erudite:
"Little souvenir from the old home town. I spared no expense to make you feel right at home."

Hangin' With Jackson

lomo01
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

Courtesy of the very creative Jackson Hall, we have here another set of photos taken at Fenario with the Russian LOMO camera. This camera takes some very spooky pictures at night, and Fenario is an amazing location out in the wilds of NC54, so we get interesting sinister telephone wires and long trails of automobile lights. Highly recommended that you view these at their original size to get the full effect.

Complete set is here.

Yes, It Blends!

This series of videos amuses the heck out of me. They're basically just commercials for some brand of blender, but they're so damn clever and the guy plays it so straight, you just can't help watching them over and over again. I own a blender that I never use, but if I were in the market for a blender, I'd buy a Blendtec just because their commercials amuse me.

I started with the golf ball video, m'self.

PCQOTD : 11-9-06

Plebian:
"Women are more dangerous than shotguns."

Erudite:
"The only arithmetic he ever got was hearing the referee count up to ten."

Where's Lucky?

Mom, by Jackson Hall
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

So my friend Jackson came back into town briefly on Sunday, and called me up. I went up to his place and helped him do some he-man stuff, like sawing wood for a sawhorse. We decided we should start a tv show called "Well That's Not Right!" about two inept geeks who try to do construction projects based on instructions they download from the internet. ('Cause basically, that's what was going on. In our first attempt, we ended up with a beautiful sawhorse for a midget.) We then went in and had a wonderful dinner of Chef-Boy-Ar-Dee pizza. Just fabulous.

The MOST fabulous part of the evening, however, is what you see to the right. Jackson painted this amazing picture for my birthday. (Click the pic to see it bigger.) I'm astounded. The house in the background is the classic Fisher-Price "blue and yellow" house, which he painted in full colour and then washed over until it faded into the background.

Brilliant. Finest birthday gift I've ever received. This is the kind of thing bourgeois hipsters in California pay $500 for. I've always wanted something like this, and Jackson created a work of art worthy of praise from the Fisher-Price gods.

Another view of the painting can be seen here.

Thank you, Mr. Hall.

PCQOTD : 11-8-06

Plebian:
"A knight without armor in a savage land."

Erudite:
"I get my kicks above the waistline, sunshine."

PCQOTD : 11-7-06

Plebian:
"I'm laughing at clouds so dark up above."

Erudite:
"London, Hamburg, Paris, Rome. Rio, Hong Kong, Tokyo. L.A., New York, Amsterdam. Monte Carlo, Shard End, and. "

PCQOTD : 11-6-06

Plebian:
"Have it your way."

Erudite:
"What does an actor want with a conscience anyway?"

Entertainment Of The Day

This is my latest timewaster, or as I prefer to call it, "mood soother". It's a simple, fun, creative, noncompetitive game that I find quite relaxing. They call it "Paintball: The Game" (I guess because you paint a path for the ball to follow), but I prefer to refer to it as "that line game". You can read the instructions if you want, or ignore the completely wrong guide on the screen below the actual game, but basically what you do is use your mouse to draw lines on the screen to guide the red ball to the red rectangle, then hit the spacebar to drop the ball. There's no one way to solve any particular puzzle, and you can try over and over again with no penalty. I love little physics-esque puzzles games like this (which is odd, since I got a D in Physics).

PCQOTD : 11-3-06

Plebian:
"I find it very, very easy to be true."

Erudite:
"Drink my liquor from an old fruit jar."

ZombieSportz

For those of you who would like to see PT Scarborough's Night Of The Living Improv, I've posted it to YouTube. Enjoy Halloween improv comedy here:

Part The One
Part The Two

PCQOTD : 11-2-06

Plebian:
"Would you be mine? Could you be mine?"

Erudite:
"Actor. Singer. Dancer. Model....Canadian."

Tat-tacular Halloween

Zombie porn is always interesting. Suicide Girls is always well-done, well-photographed, with interesting women, and interesting ideas. This layout is quite creative and amusing.

PCQOTD : 11-1-06

Plebian:
"In your satin tights, fighting for your rights, and the old Red, White, and Blue!"

Erudite:
"Four men, living all together, yet they were all alone"

CageMatch Hiatus

The show I produce at DSI is taking a break. I'm not going to do CageMatch for the month of November. This is due to a couple of reasons, mainly due to lack of energy. I've done the show just about every Saturday since the beginning of April, and spend an average of about ten hours a week producing the graphics, songs, and video for the show. As much as I love the creative opportunities the show provides me, it'll be nice to take a little time off and recoup my energy. Plus, I think everybody's been a little burned out in playing on CageMatch, and hopefully there will be some people chomping at the bit to be Challengers when we return in December, alternating Saturdays with Harold Night. It's been a fun run, and we'll do it again soon. If people are interested, we may go back to a full schedule in January.

The Undead Germs Walk!

I love this idea, and I love this illustration style. This is inspiring.

At Adopt A Microbe, Emma Lurie draws fun little interpretations of different microscopic germs and whatnot. It's almost like a childrens' book of infectious diseases. Positively fabulous.

Look At That White Guy!

So today, Mr. Corey Brown posted a blog entry in which he pointed out that people tend to state the colour/race of non-white people when they're referring to them, f'r'instance, "did you see what that asian guy did?" or "look at that black guy over there", whereas if it's a white person, people usually just say "look at that guy over there."

I noticed myself saying that sort of thing years ago, and made a conscious decision to stop referring to race unless it was necessary for whatever I was talking about. I still slip sometimes, but I try.

I've also tried to cut my use of the word "hate" down drastically. Back in college, my friend Mike (I'm not going to label him by race or anything, but he was president of the Asian-American Alliance) stopped me one day and said "you say 'hate' too much." It really stunned me, and I realized that saying "I hate this food" or "I hate that band" or whatever was filling me with negativity. Being around negative things, negative statements, negative people, will corrupt you. Now I only say "hate" when I truly mean it, and that's almost never.

There are bad things going on all around us, we all have things in our lives that bug us and make us want to gripe about it. And griping about things a little can help; we can get our frustrations out and elicit sympathy from friends. But when the things that bug us become obsessions and grow bigger than they should, and when the griping becomes an all-too-frequent occurrence, it ceases to be helpful and instead begins to corrupt us.

Mike Soohoo was right; when I said "hate" a lot, I tended to be a more hateful person. When I focus on more positive things, I can leave the hate behind and be a better person.

"Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the Abyss, the Abyss gazes also into you."

- Fredrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

PCQOTD : 10-31-06

Plebian:
"I never drink..."

Erudite:
"...and thank you for your support."

CageMatch 10-28-06

So this week we had the special Halloween CageMatch video that I had been working on all month. Some of you may know the background behind this, but for those of you in the dark (heh)...

A little over a month ago, PT Scarborough told me he wanted to form a CageMatch team...a zombie CageMatch team. I said "great." This is exactly the kind of stuff I want in CageMatch; teams with a theme are so much fun to design videos and plotlines for. Witness the videos for such teams as SUMO, CCCP, and The Children of the Atom. A team of zombies? I'm all for it. I went ahead and scheduled PT for October 28th, figuring it would make a good Halloween show. As it turns out, the champions coming into the 28th were The Darkness, who do their show in masks and with the lights turned off, so I couldn't have asked for a better scenario.

I started preparing for the Night Of The Living Improv video a month ago. Jackson Hall introduced me to linocutting, and I thought it would be perfect for a zombie video. I got a linoleum block that was about 6" x 9" and carved the background image of the hill, moon, tree, and text over the course of three hours. (One funny note: after 2 1/2 hours of carving, on the first test print, I noticed I had misspelled a word--oops!) I loved the unevenness of the print; it had the perfect spooky look. I then worked off a Jacksonian sketch of a zombie and carved individual body parts: head, torso, arm, straight leg, and bent leg. All of this was block-printed on Bristol paper with black ink and then scanned into the computer. The background was placed over some spooky clouds made in Photoshop, and the moon was layered with an inverted copy of itself to get a...well, "moon look". Then came the hard part. The individual zombie parts were pulled into Flash and puppet-animated to make them walk. This was the first time I had ever tried my hand at character animation, and I was pretty amazed it turned out decently. (It helps that I was animating zombies, who walk jerkily anyway.)

I used some great Nigel Simmons music from the "Calling All Fiends" online Halloween album, as well as a techno cover of Corey Hart's "Sunglasses At Night" done by Tiga Zyntherius, which worked perfectly for the end.

The video can be viewed here.
Stills from the video can be viewed here.
Photos from the show itself can be viewed here.

I may do a "how this was made" tutorial-type thing on this video, if there's any interest.

Many thanks to Jackson, for helping me with the linocutting, and to PT for putting on the funniest show of the year. PT did an amazing job of directing and inspiring his troupe of zombies and zombie-handlers.

IT'S A CAROLINA HURRICANES GOAL!!!

Hilarious.

Whether you like it, or you don't like it, learn to love it, 'cause it's the best thing going today.

(Courtesy of stylin' and profilin' Larry Weaver.)

Nice Graphics

I like diagrams. I like isometric graphic design. Therefore, I like this video.

Plebian:
"Messrs K and H assure the public their production will be second to none."

Erudite:
"A nod's as good as a wink to a blind bat."

The Super Adaptoid

I love Japan. Such an oddly unique and uniquely odd culture. Perfect for me.

Cellphone charms that look like cellphones.

PCQOTD : 10-27-06

Plebian:
"Goodbye grey skies, hello blue; ‘cause nothing can hold me when I hold you."

Erudite:
"Never put passion before principle. Even if win, you lose."

PCQOTD : 10-26-06

Plebian:
"Music and passion...always in fashion."

Erudite:
"We do it all for you."

PCQOTD : 10-25-06

Plebian:
"New York is where I'd rather stay."

Erudite:
"What do you think I am, a messenger boy?"

CageMatch 10-21-06

So this week I tried something ambitious for the CageMatch video. It was my first foray into character animation, as I tried to make my own "wipe" between pictures by having a horde of bats fly across the screen. The idea was that they would be sudden and surprising, and the cloud of bats would get thicker and thicker, then blotting out the screen before thinning out and revealing the logo of this week's challenger. I met with mixed success. I think it looks okay, although I really had the bats flying about twice as fast as I should've, so it's hard to discern the fact that they are indeed flapping their wings. Each bat is a three-frame animation, and they're pulled across the screen via motion tweens in Flash. I may get inspired to write a more detailed description of how it was all done, especially since Rogers asked me to. Fleeba Flabba.

Anyway, there's also some two-and-three-frame eyeball animations which are just simple crossfades, a British football song, more Bela Bartok (I use him for everything!), and a great cover of "Bela Lugosi's Dead" that I bought from the iTunes store. I can't remember the artist right now; guess I'll have to include that in the "how to" explanation!

Here's the video.
Here's the pictures.

PCQOTD : 10-24-06

Plebian:
"Pleased to meet you; hope you guessed my name."

Erudite:
"No point in mentioning these bats, I thought. Poor bastard will see them soon enough."

PCQOTD : 10-23-06

Plebian:
"So round, so firm, so fully packed, so free and easy on the draw."

Erudite:
"Look for the big red letters on the box."

What It Was, What It Should Be

This is what wrestling used to be like, and what it should be in my opinion. Two men have a conflict, the conflict is well-defined and easy to understand, they get on camera and talk about why they hate each other, and they fight. In this situation, Baby Doll turned on "The American Dream" Dusty Rhodes and went with Ric Flair and The Four Horsemen. Here's the match where it happened, and here are the classic promos from Flair and Rhodes.

I remember the Flair promo so clearly, even all these years later. "Let me tell ya, Bob Caudle!"

PCQOTD : 10-20-06

Plebian:
"Are we going to Addis Abbiba, Mr. Luthor?"

Erudite:
"Inkem binkem notamus rex, protect us all from the man with the hex."

PCQOTD : 10-19-06

Plebian:
"No, I don't think I will kiss you, although you need kissing, badly. That's what's wrong with you. You should be kissed, and often, and by someone who knows how."

Erudite:
"Don't shove me Harv. I'm tired of being shoved."

Cavalcade of Comic Covers! Cool!

Here's an amazing site that features fairly large scans of comic book covers. There's all sorts of titles represented here, both independent and mainstream, but I'm particularly thrilled by the covers for Batman and Detective, and all the wacky Batmania therein.

(And by the way, this is how the Penguin was meant to be portrayed. Short, rotund, cigarette holder, trick bumbershoots. No substitute is adequate.)