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.)

Der Pong Mit Der Ping

My friend Brantley directed me to this animated opening for a Japanese tv program, and challenged me to guess the plot of the show. I had no idea. This is offically the most bizarre anime I've seen. It's just chock-full of oddity.

PVC Skeleton

PVC Skeleton
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

My mom made this skeleton out of PVC pipe and a few Clorox bottles. She's so creative!!!

Click here to see it bigger.

Addendum:
Now mom is taking it to my sister's house. Click here to see it buckled in for the ride.

PCQOTD : 10-18-06

Plebian:
"I yelled to the cabby, 'Yo homes, smell ya later!'"

Erudite:
"Whatever you do, don't fall asleep."

PCQOTD : 10-17-06

Plebian:
"Everyone loves the king of the sea. Ever so kind and gentle is he."

Erudite:
"What is it, girl? Is Timmy trapped down a well?"

CageMatch 10/14/06

CageMatch chapionship pin
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

This was a good show. Both teams put on great performances and the crowd really enjoyed themselves. Special kudos to Monica for coming to perform even though she was terribly sick, and to Callie Peck The Tech From Heck for stepping in at the last minute to do a bang-up job teching the top of the show, hitting the special cues perfectly.

The video seemed to be rather well-received, which surprised me actually, as I thought it wasn't all that hot. It starts with a re-use of the Hostile Takeover pretape from last week, because Rene's performance amused me so much. (The crowd loved that part, too.) I had some Kraftwerk underscoring the whole recap part, to evoke that "cybernetic organism" feel that Rene started. The music swells up into a live version of "We Are The Champions" as I put myself and my cool button over. The crowd started laughing as soon as the Dolly Parton music started, and when the challenger logo was revealed, everybody popped hard. Very cool.

The pretape explaining the absence of Biff went over quite well too. Callie did a perfect job of cueing it up and adjusting the lights smoothly and on time, so it went off without a hitch. I was afraid people would miss Biff's ringtone, because they were laughing so much at his lame pickup routine, but they did calm down quickly enough to catch the second part of the phone ringing, and loved it.

All in all, a true success. I hope I can pull off my big plans for the next two weeks' videos. I've never done that level of animation, and it's going to be a big roll of the dice if my hands can do what my mind has dreamed up. Stay tuned.

video: Hostile Takeover vs Here Comes Dolly Parton
video: Where Is Biff?
this week's stills

I'm Always Up For A Meme

Super Corey
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

Jeff's doing a "I'll draw what you want" meme, and since he's been so kind as to draw something for me, I will join his meme and offer to Photoshop an image for people who request it. What would you like?

(Oh, and I started to link to Jeff's post, but since it mentions the drawing he's doing for me, it would ruin a surprise if the intended recipient were to see it. So those of you who know Jeff, go check out his blog.)

PCQOTD : 10-16-06

Plebian:
"Early to rise, early to bed. And in between I cooked and cleaned and went out of my head."

Erudite:
"We're in the air and everywhere."

This Can't Be Good

Food gone horribly bad. This was not a good idea.

Hot Dog Loaf

PCQOTD : 10-13-06

Plebian:
"Whenever he gets in a fix, he reaches into his bag of tricks."

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

PCQOTD : 10-12-06

Plebian:
"A mild-mannered reporter for a great metropolitan newspaper."

Easy Erudite:
"The best to you each morning."

Hard Erudite:
"Either he's dead or my watch has stopped."

PCQOTD : 10-11-06

Plebian:
"One, two, three, four, tell the people what she wore."

Erudite:
"Drop on the deck and flop like a fish."

Wacky Duck

wacky_duck_01_06
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

I have absolutely no context for this. I don't know what it is. I just stumbled across it and it amused the bejeezus out of me. Enjoy.

PCQOTD : 10-10-06

Plebian:
"Sometimes you feel like a nut."

Erudite:
"So kiss me and smile for me, tell me that youll wait for me, hold me like youll never let me go."

I Gotta Call My Momma

So I go over to my friend Jackson's for dinner last Friday. We had been talking about our favourite white trash food from when we were younguns, and discovered we both had fond memories of Chef Boyardee pizza. So Friday, we done had some. I wish I had taken pictures of it, so that those of you who haven't had the pleasure of this processed, sterilized foodstuff could understand how great it is. You open the box, and inside is a pouch, a tall can, and a short can. The pouch has the crust ingredients; just add water. The tall can has the sauce; pour it on! The short can has powdered parmesan cheese; sprinkle it over the sauce. You're done!

Jackson did a fabulous job preparing the stuff. Looked just like I remember it from when my mom made it for me. (sniff!) By the way, it don't look nuthin' like the picture to the right. Maybe if you added your own fresh cheese, but not unadulterated right out of the box. No, it looked flat and bland and unappetizing and that was PERFECT! It tasted just like my tastebuds remembered it. Fabulous.

Better yet, Jackson had an extra added surprise for me. When I was a wee youth, my favourite variety of Chef Boyardee pizza was "sausage". Well, they don't make "sausage" anymore, jsut cheese and pepperoni. I had groused to Jackson about the loss of the sausage version of Chef Boyardee, and dig this--he made sausage sauce BASED SOLELY ON MY DESCRIPTION. I had told him that the sausage sauce was almost granular, so he blended the hell out of some italian sausage in his food processor, mixed it in the Chef Boyardee sauce, and damn if it didn't taste and feel almost exactly right. Such an amazing friend, that Jackson Hall.

Captain North Carolina

Captain North Carolina inked and coloured
Originally uploaded by TedHobgood.

Here's the story of how this came to be:

Kit FitzSimons blogged about Marvel's "Civil War" and somehow the discussion posited that 50 Captain America clones would be stationed in the 50 states to keep order. Kit had the hilarious idea that they would all be named "Captain -insert state name here-", and I begged people to actually illustrate the various "localized heroes". So I tell my friend Jackson about it, and he surprises me with a pencil sketch. I can't draw for shit, but I tried my hand at inking and colouring Jackson's original art. And here we are.

There are three pix up here, the original pencils, the finished pic, and an amalgam.

Please, if anybody else wants to draw other state superheroes, go for it! And let me know, I wanna see!

PCQOTD : 10-9-06

Plebian:
"Missed it by that much."

Erudite:
"A small penguin who tries but can’t succeed-o."

Man, Ray's gonna be pissed if he's not the one to get this...

Learn Cricket The Vincent Price Way

I've watched cricket before, but never understood what was going on, until Vincent Price showed me the way. This is from a postscript segment of the PBS Mystery show, and the best part is that Vincent demonstrates the rules of cricket using vials of poison and skeleton keys.

Enjoy.

PCQOTD : 10-5-06

Plebian:
"The incredible edible."

Erudite:
"Creatures crawl in search of blood to terrorize y'all's neighbourhood."

PCQOTD : 10-4-06

Plebian:
"I don't know. Third base."

Erudite:
"California is a wonderful place to live, if you're an orange."

Snaggletoothed Freak

I'm famous.

PCQOTD : 10-3-06

Plebian:
"Last night I shot an elephant in my pajamas."

Erudite:
"Goddamn, motherfucker got blood all over my best clown suit."

CageMatch Report

This week's CageMatch video was fun to make. It was based around three things: a photo I took of Cranpa Hester laying in a pinwheel formation on the stage (which amused me for some reason); a pretape we did last week of Hostile Takeover (this week's challengers); and a set of drawings Remi Treuer did of his team.

The Cranpa Hester picture suggested a roundness, so I thought it would be fun to have the picture spin, so each member of the team could be seen "right side up". I ended up putting them in a picture of a four leaf clover, since they had reached the "Four Timers Club", an achievement previously only held by the legendary teams of The Pride and Siegel-Prov.

The pretape was hilarious, mainly due to a fabulous impromptu performance by Remi Treuer. If I were still in wrestling, I'd bring him in as a hell manager. He has great presence for that sort of thing. Monica's facials in the background were fabulous as well.

I took the great drawings that Remi did of his team, and "cyborgized" them. I think they turned out quite nicely, and I'm particularly happy with Nick Faber's, and the way the circuitry on the left mirrors the shading on the right.

The video can be seen here, and the Hostile Takeover Screen is here.

Oh, and this week I sprung my new surprise, and started giving out the "CageMatch Champion" buttons I had secretly made, as well as the hilarious "I Lost On CageMatch" buttons for the poor losers. Both are prestigious trophies.

And it was also a week of two milestones, as it was both the 25th CageMatch show, as well as the six month anniversary of our first episode. The moment passed virtually unnoticed.

PCQOTD : 10-2-06

Plebian:
"It's what's for dinner."

Erudite:
"Let me tell you something son, you get that hatred out your heart."