Archive for November, 2004
Not a video game or CGI movie
First, check out these thumbnails:
These aren’t pictures from the set of the latest sci-fi movie. They are actual photos of Japan’s G-Cans Project (more available at the link). This massive underground infrastructure is designed to prevent the overflow of the various rivers and waterways in Tokyo. Some stats:
“The underground waterway is the largest in the world and sports five 32m diameter, 65m deep concrete containment silos which are connected by 64 kilometers of tunnel sitting 50 meters beneath the surface. The whole system is powered by 14000 horsepower turbines which can pump 200 tons of water a second into the large outlying edogawa river.”
(via boingboing)
Daily Musings: Day 21
Ok, by now I’m sure you’ve heard about the (insert own adjective here) lady who was selling a grilled cheese sandwich on e-bay with the image of “Virgin Mary Mother of God” miraculously appearing on it. If not, here’s a snippet from her auction page:
“I made this sandwich 10 years ago, when I took a bite out of it, I saw a face looking up at me, It was Virgin Mary starring back at me, I was in total shock, I would like to point out there is no mold or disingration, The item has not been preserved or anything, It has been keep in a plastic case, not a special one that seals out air or potiental mold or bacteria, it is like a miracle, It has just preserved itself which in itself I consider a miracle, people ask me if I have had blessings since she has been in my home, I do feel I have, I have won $70,000 (total) on different occasions at the casino near by my house.”
When I looked at the auction yesterday, the bids were up to $17,000 with a day left to go.
That’s right. $17,000 for a cheese sandwich.
Obviously, there are many, many things wrong with this scenario. And not being a fan of religion in general, there are many snarky things I could say. Like, oh, I don’t know…what’s a good Christian doing gambling at casinos? Or here’s one: what with all the pain and suffering and misery and wars and murders and abuse and rape and torture going on in this world, isn’t it comforting to know that the benevolent, loving creator is showing us poor schmucks he cares by having the virgin Mary APPEAR ON A FUCKING GRILLED CHEESE SANDWICH!
But no, I’m not gonna say mean things like that.
So anyway, turns out the miracle sandwich sold for $28,000! Yep. Two. Eight. Triple zero. The winning bidder? Internet casino Goldenpalace.com. No folks, you couldn’t make shit like this up if you tried. To quote Jay Leno (and I promise this will be the one and only time,) “this is why the rest of the world hates us!”
But there’s some good news coming out of this whole fiasco. According to a BBC story:
“Goldenpalace.com says it will take the sandwich on world tour before selling it and donating the money to charity.”
Which brings us to the thought of the day, boys and girls, which is this: what a sad, sad world we live in where god appears on a sandwich, some members of his flock would rather spend 17 grand on crusty bread hoaxes rather than help the needy, and the only institution that will do any good in the end is an Internet casino.
For all you artists out there
Just wanted to remind you that each week, Steven Grant runs a couple different original pieces of art for the “Two Heads Talk” section of his column. If you’d like to be featured, here are the guidelines:
- “All panels should be 3″ wide x 6″ tall jpgs, 150 dpi.
- All panels should be head and shoulder shots of original characters. No trademarked characters of any sort please. (But don’t worry: copyright will be assigned to you.)
- Head and shoulder shots should fill only the bottom 3″ of the panel. Leave the top half blank, please. (You can put color there, just not figure work.)
- One head per panel, thanks. Color or black and white, your choice.
- Don’t put any borders on the panels.
- Email it to me, with “Head” in the subject line so I know don’t think it’s a virus, because I’ll trash an unknown attachment in a heartbeat.
- Include a website or some other contact information so that your new legion of fans will be able to find you.
And that’s it. All heads will be used eventually. Can fame and fortune be far behind?”
Coloring Bone
This is an oldie, but I forgot to post it when it first came out…
Columbus’ own Steve Hamaker talks about the daunting task of coloring all 1300+ pages of Jeff Smith’s epic book, Bone. You can read the Newsarama interview here.It’s a pretty massive undertaking, to say the least.
“We have some people helping with the flat color blocking now, so I am going a lot faster. I was doing about a page a day, and now I can get three to five pages a day depending on the complexity of them. The files start at 1 or 2 megs, and end up being around 30 or 40 megs each. It’s a big project, but we will store the files that we finish to make room, when the time comes.”
Panel to be featured in Alive
Just a quick note to let you know I heard back from Caleb, over at the Alive. He said there will be a small shout out to Panel in this week’s edition. He’ll mention the new book, and the Panel “panel” at Mid-Ohio-Con.
Daily Musings: Day 20
Ownership.
It’s a quite a powerful feeling. And I don’t mean owning something, as in “I own this here land,” or “I paid 40 grand for this car.” I mean the feeling of ownership that comes with something you’ve created through your own hard work, time, and energy.
I recently completed a Small Business course via OSU’s Office of Continuing Education. We talked a lot about the great feeling of ownership that comes from starting and running your own business. It’s one of the biggest benefits of being a small business owner (which is a good thing, when you consider all the cons…the statistics really aren’t in your favor). Sure, you may like your job if working for an employer, even, say, Microsoft. And you may even feel a sense of pride over your projects. But I’d imagine it’s not the same sense of ownership you’d feel if it were your company.
Anyway, I was thinking about this whole topic of ownership all afternoon long. You see, today’s the day I got the Hybrid book back from the printers. And it’s the day I picked up the Panel: Home book from Kinko’s and we had our traditional “fold and staple” party. Even though my story had to be dropped from the Panel book due to events beyond my control, I still felt a ton of pride and excitement putting the book together. There were 7 of us sharing the work, and the feeling of accomplishment. Same with Hybrid, which may only feature a couple pages of my work, but was my baby from inception to publication. There’s an incredible feeling of ownership there, and it motivates me to want to do all that I can to ensure a fantastic, quality end product.
If you’ve never experienced that feeling, you owe it to yourself to do so. Produce a work of art that has a personal meaning for you. Write a collection of essays or short stories. Build a cool woodworking project. Restore that old classic car that’s been rusting in the back yard. Remodel your family room the way you’ve always imagined it looking. Start a website as a creative outlet. Sew a funky garment for yourself.
It may be a lot of work, but it will be quite rewarding. And in the end, you’ll have something more than money could ever buy. A true feeling of ownership.
Cooke is cooking
This week’s All the Rage column has a short interview with Darwyn Cooke, as well as a preview of his issue of Solo. Check out the gorgeous Question page.
“The beauty of this project is it’s allowing me to stretch a few muscles that the mainstream books can’t accommodate. For example, each story will be somewhat different from a technique point of view. There will be straight-up color comix, painted work, crafting duo tone and a few other things I’ve been eager to try.”
The Fourth Rail reviews Panel and BCB
(Updated 11/22 – just found out they reviewed BigCityBlues as well.)
This is from a couple of months ago, but I didn’t know about it until just now when I was doing a Google search on Ferret Press. Randy Lander of The Fourth Rail reviews Panel: Architecture. Overall, pretty good (he gave us a 7/10). Except Tony’s name got kinda mangled. Toby Goins. Snicker.
And here’s the review for BigCityBlues. Another 7/10, which is pretty cool.
Daily Musings: Day 19
I’ve been meaning to write a quick review of a fantastic comic I picked up last month. I guess this is as good a place as any.
I’m not familiar with Rebecca Dart’s work. In fact, as far as I can tell, Rabbit Head is her first published comics work. And it’s quite the debut. In fact, it’s one of those books that makes me, as a creator, absolutely jealous. I wish I had come up with this book first.
The book is an experimental, and surreal, take on a pseudo-western story. Without dialogue. The protagonist, an anthropomorphic rabbit and her weird steed, set off on a journey at the beginning of the story. Along the way, Dart uses the strengths of the comics medium to their fullest by slowly branching the story into multiple, simultaneous storylines. By the middle of the book, there are 7 separate, yet interconnected, story threads unfolding across the space and time of the comics page. It’s an absolutely fantastic use of the medium, and one that can only really work on the comics page. As an added bonus, the story ends where it began, in effect creating an endless cycle.
The narrative is sometimes humorous, often exciting, and at times disturbing and downright painful. The reader can opt to follow a single thread all the way through, returning for the others, or attempt to take in the entire expanse of her story. The latter is quite a daunting task, though equally rewarding.
Dart’s artwork is and odd combination of sketchy and fluid strokes. Sparse where it needs to be, detailed in other places. Though not on the level of Paul Pope, she does remind me a bit of his style of brushwork.
In terms of originality, innovation, uniqueness, and emotional resonance, Rabbit Head is one of the coolest books I’ve picked up this year. It’s a prime example of what the comics medium is capable of when a creator’s imagination soars and old conventions are discarded.
I’m quite jealous of it.
Rabbit Head is published by Alternative Comics, and is priced at $4.95. It is magazine sized, 24 pages, black and white with a full color cover. ISBN: 1-891867-72-5.
Variety reviews No Dead Time
As Tom mentioned, Variety has a comics news and reviews section on their website. They reviewed No Dead Time and gave it an A-. Check it out here (you’ll have to scroll down a bit, no permalink available).
Daily Musings: Day 18
I finally finished the Hybrid book today. All PDF files, on a CD. Took it over to ElektroKopy for printing. Asked for a sample copy to proof, before they run the whole 200 copy print run.
“Not a problem, it’ll just take a few minutes,” I was told.
About an hour later, I left with my proof. An entire hour for the guy to grab 16 digital files off a CD and send them over to the copy machine. Now, I’m no expert on digital copiers and such, but I do know a thing or two about computers, networking, and Adobe Acrobat. I’m still not sure why he had such difficulty with the process.
Of course, it may have been the distraction of the televised OSU-Michigan game.
As it is, I’m glad i decided to ask for a proof. The standard 20 lbs. copy paper is not quite thick enough to prevent the darker pieces from bleeding through to the other side. And, of course, they didn’t have any thicker paper stock in…er, stock. Neither did the Staples store next door. So now I have to wait till Monday, drive down to a paper supply store on my lunch break, and drive back up to ElektroKopy to drop off the stock, drive back to work, and drive up to the copy place again to pick up the books. Chalk it up to the “joys of self-publishing”.
On the bright side, the book looks great. Especially the cover. So I’m happy.
Daily Musings: Day 17
If you have a website, you’re probably familiar with checking your referral logs to see where most of the traffic to your site is coming from. And if you have a blog, you’re probably familiar with posting some of the weirder search engine search strings that led some people to your site.
Who am I to buck the trend? Actual search strings in italics…So without further ado:
free comic books porn
Spider man porn
allison williams free porn tape
alien porn
All of the above can be attributed to the fact that I have a comic story called “Xxxagnut Beefman: Alien Porn Star” listed on the FP site. An awful lot of people must be severely disappointed to find out it’s neither porn, nor free.
“Things I’d Rather do than go see catwoman”
Well, checking my referrals logs is one of them…
central ohio band comic book ending
This falls under the WTF? category
Eros a (character) in movies; music; and literature, in stores (Minneapolis)
Another WTF? moment. What the hell was this person trying to find? Talk about a narrow search.
Ferret literary
Why, yes we are. Thanks.
Comics book characters in song
I had this site bookmarked a long time ago, and recently ran across it again. Ken Gale’s Trapped in a Lyric They Never Wrote, a “list of hundreds of songs that mention comic book and strip characters”. Some samples:
“Arthur Curry” by Ookla the Mok. “I am Aquaman and nobody better mess with me/ I may be nothing to you but I am a king beneath the sea/ Let’s see you get by under water as well as I do on the ground/ I am Aquaman and you better not mess around”
PANEL debuts 4th anthology at Mid-Ohio-Con
You can read the official press release on MOC’s website.
Daily Musings: Day 16
Ah yes. Memory. Specifically, my bad memory. Something happened earlier today where I instantly though “oh, that’ll make for a good topic for my daily post.” Of course, now I can’t remember for the life of me what it was.
So instead, I think I’ll just type up some random thoughts, ADD-style.
Cannibals n’ Strippers – catchy, eh? It’s the title of a low-budget slasher flick my friend Tony wrote for a movie director/producer down in Cincinnati. I’ve got a copy of the script sitting in my inbox. Can’t wait to read it! I’d assume he did a lot of “research” to get the script just right, but let’s just hope it was in regards to the latter subject, and not the former.
Music – I spent the better part of this evening finishing up the layout for the Hybrid art book. Unlike writing, which requires concentration and therefore precludes listening to music with lyrics, this was mostly mindless production work. So I got out some old CDs and jammed to the likes of Social Distortion (White Light, White Heat, White Trash), Robert Cray (Shame & a Sin), and Concrete Blonde (Walking in London). Yeah, I know. Mostly old school. But good old school.
In the Shelf Life (“old videos reconsidered”) section this week’s The Other Paper, they take “a look at some animated flicks created with an adult audience in mind.” Included in the reviews are 1972′s Fritz the Cat, 1981′s Heavy Metal, and 2003′s The Animatrix. Oh, and the 1994 Crumb documentary, for good measure. You’ll find it on page 27.