Merry Grinchmas

Sorry there hasn't been much action over here recently. Been in a bit of a slump and I've had a couple freelance jobs eating up most of my creative freetime. (I'd post them, but they're not the most thrilling pieces. Plus, I'm not sure if I can do that legally yet.) That and work has been crazy hectic. Guess some people don't want us creatives to have time off for the holidays. Oh well, it pays the bills. Hoping to take some time off in January and buckle down with some ink. I've got an issue's worth of Demon pencils to get my brush and quills back in shape. And I've rewritten the first issue of a comic idea I had last year. Kinda given up on NOWERE as werewolves seem to be the new zombie. I'll revisit that tale at a later date once the boom has long since busted and the lycanthropes are looking for new life.

In gamer news...I polished off MASS EFFECT a week or so ago. While I was apprehensive about the purchase at first I found it to be highly enjoyable. It’ll definitely warrant another playthrough as I probably only explored maybe 50% of the game. You’ve got galaxies and within those galaxies you have systems/clusters and within those you’ve got planets—each with its own history and most with land missions. A wide scoped game. Another nice bit is that you can playthrough again with your same character keeping all your stats, level and equipment. Of course, if you don’t boost the difficulty level you’re not in for much of a challenge. But there’s so many other classes that it’s tempting to start over again with a Soldier or Tech as opposed to the Sentinel I went with the first time. (Basically a Jedi-type that can’t really train any weapons. Pistol skills are all you get.) I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it I reckon.

Played a couple other FPS games: BLACKSITE 51 and TIME SHIFT. The latter I found to be fun with the power to slow, stop or reverse time. Sure it was still your basic run-and-gun kinda game, but being able to turn back time and unstick that grenade some chump stuck to you was a nice touch. Freezing time to get enough clearance from that missile heading at you was tough to beat too. BLACKSITE 51 was mediocore at best. Not really worth mentioning other than I played it, so you wouldn’t have to. Rent it if you must, but please, save your money.

Okay, that's all I got for now. Happy holidays to everyone. Those of you with snow, enjoy it for us Southern Dandies, okay?

YOU ARE NITEOWL II

Smart and sensitive but still packing a punch, you'd do well in law enforcement. Your sincerely chivalric approach to life and your fetish for uniforms are the stuff from which heroes are made.

If anybody else wants to see which Watchmen they are:
http://www.angelfire.com/comics/mooreportal/wpi.html

Has it really been a year?

Today Lilah turned one. Yowza. Can't believe a year has really gone by. Guess that whole "time flies by" thing is true. Squeeze hooked her up with a fantastic carrot cake and there was much celebrating...until nap time.

Whodathunkit?

Kinda makes sense as my wife was almost named Mary Jane.

Your results:
You are Spider-Man
You are intelligent, witty, a bit geeky
and have great power and responsibility


Click here to take the "Which Superhero are you?" quiz...

Hit or Mist?

As you can see on Mafus' blog that we took in THE MIST yesterday. As an avid fan of King and of Darabont's translations we had high hopes. Unfortunately, things didn't turn out as we'd hoped, but Mafus said pretty much everything I would, so drop on by to read about our woe. (I now realize this title would've worked better if we had actually wanted to see either HITMAN or THE MIST.) Kinda want to read the novella again to set things right in my head and heart about the tale. Oh well. It's like Kurtis Blow said, "Those are the breaks!"


Still haven't accomplished anything creative as of late. The urge has been there, but the time and drive hasn't—close though. So close. I did take out the pencils of an Invincible two-page spread I printed out many moons ago and threw 'em on my drawing table to ink tonight. Need to shake off the rust a bit and maybe some inking would get that artistic fire roaring under me arse. Mafus helped a bit by loaning me a fat stack of ROUTE 666, which I devoured in one sitting. Karl Moline is one talented mofo and if he's not working on a monthly—he should. I was first introduced to his work in FRAY, which I picked up on a whim as a trade a year or so ago. Just a great clean style. His inkers aren't to shabby either, though their names escape me. (Save John Dell, whose name is on the cover.) As is with most things in the comic world the whole story of ROUTE 666 wasn't told. CrossGen went out of bidness I believe Mafus said, which both blows and sucks.

Finished Assassin's Creed Turkey Day night after everyone had crashed. A fun game, but I couldn't see myself playing through it again as I always hunger for something new. Sure, I could've held onto it for a while and delved back in a few months from now, but screw it. There's a couple FPS out there I want, so I traded it in along with three other old games and scored BLACKSITE: AREA 51. Figured it's time to take out some intergalactic bastids. Also scored MASS EFFECT as it's more of a FPS RPG, which intrigues me. That and I had leftover store credit, so I said, "BUCKET!"

One dull blade

Okay. Mafus and I went to see the illustrious SAW IV last night. Afterwards I said it should be renamed SAW ENUFF. Everything good that could’ve been done with the series already has been. The Nacho Ceruda autopsy opening (you even get to see Jigsaw's junk), stale acting (Agent Strong and his tough-guy-DeNiro-arms-out-throwing-tables-punching-the-wall-beside-your-head-schtick), contrived pseudo-victims (“My lips are stitched shut so I can’t talk until I kill you, Mr. Ears Stitched Shut, then I can rip my stitches out and scream.”), to the typical obsessed, “I gotta save everyone,” cop. The whole tying it into the third film "seamlessly" said to me, "Hey, we're out of ideas and need to add a few more minutes of screen time." Just bad, bad, bad. I found myself wishing this movie would end and I’ve watched MANOS twice. TWICE, good people, which means once wasn’t enough, yet this movie was barely viewable once. Ugh. Hopefully, this will be the last as they’ve delved into Bell’s characters “true” origin. Was also surprised to learn it was written by the guys who wrote FEAST, which I enjoyed a helluva lot more.

A few highlights from the film were a couple of “Dead” actors. The police photographer was the young lady who drove Dead Reckoning in LAND OF THE DEAD and the lawyer, Art Blank, was the husband of the nurse in the DAWN OF THE DEAD remake. Not that that helped the movie much, but it kept me looking for other actors I might recognize. No dice though.

That’s all I gots, peeps. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving Eve.

One week later...

Sorry. Nothing new on the creative front. I've started and stopped so many times, but nothing really fleshed out on the paper. Mainly, 'cuz of my torn intercostal muscle. Turns out that I didn't break a rib. I broke down Friday and went to the doc for some x-rays since that pain was getting worse and I wanted to make sure nothing else was wrong internally. The x-rays came back sans fracture and I was then informed I'd gone the intercostal route, which is just as bad as a break. Science-time: Intercostal muscles are several groups of muscles that run between the ribs, and help form and move the chest wall. They hurt like hell when you tear them and take 3-6 weeks to heal. That concludes the science portion of this posting.


In the meantime I've been playing ASSASSIN'S CREED. I bought it on a whim, thinking I'd enjoy it, but not love it. Turns out I was wrong again. I don't think I've had this much fun playing a game in some time. I dare say that I've had more fun with AC than HALO 3. The whole stealthy, blade-in-the-crowd thing has grown on me over the run-and-gun gameplay of the Halo series. I've played probably 10 hours and haven't quite reached the halfway point. Usually a game takes me 6-8 hours to complete. The world of AC is too large to take in 6-8 hours. You've got three cities (Damascus, Acre and Jerusalem), the entire countryside between them and your own little guild's keep. Each city is then broken up into three districts with their own side-quests and investigations, which you can do the minimum of or maximum of. It’s open and free-roaming. Kinda the game that FABLE should have been. We’ll see since FABLE 2 is in the works and I think released next year.

That’s all I got. Wanted to post something as it’s been a week and the holidays are coming up. This’ll be Lilah’s first Turkey Day and we’ll be dragging her around to spread some holiday cheer. Get your bingeing pants on, people. Have a good one, everyone. Stay safe out there.

One more calamity

Just as I finally got over the intestinal virus and looking forward to picking up the health and exercise kick—I crack a rib. I'd like to spin a tale of heroism dealing with a burning orphanage, laser beams, and chocolate puddin', but no such luck. I was just fighting with the cumbersome box holding Lilah's new car seat when I tripped/lost balance and caught my ribs in the one place on the rail where there was a point. Laid on the ground for about five minutes before I could get up, then dragged the box downstairs. Somehow I got the thing installed before shock/adrenaline wore off and it's been painful ever since. What gets me is that I'll bend and expect it to hurt, but get nothing. Then I'll do something simple and lock up in agony. Guess I've got a couple weeks of this fun staring me in the kisser. Ugh.


Watched FIDO over the weekend. Looked like a decent flick and it was, but it just wasn't what I was expecting. Funny and the story had a lot of potential, but too "Leave It To Beaver" at times. (The Lassie joke was excellent though.) That and the father was an annoying prat. Carrie-Anne Moss and Billy Connolly were pretty much the whole show. It was strange seeing Carrie without her Matrix tone and garb. Everyone fit in with the time periodness of the picture and it was well presented, so I can recommend it as a NetFlix, but not a purchase.

Also I hit a small con with Mafus on Sunday. Not the smallest con I've ever been to, but it was nice to meet a few peeps and score a few books—Punishers actually, the arc that introduced Barracuda. Though the elusive Hitman issue 53 is still out there, waiting.

UPDATE: I have scored the elusive Hitman 53 via eBay. All is again right with the world.

And lastly, here's a pic of Lilah with a Hello Kitty hat/headpiece her uncle sent out for her. It barely fits, so we figured we'd snap some shots while the snapping was good. Kinda looks like she's got one wicked toothache.

The picture sez it all

The Missus and I are still reeling with the intestinal virus our sweet little daughter thought necessary to share. Maybe I can get something drawn tomorrow and posted as not to be a total waste of blogspace.

Finito

Here's the Sphinx colored in all of his victorious glory. It was fun, though it took me a little longer than I thought, but that's my own fault for getting a little carried away. Hopefully Mafus will like it (won't know until he gets back in town) and it'll garner him enough votes to score some free goodies. I'll be out until Tuesday as we're off to St. Simon's Island for a wedding.

UPDATE: We made it back safely, though it was a mightly draining trip. I was mistaken it wasn't St. Simon's Island, it was Jekyll Island, which sounded much better to my macabre mind. The weather was beautiful, so was the bride and the island was a non-commercialized haven. I wish I had a drawing to post, but we've all come down with a stomach virus it seems. Lilah was throwing up everywhere last night, I've been upchucking all morning and Angie's blasting from the other end. Good times.

A wee closer

Just a bit more left, but I've run out of gas for the evening. Thought I'd share the latest step. Until tomorrow.

Color prelims

Okay, here's a quick peek at the progress on the Sphinx piece. Instead of doing just your standard pin-up I've decided to give Mafus the cover treatment. Still have plenty of shading and highlighting left to do along with dropping in the old-school logo and a little Nova in the sidebar. Probably also going to drop in a dramatic caption complete with rough edges 'cuz that spells danger, True Believers!

Whilst I drag my coloring heels

Here's my Colletta treatment of Mafus' Sphinx. Hopefully, the colorized version will be up tomorrow. I've been Super-Dad all weekend since the wife is out for her 15th college reunion, so's my art time has been at a minimum.

UPDATE: The colored version will be another day in coming. Had a wild idea that I want to try to implement. Hopefully it'll work out for the better.

UPDATE 2: It looks like the idea is gonna pass muster. If I didn't have an 8am meeting I'd be up all night knocking it out. Can't wait to get cracking on this tomorrow night.

Now in beautiful Mafuscolor!

As you can plainly see, Mafus has completed the colors on the Hitman/Mawzir piece. Can't you just feel the cold clammy fingers of Mawzir? Doesn't it look like his breath would smell of pickles and other dark matter? Of course you can, thanks to Mafus' mighty Photoshop skills. Of course, I'm a day behind on inking his piece and he's bouncing out of town for the weekend, so I'll be plying my paltry talents to colorizing his contest drawing. Seems only fair.

30 Days of Night

As I mentioned earlier, Mafus and I hit a matinee of 30 DAYS OF NIGHT Sunday. We had both read praising reviews of the film, so we had no real trepidation going in. We even believed that the film might actually be better than the book for once and we were right. (I reread 30 DAYS later that night and the movie held up over. No bones about it.) Sure there were a few bits that could’ve been cut since the film did seem a little long. I understand that they had to stretch the tale out for the full thirty days, but they didn’t have to make it seem like a full thirty days. We were both impressed that the vampires acted like vampires and not velveteen fops spraffing on about the beauty of the night. No, these were hungry, mean, bloodsuckers that had no qualms about taking human life. They were smart too, using bellwethers to draw out fresh meat. A very nice touch. The gore is unapologetic and downright harsh at times. (Ol' three-chop Eben does quite a bit of lumberjacking necks.)

The environment helped (or is that hindered?), too. We walked out feeling half frozen ourselves. The filmmakers tapped what John Carpenter had done with THE THING: isolation and weather became the second monster. The characters knew how to handle the cold as occupants of Barrow, but knowing an environment doesn’t take away its teeth. (Sorry, couldn’t resist.)

The characters, both new and from the original story, were well done. The two tough married cops from the graphic novel went from an archetype to really being flawed humans that you could care about. You felt their fear and compassion whereas in the comic you didn’t feel a whole helluva lot since you knew they were the “heroes.” (I’d say more, but I like to keep it spoiler free.) Some of the bit characters could’ve gone the way of the dodo, but you need more than just a few talking heads to move a story along and add layers of tension/danger.

All in all it was one of the better horror flicks I’ve seen at the theater in quite some time. I look forward to picking it up on DVD once it’s released. Give it a peep if you haven’t already.

Random ink

Slow weekend, so I thought I'd do a quick ink job just to update this tired old thing. Did this one all with markers. For some reason I find markers a cop out, but I've got some much more control and steadiness with 'em that I can't complain too much. Erasing is the real issue I have with markers as the ink almost always pulls off and you've got to go back and darken it up. That's all I got for now. Mafus and I will be hitting "30 Days of Night" in a couple hours and I'll blab about that later.

Finally a new post

Polished off the contest piece this evening. Nothing to write home about, but good enough to post about. I was a little too uptight about inking at the beginning, but loosened up and had some fun with it at the end. Not the greatest, but excellent exercise and practice. Need to keep the mojo going and keep producing. I've passed it along to Mafus for some more of his brilliant coloring and I'll post the results when he shoots 'em back at me. Until then...

Anybody else see this?

Anybody else throw up in their mouth? Did the Silver Surfer nail Captain America, who then spawned this bastard? Seriously? Who thought remaking Cap's classic uniform was a good idea? Oh wait, that's right. The same knuckleheads who came up with Spider-Man's armor. Yeah, that went over like an adamantium balloon and is still going strong to this day...hold up, no, that went the way of the dodo during Civil War. Guess that means we'll be treated to another mind-boggling event to undo this damage next summer. Joy.

Contest Piece - Pencil Sketch

I'll elaborate a little more tomorrow, but just felt like scanning and posting the tighter pencil sketch of my next piece for the Velocity contest. The recent JLA/HITMAN series obviously had a big hand in this one. Not that I wouldn't've enjoyed drawing Abomination, it's just that this one's a little closer to me heart. Well, I've blown the drawing up and printed it out, so's I can lightbox it tonight on the dope ass drawing table Mafus hooked me up with. Hopefully Half Life 2: Orange Box won't keep me from getting final pencils on a piece of bristol tonight and I'll try to ink it Thursday or Friday since we've got a hectic weekend coming up with a wedding to attend and pumpkin carving with Lilah.

Watched BLACK SHEEP (not the Farley one, the killer sheep one) while working on the drawing tonight. An excellent film. Just the right amount of humour and horror. Highly recommend it, but again, I'll elaborate more tomorrow. Onto elaboration...I did have some high hopes for this flick as the trailers I'd seen gave it a nice SHAUN OF THE DEAD kind of feel and I wasn't let down. While the main antagonist was a bit of a prat he played the character well and convincingly. The love interest was darn near perfect in her role as well. A little goofy, vegan, tree-hugger, but with the right amount of sass. My favorite though was the farmhand. He was the embodiment of Ozzy from BAD TASTE ("The old magic's still there.") and stole the show whenever he was onscreen. The gore wasn't too over the top ala DEAD ALIVE (though there is a case of pecker eating) and if you ever wanted to see a Sheep-Man shear himself this is your movie.

Final Beach Weekend of '08

Luckily, it was a gorgeous weekend for the beach. Low 80s and the water was chilly, but brisk, and I was able to finally take my first dunk of the year. (I'd've been depressed if a year went by without soaking meself in the Atlantic.) We didn't get down until Saturday, but we had the extra day off courtesy of Mr. Columbus. The beach was stormed Sunday as the weather was a bit sporadic Saturday afternoon — rain, sun, drizzle, sun — so Angie went shopping while I hung with the Princess. Sunday was perfect and we scored rockstar parking at the beach access. Going out of season is a boon ''cuz you're not dealing with all the tourons and the beaches are fairly deserted. There were maybe 5-6 families Sunday and even less than that on Monday. Lilah's good for about an hour a trip, but she seems to enjoy it, though the concept of sand still seems to confuse her at times. (She's loathe to leave the blanket still. Next season she'll be tearing arse all over the beach I'm sure.) We soaked her toes in the surf and she pointed at everybody who walked by — even clapped for her Momma out in the water. Just damn nice to get away for the weekend and absorb as much salt air and seafood as possible. Even worked out a new sketch for the Velocity contest, which I hope to flesh out tonight and tomorrow.