Friday, May 30, 2008

$1,000,000 BOUNTY FOR BIGFOOT PHOTO

Bushnell's got a little "Coming Soon" teaser on the Trail Camera's page of their website
where it seems that they'll be giving away $1,000,000 for a photograph of the elusive and stanky sasquatch. It was a Bushnell Trail Camera that took the Jacob's Creature photograph but, as stated many times, despite BFRO's insistence that it's a juvenile bigfoot, is most likely a bear and her cubs. You can see more trail camera photos and more about the contest at Loren Coleman's excellent Cryptomundo site.





Thursday, May 29, 2008

BEYOND WORDS...BEYOND WORLDS

My spirit and soul, being as sensitive as it is, cannot gaze upon this tattoo for more than 3 seconds without having a complete meltdown. I can only cast quick glances else I face an onslaught of emotions. Patrick Swayze, rainbows, a centaur; truly this is by far the closest I have ever come to God.

NEW "PROOF" THAT JACOB'S CREATURE IS A PRIMATE

The folks at the Bigfoot Research Organization have been doing some investigating on the Jacob's Creature, though it doesn't sway my opinions...



I would love to have conclusive evidence that the Jacob's Creature is a sasquatch. I just don't think it is. Like I've said before, the one image which supposedly shows a sasquatch bending over with its head on the ground just doesn't make any sense. There's no way that black "blob" belongs to the creature that is standing. No primate can do that. Like I've said before, it's most likely a bear cub with its mother. When I saw the video posted above, their own image enhancement at 2:14 minute mark revealed more clues that it was a bear cub...check it out...

The photographs that were taken that night show bears at one point. Then minutes later we have an inconclusive sasquatch. I'm not buying it. I said it before, I believe in sasquatches and I would love to have real proof that one exists. The Jacob's Creature photographs don't hold up in my opinion despite all the measurements they've done.

Here's an older post that was posted in November of 2007 which has more of my super-sleuthing...

I've been looking around and snoopin' about and studying the Jacob's Creature photos for some time and even though I really wish we had conclusive photographs of a sasquatch, I'm not entirely convinced. Look at this fancy bear below.


I chopped off its head and applied it to the photo below for comparison to what I think could be a bear (albeit a scrawny one). Don't get me wrong, when I look at the photo below I do at first glance admit that it looks primate but if you look at what is supposedly its head (click on the pictures to biggerize them)...


If it is a bear I see that it's nose is hiding behind its left forearm as if it were licking the inside of its elbow. Here is a photo that was posted at the BFRO of a mangy old bear. Poor sack of skin and bones. If I didn't know it was a bear I may have thought it was an ill hyena. We have better lighting, clearer photography to help us determine that this is not the case. At another angle, under starker lighting conditions and grainier film, who knows how similar to a primate it could look, especially if the head was out of sight?


The other photo of the creature shows a lump on the ground. Some people have been saying that this is its head. I don't see how this can be the case. Very very odd proportions. Too odd to be correct. So what is it? It wasn't there in the previous photo? I think it's a bear cub. Hey we have photos of bear cubs already. 30 seconds is enough time for an enthusiastic little cub to run up to its mother and start squirming around in the deer phermones. Again, just my opinion. I would love to have proof otherwise but I don't think this is gonna do it.

AMERICA'S GADSDEN FLAG


A guy at work had a flag up on the wall and I inquired about it. He told me that this was the USA's original flag. This isn't entirely accurate, but it definitely did represent America in its infancy. It was inspired by Benjamin Franklin who drew a political cartoon (some say the first) of a snake severed in 8 pieces. Each piece represented a different state with the motto "Join or Die." A superstition at the time was that if you severed a snake in pieces and put the pieces back together before sunset, the snake would live.


I think that's a pretty good use of symbolism (though if I were South Carolina I'd be a bit upset). So the above image is technically the inspiration for the Gadsden flag which was basically telling the British monarchy to fuck off or get bit. Many people love the Gadsden flag and the use of a rattlesnake to represent America. The rattlesnake never bites unless it's tread upon. It gives fair warning that it will strike if messed with (this of course doesn't apply to the current USA who have decided to remove its rattle so-to-speak), and it's bite is lethal. When I see the Gadsden flag I immediately associate it with the image below and somehow it seems to fit the current state Bush, Cheney and their twat-bagged buddies have put America in. Just a few more months!

THE WORK OF JR (& STREET ARTISTS ON TATE MODERN)

Parisian artist JR was one of a number of other street artists to decorate the giant facade of Tate Modern.

JR takes 28 mm photos of people in their environment and then enlarges the photos and pastes them back up in that environment. His work is large, striking and strictly B&W so as to stand out against the bright colours of advertisements.


JR - TATE MODERN
Uploaded by JR

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

ITALIAN SPIDERMAN: EPISODE 2

AIR JELLY!? WTF?

The first of the killer Sentinels?



Here's the Festo company site. I've translated it(through Google Translate):

Air is the element of AirJelly. The remote jellyfish AirJelly not swim through water as Aqua Jelly, but glides formally thanks to its central electric drive and an intelligent, adaptive mechanism by the sea air. Because AirJelly consists of a helium-filled Ballonett.

As the only energy source AirJelly two lithium-ion polymer battery to which the central electric motor is connected. This will transfer the power to a bevel gear, and then successively to eight front wheels, cranks of the eight tentacles of jellyfish. Each tentacle is a structure with the Ray Fin Effectpackage ® trained. The drive a balloon through a peristaltische movement is now in aviation history is not known. AirJelly is the first indoor flying object with peristaltischem drive. The jellyfish moves thanks to this new drive concept, its recoil on the principle of drive-based, gently through the air.


WORLD'S BIGGEST FAKE


The artist admits that the whole thing was fake. Here's more.

Tuesday, May 27, 2008

TURKISH RAMBO

Thanks Kevin Webb!

Here's Patrick Swayze in Turkish Rambo! I love how bazooka warheads are just layin' about willy-nilly. I now know where the music for SPACE COPS comes from.


Monday, May 26, 2008

MGMT "TIME TO PRETEND"

I just picked up Brooklyn's MGMT's album Oracular Spectacular (it's been out for quite a while actually) and it's really pretty spectacular. It's psychedelic synth-pop and the trippy music video is pretty crazy cool too (sorry, the host disabled embed feature).

MGMT "Time To Pretend."

The band's website also has a 3D version of the video which doesn't look too shabby but my eyes are now buggin' out.

Here's the making of the video which is edited to another track from the album...

JOHN DRYDEN'S INDIANA JONES EXPERIENCE

John Dryden went to see the latest Indiana Jones movie and writes:

So, Kayt and I went to the Dolphin Theatre to see Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Alien Skull . The Dolphin Theatre is a family owned shitbox. The seats were torn and super uncomfortable and they had the volume up so loud that my hearing started to clip. We actually had to stick our fingers in our ears for bits. Even with all this, I still managed to fall asleep about 4 times during the movie. HOLY FUCKING SHIT DOES IT EVER SUCK!! I wanted to go into the projection room and start ripping the film out of the machine and put a match to it. Don't even bother with it.

Pretend that it was never made, or wait until me and Paul Stanley from KISS are done writing our script for Indiana Jones and the Bottomless Goblet of Vodka & Orange Juice!

ITALIAN SPIDERMAN: EPISODE 1



here's a little news report on the production of Italian Spiderman!

Friday, May 23, 2008

TIKI BAR TV'S NEW SITE


Halfsquatch favourite, Tiki Bar TV has a new site! Go there and/or be square!

FEEL THE AMISH POWER OF BALTJES


If you haven't had the pleasure of heading over to http://www.scottbaltjes.com (that's right, I respect the full integrity of the http://www. bit of a web address) yet then I highly recommend that you do.

Scott is one of the pioneers of CGI animation and by pioneer, I mean both literally and figuratively. I've had the pleasure of working with the Ball Cheese for a number of years and every day, I'd discover something new and interesting about #63 himself, Spare Change. He subscribed to a magazine called Beaver (not the kind of mag you're thinking of) kept a leg-hold trap on his desk and bragged about eating raccoon stew whenever he had a chance.

Scott's website is amazing and it has a ton to offer, including a whole shit-load of quotes from the mustached man himself. Here's a quote that's not listed: I once asked my animation crew if anyone had ever gone on a rampage and when I asked Scott, his reply was forthright and chilling--"Nope! But I wanna!" (2004)


Thursday, May 22, 2008

OVERDRIFT 2

I haven't even watched it yet and I'm posting it just so you can be the first!!!

APPLE STORE VANCOUVER

Thanks Clint Butler!

Apple's opened a retail outlet in the Pacific Centre here in Vancouver with the grand opening this Saturday and to mark the occasion Steve Jobs is going to jump from the top of the needle-building into a bin containing 30 million iPod earbud foamies. More here!

"It's a perfect time of year for apples! They're good for your body, they're good for your health!"
-- Dr. Steve Brule

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

THE ART OF PIETARI POSTI

Spanish illustrator Pietari Posti has a new series out called GIANTS!


Some of his other works:


HITLER'S PLANS FOR BURNING MAN

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

WATCHMEN BACKLOT PICS

They shot most of the upcoming Zach Snyder flick "The Watchmen" just down the road from where I live. It's completely a wrap and I finally "snuck" as close as I could to the lot to snap some pics. Not great pictures and not terribly interesting but whatev, it's better than nuffin'.

I finally got around to reading the Alan Moore comic recently as well and liked it very much but the whole time I kept asking myself "How on Earth are they going to make this into a movie?" The Watchmen is definitely a great story, rich with detail and cleverly woven story threads.

Comic/Movie spoiler alert!
My major one gripe about the graphic novel is this: There are so many characters in the comic and the world is so richly detailed with background characters and themes that it would have been easy to remove some of these lesser important characters and replace their thread with a thread that focused on a certain psychic. After all that the story takes us through, the ending could have been much more powerful if we had some connection to the psychic whose brain pretty much destroys New York.

Answer: I watches the Watchman when it comes out.

I want one of these purple "Girls" posters.



DUNCAN BROTHERS' PROMO FOR OVERDRIFT 2

JOHN DRYDEN ON ITALIAN LIVE TELEVISION

Two weeks ago John Dryden made a claim that he could strip a girl with a backhoe if he had to in under 2 minutes. Well, an Italian television variety show took him up on his offer and had him prove it on live television.

Monday, May 19, 2008

A.I. ASSIGNMENT: DAVE

A few years ago, Greg Richardson asked me to help him with an assignment he was going to give his class (among many things, he is an editing instructor at the Art Institute). The assignment was simple. Using video footage of a blocked scene that we had shot from a multitude of angles, the students were asked to edit the shots together to make a short film.

Greg had written a simple script and asked if I'd help shoot it on our lunch break. We didn't have any special lav mics or any lighting. Just went to a noisy area, with a simple camera and shot.

Years had passed and I had yet to see any of the footage. Greg had mentioned occasionally that the students were quoting my character "Dave" and had said that "Dave" had become somewhat of a "legend" around the Art Institute.

One day at work, I got an instant message from a new animator which went like this:

Wesley: "You're Dave!"
Me: "huh?"
Wesley: "You're Dave!"
Me: "i don't get it!"
Wesley: "Were you in Greg Richardson's editing project at the Art Institute?"
Me: Ha ha! Yeah! I haven't seen anything yet!
Wesley: A bunch of us just figured out that you are Dave just now at lunch! HA!
Me: Ha!
Wesley: Ha! Be cool! Don't be a fool!
Me: Ha! Oh yeah. I forgot about all of that.
Wesley: Ha!
Me: Ha!
Wesley: Ha!
Me: Ha!

This went on for quite some time.

So, this weekend, I had a very small backyard party and Greg came over and brought a drive full of quicktimes of the students' work. I copied them over to watch and I've selected a few. Some of them were really bad and consisted of two cuts. These were some of the best I think.





Sunday, May 18, 2008

THE SPIRIT: TEASER TRAILER REVIEW


Hmmmm. There's something about Frank Miller comics and cgi that go hand-in-hand. First there was Sin City which had a great look but it was directed by Robert Rodriguez so I couldn't bother wasting 2 hours of my life. Then there was 300. Again, great look, but this time it was Zach Snyder so I decided that I could afford 3 hours of my life, which unfortunately I will never get back. The movie stunk to high-heaven. Now comes The Spirit. If you haven't seen the teaser trailer, I warn you, this review of the teaser trailer has MAJOR spoilers.

Here's the deal. Like Sin City, this movie has a real high-contrast, B&W (black and white) CGI background thingy going for it. The human in this trailer is a guy who really loves cats. He probably has hundreds of them. He also has a really fucked-up tie. It's all constant-red that flutters about as if it has a mind of its own! If I were this guy, I'd think twice about putting this thing on if he's going to battle crime because if he were to be hiding in shadows, his stupid tie would definitely give him away.

After receiving a mysterious phone call, Mr. Spirit dashes about the city, high upon the roof-tops, jumping from building to building using what may be the worst case of wire-work in motion cinema (even worse than Crouching Tiger!). I mean the guy's practically floating above the roof tops like a Vegas Cirque De Soleil act. Did they only rent the wire-work rig and crew for an hour?

Frank: "Okay boys, that's a wrap! Nice job everyone!"
Actor with fucked up tie: "Uh, hey, Frank, I almost bailed on that one take and think that if I could do it just one more time, I wouldn't look so sloppy. Let me have another go, and I'll make it look better for ya."
Frank: "Naaah, it'll be fine."
Wire-rigger: If we loosen the slack just a bit, it'll give him a bit more realistic gravity. He's kinda leapin' like a fuckin' fairy. I'd like to have another go at it."
Frank: "Naaah, it'll be fine. Once we remove the green screen and comp a city behind him, it'll look fantastic. Besides, everyone'll be looking at the tie!"

Finally, to finish the trailer off, there's our main hero standing on some words in a static pose and then two crazy cuts of random jumping at camera that don't work whatsoever. Pretty sloppy. Let me watch it again, just to make sure I've got it all right...

...Yeah. Piss poor. So to review: Guy loves cats. Has a fucked-up tie. Runs around city on roof-tops. Did the producers and Frank honestly look at this teaser and say "YEAH! This whole constant-red tie gimmick will definitely get EVERYONE creaming their jeans!"







Thursday, May 15, 2008

FUSION MAN TAKES FLIGHT

Years ago, aviation enthusiast and inventor Yves Rossy dreamed of soaring through the sky like a bird. In 2006 that dream took flight.

Known as Switzerland's "Fusion Man," Rossy in November 2006 became the first man in the world to fly with wings and four jet engines strapped to his body; on Wednesday he displayed that talent to the world.

The inaugural flight lasted six minutes in Bex, Switzerland, and included an emergency parachute programmed to automatically open if he were to black out, NBC11 reported at the time.

"The idea is to have fun, not to kill yourself," Rossy said in the story.

In Internet videos, Rossy wears a white helmet with the words "Jet-Man" on the front, dives out of a plane, fires up his wings and propels through the atmosphere, leaving a trail of special-effects white smoke in his wake.

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

ABSOLUT BEACH PARTY!

BREATHLESS, CAPTIVATING & MAJESTICALLY SUBLIME


I am so glad that this van was parked in its driveway and not traveling down the road in front of me because I would probably have killed someone or myself. Truly, to be on the road driving alongside this masterpiece, one truly could not concentrate on the task at hand--attentive driving. Rather, one would find him/herself drifting off into a day dream's warm desert sunset where the sound of a magnificent wild stallion's whinny surreally transposes to the sound of squealing tires. I guess it'd be a pleasant way to go.

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

CHIP'S NOT DEAD YET!


I'm currently in super-training to be givin'er and gettin'er done on June 20th. If you want to donate to the BC Children's Hospital, head over to my donation page and giv'er!

You can do your part and find out more information about this fund-raiser here!

Monday, May 12, 2008

REAGAN ON SHITHEAD

Thanks Kamala!

Here's a funny excerpt from The Reagan Diaries (recently published by Harper Collins).

Entry dated May 17, 1986

"A moment I've been dreading. George brought his n'er-do-well son around this morning and asked me to find the kid a job. Not the political one who lives in Florida; the one who hangs around here all the time looking shiftless. This so-called kid is already almost 40 and has never had a real job. Maybe I'll call Kinsley over at The New Republic and see if they'll hire him as a contributing editor or something. That looks like easy work."




THAI LIGHT BULB COMMERCIAL

Friday, May 09, 2008

TROPHY HEAD BELT BUCKLE

Love this belt buckle though I'd want a less cartoony/silly one and one that's more realistically detailed. Created by Justin "Scrappers" Morrison, only two of them exist and one of them is keeping his pants from falling down.

Thursday, May 08, 2008

BRAVIA PLAY-DOH AD

Thanks Beadle!

The creative behind this Bravia ad employed over 40 animators and 2.5 tonnes of modeling material to create the most ambitious stop-motion animation.

THE STABBERS


Okay there's a new group in town and we're called The Stabbers. It currently consists of John Dryden on drums and me on guitar and vocals. We had our first jam session last night at my place and it was just horrible.

Here was the simple game-plan:
6:00--John picks me up from work with all the gear.
6:40--Get to my place (my wife and kids were out of town for the past few nights so we had the place to ourselves)
7:00--set up drum kit, plug in the guitar and play loud 'til 11:00
11:00--switch over to headphones for late-night groovy times

Here was what happened:
6:20--Meet John at a pub
7:00--Realize I don't have a pick so I walk down commercial bugging buskers offering to buy their picks
7:20--Go to John's to pick up some things he forgot (Popeye pajamas)
8:00--Get to my place, set up drum kit, plug in guitar

The brand new drum kit works like a
beautifully crafted German switchblade.


8:30--The rented distortion peddle's AC adapter doesn't work. Scrounge around house trying various AC adapters from other electronic devices. Nothing works.
9:00--Go to London Drugs to buy adapter.
9:30--Get back to my place. I've lost my key.
9:45--Go back to London Drugs and find key.
10:00--ROCK AND ROLL!

My voice is as dull as a butter-knife.
My guitar skills as irritating as being
shivved with a blunt-nosed bread-knife.

10:10--My wife calls saying that she and the boys are coming home now. We jam for 10 minutes, royally suck and figure that the Gods are against us this evening and we call it a night.

"What a fuckin' drag. I wish I was dead. Stick a fork
in me, I'm done. Get'er done, I'm through givin'er."

THE ROCKETMAN KY RICHARDSON

Ky Richardson is like the Ed "Big Daddy" Roth of rocketry. He has built more rocket-powered vehicles and set more rocket-powered records than anyone else on Earth. Besides rockets and rocketbelts, he's made rocket-powered bicycles, rocket-powered wheelchairs, rocket-powered scooters, and of course, rocket-powered chairs (as seen below).


Check out his stammering works of functional art at his less-than-stammeringly-well-designed website.

Also, be sure to check out "the most comprehensive website on Rocketbelts and Jetpacks" Flying Into The Future where it is said "If Your [sic] Not Living On The Edge, Your [sic] Taking Up To [sic] Much Space." Sounds like something Hatchet would say.

Wednesday, May 07, 2008

REVENGE OF THE MOON NAZIS

Here's a trailer for Iron Sky from some of the people behind Star Wreck. The music is awful and doesn't belong with this trailer whatsoever, but visually it looks fantastic.

GOOGLE EARTH 4.3 UPDATES

I'm a tad late on this, but as my step-uncle used to say "Better late than never." Such a wise man and I've always taken his sound advice seriously. He used to also say stuff like "A penny for your thoughts!" "How now brown cow?" and once he screamed "TODAY IS A GOOD TIME TO DIE!!" and then he ran himself right in front of a bus. He was always saying and doing things like that...up until the bus killed him then he stopped saying and doing stuff.

YOU NEED ELLIOTT LESTER

Another fine promotional for film maker Elliott Lester by Fred & Sharon!

Tuesday, May 06, 2008

ROBOT HIGH SCHOOL

Kinda old but I love this video. The "band" is My Robot Friend and you can download the video and song at their website.

Friday, May 02, 2008

APTERA: A GUIDED TOUR OF THEIR FACTORY

As soon as the Aptera is available for sale in British Columbia I am getting one. MARK MY WORDS.

JANE GOODALL ON SASQUATCH...

There's a bunch of footage and annoying music accompanying this. Some footage is obvious that it's a guy in a costume. Others...not so sure...

Thursday, May 01, 2008

ALIENS MAKE FIRST CONTACT IN CALGARY


Two aliens have made contact with Earth recently by transmitting their images via alien technology onto the outside wall of a house in Calgary. It seems as though they are merely observing and have not initiated any form of communication with us. Read more about this here!

I'd love to know what these guys look like! To go beyond the fuzzy inter-galactic transmission and see their entire body and their details. I know a lot of you are very talented artists. Anyone want to share their interpretations?! Submit your renderings at johnnydarrell@shaw.ca

Here's my crap-job...Nathan Thomas theory he has.

Richard Johnson's take.