COLIN STIMPSON

Check out the awesomeness that is Colin Stimpson. He's an Art Director and Production Designer for many animation projects as well a children's book illustrator. Head over to his site to see more of his work!

GET WHAT'S YOURS!

THE S FROM HELL

Here is a captivating short documentary on the classic Screen Gems logo and how it terrorized us as a society. Truly fascinating as I too was traumatized by this horror of celluloid.

360 INTERACTIVE REAL-TIME HAITIAN STREET VIEW

Update: I took down the video feed as the volume control settings on the source was driving people to kill their fellow man. The link below is still active...

Use your mouse to click and drag around the video to change the view. You can also zoom in and out. Pause and explore at any time by pressing the play/pause button under the video to stop and look around. The video below was shot on Monday, January 18, at 9:52 a.m. EST in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

If it doesn't work here in Blogger, try this link.

STAR WARS FACEBOOK STATUS UPDATES

UPDATE! Ferraro had the balls (and gall) to point out that the end of the Chewie/Han wall wasn't included...it is there now and of course, like any joke, it's much funnier with a punchline.

MY NEW HOUSE

Hey everyone, I thought I'd show you the house I just bought. It's okay and my first job is to cut down all the bloody trees so I'll have a view!



As per ush (pronounced eewzsh) I contracted architect Robert Harvey Oshatz (I kid him about his name on a daily basis) to design this puppy. Robert has designed and built all my homes and he has created a website to showcase my homes and his work here.

My favourite home still to this day is my residence in Japan which Oshatz and I called "Miyasaka Family Residence."

COOL LOG CABIN

I love log cabins and this one's kinda unique. See more pics of this cabin designed by Thomas Mayer for a musician here!

SHAWN FARQUHAR ON ELLEN

My buddy and colleague, the talented and eccentric Scott Farquhar has a brother Shawn who's a magician and over the years I've heard Scott mention his brother here and there in conversation. Occasionally, Scott will show me a trick or two that he's learned from Shawn and this week Scott's brother appeared on the Ellen Degeneres show.

DEATH METAL ROOSTER

KICK ASS RED BAND TRAILER

THE THIRD & THE SEVENTH

Completely CGI video narrative about photography and architecture by some "hack" named Alex Roman.

The Third & The Seventh from Alex Roman on Vimeo.

PACIFIC BARREL EYE FISH (WITH CREEPY SEE-THROUGH HEAD)

WEIRD SISTER-IN-LAWS

Last weekend, my wife's sisters came to visit so they bunked up in the barn in my backyard. On Sunday, I went to peep on them and this is what I saw...

GROOVY NEWS

This 80's news opening is actually quite ahead of its time in terms of production, camera and editing, in my opinion. The only thing I found slightly disconcerting besides the "cut-to-the-beat" editing was the shoulderless slug-monster in the orange outfit at the end...

SWIMMING ROBOTIC SNAKE

I for one, welcome our swimming robotic snake overlords...

T-SHIRT SQUAD!

Human Giant - T-Shirt Squad - watch more funny videos

AVAHONTAS

I saw Avatar (in 3D Imax) over the holidays and I went in with little expectations because first off, I HATED Titanic sooooo much that I couldn't watch the movie, leaving well before the Titanic kissed the iceberg. Second, the general aesthetic and designs of Avatar seemed really airy-fairy; like something from an early 80's prog-rock album art by Asia or Yes--which have always been tacky and gaudy in my opinion. I wouldn't be surprised if James pulled these LPs out of his record collection and gave them to his art director and conceptual artists as a spring-board.


Ironically, I came out of the theatre really impressed; dazzled by its technical ju-ju. I was in a real state of "wow" for a few hours but slowly that veil started to slip and all the things I was able to forgive while viewing the movie started to overthrow that magical visual imprint. EVERY character in the movie was a complete stereotype and generally, I felt that although everything I was seeing was something I have seen before, only rendered and realized in such a technically advanced way that it was something I hadn't seen before (in some sense). Story wise too, the film was basically something I had seen many of only again, in a whole new way. Below, a guy named Matt Bateman explains my point:


There it is! There's Avatar's story in a nut-shell. I'd recommend seeing the film on a big screen in 3D as there was so many times where I had to give my head a shake and say to myself, "None of this exists! Nothing is real, it's all digital voodoo!" Working in 3D animation for 13 years or so made me look at the movie with a bit of technical eye and it was absolutely stunning and nearly flawless in its execution. Don't go in expecting an epic story with amazing characters as it's extremely flat and dull. I wish James Cameron could have taken that world and presented us with a less safe story. I wish he took some risks and pushed the complexity of each of the characters so they weren't so cookie-cut (ie, the first time we see our corporate villain, he's, yes, putting a golf ball and exclaiming how much he loves his new club. The military villain is a typical marine sergeant, complete with massive facial battle scars--meaning, this guy's seen some shit!). If Cameron had taken a route similar to Princess Mononoke, where there was complexity in everyone's role, that their objectives, no matter what "side" they were on were valid and just, then I'd have appreciated the movie more. But here, the corporation is "bad" and the natives are "good" and there's no in-between. The story and characters are black and white void of anything deep, but the visuals are rich and immersive like nobody's business.