JOURNAL: Bowler

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  • Definition. 2002-03-24 22:07:20 sellout: (n) Someone more successful than the person who's using the term and pointing the finger. Commonly used by those not capable of being successful.

    EK: listening to you talk about taking flak from the "purists" took me back to my college days. Please excuse the following pep talk :D

    Don't sweat the bitchers and moaners on regarding you getting paid to do work. This is why I mentioned earlier that I'm an Artist and not an artiste. Pissing on a canvas doesn't pay the bills, so don't sweat the losers complaining that someone's willing to shell out cold hard cash for your work. They're secretly jealous and don't understand why you're getting paid and they're not. It's because they're not talented or marketable enough. Extend arm. Turn palm up. Make fist. Raise middle finger. Smile. It kills 'em. ;)

    I'll never forget the time that I was turned down *because* I was a sellout. The art director beyotch for Wizards of the Coast (makers of Magic: The Gathering collectable card game) looked at my portfolio, and asked if I had anything that I painted for myself. I replied "No, all of the pieces in this portfolio were all done under a deadline, either for a grade or for a client. You can expect the same quality of work and punctuality on any projects I might do for you." But she didn't want stuff that made deadlines. She wanted "art." Screw "art." Nobody pays for or admires that kind of art anymore. Art (with a capital "A") nowadays is a movie. A video game. A TV show. A magazine cover or illo. A comic book. Who the hell takes the family to the museums anymore to see the latest installment from Painter-X? Andy Warhol was the last great painter, and even his work was some sort of bridge between paintings and the media of pop-culture. People go to see a movie now if they want art.

    Since Warhol the great artists have been movie directors, comic book artists, anime character designers. Every last one of them sellouts. The "artistes" sit in their rags with their dirty backpacks and drink bottomless cups of cheap 63 cent coffee that rots their gut at the local coffee hauz while sharing bad poetry; all the while praising each other's poverty. "At least we're not sellouts!" Heaven forbid one pay the rent.

    Just keep in mind that Michaelangelo was a sellout. He got paid for every single piece of work he did. In advance. By commission. From rich wealthy merchants (or the church).

    Nobody remembers an artiste. History records the sellouts.

    Be a sellout, and wear it with pride :) 
  • Movie on the Rocks. 2002-03-23 23:20:27 MCwagner: Saw Ice Age last night, and loved it :) I'm going to just throw out my opinions here with no real rhyme or reason (or retort, really. Just going to do some verbal diareah here).

    There's some personal crap after the spoilers, so I'll unmark the Spoilers below.


    ::ICE AGE SPOILERS FOLLOW::



    Loved loved LOVED the animation on the animals. Not only does fur soften edges, but it softens the key-frames, too. Fur (hair, clothes, smoke, etc) all adds "secondary action" to a character's movement, and really serves to make it look more "real." This is why Sully looked like he was animated better than anything else in Monster's Inc. (in my opinion, anyway).

    The humans looked like DIRT. If you're going to keyframe human animation, at least do a good job! For crying out loud, I could have done the motion capture on those scenes in about a month BY MYSELF and it would have looked 100O times better. Am I bitter and jealous that my friend (who at one time worked under me) in our industry just got offered two jobs (one at Pixar) for twice my salary? No, not me. Should I be in the office right now putting together my demo reel? Yes. But back to the movie.

    The sets blew. They just flat out sucked. I could tell they were going for some sort of simplified stylistic approach due to the team's possible lack of experience**, but I don't care. It still sucked. Areas where some green was beginning to enter the picture again (during the migration scenes) was starting to work, but I think whoever did their background design REALLY needs to work on landscape painting and color theory. Cold, winter, and ice does NOT mean it has to be white and/or blue. Snow is white, so it's pretty much just one giant color reflector sheet. If the sun rises red, the entire landscape should also be red. There are tons of ways to liven up a snowscape. This movie explored none of them.

    Did I like the story? Oh yes. Granted, I went into it with the expectation that it was "just a dumb kid's movie," so as soon as there was even a hint of adult humor, I busted a gut laughing. Even the poo scene was funny, because of the running commentary that went with it. "Oh, HEY, c'mon guys! CURB that!" Obviously, this wasn't Pixar, so none of the characters really evolved, but then I didn't much care. I'm really happy for Blue Sky Studios (at least I think that's their name). They're new kids on the block, and if this was my film, I'd have been VERY proud of it. My hat is off. Excellent excellent job.

    Things I liked (besides animation): Sid. THE SQUIRRELL. My god that was some funny slapstick. Sid. The mud and the way it stuck to fur, and how it was thicker, drier mud, and then soaking wet sloppy mud. The character model for Sid. Sid's hands. The animation for Sid. The voice actor (Leguizamo?) who voiced Sid. Since there wasn't a lot to look at other than the characters in this movie, I kinda focused on Sid. In case you haven't noticed yet.

    p.s.......Sid.




    ::END OF ICE AGE SPOILERS::



    **The lack of experience thing. I doubt Blue Sky is inexperienced. But making a movie is a HUGE deal. It takes a ton of work, a ton of reworking, and a ton of experience. I'm not saying I've got that experience. At least not at directing, anyway (I've done the feature film animating thing). But really all that this studio did before Ice Age (as far as I know of besides commercials) was the short film Bunny which won an Oscar for Best Short a couple of years ago. Pixar at least made about 5 shorts before Disney opped them to do 4 (5?) films. And Disney helped them A LOT with the first Toy Story. I have no idea how this movie came to be, but I remember almost sending in my demo reel to this company (if this is the one in New York that I'm thinking of) a year or two ago when I heard they were making a movie. I then thought to myself

    A). I don't want to move to New York.

    and

    B). I wouldn't work for Pixar (this isn't an elite-ist thing...they fire half their crew when the movie's done), so why would I go and work for these no-names?!?

    So I didn't apply. I'm not upset that I didn't; I was too inexperienced then to get a job doing 3D. I'd love to send them my stuff now and say "YOU IDIOTS!!! WHY DIDN'T YOU MOTION CAPTURE THE HUMANS?!?! See? Look at my reel. You need to hire me." But I still don't want to move to New York.

    Believe it or not, Raliegh, NC is evidently the place to be right now (so they loaded up the truck, and they moved to N. C. Tarheels, that is. Black heels. Carloina tea.) My buddy took a job at Epic (makers of Unreal Tournament...I now know the entire animation staff there. All two of them. Too bad they're not still hiring.), and he said that just about every game company in Raliegh (I guess there's like 5 or something) is looking for a Motion Capture solution, so I think I'm going to send my reel around. I've lived there before, and hated it (when I was an uprooted high school teenager), but I think I'd like it now that I'd have enough money to make it worthwhile, and it's MY choice to move there. Christ, there wasn't even an Internet when I was in high school. You were lucky if you had Cable.

    Liz isn't too happy about the idea of moving there. Thing is, if I took a job there for that kind of salary, plus game royalties, we could afford to buy her Mom a condo there and Liz and her Mom could fly back to Illinois whenever she felt like it. Plus my parents might retire back to Raleigh (they reeeeeeealy love it there) and I'd like to see a bit more of them. And Liz's best friend lives down by the beach, two hours away. I've also got a handful of old friends who still live there, plust the two guys at Epic I already know. It seems like it's win-win. I just have to send-send my reel-reel.

    Ed-Ed has invaded my brain-brain, so that means it's late-late and I need to sleep-sleep.

    Nite-nite.
     
  • "Crap crap crap crap crap" ::Homer falling down canyon:: 2002-03-18 12:59:33 Just lost my hosting at www.startoons.net, since it seems that the server just died. That's what happens when companies fold and their pre-pay on the server expires. Thanks to the 70+ people who downloaded M7, and the 120 folks who hit it.
     
  • "This here's another song about drinkin'..." 2002-03-18 11:10:22 Got to see Gaelic Storm last night.

    Wow. They were damn good. I don't know what it is about traditional Irish music, but it stirs my soul. Love. It. If you're not familiar with their music, get thee to www.gaelicstorm.com and get friendly. Oh, and if you saw Titanic, they were the steerage band.

    I'm glad we got to see them, because we were bummed that Drovers didn't post their show announcement in time for us to see them, so we picked up GS tickets. For those of you who don't know (probably everyone here), we go see the Drovers every year for St. Pat's. We're Irish, so go fig.

    I must also say that I'm in love with their fiddle player. I've never seen someone so talented at so many different instruments. Fiddle, 4 whistles (from tin to penny to recorder), button accordian (but I didn't get to see that), sings, and DANCES. They (her and the lead singer) busted out a traditional Irish tap (think Trinity dancers or *sigh* Riverdance) routine at the end, to the shock and thrill of yours truly and the audience. I can't believe someone can look so good and be so talented. And be Irish.

    Evidently everyone else in the audience from frat boy to minivan driving husband thought she was hot, too, since gifts were aplenty. St. Patrick's day headbands, beads (who the hell made St. Pats *beads*?! It's St. Pats, not Fat Tuesday, for crying out loud), shots, cans of Guinness, etc. We actually heard some guy argue with his *girlfriend* about trying to get up to the stage (we were right against the stage) so he could leave a glass of cider for her.

    Thankfully, I have much more dignity and decorum than that.

    ::KATHLEEN IF YOU'RE READING THIS PLEASE MARRY ME::

    Thank you.


    ;D Kidding people!



    k. Now I need to rant for a bit. If you don't like rants, you can stop reading now. I won't be offended.

    Why is it that everyone thinks that St. Pats is a day for getting lit and wearing shamrock decorations? Yes. The Irish drink on St. Pats. We drink a bit more than we normally do every other day of the year, when we're still Irish. We love the fact that people like being Irish for a day on St. Pats. Seriously. Hell, the more, the merrier. But could you do us a favor and maybe NOT wear the f'n KISS ME I'M IRISH button, and the headband with the shamrocks on it? Thanks. Because that's not Irish, it's a St. Pat's gimmick. If it was Irish, we'd be forced to wear that drek every day of the year. And we don't. So you shouldn't, either.

    Confidential to the drunken guy at the show last night: Hey buddy, just because you're wearing a Guinness golf shirt doesn't make you any more Irish than the next guy. In fact, it makes you English. Don't boo a song about some guy who's forced to drink Murphy's Irish Stout when the bar runs out of Guinness, because Murphy's is owned by the Irish and Guinness is owned by the English. For crying out loud, dude, get a damn clue if you're going to have opinions about your alcohol. And don't wear a Guinness shirt on St. Pats. Ever seen PCU (the movie)? The bit about wearing a band shirt to a concert where that band is playing? "Don't be that guy!" It applies here. You're at the show. You're drinking Guinness. I think it can be safely assumed that you're a fan without having to advertise.


    And you can stop trying to direct the band and turn around and "pump up the audience" because we didn't come here for your drunken show.
     
  • The Blind Leading The Blind. 2002-03-14 09:54:52 Amizadai: I just read your old journal entry regarding how to draw with a tablet. Heh. Not an easy task if you're not used to the technique.

    I'd suggest first practicing with a sketchbook and pencils, pens, or whatever's most comfortable for you, and try a technique called Blind Contour.

    Blind Contour was developed so that you could train your hand to move with your eyes; so that you could draw what you're looking at without looking at your paper. The key is to NEVER look down at your paper for reference, and only draw the lines you see on your subject. Don't look down at your paper, even if you need to pick your pencil up to start drawing somewhere else. It's O.K. if it doesn't look good. In fact, it won't look good for years. Only masters of the craft can make them look GOOD. The object is that it's an excercise that develops your hand/eye coordination, not a nice looking drawing :). In fact, it will probably come out looking Picasso-esque.

    Then, when you're ready to draw on your tablet, you can watch what's going up on the screen (you can follow your mouse pointer for the reference of where you're drawing), without feeling the urge/need to look down at the tablet. Practice practice practice :) 
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