And so 2007 comes to a close

Yes, even if I'd rather tear my eyes out than go to your crappy party, the difference one invitation can make to the self-esteem is quite staggering. Heart-warming.

All in all, 2007 wasn't a bad year. Hopefully 2008 will be even better. Bring on robot butlers and flying cars.

Happy New Year all!

People like me

I mean, they must. Why else would I have been given such fantastic gifts this year? Wow, I'm overwhelmed with the giftness.

What a nice few days I've had, even without the pizza (I had beer). Oh actually, now that I think about it, I had pizza on Christmas Eve so it was a perfect Christmas after all.

I guess the next thing is to make up some New Years resolutions that I won't stick to. I think I won't bother going through that process and will just hope to have a year no worse than 2007, which actually turned out to be pretty good.

Hope everyone had a great Christmas and follows it with an excellent 2008!

Is that the sound of sleigh bells?

Ah! Pizza and beer. The meal of Kings! Really, if it were down to me, this would be my Christmas dinner. As it is, I'll end up with turkey like everyone else. Nice turkey but still... pizza and beer...

Hope whatever you're doing that you have a great Christmas!

Reality television isn't all bad

Monday night, another America's Next Top Model. Tonight, it's the final! Over in this part of the world, we're a season behind you US folks. I think we're on cycle 8.

Now I tend to give out a lot about reality television. I think most of it is utter shite. But, man, I can't get enough of this show. It's not just the sexy women. Not at all. In fact, some of them are muck. Nah, I enjoy sassy Tyra, the comic stylings of Miss Jay (and those legs) and the other Jay with the silver hair too. That dude's from the future.

Oh, I love the bitching too. It's entertaining while backing up everything I know to be true about women.

When the floor is your wardrobe...

And, no, I don't want to get a haircut either.

The family party

It's party season. Work-related parties - loads of these but they're nice and easy to skip. Family parties can be tougher. Lots of people you rarely see. Rarely call. Sure, all families are weird but some are way more weird than others and I don't play well with others. So it's good to make your own entertainment.

White gloves

Andy J. Latham (from Andy's Animation blog here - http://andysanimation.blogspot.com/) really got me wondering about cartoon gloves. Obsessing actually. All of the really old cartoons featured these gloves, even if a character wore no other clothes.

People say it was just to help the hands stand out. But why not just colour the hands white as they do with some other body parts? Why is it always the same gloves?

Andy speculated that maybe it came from mime. Good theory. I also wondered about blackface minstrels, who wore similar gloves - probably reading too much into it but then it's unlikely to be something easily admitted. And then there's Michael Jackson, the closest thing to a living (but really very creepy) cartoon character.

Bugs Bunny, for example, wears these gloves and nothing else. Not a stitch. Now, he's grey and has several other white patches that didn't require clothing - his feet for example. Why did his hands need gloves? I have no idea.


But I have to find out.

Dear Angry Mob (P.S.)

A choice quote from Tp - "The work on this blog SUCKS. You obviously can't draw hands or feet, or decent facial expressions, and that hatching thing is super distracting."



When you really want to criticise someones work who is in the same field as yourself, you're on steadiest ground when you make sure of two important things -

1) That you know whose work you're criticising and you know the full extent of their work.

2) That your own work is the best god damn work on the face of this planet and maybe even the universe.

In this case, well 1 is quite funny. But 2, well, Tp, I visited your blog and actually... I really liked some of the stuff there. You're doing great. Lets see if you keep up that momentum in when you're in the business for as long as many of us have been. I genuinely hope you do and wish you well with your career.

But are you at 2 yet?

I actually feel bad bringing it up as TP apologised and, while that was very cool of him, there was actually no need. That's what the comments are for. We're all entitled to our views and should be able to call it as we see it, even if we're not on that steady ground - after all, he was responding to what he perceived as an attack on other animators . But, importantly, he put forward the idea that we should be on the same team. He's right.

Tp, we are on the same team. And thanks for reminding me of that.

But, hey, when it comes down to it, the crappy drawings on this site (and they are pretty crappy) are a realistic interpretation of my life. See?

Except for the tentacles. I have no idea why the hell they are there.

Really I guess the main reason I'm bringing it up is to reiterate the point that this isn't an art blog. Not in the slightest. If that's what you're looking for, I'd recommend Marlo Meekins. She has excellent work and huge hair and she's really pretty too. Her caricatures will blow you away. Ya think if this was an art blog, I'd be going into post-coital headaches? That would be a great subject to bring up while going through my showreel. "Hey, are you the depressed guy with the post-coital headaches? You know you can't draw hands, right?"



I wouldn't get that job.

Not an art blog guys.

Dear Angry Mob...

A couple of quotes from my comments on the 3D Animators post about a week ago:

Ryan G - "I think youre just misinformed or just making blind assumptions."
Tp - "You are totally shutting out a lot of talented artists by making a blanket statement like that."


While I'd love to just tell you to go and shite, Tp is onto something (Ryan not as much) so I thought I'd give a little explanation here to help clear the air.

Picture this: 3D animator is standing in the middle of studio floor. Doing horrific Ricky Gervais impressions to entertain the other animators. Door opens. It's a producer. The guy who pays his bills. Now the producer isn't accusing him of anything but it's like being back at school - the animator thinks he's been caught messing when he should be working. He thinks fast. Pulls out the oldest line in 3D animation - "I'm waiting for my scene to render."

That's the scenario. I've seen it many times. No, it doesn't mean that the animator is lazy. 3D animators do work long hours. They do work weekends at crunch time. That's why I wrote it. It just amused me to accuse all 3D animators of laziness. As it turned out, and as I hoped it would, it amused a few 3D animators I know too. They recognised the scenario. They do perform Ricky Gervais impressions. They do talk about Warcraft. They do pull out the age old excuse when a producer barges in.

They also get the "I wish I could use that excuse" from the 2D departments. And that's where I was coming from with it. See, in the panel, I'm sitting at a 2D animation desk. There is no rendering. The excuse is useless. You see? That's what it's about. Ah, forget it... Y'all got distracted reaching for your pitchforks and torches when you saw the headline.


Not to worry. 3D animators - you know I love you, right? Well, most of you. Not the geeks.


I guess I'm glad this is the one I had to explain and not the Mohammed/Bear thing. That could have been more heated.

On top of all this, Tp made some wonderful observations on my drawings. More on that soon if I can be bothered.

So... the bear...

In reality, this conversation went on much longer. It really is a very popular name. Unlike Mr.Fluffyfeatures, which isn't all that common at all. I think in the whole of my school there were only maybe two of them.

I'm having no luck with these longer formatted pics, whether horizontal or vertical. Blogger just doesn't like them. If you can't read the tiny type, it should bring up a bigger version if you click it. Hopefully.

The bear who would be king