Looking Through the Glass Eye

First Semester Tidings

2009-12-25T09:48:00.000-08:00

Experimental Animation Foundation from Vince T on Vimeo.

Stop Motion Basic Projects from Vince T on Vimeo.

Buster and the Bird from Vince T on Vimeo.

What I aspire to.

2009-07-18T00:32:00.000-07:00

CRAZY ENOUGH - Title Sequence from Jr.canest on Vimeo.

Conform Non Conform from Nick Campbell on Vimeo.

Back in The Game (I hope)

2009-06-12T22:28:00.000-07:00

I’ve been spending the last three weeks animating this piece for a scholarship and I thought I’d share.

The challenge was to create a movie about the health benefits of tea and something about how to drink tea in a unique way…

So the basic concept was inspired by Osmosis Jones and the personification of the inner workings of a body. My hope was to get a montage of tea as a super hero fighting off the many diseases that fear the flavinoid.

This is my first time working in Adobe After Effects and this project taught me a great deal about the program. I also had a fun time trying out texture brushes in Photoshop to help add some depth to my work.

I will admit that corners were cut to finish the project in time for the next one, but overall I find the piece quite acceptable and I can’t wait to put it to shame with my next project.

-V

My Apologies

2009-05-30T15:09:00.001-07:00

Summer has started and I've yet to return to my weekly blogging ritual.

I'm currently animating an advert for a scholarship competition. more on that when I get back.

In the mean time, enjoy this little number,
-Vince

Kawaiiiiiiiii!!!!!

2009-03-25T14:54:00.001-07:00

Quick Post: Stuff from design class

2009-03-21T11:50:00.000-07:00

P.S. Accepted

2009-02-28T18:42:00.000-08:00

2009-02-26T23:12:00.000-08:00

Haven't been active online for the last month.

My apologies.

My energies have been elsewhere as of late (school)

I probably won't be all too active for the next couple months as I work on scholarship projects, but I will continue following all my news, notes, art, and your blogs as usual.

Vincent, Signing out

Someone said I should shoot some bananas...

2009-01-28T00:17:00.000-08:00

...So I did

Warning: High Resolution

So i like little girls. What of it?

2009-01-17T23:07:00.000-08:00

Now follow me on this:

While playing god one fateful night, Professor Utonium and his quest a perfect little girl (like all lonely male super geniuses do) leads to a freak accident, which leads to the creation of three bug-eyed super powered girls who live as any normal kindergarteners would, protecting the people living in the most disaster-prone city on earth from giant monsters and evil villain such as mad scientist monkeys, a crazy pink hillbilly, and the ever androgynous devil in drag; all while dealing with an obviously incompetent mayor and constant narration of their daily activities revolving around some sort moral dilemma that always seems to be solved with violence.

Who could argue with such a brilliant idea like that? Not Cartoon Network.

Since its original broadcast on Hanna-Barbera’s What a Cartoon! show in 1995, The Powerpuff Girls series has gone onto 6 seasons spanning 79 separate episodes (most made up of two 11 minute stories) a feature length movie and even its very own mutant shojo anime series, Demashita! Powerpuff Girls Z. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37BqYsNm_Ao

14th if you include the What a Cartoon! Shorts or 17th if you include Craig McCracken's student film Whupass Girls: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpHk8BCg4JA&feature=related

In celebration, Cartoon Network will be airing an all day marathon of the series January 19th, all ending with a brand new episode at 8PM entitled “PowerPuff Girls Rule!!!”. The episode will supposedly be the official wrap-up functioning as the series finale. According to a video found on Cartoon Network’s website, the new episode was written and directed by creator Craig McCracken and will involve the girls fighting all of their villains in a fight for control of the entire world.

For those interested, animation was handled by the fine folks behind Fosters, and apparently the production team was able to get all of the old voice cast members to reprise their parts for this one episode

Following the premiere of this final episode, Cartoon Network will be releasing the complete series (including unreleased seasons 3-6) on DVD on January 20th. The set will include ‘“all 78 episodes of the show and the "T'was the Fight Before Christmas" movie, plus a new documentary, episode commentaries, promos, music videos, and more”’

Personally I’m incredibly ecstatic to see the first new episode in four years, and I’ll definitely be picking up the DVD set. I’m 10 all over again.

-V

P.S. there will be a preveiw of coraline on cartoon network sometime around the new episode

2009-01-03T19:33:00.000-08:00

I finished my portfolio and finshed all the fiddly forms and such. Here is the result: portfolio

So right, I've been relatively busy and a lot of work has backed up over the holidays, but I guess that's okay considering I still have two weeks before next semester starts. I'm actually looking forward to school considering I got all the classes I wanted.

Well it's the new year... and I started it in drag of all things. I don't really have any resolutions this year, but i guess I have things to look forward to:

-TV-
Superbowl Commercials
Battlestar Galactica Finale
Superjail! season 2

-Movies-
Coraline
Up
The Princess and the Frog
Avatar
Watchmen
The Solist
Terminator Salvation
Star Trek
Power of the Dark Crystal

-Games-
Grand Theft Auto DS
Sims 3
Mad World
Heavy Rain
Brutal Legend

-general-
college acceptance/rejection
visit to Georgia at the end of the month
making use of my playing cards
Mountain Dew's flavor this summer
how the news will handle the new president
seeing how the Gaza strip ordeal will pans out
warmer weather

2008-12-23T01:08:00.000-08:00

So here are some of the fruits from my portfolio work over the past three days. Not all of it will make it in but I'm finishing stuff and that's always good.

Oh right.

2008-12-19T23:36:00.001-08:00

Semester over.
Portfolio time.
Be back in 2009.
Happy Holidays.

Good God Yes!

2008-12-16T19:44:00.000-08:00

The Legend Begins

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/43624.html

Cartoons I Don't Miss

2008-12-02T23:50:00.000-08:00

The Brother Flub

Butt Ugly Martians

My Dad the Rockstar

Super Duper Sumos

Kappa Mikey

Yakitty Yak

The X's

All Grown Up!

Whatever Happened to Robot Jones?

Squirrel Boy

Class of 3000

Out of Jimmy's Head

Hi Hi Puffy Ami Yumi

Minoriteam

12 Oz. Mouse

Hamtaro

IGPX

Duel Masters

Zatch Bell

Atomic Betty

The Batman

Blood+

Code Lyoko

Martin Mystery

Krypto the Super Dog

The Life and Times of Juniper Lee

Ozzy & Drix

Pecola

Richie Rich

Sitting Ducks

The Snorks

Static Shock

Super Friends

Superman: The Animated Series

Trinity Blood

Wait Til Your Father Gets Home

The Zeta Project

Lilo & Stitch the Series

Jake Long: American Dragon

The Emperors New School

Braceface

Disney's Doug

Sabrina, The Animated Series

Teacher's Pet

Teamo Suprimo

The Weekenders

Piichi

2008-12-01T09:47:00.000-08:00

So right. I've been using the backs of playing cards, purple stick glue, and my trusty x-acto knife for about two days time. This is what I could come up with.

The character was pretty simple so I decided to go all out on the background and ended up wit a little more work than I would have liked. I probably won't be doing any bits-and-pieces collaging for

this portfolio because it's just too time consuming for such a small (5x8 1/2 ) piece.

Still I will be making more playing card based pieces soon. I'm banking on cut-outs at this point.

-Vince

quick concepts

2008-11-22T10:05:00.001-08:00

I'm going to try and finish something today. Here's some concepts.

I'm currently interested in the ancient Egyptians and their hieroglyphic gods who apparently had a habit of getting into really unusual contests to prove their northern or southern superiority. When they weren't racing stone boats down a river they were trying to seduce one another and prove superiority through the power of semen and the erotic properties of cabbage. Gotta love ancient religion.

In progress of working.

2008-11-10T15:11:00.000-08:00

So here are two things I'm working on at the moment. I've been dabbling in cut outs and practicing with my X-acto knife. This is the result.

A big wet mess

2008-11-02T19:50:00.000-08:00

So my first time with water colors. Be in awe of my ineptitude.

Black Out

2008-10-30T20:17:00.000-07:00

Haven't updated in a while.

Sorting out schools and all that.

Working on portfolio for experimental animation application.

Not much time to spare.

Must See Show: David Garibaldi

2008-10-07T21:59:00.001-07:00

To anyone in the general Vicinity of the Sacramento Region this Friday, I suggest you attend this year's Fulfill A Dream featuring the performance art talent of David Garibaldi.

If you haven't heard, David Garibaldi is one of the most amazing artists of our time. A Sacramento Native, Garibaldi has spent the past year touring Canada as the opening act to The Blue Man Group and their show "How to be a Mega Star". His act "Rhythm and Hue" consists of painting a number of large portraits each of a famous person while painting and dancing to the beat of song linked to the subject he's painting. Along with the paintings, the show includes a message of inspiration about following one's dreams as told by Garibaldi through both his own story and the art he creates. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCWwahfD9gE&feature=related

Aside from David Garibaldi, Fulfill a dream will be featuring Sacramento's "most cutting-edge hip hop dance company" Boogie Monstarz, R&B acoustic guitarist Gabe Bondoc, and the acoustic folk Isaac Howl band.

The proceeds from the show and attached auctions will go to support Sacramento’s Toybox store to help bring Christmas to families in need. Site: http://www.sactoybox.org/

Fulfill a Dream
Friday October 10th @ 7:30PM
Sheldon High School Performing Arts Center
8333 Kingsbridge Dr
Sacramento, CA 95829
Ticket: $10 online, $14 at the door

Behold!

2008-10-04T23:41:00.000-07:00

A Chicken

Just a quick something out of my sketchbook.

So right, as some you might know, I went to the Tower of Youth's teen film festival this last Friday to see what teens have been up to in the film and animation world. There wasn't much in the way of animation (aside from the CSSSA exquisite corpse and abstract cutouts) but there were quite a few interesting films on show that day. What I found more interesting though was meeting with the directors of each film. It’s just interesting to meet other artists before the whole of life and business rights beats the shameless innocence out of their creativity. Overall, it was a fun experience I’m looking forward to next year’s competition. (On a fun note, I got to say “Damnit!” on live streaming video while on stage)

Here are two examples of the videos showing that day:

A Sign of the Times

My First Time

On an unrelated note, Double Fine, makers of Psychonauts and the upcoming Brutal Legend, have released a new game on their website based on their newest webcomic Tasha. [link] Tasha is a semi-autobiographical comic about one of Double Fine’s animators and her observations out of mundane everyday life. With a crude style and charming innocence, the comic has become something of a hit and has inspired Double Fine’s latest flash game found on their website: [link] Tasha’s Game is an quaint platforming puzzle game with a few elements of time manipulation mixed with the art and characters straight from the comic (and some neat useless unlockables). Kee in mind that you do have to read the comic to get the full effect of the game. So if you have some free time and have any interest in what crazy video game animators do in their free time, I suggest taking a look at Tasha and indeed all of Double Fine’s web comics.

Peace be with you
-Vince

Doing Time

2008-09-29T12:03:00.000-07:00

It’s been over a year since the pilot, but Superjail!, Adult Swim’s newest series, premiered last night with ep.1 Superbar!. For those who missed it, Superjail! is a cartoon filled with psychedelic fantasy and brutal violence, all revolving around a crazy whimsical jail run by a demented Willy Wonka-like warden and his characterful employees who all share a certain charm as they carry out his nefariously comical schemes. The style of the show is quite reminiscent of traditional MTV animation, which is no surprise as the show is produced by New York-based Augenblick Studios Inc. [link] If you’re the kind of person who likes random, violent, and original programming, I highly suggest taking a look. The Pilot: [link]

(link: [link])

In other news, I’ll be heading to the 12th Annual North American All Youth Film And Education Day on Friday October Third. Aside from having an incredibly long and wordy name, it’s also a pretty cool film festival with a selection of films and animations all produced by high school students. For those of you who attended CSSSA this year, they’ll be showing our Exquisite Corpses and Abstract cut-outs. There will also be a guest speaker (who are pretty cool on average) and representatives from all kinds of media schools from all over California making this event a good chance to look at future prospects in film/animation/audio/production. Oneika and I will be on stage to represent CSSSA during a Q&A session they’ll be having between 12-1:20PM. The show goes from 8:30AM-5:30PM at the Crest Theatre in Sacramento and ticket prices will likely be around $5 student $10 adult.

-Vince

2008-09-22T10:06:00.000-07:00

My weekend was shot; it smells of convoluted math and lost sleep

Anyhow,

Good news, Heroes is back and thanks to that little writer's strike, the last season had to be severely altered and now we get to jump straight into a brand new season Heroes: Villians. To say the least, I love the series to death and I have high hopes that this new season will carry on with it's interesting characters, and over-dramatic looks at a constantly doomed future.[link]

In other interesting news, The Animator's Survival Kit has been made into a 16-DVD set filled with four days of Richard Williams (Who framed Roger Rabbit) teaching his master class along with animated examples of his lessons all intercut to take the greatest animator's guide to a whole new level. It is a bit pricey though as it sells for a cool £596.00 (after a 20% discount of £149) which translates to about $1100 US, and that's assuming you pre-order the damn thing. I'm pretty sure I don't have that kind of money laying around, but maybe I can convince my teacher to buy the DVD-set for the class. The DVD set comes out Nov 17 [link]

Finally, I've been doing a little digging to see what Genndy Tartakovsky has been up to and I came across this: [link] So it's apparent that the Samurai Jack movie is off, which saddens me deeply, but at least we can look forward to a neat remake of the Henson company’s The Dark Crystal.

-Vince

bears are scary

Fun, fangs, and all that jazz

2008-09-15T12:13:00.000-07:00

So apparently Seth "family guy" MacFarlane is now creating comedic shorts on the new youtube channel SethComedy. Each short is the standard humor you'd expect from a breakaway on family guy, accompanied by a quick cameo of the Burger King at the beginning of each short. Here's my current favorite:

On a more serious note, Twilight has a bigger brother now. For those who are unawares HBO’s brand new series True Blood, from the Director of Six Feet Under, just started up and I took a peak at it. Based on the Dead Until Dark (2001) book series, True Blood follows the life of the telepathic girl, Sookie, living in swampy Louisiana and how she meets Bill the first known vampire in town. As is all too expected romance ensues, but aside from that the series has a fun dark streak as it takes place in a time when the human world has recently discovered vampires living under their noses and the racial tensions that ensue. There’s a lot to the series as it’s riddled with actually deep characters while mixing in violence, sex, and plenty of southern accents with a whole new lingo including such clever bits as “fangbanger”. Overall it looks to be a promising series, and I’d highly suggest watching it if you’ve got HBO (and perhaps a distaste for Twilight)

Woodrow's latest work of genius: [link] And let's all wish his father a happy birthday.

As for me, I think I've nailed down my latest idea and I'll be sure to post some images when I get the chance.

-much love
Vince

Oh also, Sulu got married.[link]

2008-09-10T11:23:00.000-07:00

Well, it's safe to say I'm busy, and I managed to do nearly nothing art/animation wise last week thanks to my untimely birthday. What's worse, I have Spore fever now and that eats up the rest of my free time. Still, I did manage to do a quick little something for a friend's birthday.

So a couple of quick thoughts:

Shoot 'Em Up- starring Clive Owen, and Paul Giamatti. It's a classic B movie with A-list actors with an inch-thick plot and some clever action scenes. Sadly, King Arthur and John Adams are part f some sick script with barely likeable characters with weird and awkward dialogue in an anti-gun gun-fest that falls flat on its face. It was uninspiring despite the well-planned action sequences and it completely misses the concept of having characters people can care about and be interested in. I looked at the animatics for the action sequences, and somehow I feel the director should have just cut the "story" and made the entire thing into a series of animated action scenes. (That would have been worth the dollar I spent to rent the DVD.)

On a more animated note, I’ve begun watching this really weird series on cartoon network. Total Drama Island, from the Canadian makers of 6teen. (The animated sitcom), is an animated reality TV show that proudly wears the “parent advisory warning” on daytime children’s television. The series makes use of mild teen drama, childish slapstick/potty humor, and total character caricature to make a very original cartoon that strays gently away from many of the norms when it comes to youth entertainment. Like any good reality TV show, the writers go out of their way to embellish on the many flaws of human personalities. Of course the charm of the show is in it’s writing with such nuggets of brilliance as:

“You’ve got so much junk in that trunk, you need a trash compactor”
And
“I loved, I lost, and I say Boobies. What more can a man ask for?”

Do I smell a Gemini award?
So right, I’m not entirely sure who is the target audience of this show so I don’t know who should be watching it but I suggest watching it in general. The show has reached its halfway point in America, and apparently it’s been renewed for a second season on Teletoon.

2008-08-31T12:50:00.000-07:00

For those who haven't heard, Adventure Time (of unaired Nickelodeon fame) has been picked up by Cartoon Network for a full series. [link] (The orginal short is included in the article)

Also, here's Woodrow's latest stop-motion piece. [link]

In my own news, I can now happily say i have a tablet and my tendons are already thanking me. Sadly I haven't had a whole lot of time use it now that school's started. Thankfully it's labor day weekend, so no school until Wednesday. Oh yeah, and I turn 18 on Thrusday :l . More importantly Spore comes out Sunday [link] .

As far as projects go I have to cook something up for a friend's zine today, as well as continuing work on the music video. So yeah, busy as usual.

-Vince

Doki & Nabi

2008-08-27T10:58:00.000-07:00

For those who haven't heard of it before, There she is!!, as brought to us by the Koreon minds of ZamBakZa, is an ongoing tale of the romance between a rabbit (Doki) and a cat (Nabi).

It starts out harmless enough as a cute slapstick romance comedy, but as the series progresses it starts getting more serious as the overtones of dissaproval become more racial-political statements (noted predominantly in the fourth episode).

Overall, the strength of the series is it's story telling, most notably the way everthing is understood without the help of words. Each character has their own personalities, which are recognizable from most eastern graphic media, but they're all quite effective despite the lack of dialogue. The animation varies from episode to episode, but the artists behind the series always seem to have some interesting and unique shots for each episode.

The series is suppossedly a five parter, so I blissfully await the final installment coming who knows when. In the mean time, I suggest that anyone who's into the classic Manhwa style, or simply interested in stories told without words, you couldn't go wrong with one of Newgrounds' most popular series.

There She Is!! step1 [link]

There She Is!! step4 [link]

My Reason to Watch the Olympics

2008-08-21T15:35:00.000-07:00

As some of you are well aware, the Olympics in China are still going on, and if you’ve been following the news, you should be aware of the “fake” fireworks as well as the “lip-sync scandal” among other reasons to hate china.

Now if you’ve actually been watching said Olympics, perhaps with the intent to gape at Michael Phelps’ grandeur, you may have come across my favorite part of any major sporting event, the commercials. More importantly, this year, they’ve had an interesting turnout of animated commercials.

To start, I have to make mention of the cute Chinese mascots referred to as Fuwa [link]. I won’t get into it too much, but apparently a lot of thought went into these incredibly collectable care bear-like creatures. [link]

Now I’d like to point your attention to the latest batch of United Airlines’ animated commercials. [link] This time we have 5 unique commercials, each its own little point about United travel accompanied by “Rhapsody in Blue” as played by Herbie Hancock and Lang Lang. Note the short “Heart” which comes from the same people who did United’s “Dragon” commercial two years ago.

My last offering is “Journey to the East” [link] BBC sports enlisted the guys behind Gorillaz to do a retelling of the classic Chinese Epic, “Journey to the West” following the adventure of the Monkey King and his posse (Piggy and Sandy) to the Bird’s Nest in Beijing. Apparently BBC was doing a whole campaign involving the Monkey King in honor of the Chinese Olympics.

2008-08-14T17:09:00.001-07:00

So right, I've started animating again, I'm working on a test right now, and I'll be begginning work on a music video for a family friend soon, but in the mean time, I've still been getting my relaxation in.

Today, while rummaging through my family's pantry I came across something special: Yan Yan
Now Yan Yan, from the makers of Hello Panda, is another one of those odd treats from across the orient that I had to try. At first glance it looked a bit like a Pocky rip-off (which it probably is) but upon opening the package, I found it's true charm.

To start off, Yan Yan is basically a series of little pretzel-like sticks that you dip in chocolate contained in a little tub attached to the container. It all seemed mundane enough until I noticed something odd. Each of the little stick crackers had little animals on them.

After a slight double take, and then reading the packaging again, I learned that each stick includes a "fun line" consisting of an animal, it's name, and a small blurb about it.

it's kind of cute how each stick entertains and educates us in a weird jumble of eastern ideas, and western sentence fragments. Some show the noise or lifestyle of the animal, while others teach numbers and classic animal mythos. There are, however a few odd ones:

I'm alittle curious what exactly "think big" or what exactly is doing some undisclosed action "only at night. More importantly, what is the point of the mysterious "golden egg"? Could it be a portent of luck, like the little indian on the wrapper of a tootsiepop, or perhaps a prize winning piece like a golden ticket.
On the other hand, it could just as easily be something thrown in to save ink, and entertain small singaporean chlidren.

*shrug*

who knows,
Vince

26 days later

2008-08-11T03:30:00.000-07:00

So as the first week of post-CSSSA begins, I'm experiencing the all too normal shock that comes with leaving such a place.

It's strange not waking up to an alarm again, it's odd not having a schedule, it's weird not waking up in the dorm, it's unusual not going to Cafe B in the morning, it's screwy not listening to that one french song Jonny always plays in the middle of life draw, so strange not falling asleep in the bijou, crazy not having something due the very next day, freaky not visiting with my hall mates at 10:30, queer to not get hit after every remark at meals.

I miss the place, I miss the people, I miss the habits.
I miss it all, but to my surprise, i feel...ready.

About a month ago, I was in such a slump, I could barely move my mouse let alone a pencil for any creative means. Every piece I worked on was such a labored effort. The odd mix of last year's "fun" and the oncoming life as a collegiate student left me paralyzed. If not for the coming of CSSSA I'm sure I would have been driven mad.

Now that it's come and passed, I feel up to a project for the next two weeks. Something different some crystalized. Moreover, I feel up to college for once.

For some reason moving forward into life has become all the more reasonable now that I've escaped a little bit.

I'm still readjusting to normalcy outside the nest but starting tommorrow (or rather later today) I think I'll start flying abit.

just a sec

2008-08-10T01:49:00.000-07:00

So right, I'm back, I'm alive, alittle roughed up around the edges, but overall in a state of odd bliss, depression, and extreme exhaustion.

In the last 24 hours, i did manage to watch the entire Olypic opening (which is the most epic thing on this entire planet, and I somehow found time to upload all the mildly good pictures out of the 500 I came home with, inbetween seeing The Dark Knight twice in the same day.

I still have a number of matters to handle now that I'm home, so I won't be doing too much in the way of creation, but now it's time to rest...

A quick something

2008-07-04T03:13:00.000-07:00

So I sat down today and decided to do something creative/clever. I'd been meaning to do my own version of Takashi Murakami's pattern for Louis Vuitton handbags. At the same time I wanted to do something clever with the Spore creature creator. So this came up today.

It didn't turn out exactly how I envisioned but I think it turned out pretty good considering my experience with the program.

Aside from this, I spent all day catching up with old animes and so I've got a bit of a fuzzy feeling going on.

-Vince
(8 days to CSSSA)

Beezlebub

2008-07-03T03:45:00.001-07:00

I've managed to produce essentially nothing this past month...

It feels kinda dirty...

I really should keep my promises...

Just something in the realm of accomplishment...

Maybe a character or two...

Atleast least something for CSSSA....

Afterall it's only eight days away...

Must overcome...

This wretched haze

she is coming

A funny thing happened on my way to the galaxy.

2008-06-10T21:06:00.000-07:00

As you all may or may not know, I've been following Will Wright's Spore religiously since it's announcement in 2005.

just a re-cap Spore is the game where you can create a race of creatures using the comprehensive creature building tools to develop them into an advanced race all the way into space-borne supremacy, all the while creating such things as villages, vehicles, and even the microbial versions of your creatures.

So yeah, as a note of my excitement, the spore creature creator (the tool used to build the characters with ease) is coming out in six days. To christen it, the team who created the entire game have begun making creatures to help fill their "Sporepedia" [link] which will soon be filled with creations of wild and crazy design (some my own).

So right, if you're interested in making creations akin to Pixar or Dreamworks, i suggest checking out the free demo of the creature creator, come June 16th.

Universe in motion
-Vince
[link]

Three days off, might as well blog.

2008-05-24T12:45:00.000-07:00

I have to admit, I made a grave waste of last weekend, but life has seen it fit to give me three days to make up for it.Starting off, I'm reading a book. The Stranger, by Albert Camus. It's apparently what Mrs.Ramsey would like us to call an existential piece, and I am completely enjoying this book. It captures this character who sees no meaning or point to most everything, but lives in such a way that it's the purest form of living, just do it (copyright of Nike).

In other news, I've been falling back in love with Smash Mouth. It might be the infectious use of ska punk and fast paced yet wholly understandable words, but I'm intrigued with the style that they have through out many of their music videos. It's this strange formula where everything is over saturated and the world is filled with people in normal situations that then hits a reality snag and everybody breaks into dance or the girl turns out to be a monkey. [link] In retrospect, it has many of the qualities I like about musicals but throws in a fish-eye and some more modern (for the time) lyrics.

Of course, after their popularity, they found an excellent market in re-recordings, or semi-generic songs for the backgrounds of movies. In fact, I remember being reminded that they existed when I first saw Shrek.

It's funny, how between 99 (the year All Star was recorded) and 2001 (the release of the first Shrek) that I had forgotten something I love, and yet was able to recall it to the extent that I could sing along to it word for word upon hearing it once. What's creepy to me is that, it was my first experience of nostalgia (at the age of 9) and it was at that point I realized, I was aging.

Since then, I've put on a few years and a few feet (though my weight might as well be the same) and I've had many occurrences that make me yearn for that which has passed. It makes me think, what will it be like in, when we all age? When Justin Timberlake releases his greatest hits album, and we listen to the songs of our youth on our outdated mp3 technology. It's alittle scary.

Regardless, I think I'll stick to the nearer future. i have three days to spend, better get started.

More ends tied

2008-05-14T21:44:00.000-07:00

For those who don't know, I've been spending the last few months putting together my AP portfolio for 2-D design.
Basically it's a representation of all my best work, as well as a themed series of photos to show my ability to explore an idea. My idea (aka concentration) was eggs. I've had a wonderful time experimenting with the visual possibilities for eggs (through a macro lens) so if any body is interested, I have them (plus a few extras) up for all to see http://throughglasseyes.deviantart.com/gallery/#eggs

This morning, I put the finishing touches on it, and it's all ready to be sent out. Hopefully the judges will enjoy my work, and we'll see this Summer.

In other news, I did alittle animation the other week. I haven't gotten a chance to put all the finishing touches on it, but I expect to have it up some time this week.

-V

2008-05-05T22:10:00.000-07:00

For those of you who don't know already, I went to TDR (Teen Digital Reel) this past Friday, with high hopes. I had made what I consider the best two minutes of animation I'd ever completed in my life (as short as it has been). 100+ hours of writing, storyboarding, drawing, coloring, animating, editing, ignoring Christmas as a whole, and hunting down my musician, and being forced to cut Sarah's lovely flute piece, It finally came up to the big screen. Sadly, I made the horrible mistake of not spending theose 100+ hours making cute crap that won me awards in the past two years. I did walk away with the consolation "best portfolio" award in my category which entails ten seconds of my portfolio on screen, and absolutely no stage time, nor so much as a sheet of paper saying "Good Job".

To say the least, I am still zealously convinced that animtation is the most under appreciated art form in America whenever it doesn't spew ewok cuteness in the end, and will add this offense to my Book of Grudges. [link]

Anyhow

After months of waiting, It's finally come, the summer movie rush. Naturally, I was going to go see Iron Man yesterday, but I read that it was alittle light on action near the end, so I thought I'd wait to see how it panned out after the first weekend.

SO, while I wasn't seeing Iron Man, I was treated away to the Tower Theatre (my paradise away from paradise) to see the new movie "Where in the World is Osama" from the makers of "Supersize Me". Sadly the Tower is repairing the screen I wished to watched and so I was forced to eat rhubard and mousse at the nerby Tower Cafe (YUM!).

Anyhow, knowing our movie was cancelled, Mother and I saw "Young @ Heart". Just to note: THis movie was so amazingly funny/cute/classic. Essentially it's a documentary about a choir in america who sing a range of songs both modern jam and classic punk. This seems harmless enough, until you realize something, the average age of the entire group is 80. I won't spoil too much as I know anybody, and everybody HAS TO SEE THIS, but I just want to say that oxygen tanks and "Stayin' Alive" go together like ketchup and eggs. You never realize how good it is til you've tried it.

Right, so I'll end here by saying, it's a beautiful morning, and I'm stayin' alive[link]-V

2008-04-02T21:38:00.001-07:00

I hope to see something I haven't seen before. If we're lucky, we will be seeing some egg-in-ice pieces soon so *fingercrossed*

In other news, I'm going to be writing a satirical essay. To say the least, I'm alittle worried. I really have a high standard when it comes to taking what I really hate, and blowing it out of the waters of context into the sea of insanity. *fingers crossed*

In the studio: Thanks to Sullivan (and his long hours of just helping us in the shadows) we're apparently going to hook up with epic games (http://www.epicgames.com/) and we'll be in contact with mentors in a grand example of major video game development.

-V

Genius
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59ZX5qdIEB0&feature=related

eggs

2008-03-26T21:46:00.001-07:00

so for those who don't know this is my concentration for my portfolio. I've found an odd interest in the things. So I'll be posting many more of these in the near future.

2008-03-08T18:16:00.000-08:00

well, now i can say i've served on a jury. much more fun than i was lead to believe. It was a bum case with some kids who obviously have no idea what's wrong with vandalism outside of them not being able to see eachother. I have to admit, everybody was much nicer on the truant who just happened to be "hot", with the laugh of sandpaper (of course he's only experimented with pot "once") I'm sure those minor penalties will teach him a lesson...but I guess it's is just a mockery of sorts *sigh*

anyhow, I'm just sitting, coloring in politicians.

I didn't reserve the new Super Smash Bros. so I won't be standing in line with everybody else. (though i might visit just to hangout) So I'll just relax until tommorrow. Then I'll brawl it up.

Pleasant Weekend to you all,
Vince

Proud Nerd
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLI-nC9OT1Q

Oblitus Tree

2008-02-27T21:39:00.000-08:00

Finally finished it.

so here it is:

Anyhow, everything seems to be in order, and i can finally move forward with all those things i meant to do. Though i do have to send this off to competition, and my senior project, and CSSSA. *shrugs* guess i can hold out just alittle longer.

Back in the habit

2008-02-06T21:29:00.001-08:00

in animation, we've started working on PSAs for "go to school" campaigns and finished our first shoot today. In other news, fuegos is going strong but doesn't seem to need my help at the moment so i guess it evens out pretty well.

I think I know my concentration for my AP portfolio. unlike most people who are doing "sex", "portraits", and "women in society", I've decided to do something originally personal: Escape

So here I am, at the start of second Session, and apparently i'm just as busy as ever. Luckily most of my work is artistic in nature.

2007-11-22T02:18:00.001-08:00

Thanks for friends
Thanks for family
Thanks for the freedom to put friends before family when giving thanks

Thanks for religious persecution for forcing our founders to flee to America
Thanks to our founders for growing tobacco for reasons unmentioned in 2nd grade (cursed oil bandits)
Thanks to our founders for making nice with the Indians before seeing to many witch-hunts of each other

Thanks to the Indians for being such great people
Thanks to the Indians for not correcting us when we called them Indians
Thanks to the Indians for teaching the founders to farm and survive
Thanks to the Indians for letting us have everything of theirs taking only our diseases in return
Thanks to the Indians for taking the brunt of the next few centuries as we denied them home, land, rights, decent TV impressions,
Thanks to the Indians for only expecting casinos and government checks in return
Thanks to the governor of Massachusetts in 1637 for commemorating this day for the
massacre of 700 Indians who had been celebrating their annual green-corn day
Thanks to preserving innocence by saying we “Gave Thanks” with them

Thanks to the Turkeys for being so tasty
Thanks to the Turkeys for letting us inbreed them into flightless birds incapable of saving themselves from drowning in light rain
Thanks to Turkeys for letting us pump them full of steroids that we ourselves are forbidden from taking
Thanks to Turkeys for letting us give into our vice of gluttony, if only to appease tradition (and a tasty one at that)

Thanks to Thanks for allowing us to get a day off of work/school just to give thanks
Thanks to that Friday after so we can wake up at 4 in the morning to give Macy’s 90% of it’s yearly revenues
Thanks to that whole weekend being the feeding ground for horrible “family” movies to come out
Thanks to family being off some distance to help keep our oil companies healthy with money
Thanks to Thanksgiving for being the only Holiday to not have a B-horror film made for it (yet)

And thanks to the next chanceyou can eat a leftover turkey sandwich, when it’s all over and it’s nice and quiet.

Thanks-Vince

Will They Nomi Now

2007-11-12T00:06:00.000-08:00

I've never heard quite a lovely falsetto, thank goodness for odd documentaries you'll find OnDemand. and yes he was that one guy that shdowed David Bowie in the season finale of Venture Brothers.

and back again

2007-11-01T21:57:00.000-07:00

wow, that's was easy. i think i'll be getting back into photoshop soon enough.

hey maybe the new school paper will need a few graphics....hmm. i'll have to look into this.

in the mean time, i'll have to get started on that civil war poster, maybe the geico belt safety one as well.

work to be done,
Vince

across the universe

2007-10-30T18:55:00.000-07:00

odd...?

anyhoo i'm thinking of doing a new piece, something alittle on the katamari side. alittle off the wall, some fun anti-symbolic fun.

-Vince

first picture post

2007-10-26T15:05:00.001-07:00

alittle on the old side, but who's going to notice

start of the end

2007-10-26T14:48:00.000-07:00

*sniff sniff*

good 'ol new blog smell