Videogame Ads, circa 1982

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Ah, sweet memories! Those original ads were pretty wacky. Lord knows (as does my mom) I've still got a bunch of old computer magazines... I should scan some of those in myself. There were some pretty wacky ads back then for computer related stuff. Showing off screenshots wasn't necessarily really the big thing to do, so they often had all these wacky airbrushed pictures that had absolutely less than nothing to do with the game itself. Fun stuff :)

Until I get around to scanning in all those old ads, you'll have to settle for this set of them, I guess.

The many animators of the Flintstones...

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I found this quite interesting -- other people may not. But apparently they had a number of different people who animated Fred & co. at different points, and each one drew and animated the characters in their own style. Normally, this is discouraged (at best) I think it added some character to it, though I never noticed at the time.

(as usual, click on the title for the link... and this is probably the last time I'll mention that)

50 Common Interview Q&A's

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I thought some of you might find this interesting. If you've been on a number of interviews, you've probably heard most of these, if not, this makes for some pretty good reading. It lists common questions and some thoughts to consider/ways to answer for them. (click on the title for the link)

Poseidon Case Study

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This is the "case study" on how the water rushing down a hallway was done in the recent movie, Poseidon. It's got a lot of step by step videos showing some of the process they went through. I find this sort of thing fascinating, especially since this is the software I'm starting to learn/use.

If you have any interest, you can click here for the link.

First Pics - Horton Hears a Who

What looks to be a very nice rendition of a Dr. Seuss classic. It's being done by Blue Sky Studios, who brought us Ice Age, it's sequel, and Robots. It should be outstanding.

Click here for the link.

Homemade upright bass...

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I've always thought the upright bass was extremely cool. They tend to be pretty expensive though. Some nifty fellow decided he wanted one and that they were too expensive, and he just made his own, mostly from cardboard and wood. Watch the video, it's extremely cool. I've seen Cigar Box guitars (which is just what it sounds like) but never seen anything quite like this.

He is also selling them on ebay for $49 plus $30+ for S&H... :/

"Good Lord... There are no words"

That's the phrase uttered by the CNN news anchor as the second tower collapsed.

May we never forget September 11, 2001.

The movie event of the what??

I don't watch a lot of TV, and I watch even fewer commercials. Finding something to flip to during the commercial is top priority when I sit down to watch something. Sometimes, though, I'll let my wife drive the remote and so I catch a few commercials... and then I remember why I usually skip them.

Anyway, we were watching TV yesterday and I saw a preview for a new movie with Kevin Costner and Ashton Kutcher called The Guardian. Apparently, it's a drama about some Coast Guard guys. Now, I've got nothing against the Coast Guard -- I've got a good friend who was in for several years. All the armed services have my deep respect. But a Coast Guard movie?? My first thought was, "who had the bright idea to cast Ashton in a dramatic role?" My second was, "hey, I bet this'll be almost as good as Striking Distance," which was so bad that Bruce Willis (who was the star of the thing) just came right out and said "it sucked" -- and I think the IMDB users are being waaaay too generous with their 5.3 stars out of 10... Anyway, then I heard the "sell" and that wrapped it all up for me. Are you ready for it?? Here goes...

"This will be the movie event of the fall!"

Wow... the movie event of... the year? the decade? the century?? Nope, just the movie event of the fall. And heck... in Memphis, fall only lasts a couple of weeks, if that. They may have just as well said the movie event of the week. They clearly have low expectations for it... who am I to argue with that? :)

I, of course, had no plans to see it in the first place, but that just kills me... the movie event of the fall.

A white background for your photos...

(Click here for Link)

This is a great tutorial for anyone who is trying to photograph something on a "clean" white background. And if you haven't seen it yet, stock.xchng is a outstanding resource for high quality, free stock photography (i.e. pictures you can use in just about any way you'd like).

This is an outstanding tutorial on drawing and animation.
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