Catscratch!

A bit late in the game but I recently discovered a hilarious (yet sometimes creepy) cartoon called "Catscratch". Long story short: 3 cats inherit lots and lots of money, a mansion and a butler to go with it. The three cats cause mayhem, mayhem and more mayhem. I love the picture on the left. To me, it sums up the cartoon perfectly. The white cat with the orange patch is named Gordon. The black one in the toilet is named Mr. Blik and the grey one is Waffle-- he's hilariously stupid! If only they'd do a cartoon featuring him and Patrick from "Spongebob Squarepants", we'd be set.

I watch the cartoon Friday nights at 7:30 (I catch the Western feed) on YTV (where, incidentaly, I borrowed the graphic from. So there, I gave credit. Go to ytv.com to see the episode guide, gallery, etc. etc. You happy now YTV lawyers? Actually, I used to work there way back when.).

Punching bag in the washroom!

I found this image in Oct 16-30th issue of Condo Guide. I instantly wanted it in my bathroom. A punchingbag! Perfect location! I'm looking to buy a condo and one thing I am hoping to have in there is my own heavy bag. I'd need a room with a window (you know, the smell of the sweat and all...) but then I'd need another room for the guest room and what about my home office avec drawing space? Way too much money.

But what if the master bedroom's washroom was designed around the locker room idea (like in the image above). Oh I wish I could have that! Unfortunately, the magazine didn't say who came up with the concept but whoever it is-- is a GENIUS! It does call it a contemporary Kohler bathroom though.

A day in the U.S.

A good thing about living in a city near Canada's southern border is you can cross over the border into the US for the day and shop 'til you drop, then get rid of all the tags, bags, receipts and wear everything as you cross over the border back home.

Yesterday, me and 2 friends decided to go over to Buffalo for the day and do some shopping. We didn't go overboard as we were in no mood to spend a few hours having our car searched for stuff we bought. We decided to spend within the daily limit our government graciously allows us to spend without having to declare. I only bought a $30 pair of track pants (cargo style! whoo-hoo!) and a yo-yo for my niece.

At the border, we got stuck with a crusty customs guy who thinks he's a cop. Or perhaps a badass soldier out to kick some ass and take names and also shoot and kill terrorists while he's as it. There we were, 3 guys-- 2 in their ealry 30s and 1 in his early 20s. We don't fit the description of bering a terrorist or anything of the sort (in other words, white). Maybe it was the fact that we didn't have blonde hair that made us suspicious. Or maybe he was just paranoid. Who knows. But hey, at least our American brothers and sisters can feel safe knowing that they've got sharpies like him keeping terrorists from Canada (embarrassing for Canada, I know!) from entering the states. I'm not being sarcastic in that last sentence but let's run through the questions he threw at us in a very "throwing-his-weight-around" sort of way. I mean, we told him we were going to the mall in Buffalo to do some shopping and give the US even more money than they need. The least he could have done was smile.

Anyhoo, first thing he demanded were our passports (my friend's was expired but I guess he didn't realize that) so we gave them to him.

"WHERE ARE YOU FROM!", he was really mad for some reason.
"Toronto", my friend replied.
"DO YOU ALL LIVE IN THE SAME CITY!"
"Yes. We all live in Toronto"
"WHAT JOBS DO YOU HAVE!"
"Me and my friend work at **** and he is a student"
"WHERE ARE YOU GOING!"
"To Buffalo"
"WHY!"
"To do some shopping at the Galleria Mall"
"THE MALL CLOSES IN 2 HOURS! WHY DID YOU LEAVE SO LATE!"
"We decided at the last minute to go for the day and then go for wings for dinner"
"IS THIS YOUR CAR!"
"Yes"
"WHAT IS IN THE TRUNK OF YOUR CAR!"
"Nothing really. Just some gym clothes and some tools to wash the car"
"OPEN UP YOUR TRUNK!"

So he checks the trunk and upon his return, my friend asked "What was in the trunk?". The wannabe badass soldier didn't reply and thrust our passports back to my friend.

Ok, let me see.,,
"WHERE ARE YOU FROM!"
Anyone can say anything. How can he know for sure? Maybe this is for after when they take us in and, I suppose, do a background check. Why not do it right htere so we can get service with a smile?

"DO YOU ALL LIVE IN THE SAME CITY!"
Very clever. Try to throw us a loop to see if we were lying. Good thing we were honest!

"WHAT JOBS DO YOU HAVE!"
This was a pretty useless question but I guess it's for when they do a background check to see if we were lying. But what if I said, "Oh, I work at a bomb factory and my friend here sells guns. Our friend in the back is a chemistry major". Actually I don't know if Canada has bomb factories but in any case, would "cashier at Shopper's Drug Mart" help his job or protect our neighbours? Good think none of us were telemarketers!

"THE MALL CLOSES IN 2 HOURS! WHY DID YOU LEAVE SO LATE!"
Granted. Yes, it is strange that it was 3pm by the time we got to the border but it was c-l-e-a-r-l-y obvious that all 3 of us were male. Honestly, how much time does the average guy spend at a mall? I don't even think the most flamboyant cross-dresser spends any more time than the average straight guy.

"WHAT IS IN THE TRUNK OF YOUR CAR!"
The urge to say "4 dead hookers and a stripper"...

The entire time, I was trying to keep in my laugh. The whole thing, bless the wannabe badass soldier's heart, was just surreal. Soldier was just doing his job but COME ON! We drove off and I burst out laughing. Anyhoo, we finally got into the Galleria Mall and me being the miechevous person, starting speaking in a French accent to see what would happen. Nothing did. Anyhoo, we were done in about 2 hours. Between us, we bought a hockey jersey (a very nice conversation with the guy at the hockey jersey store), a sweater, shaving scream, track pants, an iPod car connector and a yo-yo. Plus an encounter with a very pushy yet really attractive salegirl (with an accent) at a booth trying to get us to spend $70 on an Israeli nail buffing kit (I wanted to ask if Palestinians were allowed to use it). Despite the fact that 1) we're guys who have no need for shiny nails and 2) we kept trying to leave. Anyhoo, she grabbed my friend's hand and started buffing up his thumbnail. I do say that the product works wonders. For a girl. He now has a beautiful thumbnail. It looks like he put clear nailpolish on. Way to go to bruise a guy's ego!

We get back to the border and the Canuck Customs guy gives us the same routine except in a friendly manner. He didn't ask us about our jobs. Very nice man. When we replied that we had gone to the Galleria Mall, he said "Uh oh". So he did the whole looking in the trunck routine and then we talked a bit about the car washing tools. He gave us some tips. A very nice man. Don't know if he noticed my firend's passport was expired.

We continued on our way towards Niagara Falls for din-din with a pitstop at the Hershey shop then back home to find out that they had recalled a few products.

On another note, to the regular readers of this blog (if any), you may have noticed the new design. Just something I whipped up quickly. Too quickly. It doesn't even look that great! My aim was to make it look more like a blog belonging to an illustrator. I didn't even have my art in the header. So there it is. It's a rough sketch of what I plan on putting on my main superspud.com website a few moons from now. I know I'm a hypocrite by breaking information architecture rules by putting text in the graphic itself but I didn't have the time nor the patience to figure out Blogspot's css scheme to get actual text over the header. I also decided to increase the text.

And here are some more moleskine stuff. This time they come from my watercolour moleskine. I am t-r-y-i-n-g to master the art of watercolours. Not bad for a beginner I suppose. Any critiques on my technique are welcome. I'm going to start studying Bill Waterson's artwork to see what I can learn from this master.

Please disreagard the layout snafus. I tried editing and re-editing and re-editing yet blogspot can't seem to get the spacing right. Grrrrr....

Below is my attempt at recreating a piece of artwork I did in pastel (see my portfolio site for the pastel version) using Windor & Newton ink. I don't like how it looks on the moleskine paper.













The next 2 are watercoloured then inked on top with a gel pen of all things.


































And this green one is all watercolour, inked and painted.













Next time I'll center the images like I used to. I hate this left aligned business. I wish Blogspot would make images centered by default. I still haven't figured out how to change the images, alignment. Not even editing the code works.

Disco Charlie Brown

Here is a scan of the 45 I found at my firned's house. It's Disco Charlie Brown by Two Man Sound. I don't know who they are but since the label says Brazil on it, my guess is maybe they are a Brazilian band? Anyhoo, if anyone knows this band or the history of this song, feel free to let me know.

Finally, almost a plot!

The way I've been thinking up a plot for my upcoming (graphic/comic) novel is I sit down and think think think until an amazing plot is outlined. I came up with a few contenders but something about them didn't click. I wasn't too happy. they were ok, but I didn't feel they were 100% of my potential.

So after... sigh... too much time (maybe 2 years in between my full time job, working out, improving my skills, etc.) I began to feel myself becoming discouraged and unmotivated. I was too preoccupied with creating the next Harry Potter or Calvin & Hobbes.

Absolutely fed up, I decided to just sit down and write-- without thinking. Without any concern with structure or if the plot makes any sense. I used green ink and just wrote. I didn't care if I made mistakes or had to scratch out something. I just wrote.


Above is an image of that "fed up process" that I wrote in a squared ruled moleskine (there's that fanboy talking again). The drawings I drew in after. With those, I also didn't sweat too much about how they came out.

The outcome is I came up with a plot that I am thoroughly proud of and excited about! There's more which need to be done and some historical and scientific facts I need to check but I can save that for later. For now, this is perfect. Golden. Let your mind wander and see where it goes.


Boy does my hand hurt from the pen!

A record player in an electric fireplace from the 70s

My friend has a fireplace from the 70s...

which runs on electricity.












and inside is a record player!
















I brought over some 78s I got from a record collector show and my PowerBook to rip them onto my Mac and burn to cd (how's that for jargon?). You can see how my records were snug and secure in my Booq bag.











This fireplace must have been state of the art. It has phono outputs which made it really convenient for connecting to my Mac.












And my PowerBook had the convenient feature of having inputs. Too bad the fireplace didn't have optical out!












The fireplace also had an 8-track. Note how thinner the PowerBook is from an 8-track tape. Actually, you can't really tell due to the angle in this photo.












One of the records was brown.













Here is a shot of the recording process. Yup, just straight from the record. No sound procesing or remastering. I even used freeware ("Audio In"). I am armchair audiophile-- I don't really have the expensive speakers and the time to accurately remove all the scratches or make sure the sound I get is pure and free from any inteference. I'm sure some of these songs are available somewhere on CD.













It takes 2 people to move the fireplace!















The records I ripped (honestly, that term is stupid) were:

Bugs Bunny Meets Elmer Fudd by Mel Blanc
Cuban Pete by Louis Armstrong and His Orchestra
She's The Daughter of a Planter From Havana by Louis Armstrong and His Orchestra
Sonny Boy by Art Parks
Moonlight Reminds Me Of You by Harold Smith

A trip down memory lane and a Nativity Scene in a Moleskine update

On my way to work on the train this morning, there were 3 guys sitting across from me. They all had laptops and skateboards. One of them was also sketching on a pad of paper. I noticed that the sketcher had what looked like a preview mode of a 3D animation.

I know that all too well. It brought back memories of when I was in school studying 3D computer animation. Back then, in 1994, oh how awful the 3D computer animation software was. The 486 DX2-66MHz computer was the top of the line and we were using 3D Studio version 3. What a pain it was to use that program. It wasn't until 2 or 3 years later I got to work on a real program. It was Maya. Or was it Alias? I forget*. I abandoned 3D a long time ago. What a pain. You needed at least an SGI machine and there was no way I could afford it.

What luck students today have with cheaper laptops, much larger harddrives, a lot faster RAM, BETTER software. I am thankful for that. They can concentrate on the art and not on the technology or workaround.

Oh, I'm having flashbacks... And the rendering time... Make them stop! Make them stop!

Anyhoo, I uploaded my first sketch in the Nativity Scene in the Moleskine Project I am doing for Christmas. You'll see the image there.

For this blog, I'll upload a sketch of Spud's guardian angel who I finally, finally, FINALLY settled upon a character design for him! FINALLY! I just need to refine him a bit. He's the little guy on the left.


* edit: I just remembered. It was Houdini. It was also the first time I used a UNIX machine. I am so glad Mac OS X is based on UNIX!