Tuesday, February 24, 2009

CORALINE


((FEB 25th EDIT!!!))

Ben won first place in the Skadi fan contest at DummComics!! Click the pic to go check out his winning strip... it's up NOW!!!


ANYWAY-
My review of Coraline? That's easy: It ROCKS.

It's a beautiful, magical stop-motion animated film that is the BIGGEST breath of fresh air in today's world of green ogre-farting CGI bunk. Not to mention a family film that finally has the balls to have some creepiness to it!

Older family films, especially in the 80s, had a lot of great adult and mature themes like elements of drama, horror and action sprinkled throughout (The Goonies, Beetlejuice, Princess Bride, Ghostbusters, etc). But, that all died in the 90s and 2000s and now we get bland watered-down family movies that are nowhere near fun for the whole family; sure, they'll keep your 5-year old sitting still, but you'll be left gritting your teeth in boredom.

So it's nice to know that the Coraline filmmakers feel the same way, and want to bring variety and fun back to fam flicks!

Look, people working with actual hold-in-your-hand material and hi-tech camera equipment wizardry! Where are the computers???! It's amazing.

Yeah so you can probably tell that I loved this movie. Here's some Coraline fan art I just farted out.

Crappy roughs, getting a feel for the character

Hmmm. Getting warmer?

Nailed it!! I like this one.

Stop-motion gems like this only seem to come around once a decade, so go see this movie if you haven't yet. Already seen it? Go see it again!!

Eeek!

Sunday, February 8, 2009

ART JAM 2: THE REVENGE

Okay this might have been the coolest week for art ever!!!

First of all, this weekend was another ART JAM NIGHT at Molly and Carl's (blog pending) house!! Painting, drawing, photography, crafty crafts! And beer!! It was basically friggen awesome?

"You can call me Flower!"

I attempted caricatures for the night.. here's one of famous tattoo artist extraordinaire David Williams.

Sean made a self-portrait cut out. Complete with blue nipples and armpit hair!

Jess made a million awesome things but my favorite- this felt T-REX!!

I also drew local music legend Adam Nixon.

Hellen is a beautiful flower and has a great face for cartoony fun drawing. By this time I was tipsy from too much beer and I really don't think I did her any justice with this!! This is way too wonky, but oh well.

What a great gathering of pals! But that's not the end of Super Awesome Art Week...

A few days ago I got... DUN DUN DUNNNN!! A package in the mail from BEN!!!!! He sent me paintings and doodles!! It was like getting golden treasure mailed to me.


LOOK at this painting he did of Maude Macher!!!! Isn't it beautiful? This is going right on me and Kali's hallway wall!!!

Molly holding treasure!!

Eeeee!!! A painted present for Katie Rice of her very own character Skadi!! She's gonna love it.

AND a painting of a character based on me in his upcoming Jo the Faux webcomic! OMG!!!!!!


I just can't thank you enough buddy. You rock!!!! What a happy happy art week, thanks to all my pals.