GI Joe 2 Review

 I fell asleep about 4 or 5 times during this movie, and it didn't affect the plot at all. 

That said, the first movie was just more...fun, for lack of a better word. This movie was just a generic action movie (which explains why Willis was in it) that happened to be sprinkled with characters dressed as GI Joes. It was messy, loud, and fairly stupid. Once again, the action scenes were filmed with a camera that was thrown into a blender that itself had been thrown into a tumble dryer. That alone made me grateful I didn't see this shitburger in 3D. 

And for people who'll say "you didn't know the GI Joe cartoons if you didn't like this movie". Fuck you. It's a bad movie in every sense of the word. It wasn't even remotely fun as a generic action movie because the story, editing, and acting were atrocious  It didn't even work as a movie based off of a fun, but hammy 80's cartoon series, OR the comic series, OR the revived 90's cartoon series, OR the kick ass animated mini-series written by Warren Ellis (yeah, like *I* don't know GI Joe history). You know a movie is bad when even Arnold Vosloo won't be in it, since the guy is the king of direct to dvd movies. 

I was really looking forward to this movie being good, and instead I got some generic, macho, bullshit that even has fat, geriatrics being enlisted to fight in the battle. Cobra Commander was boring, and really wasn't necessary except for the MacGuffin of him being needed to launch the missiles from the satellites (why? it's never explained). A cardboard cutout could have done the same job as the guy that played Flint, and other than supplying guns and fat, geriatric 'soldiers', Willis' character was a complete waste of screen time. 

Do yourself a favor and skip this one. Wait for the redbox rental, which should be very soon. Hell, better yet, wait for cable.

Posting lag

Sorry for the big lag in posting, but I have moved. That's right, I'm no longer in San Francisco. I've moved to sunny (well, not for the last week) San Diego for work. Once I get properly settled in, I'll start posting a little more regularly. 

The Goon

If you haven't seen it, or don't follow comics, there's a comic book out there called The Goon by Eric Powell. Dark Horse Comics puts it out, and Powell is even trying to get the funding together to put out a CGI animated movie with Paul Giamatti as one of the voices. Well, Dark Horse has a little contest to draw The Goon and win a bunch of swag, so I thought I'd take a shot at it. Here's my entry.

A little bit retro, but I liked how the skull came out. Not as happy with how Goon himself came out, but I can live with it. Done with watercolors and markers (of which I'm diggin the new Copic markers I used on this piece). The piece itself looks better in person than it does in the scan for some reason. Maybe I need to work on my Photoshop skills for levels on scans a bit more. Anyway, here it is, enjoy.

T-Shirt Design Contest I'm In

Being the self-promotion whore that I am (because let's face it, no one else is going to do it for me), I entered a  T-Shirt design contest on Threadless. Here's the embeded crap leading to it.



So go in and vote, pass it on, etc. If I win, I get cash, and my design gets sold at the Gap locations. 


Enjoy.

Throg! Frog of Thunder!

A couple of nights ago I decided to try screwing around with pastels again, especially since it's been a few years since I last touched them. So I cleared off the workspace, plopped down the pad of 19" X 24" I had lying here, and went to work. 


Recently, I've been watching the animated Ultimate Spider-Man online (because for some reason Disney XD is a 'premium' channel, and I don't get it). One of the last episodes I watched had Thor being turned into a frog by his brother Loki. For those of you that don't know, there's a long story behind Throg and the other Pet Avengers. Suffice to say, that was my inspiration in today's piece. Behold! Throg! Frog of thunder!

I had forgotten how hard (and messy!) it was working with pastels. I actually had to go out and buy some blending sticks since I didn't have any laying around (again, it has been a few years since I've touched pastels). Once I got into it, I had a bit of fun. Working with pastels harkens back to finger painting as a child, except that if you want anything recognizable to come out of the effort, you really do need to plan the composition ahead of time. 

So there you have it. Let me know what you think in the comments section below. 

Enjoy.

Guess What Movie I Want To See Tomorrow

If you guessed "Step Up Revolution", well then you obviously haven't been reading this blog. Here's a little artwork I did last night to give you a hint:

"The Dark Knight Rises" is the correct answer. I had the opportunity to see a sneak preview last night, but the showing was at 10pm. For a nearly 3 hour movie. I passed on it so that I could see it at a decent time, without having to wait a couple of hours in line to boot. 

I'll probably wind up working on this pic a little more to get some color in it. Still not sure if I'm going to go digital or the more traditional route that I've been doing lately. Anyway, hope you enjoy the pic.

Belated 4th of July

If you live in a large city like I do, then you probably have various illegal fireworks going off all around the city at various times of the day and night during the weeks surrounding the 4th of July. So that was my inspiration for this quickie piece I did. I finished it in gray markers instead of my usual watercolors, because I had recently been reminded of Tim Sale's work. Now if you don't know who Tim Sale is, go check out his artwork. Go on, I'll wait for you....


Back? Good stuff, huh? You probably noticed that most of it is in black and white, and grays. There's a reason for this..Tim is color blind. His work gives off a very noirish feel. I wanted to see what I could do with just grays, black and white. So here's Captain America.

This version I tweaked in PhotoShop to get rid of the blue pencil marks. Unfortunately, as a result, it also lost some contrast. One of these days I'll learn the right way of removing blue pencil, but for now, it looks like I'll have to keep trying by trial and error. Here's the same picture taken with the camera from my phone:

So, while this one is darker, a lot of the original contrast is kept intact giving it a better feel.

Finally, you may have noticed my logo in the bottom right of the picture. Maybe it's vanity, maybe I saw a cheap deal, but I had rubber stamps made of my logo so that I could stamp my work when I was done. Too arrogant? Does it take away from the artwork, or is it no different than a signature? Let me know what you think below.

Enjoy.