Happy Thanksgiving!

From the Vault #11: Remember, BBBBBB Yourself

So last week I showed you the 3-D turnaround of the Letter A for the almost was Sesame Street action figure line. You didn't think I was going to leave you hanging with just one letter did you? Of course not! Shown here is the Letter B rendering from March of 2005. This little guy was originally planned to be packed in with the Two-Headed Monster... makes sense right? "B" being the second letter of the alphabet and all. I have the actual prototypes around in the house that I should probably take a picture of to show you the physical figure. Check back later and it should be added by the evening hours.

From the Vault #10: A Cool Muppet Accessory!

Ok, so in an earlier post I showed you a rendering of the Letter A from an almost Sesame Street action figure line. Let's switch gears from an almost to a definate. Back in June of 2004 I was contacted to make a sticker for Sam the Eagle's podium. It would be some sort of seal that would be similar to the President of the United States (ie: eagle with the shield, olive branch, etc...) Some screen captures from the Muppet Show of said podium and seal were sent up from Palisades Toys to use as a springboard for the design. There was a catch to this though, it had to be done in vector art (for those that don't know what vector art is, there are two forms of art: vector and raster. Raster is pixel based, ie: Adobe Photoshop, while vector is point based, ie: Adobe Illustrator.) The first step in making a design would be some sort of sketch to layout how it should look, roughly. Below is the sketch of Sam Eagle shown on the podium seal.

Next, we take the sketch and scan it in to the computer and import it right into Illustrator. Now, you're probably wondering why it had to be done in a vector format. The reason behind doing artwork in vector is that it can be blown up to any size imagineable and it will not lose any resolution. The image stays as clean at 10,000% as it does at 50%. It really is a wonderful thing, even though it does take a bit longer to design in. So after a few hours of design work, a bunch of tweaks and helpful (and not so helpful) mistakes we end up with a final product that gets sent down to the toy company for approval. If I remember correctly I was on my honeymoon when this was sent down. I remember hanging out daily in the cruise ship's internet cafe to see if it would ultimately get the thumbs up. It did on what I think was the third or fourth day at sea. It would be inserted into the Sam Eagle variant, aka: Shifty-eyed Sam Eagle, whom was limited to one per box.

And a couple months later the product starts to arrive in stores and you can be proud that you worked on toyline that had genuine cool value to it. I mean really, who doesn't like the Muppets? Communists maybe, and perhaps people who have phobias of singing barnyard animals?
Photo Courtesy: Ken Lilly

From the Vault #9: Larry David

This Larry David drawing was done in the same vein as the John Lennon one. I did this back in 2003 or so when Curb Your Enthusiasm was really just starting to pick up steam to being a hugely popular show. The colored version of this is lying around here somewhere. I always enjoy the sketch version much more than the final though. With the sketch you get to see all the bones to the drawing. I'm not a big fan of this piece, to me there just doesn't seem to be a whole lot of personality to it. Just kind of boring. In the Lennon piece, his smugness almost seemed to seep out of the paper. Now I'm not saying Lennon was normally a smug person, in fact just the opposite from what I've read and heard. But you could tell at times that he knew how to be a bitch. The Larry David drawing seen above doesn't capture any of that. David is pretty much a self-professed douchebag, and I'm not feeling it. Just a drawing...

Edgar Allen Poe is my Co-Pilot

There are some things in life that just don't need explaining. For instance: chocolate ice cream, puppies or big, fluffy pillows. You just know their purpose in life, there is no agenda with these things. You don't second guess a puppy, and if you do you really need to talk to someone about all your other issues. Life can't be this simple though. There has to be things that make you scratch your head and make you think, "Why would someone do that? Possibly an imbalance in medication?" A treadmill bike would be one of those things (discussed earlier this month). Earlier today I was at one of the local Albany malls with a friend of mine. We park and the car next to us in the parking lot has this on the dashboard....

Look closely. What is that you may be asking? That my friends is a stuffed crow. A dead bird is mounted on the dashboard of this person's Ford Escape. Who does this? And for that person, why? Seriously, WTF people!? A dead bird! I've always questioned people that would mount Bobbleheads and other oddities to their dashboards but this is on a whole new level of disturbing car flair. Ofcourse, this may not just be a dead bird. This could be a navigation system disguised as a crow. How creepy would that be? "Turn left here, ca caw!, Go straight for 100 meters, Turn right nevermore!"

From the Vault #8: Walter Matthau Watercolor

Anyone that knows me well enough knows that I am a self-professed Walter Matthau nut. It's true, I had and will always have a soft spot in my heart for old people. Especially slouchy, funny ones. When he died back in 2000 I kind of got on this kick to collect some memorabilia from his movies. I bought a few movies posters, a couple press cards and few autographed 8x10's of him and Jack Lemmon from various movies. I'm mostly proud of the studio movie posters. Two of which I still have hanging in my home: The Odd Couple and The Fortune Cookie (the latter winning him an Academy Award.) Both original and both in really nice shape. I even went as far as to purchase a teacup from his estate sale back in 2001. That's right, a teacup. It's ugly too, and it's got a crack in it. I look at that crack though and think to myself, "He actually took the time to glue this piece back on the cup and keep it." Now I own it and it sits in my living room. It's a god-awful ugly thing too. Something that would totally be in an old person's home.

Enough with traveling down memorabilia lane though... this is about a watercolor piece. This painting I did back in 2001. I'm not exactly sure when in that year though, it was after June because this was done after Jack Lemmon had passed away. Plus, I have the second in a series of two of this painting floating around of Lemmon. The idea was to have the older version of the actor in the front in a monochromatic scheme with the younger side being in black and white in the background. It's funny how this man ALWAYS looked old. Overall I was pretty happy how this turned out. I've never been a very good painter (and never will). The blue is a bit harsh and makes him look more frozen than artistically mellow. I also did a pencil version of Matthau along these same lines, an older and a younger version. We'll see if I can dig that up for a future From the Vault.

From the Vault #7: Jesse Facial Turnaround

Here is another on Jesse the Special Chameleon. This was a quick turnaround of his face. For whatever reason his smile was always on the side you saw. Weird. Maybe he planned it that way, he is supposedly pretty special. My favorite of these is the one drawn from the back so we can really see some depth to his head crest. Go, go Jesse head crest thingy!

Today's Blog is Sponsored by the Letter A

This is technically an episode from "From the Vault," but personally for me, it's too cool. Back in 2005, the now defunct Palisades Toys contacted me about making some 3-D turnaround renders of the Sesame Street letters. These action figures would be geared more for adults, or really, really nostalgic kids. This was one line I was really excited to get into. I kind of started with the Muppet line at the tail end of the madness, missing out on a lot of key figures. With the Sesame Street line I was pretty much guaranteed to be working with characters like Cookie Monster, Ernie, Bert, etc... The Letter A was slated to be packaged with Guy Smiley (I think). In the end, only one Sesame Street character saw the light of day and that was Super Grover. The rest of Series 1 made it into production and got to the final stages before Palisades turned out the lights. Ah, what could've been!

The Treadmill for Free-spirits

Like every morning I start my morning off with a cigarette (no, I don't) and a nice cup of coffee (I don't do this either). But today, I decided to toss in some internet web travel with my breakfast. Boy, did we find a doozie too! You ever find a product so incredibly dumb you think to yourself, "Wow, who made this incredibly dumb product!?" The company aptly named Bicycle Forest takes the prize for this week's "Proprietor Darwin Award." They have created the "Bicycle Treadmill." Hey, feel like running outside but don't feel like actually running on the ground? Try the bicycle treadmill and you can now run on a treadmill with two wheels. Yes, a treadmill with wheels. Just for fun I have attached their marketing video from their website.

Apparently you can bring this treadmill on the bus! Why would you need too though? Can't you just run on it and get to where you have to go? Also, Postal Workers enjoy using this... Not really. They do however enjoy walking along side it and pushing it down the sidewalk with their 50 pounds of mail strapped to their back. Mine as well hit them over the skull with an aluminum bat too. Oh and hey, are you looking to add some "bling, bling" to this "sweet ride?" You are? Well it's your lucky day, an option for the treadmill bike also has deuce extreme spinner rims. "Fo shizzle."

One of their marketing pitches as to WHY you should use the Treadmill Bike is because the ground has dirt on it. Of course it does! That's what ground is made up of. An enormous pile of dirt! In fact that pile of dirt is SO big another relatively large pile of dirt hundreds of thousands of miles away orbits around it! Just don't run on it, your feet might get dirty.

I especially love the guy as he rides by the camera "This is the coolest thing I've ever been on!" As he says it however he almost falls off.... Now that would've been the coolest thing I'd have ever seen. Falling onto the ground made of dirt.

You're also probably wondering... Gnarly trial courses. Can I take it on some gnarly trial courses? Yes you can... but by gnarly we don't mine half pipes and rings of fire. No, no, by gnarly we mean a series of picnic tables stacked together and a piece of wood used as a ramp. Total kickass!

The amazing thing in all this, an American is not too blame for this product! Nope, not even the Asians or Mexicans. Blame Canada! This crackpot idea was hatched somewhere in a hockey rink by a maple syrup sniffing Canuck. Yah, yubetcha!

People, if you want to go for a run, do what everybody else does and get in your car and drive to the gym. Let's keep these ideas in the box, aye? What's next?.....

Umm.... err.... hmmm?

I can't even come up with an idea nearly as dumb as this to make an analogy. Not even close. I thought of swimming without water, weight lifting with spaghetti.... nothing. I've gotta go, somewhere I think I heard a Treadmill Bike getting on a bus.

From the Vault #6: John Lennon

Here's another blast from the past. This ink/colored pencil combo was done in either late 2004 or early 2005. It was cold out, that's all I really remember. This John Lennon piece was initially done as a test to just hone my skills a little bit more with colored pencil (still my favorite medium besides the computer). It came out pretty good with some obvious tweaks that would need to be made: his wonked glasses, cigarette positioning and his ginormous sausage fingers on his right hand. Overall I do like how the coloration came out on this guy. At one point I wanted to make prints of this to sell but in the end deemed it not strong enough. My problem is I always think to big, not so much in grandiose ideas but more so in size. I planned to do this as a 16x20 inch (or thereabouts). In retrospect these would probably have made pretty kick-ass 5x7 or 5x8's.

Welcome Back

You know those weeks where it just keeps coming at you? Last week was one of those weeks. Monday and Tuesday were crazy election days, racking up 26 1/2 hours of work ( 16 1/2 on Tuesday) between them. Wednesday was the post-election hangover. The newsroom really did look like a room filled with people nursing bar induced headaches. In a pinch of bliss, I was glad I wasn't the only one feeling that way. Thursday was one of those non-days. The kind where you just kind of walk around and small talk with people about pretty much nothing, "So, did you catch Ghost Hunters last night? I know, crazy right!?" Friday was a glorious half day where I started feeling under the weather as I walked through the front doors to head home. Last but not least, Saturday and Sunday: These days were lost to a nasty virus that infiltrated my system (probably from exhausting myself from the Presidential Election). See, Barack Obama is already up to no good. He already got me sick. He didn't even call to apologize. Sure, Nancy Reagan gets a phone call when he makes fun of her seances, but nooooo let's not call Malette. Way to go Barack. Anyways, this week we should be pretty much back on track, unless I get sick again.

Election Day! aka The Seventh Funnel of Hell

UPDATE: 11:02pm: Obama takes Florida and California...it's officially President-elect Barack Obama.

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UPDATE: 10:03pm: A little bit of good news for McCain... he's only down 1% in the popular vote. Obama currently leads with 50% while McCain is holding strong with 49%. The old man is almost as cool as Obama. Who would've thought... he can't even lift his arms above his heart. This just goes to show you one glaring flaw in the electoral system. It's a blowout for Obama, who currently leads by over 120 electoral votes, but in actuality McCain is hanging in their in the form of head to head voting.

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UPDATE: 9:28pm: Oy-- Obama is just running away with it. It's currently 175 to 52 electoral votes. Again, atleast Mac said he had a lead. once.

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UPDATE: 8:46pm: Obama just won Pennsylvania... it's pretty much over for McCain now.

And in local news, Kirsten Gillibrand looks to have won NY Congressional District 20 against the very deep pocketed Sandy Treadwell.

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UPDATE: 7:43pm: Hey, here's something... McCain has the lead in electoral votes. Albeit, 8 to 3. Atleast he can't say he wasn't winning at some point.

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UPDATE: 6:50pm: McCain holding his own in Indiana...

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UPDATE: 5:58 pm: Hey there news junkies! Have you always wanted to take a look at what's going on inside the CN9 Media Center but couldn't? Well, now you can! By clicking this link it will bring you directly to our live streaming webcam high above (or 10 feet) above the media center floor. If you look closely an apparition of a lady in white will appear... well, no. That's a lie. I might walk by every now and then though. Riveting!

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UPDATE: 5:02 pm: One hour until Kentucky and Indiana close their polls. Numbers should start coming in shortly thereafter. Kentucky should go to Big Mac and Indiana will probably lean to Obama.

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For the vast majority of the American population Election Day really means one thing: Casting your vote. The people that are really indepth will turn on CNN, MSNBC or another live all-night news program and watch the coverage. Someone has to work those stations right? Right. I'll be giving updates throughout the night until I leave about what's going on behind the scenes in the graphics dept. at CN9. Exciting right? Not unless you're into maps and the occasional running from one control room to the next.

Speaking of control rooms, I think we have a record breaking three control rooms firing off for tonight's coverage. CR-A will be running the state-wide/Capital Tonight coverage (which is the CR I will be primarily working with). CR-B will be running the local Syracuse coverage and our mobile control-room has parked it's ginormous ass into our garage and that will be running the local Albany coverage.

Check back, it'll be a fun night... especially if John McCain decides to make it interesting.

From the Vault #5: Sid and I

Sorry for the long layover everyone. Between being sick and the Presidential Elections upon us it's been quite a busy and draining week. Anyways, on to more pressing matters: more openage of the vault! Everyone loves a good piece from the vault, and today is no slouch. It's not too incredibly old with it being drawn at the end of 2006. I don't ever remember sketching this... in fact I don't even know what I'm supposed to be holding. Maybe an EMF detector of some kind? Whatever is going on off the picture it definitely has the attention of myself and Sid, my trusty alligator companion. Could it be Mike Bray in the shower? Some scary demon? Keanu Reeves in an acting class?

The more I look at this, the more I wish I finished it. With the flashlight it looks like it would've been an evening or night scene so maybe I got discouraged about trying to get all the shadows and the reflective light correct... who knows?