Those of you who read these entries via feeds, please just bear with me here. There will be something for you, too.
Last year, I set up a series of labels on this blog to make it easier to find which posts were on which topics. All well and good, but as we've gone forward, it's become increasingly obvious that portions of the labeling system just weren't working the way I'd intended. This week, I took some steps to remedy that problem.
The following labels are unchanged in this transition : comic books, music, blogging, life. I don't think anything changed in those four categories.
The following labels have been discarded : cartoons, movies/TV, reading, special guest star. The first three simply didn't get a lot of use here, and sometimes fell into vague "I'm not sure" zones with other labels. As for "special guest star", my friends are no less special than when this was in place, but the original intent behind its creation fell by the wayside long ago. Its use was frequently a judgment call, and not one I care to continue making.
The following labels are new : captain satellite, return of jetman. Honestly, this is way overdue. I've discussed ROJ a lot here, and while it has been dormant recently, don't expect it to stay that way. The "Captain Satellite" project has been getting a lot of play lately, and while there isn't anything set in stone with those characters, I expect they will continue to have a role on this blog.
The following labels have been shuffled around : general nonsense, quotes, tokusatsu, works. It stands to reason that, with some new categories added and some old categories retired, there would be some that see changes. "Works" is mostly the same, except that it now excludes ROJ website updates that do not include written material by me and Captain Satellite material created by folks other than me. You can find that stuff in their respective categories. "Tokusatsu" now excludes all ROJ content unless it specifically discusses authentic Japanese material. However, this label now includes Japanese-related material like anime and non-SF Japanese productions. I realize this isn't technically correct, but it's my blog and I just don't feel like changing the name of the label! "Quotes" didn't lose any posts, but it gained a few that quote friends of mine that were originally filed under "special guest star". And "general nonsense"? It's still the "everything else" category, but that's defined a little more broadly than it used to be.
Hopefully, this new label system will work better for my needs, and enable people to find what they're looking for when they visit my blog.
In other blogging news, I've dropped the sidebar links other than my "Friends of OWARI" blogroll. It's not that I have anything against any of the sites formerly listed there. Rather, I'm trying to be more streamlined, and I seriously doubt those links got much use anyway. However, I still support all of those sites. In fact, here is a list of all of them for the record. All are still recommended!
Big Bang Comics : Fun retro comics. I hope they make a comeback someday.
Blue Öyster Cult : One of my favorite bands ever.
Dilbert : A comic strip I read because I genuinely enjoy it.
Generation Kikaida : Japanese superhero nostalgia from the great state of Hawaii.
Grand Comic Database : One of the best resources for comics fans. If you love comics, this should be one your bookmarks, pronto.
A profile & tribute to comics writer Bob Haney : Touching.
Hembeck.com : Cartoonist Fred Hembeck is super-talented, and a classy guy to boot.
Paper Heroes : Your source for a wide variety of hobby needs in Lake Charles, LA, and the surrounding area.
Super Sentai.net : The official site for the long-running Japanese superhero series.
Lest anyone think this was all about trimming down, I did add a new link to the blogroll. JR The Monsterboy has done work for me in the past, and I consider him one of the best artists I know. Check out his sketch blog (and also his pin-up blog, not linked here) and see what he's capable of doing strictly by hand. I think you'll be impressed.
That's all for housecleaning matters. Tune in Monday for the beginning of five consecutive days of entries covering the Captain Satellite characters!
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Friday, April 9, 2010
Hiroshi Miyauchi Is A Stone Cold Pimp
True
I have sung the praises of Hiroshi Miyauchi anywhere I can find a forum on the Internet. He is my all-time favorite superhero actor. Not just Japanese superhero actor, but favorite superhero actor overall.
Miyauchi isn't the best thespian to ever play a superhero. He probably isn't the ideal physical specimen. But doggone it, the man has charisma to spare, and I've never seen anyone have a better time giving the business to bad guys while wearing a funny suit. He tackles his roles with conviction and humor, and you can tell they really matter to him. Plus, he is cool. Just look at him!
Hiroshi Miyauchi rose to prominence playing the alter ego of the title character in KAMEN RIDER V3 in the early 1970s. But I'd argue it was later in the decade when Miyauchi truly came into his own. In shows like HIMITSU SENTAI GORANGER, JAKQ DENGEKI TAI (photo source), and most especially KAIKETSU ZUBAT, he distinguished himself from the rest of the pack. ZUBAT is so essential Miyauchi that his portrayal of Ken Hayakawa has largely defined his career.
Even as a guest star, Miyauchi shines. He practically steals the direct-to-video GAORANGER VS. SUPER SENTAI (2001) from the rest of the cast, which includes other veterans of vintage sentai shows. And then, there's the Japanese Spider-Man series. Miyauchi is in a grand total of two episodes, but wow, he makes an impression in them. Best of all, I can demonstrate his prowess because of them.
Marvel's official website offers free legal videos of the entire Japanese Spider-Man series, complete with English subtitles. Nothing is going to replace my limited DVD box set in my heart, but this is still one of the greatest boons to Japanese superhero fans in the history of the Internet. (Now, how about swinging a DVD on demand release, huh?)
Anyway, here are Hiroshi Miyauchi's two episodes of SPIDERMAN :
Episode 31 - "No Tomorrow For The Detective And Son"
Episode 39 - "The Greatest Martial Arts Tournament In The World"
WARNING : OWARI takes no responsibility for you being utterly rocked by the preceding videos.
Hiroshi Miyauchi is still going strong, as this page amply demonstrates. He is simply a treasure, and someone for whom the term "larger than life" is just not even adequate as far as I'm concerned.
Thursday, April 8, 2010
When Your Characters Move On
In Monday's entry, I made the statement, "I never waste a character if I think they have even a scrap of potential to be something entertaining." True enough. But the flipside of that statement is that sometimes characters just stop working. This can be because the character is so derivative of another that you can no longer justify their use. That fate befell my own Ferro Man, and it's why he (more or less) evolved and merged into Captain Satellite. But more often that not, it's not a failure of the character, but more their context.
I'm a firm believer in the notion that there are no bad characters, only a lack of imagination. I have lived long enough to see the rehabilitation of comic book heroes once deemed hopelessly lame, like Mr. Terrific. You can find value in anything if you put forth the effort and creativity. It's just that the situation isn't always ideal.
I'm not explaining this well. Let me give you two examples from my own experience to illustrate my point.
1) Doctor Diabolo is seen here as delineated by Sara Denny. This is how I explained his origins in 2008 in the notes for the 10th Episode of the "Return of Jetman" series : "Dr. Diabolo was originally a character I created to battle my personal superhero Captain Satellite. The unusual spelling "Diabolo" (not a typo for "Diablo", as a gag much later spells out) derives from the time in high school in which one of my classmates was singing the praises of the Lamborghini Diablo and couldn't quite pronounce the name correctly."
When I wrote that particular ROJ story in 2003, I didn't anticipate doing much of anything with Captain Satellite and his gang. I drafted Dr. Diabolo into ROJ because I liked his name, and he was a "blank slate" that I could mold however I saw fit. He didn't even have a set design until I commissioned that drawing from Sara.
Well, a few years down the line, I wound up doing a lot with the Captain Satellite cast of characters. Perhaps you have seen them here? Unfortunately for him, Dr. Diabolo was no longer a good fit for the very world that had led to his creation. There were other characters who filled all of his functions more elegantly : mad scientist, would-be world conqueror, armored villain, guy with alliterative "DD" name, etc. My use of Dr. Diabolo in ROJ led to his being crowded out of Captain Satellite.
Don't feel too badly for Dr. D - he fared pretty well snagging the ROJ gig. He scored a wonderful design by Sara, and the story featuring him has probably been read by hundreds of people around the globe since 2003. You could convince me pretty easily that ROJ and Captain Satellite inhabit the same "world", but I don't foresee Dr. Diabolo and Captain Satellite crossing paths in any official capacity.
2) Amazing Girl & Muscle Woman are two characters I invented back in my elementary school days. They are also the only two characters to ever be annexed into Captain Satellite's domain by popular acclaim.
I've related the story of my first jam picture here in the past. What I didn't spell out was that, a week after its original posting, I received the best gift in my Easter basket ever. That was the first time Sara posted art of my characters, but it would by no means be the last.
Sara was and is quite keen on my super heroines. She and the mysterioso Kabuki Katze even conspired to fashion for me a most excellent birthday gift in 2007 involving them. You'll probably be seeing more about that project one day.
My jam picture was intended as a symbolic shot, uniting bunches of characters running throughout my imagination. It's not a literal representation of the way my "worlds" operate. The old childhood "Legion" characters are separate from the "Captain Satellite" group, largely out of necessity. But Sara and Kabuki chose to illustrate the four heroines (two from each "world") together, and there was no harm in that. They were wonderful pieces of artwork, and the conceit worked beautifully. It was thrilling.
Eventually, Sara and I concocted a project which would have brought Amazing Girl and Muscle Woman fully into the Captain Satellite mythos. We had lengthy discussions about ideas, and even devised civilian identities for the pair - something they had lacked up to that point. (Amazing Girl was Kendal Rose, with one "l", and Muscle Woman was Beth Gordon, if memory serves.) Sara designed new looks for all four girls, and I went back and colored some of my old art as a bit of a teaser. This was the "reason" alluded to in the description on the Muscle Woman page.
This collaboration eventually fell by the wayside, as both Sara and I ended up getting involved with other things. That sort of thing happens all the time, and it wasn't a big deal. However, it left me with a bit of a problem. Amazing Girl and Muscle Woman had been sort of halfway inducted into the Captain Satellite mythos, and I had no real ideas for them.
I'll delve into my concepts on the "Too Many Superheroes" conundrum someday, but the main point here is that I try to limit the superheroes running around Captain Satellite's world to preserve the uniqueness of the ones already there. Heck, there were stages in its development in which he was the only superhero. So it is vital to me to ensure that I have some potential stories in mind for every character in what I have grandly dubbed "My World" on this blog. And sadly, I have none for Amazing Girl and Muscle Woman. That was really a story that Sara had wanted to tell, and she has moved on to other things.
After struggling to develop something that grabbed me, I ultimately decided to abandon my efforts to make Amazing Girl and Muscle Woman fit into Captain Satellite's universe, and put them back on the shelf with the rest of their Legion colleagues. They are not dead or forgotten; they can still frolic and play with their old buddies and can still star in new art both canonical and non-canonical. I'd even say the door is still open if either Sara decides she is dying to tell her stories or I somehow come up with concepts to do my delightful duo justice. It's just that I'd rather preserve the mystique they earned rather than diminish it by doing something half-hearted.
Whew! That was very long-winded, but those stories illustrate two different examples of characters of mine who are perfectly fine but no longer fit into their original plans. Fortunately, they can live on in their current versions, so nothing is truly lost.
A huge, HUGE thanks, and much credit, to my friend and former collaborator Sara. We did a lot of fantastic work in tandem for a couple of years, and her influence looms large in much of what I do to this day. Do yourself a favor and be sure to check out both her blog and her brand-new deviantArt page.
I'm a firm believer in the notion that there are no bad characters, only a lack of imagination. I have lived long enough to see the rehabilitation of comic book heroes once deemed hopelessly lame, like Mr. Terrific. You can find value in anything if you put forth the effort and creativity. It's just that the situation isn't always ideal.
I'm not explaining this well. Let me give you two examples from my own experience to illustrate my point.
1) Doctor Diabolo is seen here as delineated by Sara Denny. This is how I explained his origins in 2008 in the notes for the 10th Episode of the "Return of Jetman" series : "Dr. Diabolo was originally a character I created to battle my personal superhero Captain Satellite. The unusual spelling "Diabolo" (not a typo for "Diablo", as a gag much later spells out) derives from the time in high school in which one of my classmates was singing the praises of the Lamborghini Diablo and couldn't quite pronounce the name correctly."
When I wrote that particular ROJ story in 2003, I didn't anticipate doing much of anything with Captain Satellite and his gang. I drafted Dr. Diabolo into ROJ because I liked his name, and he was a "blank slate" that I could mold however I saw fit. He didn't even have a set design until I commissioned that drawing from Sara.
Well, a few years down the line, I wound up doing a lot with the Captain Satellite cast of characters. Perhaps you have seen them here? Unfortunately for him, Dr. Diabolo was no longer a good fit for the very world that had led to his creation. There were other characters who filled all of his functions more elegantly : mad scientist, would-be world conqueror, armored villain, guy with alliterative "DD" name, etc. My use of Dr. Diabolo in ROJ led to his being crowded out of Captain Satellite.
Don't feel too badly for Dr. D - he fared pretty well snagging the ROJ gig. He scored a wonderful design by Sara, and the story featuring him has probably been read by hundreds of people around the globe since 2003. You could convince me pretty easily that ROJ and Captain Satellite inhabit the same "world", but I don't foresee Dr. Diabolo and Captain Satellite crossing paths in any official capacity.
2) Amazing Girl & Muscle Woman are two characters I invented back in my elementary school days. They are also the only two characters to ever be annexed into Captain Satellite's domain by popular acclaim.
I've related the story of my first jam picture here in the past. What I didn't spell out was that, a week after its original posting, I received the best gift in my Easter basket ever. That was the first time Sara posted art of my characters, but it would by no means be the last.
Sara was and is quite keen on my super heroines. She and the mysterioso Kabuki Katze even conspired to fashion for me a most excellent birthday gift in 2007 involving them. You'll probably be seeing more about that project one day.
My jam picture was intended as a symbolic shot, uniting bunches of characters running throughout my imagination. It's not a literal representation of the way my "worlds" operate. The old childhood "Legion" characters are separate from the "Captain Satellite" group, largely out of necessity. But Sara and Kabuki chose to illustrate the four heroines (two from each "world") together, and there was no harm in that. They were wonderful pieces of artwork, and the conceit worked beautifully. It was thrilling.
Eventually, Sara and I concocted a project which would have brought Amazing Girl and Muscle Woman fully into the Captain Satellite mythos. We had lengthy discussions about ideas, and even devised civilian identities for the pair - something they had lacked up to that point. (Amazing Girl was Kendal Rose, with one "l", and Muscle Woman was Beth Gordon, if memory serves.) Sara designed new looks for all four girls, and I went back and colored some of my old art as a bit of a teaser. This was the "reason" alluded to in the description on the Muscle Woman page.
This collaboration eventually fell by the wayside, as both Sara and I ended up getting involved with other things. That sort of thing happens all the time, and it wasn't a big deal. However, it left me with a bit of a problem. Amazing Girl and Muscle Woman had been sort of halfway inducted into the Captain Satellite mythos, and I had no real ideas for them.
I'll delve into my concepts on the "Too Many Superheroes" conundrum someday, but the main point here is that I try to limit the superheroes running around Captain Satellite's world to preserve the uniqueness of the ones already there. Heck, there were stages in its development in which he was the only superhero. So it is vital to me to ensure that I have some potential stories in mind for every character in what I have grandly dubbed "My World" on this blog. And sadly, I have none for Amazing Girl and Muscle Woman. That was really a story that Sara had wanted to tell, and she has moved on to other things.
After struggling to develop something that grabbed me, I ultimately decided to abandon my efforts to make Amazing Girl and Muscle Woman fit into Captain Satellite's universe, and put them back on the shelf with the rest of their Legion colleagues. They are not dead or forgotten; they can still frolic and play with their old buddies and can still star in new art both canonical and non-canonical. I'd even say the door is still open if either Sara decides she is dying to tell her stories or I somehow come up with concepts to do my delightful duo justice. It's just that I'd rather preserve the mystique they earned rather than diminish it by doing something half-hearted.
Whew! That was very long-winded, but those stories illustrate two different examples of characters of mine who are perfectly fine but no longer fit into their original plans. Fortunately, they can live on in their current versions, so nothing is truly lost.
A huge, HUGE thanks, and much credit, to my friend and former collaborator Sara. We did a lot of fantastic work in tandem for a couple of years, and her influence looms large in much of what I do to this day. Do yourself a favor and be sure to check out both her blog and her brand-new deviantArt page.
Wednesday, April 7, 2010
The Green Machines
Did you ever come across something that makes perfectly good sense, yet you can't quite reconcile it with something else you know to be true? Here, read this quote from Greg Theakston that was published in Comics Interview #20 (Feb. 1985) :
What's the problem with that, sez you? Well, something was nagging me about it, but I couldn't put my finger on it for the longest time. Then, I realized what bothered me about the story. It was the Titanium Man.
Who? Old Iron Man villain, first appearance in Tales of Suspense #69 (Sept. 1965). Notice something about that cover? He's the Titanium Man (as in steel), and he's green.
Well, you say, that sort of thing happens. But if it's a rule, you'd think they would have changed it. But no, Titanium Man stayed green for years. He's probably still green, if he's still around.
And who was the editor of all three comics linked above? You guessed it : Stan Lee.
Makes you wonder, doesn't it?
[Jim] Steranko told me a story once about Stan Lee and his colorists. Again, there was nobody out there teaching anybody how to color, so Stan took a mess of comic books and cut them up, pasted them into a big scrap book, and marked DON'T DO. Don't do this, don't do this, don't do this, don't do this, don't do this, don't do this. And a lot of it is logic. I mean, you don't color machinery green. Green is an organic color. You color things like vegetation green, and maybe costumes green, but you don't make machines green because machines are metal, even though can paint a machine green, you think of chrome and metallic colors, which tend to be in the blues and purples. Now, a comic book is shorthand for reality. A twisted reality, but it's a shorthand for reality.
What's the problem with that, sez you? Well, something was nagging me about it, but I couldn't put my finger on it for the longest time. Then, I realized what bothered me about the story. It was the Titanium Man.
Who? Old Iron Man villain, first appearance in Tales of Suspense #69 (Sept. 1965). Notice something about that cover? He's the Titanium Man (as in steel), and he's green.
Well, you say, that sort of thing happens. But if it's a rule, you'd think they would have changed it. But no, Titanium Man stayed green for years. He's probably still green, if he's still around.
And who was the editor of all three comics linked above? You guessed it : Stan Lee.
Makes you wonder, doesn't it?
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
All Hail Lordwormm
I know very little about the person who calls himself "Lordwormm". He joined the deviantArt site last year, and has been making quite an impression on a lot of people with his enthusiasm. The sheer scope of both his imagination and his productivity is staggering. He has a distinctive style that I find fascinating. And most startling, at least from my perspective, he's done unsolicited fanart of my characters.
Lordwormm is big on promoting original characters on dA - both his and those of others. Little did I know when we first crossed paths that he'd be taking my gang along for the ride. So far, he has included Blue Behemoth, Firegirl, and Urban Nightmare in multi-artist pieces he has done. My favorite of those is probably the second one, as it is an homage to the cover of All-Star Squadron #1. Need I add I bought that comic when it first came out? Urban Nightmare taking the role of Kanjar Ro in spoofing the Justice League "Slave Ship of Space" cover makes me laugh, but I should hasten to add that the Nightmare is actually a heckuva nice guy. Well, no, he really isn't, but he's no evil-doer either.
There's also the little matter of this :
(Click that image for a much larger version of the pic at deviantArt!)
Why yes, that is indeed a picture devoted strictly to my characters. In it, Enemy Alien is ready and willing to match strength with the heroic assemblage of Captain Satellite, Drone Man, Ultimate American, Thunder Man, and Elektroid. I especially like Lordwormm's take on Thunder Man - in fact, I'm filing it away for future reference on the guy. I'm also deeply impressed that he didn't cheat on all the wires in Elektroid's head.
I can't even explain what an amazing surprise this picture was. All of Lordwormm's tributes have been gratifying and humbling, and I hope I can repay him a little by promoting his awesome gallery on my blog. Thanks, Lordwormm, wherever you are!
Oh, and if you're thinking you're not familiar with some of these characters of mine, you shouldn't worry. You'll be meeting them before you know it.
Lordwormm is big on promoting original characters on dA - both his and those of others. Little did I know when we first crossed paths that he'd be taking my gang along for the ride. So far, he has included Blue Behemoth, Firegirl, and Urban Nightmare in multi-artist pieces he has done. My favorite of those is probably the second one, as it is an homage to the cover of All-Star Squadron #1. Need I add I bought that comic when it first came out? Urban Nightmare taking the role of Kanjar Ro in spoofing the Justice League "Slave Ship of Space" cover makes me laugh, but I should hasten to add that the Nightmare is actually a heckuva nice guy. Well, no, he really isn't, but he's no evil-doer either.
There's also the little matter of this :
(Click that image for a much larger version of the pic at deviantArt!)
Why yes, that is indeed a picture devoted strictly to my characters. In it, Enemy Alien is ready and willing to match strength with the heroic assemblage of Captain Satellite, Drone Man, Ultimate American, Thunder Man, and Elektroid. I especially like Lordwormm's take on Thunder Man - in fact, I'm filing it away for future reference on the guy. I'm also deeply impressed that he didn't cheat on all the wires in Elektroid's head.
I can't even explain what an amazing surprise this picture was. All of Lordwormm's tributes have been gratifying and humbling, and I hope I can repay him a little by promoting his awesome gallery on my blog. Thanks, Lordwormm, wherever you are!
Oh, and if you're thinking you're not familiar with some of these characters of mine, you shouldn't worry. You'll be meeting them before you know it.
Monday, April 5, 2010
Dreaming Is Free
My dreamscape is usually not a pretty place. I try to maintain a positive attitude towards life in my waking moments, so my subconscious often feels the need to compensate. Goodness, my dreams are frequently angst-fests, and not something I look forward to remembering. Ah, but sometimes...sometimes a completely different part of my brain operates during sleepy time.
Creativity is a nebulous sort of thing in a lot of ways. I know I don't really understand how it works even for me. But I do know that when my subconscious decides to exercise its creativity instead of its anxiety, the results are pure gold.
As an example, a couple of weeks ago, I had a pair of amazing dreams. I dozed off one Saturday night for an hour or so, and that is a standard recipe for the worst kind of dreams for me. Instead, my brain crafted a neat little tale where my characters Drone Man and Enemy Alien had a fight in a spooky forest at night. There were ray guns and sting beams galore. Genius! A day or two later, I dreamt that Igadevil and I had organized a Kamen Rider convention/stage show in my tiny little hometown. It was so cool that I was disappointed when I woke up. Usually, I'm relieved to learn "it was all just a dream".
I've even been known to create characters in my dreams. The best example came a long time ago, back in the days when I was voraciously reading the original Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe series. I was fascinated by the appendix section on the inside back covers, which included brief text entries for characters that didn't warrant full entries. Many of those guys were unknown to me at the time, and I still can't say I know most of them that well.
As it happened, one night that appendix got filtered through my subconscious, and what came out was intriguing indeed. At least two Marvel characters I had never seen, Cobalt Man and the Orb, were recast in all-new Chris Elam versions. My dream guys have very little to do with the "real" characters, but that is what makes them fun. In fact, they will be turning up later this year in renamed form as part of Captain Satellite's world. I never waste a character if I think they have even a scrap of potential to be something entertaining.
This past Wednesday night, I was lying in bed, half awake and half dreaming. It was the same state that conjured my ersatz Cobalt Man and Orb years ago. This time, my mind created a character I dubbed "the Psychedelic Man". I love psychedelic music, and the imagery that accompanies it. Heck, I even think the word "psychedelic" is quite groovy. I'm down with everything except the substances, I suppose.
Next morning, I sat down and drew the Psychedelic Man exactly the way he had appeared in my mind. You can see him over at my deviantArt account. That led almost inexorably to even more artwork. It was nicely reassuring that, even when you feel like you're in a bit of a dry spell, your brain can snap out of it without warning.
Do you get any creative inspirations from your dreams?
Creativity is a nebulous sort of thing in a lot of ways. I know I don't really understand how it works even for me. But I do know that when my subconscious decides to exercise its creativity instead of its anxiety, the results are pure gold.
As an example, a couple of weeks ago, I had a pair of amazing dreams. I dozed off one Saturday night for an hour or so, and that is a standard recipe for the worst kind of dreams for me. Instead, my brain crafted a neat little tale where my characters Drone Man and Enemy Alien had a fight in a spooky forest at night. There were ray guns and sting beams galore. Genius! A day or two later, I dreamt that Igadevil and I had organized a Kamen Rider convention/stage show in my tiny little hometown. It was so cool that I was disappointed when I woke up. Usually, I'm relieved to learn "it was all just a dream".
I've even been known to create characters in my dreams. The best example came a long time ago, back in the days when I was voraciously reading the original Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe series. I was fascinated by the appendix section on the inside back covers, which included brief text entries for characters that didn't warrant full entries. Many of those guys were unknown to me at the time, and I still can't say I know most of them that well.
As it happened, one night that appendix got filtered through my subconscious, and what came out was intriguing indeed. At least two Marvel characters I had never seen, Cobalt Man and the Orb, were recast in all-new Chris Elam versions. My dream guys have very little to do with the "real" characters, but that is what makes them fun. In fact, they will be turning up later this year in renamed form as part of Captain Satellite's world. I never waste a character if I think they have even a scrap of potential to be something entertaining.
This past Wednesday night, I was lying in bed, half awake and half dreaming. It was the same state that conjured my ersatz Cobalt Man and Orb years ago. This time, my mind created a character I dubbed "the Psychedelic Man". I love psychedelic music, and the imagery that accompanies it. Heck, I even think the word "psychedelic" is quite groovy. I'm down with everything except the substances, I suppose.
Next morning, I sat down and drew the Psychedelic Man exactly the way he had appeared in my mind. You can see him over at my deviantArt account. That led almost inexorably to even more artwork. It was nicely reassuring that, even when you feel like you're in a bit of a dry spell, your brain can snap out of it without warning.
Do you get any creative inspirations from your dreams?
Friday, April 2, 2010
Two Great Tastes That Go Great Together?
I don't think I need to fess up to the fact that I have wildly varied musical tastes. I make no apologies for that. I like a lot of different types of things. Music is music, no matter what genre you choose to compartmentalize it under.
That said...
I was on Amazon recently and saw something that gave me pause. It happened while looking at CDs for that great American thinker, Tone Lōc. You remember him, right? 1980s, "Wild Thing", "Funky Cold Medina". Yeah. that guy. I saw something on one page in particular that caught my eye so much that I felt I needed to comment on it.
(You might need to click this one to see it well enough for it to be legible.)
I guess I can see the Michael Jackson album as something someone might buy with this particular collection. But Three Dog Night? As I captioned there, "Huh?" Someone decided that what really goes with "Funky Cold Medina" is "Joy To The World" and "Never Been To Spain"?
Apparently.
That said...
I was on Amazon recently and saw something that gave me pause. It happened while looking at CDs for that great American thinker, Tone Lōc. You remember him, right? 1980s, "Wild Thing", "Funky Cold Medina". Yeah. that guy. I saw something on one page in particular that caught my eye so much that I felt I needed to comment on it.
(You might need to click this one to see it well enough for it to be legible.)
I guess I can see the Michael Jackson album as something someone might buy with this particular collection. But Three Dog Night? As I captioned there, "Huh?" Someone decided that what really goes with "Funky Cold Medina" is "Joy To The World" and "Never Been To Spain"?
Apparently.
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