| I went in for an interview at a little web design firm in Evanston this morning, and they hired me on the spot. : O The pay is (technically) much less than what I get now, but the billable hours are going to be about twice as much, so it mostly evens out.
And I won't have to buy my own RAM or my own copy of Adobe CS3 or my own G5 to run Parallels or my own Earl Grey tea, and the chair is WAY comfier. And there was a gamer rag on the desk, a tiny Greedo on the shelf, everyone but me came to the interview in jeans, and one of the owners is an old friend of one of my best friend's mothers, so....
I THINK I LIKE WHERE THIS IS GOING. | comments: 5 comments or Leave a comment   |
| When it comes down to the epic battle between an overgrown talking lion Christ and an alcoholic panserbjørn, THE LION WINS.
The Golden Compass fucked itself over so bad I don't even know where to begin. Do not waste your money. | | comments: 4 comments or Leave a comment |
| TokyoPop put out a Dark Crystal manga.*
I saw a preview. It looks really well-done, and in a startling twist manages to pull of an amerimanga style that doesn't annoy the hell out of me.
I hope you realize you're now paying me for your portfolio site by buying me this book, ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) capnchef. Hint hint. Nudge. SHOVE.
*Also a Labyrinth one. It sux mightily. Skip it, oh fellow children of the 80's. | | comments: 1 comment or Leave a comment |
| This episode. It stank. The Avatar trademark snappy dialogue was nowhere to be found.
I hate teen drama. Drama with teens in it is totally fine. But they hit a whole ton of stupid cliches in 15 minutes it looks like a multi-million dollar studio had been hired to animate lousy fan fiction. Azula managed to bring down what is probably the largest city on the planet with nothing but guile. She knows how to read people and situations.
And then she flails around like dork at a beach party and needs boytips from the contortionist with D cups. She admits JEALOUSLY? Wah wah mommy didn't love me? I like multifaceted villains, but not when those facets are bashed off with a sledgehammer.
Mei and Zuko have no chemistry at all. They are horrid together. Their lines are predictable. They are whiny and annoying.
The whole episode was awkward. Not funny-awkward or cute-awkward. Painful-to-watch-awkward.
Altho Iroh and the royal kiddos making sandcastles was beyond cute. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| Irene Gallo, Art Director for Tor Books, maintains a blog. Therein are WIP sketches and paintings from the top talent in the sf&f publishing industry. Just passing on the word.
HINT HINT. | | comments: Leave a comment |
| | I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. I hate my job. | | |
| A selection of useful links to individuals engaged in fantasy worldbuilding:
1. limyaael squeezes all the stupid cliches out of fantasy you don't even know you're propagating. Read the rants. ALL OF THEM. (thanks questionstar)
2. For when you need to know how badly quicklime thrown in somebody's face will burn their corneas, how long it would take to get from Alexandria to Tanis in 55BC, or what font those little inspiration messages are on Starbucks cups are in, we have ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif) little_details.
3. hindunet.org took down their incredibly comprehensive pictorial listing of Indian weaponry and martial culture. Pissed now. I was using that you guyz! Here is a substantially less good one, which covers all of Asia and some Africa too.
4. Scans of 19th century Braun & Schneider's History of Costume . The farther back you go the more romanticized it gets. Just warning.
5. Factual breakdown of exactly who makes up the Dark Lord's Vile Horde (or the Army of Goodness and Daisies and Kittens). Required reading for anyone planning to muster an army of thousands. Remember, they gotta eat.
6. How to draw a bow. No more cute noodle-armed elf archers, please. English longbows had a draw weight of 100 pounds or more!
7. Absolutely massive free catalogue of every videogame (+movie+tv show+anime but not as comprehensive) soundtrack EVER. Getting your hero's theme music or reliving your misspent youth is but a download away! I totally did not download the collected works of Joe Hisaishi or anything. | | comments: 5 comments or Leave a comment |
| I got thinking a lot about the villain, and decided his motivation was too shallow. Then I started thinking about the "give the eldest son back his throne" plot, and how stupid it is. Birth order does not affect political ability. So instead, we are now dislodging the "true" and legal heir, a young man of purely noble bloodlines and questionable intelligence, and the man that pulls his strings. Introduced some ethnic tensions into the mix too, between the conquering and conquered (our hero's mother was of the conquered people).
I also realized the plot is a frantic race to avert rather than precipitate war in a nation that cannot afford human conflict on top of the climatic catastrophe that's grinding their civilization into literal dust. THIS DOESN'T SOUND LIKE ANYWHERE WE KNOW, DOES IT. GEE GOLLY.
Character Profile: Finvair
( Character Profile: Finvair )
Character Profile: Grandfather (the mentor)
( Character Profile: Grandfather (the mentor) )
( Character Profile: Duke Seloukon (ebil overlord!11!!1) )
To be done: Prince Nikolias (equal amounts love interest!!! and annoying sarcastic guy), General Mettic (um, Uncle Iroh with a drinking problem, and I don't mean tea), Emperor Pyrros (gonna croak soon), Yasmin (the cosseted intellectual with a raging crush on Anha), Lady Djosaena (Niko's sister and generally whip-smart badass politican), Farnasz (her husband), Matti (her adopted son and teenaged warrior monk), Empress Eirene (Anna Nicole Smith!), Prince Aleksander (Niko's half-brother and blowhard)
Dead people that still deserve brief profiles: Chiowe Ada (Niko and Djosaena's mother), Lief (Anha's husband), Heath (Anha's father), | | comments: Leave a comment |
| I got a bite on a huge job yesterday. One of my former classmates snagged a job at an interactive media company that does kid's work.
Her boss was all like: NEED CHEAP PAINTERLY DEADLINE-CONSCIOUS KID'S ILLUSTRATOR NOW
and she was all like: I HAVE CONNECTIONS TO SUCH PEOPLE...BAT SIGNAL!
and I was all like: I'LL GET MY CAPE
She said words like "contract" and "fees" in her email, so it smells like the real thing. Getting a deposit and incremental payment anyways, just in case.
I hate writing comic scripts. I learned that this week. I also firmly believe that unless you're enjoying your hobbies, you're doing it wrong. Maybe I will just go for the novel. The longest piece of fiction I've ever written comes out at only a smidge over 21,000 words, so we'll see.
I need a new lj layout. Will have time to do this when?
Avatar Book 3 premier tonight and I gots no TV. ;_;
( Meat and Sarcasm Guy STRIKES ) | | comments: 1 comment or Leave a comment |
| I miss my PlayStation :(.
But I got a job. And since when it rains, it pours, an hour later I got a second. I'll be the Church Office Lady at Third Unitarian in Austin three days a week, and will also be doing gig-based holographic print production courtesy of kuroloki (THANK YOU AGAIN!).
This brings me up to three.
Plus the volunteer do-gooderism for Urban Habitat Chicago, in which I am Lead Designer (my staff consists of a jade plant and a stuffed moose, don't tell).
Plus the ATLA fanfic White City comic. I scripted the rest of the first "issue" while listening to gypsy punk-rock at the Old Town School. Don't ask. Now I have to write it down.
I made sesame eggplant dip with the stuff in the farmshare bag. It's kinda weird by itself, but I have this feeling it would make fantastic vegetarian gyoza filling. This needs to be investigated further.
P.S. kuroloki I lost your phone number. We have to figure out the transportation situation for Saturday.
P.P.S. I call you tonight, questionstar. Saturday won't work, for reasons vaguely alluded to in previous post script. Want to catch Stardust on Sunday? | | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment |
| I'm going to be posting a whole ton of the background to The White City story I've been working on, mostly to have a backup of it accessible wherever I happen to be, and as a diary of the creative process because I like that sort of thing. Feedback is not required unless you're really moved, because this journal will be deluged.
( A brief introduction. )
Character Profile: Anhavair
( Character Profile: Anhavair )
I don't recall reading any stories that use a "minion of the Dark Lord" (as it were) as the main character. Does it just not occur to anybody?
digitaltart | | comments: 4 comments or Leave a comment |
| Topic: race in fantasy. Or: I pretend I know what the hell I am talking about.
One of the protagonists is white. One of them is black. The rest of the cast mostly comes in various shades of darker-than-a-latte, because sweet bejebus am I tired of bland Eurocentric fantasy.
But. But, BUT…I’m afraid of appropriating and exoticizing, having been raised by people who are Not Cool with That Shit, but really, what’s the line? I have a genuine respect for the contributions the Islamic empires, because their art / astronomy / mathematics / medicine were INCREDIBLE and god damn the Alhambra is one place I want to see before I die (and thanx for passing the '0' our way, guys).
The fact remains the main character defaulted to white. BAD SOCIALLY CONSCIOUS WRITER. BAD.
On the flipside, fantasy fiction is absolutely rank with racist tripe. The Drow are still around, for chrissake. Around and popular, and no amount of revision to the game books will change how fucked up the concept is. They’re dark-skinned and violent and whipped by their women and live in the ghetto Underdark. You could not get any more blatant unless you dressed them up in cheetah skins and had them yelling ooga-booga while murdering all them white wood elf women.
My story lacks the white colonialist element that so pisses me off about most other stories that rely on this trope, since the pseudo-northern European culture is very primitive compared Middle Eastern/North African people to the south, but still. There’s so much pesky emotional investment in the character I don’t want to change her. Sigh. Any first work will be flawed, I suppose.
Upcoming!
Rants on heteronormativity, how to write feminist fiction without being misandristic and preachy, complete disregard for the disabled, and why writing about people who are not straight white men is not being "PC", but rather REALISTIC. | | comments: 22 comments or Leave a comment |
| | Subject: | Awright. | | Time: | 09:11 pm | | Current Mood: | peculiar |
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| Nothing spectacular, but at least I can draw again.
( Costume study of Prince Nikolias, from the story I've been niggling at since Sequential Imaging. It has gotten steadily less Roman and more Turkish the more I squint at it. )
I'm not sure I want to make it Sequential Images, now that it comes right down to it, for I have discovered a hitherto unknown wild passion for the written word. What I really want to do, I think, is make a big fat illustrated novel. Unfortunately, the publishing world has generally agreed illustrated books Are for Children, Okay, So Don't Go Putting Sex in Them. The only time I have seen this convention broken (and broken well), was Dream Hunters by Neil Gaiman and Yoshitaka Amano, and they're Neil fuckin' Gaiman and Yoshitaka fuckin' Amano, and whatever they produce will sell.
May turn this into a worldbuilding journal. That way, the guilt will propel me to write more maybe! | | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment |
| | Current Music: | Spirited Away OST - 19 | | Time: | 08:51 pm | | Current Mood: | ![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/moonsis/stars/purple/exhausted_sp.gif) exhausted |
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| Me: It's lookin' a little slow at work this week. Maybe I can start those character sheets I've been meaning to--
My uterus: HOOORMONES FUN TIME!!!
Me: I hate my art. I hate my writing. I hate my me. *emo emo emo*
My uterus: NOW YOU BLEED.
Me: I may be a third-wave lesbian feminist, but I am not embracing this gift of my divine femininity. My divine femininity is being clubbed into unconsciousness with extra-strength ibuprofen and gelato.
My uterus: I HAVE SPECIAL TREAT FOR YOU THIS MONTH, TOFU-SLURPING, GRANOLA-BAKING, NONCOW-EATING HIPPIE. I CALL IT--"IRON DEFICIENCY ANEMIA".
Me: Oh, fuck you.
*collapses into bed*
P.S. nekokikichan where are you? When I said I'd buy you lunch that was not an idle threat. | | comments: 11 comments or Leave a comment |
| (Art)
I have to get my license soon. I am not looking forward to this. Cars, frankly, terrify me. They are expensive to maintain, annoying to store, bad for the planet, and easy to kill people with. I recognize their necessity in certain situations, such as when you are transporting heavy furniture, but other than that I don't want to touch them. People tell me I am being silly for feeling these sorts of reservations.
About 43,000 people are killed in car accidents every year, 2,900,000 are injured, and if oil consumption continues at current rates (it's actually increasing due to the rapid industrialization of China and India), the supply will flatline about 50 years from now.
It's not that that I'm too scared of driving. It's that other people aren't scared enough. | | comments: 4 comments or Leave a comment |
| I have moved out of my parent's metaphorical basement and now live in Edgewater, which is cause for a celebration that I don't have the energy to put on because I spent ALL FUCKING YESTERDAY IN CLOSE PROXIMITY TO OR ON AIRPLANES. Maybe later. The place has a deck with a killer view. I have a cat now--Morrigan, Goddess of Death, whom I did not name and generally refer to as "Gordita", because she is. There are hardwood floors, a big full-length mirror, and no cockroaches, so I am counting this as a success.
Harry Potterfest blah blah I don't care. The magnitude of my apathy has surprised even myself. I think I spent all my dorkish enthusiasm on the Golden Compass movie and essays by Ursula LeGuin, who is 100x smarter than I will ever be. She makes me want to write things about warrior princesses who are through being caricatures of Third-Wave feminism as filtered through the adolescent male psyche, because inner strength is more interesting than outer strength, and metal bustiers pinch.
WARNING PERSONAL ITEMS OF PERSONAL NATURE BY WHICH I MEAN WHINING...
follows this announcement.
This love business is creeping me out, "me" being the sort of person with an imagination. It is very difficult to turn off, and I am therefore caught up in helpless extrapolation about what will happen when she decides she doesn't want me anymore. I feel like I could spend the rest of my life with her (which, I have been led to believe, is a common symptom of being twenty-two and in love). So I'm not sure which is more frightening: hoping it will last and finding it doesn't, or assuming it won't and being proven correct.
This is why artists are so annoying to date. Save yourself the trouble and DON'T DO IT. | | comments: 3 comments or Leave a comment |
| Quick summary of events in no logical order:
1. Met Mayor Daley yesterday at a lecture on climate change (which was fantastic and had incredibly good free hor'devours ). He was as tall as I am in heels. My shoes gave me about 2 inches, and without them I stand 5 ft tall. O.O
2. Rescued a bagle-mutt-thing Em and I found running around Evanston. Its tags put it from somewhere in Austin, which is fuckall far away on the west side. It seemed healthy, smelled okay, and was cute as the dickens. I hope Buster D. Watson's family come to get him soon. I took a picture but it is stuck in my phone.
3. I NEED TO GET OUT OF THIS HOUSE. | | comments: 1 comment or Leave a comment |
| 1. Wait half an hour on platform in freezing rain.
2. Watch train approach. Watch train pass you without stopping.
3. Wait half an hour in station enclosure. Attendant knows nothing about anything.
4. Train arrives at speed of elderly snail, sparking so much you can see the light a mile away.
5. Train stops, and you board.
6. Train can't get going again.
7. Train finally moves.
8. Heat goes out.
9. Lights go out.
10. Trains gets stuck on tracks about 9,000 times.
11. Crazy drunk boards.
12. Crazy drunk lights up.
13. Crazy drunk begins screaming homophobic insults at you and your girlfriend.
14. Delay due to second crazy drunk screaming insults at conductor from platform.
15. Delay due to first crazy drunk almost missing his stop and being too smashed to operate the manual door control.
16. Transfer to subway. Train passes you going wrong direction on wrong side of platform.
17. Wait 20-30 minutes for track to clear. Board train.
Average time of journey, my door to girlfriend's door: 1 hour and 10-20 minutes. Time last night: 3 hours and 30 minutes. | | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment |
| | Tags: | wtf | | Current Music: | Esper Battle | | Time: | 04:52 pm | | Current Mood: | flabbergasted |
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| | What kind of sick fuck wears flipflops in Chicago in February? | | comments: 4 comments or Leave a comment |
| Somebody got the BRILLIANT idea to lock the kitchen door around 11 this morning, which meant I was stuck outside the main floor in my pajamas and couldn't get to class. I tried! Not my fault!
I'm working on a student film as concept artist! It's awesome! I am abusing exclamation points and someday they will undoubtedly come at me in a dark alley brandishing baseball bats in retaliation!
There's a ton of art under here, only a few of which are thumbnailed because I couldn't be bothered to do them all. The zombie ones are all from the film:
  
( Scribblies ) | | comments: 2 comments or Leave a comment |
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![[mood icon]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/mood/moonsis/stars/purple/angry_sp.gif){kind=small}
cranky