Dilapidation

Wow. Looks like I've completely forgotten about this blog. Well, it's not so much that it's forgotten, just that I've been busy uploading stuff to my art blog, and so there doesn't seem to be much need to update this one. And of course I'm mostly active on DeviantART. Although I had forgotten how therepeutic it can be to just type a post full of nonsense.

So what else is new? Still working at Forbidden Planet, for the time being. Still drawing, though I really need to be animating more. My cat is trying to eat a stale chip covered in barbecue sauce. I have just discovered an awesome band called Bury Your Dead (their back catalogue turned out to be of great comfort during the hellish Tube strike over the last couple of days.

That about covers it I think. There's other stuff, but I don't feel like going into it now...

IT LIVES

Doubt anyone comes here any more, but stuff has happened since the last post (of course). So, for your enjoyment, here is a dainty list of bullet points:

• Saw the Mighty Boosh live, and it was good
• Lost my job at doof thanks the credit crunch (now a full-blown credit crisis)
• Got a Christmas job at Forbidden Planet
• My grandfather fell ill, and it turned out he had a tumour in his stomach, which he is now getting chemo for
• I got a contract with Orange for a Blackberry, so now my wish of emails on the move has been fulfilled
• Christmas was good, and I finally watched Dark Knight (Heath Ledger sucked, by the way)
• 2008 became 2009
• Kei and I looked at a new flat, because we gave notice to move out by the end of January
• None of the Christmas temps got kept on, so now I'm unemployed
• My birthday rolled around, and I got Guitar Hero 3
• Now we're waiting to see if we get the flat, and I'm looking for a damned job again

I think that about covers it? There's probably more, but that covers the main events since October. Shit happens. And now, I have things to be getting on with....

Trapped in a Box by a Cockney Nut Job

Okay, 18th October I'm trekking back to Caerdydd to see the Mighty Boosh. Live.


In the spirit of things, I'm dressing up as the second greatest boosh character... the Hitcher!

I already have a black coat (thanks to Kei); on the weekend I bought a spring-loaded retractable toy knife and a fake thumb (which was the base for the giant thumb in the top photo); I ordered gloves and a top hat (which I will glue polos to!) from ebay, and I'm also waiting for the boots to arrive.... I've made my solo polo peeper out of masking tape, cardboard and papier mache (see bottom shot!)

Now I'm waiting for the wig and face paint to arrive.....

p.s. This will also be my halloween costume hahahaha
p.p.s. The greatest character is of course Rudi van Disarzio, but his afro is too mighty to even begin to contemplate!

It's all coming together....

Alright you bastards, I'm going to see the Mighty Boosh next Friday,  and in preparation have been putting together a Hitcher costume.  Today I bought toy knife (retractable), a fake thumb (needs some papier mache) and some PVA glue (needs Polos).  My hat and gloves arrived today, now I'm waiting for the boots and need to find the right face paint.... 

Shortcomings

It amazes me to see artists, who are actually a bit rubbish, getting paid to draw cartoons for publications or similar. Seriously, without trying to be egotistical, I am much better than some of these people (and by the same token there are hundreds of thousands of artists who make my work look like absolute dross). It makes me realise that I could probably achieve a lot more if I were to make the effort.

In any case, I'm still plugging away at the daily sketch thing, but I've yet to sort out all my drawings and scattered files, so the blog is a bit empty at the moment (this is a knock-on effect of the big move to London in June). I'll keep you posted.

What Felony Are You?

I think you should take this test. It seems pretty accurate.

You Are Arson

No doubt about it, you have a serious destructive streak. You can't help it! Sometimes you just get so frustrated with the world, and you have to let your aggression out You have a notoriously bad temper. You are obsessed with getting your revenge. You are obviously a pyromaniac, whether you realize it or not. It feels great to watch something burn.

What Felony Are You?

Still Here - Now With Added Employment!

In case anyone actually comes by here anymore, I'm still alive! Nowadays I mainly use my other blog, for all my artwork and animation, which actually helped me land a job as a Flash game artist designer at Doof! It's a Flash social gaming website, so if that sounds like your kind of thing, click the link and take a look!

Here's me hard at work:

Them's the Breaks

Things have progressed since my last post. I did indeed travel to London on my broken foot. Yes, last time I said I had broken my toe, but I've since seen the X-rays and it's a fracture on the fifth bone of my foot, right at the base, so really it's my foot thats broken (hence the stupid cast). More on that later though.

So on Saturday, the four of us went to meet our landlady, sign some contracts, and hand over ridiculous sums of cash. Or rather, Kei and Allyn did, seeing as Alicia and I are skint. In any case, we now have the flat! Romana - the landlady that is - and her husband explained all the boring bits about heating, showed us the post box, handed over the keys and fucked off. All we have to do now, for the time being, is decide what lovely cheap furniture we're going to get from Ikea (we also have to set up Direct Debits, arrange internet access and telephone lines and all that business, but that can wait!)

It was absolutely crippling, though. Due to the stupid half-cast thing on my foot, I couldn't put any weight on it, leaving my to lurch from tube stop to tube stop on a pair of crutches that were mangling my hands - probably because I'm to fat to support my weight on a pair of plastic handles.

I'm alright now though! I went to the hospital today and had that cast taken off, and now I have a metatarsal slipper. This is basically a small open-toed cast with a rubber sandal, so now I can walk on my foot but I look like even more of a tit than before! At least it will be easier to get round London this Saturday to go furniture shopping....

A Visit From the Broken Foot Fairy...

As I may or may not have mentioned, I've been looking for a flat in London, to share with my fiance and a couple of friends. Whilst in London last weekend, looking at some places, I managed to break my toe. I was running to catch up with Kei and Allyn, and twisted my ankle. Or so I thought. After a visit to the hospital last night, X-rays revealed a fracture in the base of my little toe, and I was given a semi-cast type of thing. See how fucking ridiculous that looks? This happens to be the first bone I have broken. Ever.

In any case, the flat we are having is very nice. Look how nice it is. Want to see some more photos of it?

Job Satisfaction (2006)

My second year film. Still haven't figured out why Youtube throws my sound out of synch.

Beowolf: A Throbbing Piece of Shit

For anyone who hasn't seen Beowolf yet, don't. I only recently saw it, and I have to say that it sucks cock. If you did see it, and enjoyed it, fuck you: you have shit in your eyes.



Also, if you're wondering how they came up with the idea to design Grendel as a dorky looking deformed retard, I've worked out the equation:

Domnique Pinon + Keith Richards=

+ =

Grendel!

365 Days of Sketch

I've just joined in with this Project 365 thing... basically, I'm drawing an posting one sketch a day, every day, for a year. I'm on day 4 now; keep up with the action on my Sketch 365 blog.

New... Kind Of

Another comic?! What??
Well, I actually started this one last year. Only I didn't finish it until yesterday, and now it's up!

New!

That's right bitches, Brutal Comics is back in action! I strongly advise you to sample its metal flavours right now!

Safety Pin Scorpion

I love receiving packages in the post. Yesterday I got my second ever package from the good ol' Yew Ess of Ay.

What was in it though? Well several months ago there was a competition on Bent Objects: write the best limerick about the Safety Pin Scorpion that Terry had made, and win it. I entered and guess what? I won (that must make twice in my life now)!

Not only did Terry send me the Scorpion - complete whith tiny plastic bubble which also contained a tiny replica hundred dollar note - but he included a packet of Circus Peanuts, what he describes as "Crap American candy"!

So I'm feeling very lucky today, even if it is April 1st (hahaha no one fooled me yet!). Click on the pictures to see more, or click here to go to be severely impressed!

Aliens, Robots and... Seals? OH MY!

Hurrah, another contest entry!

This time it's for a contest being held by Wildwillowoods on DeviantART. The contest is called Aliens, Robots and... Seals> OH MY! Here's the rules:

"There are three topics ^_^ for triple the fun!

1. Aliens who like ice-cream
2. Robots who like to roller skate
3. Seals who like to shave
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The goal is to convey the statement in a clear but creative way.

You may combine the topics into one pic.

You may make a pic. For each topic (but you may not win more than one prize)"


Guess which one I went for?

Free Sketches?

I'm doing this thing on DeviantART where ten people can get a free sketch from me. Yusecki was one of the first to tell me what she wanted: a swamp dragon (it's a Discworld thing). So here he is!

Sketching Again...

After the all-colour blow out of the last post, I though I'd put up something that I prefer - sketches. I don't mind doing full-blown inked and colured stuff, but I find that I tend to kill the drawing in doing so; my real strength lies in loose, quick drawings, that capture some kind of energy and immediacy. Well, I think that's the case anyway.


This one was done when I was at Imagimax in Thailand. They wanted us to do some concept art, taking a set of characters from Thai mythology and redesign them for a video game. This is one of the sketches I did of a Garuda.

This next one is just a sketch of a character I've been drawing on and off for a couple of years, and which I'm still trying to develop. This one's okay, but I think I'd prefer a looser, more 'cartoony' style.

What do you think?

That's Super, Man

Freakish

See that Feedjit thing over there on the right? It tells me what website people have come here from - usually Google. When I click on the links, it turns out that people most often find my blog by searching for "Lego Terminator" or "Mighty Boosh tattoo". Fair enough, these thing exist on my blog. Slightly more worrying, though, is the fact that someone found my blog by searching for 'little red riding hood porn'... perhaps stranger still is that one person searched for me by name: '"ash collins" bass'.

Quite bizarre...

Speaking of bizarre, look at this video of Phill's cat!


Phill's Freaky Feline from wesleyriot on Vimeo.

Continuing to Exist

I'm still here! I've been too busy in Bangkok ti carry on blogging here, but I am still going on my Tumblr blog (it's easier to update), plus I've got a Bangkok blog, although I'm way behind on putting stuff up there!

If you fancy, check out some photos from Thailand on my Flickr page:

Christmas

Yeah, Merry Christmas everyone. I know I'm particularly Non-Theistic, but I do enjoy Christmas as an excuse to give/get gifts and generally get pissed. As I've mentioned, I already got the main gift I wanted (th new phone), but I'm just happy that I managed to find everyone a gift. Tomorrow I'll be visiting the disparate elements of my family with my fiance, and eating two (count 'em, TWO) dinners. I hope everyone else has such a jolly time!

And yeah, I have no new art to share. Apart from this picture I drew a while ago: Caron asked me to draw her a robot cow (I won't go into it....)

See y'all on the other side of Crimbo!

Spiders & Monsters

First, an accidental Spider-Man sketch (I was trying to draw something else at the time!):

Also, while digging around me hard drive, I found and finished off these neon monstrosities:

HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY

Look, real artwork, as promised:

This is an entry for the Kincat club on DeviantART, a new club formed by my fiance and my friend. This month's theme is 'Joy'...

I'm also thinking of giving this blog over to purely artistic pursuits; create an online portfolio of sorts, perhaps. Wordpress looks pretty tidy, maybe I'll use that to vent my garbage everywhere.

Flick It

I finally succumbed and got a Flickr account, which is probably a mistake considering that looking at all of Huw's photos has got me hankering after a new camera again. At the moment, my account only has pics from my Sony Ericsson. Like this:

I swear, my next post will have some actual artwork on it. Honestly.

Holy Jesus Day!

Yeah, it's December, meaning that Christmas is hiding round the corner and is ready to jump out on me when I haven't finished my Christmas shopping. Arse.

As you can see, I'm well aware of how long is left until C-day thanks to my kickass Doctor Who Cyberman advent calendar. Not only does it contain bits of chocolate with Daleks and TARDISs and shit on, it has a number of "surprises" too (I'm guessing crap Dalek toys).

As far as gifts go, I've already had two; money for my passport from Mam, and my snazzy Sony Ericsson K550i from the eternally lovely Kei (which I've been using for photos lately). Yes I am spoiled! I asked my Dad to get me a M2 memory card for me phone, as 64mb just aint enough.


Back in the real world, the last two days of SAND were quite cool. Thursday belonged to Studio AKA, who blew me away with work like Love Paintballing. Love those guys. Friday I arrived late (and missed a talk about porn in anime, boo) but arrived in time to hear a talk about reflections and stuff in Ratatouille, which was quite boring. My interest was saved when Shelley Page from Dreamworks turned up and showed us a bunch of her favourite shorts; some good, some a bit arse. The best by far, however, was (unsurprisingly) a film from Gobelins called Okatapodi. I'll get a link to the actual film as soon as they put it online!


Also, Iwent back to Alicia's to get my tattoo coloured in (whilst actually watching the Mighty Boosh!) - it would have been finished, but I had to leave to catch the last train....

Monstrous

Well I'm Hooked

Anyone who glances at my Twitter box over on the right there will see
that I attended animation acting workshop by Ed Hooks at SAND. I'm too tired to write up the experience now, but I will say that he was smart, enthusiastic and above all funny - all key factors in good teaching. Expect a full update tomorrow; in the meantime have a look at the picture of him that I plucked from the internet.

Also, have some art:

Before I forget, here's a photo of my new (unfinished) Mighty Boosh tattoo, as inked by Hunchcat!

Mmmmm..... Cheeseburger

The only drawing I've done lately is character development doodles for work; and I haven't scanned them yet so I bring you this:

Yes, I've been playing with the Lolcat builder, using pictures of my cat, at I Can Has Cheez Burger. For most of today. To be fair though, I've had a lot of downtime, as I've been waiting to see Robin Lyons at Calon to get some feedback for our storyboards.

If I'm lucky, (and a good boy) Kei might be getting me a new phone for Christmas. It's a Sony Ericsson k550i, and I wants it. I think it will be handy for taking pictures and blogging when we go to Bangkok in January.

Also, I've been using Firefox a lot lately.
It's only because it's the default browser for EVERYTHING on my work PC, and I haven't been able to figure out how to change it. Although I've come around to it a bit more now that I've discovered how easily I can download and install new themes and add-ons. Really though, Internet Explorer does the same as Firefox... but better.

The Boosh is BACK!

Is everyone aware that series 3 of The Mighty Boosh started last night? Once again it returns to BBC3..... at 10:30 in the night. Seriously, you'd think with the gargantuan fanbase the programme has acquired, it would get a better slot!

Anyway, I'm pleased to say, it's awesome. Howard, Vince, Naboo and Bollo return, this time working in Naboo's shop, Nabootique (how very lol). In this episode, Naboo and Bollo bugger off on a stag weekend, leaving Howard and Vince to run the shop....

The best way to describe this is "the same, but different". It's the same mix of surreal humour and ridiculous songs, outlandish costumes and rubbish props, but judging by the little bits of crap CG creeping in, they've been given a bigger budget to work with. There are some well-loved secondary characters that return, as well as old faces in new guises. In short, it's the best thing since teflon elbow patches, and EVRYONE needs to see it. If you missed it, there's a repeat on Sunday at some point. If you miss THAT, I suggest that you use the intrawebz to illegally download it (NOTE: I do not endorse illegally downloading shit).


In more artistic news, here's a Flash picture what I done. The original sketch was done by Liquid-Genius on DeviantART, and he asked me to ink it. I drew the whole thing using the straight line tool, and am quit happy with the results.