BLOGS | Luis' Illustrated Blog

Back at work again. The Seven Impossible Tasks PART 3. Art Center blog on Warming up for Figure drawing. Macross Frontier.

March 25, 2010 in ART, BLOGS, BOARD GAMES, THE SIMPSONS NEWS, VIDEO GAMES, VIDEOS

THE SIMPSONS NEWS

Came back on the show this week and it was as if I’d never left. I was handed 32 scenes to finish by the end of the week (yikes!) and I’m off and running. Time to earn my keep.

FAMILY

We had a baby shower this weekend. Lot’s of family and friends showed up. We received many helpful gifts. The shower itself was really nice and the food was fantastic.

I did my typical anti-social thing. I really don’t know why but I’m getting worse about hanging around people. When my brother and his wife Deborah showed up, I spent my time with them, but that was mainly because they came over and sat down where I was at (and also asked to play a game with me). After talking for an hour or so, I took out two board games that I had brought and played it. I’ll write about that another day. I enjoyed myself. They left early and I sat by myself thinking about stories and my next project. A few people came by, sat down and talked to me for a few minutes but it wasn’t long before I was alone again thinking.

Later, Angelita, one of my cousin’s daughters, asked me if I wanted to play the board game TROUBLE (it’s that, LUDO/SORRY type game with the “Pop-O-Matic Bubble” that rolls the die for you). There where four of us playing, my three year old daughter was one and my two year old son was another. My son lost interest quickly and Carolina (my cousin’s eldest daughter) took his place.

That game is awful. It’s such a bad game. We all thought so. You can’t leave the your “Home” base and start moving your pieces around the board unless roll a six. Which you have no control over and if you manage to do so, if someone lands on your piece, you get that piece sent “Home” again. It was such a bad game though, that it was actually fun. We enjoyed making fun of it as we played and didn’t take it seriously at all since it was so luck driven. I think, the best part about playing the game was that my daughter ended up winning. She trounced us all. She rolled so many sixes it was crazy.

Thanks you all for giving us such a good and memorable baby shower.

BOARD GAMES\VIDEO GAMES

I was listening to the Dice Tower Podcast Tuesday and I was made aware of a Carcassonne site that had all kinds of variant rules and printable tiles for the game. If you like Carcassonne and you want to try new and fun ways to play it, I highly recommend it:

Carcassone Central

Also this site led me to discover a Carcassonne like game for the iPhone with a Sci fi theme that seems really cool called XENO SOLA. It looks cool.

ART

For Part 1 CLICK HERE.

For Part 2, CLICK HERE.

To be continued next week…

BLOGS

The Art Center Blog is fast becoming one of my favorite art drawing blogs to read. There are a ton of great tips and drawing advice worth reading about there.

One of the article that I really enjoyed recently has been some videos they’ve put up on the merits of warm up sketching during figure drawing.

I highly recommend the article. To read it, CLICK HERE.

VIDEOS

So before I started back at work, I discovered and got addicted to watching yet another anime cartoon. This time it’s a series sequel to one of my favorite animes SUPER DIMENSION FORTRESS MACROSS (the first part of what was called ROBOTECH in the U.S. which I wrote about show a few weeks back). The sequel I’m now watching is called MACROSS FRONTIER. It aired in Japan in 2008 and has not yet seen a U.S. release.

When I became aware of this show, I thought I’d give it a look because I’ve been recently re-watching the original 1980s MACROSS. I wasn’t really expecting to like it much. Mostly because I haven’t really gotten into too many anime cartoons in years. Also, because the last two MACROSS shows I’d seen, didn’t really blow me away either. Namely, MACROSS 2 (which was pretty bad), MACROSS PLUS Vol. 1-4 (which looked fantastic and were fun to watch but the story didn’t blow me away) and MACROSS 7 (which was a sequel series to the original MACROSS, that was just plain dumb). This one though, knocked my socks off. It had enough call backs and archetypes from the original MACROSS show to make it feel familiar, but at the same time, they changed things enough so that it’s new. In fact, if you’re familiar with the original show, there is a type of inside joke fake out that they do all the way through the series where you think they’re writing the same story and then turn you’re expectations on their heads. It’s great.

Besides, I just can’t help watching cool robots fighting aliens. Especially when the robots transform from jets into robots. The effects on the robots and vehicles are mostly CG.

MACROSS is known for one of the female protagonists who ends up becoming a famous pop singer. This meant the show had a singing component in it that sometimes made it a very lite musical. This version follows the tradition only I actually like the music for once and don’t find it annoying.

I’m also a big sucker for love triangles in my anime (as you can see from my own comic above) and this one has that too.

This is a fun cartoon to watch if you’re a MACROSS fan like me. Best MACROSS since the original. I’m not sure if the show will have the same impact on someone who hasn’t seen the original version but you might enjoy it anyway. Give it a shot if you can find it online.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqPWORwCYbM

CLICK HERE to buy an Uncle Chestnut T-shirt with my art on it.

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Moving on to the second to last crew of the season? My Simpson’s Comics process. Some cool art blogs.

January 28, 2010 in ART, BLOGS, THE SIMPSONS NEWS

THE SIMPSONS NEWS

We finished up helping out the crew we were on Tuesday and then we were moved to start working on our “official” crew. As far as I can tell, this is the second to last show of the season. This means that in about a month or three the shows will be done. I’m not sure where I’m going to be, work wise, by the end of next month. I hope I just get moved to a layout crew. Unless there is something else I can do on the show.

ART

In case you were interested, I’m going to write about the processes I used when making a Simpsons comics

Usually the whole thing starts with the script. I would show what a script page looks like but I threw them away.

I tend to read the script twice. The first time around, I just read it straight through. The second time around I draw little thumbnail sized sketches of ideas, on the margins, of shots I see in my head as I read it. Once I’m done with that, I number the thumbnails and then, still on the script itself, I draw a small sketch of what the pages will look like with the panels, giving each panel a number corresponding to a thumbnail.

Once I’m satisfied, I take a piece of paper and work out a rough page, laying out what I think the final page should look like. This is done so that I can send it to my art director\editor at Bongo Comics to approve:

For the step above I use the actual page proportions so that if it IS approved, I can just take a light box and draw a slightly tighter pass directly over it.

I redraw the page again, working out the drawings a bit more. I put in perspective lines and I construct the characters properly:

Once I’m done with that step, technically, all it really needs is ink, BUT I don’t ink my own comic pages and Bongo asked me, from the very start, to clean up my comic pages for the inker; SO I do one more pass and clean up the page as clean as possible:

Once this step is done, I send in a digital copy to get approved. I change anything that needs changing and once it’s approved I Fed Ex the final drawings to Bongo or to the inker.

I then sit around waiting for my paycheck (which sometimes takes a month) and then a while after that, I end up getting sent a copy of the comic:

This particular Maggie story is, by far, one of my favorites to have worked on. It had maybe three or four dialogue balloons through out the story and the rest was all pantomime. Not only that but it was a sci fi story and I got to spoof all kinds of 50s and 60s sci fi troupes. From Mars Attacks to Flash Gordon. It was a blast to work on.

The story was first published in Bart Simpson comic #15. It has officially been reprinted in Big Beefy Book Of Bart Simpson trade paperback.

What do you think?

How do you approach your comic?

BLOGS

I’ve just recently been made aware of some really cool blogs by some fantastic artists.

The first artist’s blog I want to point out is:

Rad Sechrist’s blog Rad How To – A fantastic site by a Pixar Storyboard artist. Great for anyone who’s trying to learn to draw. It breaks down the drawing process into small studies and approaches that work for the artist. A lot of his advice is something many really good artists in the animation industry do all the time. (Thank you to Krishna Sadasivam of PC weenies for the link)

The second artist’s blog I want to point out is:

Sam Nielson’s blog Sam’s Tasty Art – Though there are SOME tips on painting and drawing in this site, the reason I’m calling attention to it is mostly because the guy’s painting and drawings are just INCREDIBLE. I love this guy’s work. Check it out. Very inspiring stuff.

CLICK HERE to buy an Uncle Chestnut T-shirt with my art on it.

If you like what you read, please consider signing up to my rss feed.

Comments are appreciated as well.

I also have a store. Click Here and check it out.

If you would like to have a text ad on my site, click on the red BUY LINKS button under the Archives list.

And while you’re at it, please Digg me too.

Writing this blog is almost a part time job for me. Tips are most welcome.

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Yoga Podcasts and YoGeek.Me Designs. Jim Lujan’s newest cartoon. Cartoonists helping one of their own.

November 19, 2009 in ART, BLOGS, FAMILY, PODCASTS, THE SIMPSONS NEWS, WEBSITES

THE SIMPSONS NEWS

Worked overtime this Saturday. It wasn’t nice. We got what we needed done with time to spare though. The show looks great. I even got an hour to relax on Tuesday before I went home. Yay!

FAMILY/ART/PODCAST/BLOG

So my sister has commissioned me to design her a logo for her Podcast (www.elsiesyogakula.com) and her business (http://yogeek.me). She’s a Yoga instructor. She sent me a few example drawings of things that are in the general direction of what she wants, as well as some photos of herself in poses she though I could use. One example was a few very interesting cartoony silhouettes in yoga poses, and the other is of a cartoony Vishnu/Shiva like multi-armed woman with all kinds of devices and things in her hands (no I’m don’t worship these gods, nor does my sister). My job is to come up with something that has the general idea of the things she sent me without actually copying those things. Very tricky.

She asked me to do it in “my style”, but, to be honest, I’m not sure what that is. The “chibi” style I usually do on this blog, and in my upcoming Black Terror Kid comic strip, is not necessarily what I consider “my style”. It’s just what’s easiest for me to do. My “short hand” if you will. Does that make it my style?

So I don’t even know if I’m going to use that style for these logos. Although, it might be the first place I start.

So…here I go. The following is the start of my process of figuring out what to do:

So I chose to start designing the logos using silhouettes. It’s a technique I first saw used in a book called: The Skillful Huntsman. I chose this method because I figured, if the silhouette, by itself, reads well, adding detail would just be icing. My first attempts above, where my attempt to use my “Chibi” style for the logo. It wasn’t a good style to use though. It was too squat and compressed. In the end, the drawings just look like weird bugs. I quit using the style without refining the drawings. It would have been a waste of time.

My second attempt was to try a style that was a little like the “Chibi” style, only with more stretched out proportions. This worked a little better. It was clearer. Only it looks like the character is juggling. Also, it was too much like my source material. I didn’t want to directly copy my reference.

I chose a standing position to try to make the drawing something a little different than the reference. The proportions of the figure are much more naturalistic but still very designed. I think this is closer to the direction I should go. It’s a very clear design. Unfortunately, this doesn’t quite say “Yoga” to me. I also need more tech and health silhouettes in the hands. I’m going to have to go over this with my sister. She might have an idea as to what direction to go.

This last one is my first attempt at the podcast logo. It’s based off the photo my sister sent me, which is the same as her site photo. This was a happy accident. It just looks like a big brush stroke. I almost just want to keep it this way. Still, I might play around with it a bit more. I’ll also try working off the other photo she sent me to see if I can’t do something similar with that.

That’s all I have so far. I’ll post more next time.

ART

Fellow CARTOONISTA, Jim Lujan, has posted up the second part of his John Henry Unicorn trilogy. The story is basically about a manipulative cult leader that causes mayhem wherever he goes. It’s a dark comedy Jim wrote, directed, animated, voice acted and wrote the music for. Jim is a very funny and very nice guy. His humor stems from taking the things that make odd people odd and exaggerating them. It’s very observational. His art is very reminiscent of Mike Judge‘s art (creator of Beavis and Butt-head, and King of the Hill), only he drew this way before he ever saw any of Mike Judge‘s early films and Jim‘s drawings are a bit more stylized.

This lastest cartoon took him 2 months to do, off and on, during his free time. He assures me that it only took him this long because he was getting used to his new iMac. He told me, the next one would be done faster. This is just amazing to me. He was able to do a cartoon, by himself, in the same amount of time it takes most artists to draw a comic book.

He makes me want to try it myself.

My favorite part is the wig bit. That really cracked me up. The ending was very odd and very silly.

WEBSITES

Tom Bancroft posted this on his Deviant Art News page. I thought I’d share it here since it’s a good cause:

ART AUCTION on EBay. Former Disney animator and author Tom Bancroft along with Tony Bancroft (yes, he was also a Disney animator, my twin, and directed MULAN) and a friend (Chad Frye) are putting together a huge Ebay art auction for the Hodge family and their son, Matt. Tim Hodge (the dad) is a long time friend (my family has know their’s since our kids where babies!) and Tim is a former Disney storyboard artist and Big Ides Productions director. His son, Matt, a 17-year old senior in high school was in a terrible accident when his car was hit by a train a couple months ago. He is still in a coma because of the head trauma. Their family is in need of financial help. Thus, the art auction.

The plan is to have the auction hit Ebay in about a month (beginning of December). We have sent out notes to some of the biggest names in animation, comic books, comic strips, and illustration for donations. We are getting in great artwork every day! (I met with John Pomoroy yesterday, who contributed a signed animation drawing!)

Please go to our preview site at: [link] to see what has come in so far and keep going back for more and more artwork as it comes in and updates about the auction. I’m counting on all of you to spread the news about this site and auction! Tell all your friends, these will make GREAT CHRISTMAS PRESENTS!

Some of the artists that have donated or have promised to are: J. Scott Campbell, Chris Sanders, John Pomeroy, Drew Struzen, Peter DeSeve, Stephen Silvers, Charles Schutz’s family, Patrick McDonnell, and so many more!

BLOG

I was just checking out Paolo Rivera’s blog. His stuff is so COOL! Man, the guy rocks. He has a video of his process HERE. Here’s a video interview with him:

CLICK HERE to buy an Uncle Chestnut T-shirt with my art on it.

If you like what you read, please consider signing up to my rss feed.

Comments are appreciated as well.

I also have a store. Click Here and check it out.

If you would like to have a text ad on my site, click on the red BUY LINKS button under the Archives list.

And while you’re at it, please Digg me too.

Writing this blog is almost a part time job for me. Tips are most welcome.

Comments Off on Yoga Podcasts and YoGeek.Me Designs. Jim Lujan’s newest cartoon. Cartoonists helping one of their own.

Alesha’s birthday. Trip to Disneyland Part 1. Chance’s videos and blog. Pathfinder rules, for FREE

September 17, 2009 in BLOGS, FAMILY, ROLE PLAYING GAMES, THE SIMPSONS NEWS

THE SIMPSONS NEWS

A much easier week this week than last weeks. It helps that I don’t have to stay late. That really wore me out last week. Been getting a lot of work done lately and I’m feeling good about it.

FAMILY

Sept 11th was Alesha’s birthday. She was a little concerned about what she wanted to do for her birthday. She really likes celebrating it and having fun with it. We celebrated her birthday on Saturday the 12th. Alesha had invited (at the last minute) her family and ours to our house for a barbecue. Most everyone showed up and our little house was packed. I took Munchkin and her cousin Chrystal, to the playground and then we went swimming. Meanwhile Alesha’s sister, Devisha, cooked food. After our swim, we came home and ate.

Alesha was having a great time. The kids where happy because they got to eat the junk food they don’t usually get to eat.

Later in the night, one of Alesha’s best friends, Monica, brought a Karaoke machine from her car and we ended the night singing Karaoke. Munchkin loooved singing and put on a show.

Overall, the party was a success and I don’t think Alesha felt it was a lot of work for her (which was her biggest concern).

FAMILY

For Part 0, Click Here

We got up early Tuesday morning on Sept. 8th. We ate breakfast, got the kids ready and off we went to Disneyland. It was 7:30am when we left the house and traffic was awful. What should have taken 30 minutes took about an hour fifteen.

We got a little lost getting to the park but, after going around in a big circle, we managed to make it to the parking lot.

I had called my parents before we had left. They were going to meet us at the gates. Surprisingly enough, they got to the park at the same time we did and even parked three cars away and we didn’t even know it. We discovered it when we left for the day.

We made our way to the shuttle and where confronted by the first obstacle we would encounter, namely, how we were going to get our big double stroller on the shuttle. Lucky for us, The shuttles have a big space for double strollers.

Once off the shuttle, we made our way to buy the tickets to get into the park. The tickets are just soooo darn expensive.

For Part 2, CLICK HERE.

BLOGS

My friend Chance from the Simpsons is up to all kinds of things. Here’s a look at his reel :

…as well as his blog. Check out the adventures he’s had which include getting invited to the Alba’s house (as in Jessica Alba‘s family’s house) to draw with a few friends. Pretty crazy.

ROLE PLAYING GAMES

This week I’ll add to last week’s list of free Dungeons and Dragons type games with a free version of the hugely successful newly released Pathfinder Roleplaying game.

This is an updated version of the D&D 3.5 rules. It cleans up the rules and makes many of the classes and races much more interesting:

Free Pathfinder rpg rules (courtesy of the publishers themselves).

The link contains all the rules that are included in the new rule book, but it’s all on the site. I’m using it at the moment to make myself some Eberron characters. I found the Eberron 3.5 Campaign Setting book for three bucks at amazon (woo hoo!). I must say I’d much rather buy the actual book thought. It’s darn inconvenient to go through the site to make your characters. Not only that, but I’ve heard the art in the book is incredible. That said, it’s free, so there isn’t much to complain about. If I wanted to, I could buy the pdf of the book for $9.99 from Paizo, but that’s still not as cool as having the book. Whenever I can afford to buy the cheaper amazon copy of the book, I will. For now I’ll just use the site.

If you like what you read, please consider signing up to my rss feed.

Comments are appreciated as well.

I also have a store. Click Here and check it out.

If you would like to have a text ad on my site, click on the red BUY LINKS button under the Archives list.

And while you’re at it, please Digg me too.

Writing this blog is almost a part time job for me. Tips are most welcome.

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Finishing up on a crew. Board gaming with Munchkin. Eduardito’s birthday

September 3, 2009 in BLOGS, BOARD GAMES, FAMILY, PODCASTS, THE SIMPSONS NEWS

THE SIMPSONS NEWS

Chaotic work week. Alesha started work so we started out carpooling together. Do to the crazy amount of last minute work I need to get done, that soon changed. I had to get all my work on one crew done by Tuesday because I started on a new crew on Wednesday. I wasn’t told until late Monday. It wasn’t a very happy situation.

FAMILY

I just thought I’d take the time to say,

“Happy Birthday!” to Eduardito. My cousin’s boy has turned 3 years old, hurray! He had a really fun birthday party Saturday. I kinda wished we could have stayed a bit longer since Munchkin was just starting to have fun but, Alesha wasn’t feeling well. Best part of the party was seeing Dante hit the pinata. Very funny.

BOARD GAMES

So I asked Munchkin if she wanted to play a card game with me. Of course she said, “YES!” So I took out a Memory game. It’s a Mr. Potato Head Memory card game we got as a McDonalds Happy Meal toy a year or so ago. I’ve been waiting all this time to be able to play a game with her with these cards. I tried to do so a few weeks after we had gotten them but she was too little to understand the memory matching.

At first I wanted to test her to see if she would be able to understand what we were suppose to be doing. I put the cards face down and she flipped one up, then she took turns flipping every card, looking at it, then putting it back down face down until she found the match. This is how we played the first two times. I didn’t take any turns.

Then I decided to test her to see if she would play by the “rules” by only allowing her to flip over two cards. If they didn’t match, it was MY turn. That way, if I flipped over a card she was looking for, I wanted to see if she would remember it. Also, I wanted to see if she got the idea of taking turns. I did this with a few cards at first and with every game I added more. She did fantastic. We were playing with all the cards in no time. I was amazed. She even beat me at the game quite a few times, she was really good at it. I handicapped myself, only a little and unintentionally. When I would find a match, I wouldn’t take another turn, but when she found a match, she took another turn. When I tried to take a second turn after I found a match, I found she got impatient and thought it was unfair. She felt I was skipping her turn so I stopped doing it. Otherwise, we played the game by the rules.

To me, this was the greatest thing ever. I was FINALLY playing a board game with my daughter. One that wasn’t mindless. One with choices. It was as if the clouds had parted and God (looking like the one in the movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail) came out of a cloud saying:

So having realized that Munchkin is old enough to play games with me now, I made my way to the local Target store the next day to look for games I might be able to play with her. I looked at games and found a few but I wasn’t sure if they were any good so I wrote down the names of all the ones I thought looks interesting and went home to look them up on BGG.

None but ONE of the games where any good, and even the one I thought sounded good wasn’t really all that good. What I was searching for was a game that she could learn to play now, but that would still be challenging as she got older. Though a bit dull, Memory is exactly this type of game. All you do is add more cards and it gets more difficult. Candyland was right out. No decisions and too easily outgrown (not to mention I did NOT want to play Candyland). So I searched online for some games. These are the games that caught my eye that I think fit the criteria I was looking for:

Kids of Carcassonne:

Yes, that’s right, there is a Carcassonne game for kids and it looks great. I think Munchkin would “get” this one to some extent and she could grow into it. Check out this review of the game:

Next is…

Gulo Gulo:

This is a dexterity game with a modular board where you play a cute wolverine who takes eggs from the vulture nest in the middle. You do this so you can rescue the baby wolverine that has gotten himself trapped in the nest. Here’s a video review explaining the game:

Finally…

Chicken Cha Cha Cha:

A memory game with also with a modular board. The object of the game is to steal the feathers of the other player’s chickens by jumping over them. The way you move your chicken forward is by flipping over a card in the center of the board that matches the picture in the square in front of your chicken. You continue your turn until you fail to find a match.

Out of all of these, I think I can make a homemade version of Chicken Cha Cha Cha. It just won’t be as silly as the chicken theme but we will be able to play it.

I’m thinking of using the Qwirkle tiles to do this. They work really well to play Memory. In fact, after I got tired of the Potato Head Memory game I subjected to Munchkin that we use the Qwirkle tiles. We took out a set of matching pieces, flipped them around, shuffled them up and played a game. It was much more difficult and still, Munchkin did amazingly well. She won most of the time and I think I tide her once. Although I suppose I did let her win sometimes. Still, she remembered where tiles were or the general area where tiles were. Sometimes she remembered tiles I hadn’t, and as a bonus, after we were done playing she decided to just play with the tiles. She like telling me the colors and shapes as well as counting them.

I love being able to play board games with her now.

BLOGS/PODCASTS

I’ve recently been asked by two different bloggers/podcasters if for permission to use my drawings for their posts. They’ve both used the drawings for very different purposes and I find that kinda neat.

Here a link to both the sites:

St. Mary Catholic Church Podcast – My drawing is used as a compliment to a “sound bite” of a sermon on the Sacrament of Reconciliation (a.k.a. Confession). It’s two minutes long. Check it out.

No More Lives – This a blog (and soon to be podcast) which tries to be, in their own words, “the New Yorker of video games”. In an attempt to bring in a little variety to their content, they’ve gotten a board game geek on board to express a different position. My drawing was used in one such article on their site called Gaming Without Batteries by Kyle Bolin. Great read.

If you like what you read, please consider signing up to my rss feed.

Comments are appreciated as well.

I also have a store. Click Here and check it out.

If you would like to have a text ad on my site, click on the red BUY LINKS button under the Archives list.

And while you’re at it, please Digg me too.

Writing this blog is almost a part time job for me. Tips are most welcome.

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Hurray for overtime. Reading through Alesha’s story. Raul, superstar. Green Lantern: First Flight

August 20, 2009 in BLOGS, FAMILY, MOVIES, PODCASTS, THE SIMPSONS NEWS

THE SIMPSONS NEWS

This is the second time I’m writing this since I lost my original version somehow. I have to make sure to make a back up. This post is the MUCH ABRIDGED version of the original.

I’ve gotten permission to do overtime at work. This is good since I need the money. It’s bad because I don’t get much time to do anything else (like re-write my lost blog post).

FAMILY

Alesha finished the first draft of her story. I’ve been reading it and giving her my two cents. It starts off really well and then it begins to get a bit rushed. She needs to double her word count so it’s not a big deal. She just needs to slow the story down a bit by adding more. It’s fun to read. We’ve been bouncing ideas back and forth on it. Once it’s done, maybe I’ll put up a chapter or two on the blog.

BLOG/PODCAST

Raul is at it again. Making himself a multimedia superstar. Check this out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a72BKO2JwMo

MOVIES

Alesha and I saw, Green Lantern: First Flight on Monday. I rented it late last week. I really enjoyed it. Not for the kiddies. This is rate PG-13.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4h1yAArJe8c

I’m also looking forward to the next animated movie DC is coming out with. It’s based on a great comic I own called Public Enemies. Take a look:

If you like what you read, please consider signing up to my rss feed.

Comments are appreciated as well.

I also have a store. Click Here and check it out.

If you would like to have a text ad on my site, click on the red BUY LINKS button under the Archives list.

And while you’re at it, please Digg me too.

Writing this blog is almost a part time job for me. Tips are most welcome.

Comments Off on Hurray for overtime. Reading through Alesha’s story. Raul, superstar. Green Lantern: First Flight

Our fifth wedding anniversary, Munchkin’s Birthday. Rosaries and Deaths in the family. Raul’s new blog and podcast

August 13, 2009 in BLOGS, BOARD GAMES, BOOKS, FAMILY, PODCASTS

THE SIMPSONS NEWS

Not much to tell. Just plugging away at the scenes I need to finish.

FAMILY

This weekend was a very eventful one. It began Friday. Alesha and I celebrated five years of marriage. Well…we technically didn’t celebrate it until Saturday. We gave each other presents on Friday. I got her some “hair goop” that she wanted and a book I thought she would enjoy (Here There be Dragons by James A. Owen). She gave me a board game. A very cool one I wanted. It had won the German Game of the Year this year. Big honor in the board game community. It’s called Dominion.

Friday, instead of going out for our anniversary, we ended up NOT spending the day together at all. I got home and went to a Rosary that was being held at my Cousin Carolina’s house. Alesha was planning to go too but Dante decided he reealllly wanted to go to bed for the night. We kinda didn’t have a choice. One of us had to stay home with him so Munchkin and I went to the Rosary together. Munchkin had a blast playing with her cousin Eduardito. They played pretty hard. It looked like an awful lot of work to be playing as hard as they were. I was very happy to see them enjoying themselves as much as they did. I was really tired myself. Problem is, when I’m really tired or stressed or emotional, I tend to want to be by myself. Being around people and attempting to socialize just about kills every ounce of energy I have. I spent most of the time playing a video game on my DS while listening to conversations other people around me were having. I tend to isolate myself so much I don’t really have anything relevant to say to anyone about any subjects people bring up at parties so I end up listening and, by default, learning a few things.

Praying the Rosary in a group is very enjoyable to me. I always feel happier after it’s over. It always brings home what’s important in life.

We left at about nine o’clock and of course, Munchkin didn’t want to leave.

Saturday was spent, mostly, with the kids, but we had made arrangements with my mom to take care of the kids at four so Alesha and I could go on a date. Our date was a simple dinner and a movie. It had been a long time since we had eaten Japanese. I was desperate for some sushi. I love that stuff. So we went to a Japanese restaurant near us that has a really good reputation. It was great. We had a very enjoyable dinner. We then went to go see the GI Joe movie. It was a highly entertaining, ridiculously stupid and silly movie. We had a fantastic time watching it and we had just as much fun laughing at how cheesy it was afterward. I’d so buy that movie when it comes out on DVD. It’s that lame and fun.

We then picked up the kids, who were asleep by then, but who had just as good a time with my parents as Alesha and I had on our date. After we put them to bed, we opened up a bottle of the wine we always open on our anniversary and watched The Princess Bride in bed until we fell asleep. It was a great date night.

The next day was Munchkin’s birthday. The kids must have had a really tiring day the day before because they didn’t wake up at seven on their own the way they usually do. By a quarter till eight, they were still asleep and it didn’t seem like they were going to wake up anytime soon. I woke Munchkin up and told her it was her birthday. She acted as though the whole idea was surreal to her. She was given a special birthday breakfast of pancakes with sprinkle on it. Afterward we all got ready for church. Alesha and I made the huge mistake of going to a ten o’clock Mass with the kids. It was a mistake because that was Dante’s nap time. He was sleepy and cried pretty much the whole time. Alesha missed most of the Mass because she had to take him out the church. When we got back we put both kids down for a nap. They had both fallen asleep in the car.

I took this time to go get Munchkin a present. I had an idea of what I wanted to get her but the store that had what I wanted was closed. I ended up getting her something else. Alesha was desperate for me to get back home. Dante had woken up crying and there was no consoling him. I had to stop and get some things Alesha wanted at the store and then I hurried home as fast as I could. We needed to get to my parents as soon as possible so Alesha could help my mom with the food. Dante cried the whole way. We suspect that, since he is teething, it had to do with that. We had given him something for the pain but it didn’t stop him from crying. He had been crying for about an hour and half when we pulled up to my parent’s house. Then, when Dante saw my dad, he stopped. We’re still not sure what it was all about.

Munchkin had a blast at her party. She played with her cousins and had a great time. She opened presents and got lots of nice gifts. The last gift she got was a plastic princess crown and jewelry. The party ended around eight. We really needed to leave so the kids could be put to bed. They had to wake up early to go to daycare the next day.

…figures.

FAMILY

My cousin Tony passed away early Monday morning. He had neuro muscular dystrophy. I want to write more but I can’t…except to say that my one regret is that I wish I would have spent some time with him while he was still alive…but was too much of a coward to do so. I spent no time with him at all, either healthy or sick. Please pray for him and the family. Especially his widow.

BLOGS/PODCASTS

Raul has decided to go multimedia. He now has a blog and a podcast. You can find them at: http://manvsart.com/. He’s got two episodes up. An intro episode and a second episode. The second one is darn entertaining and he made me laugh. Go check it out.

Self portrait

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Finishing up the show a day earlier. Dante’s milestone. Caricature of me

July 16, 2009 in BLOGS, FAMILY, THE SIMPSONS NEWS

THE SIMPSONS NEWS

Turns out the show is in fantastic shape. We were told Friday night that they had upped our deadline a day. This meant that instead of finishing our work on Tuesday evening we had to be done by Monday evening. Thankfully, the show was is such good shape that the director wouldn’t have minded showing them the show as it stood on Friday. As far as he was concerned, anything we finished Monday would be icing. It was great the be in that sort of situation.

FAMILY

Dante hit a milestone this weekend. We converted his crib into a toddler bed. He was VERY excited when he discovered what we had done. He bounce around and did a small little Dante dance before laying down on the bed with his butt in the air.

The reason I thought I ought to do it was because Saturday morning, while Alesha and I where still in bed, Munchkin and Dante woke up. They played in the room a little bit (Dante in his crib, Munchkin with the toys in the room) but after about ten minutes or so, Munchkin decided to leave the room. She opened the door, got out and shut the door behind her leaving poor Dante trapped in his crib with no one to play with. He began to cry. Usually Dante is perfectly happy as long as his sister is there with him handing him toys. This was the first time Munchkin had every left the room while Dante was still in his crib. I felt really bad for the poor boy. He couldn’t even follow his sister out of the room. So I thought maybe it was time for him to be able to.

It was fun to watch him explore his new found freedom on the monitor, after I’d left the room. First thing he did when we put him to bed was get up and go over to play with toys. Well, not really. He got up and touched a toy then went back in the bed. Guess what he really wanted to do was know he could if he wanted to.

Of course, there was a few things that we had to teach him not to do, like get up during bedtime, go over to his sister’s bed and sit there, while his sister is trying to go to sleep. He’s learning little by little. He hasn’t fallen off the bed yet. We have cushions on the carpet just in case. I’m happy for the little guy. He’s doing great. Unlike Munchkin when she was moved to a toddler bed, Dante hasn’t done any sleeping on the floor.

BLOGS

My friend Shane K. Sowell started up a blog last Month. Shane was a storyboard artist on The Simpsons Movie. He was mostly over at the Fox studios. At that point I was no longer doing storyboards and I worked with him doing story reel work. His blog came to my attention when he linked his blog to mine. When I followed the link I discovered the following picture:

Now you know why I draw myself cute in all my cartoons. Who want’s to looking at THAT in the cartoons? Seriously though, it cracked me up. I really like the drawing. I later discovered he had e-mailed me about it and I wrote him back my appreciation. Interestingly, he had drawn his drawing from a picture he took of me at the Fox Lot during one of our lunch breaks. It turns out that, it’s exactly the same picture I put up in my ABOUT ME section of this blog. I’d forgotten he had take the picture and had given me a copy. He got a kick out finding out I used his picture for my blog. I’ve updated the ABOUT ME to credit him for the picture.

Check out the rest of his blog. He’s got another drawing of a fellow storyboard artist as well as many other drawings.

Thanks again for the drawing Shane.

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Dante’s first birthday, Munchkin tummy problems, Willits baby

February 5, 2009 in BLOGS, FAMILY, THE SIMPSONS NEWS

THE SIMPSONS NEWS

Stressing out a bit on how slow I am in getting my scenes done. It didn’t help that I had to take a sick day on Friday either (more on that below). It also doesn’t help that the program I’m using is a bit buggy and I need to tip toe around doing some thing so that it doesn’t mess up on me.

I managed to see the final color of the new Simpsons opening titles. I have to admit it’s grown on me. Perhaps the only thing I don’t like is some of the animation in one scene isn’t as good as the original. I made sure, when I re-drew Maggie on model in the car sequence, that I matched the animation as best as I could, stretching her little hands where it was meant to stretch and keeping the overall rhythm of the original. Unfortunately, not everyone who re-drew the characters payed as much attention to those details. There is one character in particular who got re-drawn really stiff and wierd in one scene. Oh well, I’m sure I’m the only one that will notice it.

FAMILY

Dante celebrated his first birthday on the 31st. I took him out of his crib with a big smile on his face as I sang him happy birthday. It went up hill for him from there on out. We had invited a few people over for a very small birthday celebration (Grandparents, Godparents, and a few cousins mostly). They all showed up around the time he was taking his afternoon nap. When we finally came down to the party, he got really spooked at all the people in the house and began to cry. Twenty minutes later, he was fine and was crawling around everyone playing and eating and generally having a fantastic time. When we sang him happy birthday, he was sooo happy. He didn’t know why everyone was singing but he liked it. He opened presents and played with his new toys. I don’t think he’s enjoyed himself so much, every.

Happy Birthday Dante!

FAMILY

On the other hand, Munchkin came down with the stomach flu on Thursday night. I called in sick on Friday and stayed home with her. She spent the day on the couch watching movies and drinking water. That night was terrible for her. She woke up after being in bed for a few hours crying because she needed to go to the pottie. I took her to the pottie but she didn’t want to do anything while she was on it. I left her there so she could have some privacy and when I came back to check on her, she was falling asleep on the toilet. When I asked her if you wanted to get off, she told me she didn’t. I ended up taking her downstairs so she can watch some cartoons and maybe go to sleep. She didn’t. I brought her to bed with me and she slept between me and my wife. Every two hours she would whine and we would get up to go to the bathroom. She had a fever and she had a difficult time going to sleep.

On Dante’s birthday, she began feeling much better. She was really tired from the night before, but her tummy wasn’t giving her problems anymore. She still had a fever that we gave her medicine for though. She asked to be put to bed very early that night. Poor baby, it was the first time she’s ever gone to bed before her brother.

Sunday she woke up, almost, good as new. It was obvious she was over he worst of it. By Monday, she was ready for daycare again. She was still recovering a little, but it wasn’t too bad. She just didn’t eat as much as she usually does. Poor kid, had a really bad weekend.

BLOGS

Dante wasn’t the only one celebrating a birthday Saturday. Greg and Jennifer Willits (of The Catholics Next Door radio show) had their fifth baby! Lilian Grace Willits was born on the 31st of January. It’s their first girl, and they picked such a pretty name for her. I’m very excited for them.

It’s funny, I was running around getting things ready for Dante’s birthday party when my sister texted me the news. Then about thirty minutes later my mom called me to tell me the same thing. It’s a wonderous thing how the Willits are such a part of lives. It makes me smile.

Congratulations guys! I wish you the best, and my God’s blessing be with you and your family.

BOARD GAMES

So I didn’t have time to write about a board game this week so I thought I’d put up a review of some great looking kids board games. The reviews are by Tom Vasel (and his adorable little daughter Holly) from the Dice Tower Podcast. Enjoy.

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The beginning of the end. Munchkin driving.

November 20, 2008 in BLOGS, FAMILY, THE SIMPSONS NEWS

THE SIMPSONS NEWS
The deadline for the board-a-matic is fast approaching. I got my final section for the show this week and I’m trying to finish it as fast as I can. Meanwhile I can only hope and pray that I still have a job after the Dec. 2nd deadline. I still don’t know what’s going to happen to me after the board-a-matic. Hopefully, I’ll just have to move to a different desk and continue on this same show. The work season is slowly coming to an end. The final show of the season is now in production. After that, there isn’t a new show until next season (if there is a next season). Hiatus is coming soon.

FAMILY
Once again I stayed at home with the kids this Monday. We couldn’t drop the kids off at daycare until Tuesday. It was a very busy day that day. Usually staying with them is fun and it has it’s “down times” when I can sit down and recover my energy. Monday was not like that. By the end of the day, I was really tired. I think part of the problem was that Dante asks for more attention now. He wanted me to be there playing with him the same way his sister does. It used to be that I could leave him in a corner with a pile of toys and he would play for a long while. He still does that but now I have to be there next to him while he does it. Meanwhile, Munchkin wants me to play with her. It was tough.

I decided, to make things a bit easier, to take them out for a walk in the afternoon. It was a nice day and a nice walk. We stopped at the playground and the kids played for a while. Then I got an idea. My father-in-law had gotten Munchkin one of those electric powered kid cars that they can drive. The first time we put her in it, she was too small to reach the pedal and when it moved she got scared. I thought that maybe now she might be able to drive it. We went back home and I took the car (a Hummer) out from where we had stored it. Munchkin sat in it and I was glad that, not only could she reach the pedal but she wasn’t scared when the car moved. After playing with the car’s working radio for ten minutes, she began driving it around our housing community. I helped steer because the steering wheel was a bit hard to turn. She was having a lot of fun.

We went around the community once and then I thought I’d take my skateboard out and ride it while I helped Munchkin steer the car. I put Dante in the passenger side or the car, put the seat belt on him, got my skateboard and off we went. Turns out the skateboard wasn’t very helpful. It kept getting in the way and I couldn’t help steer the car the way I thought I would. In fact, Munchkin started getting annoyed at me and she ended up telling me not to help steer anymore. When I tried she would yell at me so I said, “okay…have it your way”. A moment later they had crashed into a fire hydrant.

After bailing them out, we went around the community once again. Munchkin happily driving, while Dante was on the cell phone (okay, he sucked on the cell phone). Although Munchkin would often take the phone away from him and put back in it’s slot, in the car. A second later Dante would take it and put it back in his mouth. It was fun to see the two of them in that little car.

After that, we went back home, put the car away, went upstairs to the kid’s room and played for a few more hours. There was a lot more to the day than that, with all the feedings and the dish washing and the laundry…but I won’t go into all that. The point is, it was a busy day and it really wore me and the kids out. We had our fun though.

BLOGS

You ought to read this:

the human condition…is everywhere

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Luis' Illustrated Blog

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Finishing up the show a day earlier. Dante’s milestone. Caricature of me

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The beginning of the end. Munchkin driving.

the human condition…is everywhere

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Hi, Welcome!

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