red ass sock monkey – Page 19 – no screaming this time, just a big stick

invention through illustration 2

A mocked-up photo of a clam shell tablet being used.

Just like the 35mm camera digital insert, this is an older image. In July 2007 I posted the photo with a frustrated plea for just such a device. Like an iPod touch, but with a screen twice the size of an iPod, and a screen segmented to fold so it’s protected and easily dropped in a pocket. I used two monitors regularly; the technology for a two screen iPod is there. I added other needs, too: No apps was a requirement. I figured everything I need is on line if you just give me a browser to access it. A smart browser that can get on the darn internet and find the functionality that I need, automatically.

I’ve held an iPad Mini. If the thing would fold in half, I’d buy one. All the little apps would be a pain in the rear, but I’d live with it. At the time I created the photo mock-up, I had a reasonable income and great internet connections. Now, not so much.

invention through illustration 1

An imaginary ad for a 35mm camera insert that takes digital pictures.

The flour bag and short cigarettes aren’t real, they’re illustrative inventions. Posting them reminded me of the fun I’ve always had with this illustration type. It also reminds me that if I had a machine shop, or even a garage, I might not make pictures at all. To illustrate, you have to first understand. If you can’t illustrate something, you just don’t understand it well enough; and I really enjoy the process of understanding. With these personal illustrative inventions, I have to understand a problem, think through the solutions and then problem solve the rendering. It’s all lots of fun.

This image is from November 2008. I pictured it as an ad on the back cover of a pulp magazine or inside the back cover of a comic book. First, though, I pictured the two 35mm cameras in my closet that will probably never get used again. Great optics on each, great mechanics, too. They were fairly expensive in their day and produced professional quality images. How many other folks are storing the same sort of relics? If I had a simple universal insert that I could drop in the back of either camera and collect digital data instead of expose film, both cameras would have a new life.

Possible? Well, there it is&#8230 you tell me. [smile]

short breaks

After posting my flour bag idea here, I just had to add my Short Breaks. I’m surprised it took me so long to connect the two. The photo is a Photoshop recreation of my original pack- which is buried in boxes and bags somewhere around here. Photoshop is so much easier than digging.

About 20 years ago, I had the idea that shorter cigarettes would let people smoke a whole cigarette quickly while standing in a cold doorway on break. I’d seen people pinching cigarettes out and saving the “butt” to finish later, and I’d seen quite a few long “butts” smashed on the ground by doors in alleyways around town. So I bought two packs of Camels and emptied both packs on my drawing board. Taking my craft knife, I trimmed about a third of each filter off of the cigarettes, and about a third of the tobacco off of the other end hoping to maintain the ratio of filter to tobacco in a shorter cigarette. It took 25 cigarettes to fill a pack stacking from end to end instead of side to side; two rows of eight and a row of nine down the center. I used Letraset letters to add “Short Breaks” to the pack, wrapped the pack securely and put it in a manila envelope.

I did a quick sketch, similar to the flour bag water color sketch I just posted, and wrote a letter describing how easy it would be to transition since the new pack could be packed and shipped the same way, marketed from shelves the same way, and sold from regular machines.

Like King Arthur, Mr. Reynolds didn’t like my idea. In fact, R.J. sent my pack back seemingly unopened, stating firmly that they had their own research, development, and marketing people and didn’t need my ideas.

Ah well.

flour arrangement

An open King Arthur Flour bag.

My flour looks like this. Maybe yours doesn’t. I guess I could buy nice canisters or come up with ready mades that suit my life style, but I don’t use that much wheat flour these days. I flinch at the idea of needing to decant it to use it.

Why should I have to? I usually weigh flour, which makes decanting unnecessary. If I use the scoop and level system, though, which many recipes call for, the bag makes it a bit difficult to access the flour for consistent measuring.

Open King Arthur Flour bag on its side.

A solution seems obvious to me, but didn’t really excite Arthur’s people. What if my flour bag looked like this? The same size bags would still accept the same labels, same quantities of flour, Cartoon rendering of Popin Fresh. same packing and shipping constraints; but putting the opening flaps on the side would almost double the size of the access hole. I’d be able to scoop and scrape to the bottom of the bag!

Maybe I should send a note to Pillsbury? Commercials could show their Dough Boy playing in a bag, giggling like a little kid with a big packing crate.

dated

Contains odor-fighting 'atomic robots' that 'shoot lasers' at your 'stench monsters' and replaces them with fresh, clean, masculine 'scent elves'.

I just saw this on my deodorant. I think I’m going to change my brand.

Contains odor-fighting “atomic robots” that “shoot lasers” at your “stench monsters” and replaces them with fresh, clean, masculine “scent elves”

I love humor in advertising, and an attempt to break with old traditions and grab a new audience has my complete support. Old Spice is an old tradition. My dad used it, and I’m 60. Grabbing new market share with something outrageous, something tasteless, hilarious, or risqué makes excellent sense, and I’d go out of my way to support it. But this? Not just the content, but the use of all caps, and quote marks around the silliness as if it’s a, what? a wink? Seem poorly done. The text is embarrassingly stupid.

I did a search for the phrase on line and it turned up quite a few hits, but rather than pointing out the complete juvenility of the thing, they all think it’s hilarious. One news columnist praised the text in a review. “I want my deodorant to shoot lasers!” someone shouted. To them all, it’s a great campaign. I don’t see it. Does age really do that? Like the high pitched whistles that only kids can hear? It seems so. The humor in this is a few octaves out of my range.

obnoxious lion

Temple:

Navy:

This is old work that I’ve moved here from earlier blogs and from Facebook. When I started working on the talking lion experiment, I had a lot of fun. Making the lion turn its head was a good animation project and compiling all of the clips was a great way to push Photoshop. In the end, though, they just made me laugh. Even now, a couple years later, I giggle. I was ready to do more, putting a new one up for each home game, but they just fell flat. I had a few appreciative comments and then nothing. Nothing verbal, either.

I was bummed.

Reflecting on many of my old blog posts, the story for them is the same. For my own amusement, I may move more here. Most, I’m sure, will no longer have any relevance, but when I find something I still get a kick out of, I’ll move it here, and maaybe include a bit more of an explanation. Like a joke though, if you have to explain it, you’re kidding yourself; it isn’t really any good.

Drawings from flash

It’s been a while since I’ve put something here. Lately I’ve been helping a friend, which gave me the chance to do some work in Flash. I think it’s the first time I’ve had the app open on this machine. Although I really love working in Photoshop, there’s something about using a wacom tablet to draw in Flash that’s so satisfying that I can do without Photoshop for a while. I’m currently doing without my sketchbook, too; so maybe it’s a good thing I don’t spend all my days in Flash?

Weekend work

I’m thinking that continuing to post without a scanner is just silly. The first image here is along a road I can remember doing pastels of years ago; the layout of the more contemporary homes along the hillside is unique. The entire rendering is satisfying, but lacks the feel the more ornate buildings provide. IT’s just an errant balloon, running out of ‘lift’ and making an emergency landing. Nothing special.

The second image has more of what i want, though I need to work on it a bit- I stopped to do it on the way here and haven’t given it a second look. Till now.

Morning haze

Morning in the park, fog and traffic rolling in.

I sat in the park early this morning, intent on drawing the interesting skyline dark against the morning sky. The variety of spires and trees in this view really grabs my imagination.

As I’m focusing on the drawing I’m surprised when I see a large fog bank has drifted down the stream with the morning commuters. It didn’t stay long, and was quite dense; it appeared solid white at a few points. Pen and ink doesn’t allow for (or should I say, rather, my current abilities don’t allow for) the diaphanous rendering the scene really required. But it was fun till it burnt off and the sun started to blaze.

As I was shooting the image, I found this one too, from a week or two back. It’s very close to the same view, to me even surprisingly so. It’s very stylized; I like it, but I like where I’m going more:

Morning in the park, no fog and traffic rolling in.

Evolving plan

Morning in the park, with traffic along the parkway.

I posted several of these sketches in Facebook, but this is new this morning. The air traffic is subtler, barely a part of the visual field. I still need more practice, but I really love the direction. I should find a scanner, too; shots done with Photo Booth just don’t come close.

There are many levels to the Bellefonte landscape, and many ornamental faces for the buildings on each level. There are balconies around fourth story bay windows, stairs from rooftops to upper story porches. Decorative filigree and ornamental windows, doors and arches cover the larger buildings and even show up on homes. Street level facades could be anywhere, but looking up, there’s a fairytale architecture on the third story and above. I can see the traffic: steam powered lighter than air taxis and buses, privately owned personal balloons, docking on rooftops, discharging passengers at parties on balconies. It’s beautiful.

More mouse drawings will follow, but it’s hard to be excited about Millheim when I’m awestruck in Bellefonte. I wish I had the patience to animate- I can see it all so clearly.