Shifting Gears

I shall be shifting gear with my doodles for the next couple weeks. I have been tasked with creating an 8 page comic as well as my other assignments. I'm doing each panel on an A4 sheet and then shrinking and cropping it to the final product. To keep a decent workflow churning out I have lumped it with my doodle a day project. So I will create at least one panel every day. As I finish each page I'll post it here. If I go at my current speed I could probably finish the majority of the work in a week. But we all know that's not gonna happen. Would be nice though.
Note, captions used in the doodle a day are different from the actual end result.
Critique is also welcomed, as well as spell checks (for a change).

Click to read me without causing eye strain!

Mentally Vacant

I spent tonight at the fortnightly poker game Keir & Matt have set up. I would say I played it, but that would be a lie. I went all in on the first hand and managed to loose against Keirs trip nines and queen. I had trip nines and shit all apparently. I remembered at nine that I should do my doodle. Although the absence of my watercolours dissuaded me from doing a Broken Rainbow one. Instead I doodled for a little while, not thinking of much, then totally forgetting about it. Next thing I know and it's 2am and today had come and gone.

It's very strange talking as though your still in the day somethings written, realizing half way through that your going to have to talk about the day your pretending to be in ending.

Albums Of the Week 

FM Static – My Brain Says Stop, But My Heart Says Go

Daft Punk – Tron Legacy (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack)

Jami Sieber - Second Sight

I was told this segment often featured at least two songs by the same artist, and thats just lame. Well, this has a lot to do with my listening habits. I enjoy listening through albums, getting the full sweep of emotion and experience the musician is trying to impart. So to remedy this situation I have switched from single songs to entire albums.
Jami Sieber is some chick from somewhere. She was raised learning classical music, and in her adult years has incorporated those early lessons to her own unique little breed of music. 

Gamers will probably recognize her stuff from the kick ass game Braid. This is where I discovered her. The music is as amazing as the game. To be honest they both build upon each other. They compliment each other.
Its good background stuff, except when she starts making words come out of her mouth (Typical women). Her lyrics also creep me out a little. It's very new age. Tree of Love is a great example of what I mean.
Overall good for background stuff while you write or draw, not so much if you want to headbang with all your little friends. Do people still do that? Or has all the old metal heads told their kids to not ruin their necks?

An Unbroken Home

We turn our attention away from the Introspective cliffs, and instead focus on the colourful wasteland.

It's Comforting

I don't have a lot to say about this one because I didn't think about it very hard. I do want to see the skully axe guys around a bit more. They sort of got forgotten about after the first couple pages of Broken Rainbow.
Oh yeah, While I remember, check out Harry's post, it features super awful doodles by me.

It seems the problem with defining our time period is that we are restricting ourselves with to many rules. After reading an article "After Postmodernism" it feels as though we're still using postmodern ideas to help define our supposedly new era. We can't even use language it seems, since it changes meanings. There are no neutralities, since we're all objective. We'll always come at things from our own slant. From culture to culture, the article recognizes that, but it sees the slant as a bad thing. Or at least unscientific.

I was always under the assumption that the slant was what defines our era. For without the slant there is no flavour. Just ones and zeros. Oh, wait, there is no right or wrong from our jumping off point. So maybe just 2's. Take that binary and logic!

So perhaps the only way to really understand where we are now is to be totally honest and opinionated. Fortunatly I'm good at those.

But unfortunatly my opinion, although valid, is not their concern. Truth is what they strive for. And truth is not found in opinions. Facts, while true in modernity, were found suspect in postmodernity. So maybe truth is what defines a period. What is our slant on what truth is? Shit.. And they say religion is nonsensical and airy fairy.

Faithful Bag

So I got a new bag. It resembles the old bag quite a lot, and one day it to shall be called the old bag. I think I'll keep the old bag around and use it as spare parts for when my new bag inevitably grows holes.
It's an Olive Green Single PLCE Side Pouch used by the British army, scored from the army surplus place for 14 bucks. Although it's mostly referred to as my "green bag". I must have had my original one for about six or seven years, if not more.

Rainy Monday

Yes, this happened. and if you cant tell whats going on in the corner then your in the same boat as me. Although I'm pretty sure it has something to do with oral gratification. I guess that's one way to spend a rainy Monday in a gazebo.
This is a glass set of scales with a max weight warning of 200kg. I'm curious as to how you find out if your within these parameters. Do you just stand on it and hope that your body weight double teaming with gravity against a plate of glass won't shatter into a million little pieces?

Stencil just off K Road

Writing About Love

Originally the idea was going along the lines of "It's hard to write about love when your in it." which is true I feel. When your alone, or chasing someone, your making observations galore. When you have settled down with the kill, all you know is that your in love.
Don't you just feel like giving the machine a good boot? I thought the signage on it was very appropriate as well. It's almost begging you to tip the machine over.

bmd / 56965 / LAME

Easter Smoosh

From that day forth he never carried food in his pocket.

We went into town today and got the DnD Essentials: Heroes of the Fallen Lands. Which is pretty much the players handbook for building characters and leveling them etc. Which is fortunate since Puddle went and leveled after handing that witch his oxidized bony ass. We also came away with photos of some of the latest stickers gracing K road. It's about time. I haven't had any graff thrown up here for a while.

Arcane Individual

Inspired by tonights DnD session. My first foursome (DM + Players), It went off rather smashingly in my opinion. circumstances led to a face off with a guy in the woods who might have been a witch. Although why he had a feminine title attached to him was left largely unanswered, until a reasonable debate got turned all the way up to eleven, ending in loud accusations from Puddle the wizard being answered in the affirmative by the witch-fire-skeleton-pieceAcrud THING.
Like Puddles sword shaped wand?

Avalanche City – Go
Avalanche City – Ends In The Ocean
FM Static – My Brain Says STOP, But My Heart Says GO

I've already nattered on about Avalanche City far to much this week. So let's move right on to FM Static. These guys just released their 4th album on April 5th, and if you were hoping for FM Static to not change its overall sound since it's debut eight years ago, then you will be in luck.
I got into these guys a little after Relient K. So yet another pop punk band for ya. Yeah, I'm starting to realize how false the title of this section is.
Anyway, enjoy this preview of Avalanche City's latest video. Just popped up on TV on Wednesday, and still hidden on youtube.

Jealous Cloud

Perhaps I like the Broken Rainbow a little to much. Or maybe I've found a world I actually enjoy. Perhaps it's because I have shared to many secrets with it. Or I find its childlike approach to adult subjects charming.


I think I found one of it's theme songs though: Go, by Avalanche City. Yeah. I attach music to certain projects I do. A mood and tempo to match the visuals. And also, yes, I think I found a new band to love. I just had a gander at his site. He's recorded everything himself. it's pretty amazing actually. It's not the first time its been done, but it's one of the first times I have enjoyed it all. The Rocketsummer springs to mind. That guys voice just creeped me out though.

"After playing years of playing in hardcore bands, I guess I just wanted to do something slightly more musical." - Dave Baxter

Almost Blew It

This is a reference to one of the final pages to my Broken Rainbow series. Ever since finishing the collection, I have been wondering if I will (or should) revisit the rainbow world. They sneak into my doodles every now and again, but this and yesterdays are what I think of as direct "sequels" to the Broken Rainbow.

Appreciate that link, how often does a blog, NOT ONLY link you in house (and not off to some grotty pay per click pyramid scheme,) but ALSO get you to the exact point on the page that they want you to look at! Yeah, It took me like 5 minutes to figure out how to do that. But it's totally rad. Html skills +1

In response to Kiyo's brutal comment in relation to this next section, I have retitled it

This time last week I posed my opinion that we haven't moved out of post modernity into post post modernity yet (here on out we'll call it post*2 modernity). I haven't had any lectures yet, so I may as well do some self directed stuff. So the formula that Raymond Williams brings up says that there are emerging subcultures rising up in front of the dominant mainstream culture. Their either alternative, or oppositional. So there is the alternative lifestyle, that isn't going to rock the boat and is happy to do its own thing in the hope that no one will bother them in return. So vegetarians could fall in this category (as long as we ignore the ones who released the rage virus on us all.) Pressure on the alternative subculture can turn them to being oppositional, the second group.

Oppositional could be thought of as the group that is really wanting to shake things up. They aren't happy with the way things are going down, and are coming along to change the dominant for the better (or the worse).

Usually these subcultures bloom in response against the mainstream, a bit like how kids do the opposite of what their parents did. Hopefully this balances out when those kids have kids, and all of a sudden its hip to do what their grandparents did. Like crochet, and hiring hot air hostesses again.

Post modernity can be characterized by its use of irony and pastiche. So now we have entered a time of post irony, where things that were thought of as being cool because they were uncool are now just uncool again.

Big Rude Dinosaur

My blobby characters have a cliff that they regularly hang out on when they have something cute or introspective to say. Inhabiting the same world is a dinosaur who's constantly looking for fun, or peoples gigantic concrete sandcastles to destroy, because the buildings make fun crunching sounds under his feet. I was wondering what would happen if he decided to gate crash the cliff.

Paul the Meta-Movie

Apparently Drew Barrymore doesn't age twice as fast as the rest of us.
So yeah, Paul was ok. Its one of those movies that knows its a movie, looks like a trend, judging by the Scream 4 trailer. Or is it Scre4m? Who knows. I guess it's a bit like how Mac keeps forgetting to capitalize its products because they like the little dot on top of the lower case "I".
I'm not going to pretend I discovered it. But I like to support NZ music where ever I can, so check Avalanche City out. Similiar sound to Alaska. Thanks Keir for pointing these guys out.

Who is This?

Probably one of the worst texts you could receive. Admittedly I have sent it more than I have recieved it. Sometimes its to people I talk to on a fairly regular basis, and I have no idea why their number disappeared. Perhaps they went and got a new sim and switched the numbers, then I went and decided to disregard the mass text of "Heeeey, I'm changing my number so type in this new one."
There's only one person I ever went out of my way for to not add the number of. Not because I had any particular vendetta against them. I just thought they didn't deserve a place on my phone. Unfortunatly they would text me fairly often and I would send the "Who the fudge is this and why do you persist in keeping up the pretense that you know me?" text. Then they would reply with "Oh silly billy! Haven't you added me yet? It's blah blah blah!" then I respond with "OH! You. Ok, yeah, Ill get onto it right this minute." and then I don't. Now your probably thinking I'm a bit of a jerk at this point in time, and I would have to say... Your probably right.

I'm listening to the Tron soundtrack again at the moment, and it's just triggered my memory back to Scott Pilgrim. Since the dvd has come out I've heard of a number of people praising it. And this is friggin rad in my opinion. Although I'm really gutted for everyone who was either talked out of seeing it at the movies, or had no one to go with. Harry got the box set of the comics a wee while ago. He was gentleman enough to send me a photo of his room with the special edition poster stuck to it, just so I would feel jealous. Bastard. BUT, he gave me the box for my collection, with all the sweet 8bit art on it. So yeah, thats what I have to say about that.

Toast to a Toddler

...And I feel like there should be something wrong with that. Of course there really isn't. The first birthday is really for the parents, like a congratulatory celebration of having proved they can survive one of the most difficult periods of person raising. I would just like to note for everyone that I find the drawing of Ben, Kate, and Elijah (The little bro) to be super cute.
Ben and Nat were surprised at my choice of beverages, considering they had spent the entirety of Bens stag do trying to get me drunk, to little avail. Is it a crime to tip beer out when no ones looking? No, cause it's disgusting. I've been told that us Taylors are all "top shelf" drinkers. Which I agree with, after being told what they were. "Spirits, Bourbon and stuff. RTD's." "Oh ok. RTD's... What does that stand for?" ".... I have no idea." "Sounds like a disgusting virus to me."
Wait... Isn't top shelfing when you take a dump in the top tank part of a toilet?

Valuable time isn't getting Wasted!

Well today was the last day of uni for two weeks. To be honest it's more like two weeks not going into uni. They blessed us with new briefs before cheerfully sending us on our way. The bastards. Now whenever we do something we can idly think in the back of our minds "If I was really smart I would get onto uni work to ease up the workload later... NAAAH."
So far I have gotten my fifth gym badge, watched the latest Penny Arcade, started playing minecraft before stopping because I had no idea what I wanted to build, and watched some Australian war movie which wasn't half bad.

Johnny Cash - Hurt

Less Than Jake - Plastic Cup Politics

Common Rider - Where the Waves are Highest

I'm gonna skip Johnny. I think we all know something about that old dead guy. Although I guess he's appropriate to have at the top spot, since he's regarded as the godfather of punk.

Less Than Jake is one of the bigger Ska Punk bands out there. They've been pumping out albums fairly regularly. If you were to have bumped into any of their songs in the past it was probably The Science of Selling Yourself Short. They drop the trumpets quite a bit, so if those wind you up the wrong way it's fine, they don't use 'em all the time. But chances are if they do, you probably don't listen to this sort of music anyway. Lyric wise, these guys kind of feel like they have a lot of regrets. Quite often it seems their apologizing for the scene, or how their real screw ups. I kinda dig it. It makes a change from most punk related stuff that believes the problem lies in corporate America or something.
Common Rider, started up in 1999, broke up in 2003. Although the song that's gotten top spot today was released on a compilation in 2004. Posthumously I guess. Anyway, I rocked this song a lot years ago, when my brother lent me the Hopelessly Devoted To You - Volume 5 compilation CD. It's only a minute and a half so you could play it quite a lot. Anyway yeah, more punky ska stuff. No brass at all with these guys.I recommend Firewall, Small Pebble, and One Ton. These songs have been keeping me jumping at all the bus stops over the past few days.

Go Girls!

The title of course, is not referring to any shitty TV show or club.
So we have been matched up into groups for our next assignment, which is to make a movie poster completely out of font. It should be good. Becky, Steph, and I have been amalgamated into what is commonly referred to as a "group" (Sorry for all this industry talk, Ill try to tone it down.) We must follow what is called a "brief". Not like a case, or underwear, but a piece of paper with "instructions" on it. Anyway, I think we will do "really well". That just makes me sound sarcastic doesn't it?

Essay Punch II!

Yeah, not exactly clever. But I got other things on my mind I guess. I handed in the essays today (Including the wingdings one) and got promptly given the new essay. Which is pretty much the same thing, except we're looking at images done in the last 15 years and comparing it to images and philosophies from the post modern period. Although thats assuming a lot. Since it's essentially saying we have fully grown out of the post modern era, which simply isn't true. We may have new emerging ideas, but I wouldn't say it's widespread enough to say we have moved into Post*2 modernity. Although I do agree that advertising trends have changed. So I could agree that design has jumped into its next faze. All this brings me to my new weekly feature.

I know right! What a spell binding name! It almost makes you look forward to Wednesdays doesn't it! Ill wait for half of you to come back from wikipedia and then we can get started. For the next 7 or so weeks Ill be doing these once a Wednesday, discussing junk I have had piled on me by my lecturers. Hopefully by the end of it I will have a nice pile of info to join together to make a 2500 word essay.

I will reiterate that I am an undergrad, so nothing I say is worth the pixels that are burning to show you these letters.

And also I don't have anything to talk about that I haven't already in the first paragraph of this post.... *cough*

Essay Punch!

Remember, to show it who's boss, give the physical copy of your essay a good punch, just so it remembers its place. It's just your vehicle to a decent grade.

We learn't about David Carson over the course of this paper. If you saw it you instantly think 90's. I guess he helped create the style that we associate with the 90's. Anyway, He did an interview in Ray Gun Magazine (1994) with musician Brian Ferry. He found the interview so boring that he published it all in dingbats.
In keeping with the spirit of this, tomorrow Rebekkah will find one (or two) of these in her hand in piles.

(This won't be included in the library section)

Action Design Guy

I have told todays story to much today. I feel like flagging it. But this is the place where the words I say become regrettably immortalized.
So ill start with thanking people. Harry, your time, car and quips over the day are the only thing that saved me from an even worse day. at LEAST five creaming sodas are coming your way.
Becky, thanks for just being in the same situation as me. XD

So today yesterdays doodle came true. Except they didn't cut my arm off. We need to get our booklets printed for tomorrows class. On friday we were hoping to get it done. We were told by the printers they would have it done by the end of the day. But we got jerked around until it was to late to go somewhere else with the lines "Oops, turns out our printers were totally broken the whole time. lololololol."
So we sweatily waited out the weekend, hoping that when we made our return on Monday they would give us a more desirable response...
10:00am It was unforthcoming. Turns out they hadn't done jack since Friday. To compound problems I also completely forgot my usb. I tried finding my files on their computers but they must have renamed it from InsideShitV3.pdf to something more polite. And so we roll to my place, got my usb and went to another printers.
11:30am Now I have to say Lineset design and print limited is a pretty slick setup. I walked in boldly, ready to give my specs of what I needed, when all I could muster to the dude at the computer was "YOU LOOK FAMILIAR." and then petered off, asking Harry to say what we needed.
We were instilled with confidence this guy could get the job done. So fully pacified we left to go kill some time till he was done.
3:35pm Both his printers broke.
4:00pm Back at Cardelle's were still failing to get any decent results from their printer. Harry at this point has to split to get to work. Me and Becky continue our quest alone.
4:30pm we manage to find some generic printing place. Two ladies run it, and the general impression they give off is that of someone who has spent 2000 bucks on a laptop which they only use to check their emails on, but tell you excitedly that it CAN do other things. Like file away digital photos and play solitaire sometimes.
4:40pm They get our junk printed and we happily go home.

5:00pm The work day is concluded for all the printers around town.

5:10pm We suddenly realize we set the font to wingdings before publishing it.

Ha kidding. That would suck.

No extensions bro!

Bro over bro! BRO OVER!
This is my worst fears of what tomorrow brings, drawn today! Feverishly, between finishing my essay. It's in the clean up phase at the moment, as well as a little fleshing out just to get my wordcount up there. (1333 / 1500)

As I haven't got time to say anything, I will leave you with a little Denison Witmer. He's been keeping my ears company for the last couple hours. He was recommended by Relient K (Mostly because their publishing his latest album for him through their studio Mono vs. Stereo.) He's quite relaxed, and everythings just acoustic. So only listen to it if your not in the mood to get ragey. (Also go find his Facebook page and play "Hold on", it's good.) Also "Carry the Weight" is a good one I have found so far. (If this thing starts autoplaying tell me and Ill delete it faster than you can say

Put some clothes on!

This one happened tonight as my sister was going through my essay (currently at 1114 / 1500). She had the TV muted, and while absolutely NO ONE was interested in sport, the kids found it completely unbearable to have a muted television on that they weren't even paying attention to. Adam, caught in a blinding fervor to set the world right comes dashing into the lounge, dripping, and holding onto a towl and attempts to wrestle the remote from little Sarahs hands. She valiantly fends off her attacker when Rebekkah yells at Adam "Get some clothes on Adam! No one wants to see you naked!" Adam looked shocked at his mother,and then turned away with a hurt sounding "Fine." as if he was blessing the world with the gift of himself, and to throw it back in his face like that was rude and an uncalled for offence.

I almost ran out of day for drawing this one, I noticed 5 minutes to twelve.
Time to get back to my essay I guess.
Oh but first go check out the 100 days of Street Art blog. A few images I snapped are on there. I seriously suggest that if your ever bored, and have a camera, go for a wander round town and support the street art community! The net is always looking for new images and inspiration. Do your bit for the international art gallery. If your in Auckland or NZ I'm always keen to host pics. It's been a while since I have.

Whoever you are

You understand the extent of your unattendance when being used as an example of unattendance your lecturer forgets only YOUR name.

I'm surprised at the extent in which my lecturers are getting into my doodles. Turns out they say some solid gold material sometimes. Phil has cropped up before, earning himself a quote on the wall to inspire all us aspiring designers.

Yellowcard – Afraid

Amber Pacific – Always You

Mute Math – Reset

Yellowcard makes its way to the top of the charts this week. Wtf is this shit, I thought I called it top of the non pops. Afraid is a song that really got me in 09. I blasted it far to much.

Amber Pacific is much like Yellowcard except without the violin. So it's just straight up punk. Their latest album features a new singer. So I'm not sure if it's even Amber Pacific anymore you know?

Mute Math describes its self as alt rock I 'spose. Some of the things they do just blow my mind. Perhaps the only band I would want the live dvd and album for. Reset features on their first CD, and is one of the few instrumental tracks. I recommend listening to them with a decent surround sound system. Note in the video how often the drummer gets shown in comparison to the lead guitar. Oh yeah, things really hit the fan at about the 4 minute mark. Such a wicked way to end a show.

A Supportive "Colleague"

A badly drawn Eric again. I should ask Becky to do a portrait of him or something, so you guys know what he loo-WOOPS... Woa, to be honest I didn't realize he had been on TV.

Hurt in its Confusion

I fell victim to this gap in the wall in year one of uni. Huh, I'm surprised I didn't write a post about it then. Anyway, it's a treaterous shortcut that occasionally demands a price be paid for its use. In my case it was a set of headphones getting caught in it and breaking off.
I'm proud to announce a new player in our doodle a day family. Harry was a little bit of a late bloomer when it came to starting his sketches, and even later in creating his blog. But we won't hold that against him. He does a better job of introducing himself, so check it out. If your allergic to pow in your face pink and holy cow my corneas purple then you might want to hold off though.

Three girls

I could not be bothered doing a dedicated doodle today. So instead you get an amalgamation of what I have done today. Still counts!
Our net went down and I've only just been able to resurrect it. Looks like the old modem went and cooked itself in an attempt to escape being the accomplice in the procuring of lotsa porn.
I had to sit for more than an hour and a half waiting for tech support to not figure out my problem. Seriously. I went and played Pokemon Blue while I waited and I bet Brock long before anyone came to my aid.
Ah, faceless "Support", so we meet again. I shall have you know I appreciate your existence, but resent your inability to fix things magically. I will respect you while I speak to you, but I shall complain about you long after I have hung up the phone. For you see, it isn't you as a person, or the fact that my modem is broken that made me think you were a noob. It was the fact you told me to go ask my brother what to do. Next time someone brings me a design job I will make sympathetic noises and then direct them to someone else with the words of "You might want to find someone else to do my job for me."

Awkward flying

Turns out she was the only one on the planet who couldn't fly. Well I just found out my good friend Hanna is in hospital. Probably a million years after everyone else since I lack the facebook. So when you get online next Hanna, you can know I was writing about you & wishing you well. Ask them to take a photo of your appendix when they take it out. So you can put it in your wallet and show everyone lovingly.
Or better yet, ask to keep it, and then staple it to the back of your next essay, and then ask your tutor if they 'geddit'.
Anyway, talking about guts I watched The Social Network last night. It was decent. I'm starting to notice Relativity Media at the beginning of movies I enjoy in an odd way. Just a random note. Anyway I'll see you all tomorrow.

Giggles Don't Save Lives

This is the second time Hayden has made it into the doodles. This one was taken during the stag night. Wise words.

Stag Don't

Can I talk about the Stag Do? No. Because that would break sacred codes of conduct. Was Chris dressed up like a dirty cave man, with a giant stuffed doll that represents his future wife and also a baby doll? The public of Queen Street can testify to that one. Did I take video evidence of everything? Hell yeah! Will you guys be privy to it? Of course not.
But to make up for it I'm finally posting up Februarys video (Also being archived in the vids section.)
Thanks Keir for getting my arse into gear with your comment. I quite like this video for some reason, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did experiencing it.

Bee in This Bus

If you're still looking for the Bee on this Bus then you're missing the point.

Now for a new feature! I like to call it:

Top Songs this Week

1. John Powell – Goa

2. John Powell – The Drop

3. Cherry Poppin' Daddies – Soul Cadillac

Well. In an attempt to broaden peoples listening I have managed to pick some of the weirder side of casual listening.
John Powell does all the music for the Bourne movies. As well as Shrek, How to Train Your Dragon, and a whole pile of others. Goa & The Drop both Feature on the Bourne Supremacy Soundtrack.
At number three we got Cherry Poppin' Daddies, who hang out in the Ska/Punk scene. But it would be unfair to leave them with those two tags hanging over their heads. They have a huge doliping of vintage swing, which gives them a funky edge on everyone else.