The Skirvin

When I was in my late teens and driving around a deserted downtown and listening to The Cure late at night –when Bricktown only had 2 clubs and 1 streetlight– I've had a fascination with the Skirvin hotel. Not because I thought it was haunted –but because it was a dark, Gothic mass of ancient architecture right where I liked to feel dark and gothic. There was history there you could feel in the air. Especially since it was built when there weren't cars and since it saw the city grow around it.
It was born of an oil boom and died of an oil bust. Nearly a century after the oil boom that birthed it, another oil boom brought it back from the dead.
It was a pleasure to not only see it restored, but to build a virtual representation of it. I tried to keep as much of the excellent brick-work as I could and give it the best representation I was able to, even though this is my first official Google Earth building. It is pending approval at this point, but I have every reason to think it will be accepted. Meanwhile, here's a 2D version of the 3D model.

Addendum: from what I can see, there are only 3 people currently building models for Oklahoma City and exclusively downtown. What's more, I seem to the the only one from the 405. I want to think there's a way to make money off of this, but I'm unsure how. Maybe a few more models and I'll figure it out.

Robots love women

From the works of Mike Mitchell, Illustrator

There's plenty of great stuff there, this one was just robot-flavored.

Directors and their villians

It's only an observation I have about the nationality of evil depending on director.

Lucas = British
Spielberg = Germans (Nazi's)
Gilliam = French
Cameron = Extraterrestrials/Robots



Just an observation. What director has Americans as evil?

Get Rich Slow Scheme

Well crap. Another great get-rich-quick-idea took a whole 5 minutes to be dashed to pieces.
I was thinking I needed to pick back up the trombone. Not to play Sousa and Beethoven —which drove me screaming from the practice— but to start playing Ska, which I really enjoy.
Then I thought about my old bone and how I knew right where to put the tuning slider without checking to make it in tune. At that moment an idea came to me:
We had digital chromatic tuners when I was in high-school. Why couldn't I build an iPhone tuner app? Well, an ultra-quick search immediately lit on the Cleartune Chromatic Tuner app which really looks good.
George Carlin once said, "I'm ahead of my time. Problem is that I'm only an hour-and-a-half ahead." Looks like I've got the same problem only an hour-and-a-half behind. Dang.

Robots eat children

I've been planning my halloween costume and prematurely patting myself on the back for how awesome it's going to be... then I come across this lilliputian Voltron who puts my imagined costume to shame. Too awesome not to post.

Populat3d

Since I changed my website url, I've lost all my previous links which I may or may not go back and fix. Is it worth it?
Anywhoo, I've worked on the model of the KoR and populated it with furniture. The only piece I really lack is my plycraft (Eames wannabe) lounge that I bought for $20 including the ottoman. I bought it from a neighbor after it was sitting in front of their house in the rain and figured I wanted it more than they did. Anyway, the lounge is not simple square shapes. Everything on it except the legs are rounded and since the free version of Google Sketchup has major shape-molding limitations, It's going to take me a while to do the model justice. Or someone could take pitty on me and give me an old copy of a decent 3D program they aren't using anymore, cuz there's no way I can afford one.
The people that know my house know that this is an accurate representation, except for the extraordinary lack of clutter and state of repair. Getting better.

Adrift on the Miyazaki sea

Ponyo, Miyazaki's latest feature-length film based on Hans Christian Anderson's The Little Mermaid, is set to open in the US today. Here is a glowing review.

I will see it soon. Official Disney website with trailer here.

Sandimation

This is one of the greatest displays of artistry and animation I've ever seen. It's Ukrainian artist Kseniya Simonova. Her art and skill are incredible and her sand animations are animated images, both in creation and application. I won't spend any more time gushing about her. Just watch and enjoy.

I'd link her but she doesn't seem to have a website. Well, she'll have one soon, cuz the word is out. More on youtube.

Back to the Future.

In my admittedly biased opinion, the best prime-time animated American television show Futurama is set to return with the original cast in 2010. The story from Variety is really badly written, but you can scratch your head at it here. ("Set to bow"???)
Seems the cast was holding out for $70k an episode. The show is great, but no wonder all of television is sprinting as fast as possible towards the reality TV finished line. Jeez.
I seem to remember when Groening was all about the blue collar. Regardless of the payout (which they could have possibly avoided had they never canceled it), I'm happy it will be back.

Conan and Andy do Anime

Of course Conan isn't going to tell you he's old-hat at cartoons being the voice of Mentok the Mindtaker on Adult Swim's Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law.
And Andy isn't going to tell you he's old-hat at cartoons being the voice of Mort on Madagascar 1 & 2 and the Nickelodeon show Penguins of Madagascar.

But what they do do is make merciless fun at anime. Ghost in the Shell, too, which is the good kind of anime.


via: The Duty

So go ahead and act like you don't watch or understand anime, Conan and Andy. I know better by the friends you keep.

RobOpera Sauvage

Robots AND animation. Better than sex? Not quite, but it will suffice at the moment. The style kind-of reminds me of the French movie (animated in Czechoslovakia) La Planète sauvage. which blew my mind when I saw it. The dance-techno in this is meh, but the animation rocks.

BIRDY NAM NAM - THE PARACHUTE ENDING from Steve Scott on Vimeo.