December 31st, 2006
This was the hardest decision of the lot. Do I put the car from one of my favourite of all time films at number 1 or 2? To be fair the movie that the car that did make number 1 from is also a favourite but doesn’t quite have the place in my heart.
I remember as a very young man going and seeing Ghostbusters, not at the cinemas but in a bowls club due to the fact that I lived in a small country town at the time.
It was a phenomenon and I can honestly say I didn’t quite get the entirety of the film at that age and that has made watching it (over and over) again even more of a joy as I discover new things all the time.
One of the icons of the film is the Ecto 1 - the 1959 Cadillac Miller-Meteor limo-style combination endloader is a true favourite of mine and i have the second incarnation sitting on my desk as I type this (the Johnny Lightning Ecto 1A Matchbox sized car). Eventually I’m going to have to bite the bullet and buy the bigger version.
There is just something right about the Ectomobile. It feels right in the film. Originally they were going to have the car black like a hearse and I’m so glad they didn’t - they changed their mind due to the number of scenes at night that would have washed the car out.
The other thing I love about this car is the fact that I have seen three separate fan built replicas driving around Brisbane! The first time I saw one it was coming towards us and I said to Tracey half joking ‘ah here comes the Ectomobile!’ as it approached I saw that it was indeed made up to look like the Ectomobile complete with Ghostbusters icons on the doors. I think I went numb and just kept repeating oh my god over and over until we returned from the shopping.
So like I said it was hard not to make this the number one car but the movie has more weight than the car does with me!
We’re there! We’re at number 1!!!! It may be my first post of 2007 or it may be my last of 2006 depending on how I go!
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December 31st, 2006
And once again we have the Batmobile in our top ten list. Now the latest Batmobile is pretty cool… pretty dang cool however the Batmobile I wish to honour is the 1989 Tim Burton version.This car is a dream machine!
Designed for a darker Batman:
“For Batman Anton Furst was hired as production designer for Gotham City and the Batmobile. He wanted the car to be unlike any previous incarnation, a combination of brute force and classic design aesthetics. To build the car, the production team spliced together two Impala chassis, and the car was powered by a Chevy V8. The body was a custom-built fabrication, and the whole thing rides on a set of Mickey Thompson racing tires on custom wheels.
In his design, Furst managed to capture the essence of a Batmobile while providing all-new design elements. The bat-mask was gone entirely from his design. In its place, the nose featured a large jet turbine intake flanked by sweeping, mandible-like front fenders. Cold air intakes for the afterburner were mounted ahead of the rear fenders. The rear of the car had a rounded, heavy look that was influenced by cars of the 1930s, set between a pair of relatively short sculpted fins. Inside, the two-seat cockpit featured aircraft-like instrumentation, a passengers’ side monitor, self-diagnostics system, CD recorder, and voice-command recognition system.
Gadgets on this Batmobile were relatively simple, but potent. It was armed with spherical bombs, a pair of forward-facing Browning machine guns, side-mounted disc launchers, and chassis-mounted shinbreakers. For quick maneuvers, the Batmobile had side-mounted grappling hook launchers and a central “foot” capable of lifting the car and rotating it 180 °. In addition to its armor plated body, the car could envelop itself in a heavy armor cocoon. To avoid capture, the Batmobile also featured three primary pursuit deterrents: oil slick dispensers, smoke emitters, and, in extereme circumstances, a “Batmissile” mode that sheds all material outside of the central fuselage and reconfigures the wheels & axles to fit through narrow openings.
Once employed, however, the Batmissle mode essentially destroys much of the car, and it must be rebuilt afterwards.
The car was retired after Batman Returns, though its popularity with fans has established a strong following. (source)”
For me this will probably always be THE Batmobile the ones that replaced it were too much like the films they appeared in; lavish. I’m actually kind of glad this Batmobile didn’t make it to Batman and Robin.
Now the Batmobile in the latest film Batman Begins is really cool and powerful (it’s referred to as the Tumbler) and it’s really suited to this Batman film but it doesn’t have the iconic edge that that the 1989 version does!
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December 29th, 2006
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December 29th, 2006
The artist diary. I never really got why one needed to do this when studying art - I hated doing it - with a deep loathing!!!
I was always under the impression that you just work on your piece. Anything that doesn’t work you just either toss out or put to the side at the very least.
Now with a little maturity behind me (and I do mean a little!!!) I’m starting to get it and I’ve got several artist diaries floating around the mess that I call my office. Many of the sketches and drawings will never amount to anything. In fact one book I’ve got I’m just sketching manga related imagery such as eyes and hair etc and this is nothing remotely arty!
The system that works best for me I think is that I work in different books and on paper all over the place and I just drop into a big scrap book or folder. Then if I’m working on a piece I can tape the bits and pieces up around me for inspiration.
Here as discussed from the previous post is several earlier sketches/scribbles for the dracula pic (which is not complete I may add - I’m going to wait on some better quality crayons) and a re’scan of the invisible man study I did! Actually on second thought I’ll post that on it’s own.
Instead of putting all the images on the first page though I might force you to click and go into the story just to see the images! Rather than slow this front page down and push everything kilometres down the screen - so please go and have a look at someone playing around with crayons and leave comments cause I love counting comments hah hah hah one comment, twoo comments, threee comments (be sure to post a comment - I’ll send a random commenter a sketch of a monster - your choice!)
(more…)
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December 29th, 2006
No I don’t mean the cheap hot dogs in their cafe! I’m talking about flatback toys that you can download and print up at home.
So first off you download the PDF which has the toy flattened out and then a little like origami you fold the flat piece of printed paper into the toy.
On my travels through the virtual world I found this site FWIS Readymech which has a whole bunch of these guys (like the one to the left) for you to download and print up and all for free!
Now obviously these aren’t for kids although it would make a great project for them whilst they’re on holidays, they just won’t stand up to too much punishment later!
The main reason why I like them is that if you work in a shared office or a cubicle it’s a way for you to add a little of your own personality without the fear that some freak will steal one of your figurines because if they do you just print him up again and put him right back there on your desk!
I do want to point out too that I am in no way affiliated with any of the sites that I mention on here unless I state it - I just want you to know that these are sites I’ve actually found and enjoyed!
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December 29th, 2006
Ok I’m not as happy with the crayons as I was the other day. The colours are not vibrant enough and they’re in those pen things so you twist them out but if you put in pressure on them they don’t work they just go back in.
So anyway here is a picture that I’m really not happy with but I’m posting it anyway - I might post some of the crayon sketches I did earlier that I wasn’t happy with. Hey if anyone else has been inspired to go get some crayons (I’m not talking pastels here - it has to be kids crayons!) email me or post your picture link!
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December 28th, 2006
I know we’re a couple of days past the whole Christmas Day thing but we’re still basking in the afterglow of the merry season and this is something I ask all my friends around this time of year because it gets them thinking and it’s a nice little spin on the generally sweet Christmas entertainment. It’s the non-christmas christmas movie (nccm)!
What I mean and I’m going to use mine as the example, is a movie that is set during Christmas but doesn’t have the sickly sweet Christmas message. My example is Die Hard. It’s Christmas eve and poor John McClane is visiting his separated wife at her Christmas work function. Then of course terrorists show up and John has to go all Die Hard on their butts… oh yeah that’s where that comes from LOL.
There’s plenty of Christmas references throughout the film, tinsel, Run DMC carols, Santa hats and my absolute favourite Christmas related scene where John uses Christmas tape to tape his gun to his back. Magic.
So what are your NCCM’s? I don’t want to get a list of horror films like Silent Night etc that’s too easy and they’re using Christmas directly. I’m talking your Lethal Weapons, Die Hards etc…
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December 27th, 2006
In Gone in 60 Seconds retired car thief Memphis Raines is coerced into coming back into the ‘boosting’ business in order to save his brother from an evil Dr Who (ok it’s not actually Dr Who but the guy who brought Dr Who back).
The holy grail of cars that is on the list that Memphis has to boost is the 1967 Shelby Mustang GT500 or codename ‘Eleanor’.
Considered to be the more famous of the Mustangs there were 11 built for the movie.
“Of those, two were destroyed in the climactic bridge jump and junkyard crusher scenes. Because certain cars were needed to do different manoeuvres in the film, no two Eleanors were alike.
All the Eleanors only acted the role of being Shelbys while really they were modified Mustang fastbacks. And, although in “Gone” the car is supposed to be a four-on-the-floor, most of the Eleanors were automatics — because it’s easier to act and do stunts when you don’t have to manually shift gears. source“
A model of this car sits in my wife’s office so at the very least there was no chance of it not making this list! (more…)
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December 24th, 2006
It’s the silly season so not much time to sit down and write! I did a couple of nights ago though sit down with some crayons I bought from the supermarket and below is the result - I’m going to do a whole series of them the universal monsters. Of course if anyone has any requests!
Oh and don’t worry I’m still going with the movie cars!!!
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December 22nd, 2006
Go and take a look at Scribbler - an absolute little gem of a website! What you do is draw a simple line drawing and then let it do it’s thing. I didn’t even think at the time to take a copy of what I drew but I love the outcome:
If you happen to post your own image on your own blog send us a link so we can check it out!!!!
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