An Empire Generic

Lobsterdance Pro. Presents: THE TERRORMISU

2012-02-06T09:25:00.003-05:00

THE TERRORMISU was created for the Vimeo Weekend Project's fake trailer contest. As the contest denotes, it is another fake trailer and a spiritual sequel to our last, OGGRA! VOODOO MONSTER FROM HELL. Similar to OGGRA, all the footage you see here was created using almost entirely practical special effects work, largely miniatures.

Camera: Panasonic DVX100b
Music: Akira Ifukube (from Frankenstein Conquers the World and Battle in Outer Space)

Behind the scenes clip, courtesy of crew member and co-star David "Tim" Johannaber.

Eventually, I intend to release a longer director's cut of this. It'll include a couple of shots missing from this cut, as well as a couple of new special effects shots I want to film soon and a more complete, polished sound mix.

GODZILLA VS. PIKACHU: SUPER ULTIMATE FINAL BATTLE

2012-02-06T09:15:00.000-05:00

Yes.

A Trio of Etchings and a Monoprint

2012-02-04T05:15:00.002-05:00

Here are some of the results of my adventures in printmaking last semester. First, a trio of etchings:

And then a monoprint based off of a lovely acquaintance of mine, Young. It's imperfect but a worthy experiment in the medium, I think:

A really lame joke.

2012-02-04T05:10:00.000-05:00

Playing some art catchup! I'll start off with this, a really lame joke:

GRD3000 Project II - A fun little tidbit maybe.

2011-12-02T04:55:00.000-05:00

Okay, so this will be a no brainer for you tokusatsu fans out there but for everyone else, here'ssomething fun. Remember the Ultraman ad I posted a couple days ago?

(This one.)

Okay, well, for starters, the delightfully derpy silhouette of Ultraman himself is pulled straight from the opening of the original TV show (from a version used a little later in the show's run). Thought it'd be a fun design element to incorporate since I can be kind of a whore for silhouettes. Anyway, note the star field that I added on the inside of that same silhouette. Now, Ultraman IS an alien "hero from the stars" and I really could have picked any interstellar medium image I pleased totally arbitrarily but I chose this particular image because it is this:

Photo Credit: Martin Pugh, via APOD

BEHOLD! THE NEBULA M-78!

"Big deal," you say, "it's a nebula. So what?" Well the Ultraman fans who might be reading this will tell you: M-78 is the in-universe location of the Land of Light, Ultraman's world of origin! Why on Earth TSUBURAYA picked that particular nebula is beyond me but for the sake of my ad, I thought it was a nice, subtle reference. 8D

New from Lobsterdance Pro.: BATTLE LEAVES IV

2011-11-28T10:30:00.002-05:00

IF YOU THOUGHT BATTLE LEAVES III WAS INTENSE, YOU'RE FULL OF SHIT.

Playing Catch-up: GRD3000 Project III - Event Poster

2011-11-28T10:25:00.000-05:00

Pretending one of my favorite bands liked me enough to use my artwork for one of their concert posters.

Playing Catch-up: GRD3000 Project II - Ad Campaign

2011-11-28T10:20:00.001-05:00

Pretending the BCI/Mill Creek DVD sets never happened...

Playing Catch-up: GRD3000 Project I - Personal Logo

2011-11-28T10:15:00.001-05:00

BLOG NEGLECT. I AM SO BAD AT THIS, GUYS.

Also, the PNG versions of these look awfully jaggy. I'll try and fix that later.

Godzilla Study

2011-06-06T11:35:00.000-04:00

Another study of the King of the Monsters. This one was done with watercolors, charcoal and acrylic. Not as successful as a sketch I'd done with the same technique but I'm sure someone out there will like it and if that someone sees it, feel free to make an offer of the monetary sort. XD

Vaxxim

2011-05-25T18:15:00.000-04:00

Quick 15-20 minute sketch experimenting with charcoal and watercolor. Results left something to be desired, going to try something different next time.

OGGRA, VOODOO MONSTER FROM HELL!

2011-05-19T14:15:00.000-04:00

BEHOLD! The newest short from Lobsterdance Pro.!

OGGRA! isn't a real Lobsterdance project in the works - it is merely a fake trailer and a visual test run for a larger, more substantial project that we have in the works. It was original conceived and created for my Intro to Sculpture class in May of 2011 and the whole thing was literally shot in my driveway from 8 PM to 5 AM on a Saturday night. Yeah.

I think it's worth noting (because I'm extremely proud of the fact) that the film is composed of entirely practical, in-camera special effects work. With the sole exception of the composite fire effects in the final shot, everything was created with miniatures, costumes, smoke bombs, baking soda, etc. This is truly my favorite style of filmmaking, to be sure.

New Ultra Series: "ULTRAMAN RETSUDEN"

2011-04-21T16:45:00.002-04:00

Very little is known about this new series and all we do know comes from the scan to the right. Here's the rundown:

ULTRAMAN RETSUDEN
(ウルトラマン列伝)
("Retsuden" translates as "series of biographies")

It will air from 6:00-6:30 PM on Wednesdays starting from July 6th.
It will apparently "uncover little-known facts about the Ultra Warriors and Monsters."
It's part of the series' celebration of its 45th Anniversary

So is this going to be a fairly lame stock footage recap series or a fairly awesometastic series of original adventures featuring past heroes and monsters? I initially assumed the former but I talked to August Ragone on the matter and his speculation is that its half-hour runtime may indicate an original, dramatic production as opposed to a simple clips-show - something like a more Ultraman-centric spin on the Ultra Galaxy concept only likely to have much higher production values as this is airing on TV Tokyo and six national networks.

Again, this is all speculation so don't start thinking that this is definitely what we're getting. However, if it is it ought to be cool as hell. I love the thought of what could basically be a series of gaidens for multiple Ultramen and monsters. LOVE IT.

*crosses fingers and waits*

Of course, not too long ago a new Ultra film was announced to be in production for a December release. This is, presumably, the speculated third and final installment of the loose "Ultraman Zero Trilogy" that began in Mega Monster Battle: Ultra Galaxy Legends the Movie (2009) and continued in Ultraman Zero the Movie: Super Decisive Battle! Belial's Galactic Empire (2010). Yes, I did have to use the full titles. The latter of the two previous movies comes out on DVD tomorrow, actually! I don't know if the recent disasters in Japan have had any effect on the production on this new, 45th Anniversary film so for the moment I'm going to assume it's still on track. Definitely looking forward to seeing what TPC has in store this time around and I'm very excited to get my mitts on the Ultraman Zero movie as soon as I can!

Cheers!

- Jared P. Foust

The Great Monster Yongary

2011-03-03T10:45:00.001-05:00

Go watch this movie now, dammit.

Tokyo

2011-02-13T14:25:00.001-05:00

I really should stop neglecting this blog.

Anyway, here are a series of studies I did of photographs I took of Tokyo at night. I tried to keep them loose as a personal exercise but I'm not sure how well they sit with me or not. Other people, however, seem to love them, so that's something. I may alter them a little in the future so I'm not really sure if I consider them "finished" or not.

Ginza I - acrylic on panel - 18x24"

Shimokitazawa I - acrylic on panel - 18x24"

Shibuya I - acrylic on panel - 18x24"

Akihabara I - acrylic on panel - 18x24"

Ginza Study - acrylic on canvas - 9x12"

Acrylic is a medium that I'm very on the fence about. When applied to paper, I abhor it and I was terrified of using it again in my water-based media class last semester. This changed when I found how wonderful it felt to paint with it on a canvas and even moreso on a panel. That said, it dries very quickly, which is a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, it means you can paint a lot faster than with oil, which is great because oils can become very tedious. On the other hand, the quick drying time means that the paint never flows as smoothly as oil paints do and the feeling of working with a brush that keeps getting gummed up and sticking to the painting surface and never completing a full stroke is frustrating as hell. Additionally, I find the resulting brushstrokes to often be ugly as sin.

All that aside, I keep seeing people create gorgeous work in acrylic and that alone is enough to keep me curious. We'll see where it goes.

ULTRAMAN ZERO THE MOVIE: Super Decisive Battle! Belial's Galactic Empire!

2010-11-23T12:55:00.001-05:00

After months without a proper trailer, the REAL trailer for the newest Ultra series movie finally hit the internet a few days ago!

This movie is going to be amaaaaaaaazing. D8

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3K7x-3wZRI

Happy Birthday, Godzilla!

2010-11-03T19:25:00.002-04:00

56 years ago today, Godzilla redecorated Tokyo for the first time!

Review! "Kamen Rider × Kamen Rider Double & Decade: Movie War 2010" (2009)

2010-10-06T23:25:00.002-04:00

Kamen Rider × Kamen Rider Double & Decade: Movie War 2010
(仮面ライダー×仮面ライダーＷ（ダブル）＆ディケイド MOVIE大戦2010; 2009)

Let me preface this review with the fact that I am not really a big Kamen Rider fan. I should qualify that I particularly am referring to the modern series, as I have not seen much of the classic stuff and I feel like I might like them more. That's not the point, however. The point is that I want to like the modern Kamen Rider series - I love a lot of the concepts and designs and they usually have some pretty fun action scenes - and while there are some cases where I have enjoyed one series or another, almost all of them have burned me in some respect. To date, I have only been able to complete all of three of the nine series I have tried to watch and of those three only one left me satisfied at the end. Even now I am beginning to realize that that one series - Kamen Rider Faiz - is far more flawed than I remember it being when I first watched it.

The problems I have with them are many - ranging from shoddy writing to boring dramatics to a hero having too many useless power-ups and form changes, often being too "toyetic" for their own good - but each year since about 2006 I try to watch at least a little of whatever the current series is to see if there will finally be a modern Rider to fully grasp my imagination and each year I either wind up giving up midway through the show's run or I finish it and wonder why I wasted my time. 2008 and 2009 were particularly bad and they nearly put me off the series entirely! The 2008 series was Kamen Rider Kiva, a series loosely inspired by the classic Universal monsters. At least that's what it seemed like initially. Once the show started airing it turned out to be nothing but an incredibly bland retread of the head writer's previously crappy series that finished off with a final ten episodes so poorly written that they made me want to kill things with a sharp stick.

And then came Kamen Rider Decade, the 2009 series. Publicized as an anniversary for the Modern Kamen Rider series (the series was re-launched in 2000), it went on to be one of the most abhorrently-written clusterfuck-passed-off-as-entertainment I have ever encountered in my life. It did have its moments, mind you. If you just wanted to see old Riders fighting each other or teaming up to fight a mutual enemy then the action was pretty slickly handled and you'd get more than you paid for. And that's fine. However, if you wanted, I don't know, a coherent series? Or even just a semi-coherent one? Yeah, I don't know, go watch an Ultraman series or something because Kamen Rider Decade is not where you'll find something like that. Mind you, there were still times where the sheer (pardon me for using this word) epicness of certain scenes would be so great that even non-fans could watch it and think, "Whoa." This scene in particular:

I can't speak for everyone but I dare say that it is one of the coolest scenes in recent tokusatsu history and it's about fifty times better if you're a fan of Kamen Rider. The hardcore fans at the Henshin Justice Unlimited forums are still pissing themselves over that scene to this day.

I should get to the actual movie review at hand here pretty soon. My apologies for the long-winded nature of this review.

I dropped Decade about halfway through and initially wrote off the following series, Kamen Rider W (Double), as more of the same dreck. However, upon giving it a second chance several months after it initially premiered, I realized a very important thing about Double: It was actually good. The plot made sense and the need for toy promotion wasn't a detriment to the series! What happened?

Apparently, Toei hired new writers. WHAT TOOK YOU GUYS SO LONG?!

So now I had a vested interest in the movie I'm supposed to be reviewing here. I originally ignored the movie because of how awful Decade was and the fact that the movie...

Okay, let me explain how this worked: Decade ended on a cliffhanger. They had all this crazy build-up and then they ended it on a cliffhanger that was quickly followed by an advertisement for this movie, Kamen Rider × Kamen Rider Double & Decade: Movie War 2010, which was to be a crossover film that wrapped up the end of Decade and showed the full events hinted at in the first episode of Double. Aside from this being a dick move in general, I want you to skip to the end of this video and take a look at the trailer for Decade's half of the film (sorry, Toei took the original, trailer-only video!):

That is the original trailer that followed Decade's cliffhanger final episode. It doesn't really matter that you have no context or that you probably have no idea what the hell is going on here. The point is that nothing from that trailer is in the final film. Not a single plot point, shot, or line of dialogue from that trailer appears in Movie War 2010. Zilch. More on this in a minute.

Now that I was actually a fan of Double though, I felt I should watch this movie if only to see his (their - it's two people combining to make a single Rider) story.

Well, here goes. This movie is basically three (two and a half) films in one so I'll review each part individually.

Part 1 - Kamen Rider Decade: Conclusion

In a word, this film is a travesty. I have never seen a tokusatsu film as shoddily-written as this film is. Everything that happens is incomprehensible at best and the film is a pain to watch the whole way through. Characters and plotlines are introduced or reintroduced in ways that never make sense and none of it seems to have anything to do with what actually happened at the end of the series. Seriously. At one point, the series' God-surrogate character (a previous Kamen Rider who was somehow granted magical, space-shifting abilities?) even tells our heroes that "Decade does not have a story." Right, thanks for stating the obvious.

The action is generally well-done but the battles are generally all so short that you forget they even happened once they're over. The effects work would be passable if this were a regular television episode but as a theatrical film, the CGI and compositing is downright shameful even by Japanese and Tokusatsu standards!

There are two redeeming factors to this movie: One is that the music is generally pretty awesome. They got a great composer to work on Decade, even if everything else was awful. Two: the eye-candy that is Natsumi, the heroine of the picture as portrayed by Kanna "Omnomnom" Mori. Seriously, if my screencaptures of this film were actually accurate in showing the parts I enjoyed, they'd look like the set I included to the right there.

Moving on.

Part 2 - Kamen Rider Double: Begins Night

Moving onto the second part of the film - the reason why I subjected myself to it in the first place - we come to Kamen Rider Double: Begins Night. It is not a travesty, thankfully, and manages to not be a torturous viewing experience. Its problem, however, is that the much-advertised prequel material is actually just a 10-minute long flashback (if that) and the real bulk of the film is basically just a standard TV plot that has almost no effect on the series. The flashback portion, mind you, is AWESOME and delivers all the fun and action that I want Kamen Rider to be. The rest of the film is just, uh, there. It's not unentertaining but it's not really exciting either and while I enjoy seeing Gamera 3's Toru Tezuka being his creepy self as much as the next guy, there's nothing about the plot that really makes me want to watch it again anytime soon (apart from the flashback, of course).

The film is really carried by the performance of Koji Kikkawa as Soukichi Narumi/Kamen Rider Skull - one of the most badass, manly Kamen Riders to see the light of day in recent years. Everything about the man just oozes cool and suaveness. A Kamen Rider wearing a fedora? Hell yes! And, naturally, he primarily only appears in the flashbacks. Seriously, what gives? The other big positive point is that despite being a little dull, it actually makes sense. Oh, and attractive, young Japanese women. Can't go wrong there.

Part 3 - Rider War 2010

Unfortunately, the ending of the Double portion of the film segues back into and merges with Decade's thing (I refuse to call it a 'plot'). At this point the film stops even trying to make some sort of sense and just devolves into mindless action that, while generally very well executed, I couldn't give a care about if I tried because the movie has already bludgeoned me past all rational thought. Lots of CGI spam (which is, thankfully, better than the CG in the first half of the film) and a couple idiotic "twists" later, the film is over and--

God, I don't even care anymore.

Don't watch this. If you like Kamen Rider Double, watch the ten-minutes of awesome flashbacks and skip every other worthless second of this film. There's a Director's cut coming out on DVD soon but I can't imagine that anything could ever make it watchable. How this managed to do so well at the box office, I'll never understand. Screw you, Toei.

Review! "Battle in Outer Space" (1959)

2010-10-05T19:25:00.000-04:00

Battle in Outer Space
(Uchuu Daisensou; 宇宙大戦争; 1959)

[WARNING: The following review contains minor spoilers concerning this film's only interesting character!]

These days it's getting more and more rare that I get to see a classic Toho film for the first time ever so it's a real treat when the opportunity arises. Oh, I rue the day when I have seen them all! Luckily, that day has yet to arrive and several months back I finally got around to popping in the copy of Battle in Outer Space I picked up along with The H-Man (1958) and Mothra (1961) a few months ago. Naturally, I enjoyed every minute of it (I have a hard time NOT liking oldschool Toho) but it was sadly very underwhelming.

The film was originally developed as a sequel to Toho's 1957 sci-fi epic, The Mysterians (a personal favorite) but at some point during pre-production became a totally seperate film. There are still a handful of references that could easily fit into the world created in The Mysterians - such as the alien race hiding on the far side of the moon and the practically identical design of the flying saucers - but every other connection has been stripped away and Earth's extraterrestrial encounters reset to zero to allow this film to do its own thing. It's kind of a shame because even though there are many benefits in creating an entirely new plot, I can't help but think it would have been great to have seen a continuation of The Mysterians. I will not hide my total adoration for that movie!

The plot of Battle in Outer Space, shallow as it is, concerns the attempted conquest of Earth by the warmongering Natal aliens and the extension of a very large, collective middle finger by the citizens of Earth, directed at the citizens of Natal. And that's... basically it. It's the same basic plot of The Mysterians, Monster Zero (1965), Destroy All Monsters (1968), and countless other films but all of those films added a lot of interesting twists and subplots that changed things up and made them all unique from each other. Battle in Outer Space is literally just the basic plot. That's IT. Like, really. What really gets me here is that while these sorts of film are typically derided for having threadbare plots, I find this usually isn't very true. No, they may not be the most intricately plotted works of cinema to have ever been made but I find them to be a lot more rich and compelling than most would give them credit for. In the case of Battle in Outer Space, it really IS that threadbare. Ridiculously so. I love Ishiro Honda as a director but he really has nothing to do here.

The sole interesting plot point and character in the film (because he is one and the same) is Yoshio Tsuchiya's Iwomura, a member of the team sent to the moon to take out the Natal's base who becomes mind-controlled into turning against his comrades. Every time he is onscreen the movie gets waaaaaay better than it was in the moments before he appeared. I tense up when he is going on his brainwashed rampages, root for him when he redeems himself, and feel terribly sad when I witness his final fate. He leaves the plot about halfway to two-thirds of the way through the film and from there on out the human plot completely ceases to be compelling in any way.

*Breaths deeply.*

Now, all that aside, the true star of Battle in Outer Space is special effects director Eiji Tsuburaya's spectacular work. And I do mean spectacular. The film's effects are pure visual candy from start to finish with a great number of drool-worthy shots, especially it you're into this aesthetic as much as I am. A particular standout is the wholesale urban renewal the Natal cause at the end of the film, blowing up a large chunk of New York, toppling the Golden Gate Bridge, and leveling Tokyo with a great effect that rips the buildings apart and blows them sky high. It's a wonderful feast for the eyes if you're into city destruction. Some of the larger miniature sets do suffer from a lack of detail but it's rather forgivable given how grand the spectacle of the whole thing is.

I should note that we are thrown some truly ridiculous science throughout the film - such as the notion that gravity is effected by temperature and that a rapid drop in an object's temperature will render that object weightless and without gravity (this is how Tokyo is destroyed, among other things) - which, I suppose, is par for the course in these sorts of films. The best part to me, however, is that this is not the fault of the filmmakers. No, Honda and Tsuburaya loved trying to be as scientifically accurate as they possibly could! Which means this was an actual theory at the time this film was made, a fact further confimed by SciFi Japan's Keith Aiken:

That jumped out at me, too, when I first saw the film years ago. But the audio commentary for BIOS explains this wasn't something Toho just pulled out of nowhere; it was actually a theory being discussed in scientific journals at the time the film was made.

I thought that was pretty great. XD

Oh, I almost forgot. The score is another plus, being another classic from Maestro Akira Ifukube. It contains lots of great battle themes that I've heard a thousand times over in Godzilla Vs. Gigan's recycled, patchwork score and it's really cool to hear them in their original context. Additionally, I realized that a particular motif I fell in love with while listening to Ifukube's Symphonic Fantasia No. 1 arrangement originally came from this film as well. Sweet! The one complaint I see some people having with the music is that the battle themes are constantly looped in portions of the film. Ifukube does this a lot but it really never bothers me because I can never get enough of them!

To wrap up, I guess I would just have to say that Battle in Outer Space is definitely worth a watch if you're already a fan of oldschool Toho films and the work of Eiji Tsuburaya but otherwise you might want to keep away. If you're new to this genre I'd recommend The Mysterians instead as it's a lot more solid. Overall, this was really nothing more than Tsuburaya flexing his (very powerful) muscles and while that's pretty fun in my eyes, the overall final product just isn't that interesting, unfortunately.

Review! "Yongary, Monster From the Deep" (1967)

2010-10-04T10:35:00.004-04:00

Yongary, Monster From the Deep
(a.k.a. Great Monster Yonggary; 大怪獣용가리; 1967)

Our first movie review is a special guest star from Korea. That's right, Yongary! Yes, Yongary, Monster From the Deep, that classic South Korean masterpiece of cinema. Yongary: the tragic tale of a sleep-deprived monster's doomed search for a cup of coffee in South Korea, a country where no one knows how to drive.

So here's a quick run-down: In the 1960s, every major studio in Japan was churning out giant monster movies and television series like crazy and they were phenomenally popular both domestically and in foreign sales. South Korea's Keukdong Entertainment Company, a producer of many popular Korean films at the time, perked up and took note, thinking, "Why, we should do THAT!" Thus Keukdong assembled a crew, hired out Japanese effects technicians from Toei Studio and created Yongary, Korea's first* giant monster film!

* It may actually have been the second, the first possibly being a 1962 version of Pulgasari, a super-obscure film that was later remade in the 80s in North Korea at the whims of Kim Jong-Il. As I'm not sure how big the original Pulgasari was, I don't know if it qualifies as a giant monster film or not. The 80s version does, however.

CORRECTION: 04 March, 2011, I totally found out that in between 1962's Pulgasari and the film being reviewed here, another film was released just a few months before Yongary, titled Space Monster Wangmagwi. Oops.

The plot is very standard for this type of film: An earthquake with a moving epicenter is discovered to be making a path towards Seoul. Panicked officials grow ever more panicked when the earthquake is revealed to be a giant monster who continues to make a bee-line towards the capital. In the midst of all this, a normal family (excepting the astronaut husband and the genius scientist boyfriend) gets caught up in the mayhem and they all manage to help defeat the monster in the end. That's really all there is to it as far as a basic plot summary goes. The curious thing about Yongary, however, and what makes it such a joy to watch is that for how straightforward the plot is, there is a lot of batshit insanity that occurs within that framework. It's great! Highlights include the following:

Yongary needs a good, strong cup of coffee: The titular monster's countenance, movements, and overall lack of zeal in the rampant destruction he causes throughout the whole film can only lead me to one conclusion: He's only sleepy and wants a cup of coffee. Watch the film keeping this in mind and it becomes about ten times more entertaining than it already is and makes his eventual untimely demise all the more tragic.

No one in Korea can drive: When I alluded to this earlier I was not trying to make some sort of lame, racist, "Asians can't drive, hur hur" joke. No, see, if Yongary is to be believed then no one in Korea seems to be able to drive properly unless they do it very slowly and on one-lane roads. Anywhere else and there's no guarantee they'll stay in the proper lane, let alone stay on the road. Watch for the military jeep that careens off a cliff for NO APPARENT REASON and then EXPLODES IN A GIANT FIREBALL, presumably killing everyone riding in it. Except a photographer dude who manages to magically warp to the military head-quarters and deliver his camera to them just before croaking like he should have done in the GIANT FIREBALL. This leads me to my next point:

Magical Korean Spatial Warping™: According to this film, Koreans apparently have something I like to call the Magical Korean Spatial Warping Ability™ - or rather - the ability to teleport wherever they please, whenever they please. It happens constantly throughout the film - men, women and children all will be in one scene now, then in a completely different scene moments later, then back at the previous location immediately after as though they had never left! And nobody ever blinks an eye at this! I can only assume that it is a commonplace occurance! Unfortunately, my girlfriend doesn't seem to display this ability but I suspect that her parents might.

Children and Monsters Alike Enjoy Dancing!: It's true! Don't even think I'm kidding!

Yongary's Horrific Death: During the course of the film it is learned that Yongary is irritated by a certain chemical compound. Learning this, Genius Scientist Boyfriend synthesizes a much more concentrated form that the family proceeds to gleefully dump all over the beast who writhes and screams in agony while they look on, laughing their hearts out. Aside from cruelly executing the monster and ENJOYING IT IMMENSELY, the family is also dumping this deadly chemical on Yongary while he's standing in a river, presumably severely contaminating all of Seoul's water supply and leading to the events of The Host 39 years later. Yongary keels over and proceeds to go limp, only twitching slightly as he begins to BLEED OUT HIS ASS. Yes, my friends, Yongary is the world's only giant Asian monster to expire from anal bleeding. See for yourself:

Oh, how I love every demented moment of this movie.

From an effects standpoint the film is actually surprisingly well-done and is about on par with most non-Toho Japanese films at the time. Yes, the miniatures look like exactly what they are but it's a wonderfully surreal quality that I will never say is a bad thing. There are a few effects misfires that look pretty awful but they are made up for by a handful of effects that work wonderfully, such as a miniature manhole opening and cut with a shot of a child peeking out of a real manhole to get a look at the monster. It's such a simple scene but it works oh-so-well.

Unfortunately, the original Korean version of this film is lost to time and only the American dub remains. When American International Pictures licensed the film for U.S. distribution, the relatively naive Keukdong Entertainment Company sent them their original negatives to work from - materials that apparently didn't survive past that stage, sadly. The AIP version, however, was recently restored and released to DVD by MGM on a double bill with Great Britain's KONGA (1961) (starring Michael Gough!). The print on said DVD is pristine and watching it is a joy in and of itself.

While this genre obviously isn't for everyone, I say that you should watch Yongary, Monster From the Deep if you're looking for a good time. Really. I recommend watching it with friends so you can all rejoice in its absurd delights together. Also, it would make a fantastic triple-feature alongside the equally zany films X From Outer Space (1968) from Shochiku and King Kong Escapes (also 1967!) from Toho.

Source: Sci-Fi Japan

Godzilla: History, Biology and Behavior of Hyper-Evolved Therapod Kaiju

2010-10-01T21:05:00.006-04:00

Source: Undead Backbrain

This is kind of amazing. And by kind of amazing I mean it rocked my world.

Of course it did. I'm just that dorky.

Also, here is an updated work-in-progress shot of the oil painting that I posted a few days back:

- Jared

New Toho Watercolors

2010-09-24T04:05:00.002-04:00

Played around with introducing alcohol into the paints for... I think the first time. Love the effect it got in the sky in Hedorah's picture!

Cheers!

- J. Foust

Jared Foust would sell national secrets for a good bowl of Macaroni and Cheese.

2010-09-14T13:25:00.001-04:00

It's true! I would.

Make sure it's Gluten-free though if you're intending to bribe me at some point in the near future.

Also, here is an oil painting work-in-progress. It started life as a failed self-portrait that I wiped off the canvas before attempting a second self-portrait that also failed. Frustrated, I wiped the canvas clean a second time and decided to paint Godzilla instead, as the case so often is with me. Oops.

I don't post works in progress much, come to think of it but looking at all the stages is incredibly fun to me. Maybe I'll have to show more sometime. Thoughts?

- Jared

The Imperial Fleet on a Budget

2010-07-27T16:45:00.000-04:00

I am mildly embarrassed that I started this in February and only just finished it last night.

怪獣王ゴジラ

2010-06-30T14:55:00.001-04:00

Getting some art ready for GFest - [probably*] gonna have a table at the artist's alley this year!

* Pending approval! D:

Here is a new thing I did for the occasion!

More to come soon!

- Jared

New ULTRAMAN SORTA Episode 3 Teaser!

2010-06-21T18:55:00.000-04:00

Yes! It's finally arrived! Your first glimpse at Ultraman Sorta Episode 3!

Kind of.

We've had several setbacks in production - we're not going to make the GFest deadline, unfortunately - but we're still working hard to deliver you THE best episode of Sorta yet. We're aiming for "face-peelingly awesome" but we'll take "pretty cool" as well. Expect it to be released by the end of this summer at the absolute latest. I hope! 8D

Enjoy the teaser and look forward to the episode!

MOVIE REVIEWS

2010-06-03T00:25:00.002-04:00

No!

Yes! I am going to post movie reviews here on An Empire Generic! I know. Exciting.

Initially I will be posting up several tokusatsu reviews as I have been writing them for a couple different places and feel like I'd do well to post them here as well. Eventually, however, I will branch out and post more varied things.

As I post the reviews, I'll update this post as an index, I think.

Please enjoy!

- Jared P. Foust

1. Yongary, Monster From the Deep (1967)
2. Battle in Outer Space (1959)

蛾超獣ドラゴリー！！！

2010-05-30T21:35:00.002-04:00

Here is a drawering of one of my favorite Ultra monsters - the Moth Superbeast: Doragory! - for an upcoming feature in G-Fan Magazine.

He is the perpetrator of this heinous act in episode 8 of Ultraman Ace - quite possibly THE most brutally violent thing you will ever see in a children's television series:

WARNING: Not for the squeamish! No, seriously.

Cheers!

- Jared

Slinky Black Dress

2010-05-27T19:25:00.000-04:00

New drawings of Alison. Not amazing, not terrible.

At the risk of sounding like a total creepfreak, Alison looks damn sexy in that black dress.

- Jared P. Foust

MM9 - New Shinji Higuchi-Supervised Kaiju TV Series!

2010-05-26T19:11:00.005-04:00

I've been saying for some time that Shinji Higuchi needs to do more work in with kaiju - after all, his effects work on the 90s Gamera trilogy is STILL a high-water mark for the genre. Well, apparently, he listened!

Coming this July is MM9, a new kaiju television series supervised by Shinji Higuchi!

The show centers around a special “living creatures” division of the Japan Meteorological Agency which predicts the appearance of monsters. When an attack does occur, a team of monster specialists called “Kitokutai” is sent to the front lines, even if the Japan Self-Defense Force is unavailable. As ordinary public servants, this team of unsung heroes has no weapons, and must rely only their skills, knowledge, and experience to minimize the damage caused by monsters.

This project sounds excellent and given the talent behind it - not only Higuchi but Gamera scribe Kazunori Ito and Gehara director Kiyotaka Taguchi - it probably will be! I know I can't wait!

Source: Nippon Cinema
Official Site

Greatest Film Concept Ever.

2010-05-12T03:55:00.002-04:00

I'm just going to quote this because there's no way I can make it sound even better than it already is:

This is the short teaser trailer for Rubber, soon to play as an entry in the International Critic’s Week competition at Cannes. Yes, it’s about a tire that kills people with psychic powers. Let that sink in for a minute. This may become the best film ever written.

Yes. Just yes.

Source.

And now, totally unrelated but also pretty awesome: The Original Star Wars Trilogy. In two minutes. In LEGO.

That is all.

- Jared

On a roll[ing star]...

2010-04-19T00:45:00.001-04:00

Awesome things!

Firstly, my artwork from February was just recently published in GFan 91! Working on more art for issue 92 now! Woo!

Nextly, this awesome photo I took of Alison a few months ago got an honorable mention in a photography contest run by DOMAI (NSFW) founder Eolake Stobblehouse! Woo!

Thirdly, the new latex mold for the new Ultraman Sorta mask came out perfectly! (Our first attempt was terribly botched!) Woo!

And finally, WoO! Woo!

- Jared P. Foust

Oldspice.

2010-04-12T10:25:00.002-04:00

Because they have the most amazing advertising crew ever.

I'm on a horse.

Happy Easter!

2010-04-04T03:45:00.001-04:00

Here, my girlfriend and I dyed you guys some Easter eggs!

Oh, too late - we've already eaten them all! You guys are so slow sometimes!

Cheers!

- Jared P. Foust

HOLY HELL: The Return of Godzilla!

2010-03-31T13:45:00.007-04:00

Okay, let me preface with this: I love Godzilla, if you haven't been able to tell by now. He's totally my hero but God knows I can be extremely pessimistic about his present state and his future. To summarize my stance and bring you guys up to speed real quick:

Point 1. Toho has lost the spark they once had in the 50s, 60s, and 70s and no modern (80s-00s) Godzilla or other Tokusatsu production from that studio has been able to fully recapture that.
Point 2. As Godzilla's popularity is at an all-time low in Japan right now, I am holding out no hope for a new Japanese production in the near (or far) future and part of me thinks they shouldn't even bother (see Point 1).
Point 3. There is no need for another American Godzilla film. I have many doubts as to whether or not an American studio could truly ever capture the essence of Godzilla properly and there is plenty enough fantastic talent in Japan to take on a revival, Toho's just too stupid to tap into it.
Point 4. There won't ever be another American attempt at a Godzilla film anyway. That chance was blown back in 1998.

Okay, so now that that's out of the way, here's some CRAZY news that totally obliterates Point 4 in every sense of the word:

Warner Bros. and Legendary Pictures have acquired the rights to produce a new American Godzilla film to be released in 2012.

This was rumored to be happening waaaaay back in August but I dismissed it as utter poppycock (see Point 4). However, my good friend Matt Frank called me on Monday and repeated this information to me (far more exuberantly, mind you). I said, "Bullshit!" He replied, "Variety!" Variety, the entertainment news publication, that is. I was directed to this article and discovered, much to my bewilderment, that his news was indeed true. From SciFi Japan:

Burbank, CA – March 29, 2010 – Legendary Pictures announced today that they will develop and produce a new film based on Toho Company’s famed GODZILLA character. Through the terms of the agreement, Legendary Pictures has acquired the rights to produce a movie inspired by Toho’s Godzilla, a franchise the Japanese company created and has nurtured for over fifty years.

Toho’s GODZILLA franchise boasts one of the most widely recognized film creatures worldwide, resulting in a series of books, television programs, video games and more than 25 films worldwide. Legendary intends to approach the film and its characters in the most authentic manner possible. The company will, in the near future, announce a filmmaker to helm the film for an intended 2012 release. The film will fall under the company’s co-production and co-financing deal with Warner Bros. Toho will distribute the film in Japan.

Source: SciFi Japan

So yeah. There's going to be a new American Godzilla film. Pretty freaking crazy. At the moment, consider me cautiously optimistic. I certainly WANT to be overly-excited for a new Godzilla film but after we were so badly burned with the first American "Godzilla" film and given how dead the franchise feels to me after the atrocity that is Godzilla Final Wars (2004), I can't help but approach this production with a bit of trepidation. I sincerely hope for the success of this film and I'm sure they Legendary Pictures won't be foolish enough to make the same mistakes that Tristar did in the nineties. I'm just afraid they'll make all new and different mistakes! But, to be fair, we know next to nothing about this project right now so I'll give it the benefit of the doubt.

One thing we DO know - and my jaw hit the floor when I read this bit - is that is one of the executive producers is Yoshimitsu Banno. For those that don't know, this is the man responsible for Godzilla Vs. Hedorah, the acid trip film that was accidentally released as a Godzilla film sometime in 1971, presumably after a long night of heavy drug use by the staff at Toho. This means that this is also the man responsible for making Godzilla fly, which is either the most horrendous or genius thing to ever happen in the history of the character/mankind, depending on who you are. For the record, I fall into the latter category - your mileage may vary.

Oh, here is a sexy Godzilla Vs. Hedorah cosplay for those of you who are still reading:

I really think that the most important thing here is that even though Banno may have given us the strangest, most bizarre Godzilla film ever put to celluloid, he's still one of THE classic creators from the days when Toho still had a bit of gumption in them and he has a LOT of love for the character. Knowing that he is involved at least in some way with this new project is comforting as it feels like a small step in the right direction. Maybe this time the film will be crafted with love and care for the character and the genre as opposed to Devlin and Emmerich's disinterest and disdain.

...which leads us to my final point: some hilarity in the form of a tweet from Dean Devlin's Twitter. Your version did suck, Mr. Devlin. Stop living in denial!

- Jared P. Foust

BEHOLD.

2010-02-28T13:45:00.001-05:00

A Pair of Studies

2009-12-21T18:15:00.002-05:00

Lobsterdance's Newest Films!

2009-12-11T02:45:00.001-05:00

Here are our latest shorts, folks!

Episode 74b - "Adam is Not Korean (Part 2)": The long-awaited sequel to Episode 29, "Elliot is Not British," has finally arrived!

Once again, this film was shot in about twenty minutes, not unlike its predecessor, so it's a little rough around the edges. Still, I think it's pretty enjoyable and a worthy successor.

Have fun!

"Luxembourg": Our most profane film to date. It's really not *that* bad but we still hope and pray that our grandmothers never see it.

There's really not too much to this one. It was conceived and shot in about two hours at Manuel's after a late-night screening of "Abbot and Costello Meet the Invisible Man." Actually it was based on an actual conversation we had that night, bad accents, pointing fries and all.

Oh, and it's pretty. I'm very proud of the colors in this one, even though that's more of a Manuel's thing, not a me thing. I'll take credit for it anyway.

Blast from the Past!: Crash!! Bang!! Pow!!

2009-11-21T01:00:00.000-05:00

I thought I'd upload my old Driver's Ed. film to Vimeo for a few reasons. Firstly: Better video quality! Secondly: Vimeo doesn't have the stupid 10-minute limit that Youtube has so the film can be viewed in all its 16-minute glory without ever having to switch to another page! Hooray! Thirdly: It's been over three years since we cobbled this thing together and, unlike some of my other projects, I'm STILL proud of what we made here. I really look at it as being my first real "film," even though I'd been dabbling in video projects since middle school.

And yeah, that's a real cop.

Hope you guys enjoy this!

Episode 103DX - "I Cackled When You Died, Kusaka."

2009-10-21T22:35:00.003-04:00

I made this awhile back and released it pretty quickly to YouTube. Somehow it became my most popular video there. Ever. Weird! Now I've put it up on Vimeo, only this time it's a wee bit different - namely, it's five seconds longer! Yeah, I only added two whole shots to it but it looks SO MUCH COOLER. Oh, and I tweaked the effects and sound mix. It's just generally cooler overall, no? [Here's the original version for you to compare it to.]

Basically, I'd shot the backgrounds for the two additional shots you see in this version but I didn't feel like it was worth the trouble to actually add them in. Then later I decided that being lazy was stupid (and that I'd been editing my videos with the wrong settings but that is another story) and started working on putting them together so they could be added into the final film. I personally love how the stop-motion turned out, even if it is a little rough.

Yep. I'm a dork beyond dorks. But that's okay.

- Jared

There is totally a B-52s song about this.

2009-10-16T23:09:00.002-04:00

Has to be.

Observe.

2009-10-08T14:15:00.000-04:00

Still more of Alison.

2009-09-13T22:25:00.000-04:00

My most commonly recurring muse, I suppose!

Sevananda Sorta!

2009-08-23T18:35:00.000-04:00

As part of a publicity stunt for Atlanta's Academy Theatre, Ultraman Sorta invades Little Five Points' Sevananda community market!

Acts creepy towards one of the series' writers, Miss Lainey Welsch!

Inspects his enemies at the Junkman's Daughter!

And then goes for lunch!

He/She & Me: A Love Story

2009-08-17T20:45:00.000-04:00

Here's a poster I designed for an upcoming production at the Academy Theatre:

It's a pretty good show. I recommend it.

New Ultraman Sorta Images!

2009-08-11T17:15:00.000-04:00

Alison Sketch

2009-07-30T15:45:00.000-04:00

Hey, wow, I actually like this one for once.

Happy Birthday (to me!)

2009-07-25T23:55:00.001-04:00

I forgot I painted this.

2009-07-22T02:30:00.003-04:00

Hey, look, another oil painting I did. And forgot.

Oops.

A So-So Return to Figure Drawerings

2009-07-21T01:35:00.003-04:00

It's weird to walk into a figure drawing class and expect a nude model only to walk in and find that said nude model is your friend who usually draws next to you fully clothed. But we're all art students so we get over it pretty quickly.

Egoist Proper

2009-07-17T02:55:00.004-04:00

Finally got a better image of Egoist today (since I got my two pieces back from the student show at school). Now everyone can see just how dreadful Alison's skintones turned out!

...maybe I should have just left you guys in the dark. Seriously, that cruddy first image makes this painting look ten times better than it really is.

Saori

2009-07-16T00:15:00.001-04:00

I have new art finally!

Not really totally satisfied with how this came out. Though I think I managed to get the likeness pretty close for once, the big stars just turned out sloppy. Urgh, damned acrylics!

Not that anyone ever actually, you know, COMMENTS here but would anyone buy prints/originals of works in this series of starfield-themed pieces? I've been planning on doing several more. Let me know!

Win & Special

2009-06-27T16:25:00.000-04:00

So a few new pictures from Mega-Monster Battle: Ultra Galaxy Legends The Movie were released just recently. Nothing particularly special other than some nifty turnaround views of Ultraman Belial and other standard pictures of the suits (so no stills from the film itself).

But what's got ME excited is HOW FREAKING COOL THE ULTRA BROTHERS LOOK IN CAPES.

I don't know why they have or need capes but it looks awesome and makes me beyond happy. Lookit dat! 8D

*ahem*

That is all.

- Jared

The Land of Light - ANNIHILATED!

2009-06-24T01:15:00.003-04:00

The trailer for Mega-Monster Battle: Ultra Galaxy Legends The Movie is online! You can view it here. It is also on YouTube now:

To be totally honest I'm still very much on the fence about this film. The initial shot of Moebius flying towards the Land of Light and the shot of the city immediately after are pretty sweet, certainly, but while the new fighting styles glimpsed next are really sweet, I don't know how I feel about the apparent digital backdrops they're employing. I'm still not sure how to feel about this movie and this trailer doesn't help one way or another. At this point it could go either way - it could be the most kickass Ultra movie to date or it could be the biggest mess since Godzilla Final Wars (2004). Bleah!

Believe you me, I'm desperately hoping for the former but five years after its initial release, the massive letdown of Final Wars still stings.

But back to the Ultra Galaxy movie. The title is still awesome. But it ought to be longer.

Just sayin'.

- Jared

Zophy kicking ass: Hell. Yes.

GFest Closing In!

2009-06-21T18:27:00.002-04:00

Nine days until G.H.I.D.R.A.H. begins its epic journey out of the Deep South and up towards GFest! Unfortunately, the alien costumes for episode 3 will not be finished in time to parade about the convention. Oh well! Maybe we don't care! MAYBE WE HAVE SOMETHING EVEN BETTER PLANNED AND WE'RE JUST NOT TELLING. DIDJA THINK ABOUT THAT?!

*cough*

So yeah. We're rushing to get some things finished for the con - it's major crunchtime now but I really believe we'll be ready.

Please look forward to Sorta's next GFest appearance and the GFest premiere of episodes 1 & 2! :D

- Jared

NEW ULTRA FILM

2009-06-19T01:25:00.011-04:00

Releasing 12 December, 2009:

MEGA-MONSTER BATTLE:
ULTRA GALAXY LEGENDS
THE MOVIE

「大怪獣バトルウルトラ銀河伝説 THE MOVIE」

And THAT, my friends, is a Japanese movie title! Sheebus, that's a mouthful!

[Official Site]

It will be a crossover film featuring the characters from the recent Ultra Galaxy series (one in 07-08 and one in 08-09), the ever-popular Ultraman Mebius, the classic Ultraman and UltraSeven, and the new, evil Ultraman Belial.

Honestly, it's not the film I want but it looks a lot cooler than I expected when I first caught wind of it a little bit ago. I'm a little tired of these "event films" like Ultraman Mebius & Ultraman Brothers (2006) and Great Decisive Battle! The Super 8 Ultra Brothers! (2008) and now this one - I'd love to see them return to something more along the lines of 2004's ULTRAMAN THE NEXT.

That said, Tsuburaya is still, like, the last of the big three studios that still produces quality tokusatsu. Toho's all but given up and everything Toei makes just feels soulless these days. Plus, I was pleasantly surprised with how much I LOVED Super 8 Ultra Brothers* after expecting it to be nothing more than a retread of the movie previous so I am hoping the same thing will happen here.

I'm tentatively excited for now. Ultraman and UltraSeven look pretty awesome in their capes and Belial looks pretty friggin' wicked. It'll also be great to finally see what Ultra Galaxy could look like with a real budget.

On the other hand, I have no idea who this Koichi Sakamoto fellow is outside of taking the director's chair for this film. His wikipedia article names a lot of Power Rangers (not Sentai!) stuff, in addition to some work for Disney. Huh. Okay. Anyone care to enlighten me as to his skill? After seeing Takeshi Yagi's sublime work on Super 8 Ultra Brothers, I'd be sad to see a drop in directorial quality.

We shall see.

* It just occurred to me that I never gushed about how much I adore The Super 8 Ultra Brothers on this blog! I must fix this if I can find the time!

UPDATE!

SciFi Japan has been updated with a translation of the story synopsis by James Ballard!

The story heats up when Belial breaks free from his prison, and plans to use the Giga-Battlenizer to control 100 giant monsters and conquer the galaxy, shrouding the home world of the Ultramen in a state of darkness. Set in nebula M-78 on the Star of Ultra – the home world of the Ultramen – original Ultra heroes Ultraman and Ultra Seven stand with the popular Ultraman Mebius against the devious Ultraman Belial. As the movie takes place in their homeland, the heroes are not restricted by the same 3-minute timer as they are when they visit Earth.

Original actors Susume Kurobe and Kouji Moritsugu return to reprise their roles as Hayata (Ultraman) and Dan Moroboshi (Ultra Seven) respectively, facing off against an army of over 100 giant monsters!

A 100+ monster army? Screw it, I'm sold. >> Read the rest of the article here.

UPDATE II:

A newspaper article has stated there will be FIFTY Ultramen appearing in the new film! The following 18 are confirmed:

Ultraman
Ultra Seven
Ultraman Jack
Ultraman Ace
Ultraman Taro
Zoffy
Ultraman Mebius
Ultraman Hikari
Ultraman King
Father of Ultra
Mother of Ultra
Ultraman Leo
Astra
Ultraman 80
Yullian
Ultraman Neos
Ultra Seven 21
Ultraman Boy

Jesus Christ! D: Oddly enough, the Neos and Seven 21 are not technically part of the "Showa-verse," despite originating from M78. Perhaps they are only here as characters and their series never occurred in this timeline? And following that train of though, does this mean my personal favorite, Ultraman Max will put in an appearance?! D8

Also, it appears that Ultraman Mebius will be getting another direct-to-DVD gaiden series, titled Ghost Rebirth and releasing in November and December. Don't really know much about this except that it seems to feature a robotic version of Mebius's nemesis/ally Zamshar, named MechaZam(u) and it may have something to do with the kaiju graveyard maybe? Dunno. Hopefully it'll be a little higher on the quality scale compared to Armored Darkness. Not getting my hopes up though.

I'm just hoping that after this we'll finally move on and get something NEW out of the Ultra series. I hate that it feels like we just ground to a halt after Mebius came out. Sure, we got Ultraseven X and the two Ultra Galaxy series after that but I'm really dying for a new Ultraman (Ultrawoman?) series here.

Oh well, still looking forward to what TPC has in store for us regardless.

- Jared

Blackjack. Steampunk Edition.

2009-06-14T01:05:00.003-04:00

Twenty-one tapes.

Tonight, my good pal Clayton and I got finished (mostly) with documenting the first ever STEAMfest down at the Academy Theatre. STEAMfest is a miniature Steampunk convention masterminded by a good friend of mine, the lovely and talented Lainey Welsch.

Our footage includes (but is not limited to) a filmed version of a staged reading of the new Steampunk play, H.M.S. Tempest, an adaptation of Shakespeare's similarly-named classic. Our footage is also comprised of twenty-one tapes.

Twenty-one tapes.

Twenty-one.

Godforsaken.

Tapes.

The idea is to edit them all down into a couple different things, including a documentary on the whole event. If you don't hear from me for a while, I died sometime during post-production.

-Jared.

The Renewal of Ultraman Sorta

2009-06-03T15:25:00.004-04:00

The Brief Adventure of Ultraman Sorta has been given a wee bit of an update to bring it more in line with Episode 2 and the upcoming Episode 3!

I mostly only changed the title card, did some minor color correcting, created a new credits sequence, and tacked on the trailer for number two. The old version is still available on Youtube and I'm not going to bother uploading this version there - instead it will be for Vimeo and GFest only.

Watch out for the CGI Jabba! 8D

Also, Monster Island News did a little piece on Sorta just recently! Swoot!

A bit of background info: I made this in the summer and fall of 2006 working almost exclusively by myself with the notable exception of having my mother take two or three still photos. Everything else is me. All the roles, all the camerawork, editing, effects, etc. Some of you may find that impressive but it was kind of hell. I hate working on films like that, it's a very lonely existence.

All the effects were done as a combination of Final Cut and Photoshop, many shots being drawn in frame-by-frame in Photoshop. Seriously, it was hell.

The original version of this film was originally part of a duel of sorts with my friend Elliot Gay (not to be confused with Elliot Long). You can see his entry, "Office Man," by clicking here. Great stuff.

I wound up winning the duel. ;D

- [Click here to go to the Original Version of "The Brief Adventure of Ultraman Sorta."] -

ラバーシ星人出現！

2009-05-31T21:00:00.002-04:00

Ho shit!

DaiKamonohashi Gets a Vimeo Account!

2009-05-30T18:30:00.000-04:00

Because Vimeo is so much sexier than YouTube, Zomg.

I'm not going to be moving all of my films over and I will still be posting my work to YouTube so no worries if any of you have trouble with Vimeo Playback.

But yeah.

Swoot!

ウルトラマンソータの新しい顔！

2009-05-22T01:15:00.002-04:00

Despite having to push back our original filming dates so we can make further revisions to the script, costume work for Ultraman Sorta Episode 3 continues unabated! Observe this, the new face of Ultraman Sorta!

It's really different molding the shape of this mask out of plasticine versus carving the original from styrofoam, which was more of an unholy mess and looked something like this:

Yeah, that got everywhere. Also, instead of only having one chance to get the mask's shape right, I can remold the features of this new mask as often as I want - it's beautiful! Only now my fingers are raw but whatever!

It's also interesting to me that I'm molding in certain features based off of what were originally mistakes on the old mask. They began as mistakes but now I've found that they really do a lot to give Sorta his own unique character so I am trying my best to incorporate them into this new design. So far it certainly looks like an Ultraman but it's not quite Sorta yet.

After this positive is done, I'm going to make a rubber negative and then cast the final mask in fiberglass. Should this work (and I certainly hope it does), we'll have a much, much sturdier mask to work with - along with a couple more surprises!

- Jared

D'awwwwwwwww

2009-05-19T14:05:00.001-04:00

This is amazing.

Sorta 3 Pre-Production in Full Swing

2009-05-16T02:45:00.000-04:00

Some behind-the-scenes photos. . .

Have a good night, everyone!

-Jared

A New Form For Ultraman Sorta?!

2009-04-26T18:05:00.000-04:00

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, you heard correctly! Presenting: ULTRAMAN SORTA, MAIDEN FORM!

>>

<<

Okay, no, it's just one of our lovely Japanese tutors after she stole the mask from me a few weeks ago. There will be more real Sorta news coming soon though, I hope.

Heck. Freaking. Yes.

2009-04-23T01:41:00.001-04:00

Speaking of School Food Punishment, they've got a new single coming out! As usual, it sounds brilliant.

schoolfood

Oh yes.

Egoist

2009-04-20T19:45:00.004-04:00

Apologies for the crummy picture. Will try and replace this with a better one eventually.

And here is my newest finished piece, "Egoist," named for this song by the Japanese band School Food Punishment. I'd never heard of the term "egoist" before hearing the song on their latest album, Riff-Rain, but I've grown to like it quite a lot.

From the Oxford American Dictionary:

The words egoism and egotism are frequently confused, as though interchangeable, but there are distinctions worth noting. Both words derive from Latin: ego (‘I’), the first-person singular pronoun. Egotism, the more commonly used term, denotes an excessive sense of self-importance, too-frequent use of the word 'I,' and general arrogance and boastfulness. Egoism, a more subtle term, is perhaps best left to ethicists, for whom it denotes a view or theory of moral behavior in which self-interest is the root of moral conduct. An egoist, then, might devote considerable attention to introspection, but could be modest about it, whereas an egotist would have an exaggerated sense of the importance of his or her self-analysis, and would have to tell everyone.

As for the work itself, I can't say I'm entirely satisfied with it. Something about it just feels, I dunno, off. Somehow. I think it's a combination of several things though, including (but not limited to), the so-so facial structure, the botched skintones, and the rather sloppy execution of the ribbons. On the other hand, I'm very proud of the vivid, almost neon-ish colors I managed to coax out of the watercolor paints. It's not a total bust but I feel like I can do the concept more justice in a re-do at some point in the near future.

Moving onto the musical side of things, awhile back (last Spring, it would seem) I happened across a song by a Japanese act curiously named School Food Punishment. The song's name was "you may crawl," and it kicked all kinds of ass, quickly rising to become one of my favorite songs. For awhile they occupied the "just okay with small doses of awesome" shelf in my mental music library but after listening to "Riff-Rain" a number of times and also going back to re-evaluate their previous albums, I find myself falling more and more in love with their music. Most of their best songs have lush, deeply-layered soundscapes that are nothing short of wonderful to draw to - part of what inspired the above piece, among other things.

But enough of me jabbering! In the words of the great and powerful Levar Burton, "You don't have to take my word for it!" so I'll be leaving you with some more songs of theirs you can listen to. Maybe you will like them too.

Cheers!

- Jared

Prelude

2009-04-19T19:10:00.000-04:00

Another study for an upcoming couple of pieces.

歳星の後ろから宇宙人がきます！

2009-04-13T23:59:00.002-04:00

D：

We spend our time oh-so-well.

2009-04-08T11:25:00.002-04:00

This is the result of two-plus hours' work in a Japanese/Korean club meeting (because they've more or less melded together anyway):

Gee, maw, aren't you proud?

Phoo Action!

2009-04-05T18:55:00.000-04:00

Ever heard of Phoo Action? It's a pretty awesome pilot that was aired on BBC3 last year, was picked up for an entire series, and then canned just before said series started filming. Which sucks. Big time. Just check out the trailer!

It was based on a comic strip by Jamie Hewlett (Get the Freebies, I think, though I've never read it), co-creator of Tank Girl and Gorillaz and it's just a whole lot of fun, so I'm recommending you guys to check it out if you haven't already. You can find the whole thing in various parts on YouTube but it's really awful Youtube quality and cropped down to fullscreen. Alternatively. . . Well, I probably shouldn't do this but since it's highly unlikely we'll ever see a DVD release of this here in the states, I'll let you guys snag it here if you want it. :D

Oh and it also introduced this song and this band, both of which I am now far too addicted to.

Thanks goes to Elliot for turning me onto this show.

Ciao!

-Jared

It's so true.

2009-03-18T09:05:00.001-04:00

How many artists does it take to change a light bulb?
Ten. One to change it, and nine to reassure him about how good it looks.

[and]

How many visitors to an art gallery does it take to change a light bulb?
Two. One to do it and one to say "Huh! My four-year old could've done that!"

God, I love lightbulb jokes.

Getting back in the habit...

2009-03-18T02:05:00.000-04:00

Spent the last two weeks (or more?) not drawing and so now I return with a not-so-hot watercolor/graphite study.

Will try and get part II of the Toku Recap online tomorrow.

Interlude [Refreshed]

2009-03-18T02:00:00.002-04:00

Awhile back I checked out a Korean film, Nowhere to Turn (2008), on a whim. I had read a synopsis on it that mentioned how it was about someone just out of college not really sure how she was supposed to fit into the world or something like that. As I've been having similar existential troubles with my own life as of late (as I'm sure most of us do from time to time), the movie sounds very appealing. Plus the lead was cute, so win-win, right?

Oh God, no. Frankly, it was awful. On the positive side of things it did have some nice cinematography and a gorgeous color palette - visually it was lovely. On the other hand, however, I simply despised the lead character. Here we are presented with our protagonist, a twenty-something young lady who's trying to figure out who she really is, and she is portrayed as a total bitch. She is portrayed as a complete and total bitch and this is the person we're supposed to feel sympathy for. Come again?

Well, okay, that's fine if she changes for the better or something, right? That's how these things work, right? We're supposed to grow to like her as we see her change into a more pleasant person, yes? Well that's all well and good except for the small fact that she never freaking changes. Yes, friends, the film opens on her being a bitch and the film closes on her being a bitch. Well I think they tried to make us feel sympathetic for her right in the last five or so minutes but, uh, it didn't work well at all and I still walked away seeing her as nothing but a spoiled bitch who really needs a kick in the tail. Ugh.

So yeah, it was a pretty big letdown for me after being so impressed by what I'd heard about it prior to seeing it. Oh well.

That brings me to today. Today being absolutely gorgeous, I drove down to the park and walked the trail there before heading over to the nearby mall to do some watercolor studies. It'd been awhile since I'd stopped in the book store there and browsed the graphic novels so I thought I'd take a few minutes to first do that before I went about my arting.

Now, I am notoriously picky when it comes to the comics I choose to read. If they don't click with me just so I will not read them. If the art is awesome but the story is bland - no good. If the story is promising but the art is lacking - nope. If I don't like the paper it's printed on? Yeah, call me crazy but I will indeed turn a comic down because the printing and/or binding doesn't appeal to me. Maybe that's a little too picky but it saves me a lot of money! The other thing is that while I'm often the first to defend Japanese comics/manga from their naysayers, I do tend to find most of the ones you see on a big bookstore's shelves to be pretty bad. Not all, but rarely do they appeal to me and so I'll often just skip these shelves (along with the Marvel/DC schtick) and head straight for the "everything else" shelf. I also like a graphic novel to run thick - a la Bone - but I am quite averse to series with 40-million volumes to read (most of the popular manga series).

Given my pickiness I thought I'd be there fifteen-twenty minutes, tops. Browse, toss, browse, toss, etc., leave - that's how it normally goes. Today looked very much like this until I happened to turn around and spot an abnormally large volume of manga sitting on the shelf behind me. I picked it up and - yes! - it was a complete story in a single volume! And what's this? I love the art! Okay, time to peruse the first few pages...

Solanin. Oh my, this was good. Really good. Really, really good. Worth buying? You know, I think it is. I didn't buy it though.

Instead, I read the entire thing sitting there in the store. Oops.

But this was the story that Nowhere to Turn should have been, the story I was looking for back when I decided to watch it, right down to a variety of similar story elements. Both feature the twenty-somethings wandering, lost in the world they don't want to be in yet, upstart bands with the eventual goal of playing a live concert, job-hunting, etc., etc. The difference is that where Nowhere to Turn is one of the biggest letdowns of a movie I've seen in some time, Solanin is one of the best, most refreshing graphic novels I've read in a good while. No, it's really that good. I look forward to reading whatever else its creator, Asano Inio, has to offer next and you can bet it's highly likely that I'll own Solanin by year's end.

...I never did the watercolor studies.

-Jared

Tokusatsu 2008-2009 Recap [Part I] Kamen Rider Kiva Bites

2009-03-15T23:35:00.012-04:00

As many of you who frequent this blog may have noticed, my favorite hobby by and large is watching Japanese tokusatsu or special effects if I haven't been over that already. Yeah, I am probably a strange, sad little man. Wh'ev.

If you do frequent this blog and you haven't picked up on this then you are blind and/or illiterate.

Otherwise you guys know the drill here. I am a dork, blah, blah, blah, etc. So for awhile now I've been feeling like posting my two cents on some of the latest releases and developments in this brightest and colorfulest subset of the sci-fi/fantasy genre, right? It started out simply enough, really. I was just going to post the trailers for Toei's latest installments of the Kamen Rider and Sentai franchises and make a few remarks about them and be done with it. Then the longer I waited the more I wanted to cover other subjects and to make it worse still, more stuff started coming to light! So now that I'm finally getting around to it it's turned into a multi-part post covering multiple films, series, and short subjects and hopefully I won't overwhelm everyone with my rampant nerdiness.

For this post I am starting off with the Kamen Riders. I'm not really sure why I'm starting off with the Riders but they seem as good a place to start as any so away we go!

Oh wait. First I need to say that there are going to be a lot (A LOT a lot) of spoilers in the following post. Turn back now if you don't want to read them and don't say I didn't warn you!

Kamen Rider Kiva (Finale)
「仮面ライダーキバ」

Right, first thing's first: Kamen Rider Kiva is over. Finished. Done. Before I get into how I felt about its ending, let me say a couple of things about the series that preceded the finale.

Well to start with I gave up on Kamen Rider Den-O a little over halfway through that series since it just couldn't hold my interest any more (more on that later). Before that I'd watched the entirety of Riders Kabuto and 555/Faiz as my introduction into the franchise - both of which I found very fun, the latter of which is probably still my favorite to this day. When Kiva was announced people were raving about how awesome it was going to be and how it would be a return to the "Dark & Serious™" style of Kabuto* and other previous entries.

* Hold up, Kabuto being the epitome of Dark & Serious™? AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA-- *coughcough* No, I'm okay! Honest! Well, I mean Den-O was mostly straight-up comedy so returning to any style set up by a previous series would be more serious but still.

Oh and additionally, it was going to be "horror-themed." Well, Kiva's forms and such were themed after the classic Universal monster staples - Dracula, the Wolfman, the Creature from the Black Lagoon, Frankenstein, and the Mummy - but the final result was pretty much your standard Modern Rider Series.

And that more or less sums up my problems with it.

Kiva wasn't really awful, it was just a lot of "been-there-done-that" and "seen-it-all-before" that made me really wish I were just watching Faiz again (or starting one of the older series I haven't gotten around to seeing yet, like Kuuga or Agito or - going really far back - V3). When it started this was especially evident in the first few episodes. It was all solid but nothing really excited me until they broke out Nago and the iXA system.

Yeah, at that point I really got into the series, I'll admit. For a few weeks it was a pretty awesome ride. But then it started losing steam for me again and it never really recovered. Sure, it introduced several neat concepts here and there but after how badly this was bungled in Kabuto I was pretty resigned to stuff like that never really going where I would want it to, even if it weren't forgotten entirely. It wound up being just fun enough to keep following but it was never really satisfying - not unlike slightly-better-than-mediocre Chinese take-out.

Oh, and let's not forget how the motorcycles were once again totally forgotten after awhile (naturally) and Toei's attempt at cloning Den-O's Denliner, the friggin' Castle Dran. Thank God it became just another location for characters to go and talk about things at because those giant-sized battles were obnoxious. I'll watch Ultraman if I want to see that sort of stuff (and done a helluva lot better), thank you very much. And none of the rider design-work did anything for me apart from iXA - every successive rider just seemed to get clunkier, really. At the same time, none of them bothered me much aside from the far too overdone Dark Kiva. Bleah. Something slimmed down and sleak would've worked a lot better, methinks.

It wasn't without its positives, though. Aside from the awesomeness that was Nago and his version of iXA, the three leading ladies were all very easy on the eyes and I love that Yuria Haga came back to do another Rider series (even though she's still at her best in Sh15uya!). The stained-glass motif that the Fangire - this series set of Monsters-of-the-Week - had was pretty sweet too and made for some really interesting designs. Oh, and the soundtrack was pretty good too; some great violin pieces and several kickass insert songs in addition to the catchy opening theme.

Now onto the finale itself: I was really hoping that maybe the end of the series would bring it to a decent enough close that I could walk away saying, "It had some low spots but overall it wasn't half bad and man! What an ending!"

Did it? No. Not really, no. The finale was about the same as the rest of the series was for me: kind of bland and okay at best. The key difference between the final arc and the rest of the series was that there was one element that elicit a very strong reaction from me. ...a reaction of mixed anger and annoyance, unfortunately. Why, you might be asking? Wataru's time-traveling hijinks. Oh. My. God. Wataru's time-traveling hijinks. Just thinking about them makes me want to go all stabby on something.

Okay, let me try and explain this as best I can for those of you who've never watched the show. Basically, Kamen Rider Kiva follows two plotlines - one the follows our primary protagonist and his companions in the year 2008 and another that follows his father and his father's womanizing in 1986, among other things.

2008:

1986:

In the final arc, Wataru turns really emo (again) and uses the power of Castle Dran to go back in time to stop his mom and dad from doing the nasty so that he is never born. Okay, that's already annoying enough but I can deal with that. While trying to complete this task, things keep happening so that you see that no matter what Wataru does, Otoya, his dad, will eventually bang the Fangire Queen and sire the future Kamen Rider Kiva. Destiny's a bitch, ain't it? That's an old standby concept and it doesn't really bother me much. What bothers me is this:

In 1986, the big baddie of the series, the Fangire King/Dark Kiva, is pretty much lording over everyone with an iron fist and no one at all shows any willingness to try and take him down, much less has the power to. So how - if the Fangire Queen is forbidden from seeing Otoya under threat the of death to herself, Otoya, and her other son, Taiga - how do they ever get together to make another baby? Why, that very child comes to them from the future to help his father defeat the Fangire king and ensure his birth! Even though he was going to be born anyway, even though everything pointed to him NOT being born ever. What? DOES THIS MAKE SENSE TO ANYONE?! Essentially, Wataru would never have been born if he hadn't gone back in time to save his parents. In the long history of time-travel flubs, this one REALLY takes the cake for me and if mostly ruined the end of this series for me. Hell, even The Terminator makes more sense. Gah.

They did the time-traveling thing before in the series but that was harmless enough and filled with enough lolNago moments that I could overlook some of the continuity problems it could have conceivably caused. Plus it lead to some really great suspense that didn't really pay off as nicely as I had hoped it would but whatever.

The one thing that I did really like about the ending was the romance between Megumi and Nago in 2008. It wasn't entirely unexpected but at the same time it kind of caught me off guard in a very good way. I'm a bit of a hopeless romantic sometimes, I guess, and the whole bit with Nago going blind and Megumi being his eyes as he fights was very much a "d'aawwwwwww" moment for me. Very sweet. ...Yeah.

Overall though, Kamen Rider Kiva was okay. I didn't hate it and it certainly was not without its moments but it was bland and re-treaded to the point where it just felt tired where other bland and re-treaded shows still felt fun. Oh well, that kind of sucks but the movie was a return to the alternate reality concept so maybe it could stand on its own awesomeness?

Movie Edition Kamen Rider Kiva: The King of the Castle in the Demon World
「劇場版　仮面ライダーキバ　魔界城の王」

Alas, no. Not really, no.

I just feel very indifferent towards this movie - it's just not very entertaining. Sure, there are moments here and there that are really awesome (including a fantastic wirework jump from iXA) but overall it just feels like a glorified television episode. When you're making a glorified television episode of a show like Kiva, that's really not a good thing.

Yes, they decided to go back to the Alternate Reality schtick that characterized most of the Heisei Rider movies but here it's really weird. Where other movies would make some pretty big changes - see Kamen Rider Kabuto - GOD SPEED LOVE (2006) or Kamen Rider Faiz: Paradise Lost (2003) for examples of this - the Kiva movie may as well just be a side story to the TV show. Yet they change enough plot points to make that more or less impossible. Why? Hell if I know but it seems really, really dumb to me. Background characters from the TV series aren't really used well here either. Instead of them blending into the new, alternate reality it feels more like Toei's saying, "HEY LOOK, WE DIDN'T FORGET ABOUT KENGO!" or whoever.

That said, almost everything featuring the movie-exclusive Kamen Rider Rey was fantastic and I think he was terribly, terribly underused. Arc had a pretty swell design and they handled the size effect very well (he really does look three meters tall!) but, eh. In my opinion, Rey's where it's at and yet it hardly feels like he's in the movie at all. The effects in general are pretty well handled, though the mega-CGI battle at the end gets to be a bit much after awhile.

I don't know, I just can't find it in me to give a damn about this one. Color me very unimpressed. Doubly-so after the show turned out the way it did.

Oh well.

Anyway, I wrote so much about Kiva in this post that I didn't have room for all the other Rider stuff I'd intended to put in here. My bad! Stay tuned for Part II, coming soon! The worst is out of the way, so expect the following posts to be a lot less pessimistic!

What to expect next time: Decade and the rest of the Rider Stuff! What never to expect: a recap for Go-Onger! Screw that noise, I never watched it! In other news: I probably have far too much time on my hands! 8D

Night, folks!

-Jared

ULTRAMAN SORTA 2... Sort of. - Scrapped "Return of Ultraman Sorta" Teaser

2009-03-09T23:50:00.000-04:00

Well I don't want to make any promises that I can't keep but at the moment it looks as though Ultraman Sorta Episode 3 is going to be made! Probably. Hopefully. We'll see, right?

In any case, for this reason I have decided to release to you this unfinished trailer I started working on almost two years ago. This was way back before Sorta 2 was even conceived and I'd never really given any serious thought to doing any more Sorta episodes. What you're about to see here is the original "Ultraman Sorta 2" as it were: "The Return of Ultraman Sorta". Here, go ahead and watch it:

This started out much the same way the original Ultraman Sorta started out. I was bored on a summer day and thought I'd shoot with my Ultraman Sorta costume for fun (I think that makes me a masochist) and it'd give me a chance to experiment with a few effects I wanted to try out. Later I would just randomly add shots as I went along until I wound up with what you see here. It's all fake, mind you - there will not be a "Return of Ultraman Sorta" and if there ever is it won't look anything at all like this.

Obviously I never finished this trailer though. I'd considered reshooting parts of it and adding still more fancy-cool shots but it just never happened and now that Sorta 2 has been made and Sorta 3 is in the works it just feels pointless. That and I'm tired of the raw footage taking up ten gigs of my hard drive space. Gah. It doesn't even look very good compared to the haphazard look of Sorta 2 and that's saying a lot, I think!

Well, that's that. Hope you enjoyed this weird little thing at least for novelty's sake. Thanks, everyone, for such a wonderful response to Sorta 2 and I hope you are all looking forward to Sorta 3!

- Jared P. Foust

Oh and to anyone who appeared in this: Lawl, you're on youtube.

ULTRAMAN SORTA Episode 2 - "A Vacation. . . Kind of"

2009-03-01T23:55:00.004-05:00

D:

Like, this is actually it. I finished it. It's done.

AND THANK GOD FOR THAT.

Here, go watch it now:

Now go and tell your friends, your neighbors, your relatives, your mailpersons, your enemies, the strangers you meet on the street, everyone! Sing it from the mountaintops: ULTRAMAN SORTA 2 IS FINISHED!

Disclaimer: To avoid spoilers, it is advised that you view the film before you continue reading this post.

In a fit of madness this past week or so I finally found the get up and go to wrap this sucker up and get it out the door and into the world. Neglected my studies a bit and nearly ran myself into the ground to do it but by God I DID IT. It's finished and I don't have to touch it anymore.

Okay, so it's hardly the best film I've ever done (that would probably be The Fren chman) but I think it turned out pretty well for what it is. It turned out especially well for a film with a five-second-long pre-production period. Seriously, it was a late-afternoon in July and we were packing the car to head to GFest when we decided to make it. Pre-production went something like this:

"Hey, guys, I could pack my dad's camera and my Ultraman Sorta costume and we could totally make a new Sorta episode up there!"

[This is pondered for approximately five seconds.]

"Okay! Let's do it!"

We didn't even have an inkling as to what it would be about until after we got to Chicago, so we just kind of made it up on the fly. And Zaida Seijin? Yeah, we didn't have a proper enemy until the second night of shooting. We had to hijack this random kid we'd run into a few times over the course of the convention and make him be our antagonist.

Oh, and Don Frye is an awesome guy. That he agreed to cameo in our silly little fanfilm was really, really sweer and I couldn't be more grateful to him and his wife. He was even merciful enough to let me live after I admitted to disliking Godzilla Final Wars (though I do get a kick out of his character)!

"Everyone, I want you to panic but, please, panic quietly!"

The most fun part of it all was filming the evacuation scene, I would have to say. First off, if you're ever going to film an evacuation scene then the best place to do it is a Godzilla convention, easily. No where else are you going to be able to ask twenty, thirty people to be in it and have them answer, "MY GOD, MAN! OF COURSE I'LL DO IT!" without a moment's hesitation. Secondly, while I did not get to see the hotel staff myself since I was busy directing the scene, I was told by a couple people that their bewildered reactions to the panicking crowd running through their lobbies at one in the morning was utterly priceless.

Taking a breather in between shots.

There was actually supposed to be a lot more actual grappling between Sorta and Zaida but in a flash of stupidity I had forgotten to bring any blank tapes for the camera with me. Oops.

The prologue and epilogue sequences were, as mentioned before, thought up awhile after we'd returned from Chicago. I felt the final battle between Sorta and Zaida was a little anticlimactic (due to our only tape running out of space) and wanted to inject just a little more action and story into the film. Back after I made the first Ultraman Sorta film I always thought it would be funny if "Monsieur Gojida" had a brother or cousin who could come and avenge his death and when I considered creating a new opening sequence for this film that was the first idea that popped into my head. It serves as a nice reference to the previous film without being too intrusive (and actually expanding upon) the main narrative. I actually took some time and storyboarded that part and filming went a lot more smoothly because of it.

After much searching I found these under a pile of old schoolwork.
Shows you how much I care about these things, I guess... XD

Or at least it did after we settled on a location to film at. We considered at least three other locations and were either not allowed to film there or we just didn't think it worked well enough. Eventually I remembered a place over in Lawrenceville that'd do pretty nicely and we shot there instead. The other hurdle to get over was that Clayton wasn't available to reprise his role as Sorta's suit actor, so I recruited my dad instead (after first making him watch several episodes of Ultraman Max so he could get an idea of how to play Sorta). This wasn't his first time in the Sorta suit, actually - though I won't say why, that's a secret for now. I should probably add that working on that scene in the middle of the freaking summer was all sorts of hell and I wasn't even in one of the suits! I felt sorry for Jae (Señor Gojida) and my dad - but then I'd had to do both of their jobs and more back when I made the original Sorta film so I felt I deserved the break!

So while I'm really sorry to all the people who were told that the film would be done last July or August, I really think the longer gestation resulted in a much more solid film overall. In that respect, I have no regrets.

Now, the bit of Japanese there at the very end does say "tsuzuku," or "to be continued."* So that of course begs the question, "Will there be an episode 3?" Maybe. When I originally added that we were in fact planning to shoot an episode 3 but now that is less certain. I would still like to, certainly (if not an episode 4 & 5!) but right now I'm not sure if I should or not. If reaction to episode 2 is strong enough, however, I might be persuaded into pushing forward with the next one.

* I just liked the way it looked in Japanese better. I regret nothing.

So my question to you guys is this: Do you think I should make another film (or more?) about Ultraman Sorta sometime in the near future? Upping the quality from the last two, of course - there'd be no sense in making a third film if it was nothing more than just another stale repeat of the last two. Please leave comments here or wherever else I might have posted this (YouTube, HenshinJustice, Clubtokyo, etc.) and let me know what you think. It'd mean a lot to me to hear from you all one way or another.

So cheers, everyone! Hope you guys enjoyed it! And I want to send out a huge, hearty THANK YOU to everyone who contributed to this film in some form or another. I really appreciate it!

Shuwatch!

- Jared P. Foust

[Photos graciously provided by Matt Frank.]

-----

Oh, and by the way, if you'd like to see a different view on the making of this film you can read Clayton's post about it over here.

Pardon the delay...

2009-02-28T02:02:00.000-05:00

Due to an unforseen (and incredibly obnoxious) sound glitch and the fact that I am too unbelieveably tired to work on it any more tonight, there will be a slight delay in the release of Ultraman Sorta Episode 2. Please bear with us as we attempt to sort this issue out and as I attempt to regain my sanity.

You can still expect to see it online late tomorrow evening or, if not then, sometime early on Sunday. If I still don't have it out then you are allowed to break out the pitchforks and torches.

Thank you and good night.

- The Management

Ultraman Sorta Episode 2 - Releasing this Friday!

2009-02-26T00:45:00.000-05:00

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, you really did read that right. After six months of floundering about in post-production, Ultraman Sorta Episode 2: A Vacation. . . Kind of will finally be released to the public this Friday!

Yes, I know nobody really cares at this point! 8D

But no, it's really that close to completion and I'm 99.9% positive that unless something goes terribly wrong, I'll make this deadline. Well, sort of.

See, my plan is to officially premiere this on the big screen at my house alongside a showing of the excellent, excellent ULTRAMAN THE NEXT (2004) (to flesh it out into a legitimate movie night since my film is so short). The YouTube version of Sorta 2 would go up after that, so it may actually be out to the broader public this Saturday instead of Friday. I know, I know - technicalities. Wh'ev. You'll get to see it before the week is out, regardless. Promise.

Oh yeah, and if you're in the area or could be, let me know and we'll get you over here for the event!

So that's about all for now. I'll leave you with a few fun facts about the film to tide you over. Mind you, these are still subject to change as the film isn't totally complete but they're about as close as to not matter in the long run...

Runtime: 00:08:42
Number of Explosions: 4
Panic level: High - but very quietly so.
Number of Screaming Bystanders - Countless
Number of Toho Monsters Ripped Off - 5
Times Zophy is Ridiculed - Not nearly enough
Special Effects Work - Soul-Killing.

Cheers!

- Jared P. Foust

(And for those of you who've never seen the first, click here!)

Appanananepper

2009-02-24T23:00:00.001-05:00

Okay, I'm still feeling the loss here but this blog's gotta stop being depressing now. Must let the show go on.

With that said, he's a new painting. Of Fruit. You knew it was coming sooner or later - every artist is required to paint some sort of fruit at some point in his or her life. Naturally.

Omnomnomnomnom.

I think my messy palette knife style when I work with oils is reaction to how obsessively meticulous I get when I work in ink or my more detailed pencilwork. More than anything else the oil paints (and the palette knife) really help me to just let go and artify. It's fun and I definitely could see myself continuing to work with oils after this class is through.

I should mention that this isn't technically finished but I don't think I'll make enough changes for it to really matter. I'll repost it later if I do though.

2009-02-23T17:55:00.000-05:00

She's just Sam - it's not short for anything.

2009-02-21T01:35:00.001-05:00

1995 - 2009

Goodbye.

I can't draaaaaaaaaaaaaw

2009-02-18T23:25:00.001-05:00

Well, I mean, obviously I can but I certainly couldn't draw a likeness to save my life.

This wouldn't be so terrible if it actually kind of resembled the person it's supposed to be depicting. In all fairness there have been many things that have looked less like her, though.

God, why does this art thing have to be so freaking difficult? I drew a fair amount today - well you know one could always draw more but I think I squandered less time than I could have. I don't feel like I'm progressing any though. Maybe I really am and I just can't tell but this stagnant feeling within me just will not do. At all.

Damn it.

On a side note, my room is super-tidy again and I'm just not sure what the hell I'm supposed to do with myself!

ぜんぜんわからない。

2009-02-18T03:33:00.000-05:00

とてもまぎらわしいよ。D：

Art you could wipe your ass with.

2009-02-17T22:25:00.001-05:00

No, no, this isn't another rant about Abstract Expressionism.

Instead, here's my first ever oil painting!

Softer than ever!

For the record, I find the feel of oil paints on my skin to be utterly revolting, so I have to wear gloves when I use them. I sat down at an easel that hadn't been properly cleaned up after someone was using it for an oil painting and got it all over me before I realized what happened. I freaked out, man - it was disgusting. To make things even worse I got some on my face and my teacher said the best way to remove it was with more oil-- right before she rubbed vegetable oil all over my cheek. It felt like I hadn't washed my face in at least three years. Probably worse.

Ugh.

Anyway, that wasn't scarring enough to scare me away completely so now I'm taking an oil painting class (with the same teacher). Expect more of this stuff and maybe some things that are less boring. Mind you, the focus of the course is on palette knife-work instead of painting with brushes so a lot of it is going to look like this one but hopefully I get to be a little less messy as time goes on.

Cirque Du Sexy

2009-02-15T02:30:00.001-05:00

KOOZÅ marks my second time attending a Cirque Du Soleil show, the other time being a showing of Corteo back in 2007. KOOZÅ was tonight, mind you.

The thing that's always struck me the most profoundly about Cirque du Soleil is how beautiful- how elegant-- how sexy almost every single performer is. Not just the women, either - even as a perfectly straight guy I cannot help but marvel at the beautifully sculpted bodies of the male performers, What I wouldn't give to use any of them - man or woman - as a nude model for my art. Accordingly, most every move they make is also sexy, the way they pose is sexy - hell, they even make a unicycle look sexy! I don't know about you guys but I never thought I'd live to see the day a unicycle brought on the sexiness like it does in KOOZÅ.

And they make mistakes, I like that. To err is to be human and when a performer missteps, wobbles, or falls, it humanizes them instead of making them look bad. It both brings them down to our level for a brief moment and also gives us an even greater appreciation of the awe-inspiring feats they are performing for us. My understanding of Cirque (and I could be wrong) is that it is first and foremost celebration of humanity, something I think would not be complete without a few stumbles along the way. If they were perfect it would be as though we were watching the Gods at play and in my mind that would be just a little too overpowering.

All the rampant sexiness and death-defying stunts were accompanied by a wonderful score, itself very sexy at times (with some very sexy vocalists as well!) and encompassing a wide variety of musical styles - many more than I recall Corteo having (but I could again be wrong). In addition, the character and arc of "The Innocent" were a delight to watch, with the conclusion being the highlight of the show for me. I'm a sucker for kites, what can I say? On the whole, the acrobatics were not as pronounced as in Corteo - KOOZÅ focuses more on clowning - but what there was was stunning and put my tree-climbing exploits at school last week to utter, miserable shame.

A curious coincidence, I thought, was that the Bodies exhibit had not only returned to Atlanta but was also in Atlantic Station, only a couple of blocks away from where Cirque had set up camp. Now, I'd already seen the exhibit a couple of years ago when it was down at the civic center but tonight I found myself gripped by an overwhelming desire to see it again before Kooza. Somehow I think that would be a day excellently spent - a perfect double-feature, if you will. It's first seeing, "Wow, this is how the human body is constructed," quickly followed by, "HOLYSHITLOOKWHATITCANDO. D8" If seeing Kooza again weren't prohibitively expensive (not that I could even find tickets to a showing this late in the game) I would totally do that. Tomorrow.

My only true regret tonight is that I didn't have my watercolors on hand when I was waiting around Atlantic Station before the show started (or at least my camera!). It may be a characterless, prefab part of town but it certainly has a nice atmosphere on a Saturday night as the crowds flit about the pretty lights.

And now to watch the Shinkenger premiere. More on that later. . .

- Jared P. Foust

Happy Singles Awareness Day!

2009-02-14T17:05:00.001-05:00

I thought today would be a good day to repost this. : D

Blind Monster Utogami

2009-02-12T03:00:00.002-05:00

Rawr.

Here is a new creation of mine, the blind monster Utogami. For some reason I really dig giant monsters that have no proper eyes. They're really creepy.

I may ink this later - I'm not really sure right now - but here are the pencils for the time being.

Wow - Akira Ifukube's Symphonic Works

2009-01-18T00:55:00.003-05:00

If you're a fan of famed Godzilla-series composer Akira Ifukube or just classical music in general then you owe it to yourself to listen to this CD. It is a compilation of three of Ifukube's symphonic pieces - "Sinfonia Tapkaara," "Ritmica Ostinata," and "Symphonic Fantasia No. 1"* - as performed by the Russian Philharmonic Orchestra and having just finished listening to it tonight I can safely say that it is amazing.

* "Symphonic Fantasia No. 1" is a compilation of Ifukube's sci-fi film scores (Godzilla, King Kong Vs. Godzilla, Frankenstein Vs. Baragon, etc.) that he arranged for concert performances.

As I am no music critic and you really should just hear it for yourself, here is a sampling for you. The following is the third movement (Vivace) of the first composition, Sinfonia Tapkaara, which is probably my favorite track, even over the Toho-score-laden "Symphonic Fantasia No. 1."

This came bundled with an order from Amazon that also included Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961) and North by Northwest (1959), two movies that I utterly adore. That being said, Ifukube's fantastic work easily trumps the other two in sheer awesomeness. It's just that good. I've got to find an orchestra around here that will perform it.

Now, then, go listen to it!

Exclamations, Lamentations and Observations (but still no new art)

2009-01-13T00:00:00.004-05:00

First, the awesome news so I can just get it right out of the way: I GOT A NEW COMPUTER! FREE! Some friends had an old eMac they weren't using and, not wanting go through the hassle of selling it on ebay offered it to me on the condition that I use it to continue creating more films. Oh, and they tossed in Final Cut Pro 4 as well. Freaking swoot. It's not much just yet - right now it's only really good for watching my DVDs on - but after a few modifications I'm pretty sure I can fix it up into a really nice little editing box. No, it's not my $6999.98 editing suite dream setup but for the price it's a damned sweet deal. Looking forward to getting it up and running! (The girl, by the way, is the stunning new Bond girl, Olga Kurylenko. 8D )

To say that I am eternally grateful to these unexpected benefactors is the understatement of the year.

Funny though, I left my Elly at home while I travelled to North Carolina to visit my grandparents and then my mom (because, frankly, the internet has been devouring my soul) and somehow I wind up coming home with a totally different computer. Go figure!

While I was traveling computerless I guess you might say I did a bit of soul-searching. At least that's what I did if you consider soul-searching to be watching a ton of Scrubs and Law & Order: SVU. Close enough, really. Anyway, I've come to realize a few things. First off, this whole existential conflict I've been having lately (or crisis, depending on how crummy I feel when I bring it up), while not totally resolved, may finally have an answer. Lately I've been torn between film and art and deciding which, if either, I should focus on. I'm semi-decent at both but in my mind both require excellence! Which I wonder if I'll ever achieve sometimes. Anyway, I've decided that it's really not so unreasonable to pursue both simultaneously if I'd just get off my ass and make things. Yeah, that. So we'll see what happens.

The other thing I realized is that I'm in love with SVU's Assistant D.A., Casey Novak. She's awesome.Just out of curiosity I looked up the actress who plays her, Diane Neal, and I find all these pictures of a pretty lady being all smily and happy and WTF IS THIS?! D: The Casey Novak I know smiles, what, all of once in the entire show?

Hell, even this might be pushing the happy meter a little too much.

Maybe that's an exaggeration but I think if you know the show then you know what I mean (or maybe I just need to see more of it than I have). The icy, "I will destroy you in court and then devour your family for kicks" Casey Novak is the one I love, not this smiling... thing! D:

Pretty, yes, but decidedly not Casey Novak.

*ahem*

So on the actual art side of things, no, I don't have anything new to show you. Not even a doodle! I've been drawing, yes, and one of my resolutions this year was to try and draw at least an hour every day but the stuff I'm turning out right now is a whole new level of crap, not kidding. That said, my resolve is strengthened and I intend to start turning out a lot more new material in the near future.

And on the film side of things. . . Well, obviously Ultraman Sorta still isn't finished yet but it's closer now than it ever has been before! Yeah, I know you're not impressed but in the meantime I have also been brainstorming a lot lately and have been talking to some interesting people about some intriguing ideas for appealing projects. Hopefully something will come from all of this and we'll see some exciting things coming in the future. And Ultraman Sorta 2.

Today, I should add, was the first day back to school. Blah! I think it might be a pretty decent semester, despite having classes Monday through freaking Saturday. Oh well, it may work out alright. We'll see.

Back on the subject of Bond girls, I have to share this awesome desktop I was using not too long ago, taken from the theatrical poster for the 1967 version of Casino Royale, painted by Robert McGinnis.

Isn't that just crazy-awesome-cool? Better yet, here's a gorgeous Italian model wearing that jumpsuit. Man, that's great.

That's all for tonight. Thank you all for your patience. Or ignorance, whichever keeps you quieter?

Night, all.

- Jared

Coming Soon: Less talk, more art.

Egads, that was the bloggiest blogpost I've blogged to date!

And a Merry New Year to all!

2009-01-01T00:00:00.003-05:00

Hope everyone had a good 2008 and whether you did or not, here's to a great 2009 and breaking all our resolutions again! Cheer up and have some reckless optimism, guys!

...

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

8D

*leaps out a window*

Happy Christmas, everyone!

2008-12-25T04:00:00.000-05:00

What's more awesome than Father Christmas?

Ultrafather Christmas!

Have a happy Christmas, everyone!

- Jared

Oh yeah.

2008-12-21T22:00:00.001-05:00

Happy Winter Solstice, everyone!

Here's an excerpt from my favorite comic evar to celebrate. 8D

- Jared P. Foust

Kill it with fire.

2008-12-21T13:25:00.001-05:00

I hate abstract expressionism. Loathe it. Despise it. Why anyone is willing to call the "work" of, say, Jackson Pollock "art" is beyond me. Maybe it was theraputic for him, that's great. Maybe splattering all that paint about was a great stress reliever, I can understand that. However, art, it is not.

And look, I don't care how much thought you put into that red square on a white canvas and I don't give a damn what it means, it holds little to no aesthetic value to me and I refuse to call it art. I can appreciate the style as a design element when it is contributing to a larger, more interesting overall piece, or perhaps as an accent to a room's decor, I can. By itself it is pretentious dreck.

Take this piece I did, for example:

I did this for a figure drawing class. The same class that I had to make cubist pieces in, mind you. This was supposed to be a "non-representational" piece that represented our "first love". For all intents and purposes it was an abstract expressionism assignment. For a figure drawing class.

Excuse me, does that make sense to anybody?

Anyway, yeah, that picture up there is unfinished and for a time I honestly thought I might be nice and finish it just to say I did. Last night though I was showing it to a friend and just found myself so disgusted with it that I decided there was no way I'd ever bring myself to complete it.

So I set it on fire instead.

God, that felt good.

Keep in mind that I'm not advocating the burning of all abstract expressionism art everywhere - even if I do think it's all pretentious bullshit I am certainly not Hitler. I don't care how you waste your time, just stop pretending to be a genius and stop getting paid so damned much for it. To those paying the big bucks for things of that ilk: You're all idiots.

On a more positive note, here's a drawing that doesn't suck:

Gotta run for now. Will work on better stuff when I get back.

Afternoon Tea for the Gentleman On the Go

2008-12-19T03:05:00.001-05:00

Okay, this is quick and dirty but at least I drew something today. Better stuff tomorrow, promise. I think.

In other news, I have discovered my unconcious, lifelong goal. It has been right here in front of me all this time and I never noticed but everything seems to point in just one direction.

That is, I want -- no, I am destined to become Gengo. No, seriously!

For those of you who don't know, Gengo is the quirky comic artist from Godzilla Vs. Gigan, possibly the best entry in the entire Godzilla series, barring the original. This guy:

The guy in the turtleneck on the left. Not the other guy, he's a cockroach. Literally. Gengo, on the other hand, is pretty awesome.*

*Okay, Kubota's pretty awesome too but in an evil, cockroachy sort of way.

But yes I think it is quite clear that it is my lot in life to become the awesomeness that is Gengo. I mean, Gigan has almost always been my favorite Godzilla film - perhaps one of my favorite films of all time - and for the past few years I've been working towards becoming a comic artist! Add to that my fondness for drawing giant monsters, bananas, relaxation, and awesome coats, plus my general dislike for cockroaches and I think I've got a pretty strong case here. Did I mention I love the way he dresses? Snazzy as hell. And check out how I drew myself in this autobiographical comic I worked on awhile back:

This it totally what my Japanese class was like.

A sign of the coming revelation, to be sure. I've also been wanting to talk a bunch of friends into cosplaying as the main characters from Gigan one day. Who would I go as? Why, Gengo, of course!

I had this epiphany earlier this evening while putting up a string across my room so that I could hang work-in-progress art up on it.

And the direct inspiration?

Yes. Gengo's awesome art-tastic abode.

Now I've got to get myself a neat coat like that, wear turtlenecks more often, find some sort of alien invasion plot to thwart (bonus points if life-sized drawings of myself and my friends are used), and start dating an awesome girl who is also a black belt in karate.

This is how things are meant to be.

Accidental Fanart

2008-12-18T01:00:00.001-05:00

Okay, here is some art, as promised. Was hoping to have more to show for today but at least I spent most of the day drawing regardless.

It wasn't meant to be fanart, honest. It just sort of turned into another character as I drew her. I won't say who she is, it's more fun to see if people can figure it out even though I drew her in my own style.

Also, this is freaking awesome.

Okay, maybe I will get to post more art tomorrow!

135

2008-12-17T12:05:00.001-05:00

Am I a closet fan of Do As Infinity? Not really, I just don't talk much about how much I love them and I don't listen to them as much as I did back when I was just getting into Japanese music - back before I discovered Waffles, Swinging Popsicle, etc. I think it says something that I once considered them among my favorites even though I don't any more. Nowadays I tend to listen to them in fits. It's really lovely stuff to listen to though, and I really love how often they use bells in their music. All the bells actually make Do As Infinity one of my favorite bands to listen to around the holidays because they make the songs feel so Christmas-y.

"Why the hell are you jabbering on so much about freaking Do As Infinity, anyway?"

Well yesterday-- have you ever had a song (and I wonder if this occurence is kind of unique to the digital age) where the file left out the last little bit it? For instance, the second-ever Do As Infinity song I acquired was a lovely gem called "135" but the file I found of it left out the last forty or so seconds. It was a really bizarre and awkward cut but I never really bothered trying to find another version of it. Until yesterday. I mean about four years later. Funny, because I've long considered this to be my favorite or second-favorite Do As Infinity song but I'd never heard its ending before last night.

What's really wild about this is that those last few seconds have radically altered my feelings for the the song. I still love it but now it's different. Before it was a great, fast-paced song made of kickass and awesome. It's still that but the final part of the song puts emphasis on a piano part that I never realized was there even though I now hear that it's quite obviously woven throughout the entire piece. Further, that little piano melody transforms the song from one that is simply made of kickass and awesome into one that is both uplifting and a little wistful. It is my belief that unless a song is intentionally deceitful (i.e. a happy, uppity song about something absolutely terrible), the honest mood of a song should carry through no matter what the language and, sure enough, when I looked up "135's" translation, I found the lyrics reflected that kind-of-wistful-but-uplifting feeling that I now get out it.

Maybe that whole spiel wasn't that interesting, I don't know. I find it kind of fascinating, personally.

Also, a bit of an aside: based on what little I've heard of lead singer Tomiko Van's solo work (and that's not a ton but), I feel safe in saying she's not much of anything outside of Do As Infinity. I mean she's certainly got a nice voice but it's just not the same. On her own she is just your standard idol fare - or so it would seem to me, feel free to prove me otherwise. "Essence" is a catchy song, but that's about it.

Actually, I just read last night that Do As Infinity reformed in September. That's good.

* * *

Okay, so while we're here let me post some awesome links that I've been saving up for awhile.

Firstly, here is a rather NSFW link to a photography collection featuring topless women in New York. Yeah, that sounds sleazy the way I phrased it but it's actually very cool as it focuses on the beauty of the women without over-sexualizing them or over-arting them - my favorite sort of nude photography (I think I went over this in an earlier post). It's just the women being themselves. In New York. And topless. That's pretty amusing, if nothing else.

Secondly, here is an Onion video that my good friend Matt linked me to. It needs no further introduction other than that it contains giant monsters and win. Go watch it now.

And thirdly, two friends simultaneously linking me different Cracked articles led to a sprawling, wikipedia-addiction-like tour of the site that eventually led me to this article. It's right on the mark and really makes me want to give up on this whole internet business... or at least scale back substantially.

* * *

Holy God, how am I supposed to work when I just got nearly 30 hours worth of Monty Python in the mail?!

D:

No! I must resist! I have given you guys three straight posts in a row without any new artwork and that is simply shameful! I will make a new artpost later today, I swear it!*

* Actually, this was supposed to be an artpost but I typed so many words I thought maybe I should just let it be its own thing so the art wouldn't get lost amongst the words (and vice versa).

OH GOD, THE TORMENT! D8

LET'S WATCH MOVIES! UNTIL WE CAN'T FEEL FEELINGS ANYMORE!

2008-12-09T01:15:00.004-05:00

Okay, guys, it's finals week so you won't be seeing any new art for a few more days still (gotta work on my final project for Figure Drawing and all). Hopefully this will be rectified soon and I will be back in the swing of things again.

In the mean time, here are two more articles I've written for LET'S WATCH MOVIES! UNTIL WE CAN'T FEEL FEELINGS ANYMORE! The first is on the showing of North by Northwest that I mentioned I would be having in my last post here and the second is on an upcoming Godzilla movie night I am holding here on Saturday. Yay, movies!

Now go read these:

North by Northwest: "Tell me, why are you so good to me?"

G.H.I.D.R.A.H. W.U.R.F. IV: "Drop your cynical brainwaves into the dimensional gap!"

I want to thank the people who came to see North by Northwest on Thursday. I really enjoyed having you there and I hope you enjoyed the screening as much as I did. Also, I hope to see you all and more at future movie nights as well (Saturdaynudgenudgewinkwink). Thanks again.

And now I'll leave everyone with this link, "a brief illustrated history of mankind." Beware: it's a little NSFW and a lot of awesome.

I'm an advertising man, not a red herring.

2008-12-02T20:15:00.001-05:00

By the way, I should mention that I'm part of a new blog for posting various articles and reviews about movies. It's called Let's Watch Movies! Until We Can't Feel Feelings Anymore! and it just got its very first post the other night, written by yours truly. Given that last month was Godzilla's 54th anniversary-- well, I'm sure you can guess what I posted about, can't you?

The article can be found here and I encourage you to go and read it and leave us some feedback as well. Hope you like it!

* * *

Speaking of movies, we're watching North by Northwest at my house come Thursday. It's been ages since I last saw it... so long that I might as well be seeing it for the very first time! And man, it looks exciting! 8D

Her peach, it is a breast.

2008-12-01T16:49:00.003-05:00

I hate cubism.

Thanks I am Thingful For.

2008-11-26T13:15:00.004-05:00

My mom sent out an email of things she was thankful for this year. I though it was a very nice idea, so I ripped it off.

Lovingly so, of course.

Thus Follows a List of Thanks I am Thingful For
(In a decidedly un-particular order):

Friends for all occasions
Good music I can listen to again and again and again
Long conversations with my dad
Bananagrams!
My aunt and uncle tolerating me still
Drawings that turn out well
Drawings that turn out badly - I mean I'm learning, right?
Old movies
Good movies in general, really
Climbing trees whether I'm allowed to or not
Brilliantly cold weather
Sleep, sweet merciful sleep
Ridiculous dreams that leave you thinking... well I'm not really sure what but they're most certainly bizarre
That no matter how much things will change or how terribly a day or week or year may go, Godzilla Vs. Gigan will always be the same beautifully absurd film it's been since I was but a wee lad. I simply don't believe in coincidences like that.
Even though I don't read nearly as much as I ought to lately, I still know how to appreciate a good book.
Cute girls
Supercute girls
People that still do random acts of kindness for one another
Rambling on and on and on and on and on and on and...
Conversational tangents
When a plan comes together
Gluten-free macaroni
Dogs and cats that forgive me for hardly ever getting to see them anymore
Flights of fantasy
The dangerous levels of dorkiness exhibited at G.H.I.D.R.A.H. meetings
Parents, relatives and friends that put up with the dangerous levels of dorkiness I achieve at, uh, every moment of the day
A place to rest my head wherever I travel
My mother's patience
Camp Sunshine and everything that comes and goes along with it
Getting little kids into Tokusatsu
An infinitely beautiful and intriguing universe
Titmice
Adorable things
That even in this Godforsaken county full of Atlanta's urban sprawl there is still a beautiful forest I can go get lost in and be isolated from the rest of the world
This picture
Randomly finding small change on the ground
Laughing until I'm doubled over on the floor in pain
Hugs
Friendly conversations with strangers I have never met and will never meet again
Having an awesome job, even if I still need to find another source of income
My Elly <3

That's off the top of my head but the list goes on and on. And on.

And on another note, here is a trio of pies I baked last night shortly before going insane:

Omnomnomnom

The crusts kind of exploded BUT they are gluten-free and look and smell delicious. I shall certainly keep everyone updated on their tastiness once I can test it first-hand, yes.

Have a great Thanksgiving, everyone!

- Jared P. Foust