ScrollBoss: Now that I’m not scrambling to slap updates together every two weeks while also trying to make content for Illmosis, I’ve been able to finish some long overdue work.
The worst part was finally renaming and reformatting the last batch of sprites, over 100 files, from the old naming format. Before 2005 or so, I used to put files in the same folder so graphic file names started with “sprite” or “anim” for easy sorting. I’ve been converting 100’s files to the superior “sourcegame-platform_character_whatitdo.png” style off and on for years until I finished it Tuesday night. This also includes saving static stuff as PNG files. Then I had to (try and) find every page where I used those old sprites and fix the IMG tags. If reading that bored you, imagine living it. That’s some of the unseen behind-the-scenes crap I talk about in certain updates. The crazy part was finding sprites that I never added to the galleries like Drokmar’s “I have magics” jazz-hands pose and some stuff from Undercover Cops.
Next update’s ETA: March 6th. Kung Fu Master finally gets a graphic gallery while other random galleries get some additions. Magic Sword gallery gets a few new animations that I took for reference some reason. I want to kick in at least one sprite edit, but no promises.
Beans vs. Cornbread: I signed up to Twitter and I’m testing two different widgets in the sidebar. One has a ton of features but updates a bit more slowly than the second widget that’s just a simple script from the main site. My Twitter page is here so add me to your follow list. I may throw in links to preview and test stuff on there for quick feedback.
Illmosis: Continues to roll on. Just scanned B&W profile pic of an “earlier age” hero but I plan to have more than that this weekend. No new character profiles yet. Custom Lego Batmobile update IF I remember to get batteries.
My original plan was to talk about how it feels like a lot of non-essential things (not comics and toys, because they’re okay right now) seem like heading towards critical bland. The internet is full of people complaining in uninteresting ways and that would’ve been about as bland as what I was complaining about. So I’ll skip ahead to the important part.
For one thing, I’ve had enough of my own half-steppin’. That ish ends now. I’ve spent so much time coding, typing and doing boring crap that I haven’t really been as straight-up ill as I should have been and I apologize for that. I’ve been scheming on some projects that are caked with crazy and this is the year that I pull the trigger. Yeah, the comics I’ve been talking about are still happening. But the first schemed-on project is something that I’ve wanted to do for a few years but will finally get around to doing early this year. I’ll make sure that I have a few done before I start throwing them out there but it will be soon. In fact, this blog is probably the best place to keep an eye out for it since… you know what? You’ll see soon enough. The other project is a whole new site that will hopefully hit in the middle of the year. It’ll be an ambitious waste of time (yours and mine) with things that I’ve been posting previews and beta tests of for years so a few friends may already know what this is.
I’m not saying this in some effort to say, “Wow, look at me, I’m doing a lot of stuff and that makes me important!” because it doesn’t. The point of this rambling post is that those who can ill must ill if we are to survive. Yeah, that movie coming out next week sounds just like the one that came out this year, that game that hits stores next month looks a lot games that also looked like other games and, dammit, there’s no need for this comic character to be on his 8th dead girlfriend except for lazy writing. But what the hell are you going to do about it? You gonna cry? Reminisce like Mary J. Blige for the love you had? Or will you fight? If you can do it, start working on your own stuff. Team up with other people who feel the same way. If you don’t think you have the skills to pull it off, find a way to get the word out about the people who you think are doing things right. If you want to want to complain about something and can’t write creatively, figure out how to make a slideshow video about it and put it on a video site. The internet is full of free tools and free tutorials to teach you how get your thing in action. Even a chump like me can afford to have three websites on my Dreamhost account and I can’t even afford an X-Box 360. If I can do it, so can you. No, it may not change the world but it’s a whole lot more fun than waiting for things to be less crappy.
Nice children get little bottles filled with destructive, playfield-clearing magic attacks. Wind, Fire, all that kind of thing.
Naughty children get Level 2 lightning bolts in the face.
These are some of the things that I’m thankful for:
1.) Time off from the day job so my aching legs could get some rest.
2.) Amazon.com for having a sale filled with magnificent awesomes so I could get two of the main DVD sets on my want list: Aquaman and Boondocks Season 2.
3.) Finishing a sprite edit animation that will be used for someone’s MUGEN character. Oddly enough, this means that I’ve done fight stance anim work for two different versions of this same character.
4.) Incredibly moist turkey that is perfect for sleep-inducing sammitches.
5.) To Sci-Fi for showing the Stand again for the 484th time this damned year. I’m sure they’ll shoot for an even 700 before the New Years Twilight Zone Marathon hits.
6.) To Cartoon Network for not showing the Brave and the Bold on the first Friday that I was home and guaranteed to see it. Like I won’t buy the DVDs anyway.
This one made my jaw drop: Boondocks: Complete Second Season for $16
AW HELL YEAH. The regular price was always too steep for me but the $16 is even lower than what I was hoping for. This set includes the two episodes never shown on Cartoon Network.
So Friday afternoon had me thinking how crappy it was that I had this big update at ScrollBoss on Halloween with now Halloween stuff in it but it was even worse that I didn’t have anything for Illmosis. My mental condition, also named Illmosis, kicked in and caused me to think of Count Floyd from the SCTV sketch, Monster Chiller Horror Theater. Then I thought it was too bad that I couldn’t have a “Monster Iller Horror Theater” on the site and that was followed by, “Well why can’t I? It’s my damn site!” So that’s where the idea for Creature Iller Horror Theatre was born. Actually, I kept accidentally flipping between that and Creature Iller Terror Theatre, but I’m changing it back to Horror because Homeland Security may claim I was giving aid an comfort to the enemy or something. Anyway, the idea was to try to draw as many monster and horror related pics as I could without sacrificing quality.
As soon as I got home from work, I drew a really quick two-panel comic of Nutroll dressed as Count Floyd and put it on the index page to let any visitors know what was happening over the weekend. Then I started the creature art marathon which stars the characters you see to the left of this post. Click on the thumbnails to check out their Illmosis gallery pages. I started with Slimer/the Green Ghost from Ghostbusters as a warm-up. He’s a weird mix of the (un)live-action and animated versions since I like both of ’em. I followed that up with the werewolf from Altered Beast. This was a giant pain in the butt that killed most of the momentum that I had because I pencilled him three times before I got a version that I liked. The problem was that I kept trying to draw him in a wild, feral pose but the Altered Beast wolf is more of a brawler. I was inking the picture until around 7 AM Saturday which meant that I didn’t sleep much. When I hung out with my friends that afternoon, I sat in the car and pencilled Solomon Grundy’s pose as they shopped in a rummage sale. After all that and having some fun at my niece’s birthday party, I came back and spent a really long time fixing up the pose and then inking it. I finished it that night but sleep deprivation kept me from doing anything else for Saturday other than watching Pan’s Labyrinth, one of the most amazing movies I’ve ever seen. I woke up Sunday and went to work on the Lego Skeleton which took longer than it should have. I wanted the picture to look as close to a real minifigure as I could with minor tweaks to get the pose right but use the shadows to get a more horror-style vibe.
At this point, the Skeleton seems to be the early favorite with Grundy as a close second. That’s close to what I expected except I thought Grundy would be more popular. I didn’t get a lot done in the end of it all, but considering all the ScrollBoss recoding and commission art pencil work I did earlier in the week, I had a bigger Illmosis update than I expected. That counts as a win in my book. I may not be able to do it like this next year but I will keep the event name for the month and may have Count Rollula or another Halloween mascot announce the pictures. If I do anything like this for ScrollBoss, I’ve already decided to call it Danger Terror Horror Theater. Yes, I’m just that damned corny.
