| Thursday, August 21st, 2008 |
axa
|
11:04a |
Things are a bit better, Evee and Jason came on line for a while.They both managed to cheer me up in their own little ways. It was nice talking to Jason without having to run off to be somewhere, I don't think we've managed that since I got here. And Evee finally got around to get Facebook, now I just have to get her on a proper IM too and we can keep in when I'm not here. |
axa
|
4:16a |
I feel like crap, I'm too tired to write all about it right now, but it's been a trying couple of weeks. I'm going home tomorrow and I'm expecting it to be a minor disaster, having to deal with school stuff and money issues. I just wish things were different right now. |
| Wednesday, August 20th, 2008 |
moneta_xi
|
7:48p |
Cropped Shot of another image In reality this is a cropped shot of a picture in my Paul Van Dyk set. I was looking through them again tonight and thought that this shot would be awesome if it was horizontal and centered better. I was right. I like how its grainy, it has an old warm film quality about it. Also check out... http://www.flickr.com/photos/moneta_xi/sets/72157606809124007/ |
msfrisby
|
7:02p |
 Neilsen ratings were at my doorstep today, hoping that I had cable tv and that I had children under 18. I did have the children, but I don't pay for cable tv and haven't for years now, which is what I told the nice lady. I explained that we only watched movies, some of which we got at the library. She stated that she thought it was really neat that we did other things besides watch tv all the time. My co-workers constantly forget that I don't have television and ask me if I saw this program or that one and I continually have to gently remind them that we don't watch tv at home. Of course, this makes it so that both my kids and I suffer tv trance rather badly when we visit someone and they have their tv on. People get used to talking to other people when they are watching tv, but I can't do it. Television is just too distracting for me to watch and speak with someone at the same time. |
zubkavich
|
7:05p |
The War on 'Talent' Mark Brooks (a kick ass penciler and good friend) posted a wonderful piece on his deviantArt today. The art and sentiments that go along with it are so lockstep with what I think that I just had to repost it here on my LJ: ( big art behind the cut )I’m going to go on a little bit of a rant here so bare with me or just stop reading now if you don’t want to waste the next few minutes of your life reading my drivel.
START RANT!
I hear the word ‘talent’ thrown around a lot whether directed toward me or the myriad of other skilled artists here or any of the other places artists like to hang out.
I’ve always been of the opinion that there is no such thing as talent but rather the drive and determination to do something you love and the aptitude to keep working at it to get better and better. To say someone is talented (to me anyway) is to suggest that there was one day when we just decided to pick up a pencil or a paint brush and were able to draw or paint well. I feel it downplays the years of hard work, squalored living and rejection we put in to get to the level we’ve achieved.
I don’t know about you but I sucked the first time I decided to take drawing seriously and continued to suck for years. I worked my ass off and gradually (very gradually) got better and better and continued to learn and grow. Do I think I was born to be an artist? I like to think so and don’t think I could be as successful at anything else even if I put the same effort forward but it still came as the result of years and years sitting in my room and filling sketchbooks with crappy drawing after crappy drawing. I knew I wanted to be an artist and I wanted to do very little else. It’s an aptitude perhaps but even then it comes after a lot of hard work.
I challenge you; strike the word talent from your vocabulary. Stop downplaying the effort put forward by others or the effort you’re putting forward yourself. It does a disservice to us as artists and becomes a crutch to those that can’t draw and gives them an excuse not to even try. I hear “I can’t draw. I have no talent” or “I can’t even draw a stick figure”. Well, maybe you can’t but it’s only from a lack of trying and not from the inherent ability to not be able to draw. Find your favorite artist here on DA and take a long hard look at their work because you can be just as good if not better. They aren’t supermen and everything they’ve accomplished artistically can be a realistic goal for everyone else. They didn’t wake up one day being able to draw and neither will you.
Once you fully realize this ,embrace it, and start putting that pen to paper for hours at a time I think you’ll find that all your artistic goals are in reach.
So the next time you see a really skilled artist and want to compliment him or her don’t say that they’re ‘talented’. Congratulate them on all the hard work they’ve put in to get that good. It’s only a few more words and I think you’ll find it sets you apart from everyone else.
END OF RANT!
Just to illustrate the point and for giggles I’m posting up a side by side of a drawing I did when I was 14 and one I did just a few months ago for Ultimate X-Men. While the recent drawing is far from perfect I think it illustrates the leaps and bounds I’ve come in the last 20 years. And believe me when I say that there were literally 1000's of drawing done in between. Some decent and some downright horrible but every single one getting me one step closer to being a better artist.
Hope you dig!
-Mark |
cactaur
|
6:29p |
New PC blues.
So, I want something new. A new home PC. Shiny. I need a new monitor, as mine is going dead. My mouse is on its last legs. Yes, those are ancillary, but that is still the case. My PC is rusting edge at this point, having been built before Jody and I even started dating. That was...yeah.
Anyway, we've got too many things coming up...new vehicle, surgeries, etc. I can't justify the cost right now. Especially since what I've got is still working. Alas.
But it would be shiny. |
juliarandolph
|
3:55p |
|
allthingsaaron
|
4:40p |
Seventy-nine-year-old Wu Dianyuan, right, and her neighbor Wang Xiuying, 77, waited to apply for a protest permit outside a public security bureau in Beijing on Monday. They were later sentenced to a year of "re-education through labor."w00t china |
zarq
|
4:15p |
I'm not this evil... I'm not this evil.... I SWEAR, I'm not this evil. On the other hand, ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) gbam may soon be getting an txt message about the awesome new "Obama / Cheney" dream ticket.... Poll #1245384 Veep Picks
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: AllSo... who's on your short list? (Non-serious answers only, please)  |
pickled_kitten
|
2:59p |
fat cats and sculpey Sooo Pickles has put on some weight since he's been at Tim's  And I have finished my sculpey octopus! His legs burned a little in the baking process but over all I like the way it turned out. Someone posted something similar on Forumopolis before the big crash and I was inspired and wanted to try and make my own ^_^  Yes I mostly did this at work. |
allthingsaaron
|
1:54p |
Game of the millennium. |
pickled_kitten
|
11:21a |
So my hedgehog Pico found a new home this morning.
I was so happy to have her when I got her but after Salsa died things just haven't been the same. I'm perfectly able to care for Pico in the general sense. She gets lots to eat and has a nice pen and is out where she can see people but after Salsa I don't really go around Pico at all. It just wasn't fair to her.
I put her up on craigslist a month ago and finally found a nice home for her. A nice family with a boy that will love her and snuggle her and people that will give her the love and attention she deserves. I was asking for a $50 rehoming fee but since the boy was spending his saved up money and bought a new cage and goodies for her I told him to just bring me the receipt as proof and we'd call it square. what a good kid. ^_^
ok...time for a meeting and then back to work. pictures of sculpey creations to come soon
edit: It's always nice when your first call of the day turns into 3 sales ^_^ the rest of my calls today will probably suck but at least this one has me pumped enough to make them! :P |
msfrisby
|
8:59a |
Good morning!  |
fionn_mac_lir
|
10:39a |
"Forum Tradition".
Please, somebody stab me in the throat. |
allthingsaaron
|
9:16a |
|
| Tuesday, August 19th, 2008 |
cay
|
11:45p |
Reading World War Z
This is a damn good book so far. some of the storys are interesting in the broader perspective of the oral history and some are worthy of being great short stories in and of themselves. |
| Wednesday, August 20th, 2008 |
allthingsaaron
|
12:15a |
Okay, now that the NDA is up, ask me anything about the game and I will answer to the best of my ability. |
cactaur
|
12:09a |
Quoth my eldest
"Dammit dammit dammit dammit Dammit dammit dammit dammit Dammit dammit dammit dammit Dammit dammit dammit dammit Dammit dammit dammit dammit Dammit dammit dammit dammit [ad infinitum]."
Of course, she does this while we have guests over.
I was half horrified, half dying of laughter. |
| Tuesday, August 19th, 2008 |
allthingsaaron
|
10:22p |
|
qamarman
|
8:53p |
First Casuality today at the gym. I was doing chest excercise and all of a sudden my left arm started to throb and really hurt.... I pinched a nerve in my shoulder. needless to say it fucking hurts. I took some pain meds and gonan go soak in the tub some. Hope it gets better by thursday. Current Mood:  nauseated |
allthingsaaron
|
6:43p |
Ahahahaha hahahahahahaaaaaaaaa
Speaking at the Games Convention Developers Conference this afternoon, industry veteran Dave Perry (most known for his studio Shiny Entertainment and its games Enter the Matrix and Earthworm Jim), gave an overview of the games industry as he sees it today. When discussing the current console race, he brought up some interesting statistics that he obtained from research firm DFC Intelligence. According to Perry, Sony has lost more money selling PlayStation 3s than it made selling PlayStation 2s during the entire five years of its peak. |
juliarandolph
|
4:22p |
|
pickled_kitten
|
4:19p |
drifting through my day
The phones at work are fucked so I get to go home early again. I got to watch tyler and charlie almost get into a fist fight.
Through all of this I've been playing with sculpey while TRYING to finish my calls.
A huge black rain coud just rolled in soooo yeah.....I'm just waiting for the phones to officially be 'offline' so I can GTFO in a few.
PS. My sculpey octopus v. 2.0 is fucking AWESOME so far |
droogiemiyuki
|
4:21p |
clean clean clean I've been wanting to do some cleaning lately. Not just cleaning, but hardcore, throwing stuff away, organizing, dusting, making nice-nice cleaning. I attacked the top of my bureau and the my side of the bed where I tend to drop a lot of clothes and books. (plus under the bed!) I've realized I own a lot of books and I've cultivated a dust bunny colony. I also found lots of loose change and where I had "put" my DS. I tossed three bags of pure crap and organized my "stuff" drawers. I feel a lot better. I could stand to lose a lot more stuff but these are babysteps for a born pack-rat. Besides. If I get rid of stuff I can get more, right? I'm also convinced that if I go to a baseball game, the home team loses. Going to Fenway was awesome. It may be small (and in some places backed up where the crowds could barely move) but it's such an intimate spot. It's like a party and everyone's just so down. However, next time I go to a night game there I am NOT driving back afterwards. I was fading fast once I hit Hartford. I have a long weekend next weekend. I think I want to go camping. Something chill. More importantly, something cheap. Current Mood:  accomplished |
zarq
|
3:11p |
@#^%! Liberal Media! Typo? What typo?One of the most amusing typos of the season turned up for awhile overnight in a major Associated Press dispatch. Some in the liberal blogosphere, who have often criticized Sen. Joe Lieberman -- the Democrat turned Independent who has endorsed John McCain -- found it all too apt.
The typo, in an article on the upcoming vice presidential picks due from McCain and Barack Obama and written by one of the top AP political scribes, Nedra Pickler, was soon corrected but can still be found viewed via Google at numerous news sites early this morning.
After focusing on Obama, the article discusses several possible McCain picks, and relates, "His top contenders are said to include Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. Less traditional choices mentioned include former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, an abortion-rights supporter, and Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman, the Democratic vice presidential prick in 2000 who now is an independent." If the shoe fits.... Edit: I submitted it to Wait, Wait. Wonder if it's going to show up in this week's broadcast. :) |
contemplative
weird