An Island Where No One Lives

I did this painting in about an hour or so.  I guess that makes it somewhat akin to Impressionism, at least with the idea of working quickly.  Certainly not in the matters of subject or color palette, of course.

It’s nice now and then to do something quickly and completely, but I don’t think I want to work this way as a matter of course.  I’m too detail-oriented and keep wanting to futz with things.

Not the one above, though.  I like it fine just the way it is.  I have no idea what it’s supposed to be, except that I’m pretty sure it’s alive.

I also think it would make a great book cover, say for a new edition of Bradbury’s “The Martian Chronicles.” 

I bought all the volumes of Gilgamesh, but it was a long time before I watched them.  There were a couple of reasons, but the main one was the character design.  Those downturned frowns and deer-in-the-headlights eyes made all the faces look like masks.  Given the events of the series–all the veiled hints, the “unexplained” origins, hidden motivations and shifting agendas–the look is entirely appropriate; but man, it sure doesn’t make for an appealing look.  Looking at the DVD covers, what we have here is one batch of fugly folks, all right.  

However, I have to note that once I started to watch the show, it only took a handful of episodes before the character designs didn’t bother me much.  In fact, I found a certain icy, precise beauty in some of them.  And as noted, events made the look seem appropriate.  At any rate, they didn’t interfere with my enjoyment of the show–and there was a lot to enjoy.  The music, for a start, is excellent–shimmering strings, clattering percussion, steely choirs, battling brass, all of it adding an ice-cold finger down the sides of one’s nightmares…good stuff.  The characters were also uniformly excellent, well rounded and with a depth that was frequently surprising.  No one here is a stock figure, put in place because the show required them to move forward.

The story proper takes place some fifteen years after a world-wide cataclysm.  A mysterious explosion at an archeological dig–thought to be the tomb of the Babylonian king who gives the series its name–changed the structure of the atmosphere, which is now a huge reflecting surface.  All computers (and some other electronic devices) ceased to function, though most other mechanical and electrical systems appear unaffected.  This naturally led to rampaging chaos and panic, world-wide devastation, and a diminished, crumbling state of life for the survivors.  In the early episodes, buildings collapse into clouds of dust in the background, seemingly without cause, and it sure looks appropriately normal for these parts.

The explosion left another side-effect in its wake: some children born since the cataclysm are gifted with psionic abilities, primarily psychokinesis, but also including teleportation and a limited degree of telepathy (they can talk to each other)   One of our main characters, the Countess Werdenberg, has been gathering these children at a resort she frequents, where they are being trained as a fighting force.  Because there’s another group of powerful children (teenagers by this time) called Gilgamesh, who seem–”seem” is an operative word for this show–seem to be working toward ends inimical to the survival of the human race.  Both sides have been aware of each other for some time, but they lack a trigger to bring their hostilities into full flower. 

That trigger arrives with our main characters, Tatsuya and his sister Kiyoko.  Both Gilgamesh and the Countess’ forces (called Orga) want them to join their respective sides.  By force if need be.  Both sides are reluctant to reveal any information, both are determined, both are dead set on victory.  Tatsuya and Kiyoko are caught in the middle.  “Whose side are you on?” is the series tagline and it is to the makers’ credit that it is several episodes in before we know where we ought to stand.

And as the show progressed, I was struck by how excellent it was (as noted above).  By the time I was through the sixth volume, I was nearly convinced that I was watching a masterpiece, on the level of Noir.  Like Noir, the show was about characters trying to wrest the hand of fate from their lives and make their own way in the world.  Like Noir, too, the show is dark and gloomy–the palette seems to be (but isn’t) entirely shades of gray and black, with stark white faces poking through the shadows.  There’s an air of depression and desperation over it all, but then, one can’t have everything.  Humor is conspicuous by its absence, though there are some wonderfully human moments where the characters do manage to have fun.  (A snowball fight via telekinesis is a highlight, and there’s a marvelous scene where Orga plays a game of psychokinetic “catch” with a manhole cover.  It swoops and dives dizzyingly through the city streets as they toss it around.)  The story at its heart is a human one, and the makers seem to recognize that our species does have some traits that make us worth preserving, and those traits are worth celebrating and defending. 

You’ll note, though, that I said “nearly convinced” above.  I’ve seen too many anime series shoot themselves in the foot in the final stretch for me to wade naively in all wide-eyed.  Also, none of the anime blogs that I regularly read seem to have mentioned this show at all (note: I did not do an exhaustive search).  There’s just no way that I, the anime tyro, am going to be the first one to find a masterpiece that they somehow missed.  So that was something of a worry.

My philosophy, however, it to put such worries aside and just watch the show for what it has to offer.  Good or bad will come in the watching, and not in the sideline opinions.  So I put in the last disk, and started watching.  Episode 24 had what looked like a minor misstep, but episode 25 had one of the best scenes in the entire show–a dinner party wherein our main cast seemed to shed many of the masks and acknowledged how much they all benefited from, and needed, each other.  As I said before, but it bears repeating, despite the gloomy, heavy-hand-of-fate background that the story played out within, the makers seemed to know that what makes a story is the humanity of the characters, the things we all share so that when watching, we can see ourselves and our own possible choices in the actions on screen.

Episode 26 (the final episode), started out reasonably well and as expected–the final confrontation between the two factions.  And there and then, in the second half of the episode, the makers kicked the struts out from under the structure they had painstakingly built, and the entire thing collapsed into a choking cloud of dust.

I could not believe what I was watching.  How could the folks who’d brought us so far…do this?   How could they so take what they’d made and twist it so horribly?  I’ll give them this, the ending they chose was always within the realm of possibility, and the final scene before the credits (and immediately after) seemed to say that the makers hated this ending too.  (Not that that really helped, mind.)  But otherwise, what I saw was an ending of Gainaxian proportions.  And Studio Gainax had nothing to do with this show.

Other “Gainax ending” endings can be worked around.  If one chooses not to watch the last disk of Mahoromatic, one is left with a pleasant romantic comedy punctuated by android fights.  The ending of Neon Genesis Evangelion can be met with a shrug and a colorful suggestion of what Shinji can do with his own anatomy.  In the end of that show, nothing is resolved with any finality.  The film-makers could (and did) pick the story up again and take it in another direction.

But Gilgamesh isn’t episodic like that.  Each episode builds on the one before, carrying the story with them, so one just can’t watch all but the last and have a satisfying experience.  (Watching the last episode, on the other hand, definitely robs one of any kind of a satisfactory experience.)  The ending makes clear that the story is most definitely over, too; no retooling or rebooting possible.

Never have I felt so frustrated and disenheartened by a show, nor so perplexed at the makers’ intent.  Had it not been for the last ten minutes, I would have given this show five stars and an unqualified recommendation.  Now I feel lost, cold and alone, huddling in the rain beneath that piano like Tatsuya and Kiyoko.

Boring technical note: I’ve long been unhappy with WordPress’ word processor and have looked for an alternative.  The original (superior) draft of the above was written in a freeware program called “Blink” which looked great, but had one little teeny drawback: whatever I saved…wasn’t.  I had to recreate my thoughts, such as they were, with an old copy of FrontPage.  

Blink and you’ll miss it, I guess.   

It’s been close to a year since we last looked at Paint Blog II. When we did, it looked like this.

Now, it looks like this.

What happened? Did it get painted over for some other fool scheme? Well…not exactly. The first image above was made when Paint Blog II was a triptych, or a three-panel work.

Now, it’s a four-panel work, technically called (thanks, Cafe Terrace!) a polyptych. And you know what I did?

That’s right. I forgot to show you any of it.

However, I didn’t forget to photograph it. So for your consideration below, are the steps of Panel Four’s creation from beginning to…end?

Possibly. This stuff is always hard to say for sure. (Since the second photo above was taken, the right-most edges of the cloud-storm have been softened.)

Anyway, on with the show…because of the sheer number of images, I’ll be keeping commentary to a minimum (also I’ve forgotten rather a lot).

Lots of graphics, so if you don’t wanna stick around, I understand. But thanks for visiting!

Let’s get some paint on there.

Let’s shape it into sky.

Let’s make a big ole cloud-bank.

And as we’re doing that, Let’s add some ground.

While we’re doing those things, let’s detail them with highlights and what-not.

What should we do with the ground that’s a bit farther away? The answer may surprise you, though probably not if you’ve read many of these things. (Anyway, the guidelines painted on the 11th painting give it away.) Some vague highlights…

Yes, it’s a whole horde of writhing tentacles, approaching out of a vast sea of them. Good guess!

We gradually add shading and highlights to these…

Let’s give them a buidling to play with. Specifically, we’ll give them the other section of the building to the right on the Third Panel.

Voila:

Next…

Yes, that’s right. There’s a fifth panel, beyond that which is known to man…

A funny thing happened after the last update: I posted the image as a work-in-progress at another site, and someone said, “Wow, I’d buy that.” 

R-really? I thought.  I mean, the site is frequented by students and other types who typically (to judge by their complaints) have no money, but gosh–still, someone thought they might like to buy PB 2008-A?  (Yeah, if I do sell it, it’ll need a snappier title.)

The strange thing is, the consideration has made work come to a halt on that particular canvas.  I mean, I don’t want to ruin the “sale” so I’m hesitant to touch it.

Above, of course, is PB 2008-A as we last left it.   For the past several days, it has stayed that way.

Man I hate indecision like this.

Soon:  more work on Paint Blog II, believe it or not.  In fact, it turns out there’s been…rather a lot of work on Paint Blog II that I haven’t been posting here (last time I talked about it was in April of last year). 

It promises to be a big update. 

See you then, and thanks for visiting today.

Yes, I watched Pretear again recently, for the seventh time. And like the sixth time before that, I worried before my fingers touched the DVD case: would this be the one? Will this be the time when all the flaws and what-not come to the fore, and I get impatient or bored with the show, and put it in a box forever?

Answer: no. I still love the show, and in fact, once it started any trepidation just evaporated and I couldn’t wait to go from episode to episode. I watched the whole series over three days of exercise (six miles a day, too). I can’t believe that I’m still just as enthused about Pretear as the first time I watched it. But damn it, I am.

That’s not to say there aren’t flaws, of course, but the flaws don’t interfere with anything important. Yeah, the art is sketchy here and there, and the exposition-cramming is noticable in episode one. But the sheer joy of the show erases all that. (At least for me, I hasten to point out; I’m sure the mileage for others will vary considerably.)

If someone ever comes up to me and says, “I’m taking away all your anime DVDs, you get to keep one series,” Pretear would be the one I’d choose with absolutely no hesitation. Much as I love Noir and Divergence Eve and the others on my not-quite-ten best anime list, there’s just nothing that compares with this one for satisfaction.

Okay, sorry for raving.  Dunno if you could tell or not, but I just love this damned show.  Another paint blog update “shortly” (if “shortly” is considered in context of the age of the universe).

Thanks for visiting, and see you again soon!

For some time now I’ve been dreading the fact that Blue-Ray, or BluRay, or Blu-Ray, is the high definition format that seems to be heading into the winner’s circle.  The reason I’ve not been too happy about that is, in all honesty, I thought the competing HD-DVD format looked much, much better.  A Blu-Ray DVD, to my admittedly aging eyes, didn’t look any better than a standard DVD.

Well, that’s changed.  It turns out it wasn’t Blu-Ray.  It was the player–in this case, a Sony PS3 or, as I like to call it, The Retard Machine.  As it happens, you don’t have to tell the PS3 what kind of television you have.

You have to tell it what kind of television you don’t have.  I have a 720p set; the PS3 assumed I have a 1080 model, and consequently tried to send a 1080 signal to my non-1080 television.  My non-1080 television reacted by saying, I suppose, “I don’t know what this is, so here’s what I can do with it.”  And I got standard DVD, I guess.

Squirreled away in one of the PS3 submenus is a list of all the television signals that the PS3 is going to send out.  By default, they’re all turned on.  You have to uncheck the ones you don’t actually have, then somehow figure out how to save that setting while resisting the urge to throw heavy objects–like, say, a PS3–out the nearest window. 

(I feel compelled to point out that the XBox 360 asked me nicely what my equipment was when I first set it up.  Nyah.) 

Once I got all that straightened out, Blu-Ray looks terrific, easily as good as HD-DVD.  So if (or when) Blu-Ray wins, I won’t be disappointed.

Sorry about that, Blu-Ray.

Now is the winter of our discontent, I guess, because I did some detailing on the background for this thing.  Viz:

At the end, I remained unconvinced.  Actually, I was pretty convinced I was doing it wrong.  The background looked like an aquarium.  The more I saw, the more it resembled the background in one of those old comic book ads for sea monkeys.  Vaguely castle-y and stuff. 

I didn’t like it, so I did the only thing possible.

Yes…I started reddening the whole thing up.

More and more.

Finally, the whole thing now looks like some kind of surgery being performed in the flaming aftermath of some horrible disaster.

I think I have to admit I like it better this way.   Also, this was done to more “RahXephon,” which I’m kind of liking as well.  The show is a lot like “Neon Genesis Evangelion,” with one big difference:  the characters are actually likeable.  It’s amazing what a difference that makes.

Especially when painting.

Thanks for visiting, everyone, and see you next time.

Well, last week we saw the insidious Riddler laying a deadly trap for Batman and Robin, and the Dynamic Duo were caught unawares!  Only seconds away from being crushed by the giant squid, Batman hatches a desperate plan….

Oh, sorry.  Actually, this is just another Paint Blog update.  Sorry if you were all up for reading about Batman.  Batman’s not here, man.

Lat time around, we ended up with an image that was in the last update.  The last update is almost directly below this one, so you can go down there to see if you like.  Are you back now?  Oh good.

So, now, we made the “hand” on the far right more elaborate, and we added legs to the thing in the upper left.

More elaboration, and another leg.

Legs on the other side of the upper left guy, and a leg on the other side of the center-top-right guy.   Also, some red marks at the bottom right.  Why?  I don’t know the reason for that.

We then gave the legs on the center-top-right guy some lighter highlights, because his legs were clashing with the legs on the upper-left guy.

The red blobby thing got another tentacle.

He also got another tentacle after that, and some areas of variety in terms of light and dark.

And after that, he really started to expand.

Including some (perhaps overly subtle) expansion on the right (the slightly darker area).

That got expanded, and highlights were added.

Suddenly, the crustacean’s elaborate right hand got even more elaborate.  And his far left hand got a bit of fringe.  The middle hand, too, got some spines and things.

Far right hand got even more, um, elaborater.   And some of the red material started climbing up the right side.

Leaving us, finally, with what lies beneath.

Well, so far so good, I think when I look at this, though I’m not exactly sure what it will end up becoming in the end.  Of course, I never am.

Most of the above, by the way, was done while an anime series called RahXephon was playing in the background.  I don’t think the two are related, but one never knows the subtle pressures that the senses place upon the working brain.

Thanks for stopping by.  Tune in next time for the next thrilling chapter.  Or not-so-thrilling.  You never can tell, can you?

So, as mentioned in the previous entry, I bought a ticket for Cloverfield a week or so ago (Fandango = cool).  And last night I sat in the theatre (which was nearly empty.  Sunday night showings = cool).   In accordance with what I’d heard about motion-sickness, I was at the far edge of the first third of the theatre, seating-wise.

The short version is, I liked it.

As I’ve said to many tedious degrees, I was worried about the quality of this film for one reason only–the release date.  What studio in its right mind releases a film in the middle of January?  Mid-January is dumping time, when those films that won’t win awards or set fire to the box office are released to wrestle over the tiny post-holiday scraps that folks still have in their wallets.  Maybe the success of this film–$41 million opening weekend–will change that; it would be nice to have an entire year to look forward to, rather than the obvious highs (Summer, pre-Christmas) that the studios typically target.

In a sense, I can see the “logic” of the studio’s thinking.  Here’s a film that’s very low-budget–around $30 million–with no stars and no big names behind the camera, other than co-producer J.J. Abrams.  They had little to lose, again by their logic, by releasing it when the competition would be somewhat sparse and uninspired.  What they didn’t count on, I think, was the incredibly clever marketing that really pushed the film into the public eye.  The advertising for the film seemed designed to intrigue, rather than mystify or annoy, and it avoided the “sure fire” gimmicky nature of, say, Snakes on a Plane.  I knew I wanted to see this film.

As for the film itself…

As everyone no doubt knows by now, the film borrows a page from The Blair Witch Project, in that all the footage seen comes from a singe camcorder wielded by the actual characters, rather than a separate director of photography.   This lends a huge amount of verisimilitude to the story, as well as a certain level of frustration at the lack of “professional” choice.   A number of times, I kept wishing the cameraman would focus on something he’d rapidly panned past (What was that?), rather than the faces of his friends or whatever random image he chose instead.  Still, this is his documentation of what’s happening to him and his friends so his choices were understandable.  Admittedly, like the Blair Witch “film students,” we simultaneously have to admire the willingness of our amateur cameraman to keep shooting, despite the chaos and death all around–long past the point, in other words, when you and I would have tossed the camera aside in order to concentrate on gettin’ our feets a movin’.  But I certainly wouldn’t have minded a little more footage of the monster.

But don’t worry; the monster gets enough screentime, and he’s entirely satisfying.  Because he’s almost always in motion, lurching between (and through) buildings, it’s hard to get a good grasp of exactly what he looks like, but there are a number of good shots of him.  And if you’ve seen the film, you know there’s one extremely good look at his face, from the worst possible vantage point of one of our heroes.

So, yes, I liked it, and I’m glad to see someone was able to wring another variant of the Blair Witch system.  It makes me think that there still are some creative minds in Hollywood who can see the possibilities inherent in an idea that, at first blush, seems unrepeatable.   More fool me for thinking it could not be so.  What’s nice is that there’s a lot less “idiot plot” than there was in Blair Witch; yes, there is an extremely questionable decision made, but the reasons given are valid.  No one acts like an idiot because the movie would be over otherwise.  (There are also some definite echoes of Blair Witch–I’m thinking particularly of a pair of shots toward the end.  You’ll recognize them.)

There are also, apparently, a number of little things that happen to the side of the image at important moments–not necessarily plot points, but things to think about.  I missed one of them (in the final shot) but caught a number of others.  What’s interesting is that these things are tossed in more as food for thought, as a way to keep the story open-ended, than as story elements, though they contribute as well.  It’s up to the viewer, then, to watch the camcorder footage and try to decide what to focus on, much as our heroes had to do.   This is definitely something I’ll want to watch again when it makes its way to home video, if for no other reason than to place all the puzzle pieces into a “narrative.” 

But even if you just want to watch a movie and not worry about puzzles and pieces, it’s still a pretty good film, and a very good addition to the “giant monster” genre.  One of the best of those, in fact, if for no other reason than “camp” is conspicuous by its absence.

Highly recommended.

Since our last thrilling chapter, Diego found the hidden treasure map, but was betrayed by Warren, who (as it turns out) was working for Mister Redfield the entire time.  Meanwhile, Patricia discovered a hidden room in the attic, with a lock that the key from the kitchen just happened to fit! As she turns the lock, slow, shuffling noises come from inside…

Actually, none of that happened, sorry.  I hope you weren’t expecting to find out what happens to Diego now, let along Roger (who got left out of the update).  No, we just did some more work on a painting.  A step forward, a step back, then some more steps forward.

Just to try and do something with it, I took some red and white, and a bit of burnt sienna, and played over the canvas with more or less random marks.

We ended up with this.

I didn’t like it, so I grabbed more paint and covered it over, so we were (again more or less) back at square one.

Then, while semi-watching 42nd Street, I decided to try some more with white, burnt sienna, and raw umber.  I could still see some of the marks beneath the latest layer of paint, so I decided to play with them.  While doing so, I happened to turn the canvas to a horizontal position, and…I thought I liked it more that way.

The next series of images shows how the work that evening happened to end up on the canvas.  

I’m thinking this is more successful than the last version–at least, I can look at it and not think, That’s all wrong. 

So that’s where we stand, as of today.  I’ll probably do more on it this week (I have more Buzby Berkeley musicals to watch after all).  Probably not tonight, though.  Tonight I’m going to see Cloverfield.

Thanks for visiting, again, and see you soon.  Maybe next time we’ll find out what happens to Diego, eh?