wheezytumblr:

Please, allow me to talk at you.

I think Craig blew it out of the water with this video. I think I may start posting things in progress to get critiques or just openly ask for them. I can see the flaws when something is finished, but if I can make those changes sooner I can create stronger pieces and learn more.

I commented i think on twitter about why I’m glad I’m not on deviant art anymore, people are bad at giving constructive criticism and others are absolute shits at receiving it. I strive to improve and often an extra set of eyes helps more than my just trying to figure outer out on my own.

In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face, is that in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the *new*. The world is often unkind to new talent, new creations. The new needs friends. Last night, I experienced something new: an extraordinary meal from a singularly unexpected source. To say that both the meal and its maker have challenged my preconceptions about fine cooking is a gross understatement. They have rocked me to my core. In the past, I have made no secret of my disdain for Chef Gusteau’s famous motto, “Anyone can cook.” But I realize, only now do I truly understand what he meant. Not everyone can become a great artist; but a great artist *can* come from *anywhere*. It is difficult to imagine more humble origins than those of the genius now cooking at Gusteau’s, who is, in this critic’s opinion, nothing less than the finest chef in France. I will be returning to Gusteau’s soon, hungry for more.

Ratatouille (2007) - Memorable quotes 

Anton Ego

Source: imdb.com

tuckfheman: NYPD Proves Street Artist Right by Tracking Him Down and Arresting Him Essam Attia is the New York street artist responsible for placing fake NYPD ads reading “Drones: Protection When You Least Expect It” around town. In September, he gave a video interview to Animal NY, with his identity and voice obscured, in which he discussed this project and his art in general. Wednesday morning, the NYPD arrested him at home. [Full Article]
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tuckfheman:

NYPD Proves Street Artist Right by Tracking Him Down and Arresting Him

Essam Attia is the New York street artist responsible for placing fake NYPD ads reading “Drones: Protection When You Least Expect It” around town. In September, he gave a video interview to Animal NY, with his identity and voice obscured, in which he discussed this project and his art in general. Wednesday morning, the NYPD arrested him at home.

[Full Article]

(via bcfortenberry)

Source: Gawker

The Burnt Asphalt Family at the Chrysler Museum (by ChryslerMuseum)

Yes, they are cooking on glass. This shit is amazing. Their thing is a commentary on traditional feminism and women as artists. So taking women from the kitchen and putting them into the studio, their thing is performance art and it’s fucking amazing. 

Source: youtube.com

Response to JF Sargent

Not to long ago JF Sargent posted this criticism of prejudices in video games on Cracked. He then got a shitstorm of responses with people who argued varying things about why Sargent was wrong. On Twitter he asked (rhetorically?) why so many people responded with such ire to this post on video games and not as loudly so a similar post from a few months ago about movies. 

On Twitter he said:

Hey — why didn’t anyone freak out about my “Prejudices in Movies” article? Are those things more socially acceptable to point out?

I responded:

maybe hardcore gamers feel like games are more niche and less of a mainstream thing, like movies. They’re defensive about any criticism. Games are too violent, too sexual, too sexist, too immature, too racist. Any time anyone criticizes games gamers take up arms (almost more juvenile than comic fans) that those things ate important to the game. I mean, you know about Feminist Frequency and the shitstorm that happened because she wants to do an intelligent discussion on women in video games. The fact that anyone, let alone a woman, had the audacity to say anything about games and they became misogynistic twats. I should have just waited and written you an email. It also would have been a lot longer.

—

Can we talk about the nonsense of caring about which news outlet first reports a big piece of news? I’m not talking about a genuine scoop—a report that wouldn’t have otherwise come to light—but about news that we’re all eventually going to find out anyway. Who Mitt Romney selects to be his running-mate, for instance, or whether the Supreme Court upheld the individual mandate.

I know I’m often out-of-the-loop when it comes to journalism norms and conventions, but this one honestly confounds me. Has any publication ever received a Pulitzer for being the first to report a major announcement? Is there some secret reward at stake—free cookies for a year? A trip to Hawaii? Do colleagues buy you a drink to congratulate you on beating the other networks by ten seconds?

Because if this is just about bragging rights, it needs to stop. Now. And not just because it can lead to some outlets rushing to report incorrect information, as CNN and FOX did with the recent Supreme Court decision on health care reform. But because the race to be first is no longer just a feature of news coverage but often the main factor driving it.

Amy Sullivan, The New Republic. Who Reported It First? Who Cares?

With the Supreme Court about to announce their decision on the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act our (mostly cable) media were chomping at the bit to be first out of the gate with some BREAKING NEWS.

CNN, as we know, fell flat on its face. It’s been struck down, they reported incorrectly. Their amplification machine went into overdrive with banner headlines on CNN.com and posts on social media until Wolf Blitzer — in purely Wolf Blitzer moment — helpfully illuminated us all.

“It’s getting a little more complicated,” he said.

As Sullivan points out: “His remark, of course, referred to the network’s own coverage. The court’s decision couldn’t have gotten more complicated because it was final, set down on paper.”

Sullivan’s article is well worth the read. Yes, there’s some importance to speed, she writes, but the media focuses too much on getting it first on too many stories where getting it first really isn’t important. Like, say, a Supreme Court announcement that everyone will hear about when it’s actually announced.

If the topic interests you, check out her follow-up. And if your journo-geekery runs real deep, head over to SCOTUSblog where Tom Goldstein walks 7,000 plus words through a minute by minute account of how CNN and Fox got their reporting wrong, and who the whole media scrum works in cases such as this.

(via futurejournalismproject)

Punching Down

guttersnipercomics:

So, despite the mega-bummer-storm of the recent Gary Friedrich super-screwing/Before Watchmen/Avengers movie boycott/Walking Dead profits controversy, I’ve tried to stay positive about the losing battle that is being a comics fan, but a couple things have really stuck in my craw the last few weeks. It really started with this tweet from Brian Michael Bendis:

Ugh. Super asinine, right? As a person who (sort of) reviews comics and (sort of) knows a lot of people who do it very well, I took umbrage at the fact that Mr. Bendis set such arbitrary boundaries for criticism in order for him to consider it valid.

So of course I shot my mouth off. 

Read More

This is an interesting discussion on criticism. I also happen to spend a lot of time criticism things here and on blogger, but reviews are steeped in opinion. I mean, sharing a review is just artfully writing your own opinion on something else while taking the time to be a bit objective about it so people with different opinions might get something useful out of it. 

coelasquid:

oldmanyellsatcloud replied to your post: I don’t know why people are getting it in their…
I haven’t actually seen anyone seriously adopt that extreme of a position, but you might be on more DA specific sites than I am.

Forbes - The Changing Face of Games: Feeling Angry and Ignored, Fans Look for Someone to Blame

Gamespot - The Dangers of Gamer Entitlement

FemPop - Creepy Internet Stalkers Harass Female Video Game Designer for Months

zConnection - When The Internet Fought Jennifer Hepler

The Mary Sue - Inclusion: What Jennifer Hepler’s Story is All About

Atomic - This is why gamers can’t have nice things - the Jennifer Hepler ‘debate’

Kotaku Australia - BioWare Writer Describes Her Gaming Tastes; Angry Gamers Call Her A ‘Cancer’

Destructoid - BioWare writer’s vagina versus the Internet

(list kindly collected by freckles04)

Movie Posters

I’ve spoken about movie posters a few other times but this is a bit different, and a lot shorter. (the initial rant is shorter but my examples not so much. )

I miss the old painted posters. They had a different sort of life and appeal as opposed to taking one round of promo shots then pasting and re-pasting them together awkwardly to make a modern movie poster. Not all of the old style of posters were perfect but it was nice to get an odd hint at multiple aspects of a movie, such as the hero AND villain, instead of one image with just a hero pose. I’d like the modern photo shoot ones more if more often they were shot that way and not pasted together later. Lighting and layering is still odd. 

Example time!

Rich paintings that show heroes, villains, side characters and the environment for the movie. You get a bit to expect. 

Photo edits that show some of the environment but are mostly edits from a a day or a few days of photo shoots. 

(I love Rashida Jones but her dead smile here is creepy. Does this movie take place in a void?)

Here’s a small comparison from a few different genre of movies where I’m not saying it’s poor poster design I’m saying they’re not as engaging in a way because of how little they tell. The Inception ones hint at the world of the movie not being entirely real, Sherlock Holmes just tells me that it’s a period movie. I also think that the post-shoot cleaning up and air-brushing is distracting because they don’t quite look like real people, there’s just a little something missing. 

(via OUR VALUED CUSTOMERS:) I’ve looked over this comic on more than one occasion and it’s just dull. The statements aren’t that amusing in their idiocy and it’s too repetitive. It’s one expression in every post. Men and women tend to look the same, so it’s supposed to draw attention to the criticisms from the customers but it just seem uninspired. The line art doesn’t really capture me and this doesn’t seem  sunken in any world. I know these are overheards and things said to him at work, but half the time the statements could have been said anywhere and he just happened to document the comic or geeky ones. Everyone knows customers say stupid things, but these aren’t really funny stupid things. He just seems bitter and it’s just cathartic for him to draw crude caricatures of people in this shop, which is all well and good, but it doesn’t seem to go anywhere. I can’t see where this might progress to or how it might evolve into something more fufiling. 
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(via OUR VALUED CUSTOMERS:)

I’ve looked over this comic on more than one occasion and it’s just dull. The statements aren’t that amusing in their idiocy and it’s too repetitive. It’s one expression in every post. Men and women tend to look the same, so it’s supposed to draw attention to the criticisms from the customers but it just seem uninspired. The line art doesn’t really capture me and this doesn’t seem  sunken in any world. I know these are overheards and things said to him at work, but half the time the statements could have been said anywhere and he just happened to document the comic or geeky ones.

Everyone knows customers say stupid things, but these aren’t really funny stupid things. He just seems bitter and it’s just cathartic for him to draw crude caricatures of people in this shop, which is all well and good, but it doesn’t seem to go anywhere. I can’t see where this might progress to or how it might evolve into something more fufiling. 

Source: ourvaluedcustomers