Growing Up Transformers
In my review for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen I wrote:
Growing up, I was fascinated by machinery and form. As a young boy, like most boys, I really liked trucks and construction. Monster trucks, bulldozers and heavy farm equipment fascinated me, and I always loved cartoons and characters. When the two met, and I saw a tractor-trailer semi transform into a robot, that was it. Ever since, I’ve been collecting Transformers toys — I have ones that I received as gifts when I was four — and I still look forward to the new figures coming out now. I’m sure a therapist could explain the true, and possibly disturbed, reasons I hold onto and collect these toys, but for me, it reminds me that no matter how old I get, I never have to really grow up.
I thought I’d write a quick post to show you a what I was talking about. Here are a couple photos from when I was young. The first one is above, the other below the jump.
In the first one, I’m probably around five years old, maybe six considering the room I’m in, and you can see I have a few Autobots. This is how the madness started.
The second one is a photo I found while looking for the first one. I’m probably around three in this one and I wanted to share it just in case you couldn’t picture me rollin’. Continued »
Because I Am A Digital Boy
I’m excited about the prospect of living in an entirely digital world. Being slightly obsessed with new technology and gadgets, I can’t wait until all of my entertainment options — the non-physical ones — are available from a single digital hub. Pushing a button to summon a song through the stereo, a movie on the television or a game on the console of my choosing fills me with glee. This is the kind of thing that makes people shut themselves inside their homes, away from the world at large.
I’m Making This Up As I Go Along
Well it’s been far too long since my last post. Even though I’ve been very busy — with art and non-art projects — I haven’t really done anything worth posting here. I started a personal blog where I can share a little more about my life and interests that aren’t related to art, and I seem to update that page more often than this one. That shows me that I’ve neglected my artwork for far too long. And that needs to change. Now.
At my current job, I’m in the process of learning how to develop websites in the WordPress environment (Hey, this site was made in WordPress!), as well as dabbling in some PHP programming. I learned a little C++ in college and I’ve taught myself quite a bit of ActionScript, so the PHP thing has been a lot of fun to learn. I even ordered a book to teach myself some more of it in the form of a catalog project.
What does this mean for Killer Robot? Well, since I’ve already learned a buttload about WordPress in just my first couple of weeks, it means a new website design is coming. I’ve learned a lot about manipulating template files and source code, so I want to take a stab at creating a WordPress template from scratch. It’s going to be a lot of work — which will include a new logo, color scheme and branding as well. I’ve only had this site for a little over a year and it’s incredible the amount of knowledge you can absorb in such a short amount of time.
On top of the new website, I’ve been honing my sketching technique, as well as fine-tuning my process of going from sketch to final product. With these things in place, I’m starting over on the Zabka comic — even though there has only been one page so far — and looking to begin my Human Element story as a webcomic that will be integrated into this site. I also have a few side projects in the works, including but not limited to:
- Logo and website for my wife Laura’s business
- Logo character for a friend’s website
- A birthday card design for my grandfather’s 80th birthday
- A new self-portrait
- Something involving the otter holding the Idol from Raiders Of The Lost Ark (see above)
There’s a lot to be done in the coming months, and I feel like I’ve spent too much time dawdling in laziness and excuses. It’s time to get focused, and hopefully because I wrote it here for others to read, I’ll get serious about it. I want to make a schedule with due dates to keep everything on track, and I hope to share all this with you. Here’s to an eventful eight months of 2009!