Here was a life story that should inspire us all: Born in 1942 Isaac Hayes started his life in extreme poverty: His parents died when he was young and he grew up picking cotton in Covington, Tennessee. His first public performance was at the age of five singing at a local church — and soon after that he taught himself how to play multiple instruments including everything from a piano to a saxophone.
“Go on a flight with Tony Stark! Blast off with the armor-wearing, comic-book hero as he takes on air-powered rocket form. While Iron Man may be most well known for the armor that gives him superhuman strength and his extensive, built-in weapons system, its his ability to fly across the sky at supersonic speed that inspired this awesome air-powered rocket launcher. Made of cushiony foam, attach the included glider to the superhero-shaped rocket. Load the rocket onto the launch pad and build up some force using the pump. Then, press the launch button to send Iron Man soaring up to 40 feet in the air! When the rocket reaches maximum altitude, the glider will detach and soar away. Watch where it twists and turns as it makes the descent back to Earth. Reach for the skies with this awesome flying figure!”
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 10, 2008 in Animation
The above BBC animation for the Olympics was designed by Jamie Hewlett (who is best known for the comic book Tank Girl and co-creator of the band Gorillaz). I’m not blown away by the animation, but the character designs look great!
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 10, 2008 in Japanese TV
The Japanese obsession with Ronald McDonald in fan videos is so strange! The above video is a reference to to the song Beware the Forest’s Mushrooms from the Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars game.
It may be a pipe dream or a fantasy, but this fanboy would love to wake up one day and find out that there was a breakthrough in warp drive technology that would make interstellar space travel possible in my lifetime:
“It is possible to travel faster than light. You just wouldn’t travel faster than light.
Seems strange, but by manipulating extra dimensions with astronomical amounts of energy, two Baylor University physicists have outlined how a faster-than-light engine, or warp drive, could be created that would bend but not break the laws of physics. “We think we can create an effective warp drive, based on general relatively and string theory,” said Gerald Cleaver, coauthor of the paper that recently appeared on the preprint server ArXiv.org.
The warp engine is based on a design first proposed in 1994 by Michael Alcubierre. The Alcubierre drive, as it’s known, involves expanding the fabric of space behind a ship into a bubble and shrinking space-time in front of the ship. The ship would rest in between the expanding and shrinking space-time, essentially surfing down the side of the bubble.”
This girly gangsta J-Pop band is called Hi-Prix and features Miki (who is 18 years old) and Hina (who at age 17 is the younger of the duo). I’ve been listening to people tell me that “hip hop is dead” for over 20 years now, but I fear that Hi-Prix could be the one act to put the nail in that coffin…
Shown above is the IBM 026 Printing Card Punch which is from the Vintage Computer Festival website. If you’re a lover of antique hardware there’s going to be a show coming up in September that’s worth catching:
The 5th annual Vintage Computer Festival East will be held on Saturday, September 13th and Sunday, September 14th, at the InfoAge Learning Center at Wall Township, New Jersey. The event is sponsored by MARCH and VintageTech. The exact daily schedule will be announced shortly.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 8, 2008 in Comic Books
This wonderful lavish display of red hair is a detail from the cover of Secret Invasion: Inhumans by illustrator Stjepan Sejic. This issue will hit comic shops on August 13th:
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 8, 2008 in Videogames
Yes I know: You eat, sleep, and drink videogames! But dreaming about videogames isn’t enough so to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Space Invaders Taito has created the above pillows to ensure that you spend your REM cycles in style:
“The pillows are colored black and decorated with pixel images of Space Invaders in a shade of drab yellow and drab gray. There’s a reason why the pillows are colored black – they provide the perfect contrast for the Space Invaders designs which glow in the dark when the lights are low. Two styles are in stock and shipping today as follows:
(A) Two large Space Invaders (Top Pillow)
(B) Space Invaders logo with rows of invaders (Bottom Pillow)
Each pillow measures 53cm (20.86″) in length and 33cm (13″) in width which is larger than Taito’s original measurements when they started accepting preorders. The pillows are big enough to accommodate human heads, pets, and assorted wide loads.”
Ummm, I hope those ‘human heads’ are attached to bodies!
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 6, 2008 in Comic Books
This Kyle Baker cover for Special Forces #3 is brilliant for the sheer comedy value, it’s like something from the golden age of Mad magazine. That or I love seeing Mickey get it…
Do you know why Star Trek the Next Generation was so lame? It’s because the coolest thing that they ever came up for the series was the Borg — and that was just a lame second hand copy of the Daleks (well with a little bit of Blade Runner thrown in for fun, but you get the idea). Well now you can celebrate the superior bad guys with your very own Dalek Voice Changer Helmet:
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 5, 2008 in Videogames
Little Busters! (リトルバスターズ! Ritoru Basutāzu!) is a game based on a visual novel — the plot focuses on six female characters. The game has done so well that it has already inspired a manga. Here’s an official commercial for one of their titles to give you a better taste:
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 5, 2008 in Videogames
You can see from the above commercial that Sony is trying to go after the “girl game” market more and more — the above spot is for Monster Hunter Portable 2G from Capcom. The game allows you to hunt for monsters and other wild creatures.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 4, 2008 in Videogames
There are three cool things about the iPhone game Anime Match 勝負 (caution: link launches you to iTunes):
1. It’s for free! Granted you get what you pay for these days, but if you’re a cheap fanboy that’s a plus in my book.
2. Despite the fact that the game has an Japanese interface it’s very easy to use. By the way it should be noted that Jirbo, Inc. who makes the game also has an English version — but that would make the game itself less cool, no?
3. The ever so cute icons of anime animals have a nice moe factor to them.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 4, 2008 in Animation
The above animated short is from the long running Japanese series Minna no Uta (みんなのうた) which translates as Everyone’s Songs and has been on the air since 1961. The show is interstitial programming which runs there’s a five minute gap on NHK and the series focuses on introducing new songs and animators. The above 1987 film was animated by Taku Furukawa and the featured song is Kumo ha Haretara by Etsuko Sai. What I love about the animation is that it’s very Japanese in style and approach yet it’s not the typical look that you associate with anime. The other nice thing about is that the animation isn’t dated, which is pretty amazing since this music video is over 20 years old!
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 3, 2008 in Animation
At long last it looks like Yoshinobu Nishizaki has come to a legal agreement under which he can revive Space Battleship Yamato (which is known to American fanboys as Star Blazers). As a long time fan of the show I have mixed feelings about this: On one hand I love the idea of the show being brought back to life for the first time in a serious way since the 80s — but yet Nishizaki has a record for making somewhat lackluster films like Odin and the fact that Leiji Matsumoto doesn’t bode well for me.
Here’s the official press release (which is from here and here) from a quick translation by my old friend Ed Hawkins:
Press Release – Yoshinobu Nishizaki
“In 2220 of the Christian Era … A crisis is approaching Earth, it is seen as the expansion of a moving black hole. An operation of immigration as progressed with moving over 300 million people from Earth … The latest transportation fleet is attacked during the immigration effort, yet is counter attacked by Space Battleship Yamato, now commanded by Susumo Kodai (38). Aboard, is daughter Miyuki … Child of Susumo and Yuki.”
The animated masterpiece “Space Battleship Yamato”, last scene in theaters 25 years ago, 73-year-old producer Yoshinobu Nishizaki, who worked on that film and the original anime series, declared that he wants his last work to be a new “Yamato” film. He said he hopes to surpass Hayao Miyazaki’s latest effort, “Gake no Ue no Ponyo.” To achieve that, Nishizaki has founded Yamato Studio, based in Nerima, Tokyo.
The more I see cool collectables like the Transformers – Autobot Logo USB Hub the more I want to ditch my current ugly civilian USB hub. The best part of the above hub is that it lights up when connected (in addition to making you smile and earning snarky remarks from your more mundane coworkers).
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 2, 2008 in Star Wars
I sense that the Force is very cute in this one! I’ve now had to view tons of photos from the Comic Con last week and I think this above shot by Bonnie Burton titled Pink Vader Princess wins my best in show award. The idea of putting together the stark contrast of Vader with a pink ballerina motif makes or an innovative fangurl fashion statement.
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 2, 2008 in Animation
The idea of Disney getting back to 2D animation makes me happy and I think the idea of some diversity in the princess department is long overdue, but this latest trailer for The Princess and The Frog seems a bit lacking. Well until I see more I’ll have to give them the benefit of the doubt…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Aug 1, 2008 in Animation
I just love the character designs in this mid-century modernist Pepsodent commercial — it’s amazing when you think of how much work that was put into a TV spot at the dawn of the medium. The animators also did a nice job with Susie’s walk cycle and those potential geeky boyfriends (one wearing a bow tie!) coming in from off screen just add to the energy which is pumped up by the cool Jazz drum beats.
Posted by Guest Author on Aug 1, 2008 in Animation
Before the classic anime version “Astro Boy” (“Tetsuwan Atomu”) in 1963, there were a couple of partially animated tries at bringing Tezuka’s manga creations to TV. Previously “Tetsuwan Atomu” had been adapted as a live action TV series with an animated prologue in 1959 (shown above). Then in 1963, Mushi Production teamed up with the Takeda Puppet Troupe to adapt his manga “Galaxy Boy Troop” (“Ginga Shonen Tai”) for 2 seasons of TV:
What caught my interest besides the puppet work was most of the effects are being cel animated. It’s well known that TV posed an enormous challange for animation production since the schedule and budgets were extremely tight. So one assumes that the puppets were cheaper and very likely faster than animation.
However in this circumstance, while cel animation was economic for special effects, I’m guessing that miniature effects weren’t. Then again all those miniature effects really ace it for Gerry Anderson’s science fiction puppet shows (“Thunderbirds”, etc.). Though perhaps the cel animation was something to give Tezuka’s Mushi Animation company a piece of the pie. The first episode actually aired after the all anime “Astro Boy”
premiered and for all intents eclipsed it.
Apparently most of the ninety-two 15 minute episodes have been lost or destroyed. Only some examples subtitled for French broadcast in 1964-5 have survived, hence the giant French subtitles from the 1960s. …Hmmm, the notion of a subtitled kids shows is something to think about.
Kinosuke Takeda (1921-1979) was the man behind the puppets. I’ve not run into much info about him though the Takeda name has been associated with mechanical dolls since the 17th Century and there is a museum theater displaying his work. Another Takeda still performs there, most probably his brother. He and his team made other science fiction puppet series in the 1960s that were not based on Tezuka’s characters. I’ve seen an episode of “Spaceship Silica” from 1961 and “Aerial City 008” from 1969 on NHK’s “Puppet Chronicles” series of DVDs. All have scores by Isao Tomita who’s best known for his “Kimba the White Lion” music as well as his excellent synthesizer arrangements of classical music from the 70s. Recently he scored a “Black Jack” anime feature based on Tezuka’s characters.
Nick Kent is a New York based artist who works with electronic media and is an occasional pop culture pundit.
