Friday Night Random Stuff

REVIEWS

• I might have linked to this before, but this is a good review of Scott McCloud's book, Making Comics with a scan of the very interesting page on primary and secondary expressions.

LEGAL

• This video, titled The Disney Trap, features a discussion on how copyright prevents creators from telling new stories about old characters.

AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 BLOGS

• Everyone is linking to Chris Ware's "variant" covers for the current New Yorker issue. This comic book marketing gimmick feels a bit less gimmicky in this instance given that it's Chris Ware and the New Yorker, but c'mon… do we really want a world of variant covers of issues of People or Sports Illustrated?
• Boing BOing caught this photo from a 2003 exhibit – a setting of sculptures of superheroes in old age called The Hospice. Cool, weird and total dork-i-tude all in one. Click here for close up photos of the exhibit.
• From the blog Your Mom's Basement comes this Jack Chick-ish comic about Marvel's Eater-Of-Worlds, Galactus.
• Fast Film by Virgil Widrich, is a very interesting piece of animation that uses snippets of famous films to create a sort of moving collage. Cartoon Brew posted this 2003 project here and it's worth seeing (given it's likely conflict with current copyright law it's possible it won't be available forever).
• Finkbot demonstrates how to create an "Art Bot" out of a small motor, batteries, paper cup and markers. It does sound like a cool project for kids to do. Maybe it could also be the conceit for a webcomic 🙂 (If you need to make a motor here's a page on how to make a simple motor from a wire, battery and screw.)
• How to make a mini comic from one sheet of paper.
• A scan of Disney artist Carson Van Osten's Comic Strip Artist's Kit. This is a really good primer to practical problems and fixes for comic strips.
• Can you make an alphabet from scratch? How about in an hour? Here's Ape Lad's effort. (I had to do this as an assignment in college – my final is too big to scan in, but I did it around the oil spill at Huntington Beach, California.)