Marie Severin, who was one of the rare female artists at Marvel from the Silver Age onward, as well as an Eisner Hall of Fame member, has died at age 89. Over at 13th dimension they have a great tribute, with links to some of her past work.
Month: August 2018
A Survey of Some of the Best Science Fiction Ever Published (Thanks to Judy-Lynn Del Rey) | Tor.com
Reading a collection of short fiction from any given author is always a mixed bag. Same goes for an anthology of works by different authors centered around a certain theme or category. You might like some and some, well, they round out the collection.
But when you have a “Best of” collection, especially one curated by another well known writer or editor, well then, that’s a great way to start a good library. And that’s what Tor.com talks about in this article featuring A Survey of Some of the Best Science Fiction Ever Published (Thanks to Judy-Lynn Del Rey). While I’ve read some of these, and own several, a bunch more are going on my wish list.
Photos of Abandoned Russia – The Atlantic
“For years, photographers have traveled across Russia finding and photographing intriguing ghost towns, empty Soviet factories, toppling houses, and crumbling churches.”
For me, though, it’s really more about just finding cool, funky, unique places to spark the imagination and speculate on what kind of stories could be set there.
Card Sharp: flashback to when Comic Creators delivered some ace playing card art for Childline – downthetubes.net
“Back in 2001, 65 of the world’s leading comic book artists illustrated a deck of playing cards to raise money for the British charity Childline, as part of the 2001 Comics Festival in Bristol.”
I had no idea about this, but as it combines my love of comics and my love of playing cards, I felt it was something I needed to let others know about. The whole story, Card Sharp: flashback to when Comic Creators delivered some ace playing card art for Childline, along with images of all the cards, is here courtesy of downthetubes.net and it’s great. It’s been 17 years since this happened and needs to happen again.
A True Titan: Six of Marv Wolfman’s Best Tales | DC
“Fifty years ago, an up-and-coming creator named Marv Wolfman turned in his first script, and though no one knew it at the time, the DC Universe was about to be changed forever.”
I first met Marv Wolfman in 1983, when he was a relative newcomer, having only been in the biz for about 15 years, and I was a 16 year old punk.
Since then, we’ve been friendly, we’ve broken bread and hung out and shared a number of laughs.
And he is defintely one of the formative writing voices of my own work.
Evidently, I’m not the only one who feels that way.
“So there was this girl…”
Recently, I was asked by the Baltic Summer University to give a lecture about how I ended up in Lithuania. I titled the lecture Stranger in a Strange Land: How I went from All-American to part-time Lithuanian. That picture to the left is from the talk.
This was all well and good until it came time to actually start to put the lecture together and I realized I didn’t really know what I was going to talk about for 90 minutes. I mean come on, even if you had Neil Armstrong come in for a lecture, he probably didn’t talk more than 60, and he actually did something important (although, if you ask him, it weren’t no big thing). Continue reading ““So there was this girl…””
Baltic Summer University and the birth of documentarians…
So for the past couple of weeks, I’ve been teaching an intensive filmmaking class for the Baltic Summer University. The class itself had gone through various permutations, since this was the first time it was being offered (and so, it stands to reason, my first time teaching it). Originally, the plan was to have the students break into two groups, with half making a scripted film and the other half doing a documentary. With only 5 students, however, that wasn’t going to work. Add in that four of the five were really interested in documentary work and we changed plans on the fly, eventually deciding that each of them would make their own 5 minute documentary. Continue reading “Baltic Summer University and the birth of documentarians…”
How YouTube Became the World’s Best Film School | WIRED
Earlier this year, in a post called Two Side of Teaching, I talked about a student who wanted to know what I could teach her that she couldn’t learn from a video. I responded “not much” and then went on to explain my answer. Continue reading “How YouTube Became the World’s Best Film School | WIRED”
Incredible Video Flawlessly Edits Dozens Of Famous Characters Into One Coherent Scene – Airows
There’s something incredibly cool about the art of editing. It can transport you from one time and place to another in a fraction of a second. Kuleshov developed the idea of “creative geography” when it came to film editing and now, here’s an extreme example of how it can be put to an extremely effective use. While this might be a tad long, it nevertheless is worth watching.
Elfquest and Comics without Superheroes
When I was a kid, and I started getting into comic books, naturally, my first inspirations were the superheroes. AAron and I would pull whatever was on the rack at the local Safeway, stopping for an hour or more on our way home from Kenny Guinn Middle School to sit and read. Continue reading “Elfquest and Comics without Superheroes”
