Geek Tragedy Blog Archives

	AUGUST '08
.
29 / AUG / 08 - 1023 CST : Please don't tell me where I can / cannot thrust my deviance... Hey folks. Late last night, just before I started working on today's GT², I swung on by this site I know that has a clever little webcomic on it that I've grown quite fond of called, Evil Inc (the art's quite good, but I preferred it when it was black and white). And on the front page right there in the blog section I noticed a link to an article talking about how The Coalition of Family Values is taking Marvel to task for introducing a dominatrix villainess into one of their "children's books". The name of the "children's book" in question you may ask? *The Uncanny freakin' X-men.* Yes, it seems that not only is there still one single person left on the planet who hasn't gotten the memo yet that comics aren't all for kids, but apparently there's actually enough of these morons out there to form an entire "coalition". In other news, water is wet, the earth ain't flat, and I immediately changed today's GT² from a strip about babies, to what you see now. Alrighty folks! I'd love to stay and chat more, but I've got a house that needs a bit of tidying up...or perhaps a thorough cleaning is more accurate...okay fine it could actually use a run-through with a backhoe and then a good hosing down, but sadly I don't have time for all that. Later, -Ed PS: Once you've read that article, given the point they were trying to make, please let me know if I'm the only one who got a chuckle from the Family Values folks decision to use of the word "*thrust" in their little sound bite. *** 26 / AUG / 08 - 1523 CST : Not back in black (and white)... Hey folks. I got back late yesterday from a five day vacation, and unfortunately didn't have time to do up a GT² for y'all to see come Monday. As well, now that I'm back I find that I have too much work to catch up on to be able to get any work done on one today either. So at this point it looks like the next strip you'll see will be the colour one I'll be doing for you guys tomorrow. Come Friday though I'll be back on the black and white strip track, so there will be another bit of single panel digital nonsense for you folks to check out then. Anyway, I've still got a fair amount of work ahead of me today before I'll be able to get any sleep and head on back to the "job" type job tonight, so I better get to it. Later, -Ed PS: Once I'm a bit more settled in I'll also be tackling some of the e-mails that I haven't had a chance to reply to just yet. So for those of you who are waiting (ever so patiently I might add), I apologize, and will try to get back to you in the next couple of days. ** 18 / AUG / 08 - 1324 CST : Going back to the (empty?) well... Hey folks. Some of you may recognize this particular joke set up from two other GT² strips I've done in the past. I'd like to say I spend many a month agonizing over what clever little quip I'll be crafting for the next installment in the "Yo' Mama joke for computer geeks" series, but sadly (as you could probably tell from this one) it's really done kinda at the last minute. Now typically this is my goto joke when I'm strapped for an idea, but that wasn't really the case this time. Truth be told, I had another strip already done for today, but since I'll be out of town this Friday I thought it would be a good idea to try and capture that near mythical creature that has thus far eluded me called "a buffer." And so I pushed the original srtip back and whipped up "Yo' mama" for today instead. So there you have it folks. A new strip for today, and Friday's strip is already in the can. Now just so long as I don't botch up the timing on Wednesday's and I'll be set for the week. Alrighty, that's all or now guys. See ya Wednesday. Later, -Ed ** 15 / AUG / 08 - 1346 CST : I only wish this was Marvel's next flick... One last quick thing before I head to bed. I just stumbled upon an amazingly well done Marvel Zombies fan film / trailer . Now if you're a fan of Marvel Zombies, or Marvel comics, or zombies, or just like you some good old fashion horror flick gore, you really need to check this out. Also, there's a good sized interview with the folks who made it that can be found over at Revenant: The Premier Zombie Magazine site. Okay, now I really am heading to bed. Later, -Ed 1333 CST : Two programs, one giant headache... Hey folks. So if you've been reading my twitter at all, by now you know that I'm finally getting around to making a full switch over from using a very, very, VERY old version of Corel's Photopaint (I think Fred Flintstone is credited as one of the programmers on the version I have) to the practically untouched CS2's version of Photoshop that I've had kicking around for about two years or so. Now my decision to make this switch actually has nothing to do at all with me being displeased with the quality of Photopaint as a program. Truth be told, despite a few bugs and the lack of a few bells and whistles that'd be kind useful to have available to me (both of which have more to do with the program's age than anything else), it's served me quite well over the past three years. In fact, instead of switching over I gave serious consideration to just buying the newest (or at least second newest) version of Photopaint instead. However, in the end it really came down to the fact that when it comes to learning new tricks and techniques for colouring, there are just way more tutorials for Photoshop users then there are for those of us in the Photopaint minority. And at this point in my career / skill set, I felt that if I was going to be able to reach the next level I needed to make the switch. And while I am beginning to get the hang of a whole new set of commands, menus, and shortcuts, the learning process has proven to be rather...uh...excruciating at times to say the least. Alrighty, I think that's enough techno-bitching for one day. Have yourselves a great weekend folks, and I'll see y'all on Monday. Later, -Ed ** 11 / AUG / 08 - 1013 CST : 'App'tly named... Hey folks. First off I'd just like to say that I am now officially back on the horse as far as creating new Geek Tragedy strips are concerned. However, I have decided to pull back to only doing three per week instead of four. I'll be sure to talk more about that later on in the week, but for now... My App'd attention... Despite that fact that I own neither an iPod Touch nor an iPhone, I find myself complete enthralled by the recent "I Am Rich" application debate that has sprung up all over the net during the past week. For those of you who haven't heard of it I'll you can check out a few bits of news about it HERE, HERE, and HERE, and see peoples various takes on the subject throughout both the articles as well as the accompanying comments section on these sites. However, if you're not in the clicky type of mood, allow me to give y'all my take on what all the hoopla is about. Apple recently opened up an application store for both iPod Touch and iPhone users where folks can buy a wide range of user created programs that run a wide gambit of usefulness and cost. Recently one such app called "I Am Rich" was pulled from the store for as of yet unspecified reasons. The basic function of the "I Am Rich" app was that of a glorified screensaver, which when you clicked on it would bring up a bit of digital art depicting a small glowing red gem set over a black background...and that's about it. On it's own that doesn't seem like something that could stir up much controversy, and I'm sure it wouldn't have, had it not been given a price tag of $999.99, and were there not at least one person out there who apparently managed to buy it "by accident", and then tried to rationalize his idiotic blunder by referring to the most expensive screensaver in the world as a "ridiculous scam". Now keep in mind that the creator of this glowing red bit of digital bling made absolutely no claim that his program was anything other than what he described it to be, an overpriced status symbol that was put in place just to give people who have lost all concept of the value of money something to buy and show off to others. In fact he very clearly spelled out the near total uselessness of it right in the program's description. As well, it wasn't like the the price tag for this item was tucked away where one would have any trouble finding it. It was places right beside the "Buy App" button, in bold black letters, just like every other application sold in the store. Still, given all that, Apple found it necessary to remove the item from the store. Which once again, on it's own shouldn't really be that big of a deal. After all, who in there right mind would have ever bought this thing anyway, right? Well here's the kicker. It seems that aside from the one person who allegedly bought "I Am Rich"** by accident, there were also seven other people who willingly purchased this item. Granted, given all the iTrinket owners out there, that number doesn't exactly give one the impression that "I Am Rich" was going to be a best-seller, but it does show that (for some truly mind boggling reason) there was in fact a niche market for it. At least enough of one to earn Armin just over $5000 (the estimated amount he'd get after Apple gets their cut) in less than a week. Now I'm not really going to go into any further detail about my own personal feeling towards this subject, as I think the tone of today's GT² and this blog post speaks for itself, but I will say this; After discussing the subject with a friend, and former art school classmate, we're both fairly certain that this is a subject that deserves at least some form of debated in future art history classes (if for no other reason than to simply kill the soul-crushing boredom that's inflicted by most art history classes). Later, -R. Mutt **** 06 / AUG / 08 - 1732 CST : Something old and something new... Hey folks. For those of you who might have missed it, just wanted to let you know that I won't be getting back on the strip producing horse till next week. However, to help keep you occupied until then I've gone ahead and posted roughly 150+ new pics up for y'all to take a peek at in the aptly named "Pictures" section of the site. So either head on over there to take a look, or just click HERE to see the pic of my trip to the 2008 Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo or you can click HERE to go directly to the images from my much more recent journey to the San Diego Comic Con. Also, over the next few days I'll be adding some captions and links to these pics that should give y'all a better feel for what my trips were like (and act as a lazy man's con report). Plus I plan on posting a couple of other picture sets from Keycon 2008 as well as my most recent excursion to Connecticon 2008 very soon. Alrighty guys, that's it for now. Time for me to get a bit more work before my body finally demands that I get my ass back to sleep. Later, -Ed ****