One of the things that I’m hoping to cut by at least 20 minutes is my commute. Currently it takes between 38 and 40 minutes (including parking). The part which took the most was actually from Saida to Beirut which took a little more than originally anticipated. In contrast once I was in Beirut the drive to Dora area took no more than 4 minutes or something silly like that.

Truth be told I can live with that kind of commute for a little while. I’m guaranteed a place to sit, don’t have to wait for the next train to come along. Don’t need to be squeezed getting on and off. No sweating like a bastard because it’s 35 degrees down there in the summer. Sure I get the odd asshole who cuts me off, or yells because he thinks the road is his own and can go anywhere he damn well pleases (without indicating), but it’s a small price to pay. The commute is about 10 minutes more than it used to be in London.

One of the things I’ve done is actually started downloading some audiobooks and lectures that I’ve been meaning to listen to for ages. As I wanted something relatively light, I’ve started with the first Harry Potter audiobook. After many many years of people TRYING really hard to get me to dip my toe in this universe, I’ve finally taken the plunge thanks to Stephen Fry’s amazing voice and reading abilities. To be honest with you, I wish he’d read all of my audiobooks. The man is amazing at it. I’ve heard about 3 chapters so far and it’s all very predictable so far and really can’t see what all the fuss is about.

Let’s finish the first book, since at least then I can claim to have given it some of my time before I write it off. Let’s just say the concept has never really appealed to me.

HTML5 for Web Designers - This is looking like a must read for this year. I’m planning on starting to get back into web designing for some small side projects and this would be a good book to get into.

The Daily Zoo 2 - Having just bought the first book, I can tell you that this is an amazing art book, with an amazing story behind it. Draw an animal every day for a year…well two years so far and counting.

Spider-Man The Other Review - I do have another website…I’ve not been giving it much love. Fortunately the excellent James Huff has taken it upon himself to start reviewing again, which is only a good thing. Hopefully I’ll get inspired to start review some stuff in the not too distant future as well. If you’re into graphic novels and the comic book form, Splash Panel has got only good recommendations. We’d don’t review books we didn’t like.

All animals are equal. But some animals are more equal than others.

It’s been YEARS since I read Animal Farm by George Orwell, so much so that I’d completely forgotten the story. I know it mirrored Communism but couldn’t really remember the details. If you’ve not read it in a while, seriously you’d do yourself a massive favour in rereading it when you’re older because it really does make for better reading with older eyes. Also this time around I’ve got the power of the internet in front of me so the following links can only add to the general enjoyment of the work; comparison chart of the characters and the wikipedia entry.

Lemonade - Documentary on some of the 70,000 people who lost their job in this, the latest great recession, within the advertising industry. What’s interesting to me is the fact that due to ‘Mad Men’, I’ve been able to peer into this little industry and the characters inside. The documentary itself looks relatively pedestrian and very, very American but at the same time there is something nice from people that have lost their jobs that move forward to something bigger and better. I know several friends (good and talented) that have had to do this.

Inglourious Basterds Comics - With the Tarantino dialogue I presume and the EXCELLENT RM Guerra (he of amazing Scalped series from Vertigo). Beware, this isn’t safe for work (I’m linking to Playboy)…yeah I can already hear the comments from Stathi and my brother.

In case you’ve not gone out and bought this, you owe it to yourself, really you do. Don’t believe me, here are a couple (one, two) of reviews.

Lone Wolf and Cub Reviewed - Epic series, epic series of posts reviewing every volume, with loads of images and explanations. Excellent work for those who have read and enjoyed the series like I have.

Blacksad Gallery - Without a doubt, one of my favourite series, and a huge inspiration for me in the art department. If there is one thing that ‘Aitus Moralis’ is trying to learn is just the general attention to detail that this series claims. The other is the mixture of inks and watercolours onto a page. Truly stunning work that deserves your attention. Book Three is coming out this November (not sure who is going to be publishing it in English though). Here is a review I wrote 2 years ago regarding the first book.

Bluebird - Yet another Twitter client. This however looks a little better than Twitterific, which has just stagnated, although not as good as my current twitter client of choice, Destroy Twitter.

MacHeist 09 - For those in the Mac community, you probably know about MacHeist. I bought last year’s bundle which I believe was a hell of a lot stronger offering than this year’s. Is it me, or is it not selling as quickly as the previous bundle did? I could be wrong, but it seems to be stuck under the $300,000 mark (for charities that is) for the last few days. From all the apps on offer, I only am interested in LittleSnapper and maybe iSale. Apart from that, the rest of the bundle doesn’t particularly interest me (Espresso would be nice, but I already own Coda).

Terminator Salvation / Trailer 2 - Oh now that is more like it. Is that NIN in the background?Maybe McG has created something worth watching, as long as I can get the whole Christian Bale outburst thing, I might even enjoy this.

Saulius review Pixelmator Sprinkle’s new feature - I’ve been using Pixelmator for nearly a year now and month in an month out the guys have been doing a bang up job of moving the software forward. What’s incredibly pleasing to see is just how far this little application has grown in a year between version 1.0 and the current version 1.4. A great deal of the gripes that I had have been rectified and here’s hoping that the few I have left will be addressed soon (grouping layers and better text control).

Battlestar Galactica promo - Deadlock - And since we’re talking about BSG, here’s the promo from next week’s episode. Can you imagine the conversation that Sol will have with you-know-who. Awkward. (Obviously don’t go if you’ve not see the final episodes)

This was a HUGE Battlestar Galactica Episode. This post is rife with SPOILERS, so if you’ve not seen the episode go somewhere else, nothing to read here.

No Exit answered many questions that have been lingering with most of us for years. As the EW review says, I definitely feel like i’ve deserved this particular episode dammit. I sat through years of BSG goodness, and dammit I wanted some resolution. However this episode didn’t give you everything. It answered (or tried to answer) a number of questions, however these are some of the questions outstanding.

Who Nuked Earth?

Eventually these guys (over the course of several 1000 years) forgot how to do this, because they didn’t need know. The lingering question remained however was who nuked Earth? Was it themselves? Unfortunately this little interview snippet doesn’t really shed much light on that question. For the sake of argument let’s just say that a war began between the Cylons and Humans from Kobol. The 5 Cylons were warned (through the ‘Head’ characters) and so they went off to stop the same from happening to the rest of the colonies and trying to actually live together in peace.

Update: Alan seems to think that the Cylon Humanoids of the 13th Colony actually created their own servant cyclons and they were the ones that rebelled.

The Plan

Daniel

I seem to always reread Sidekicks by J.Torres and Takeshi Miyazawa whenever I come back to Greece. It’s such a well put together book, which I find a crime that it’s not such a massive hit. The last page of the trade (which is the first edition of The Transfer Student) has a great way of ending, which I have always loved.

Have you ever had one of those days? One of those days that changed your whole week? One of those days that determined an outlook for an entire month. One of those days that you look back on after a year and think.

“Yeah. That’s when it all started.”

Today is not one of those days, but I really want one of those days to come soon.

In anticipation of the new Watchmen movie (hopefully coming to a cinema near you), there is actually a slew of great books on offer to enhance the whole experience. If you’ve not read the source material, SHAME ON YOU. Your homework is to buy the Absolute Edition of this masterpiece and get reading. If you’ve already done that, don’t forget to grab the Dave Gibbons artbook, Watching the Watchmen.

If you are more into movie related books (I personally do like a good one), there is the standard Film companion (which is probably the weakest offering actually) as you can have the Art of the Film which is bound to be more interesting, especially when you get work by such greats as Adam Hughes (who has always been one of my favourite artists of all time). But possibly my favourite tie in book of the entire movie might have to be the Portraits book, which is a collection of black and white photographs taken during the making of the movie.

Don’t forget to read these books while listening to the official soundtrack. Yeah this movie is going to make someone a TON of money, some definitely from me.

Slumdog Millionaire was released this week and it’s the latest effort form director Danny Boyle. I’d heard literally NOTHING about this movie but I knew from the way that it was being talked about that it might be a pretty good movie. I was wrong. It’s an EXCELLENT movie…see what I did there?

If you’ve not heard about it, starts off with the interrogation/torture of a young man who as we find out quickly is from the slums in Mumbai who manages to gets on the show ‘Who Wants to be a Milliionaire’. The story basically weaves the questions asked on the show with his life spanning across three time periods.

The situations and the character development is incredibly well paced and the story, much like the show keeps you on the edge of your seat. If I had a complaint it’s the fact that the ending that I came up in my head for the movie would have probably made it into more of a classic than it is destined to be.

That’s two in two movies I’ve watched this year, both of which have been absolutely supreme. So much so I can claim that this one is also in my top ten of the year (the other being Persopolis). Caramel is basically the Lebanese Amelie. Believe me I don’t say such things unless I actually mean them, but everything about this movie was a joy to watch.

The movie is set in Beirut, and considering the times that Lebanon is going through right now, it was extra special for me and heartbreaking at the same time to watch this movie as I got to see more elements of the country and the people celebrated rather than destroyed. What’s even more special to me about this movie is that it portrays the city as something vibrant rather than how it is traditionally shown broken, battered and bombed. It gives it a certain filter and lets it shine slightly. Sure there are times when I felt that it would have been nice to show the city at night, but that’s a minor point and the director Nadine really gives us a Beirut to wonder about.

The story centres around 5 women living and working in Lebanon and how their romantic lives evolve along with the expectations of the world they inhabit and their families and upbringings. The great thing about this movie is that none of the characters are perfect, in fact all of the women are far from perfect, they’re all real and that adds the most amazing layer to the whole story. They each have their own problems and obstacles to overcome which slowly unfold throughout the movie.

My only fear is that people in the Western world may not appreciate some of the situations and customs that inhabit the story. While they’re not crucial to the enjoyment and understanding of the story, it adds a whole other dimension to the story that they are portraying, in a certain way you have to be Lebanese to appreciate that this is actually true and it’s the reality. Specifically the police scene and the hotel scenes. Trust me when I say this, that’s all true, no dramatisation for the movie.

The director Nadine Labaki (who also wrote this) does a masterful job of injecting so much humour and warmth into this movie, which is where the direct comparison to Amelie comes from. It’s been a while since I was given a set of characters that were all likeable and beautiful in their own right. In my view this is probably one of the hardest things to do in a movie and Nadine hit all the correct notes on this front.

One thing I want to comment on is the beauty of the lead actress and fundamentally the sex appeal that she oozes and that is lacking in a lot of American shows that I watch. It struck me as odd that this woman who isn’t stick thin as is required by the 10pounds-added-by-the-camera world that we live in. Sex appeal cannot be brought or added on, it’s just there, in a Marilyn Monroe kind of way.

Finally I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the excellent soundtrack that was chosen and composed by Khaled Mouzanar (whom the director I believe is engaged to, good name btw son) which fits the movie feel to a glove and adds yet another exceptional layer to the movie.

I honestly don’t want to give much more about this movie other than it’s something that people who enjoyed Amelie would find the same kind of magic in this movie.

For the last Battlestar Galactica season, I’ll be reviewing each episode from this 3rd episode, ‘The ties that Bind’. So if you’ve not seen the episode yet, I suggest you stop reading and come back once you’ve done so. I guess you can consider this your SPOILER WARNING (that’s for the entire post in case you were wondering).

Plot Threads

So Kaylee was the centre of this particular episode and the fact that she found out that her husband, Colenl Tai and Tory are all Cylons and obviously her obvious murder once that toaster kills her after she’s taken the child from her.

It’s a shame that this character died in this fashion, but I guess finally we’re dealing with some proper ramifications in this season. It’s been a pretty slow burner as the first two episodes have been pretty mediocre as far as I’m concerned. Definitely did not provide the correct level of punch that you would expect from a final season. There’s no time for them to frak around with silly exposition. Each episode has to be complete dynamite, seeing as they only have 22 episodes (19 now) to wrap the entire story and tie up all the loose ends…after a fashion of course. I’m sure they’ll leave some questions for the audience to decide for themselves, but my hope is that the major elements are discussed and explained.

Meanwhile, Kera is commanding a ship through space trying to find Earth, while fucking off everyone around and acting like more of a bitch than she normally can be. obviously she’s changed and it’s going to be interesting to see what exactly happened in the 2 months that Kera was away and why she’s acting the way she’s acting, completely spaced out. Is she the last Cylon?

Then you’ve got the Lee Adama thread. obviously they’ve put him in this position seeing as his and kera’s love thing is all but over, and she’s got her mission and Anders has his, he can now do his thing and screw around with Rosaline’s administration and play politician. Out of all the characters on this show, I guess Lee has had the most change than any other character on the show. He’s had the most friends become enemies, enemies become friend type scenarios than anyone else and they’re poised to continue that fine tradition throughout this series as well. Do you get the feeling that he’s hoping to take over as President once Rosaline kicks the bucket?

As if that’s not enough plot threads, you’ve then got the crazy civil war that’s going on with the Cylons. So half want them to get the Diana’s up and running again and the other half want to neuter everyone apart from a specific number of models. I’m not sure where this is going to be honest.

CGI Cylons One thing that i definitely noticed and wish they go back and sort out for the rest of the seasons, is the new look of the kick ass Cylons. The whole chromed goodness is pretty awesome as far as I’m concerned. I used to think that this was one of the weakest aspects of the actual CGI work that BSG elevated but they’ve really brought their game up for this one.

Overall I liked this episode a lot more than the other 2 episodes, however they’re still not giving enough information as I’d like and not progressing certain elements of the story as much as you would hope them to, however looking at the trailer for the next episode, they do seem to be kicking things up to the next gear. Here’s hoping.

In a word, RUBBISH. The newest MacHeist is up and running and basically it’s a really poor showing this time around. See the last time was an AMAZING collection of applications that included Pixelmator and VectorDesigner. This time around you have some of the same applications and a few random new ones as well, but NO killer application.

Don’t get me wrong I REALLY rate Awaken, use it every day, I really like Coversutra, use that every day (tried using Cha-Ching but couldn’t really get to grips with it at all); crucially all three of these applications were in the previous MacHeist that was held not 3 months ago. What is the application in that bundle that would make you excited? Seriously? It’s not there. Unless they start adding some good stuff, there is no way that this Heist will be as good as the previous one and for good reason. Who exactly are they trying to get on board on this?

On a personal note, there is really no application out there that I want, apart from maybe a better FTP application (there are a couple of good ones knocking about but I’ve not decided which one i should go for) and a better torrent client (transmission is doing exactly what I want and the development is constant so hopefully there’ll get some basic UI issues sorted out and add being able to search and add torrents from within the application itself and I won’t need a new torrent client either).

So went to Jongleurs yesterday for part of Reid’s stag-do and I’ve got to say that apart from the compare (is that how you spell compare?) and the last act, the other three were mediocre to bad. The first comedian to come on stage, was mildly amusing but crude as you like, the second guy got confused and decided to do something singing but would mumble his lines when he spoke and didn’t come out very well, by the time the third guy came out we were hoping for someone funny, alas we got death on stage. I’ve never seen that before to be honest. The guy was dying on stage as NOTHING he was saying was striking a real cord with anyone. Also as it happened our table was the lairiest of the bunch (get 15 guys on a stag-do will do that) and having most of his material come off as completely ignorant (there is funny and then there is just plan wrong,…since when were people from Sudan, Asian?).

Thankfully the last guy did save the show slightly and had like 100 or so jokes that he kept rattling on and did a very good job of keeping everyone under control. Which basically made me think about standup comedy in general. The first of which is the fact that it is EXTREMELY difficult to do properly (I knew that was the case, but until I witnessed someone really die on stage I wasn’t clear as to the real extent).

The thing is I’ve been listening to the AWESOME Bugle podcast, which is one of the funniest things I’ve heard in a really long time. Different format admittedly, however the point still stands that new comedic talents do exist however sadly they were not at Jongleurs last night (and based on that I’ll probably steer clear of the place and look for my standup fix in other establishments).

Late last year I made the move to a mac and while there was a bit of getting used to certain things I’ve been really very happy with everything that it’s offered me in terms of getting on with computing in general. However the thing that I’ve missed the most is Firefox with all of it’s plugins and general speed and open source goodness. I tried Camino and i’ve got to say it’s good in some respects but trying to get any of the blasted plugins to work was a mission in and of itself. It just seemed to me like it wasn’t really there in terms of both backing and development as Firefox, which is just as well. So for the last couple of months I’ve been using Safari, and while I like a lot of stuff in Safari, I think there is room for improvement.

Enter Firefox 3 Beta 4 which was released earlier this week. DAMN that’s MUCH better.

I’ve installed GRApple Yummy theme, which is basically a correct integration of the theme into Leopard and I’m away. Firefox 3 is faster than Safari at loading up, it’s slowly starting to get all the various plugins updated as well and crucially it now also looks the part as well. I’ve not really played around with the browser much yet but one of the more welcome additions is the fact that now I can look for plugins and themes from within Firefox itself rather than going to the mozilla website and searching. It’s inspired me so much so that I installed ScribeFire straight away and I’m writing this from within there which I’ve never done before, just because I can.

So the guys over at Pixelmator have just released yet another update on their excellent little image editor. Now the thing that has impressed me more with this little editor isn’t soo much the actual editor, because the truth of the matter is I don’t think it has got what I need (which is surprisingly a small list) what’s impressed me most is their diligence in releasing new updates for the software each and every month on around the 20th or so. While some people on the forums expect them to be releasing things on a daily basis, I really like how they’ve decided to release once a month and see how much stuff they can cram into that month before releasing it to the world at large.

It just means that I’ve got something to look forward to from them and makes me happy to see that they are developing constantly to improve on the editor. What you can also notice from their updates log is the fact that as time has gone by, they’ve definitely been getting better at closing out issues as the lists have become larger and larger.

Does Pixelmator get my thumbs up as a Photoshop killer? Honestly not yet but as three minor requests that would make this editor my choice one, which I can’t imagine as being too difficult for the sole coder (I think it’s only one guy doing the coding right?) to deal with, however it might not be a major priority at the moment. Here’s the list:

1. Rulers and Guides - Listen if I'm going to be doing any digital work of any description I need these things. So I need to be able to add guides, move them about and snap to these guides. The ruler set to pixels as a minimum before you move onto something else is fine as an initial release if you're thinking doing everything else will take too much time. Maybe limit the functions to their most basis before expanding might be a good idea?

<li><p>Text Function - Yeah this is pretty poor. Now while I might be ok with the limited font functionality how I would really like to have a full text box that I can resize as a minimum rather than being able to just put some text in a straight line. I know it's a really minor thing, but in my eyes it's what separates a good image editor from a great one. If you can add this into the next iteration that would be AWESOME.</p></li>


<li><p>Folders for Layers - Not sure how difficult this is but again this is one of those things that makes organising my layers something manageable as opposed to a complete and utter free for all.</p></li></ol>

I’m not going into any more detail as I’m sure the other things will come in time, however if I can get the above items by March I will love you guys forever.

This past month and a half have allowed me for some reason to watch more movies than I watched nearly all of last year. I just finished watching ‘Stardust’ which is based on a story written by Neil Gaiman and illustrated by Charles Vess. I believe I’ve got the book somewhere in Greece but I never got around to reading it and alas I’ve not had the chance to buy the book again. For some reason last year I missed this movie when it was in the cinema last year. I wanted to watch it but didn’t make enough of an effort to go and see it. As it turns out I was probably missing out on one of the few great movies from last year.

The best way to describe this story is a modern day fairy tale but with soo much charm that it leaves you with this stupid smile on your face after finish watching the movie. The story begins in Wall, called this because of a great big wall that separates it from the city of Stormhold. Tristan trying to win the love of his life, Victoria promises to bring her a fallen star they both saw fall (on the other side of the wall) before her birthday, which is one week. I’m honestly not going to try and ruin anything but the star isn’t exactly what he originally bargained for and the story that unfolds is one of the most pleasant, fun and ultimately romantic movies I’ve seen in a long time. Stranger still was the choice of the actual director of the movie, which was none other than Matthew Vaughn, of Layer Cake fame. Not exactly the kind of movies I’d expect from the man but he’s definitely creating a body of work that makes him one of my favourite directors in recent times. There’s a quality to this movie that harkens back to an era in the 80s where they used to make fun fantasy and sci-fi movies. Movies that had heart.

And before anyone mentions that I’m writing this review on Valentines day, seriously this has NOTHING to do with the retched day that is coming upon us (happy love day everyone, only the few Simpsons fans got that reference), it’s just an unlucky coincidence that I’ve just finished watching the movie. If you’re looking for a great movie that will leave a smile on your face after you’ve finished it, then this is one for you.

So went and saw I am Legend with Willy Smith on sunday, without really thinking about it too much. First movie of 2008 I go to, so it’s good that i did come out with a smile on my face. Sure it was no 28 Days Later (not seen the sequel so I can’t comment on that one) because that movie was a lot more closer to home for me, since it was based in my current home town of London and I am Legend is based in NYC.

My favourite parts in both movies are what the survivors of these plagues actually do in their free time and the scenes around the completely deserted cities. From that aspect this movie really does capture this element in a great way. In a surprising way, Smith actually does a good job in his role as the military scientist who’s lived through the plague that hit mankind. He does seriously come off as a very likable character and the co-star Sam is also a great positive to the feel of the movie.

Ok, spoiler alerts from now on, so move along if you’ve not seen the movie yet.

So what fell for me? The main area for me which didn’t really resonate that much was the fact that Will Smith was a military scientist who is actively trying to find a cure. He doesn’t come across as that sort of character. Scientists don’t look or act like him (well at least not the scientists i’ve met in my life). They put far too much Hollywood gloss over it by making sure I saw him work out without a shirt on. From that respect it was just pandering to the female population which I just kinda rolled my eyes at and asked for the movie to move along with the story. I’m glad he didn’t fight for another shower scene again (like he did in I robot,..hmm must be a bit of a theme going on there with the ‘I’).

I wasn’t all that impressed with some of the effects for the zombies or nightwalkers or whatever they decided to call them. Something about their design just fell extremely flat for me. However having said all that many of the concepts surrounding the story were pretty fun to see pan out. Like why the movie is called I am Legend was a good one and the fact that they were created after a cure to cancer.

There are several plot holes in the movie, however overall it was a fun movie to watch. Nothing you can’t watch on a dvd or something, since I don’t think it’s terribly necessary to have the full cinema experience past the first 20-30 minutes.

It’s been nearly 4 years since the last Radiohead album ‘Hail for the Thief’. While I enjoyed that album as I’ve generally enjoyed most of what they’ve produced, The Bends and Ok Computer being the zenith of their output as far as I’m concerned, their new album ‘In Rainbows’ is a completely different beast altogether.

The major difference here is the way in which they’ve decided to distribute their album. See they’ve decided not to go the traditional route and release the album via a label. Instead what they’ve decided to do is let you download it off their website. Nothing new there, right? Ah but here’s the catch. YOU decide how much you actually want to pay for it. You can either pay something, or download it for free.

This turns everything on it’s head as far as I’m concerned. I’ve always claimed that the price of music is completely and utterly extorionate. A tiny teeny fraction of the cost of what you pay actually goes to the creators themselves, instead the majority goes to everyone else around. £12 for an album is just too much. So download it you say and just keep the music? You obviously don’t know me very well. When it comes to music from my favourite bands I will buy the CD. It’s just the way it goes. For me it’s not just the music, it’s the package. It’s the entire experience. I’m also a collector of sorts. I like to have physical copies of material by certain bands. I own a proper CD player and Amp that I paid through my nose to get a better sound. If you think that you can’t tell the difference, then you’ve obviously not heard a proper system in action.

Sure, this might be something of a dinosaur mentality however it’s one of those thought processes that I honestly cannot get away from. The thing is Radiohead are known for the amount of effort and creativity that they put into their package as well. They obviously feel the same way about this sort of thing, otherwise we wouldn’t have the school library book for Amnesiac or the Map for Hail to the Thief. Case in point, in addition to the actual download option, there’s also the option to pre-order the physical edition of this album, which comes with 2 CDs with artwork, photographs, lyrics and 2 Vinyls of the material as well. All encased in a hardcover book and slipcase.

I’ve only just found out about all this, since I only found out yesterday that they’ve got a new album out. So I quickly downloaded the album (more on that in a little while). Is it any good? The short answer is that ‘In Rainbows’ is BRILLIANT. It’s one of the best things I’ve heard this year, and this is a year where the Smashing Pumpkins released their return to form album. It’s a mixture of ‘The Bends’, ‘Ok Computer’ and maybe even a little bit of ‘Pablo Honey’. It’s not this heavy rock album. It’s a glass of fine wine, where the drums and guitars are back. Yorke’s voice is crisp and clear over the music in this perfect mixture that only they can achieve. God it’s great to hear well produced music again.

So back to the download versus physical object question, what am I going to do? Well I’ve already downloaded the album for free, and have ordered the physical edition of the album as well.

Tales from Earthsea by Goro Miyazaki (the son of Hayao). File this under “I hadn’t heard anything about this until yesterday” sections. This movie seems to have all the right ingredients. It’s an adaptation of the great Earthsea story (which I’m a huge fan of). It’s being done by Studio Ghibli, who are to me like Pixar, they can do no wrong. Finally it’s directed by a Miyazaki, so it’s bound to be great right? I was like, oh cool, it’s his son doing a movie. That’s bound to be interesting.

Then I started thinking, hang on, I’ve never heard he had a son that was into animation. Seems like there has been a series of in house fighting over the fact that Goro was given this movie to direct. Surprisingly the main instigator to all of this was his own father. Reading around further (article from the latest Little White Lies) shows that the father/son relationship has completely broken down and is practically non-existent really. Honestly, this has kinda taken away from the movie from me. It’s not a particularly happy story but alas a new Ghibli movie is always cause for celebration.

The movie is out in cinemas in the UK as of the 3rd of August. Loads of good links over at the wikipedia page. You can read Goro’s translated production blog over at Nausicaa.net

Just got back from watching the Transformers with Yanni. To be honest, I really don’t think I could have watched this movie and enjoyed it as much as I did with anyone but Yanni. See we both grew up watching and playing with the Transformers. We’ve had countless arguments about them , with them and because of them.

So what did I think of the movie? First off, this isn’t a movie for everyone. Not everyone is going to appreciate the whole idea of transforming robots. If you’re a guy in your mid to late 20s this movie was made for you and me. Classic lines like:

You've failed me once again Starscream.

Echo straight out of the cartoons we would watch on a Saturday morning. The story was adequate in that it chugged along and there was something there in-between the awe-inspiring action scenes. I don’t usually get like this, but this movie was all about the robots, transforming and kicking the shit out of each other.

Forget the bullshit attempts at humour, I swear that asshole who tried to write the American Pie riff needs to be taken outside and given a good kicking. It had absolutely no place in this movie. I’m sure it was some toss-jockey producer saying that they need more humour in the movie. Some of the humour was done well, like with Bubblebee and his great music choices at the beginning of the movie.

Can someone explain the relevance of the Australian chick and the fat man? Comic relief and what exactly? Easily the most REDUNDANT characters I’ve ever seen in any movie. Also I’ve got to say that John Turturro’s role was a tad bit annoying. I love John (Big Lebowski being his crowning achievement as far as I’m concerned) but what the hell was this role all about?

Anywho, enough about the peripheral characters, lets concentrate on the stars of this movie, namely the Autobots. It’s great how they explained the whole morphing into cars and whatnot, that was very nicely done. What I didn’t really care for was the whole product placement within the actual fekking movie. Was it really necessary to have the whole Ebay thing? Or every car being a GMC? Or what about Nokia being Japanese as well? Or the Pepto Bismol? I mean seriously great chunks of this movie was nothing more than one big advert.

However all of that disappeared, the second you saw Bubblebee transform into the newly supped up version of himself. Or Optimus Prime transforming for the first time. Starscream and Megatron transforming in mid air, combined with the sound effects and the music is enough to make you forget about all the short comings of the movie, because basically they COMPLETELY kicked it out of the whole theatre. I’ve never seen anything like that. It was meant to be larger than life and the effects delivered every step of the way.

Bring on the sequel.

You know when you’re in the dark about something and then someone wakes you up and you get that realisation that things could have been better, you just didn’t know any better, because nobody bothered to tell you about it?

What am I talking about? I’m making less sense than normal? I’ll tell you what I’m blathering about. I’m talking about how fonts are displayed on the four major web browsers, Internet Explorer 7, Firefox 2, Safari 3 and Opera 9.

If you’ve visited the ‘kode in the last week, you’ll have seen some more changes in my every evolving design process. Currently I’ve given up altogether with putting a design mockups and opting for the completely different approach of throwing shit at the wall and seeing what sticks. Subsequently I’ve decided to do things in glorious black and white and start thinking about colours and design elements once I’ve got the basic structure and functionality working as I actually want it. However what I have done is use fonts as big bold elements in the design, going above 16px font-size to bring things to the forefront.

Fortunately for me (as this is what actually opened my eyes) was that this effectively brings out the font rendering inadequacies in my favourite (and de facto) browser, Firefox.

Firefox

Opera

Internet Explorer

Safari

The fonts are all smoothed (the only part that I felt was a bit off, but that’s only because I’ve been staring at this for a while trying to find faults) is the bottom of rounded characters which become slightly more blurred. I haven’t checked to see what other things this browser has to offer because I’m still a bit gobsmacked by the way it rendered a simple page. I understand that Safari is based on the same framework as Konquerer, is that correct?

Final Thoughts

Okay, just to confirm to everyone that I neither care nor have I ever watched any of these stupid reality TV shows that try to make singing stars. I think they’re generally a complete waste of time, and apart from the odd clip of the truly terrible ones during auditions I have to say that I don’t care for this.

However, (yeah you knew this was coming), this little clip was something different. I’m not going to ruin it because to be honest you have to go in there without ANY expectations. Don’t read the comments, just click on the play button and watch.

Don’t ask me why but I actually felt teary during that. I swear, I have NO idea why and I’m kinda annoyed by it. Real men don’t get teary. Real men don’t cry :). I think it’s partly because I didn’t expect it to be honest but it’s a pretty cool little clip and maybe someone to look out for in the not too distant future, maybe?

The new London 2012 branding was unveiled today and seriously, it’s very funny how the organisers have got this soo spectacularly wrong. I don’t even know what the fuck this piece of shit is actually meant to be (also check out the absolutely heinous website) .

Update: Seems they’ve launched the site 4 days early since they saw what an absolute pile of shit their ‘placeholder’ actually was. I mean my placeholder is not better but at least you can read the text and it doesn’t hurt your eyes from the sheer stupid colour choices.

I’m to understand that it says 2012 but I mean seriously, what the hell were they thinking.

What I find really ironic is how the British design press (Creative Review, I’m looking at you) kept harping on how the Athens Olympics logo just wasn’t all that great. Personally and I’ll admit that my opinion on the subject may be slightly biased but I thought the Athens Olympic logo was miles better, miles and miles better.

Now see that is bloody interesting. A month ago I kinda asked about whether or not people actually look at design or not. Since that time I kinda have this inprogress site design going on and have noticed my readership and hits to the site seriously fall by half.

So for all those thinking to themselves and wondering whether or not design is still important to traffic, hell damn yes it is important. You’re all fickle, you know that don’t you :). Which also means I’ve got to pull my finger outta my a$$ and just finish off the design, which I more or less completed as a mockup last week. So expect something soon.

Ok if in case you didn’t read the title of this post, it has the word spoiler in it for a reason, not interested in finding out what has happened on the end of the third season then pretty please with a cherry on top go somewhere else and you don’t ever need to blame me for ruining anything for you. Good everyone else here?

Watched it yesterday and I’ve got to say I was pretty damn excited about this episode. I got back home at a normal time and went straight to downloading the episode. All the while I was waiting for the other shoe to drop. The big massive revelation; who is the Cylon, who is the Cylon. I don’t get one I get 4 of them, definitely didn’t see that one coming, especially Saul as one that’s come out of NOWHERE. I’m sure they’ve thought this one through, but seriously how the hell does that actually work? He’s like over 50 years old and that’s how old the Cylons are right? At least that’s what we were originally led to believe.

So I did a bit of researching. Ron Moore’s podcast isn’t up on the scifi channel yet however if you look around you’ll be able to find a couple of interviews scattered around the place where he talks about things.

The biggest twist of couse was definitely Starbuck’s appearance at the end of the show. I honestly didn’t expect that. I’ve got to say that while listening to Ron’s commentary regarding the reasons to kill off Starbuck never rang true with me. It seemed as though it was all about the AUDACITY of it all, which felt a little bit on the weak side. It’s nice to see how they’ve pulled one of the best cons in recent television history. ‘Kill off a character’, have actress in on it as well so all her interviews point that she’s going to be moving on, don’t insert her name in the credits of the actual episode and then have her come back right at the end. Of course there are a lot of unanswered questions but it’s definitely one of the better endings on the show which always has pretty spectacular cliffhanger season endings.

Also I really loved ‘All along the Watchtower’ cover by Bear McCreary and his brother, definitely will be getting that once it’s available from somewhere.

Frank Miller’s 300 had my money several times over from the moment I heard it was going to be made. Then came the trailer and I nearly came in my pants several times over (I know not a pretty vision but at least I’m being truthful). Then I shared the trailer with Stathi and Christos and while I thought I was excited, these guys were even more excited about this movie than I was. Honestly between the three of us we’ve probably seen the trailer like 3000 times.

I can’t count the number of times we’ve quoted the lines:

"Blasphemy? Madness? THIS IS SPAAARTAAA!"

So to say that we were completely hyped for the movie is a slight understatement. So how do we celebrate this momentous occasion of the release of 300? We book the top section of Everyman cinema in Hampstead (much more about this glorious cinema theatre in a moment) and pack it with 40 something Greeks. To say there was a bit of atmosphere in the theatre, is once again a slight understatement. Half of us screamed the above line when Leonidas said it.

The Venue

It’s strange but one of the things that annoys me about cinemas is that the experience seems to have been diluted. I’m talking in a general sense here. It’s no longer something special, it’s no longer something that is truly an experience in every sense of the world. Thank god someone remembered this and made the Everyman Cinema in Hampstead, North London. Basically it’s very small little venue however there are different levels of seating throughout all of which are larger than usual, with little tables to the side of them. The side seats are leather with foot rests and all of them have champagne bottle holders. The ambience in there is amazing. Seriously I kept looking at just how beautiful the place was and how great all the colours worked together seamlessly. The screen isn’t the largest, the sound isn’t this amazing THX (at least I don’t think it is) but it’s definitely one of the best cinema’s I’ve ever been to. This enhanced this movies completely for me even further than if I watched it in your run of the mill movie theatre.

The movie itself

"A new age has begun. An age of freedom, and all will know that 300 Spartans gave their last breathe to defend it."

The story is a timeless one, depicting one of the greatest if not most important battles in history, completely stylised of course with loads of magicians and huge monsters people and weird freaks, however believe it or not it’s not the story that counts here but how it is delivered. You see this story has been told several times before, however never like this. Some of the fight scenes in here are some of the most brutal you’ve ever seen in a swords and sandals epic. Forget all the rubbish that is Troy and Alexander and open your eyes to 2 minutes of pure Spartan maddness cutting through one guy after the other. Then chilling out and eating an apple over the dead. It’s meant to be over the top. It’s meant to be completely manly in nature. The dialogue just drips of testosterone and I think that’s one of it’s greatest qualities. You don’t get enough movies where the guys are completely hard as nails.

A distinct success of the movie was use of colour filters throughout the movie. From the soft yellows used for Sparta to the blues used for scenes with the Immortals. The darker browns used for the fight scenes made the red capes sand out even more. Make no mistake this movie isn’t for everyone (although I wish it was). For a start it’s an 18, which means this movie is violent, has got scenes of a sexual nature (read: soft porn) but there isn’t any real swearing as Miller didn’t really have any of that in his book.

My gripes

The Casting

The Details

From a comic book point of view it was completely faithful to the style. The additional areas were actually very very well done. The scenes with the Queen showed just how hard she was. It was an welcome addition to the story while I am a purist in these things I think if it’s scenes that don’t take away from the actual original source material then I have no problems with it at all.

Final Word

Anna kept telling me to watch this series again and again. I do actually remember the TV spots for this series, which preceded the actual series being broadcast over here in the UK. I remember really thinking the idea was very intriguing however as you can imagine I completely missed it, since I’m honestly not very good at keeping to a schedule brought about by the TV box. It’s funny but I’ve watched more TV in the past couple of months than in the last few years, mainly because I can download and watch whenever I actually choose to watch them.

Anyway back to Prison Break; without a doubt one of the smartest and most gripping TV series ever made. I know bold statements but this is a very very different kettle of fish to all other great TV series of the past year or so (we’re talking Battlestar Galactica, Lost, Heroes, My Name is Earl etc). What makes this series so damn special? I guess part of the success in my eyes is it’s incredibly tight plotting.

The story centre around Michael Scofield (fantastic name, best one after McGyver) who orchestrates him being admitted into prison so that he can save his brother who’s on death row. Already the story resonates with me because it’s taken the prison story and flipped it in a direction I’m not used to. We’ve seen several ‘prison break’ type movies in the past (led of course by the exceptional Shawshank Redemption) but not exactly like this.

See Michael’s had a while to prepare for this. He’s put contingency after contingency after contingency. The really amazing thing is of course that absolutely EVERYTHING he’s planned gets a spanner in it at the end of every episode. The cliffhanger endings are pretty amazing and the tension is exceptionally well produced. There are several exceptional twists within the story and I think I counted one scheme where the acting was terrible (but that was from a supporting actor rather than the main cast).

Which leads me to the actors themselves. All the cast is exceptionally well chosen for their roles which is weird as I’ve not really seen (or can remember) seeing them in anything prior to this.

I love that the warden is actually a good guy. I think there was only a single moment in the entire first season where I thought he was a building up to being a bastard and I guess that’s another definite asset of this series, not following with specific stereotypes that I’ve become used to. Obviously the fact that the guy’s an engineer resonates with me a little bit (ok a lot) and it’s great to see how he gets himself out of one bad situation after another.

Ultimately however this series is about what one brother will do for the other one. The answer is a lot and those who have brothers understand this pretty well. Growing up you might want to kill each other or were constantly bickering about stuff, but ultimately after everything you knew that you couldn’t stay mad with each other for more than like 10 minutes. What impresses me the most about the story is when you finally are told the WHY. Why would Michael risk EVERYTHING he had, put himself through hell, enter prison to save his brother. Apart from the fact that it’s his brother, what would possess him to take matters in his own hands like this. The answer is basically the core reality of what brotherhood is all about. I don’t want to spoil it for anyone because I really loved the explanation and I think you’ll feel the same way.

Continuing in my series of the best of 2006, just finished my post on the best graphic novels of 2006 over at Splash Panel.

I started writing a best of 2006 about a week ago, however I’ve had to break that down into several posts because it got far too large and I didn’t feel that I would be doing each topic justice, if I bulked all of them into one post. So for the first topic of conversation I’ll talk about the best of the Net for 2006. This is mainly about design on the net, internet applications, websites that caught my attention on the net for one reason or another. So without further adieu here’s the Squeaky Kode Trophies for the year of 2006.

Addictive Site of the Year

Best Advert of 2006

Best Designed Site of the Year

Best Internet Application

It’s taken me a long while but I finally bit the Flickr bug as well and got myself an pro account as well. I’ve got to say that I don’t use it as much as I should do but that will be changing in the not to distant future.

For my feed reading I’ve jumped on the Newsgator bandwagon. I’ve got a lot to write about with respect to FOFRedux and will hopefully go to using that application in the not too distant future sometime next year, but in the meanwhile I’ve found the Newsgator service to be exactly what I was looking for.

So I guess it’s not so much that I had a specific internet application, but rather the fact that I actually decided to use several of the plethora of applications out there for use in the first place.

Best Internet Related Software

Best Firefox Plugin

Blogging Networks Politics

If you think I’ve missed something pretty fundamental just drop a comment and I’ll be sure to add it into the list or create a whole new category for it.

The Prestige, the new Christopher Nolan movie is like getting Christmas early. I mean how could the following ingredients possibly disappoint. You get Christian Bale, Hugh Jackman, Scarlett Johansson, Michael Caine, David Bowie all in one movie, set in turn of the century London, revolving around magicians and the ultimate magic trick.

Seeing as how becoming a magician was one of my first dreams of what I wanted to become when I was older, you can imagine how giddy I felt watching this movie. It wasn’t slightly good, it was bloody good. Watching the movie there was this sense of urgency, tricks and double tricks, twists and turns. You always were thinking how is that trick done, how do they do it, what’s the deal with it all.

Bale is awesome as he’s definitely beginning to take over as one of the premier actors you go for when you need a solid performance. Michael Caine is doing a spectacular job as always. In fact with regards to the acting (and casting for that matter), everything was completely spot on.

One of the first things you find out about the movie is why it’s called the Prestige. I’m not going to ruin it (unless you’re really into magicians, then you probably already know, I didn’t), as I wouldn’t be able to it the same justice as Michael Caine does in the first few minutes of the movie. The story centres around two rival magicians who go through life trying to achieve greatness. As you can imagine with a movie coming from the Nolan brothers we’re going to be dealing with a non-linear timeline with many twists and turns (I mean come on, what else would you expect from those that gave you Memento, one of the all-time classics of modern cinema.

Nolan has definitely routed himself as one of my favourite directors as he’s currently three for three in my book. He’s definitely taken over from David Fincher who has disappeared into the ether of late (wasn’t Panic Room the last Fincher movie?).

Abracadabra.

I’ve reviewed Frank Miller’s 300 over at Splash Panel. It’s most definitely one of the few graphic novels that every red blooded male should have on their shelves.

I’ve been trying to find ways to increase my productivity and effectively take my life back by the horns, which for the past couple of months has spiralled out of control.

Gmail is a staple in my life. I use it and don’t think about it. I’ve not gotten to the stage where I really use the folders as I can, however that might be about to change. So I’ve been looking into other online solutions that might be able to reach that status. Traditionally I’ve tried my very best to shy away from online services except those that are backed by one of the major players, mainly because they’re not going to be charging me cash to provide a task that while isn’t necessary to have online is nice to have. You could say it’s a bit of an antithesis to Web 2.0, and in a way it actually is. You’d also expect someone like me to jump for this sort of thing, however I don’t move into this arena without a little bit of caution, simply because I don’t like to be dependant on others that can pull the plug on me at any time or worse, decide to change the terms and conditions.

NewsGator

Ma.gnolia

Google Calander

I think I’m becoming a life hacker, hopefully the next couple of weeks will see a bit of this hectic lifestyle that I’ve been living cool down a little bit and I can actually get back to finishing off some of these projects that have been on my plate for months, some even a year.

Finally my wishes for a mobile that actually provides me with what I want have been answer with the latest Sony Ericsson M600i.

I honestly don’t care that it doesn’t have a camera, as I find that feature a bit superfluous for my liking in a mobile phone anyway. It’s also fantastic news that mobile phone manufacturers are starting to utilise touch screens a little bit more, thus reducing the overall number of buttons on the phones, simplifying the design completely. Even better than a Crackberry.

In my mind this is exactly what I was trying to get last year. A phone that lets me:

1. surf the internet
2. check my emails
3. all within a nice, small tidy little package, not the size of a PDA.

On a similar but unrelated note, by the very nature of contracts in the UK, I end up getting new handsets every year; while this is a great thing, it’s also a terrible waste, as I’m massing a collection of handsets. All of them work, but they’re different generations. Randing from a battered Ericsson (when Sony hadn’t merged) to an oldie Nokia, the LG chocolate phone and my Sony Ericsson K750i. Definitely make a nice collection of how quickly technology for mobile devices has ramped up in a small space of time, but what the hell am I supposed to do with all these handsets? It’s not like they’re vintage yet so I can sell them on ebay as a collector’s item, and it seems like an awful waste chucking them in the bin. I mean where do ipod mini’s go when they retire? I ask because I’m eying up either a Zune or one of the new ipods.

Grid Systems by Kimberly Elam (published by PA Press) is required reading for ANYONE even thinking about jumping into graphic design of any description. I blasted through this book in a week and it’s definitely one of those books you refer back to again and again as it’s a reference book as well as a book which generally teaches you the basics.

Just finished reading this book, which is definitely on my list of best books of 2006 already (I know we’re only just half way through the year) but this book does stand out very tall.

Blink is written by Malcolm Gladwell who has crafted the only book on psychology and how the human brain works that I’ve ever, not only been interested in reading, but actually got past the first paragraph.

Blink is all about rapid cognition and the way our brain works in such a way so as to actually aid us in making dicisions throughout our lives. It’s about those GUT feelings you get and all about the hows and the whys that you get them. It’s about how you can trust them and why you shouldn’t ALWAYS trust them. How your mind is sometimes misled and then the explanation about why it was mislead.

It’s truly a fascinating look at the world around you and more importantly the people and how you interact with these people. Once you’ve read this book you will start looking at people around you in a different way. You’ll begin to ‘read’ their reactions slightly differently. Body language and subtle twitches of their face will begin to shape a whole new meaning for you.

One of the great things about this book however is the style in which it is written. It’s got an almost informal feel to it all. Like Malcom was just sitting next to you and having a conversation with you about something he’s been researching for a while now. This would make an absolutely brilliant documentary and in many ways the book reads like one, in that it does reproduce a number of conversations with various characters and their experiences throughout the book. I guess that is ultimately what makes this book so readable is the fact that it doesn’t go on and on and bore you about the theory. He gives you a small description of the theory only AFTER he’s hooked you with the bait. He explains the situation and stops it off at a place which keeps you hungry; wanting; needing to know the final reasons. I’m a COMPLETE sucker for that method at first. If the final explanation leaves me wanting however my attention span turns away. Malcolm manages to really deliver with a good ending in just about every single one of his examples.

It very funny, but I’d never heard of Blink before I picked it up and bought it. I’d never heard of Malcolm Gladwell before Blink. I was casually walking around Fopp one Sunday (must have been a few months ago now), and the cover really grabbed me. Something about the name just clicked in my head. I read the cover very slightly, but it was only until I got into reading that I realised just how important it was to really start believing in your unconscious mind. The bloody thing works on OVERTIME and we haven’t even noticed. Or more accurately don’t tend to notice as often as we really should.

Go buy Blink, your life will be different once you’ve read it. Guaranteed.

Arguably the most arty thing I’ve done in London in a good long while, yesterday I went to watch Kabuki dancing in Sadler’s Well in Angel. This was the last show in the tour by Ebizo Ichikawa XI. On what was probably the single most humid day of the entire year in London I was in a closed theatre with another few thousand or so people, without air conditioning, sitting next to the biggest lady in the entire audience (on one side at least, Sophia is quiet petite so there wasn’t a problem on the other side).

The word Kabuki means a lot to me as it’s the title of one of my favourite graphic novels (I’ve written the first review for this series on Splash Panel). The graphic novel effectively showed me what could be done with the graphic novel format and I’m still aspiring to craft something that I can be proud of in that genre of storytelling. So when I saw the advert for this particular show I had to see it.

I will say that Kabuki isn’t for the action/adventure types. This is a form of theatre that hasn’t much changed in over 400 years, so what it is trying to convey and the methods by which it conveys them might not really mean much for the culture of today. This is most definitely an acquired taste. It’s not like a form of music. It’s an appreciation of Japanese culture and the time in which this type of theatre came to prominence.

I for one really enjoyed it. I was taken aback by how perfect the male actors were pulling of the female roles so gracefully; fair enough they’ve been training since they were 4 years old but still it was an amazing transformation to see Ichikawa go from a woman in the play ‘The Wisteria Maiden’ to the evil samurai in ‘Kasane’. The kimono’s and the sets and the music were superb as well (but then again I loved that before I even was saw the show). The musicians seriously impressed with me with their absolute stillness when they were not involved in that particular part of the musical section.

I also learnt of a number of things about the Kabuki theatre experience that I was completely unaware of. Like the fact that members of the audience actually shout the names of the house of the actors or their number in the lineage. The fact that the story is mainly told in their actions themselves, rather than in words. Sometimes the music and the lyrics are used to tell the story leaving the actor to concentrate on the motions to tell the story. Like I said it’s an aquired taste but one that I recommend for those who like Feudal Japanese Culture and viewing storytelling in different mediums.

Been meaning to write a proper review about this book for a good long while. Due to many commitments it’s not been possible to really get into the book until now. “Blog Design Solutions” is a book that was released earlier this year (from Friends Of Ed) and was written by 8 guys from around the world; you might recognise a couple of the wee rascles, Chris J Davis, Michael Heilemann, John Oxton, Andy Budd and several others (I appologise I’m not terribly familiar with their work/sites but I’m definitely going to check them out from now on). The common link between these gents is that they’re all bloggers. The difference is that they use different software to run their sites.

There are numerous sites around the place that highlight the differences between the major blogging software packages available to run your blog sites on. What this book does is give a taster, a morsel, a sampler of the major ones. The book is seperated into 7 Chapters. The first two chapters cover general information about blogging and the world of blogging. While the second chapter tackles how to set things up to test and run a blog on you machine locally. It’s a nice reference guide to have to be honest. I personnally use XAMMP, but it would be good at some point when I’ve got a bit more time to set things up in a less lazy manner :).

The next 5 chapters are where things get interesting. Each chapter addresses the ins and outs of a particular blogging engine. Movable Type, WordPress, Expression Engine, TextPattern are all covered. The final chapter is very interesting because it tackles the subject of building your own blogging engine from scratch and how you go about it.

Movable Type is covered (including the history that Mena probably tends to like to forget, ie when MT3.0 was released and there was this massive jump away from the MT solution to the WordPress solution). I was intrigued to read this chapter because honestly I think to myself what the hell is the point of using MT? It seems to me like it’s lagging behind most of the other internet blogging solutions? The answer to two fold I guess. Part of it is the fact that it’s pretty old (in internet terms) and has a loyal base of users; in addition to that it’s also the fact that there is a core base of developers that are accountable to you if in case you want something done, or sorted out. Some users want that level of support, especially if we’re talking about commercial corporate users of some description.

The WordPress chapter is special to me, because it’s the WordPress chapter (in case you didn’t realise the ‘Kode currently runs on WordPress) but more importantly it was written by my two buddies Michael and Chris, so obviously I’ll be paying more attention to this chapter than the rest of the book (hey at least I’m honest about these things). So how did the boys do? Not too bad. What’s great about this particular chapter is that their characters come throughout the entire chapter. Blogging is about interating and reading other people’s thoughts. It’s about communication and expression. They’re the only guys that spend a bit of time telling you about themselves and what their knowledge levels are. It’s a great way to ease the user into a comfort zone. Michael (at the time) was still struggling with php (no problems now I’m sure as he’s decided to take on JS as well), to prove that you didn’t need to know PHP coding in order to design and play around with WP, all you need is the drive, patience and some time.

I’ve got to admit though that the most interesting chapter for me was the final chapter by Richard Rutter. Which walks you through the process of making your own blogging engine. Why is that interesting to me when someone else has already done most (if not all the hard work for me). To be honest it would just be fun to have everything running on something I designed and coded. The thing of course is that I’m not a coder and therefore won’t realistically be able to do something like that. Also the first thing that comes to my mind is how I don’t think I’d be able to deal with Spammers. I can’t do without Akismet to be honest and I don’t understand how other people can manage without this plugin.

The book targets 2 groups of people, those that want to start off blogging and what they’ll need to know; the second group of people are those that have passed that stage and would like to learn how to customising their blogs, and what to look out for. I don’t think I’m really the core target audience, but even I found several nuggets that were really worthwhile. It’s definitely a book I’d recommend giving to the newbie who’s interested but is also a bit overwhelmed by it all, because this book holds his hand in style. For the hardened blogger the book is interesting as an overview of other technologies so as to keep abreast of what’s going on, with a couple of areas that are definitely of interest, but then again that’s not who the book is targeted at, so it’s nice that the editor made sure there was something for that group of people as well.

Fables is one of the best series you can read by VERTIGO Comics. It’s written by Bill Willingham and illustrated (most of the time) by Mark Buckingham (who is without a doubt the nicest guy working in comics). I’ve effectively got to write my own little review; in the meantime there’s this excellent review to get into by the Fourth Rail boys and this Podcast by the Comic Geeks.

It’s been a while since I read a proper Authority story. Last time it was the one issue found in the Coup D’etat mini-series which effectively sets the scene up for this story. Just finished reading Volume 1 of The Authority: Revolution (the mini-site also provides a little video interview with Dustin the artist of the book, more on him later) The Authority now control America and are making a better world, or so they would like to believe.

The Story - Ed Brubaker

Unlike many people out there reading comics, I’m much more an Image boy, rather than a Marvel or DC boy. That’s not to say I will buy everything by Image, but explains my reading habits. I hunt down stuff by creators, and not a company, with the sole exception of the Wildstorm Universe. It’s the one set of books that has always been one step ahead of the rest. I doubt I’ll ever do work for hire (although never say never) but if I did it would have to be in the Wildstorm Universe and with a writer that actually was a fan of the Universe, as Ed Brubaker so clearly is.

In the latest trade paperback in the Authority series (Volume 7 apparently, I’m thinking 2 for the Warren Ellis run, 2 for the Mark Millar run, and 2 for the Robbie Morrison run), is easily back to the exceptional form established by the first 2 creative teams. This is some of the best Authority fare, where each issue has got memorable moments, dialogue and artwork. The structure is very different to previous incarnations. Previously Ellis and Millar structured their stories into groups of 4 issue arcs. Brubaker is doing a 12 issue mini series.

What I love about this story is that it allows the characters to grow. The status quo is not stagnant; the structure and details are constantly being questioned. For anyone thinking that everything remains the same throughout the life of the story to preserve the status quo is dead wrong. It’s playing out in a very unorthodox fashion, one I’m very keen on following through to with the next book.

One thing I’ve noticed however is that the first half of this story is a Midnighter story, while the second half will be a Jenny Quantum story. You can tell this is who Ed’s favourite is, and to be honest he is the coolest member of the team. In previous incarnations of the book it was more of team book, and all the characters got equal airtime, however Ed doesn’t seem to balance that. This isn’t so much a criticism as I like the fact that he’s concentrating on a few characters and giving them time to grow and develop. He does provide key moments for the other characters, however he is playing to his strengths as a writer.

The Wildstorm Universe has always had a single writer who defines the direction for many of the books for a given period of time. We’ve had the Brandon Choi era, followed by the Alan Moore era, Warren Ellis took over not long after that and set the tone for things to come for a while, then Joe Casey tried his hand, but he didn’t really get the Universe in my humble opinion, and now we’re slowly drawing the curtain on the Ed Brubaker era. I’ve enjoyed the Ed era the most (after the Alan Moore era). Ed has a complete understanding of the history of the WS universe and gives all faithful readers lots of gratification as he links in characters and situations perfectly. He provides continuity, while masterfully making it completely accessible for people that haven’t read the stories before. He has a respect for what’s come before which is very rare in the current comic book market. The twist he’s provided in the 5th issue however will have to be properly explained, but it’s an explanation I’m really looking forward to.

Like I said it’s a shame that it will also mark the last work that Ed will have done for Wildstorm (as he’s completed Sleeper which is the other must read book of the Wildstorm Universe).

The Art - Dustin and Rich

Side note, I love Jenny Quantum. She’s easily turning into my favourite character right now, and I can see her becoming more and more prominent in future Authority stories.

His carrier interiors are very consistent and his designs for the Sons of Liberty were exceptionally well done.

So to recap if you stopped reading The Authority after the Millar run, do yourself a favour and pick up Revolution, you’ll remember why you liked these characters in the first place.

Artistically David Mack is one of my biggest influences. In fact he’s such an influence that my first foray years ago into actually colouring my work using water colours can be landed squarely on his lap. The man escapes the boundaries of traditional art and elevates everything he does to a level few can ever see, and even fewer can ever reach. What I find amazing is the lack of recognition this man deserves in the real of both contemporary artwork and graphic design. Oh sure he’s got loads of fans from all regions of the world and all coming from different backgrounds, some design, some traditional art, some comic book art, but I still think he deserves much more.

And not to be completely cliched about the whole thing the guy is an exceptionally nice person as well. I’ve had several e-mail correspondences with the man and bought several books and what not off him in the past. I was even contemplating saving up to buy a piece of his artwork. It was going to cost me an arm and a leg, at $1500 but I was seriously thinking about it; luckily he didn’t actually have the particular piece I wanted as he’d already sold it. Luckily simply because I really couldn’t afford it even though I wanted it more than anything. Throughout our conversations he was such an approachable guy, which made me even more of a fan of the man as he earned my respect. It’s more than can be said of a lot of creators that let things go to their heads.

Every Thursday used to be a religious journey to get my weekly fix of my favorite books. I’ve since stopped doing that and rather like going into the store and waiting for things to jump at me. This week I was pleasantly surprised by the fifth installment of Mack’s fantastic Reflections series, which effectively is his collection of artwork that never saw print, sketches and other Mack related goodies. It’s not the most powerful one in the series, however Mack on a bad hair day is better than 90% of the ‘artists’ out there working in a professional environment.

I can acknowledge that his stuff might not appeal to everyone, but if it doesn’t then it’s that person’s loss. I’ll be writing about his epic series Kabuki in the coming months as it’s a series that deserves to be read by everyone who’s even mildly interested in a good story, in ANY medium.

I just finished reading this seminal work by the great Amin Maalouf, who is a fellow Lebanese. See before reading this book and researching into the other books that the man has written, I used to think that one of the greatest things to come out of Lebanon of Gibran Khalil Gibran (he of ‘The Prophet’ fame). I’ve read ‘The Prophet’, and honestly I wasn’t all that enamored. I remember clearly the first time I heard talked in depth about ‘The Prophet’ was in the most unlikely places with the most unlikely person. That’s a story for another time. After completing Leo the African, I can easily say that Amin Maalouf is the heir apparent for the best literary voice to have come out of that tiny little country.

One of the most important things that elevates a writer to becoming truely exceptional in his readers eyes, at least this is how I see it, is educating the reader. Not trying to show the reader how many longer words he knows, but showing him the depth of knowledge he pocesses in a way that doesn’t insult the reader. The obvious outcome is that the reader comes away actually having gained something more than simple entertainment.

Amin Maloouf writes historical fiction. However this isn’t the history I learnt at school. I would have killed to have these books when I was in school or in University. To study the time period discussed in this book would have been a dream.

Leo the African is written as though it’s the autobiography of Hasan al-Wazzan. This is a true story, with the obvious embellishments by Maalouf. Hasan was born in Granada during the fall of the Muslims from Spain. It tracks his life as he goes from one country to the next, experiencing the wonders and the horrors of the world in front of him. Leo the African is the story of travelling and discovery. It’s a story about religion in the hands of man.

Reading this book you get attached the characters in such a profound way. You feel his pain, and Maalouf uses a trick I only noticed clearly in storytelling terms when I was watching Babylon 5. The most interesting part of a story isn’t what happens, but rather the path or road to get there.

Even though the writer has already told you what the final outcome is, you can’t help but feel like you’re hoping the characters come out of it unscathed. Maalouf uses this technique to great effect during the entire book.

This book was not published in 2005, and even though it’s still relatively early to be thinking about Book of the Year type of thing, Leo the African is the one book I think I’ll remember in years to come as the stand out book I read this year.

I wrote this about ‘After the Empire’ and while both deal about completely different subjects I’m extremely lucky to have read them, and I honestly believe that everyone should at least have them on their shelves, with the full intent of reading them some day. You owe it to yourself.

What the fuck? Was I sleeping at the wheel when this happened? So go check this little link out will you. Apart from the very nice Optimus Prime right in the front and centre of the image, check right behind, oh yes is that the cover to Northern Lights? I think it is.

The Fantasy Comes to life in 2007.

I personaly can’t wait. I’ll have to write a much more in depth post about my love for His Dark Materials. It deserves several posts in fact. A little research and we’ve got the following site. Once I’ve got a bit more time I’ll investigate further.

No I didn’t but it would be nice to experience that. However I’ve been reading Inoue Takehiko’s SLAM DUNK. This was a manga done in what it would seem the early to mid 90s. The series ran 31 volumes in Japan (each volume having around 180 pages). It was originally published in the US and subsequently shipped to the rest of the Anglophone countries by Raijin Comics sometime in late 2003. The company stopped it’s publishing program about a year ago and with it Slam Dunk stopped being translated, at Volume 5. Needless to say by that stage I was COMPLETELY hooked on this series, which is one of the best selling manga’s in Japan.

With no translation around I just gave up on the series, not because of choice but what was I supposed to do, learn Japanese?

Little did I know that the internet and more specifically Bit Torrent would come to my rescue. I never ever download comics. I’m a book nut. I like the smell and feel of a book. I like picking it off the shelf and flicking through to have a look and be inspired. Never got into it, even though there seems to be masses of series available for illegal download on the net.

I was talking to James and he mentioned that the entire series was available in English online if I really wanted to read the series. I’m up to volume 14 and I can’t seem to get enough of this series.

The story centres around Hanamichi who’s been rejected 50 times, and then meets this girl who’s into basketball, in order to impress her he decides to join the bastketball team. Thing is though, he HATES basketball. And so it begins.

It’s easily one of the most addictive series I’ve ever read. The thing that really comes across fantastically is the humour which is absolutely brilliant. It’s been a while since I laughed out loud on my own reading something. The art is superb, but there is a bit of rawness in the work that Inoue’s later offering (the great Vagabond, which I’ll hopefully get round to reviewing properly in the near future). Having said that it’s still tighter than most manga on the stand, and he’s easily becoming one of my absolute favourite Japanese creators, and that’s saying a lot.

What makes me wonder however is which country translated the series and published it in english, and if so can I buy it online or not? That’s how much of a fan and idiot I am of this series. Also I’d really love to sit down and watch the anime series of this, except I don’t think it’s available in english. Again I could be wrong in this subject.

Ages ago, when I finshed Grass for his Pillow I said that I’d write a better more full review of the great trilogy, Tales of the Otori. This set of books caught my eye in an ad on the tube in Camden. I remember the poster clearly since it’s also the cover of the first book. What attracted me to the actual story wasn’t soo much the poster, but the name of the book.

The first book as called ‘Across the Nightingale Floor’. I remember standing there thinking what a fantastically lyrical name for a book that was. I read the blurb which was something about forbidden love etc, and thought ok, it’s got samurai’s, and a fantastic name, let’s give this book a shot. Needless to say I wasn’t disappointed. The books are written by one Lian Hearn, which is a pseudonym. A friend a work, who we used to talk about books all the time, mentioned the writer was originally a children’s author from Australia, and decided to go for another name to prove that she shouldn’t be categorised as a children’s author alone.

The books are set in a world that resembles Feudal Japan in many ways. The thing is though, it’s not set in Japan. I think this was because Japanese History buffs are fanatics. They’ll remember every minute detail about everything, and call you up on it when/if you go wrong. I guess it would also restrict the story a great deal, as there are some elements of the supernatural in here as well. These are very subtle but add another great layer to the story itself.

The main characters are Takeo and Kaede. It shows their struggle to being with one another in a world mired in tradition, rules and regulations. The story fuses all the ingredients of a good story, mystery, love, war, betrayal and revenge.

There is serious talk of the movie being made, but personally I think you should get these books first. They are very well written books, with a lot of great twists and turns. Now that I’ve finished them I’m a bit sad because I’ve got to wait a while before I find the next set of books that will take my imagination away.

Tales of the Otori:

I’ve not read an Alan Moore book in a very very long time. Too long by my standards. I went through a massive Alan Moore phase 6 months back. Would buy something that had just come back into print every week, but I kinda wanted a bit of a breather. Not because Alan Moore got too much for me, but because I usually give a lot of attention to Alan Moore. His works work on soo many layers, and are really clever works, that you have to go back and digest and try and understand and discover. You won’t get everything the man’s trying to get across to you on your first pass in one of his stories. Even on a shit day Alan Moore writes circles around 95% of ‘writers’ working in comics today.

I guess that’s what I really love about the man in that he’s actually giving you value for what you’re buying, and ultimately he’s smarter than you. Yes I’m looking at you. Or at least it seems that way. Whatever topic he’s choosen to write about, it always seems as though he’s an expert in that field. Well it does to me at least. You can attribute that to a lot of research etc, but Alan Moore doesn’t do Computers. He doesn’t have a website, and he still faxes things through to his artists.

Anyway, Smax the Barbarian shows a rare side of Alan Moore. The humourous side. The flavour of the absolutely amazing and superb Top Ten is still apparent. It’s as if he didn’t miss any clicks between the long time since he last touched these characters. Smax the Barbarian has a lot more in common with Terry Pratchett than Lord of the Rings, so don’t be coming into this story looking for the serious. Oh sure there are serious moments but they don’t occupy centre stage.

The story focuses on Jeff Smax and Robyn going off to Jeff’s homeworld, for the funeral of Jeff’s uncle. Think of this line as the opening sequence of a Simpson’s episode, it’s just a vehicle for a different story entirely. Turns out it’s a bit of a fantasy world, and that’s when the fun starts, as Jeff’s past starts comig back to bite him on the ass, and the real reason why he left his homeworld in the first place start coming through.

I loved Jeff’s lines. He never really talked in the earlier series Top Ten, and it’s apparent in this series the reason behind that. He’s not the sharpest pencil in the box, and that quality makes him a lot more likable. His singing sword is genius as well. This is a Smax story. You get his origin told, it’s centered around his world, and the people in it. Rexa is a good character addition to the Top Ten mythos.

Cannon Zander takes on the artistic chores. No offense to the man but he’s no Gene Ha. Cannon was the original breakdown artist for Top Ten, but it’s apparent that the real star of that show was Gene. The artwork works well with the story I guess, but the characters weren’t as expressive as I’d have liked them to be, and the character designs weren’t that spectacular. I guess the artwork didn’t really captivate me, it told the story competently, which I guess is always a good thing.

Would I want to see more Smax? Not really, I think this series said everything there is to say about the character, and I mean that in a good way. It gives you a really fun adventure, full of clever little twists and lots of chuckles. Having said that there is an absolute mountain, literally of characters in the Top Ten arsenal, and it’s nice to see that some of them are going to shown in the upcoming Graphic Novel The 49ers.

The verdict is Alan Moore never disappoints. Ever; however this is a much lighter affair, that will make you smile, and is just a really well put together mini-series and ultimately it’s fun.

The story was initially released as a 5 issue mini series. It’s now collected in hardcover format, although I’m sure if you wait a little while ABC/Wildstorm will bring out the softcover version. The hardcover as is standard with the ABC collections doesn’t have much in the way of extras etc. (Yeah like the couple of sketches in the original HC really counts, they’ve been sorely lacking in recent collections).

It was one of the things I on my new year’s resolution list, so this is the first in hopefully a long line of comic book reviews, or as I like to refer to them Graphic Novel reviews. The first to receive the proper treatment is The Technopriests.

Alexandro Jodorowsky is a creative genius. Now I don’t give such a title easily. In fact in terms of writing, the only other man to completely take my imagination away is a certain Alan Moore. The thing is though both these distinguished gentlemen approach sequential storytelling from COMPLETLY different angles.

Alexandro has a mad idea on every page, sometimes several mad ideas. At the same time he explores an enormous breadth of topics in which his stories are based,…and they’re all well developed worlds where his character live.

The Technopriests is based in the same Universe as The Incal and Saga of the Metabarons. With Saga of the Metabarons his approach was to instil drama into the work. A sense of serious sci-fi in the air. Obviously so as to not make it too serious he put 2 robots who tell the story (I’ll stop talking about SOTM, I need to leave something for that instalment); in The Technopriests he utilises a similar method of story telling. Except this is a digital autobiography, by the main character Albino and his sidekick rodent Tinigrifi.

It’s Albino’s story and how he gets to be like the moses, however the twist is he’s leading 300,000 technopriests to a galaxy where healthy human relationships are valued more the scientific achievement.

The Good. The setting is amazing. He’s created a world, very far in the future to ours, and he’s extrapolated certain aspects of our lives and blown them up to great degrees. Within the story he offers social commentary that point fingers at people now. However I feel that Jodo is best at when he’s describing:

In the same manner, I saw myself approaching the end of time, roving between galaxies...I had become an immense and sublime angelic being.

Trust me absolutely not even a hint of a spoiler there. What makes this work special is just how much happens in the space of 150 pages. It’s the scope of the work and rather than what is going to happen, you’re always wondering, how the hell is that going to happen. This is a trademark Jodo trick. You think you know what’s coming around the corner because he’s put you in that situation, then he pulls the rug from under you.

The Bad. The thing about Jodo’s here is that at times he’s trying to make it a bit more fun, by way of the dialogue which sometimes comes off a bit wrong in my opinion. Sometimes the characters fall in love at first sight thus declaring their undying love etc and to be honest it just doesn’t ring true. To me that’s the only weakness of this story, I’d love to blame it on the translation, but I respect Justin Kelly as he was responsible for the immaculate translation on The White Lama (more on this fantastic series in the future for sure). No this is a story driven issue, which fits in with the style established with the earlier work The Incal.

The Artists: Zoran Janetov & Fred Beltran. In terms of artwork, these two men have done an amazing job elevating their previous collaborations. For me seeing all the creatures and planets and vehicles this man created was enough to earn him a great deal of respect from me. His work on Avant L’incal (Before the Incal) was less polished. This work shows some serious maturity in form, ranging from facial expressions to backgrounds to body language.

Format Originally this story was presented in 3 hardcover books, oversized. I wouldn’t trade my White Lama books for anything, and I’m buying the Metabarons books in French since that’s the only way I can get Juan Gimenez’s work at that scale. Having said that, 3 books for 10 quid (that’s roughly $15 since you guys don’t pay a lot of rubbish we have to pay for over here), it’s pretty good value for money. The paper is top notch. It’s slightly larger in format than your traditional comic book size. All 3 covers are reproduced at the back which again is a very nice addition, DC generally tend to screw this aspect up whenever they can. So I’ll be buying other Humanoid Books in this format without much fear in the future over production values, and would recommend it be adapted by other publishers as well.

On the web: DC Comics Humanoids Publishing