Avi sez, "'Mickey Mouse in Gurs' is a tragic 'comic' book made by Horst Rosenthal in 1942 while incarcerated at the Gurs internment camp in France. Rosenthal uses Mickey Mouse as a kind of subversive Virgil to guide us through the hellish experiences of the concentration camp. Horst Rosenthal was murdered in Auschwitz in 1942." --BoingBoing
Recently in the Aesthetics Category
Cell Size and Scale
I wish it could also zoom out and show astronomical sizes, too, like this FSU slide show (not as smooth as the Utah one) or the famous Powers of Ten movie.
Landscape of open source games
While much of the talk covered well-known libraries (SDL, OpenAL), game engines (Ogre, Irrlicht), physics engines (Bullet, Tokamak), and content creation tools (Blender, GIMP), there were a few surprises. One was how many open source game-creation systems I found (4, more than the zero I expected). These are Game Editor (2d with export to some mobile devices), Construct (2d, some 3d), Novashell (2d), and Sandbox (3d). Another surprise was the game Yo Frankie! (pictured above), which has very high quality animation and artwork, and was produced using Blender. --Jim Whitehead
Teaching the Holocaust
The students discussed the abrupt ending, the use of ethnic stereotypes, and of course the comic book medium itself. One student's "Hearing through Yiddish... Seeing in Ink..." is particularly thoughtful.
About a third of the class went on to read book two, even though it wasn't on the syllabus; one student read the book aloud to her nine-year-old sister.
This weekend, Seton Hill is home to a conference sponsored by the National Catholic Center for Holocaust Education. I'm canceling all my classes during one day of the conference.
New filings to the court, he said, "state for the record that the AP is correct about which photo I used...and that I was mistaken. While I initially believed that the photo I referenced was a different one, I discovered early on in the case that I was wrong. In an attempt to conceal my mistake I submitted false images and deleted other images."
In February, the AP claimed that Fairey violated copyright laws when he used one of their images as the basis for the poster. In response, the artist filed a lawsuit against the AP, claiming that he was protected under fair use. Fairey also claimed that he used a different photo as the inspiration for his poster.
After Fairey's admission, a spokesman for the Associated Press issued a statement saying that Fairey "sued the AP under false pretenses by lying about which AP photograph he used."
Fairey said that his lawyers have taken the steps to amend his court pleadings to reflect the fact that "the AP is correct about which photo I used as a reference and that I was mistaken." --Los Angeles Times
Animator vs. Animation
The first action heroine
In the figure of the coltish, resolute Sigourney Weaver, Alien may just be the film that overhauled the old, unreconstructed horror genre and dared to put a woman centre-stage. Because make no mistake: a horror movie is what Alien is. "It's basically a haunted house film," explains the critic David Thomson. "The only difference is that the old dark house just happens to be a spaceship." --Xan Brooks, GuardianAlien came out thirty years ago. Thirty years ago!
I would have just turned 11. I remember reading all about the movie in Starlog (a science fiction magazine my sister and I read from about issue #6 or #7, and we later ordered back issues so we had the complete set), and I remember seeing advertisements for Alien-themed toys, but I wondered who would want them... I'm sure I saw an edited version of the movie on TV, or maybe I rented the video, but I really wasn't into horror.
The sequel, Aliens, came out when I was a teenager, and was a big hit with my peer group. It made me re-watch the first film, and I appreciated it more.
I did watch the third film once, but I settled for reading an online version of the script for the fourth movie.
But honestly... thirty years?
If you were starting out now, do you think you would have started out in games rather than comics?
If I were young now and I wanted to do stories, I would very much want to get into the videogame business because it's the most exciting. Videogames and movies are the most exciting forms of entertainment. But a videogame in a way is more imaginative, it has more variety. In a movie you stick to the plotline, in a videogame you go in a million different directions. I have no idea how they're able to do that. It's like a miracle.What advice would you give to a newcomer?
Well it's like anything else, if he or she wants to be a writer they should first study writing. Don't study comic writing, study writing - read literature, read the best writers you can find. Learn the language, learn how to use it. If you want to be an artist, you've got to study the best artists in the business and try to draw as well as they do. But too many people try to become artists in comics and they're not as good as the ones that are presently drawing the comics. --UK Guardian

In 1970, the gap between shows featuring magic and shows featuring more science-based themes is fairly wide, which may be related to the relative cost of producing the different types of shows; Captain Kirk required pricey sets and a makeup crew while Samantha Stevens just needed a film editor and the ability to wiggle her nose. But as audience expectations for shows involving magic become analogous to their expectations for science fiction shows, magic's peaks and valleys start to correspond to those of other themes, though supernatural shows may be a bit more resilient to overall drops in television spending. --i09.com
Don't try to sound like "an announcer." Forget the barking style of voice that radio announcers always seem to have in movies when they "interrupt this program with a special bulletin."
Birdhouse: Existential Philosophy, Biology, Aesthetics, and Re-enactment of a Literary Entombment

Dude! Your shirt looks just like the blue walkway and the brown sand! How do you do that?
From the MailOnline, via.
As an instructor of art for the past 7 years, I have had the disheartening experience of encountering illiteracy at the college level with a frequency that far exceeded my expectations. Having taught at the University of California, Santa Barbara; Fresno City College; Hillsborough Community College in Tampa, FL; and Bakersfield College, I decided to collect the hundreds of student essays written for my classes that were abandoned by their authors (the fact that these students did not find the retrieval of their work to be important was in many ways discouraging enough). I decided to archive these student essays as documentation of the growing illiteracy problem, for what I found in the contents therein mirrored and sometimes surpassed the following data.I suppose, too, that there's some self-selection involved -- perhaps the students who care least about their writing are the most likely to abandon their essays, while the best writers were proud of their work and wanted to pick it up. A lively discussion on the comments page.
--Look Like If The Words Are Bleeding
The context in which the students' intellectual property is used -- as evidence of the nation's illiteracy -- is problematic, as is the fact that the students weren't given the opportunity to consent to their work being used this way.
Choose Your Own Buzz Lightyear
The cover of this book, originally published in 1979, features a big-jawed space hero in a suit that sports a familiar color scheme.
The title of the CYOA book is Space and Beyond, which may remind you of a certain movie character's catchphrase.
The book has been republished in other editions, with different covers, but according to Wikipedia, this is the cover of the original edition.
Hovbergs blogg | Blip
Blip from Sean Mullen on Vimeo.
Ten Predictions About Digital Literature
Within five years:
(1) Many online journals and magazines now only publishing traditional text-based fiction and poetry will, as part of their online offerings, publish digital literature on a regular basis;
(2) Most major universities and many colleges (if they don't already) will offer courses in New Media, and those courses will cover/include digital literature;
(3) Accomplished scholars who assess the whole of digital literature by examining exemplary models from early hypertexts will be saying "oops!" and seeking a vocabulary that accepts the continual flux and explosive change of current practices in digital literature;
[...]
--Alan Bigelow, Netpoetic
Mourning the Death of Handwriting
The cause of the decline in handwriting may lie not so much in computers as in standardized testing. The Federal Government's landmark 1983 report A Nation at Risk, on the dismal state of public education, ushered in a new era of standardized assessment that has intensified since the passage in 2002 of the No Child Left Behind Act. "In schools today, they're teaching to the tests," says Tamara Thornton, a University of Buffalo professor and the author of a history of American handwriting. "If something isn't on a test, it's viewed as a luxury." --Clare Suddath, Time (via Annette Vee's Facebook posting)
Blender Tutorial: Rigging
I really love Blender, since it's forcing me to develop the visual side of my brain. The summer is too short... work for the fall is already starting to pile up. I'm going to have to set aside Blender pretty soon.
Rainbow in Suburbia
Steampunk Gears and Hearts
NASA finds missing moon landing tapes
The final loss in quality came when Nasa made its US recording of the event--the one always seen in archive footage--by simply placing a 16mm film camera in front of a television monitor in the US.But now, according to the Daily Express, the original high-quality recordings have been found. (It looks like NASA was planning to surprise the world a little closer to the 40th anniversary of the moon landing.)
However, it is the original magnetic tapes recorded back at the Parkes Observatory in Australia that contained the unadulterated and highest quality images.
To the later horror of researchers and scientists, it was those tapes that went missing.
Blender 3d Softbody Demo
My wife arranged a visit to The Franklin Institute a couple of weeks ago. We didn't actually know that this Star Trek exhibit was there. I was ready to pass, in favor of the more educational exhibits, but my wife made it a Father's Day treat and shelled out enough gold-pressed latinum for the four of us.
No photography was allowed in the exhibit, which was annoying, so I wasn't going to blog it at all because, well, sometimes words are boring. But this YouTube clip, in between the chatter and the promos, shows some of the collection.
Despite her ability to channel William Shatner, my seven-year-old quickly got restless. My son enjoys reading every single line on every single card in every single display, so we took our time working through the place. I kept hoping maybe there would be a ball pit full of tribbles for the girl, or a dress-up area where she could try on different forehead bumps. No such luck. My wife had to take her out early.
The truth about game physics
A few years ago it was enough for a game world to look realistic. Now, in its every action and reaction, it must behave realistically. Physics is what graphics was ten years ago - a yardstick to judge and compare games.-- Keith Suart, GuardianThe first article in a series.
I enjoy steampunk, a cultural aesthetic which celebrates what both ordinary and extraordinary things might look like, had technology progressed along the lines that Jules Verne and his contemporaries imagined. As a literary subgenre, it imagines that the immeasurable power of steam has opened the skies, leading legions of top-hatted gentlemen-explorers and parasol-wielding adventuresses to the heavens beyond.
With steampunk on my mind, after submitting the final semester grades, I took a moment to celebrate by poking through the stacks. I found this absolutely beautiful book, A History of the Growth of the Steam Engine, by Robert H. Thurston, published in 1878. (Full text via Google Books.)
This isn't just a retro aesthetic, reacting against the streamlined and textureless Apple assembly line, or a self-conscious choice to make every bolt and gear visible in order to force us to come into direct contact with the technology. This is the real thing.
This engraving of the Worthington Pumping-Engine made my heart stop.
I found these big metal things near the art building. I don't know what they are, but I like them.


Recent Comments
Fri 8:17 Mitchell: Delightful animation. Note that breaking the scale into chunks[1] can be helpful when trying to teach/learn and remember sizes. "I... (on Cell Size and Scale)
Fri 5:47 Carl Coryell-Martin: For the record here is the NTSB report on the airplane crash that killed Aaliyah: http://www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/brief2.asp?ev_id=20010907X01905&ntsbno=MIA01RA225&akey=1 There is some great... (on A Math Paradox: The Widening Gap Between High School and College Math)
Thu 20:59 Dennis G. Jerz: Maxon, thanks for that detail. That was one of the first examples in the book, so I think maybe the... (on A Math Paradox: The Widening Gap Between High School and College Math)
Thu 19:47 steven: i think i may buy that book for my little brother. he's twelve, but he's flying through algebra. a lack... (on A Math Paradox: The Widening Gap Between High School and College Math)
Thu 19:42 Maxon Crumb: Not to be pedantic (no pun intended), but the cause for Aaliyah's plane crash was not that it was overloaded... (on A Math Paradox: The Widening Gap Between High School and College Math)
Thu 15:22 Crawford Kilian: Glad to see this, Dennis--it explains a lot of the sites I've seen springing up to exploit the H1N1 pandemic.... (on 'Fakeosphere' latest Web trap for consumers)
Wed 12:22 Thomas Jefferson journalism class- Jefferson Hills, PA: My students preferred the lead by Daniel C. Ford over all of the other leads. It really "grabbed" their attention... (on Personality Profiles: Prize-Winning Student Journalism Samples)
Mon 16:23 Ollie Donovan: Thanks for the link, it have some really cool poems. I just became a father 2 months ago, and I... (on Poems About Fathers)
Sat 9:59 Dennis G. Jerz: Media production, from manuscript to 3d design, used to require arcane knowledge and power (in the form of political sponsorship... (on $160,000 Per Stimulus Job? White House Calls That 'Calculator Abuse')
Sat 6:38 Thais: It was a great pleasure that you’ve made a comment on my blog. This blog is related with the subject... (on $160,000 Per Stimulus Job? White House Calls That 'Calculator Abuse')