Category Archive: Blogroll

Aug
01
2009

Summer 2009 – San Diego Comic-Con 2009 – part 1

Well, here I am in sunny Southern California getting ready to head back home to the Bay Area. What? You didn’t notice I was gone? Well, I have been surrounding myself in geeky delights for the last week and a half. Would you like to hear what I did? Of course you do.

My adventure started on Wednsday July 22, 2009 as I flew to San Diego for the US’s largest Comic Book/Pop Culture convention the San Diego Comic-Con 2009 (i.e. SDCC). This is my sixth year and it seems to get bigger and better every time I go.

Now the convention does not start till Thursday, but they have their Preview Night starting at 6pm the Wednesday before. So I decided I would visit the world famous San Diego Zoo. First I stopped at my favorite resturant in Balboa Park, the Tea Pavilion for a California Roll Sandwich. I don’t have a lot of photos since my batteries died on my early on, but I loved what I saw. Plus not having my camera working made me focus on just enjoying myself instead of recording everything I saw.

Click here to see more pictures from Balboa Park and the San Diego Zoo.

That evening I returned to the convention after checking in at the Hostel to pick up my badge and set up the Cartoon Art Museum table for the next day.

Then I just wandered around and visited with my fellow artist.

The next day the conention was in full swing as I helped out at the Cartoon Art Museum table for their 3rd annual Sketch-A-Thon. The idea is that artist create original custom art for a mer $10 each. A sweet deal indeed.

Here are some photos of Anthony Hon and Wahab Algarmi drawing. I will post more on the convention soon as well as my trip to Disneyland and Universal Studios. Click here to all my SDCC photos I have posted on Flickr so far.

More to come.

Jul
04
2009

Happy 4th of July

Today we celebrate the Independence of the USA! I hope my fellow Americans all have a wonderful day with their friends and family.

Why not check out the Disney and More blog to see original artwork from Disneyland’s ‘America on Parade’ show from the bicentennial. I have faint memories of seeing the show when I was a kid.

Have a great day.

Jun
25
2009

Follow me on Twitter

Everyone seems to be Twittering. Maybe even your mom is Twittering. You can follow me on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/AtomicBearPress

I post updates on classes and events that I am part of. Also I have just installed a plug-in on my site that will (hopfully) Tweet when I post a blog post here.

Apr
26
2009

My birthday jaunt on April 18th, 2009

On April 18th, I invited a bunch of my friends to share the day with me in San Francisco to celebrate my Birthday. I had a schedual for the day and folks who come come and join me at any point.

click for bigger image.

Before Mom and I arrived at the museum, we took a look at the mural in the Monadnock building. My Mom worked in this building in the past.

To start the day was my Mom, Mike Hales, Jeff Plotkin, and Toni Noble at the Museum of Craft and Folk art to see the exhibit “Inside/Outside : Artist Environments.” The work is by Mike Shine based on his real life “Surf shack”. Take a tour of Mike’s shack here: www.shinelounge.com/ Most of the exhibit is a full cottage with working 8track tape player and hand painted cartoon gods everywhere you see. Everyone should see the show and it runs till May 24, 2009.

Inside the Mike Shine surf shack.

click for bigger image

Also here is a review of the show: www.miromi.com/webpress/?p=486

Mike Shine surf shack in San Francisco Caft and Folk Museum

click for larger image.

Next it was off to Mel’s diner for lunch. Audrey Soffa joined us for great comfort food. I love their Ruben Sandwhich.

After a jot to the Cartoon Art Museum to say ‘Hi’ to the weekend crew we headed off to North Beach.

click for bigger image.

Audrey, Toni, Jeff, Mike, and I meet up with Mike Capazola and we headed to my favorite candy store, Z-Chocolat for free samples of Taffy and Fudge. Then we headed to a cafe for sketching and drinks.

click bigger image

We were joined by Anthony and headed to the Artist and Craftman Supplies. An awsome art supplie store in North Beach.

Then we headed to Zeitgeist on Valencia St. where we met up with Rick Lucey, Summerlea and Nathan. We did not go in since the place was standing room only. So we walked down to Pancho Villa Taqueria for tasty Mexican food where we met with Lori and Dan.

There were drinks at Casanova and then Summerlea, Nathan, Jeff and Toni joined me for crepes and some hard cider in stone bowls. We then walked to Deloris Park and then it was time to head home.

It was a beautiful day and a great time. A great way to celebrate my birthday.

Thanks everyone.

Apr
17
2009

Twitter Funny

Twitter is the Micro Blogging system that everyone is talking about. I do Twitter myself at AtomicBearPress about projects, links, and call for feedback so I found these clips funny. Twitter is useful at time, but I can see how it could get out of hand.

Enjoy.

Apr
01
2009

Update: Time for Spring

Well, Spring is in full force and the sun is out and warming the Bay Area. Of course my allergys are up too and worse then ever, but that won’t keep me down too much. I am not much of a hot weather person, but I love spring with it’s half-way point of coolness and sun mixed together.

Spring is a time of change and new growth. Both are elements I am looking forward too this year. I have a big birthday coming up this month as well.

Here’s whats up:

- I am doing production work on the new Kid Beowulf graphic novel by colleague Alexis Fajardo.

- Creating some new graphics for a local non-profit

- Designing a logo for a local business.

- I will be teaching the Cartoon Boot Camp at the Cartoon Art Museum this summer as well as teaching at the Schulz Museum for a one week session

- I am going down at the San Diego Comic-Con in July with some new art to show. The trip will also included 2-3 theme parks.

- I donated some artwork to a favorite Disney theme park video podcast for a special story.

Mar
29
2009

Follow me on Twitter

My friend Adam convinced me to join Twitter. I am now on Twitter as AtomicBearPress if anyone wants to read my infrequent micro posts there. http://twitter.com/AtomicBearPress

I am mostly going to post ‘tweets’ that are about my artwork and teaching, so nothing too personal will be there.

Mar
18
2009

No Wigs and Un-Pluged

I just saw that Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer who were the Mock band in This is Spinal Tap and A Mighty Wind are performing for real in a six week tour. No characters (i.e. no wigs) and playing acoustic only. If you have seen either of the excellent mocumentry’s then you know that these guys are pretty good. I will look forward to hearing how they sound. http://www.unwigged.com

UNWIGGED & UNPLUGGED An Evening with Christopher Guest, Michael McKean & Harry Shearer (March 2, 2009 – Los Angeles) — Actors/Directors/Musicians and Comedy Icons Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer are doing something they have never done before; performing a six week, 30 city multi-media acoustic tour without wigs and electric instruments. UNWIGGED & UNPLUGGED: An Evening with Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer has the legendary musical and comedic trio performing music from heavy metal’s loudest band Spinal Tap along with the folk music from A Mighty Wind, and more. Tickets for the UNWIGGED & UNPLUGGED tour go on sale Friday, March 6th, with the tour starting Friday, April 17th in Vancouver and ending Sunday, May 31st in Milwaukee. UNWIGGED & UNPLUGGED is not about funny costumes and characters, but rather three long time friends and collaborators who make each laugh and love nothing better than to find some excuse to get together and play music. The trio commented, “With this being the 25th Anniversary of the film This is Spinal Tap, we thought this would be a fun and at the same time, a little challenging, as we have never performed as ourselves. Think of the evening as three old friends jamming in your living room. As opposed to OUR living rooms; we won’t be home.” UNWIGGED & UNPLUGGED will feature songs from the original soundtrack This Is Spinal Tap (1984), the studio album Break Like The Wind (1992), and A Mighty Wind (2003) along with some special surprises and rarities thrown in. Guest, McKean, and Shearer have a rich history going back decades. Guest and McKean first met in college where they wrote songs together. As for McKean and Shearer, they have known each other since 1970 when they were both members of satirical group The Credibility Gap on radio, stage and records. In 1979, Guest, McKean and Shearer appeared together for the first time in a Rob Reiner-produced, sketch comedy television pilot called The TV Show. It was here the world got their famous glimpse of Spinal Tap featuring lead singer David St. Hubbins (McKean), guitarist Nigel Tufnel (Guest), and bassist Derek Smalls (Shearer). In 1984, Reiner and the lads devised a way to bring the group back this time in a major motion picture, This Is Spinal Tap, and the rest is history, literally. This Is Spinal Tap was ranked #29 of the “100 Funniest Films of All Time” by The American Film Institute and The Library of Congress added the film to the National Film Registry’s list of 25 American cinematic works selected for historical preservation calling the film a ‘culturally significant’ work. Entertainment Weekly recently awarded TISP eleventh place (of course) in their “cult film” list. And Netflix has ranked This Is Spinal Tap in the Top 1% of all Netflix Titles in terms of total rentals to-date!

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