More technical difficulties

OK, I'm really sorry. Technical difficulties have kept me from keeping this updating enough. My apologies! I promise much improved posting here on out!!

To see what you missed last week, please read below - and don't miss the post about the new Life Drawing Sessions in the Star Clipper fight club.

He LIKES it Mikey!

So you might remember a couple of weeks back Nick said how I didn't care for the vinyl toys that we were getting in. And to some extent that's true; at the time I didn't care for them. But now we're getting ton's of stuff from Kid Robot, and this stuff is so cool it's not funny.

I think the best is the Smorkin' Labbit, while I haven't bought one of the big ones yet, I have bought five of the small ones. Which, by the way, if anyone has an extra skeleton version they want to get rid of, I have some others for trade, including the shaved one with band-aids. We also got the vinyl Uglydoll's in as well, and they are so cool. Apparently they don't have Ice-Bat anymore, the one I wanted of course, but the Wedgehead is good enough to make up for it. Anyway, we've gotten tons of neat Kid Robot stuff in over the past week and you should come take a look before I buy it all. Mwah, heh, heh, hah!

Death Note Live Action Trailer!

AJ passed this link to me for the Death Note movie trailer. I thought all you Death Note-a-maniacs would want to see, too.

And if you're into the sci-fi western thing, this's awesome too...a short film for MTVasia.

Why can't they play MTVasia in America? Nobody listens to what people say on there anyway.

-Nick

Life Drawing Sessions at the SC

Finally an update on the life drawing sessions!

The first one will be on Thursday June 8th from 6:30-8:30. If you draw comics. If you want to draw comics. Comics have people. You need to know how to draw people. come draw them! The first session will be free, so you can come and see what its like and so we can get an idea of how many people are really interested.

This is not a class. You won't be taught to draw, but you'll get some practice and get to see how other people draw, so you will learn something.

One other thing, if you're interested in modeling, let me know. (nick@starclipper.com) Especially if you have any sort of unique clothes or costumes.

This would work...


This'd be cool...


This guy's my hero...


-Nick

Star Clipper Blog Down!

Sorry for all the late postings, folks! Blogger was having some, ahem, problems. But they're fixed - hooray!

Please read below for all you missed!

-ben

Vs. Dracula!

Keep an eye out for Spike vs Dracula #3, coming soon. Not only is it at least in the top 2 of the 3 different books currently running with 'Vs Dracula' in the title (guy's got a bad attitude), but it also marks my first work on a nationally published comic. Okay, it's just flats (assisting the colorist) and sure, I only did 2 pages in that issue. But it is clearly destined to become a much sought-after collectible due to my involvement (uncredited).

I got involved when I met the colorist, Thompson Knox, back in January, when he was in the store for the Athena Voltaire signing. Since then, I've been helping him out on Spike and another book, Lai Wan.

If you're not familiar with 'flatting', its basically my job to mask off all of the different areas of color. Then it goes on to the man, who makes the actual color choices and renders form and lighting and such. So I do the boring, tedious stuff and he does the creative, skillful stuff. I'm kinda on the bottom rung, but whatever, its a start.

I'll be in-store for autographs 40 hours a week.

-Nick

Comics Social Club

Hey guys, just wanted to remind you that this coming Friday is the second meeting of the Star Clipper Comics Social Club. We had the first meeting this past Wednesday and it was pretty fun. I'm hoping a few more will be able to make it out for this one! We will be talking about the resurgence of Noir, Crime, Romance, Horror, Mystery and other genres in mainstream comics. Refreshments will be also be served in the back room, so roll on through people!

-Dan

360 Degrees of Fun

Well I finally did it. I bought a X-Box 360 this past week. In retrospect probably not the best idea actually. Not buying the 360, just buying it this particular week. As I am sure you guys know we have been doing some hiring, and between that and FCBD I have had absolutely no free time. So it's just sitting there taunting me, laughing at me in my frustration! This thing is amazing though. After I got it all hooked up Tuesday night I started looking at the interface to see just what kinds of things it could do and I could not believe it! It can play videos and music, but I can hook my camera right up to it through USB and upload the pictures to it. Since I have X-Box Live I found I could download all kinds of stuff as well, movie trailers, wallpapers from movies and games, new game content, all kinds of small puzzle and card games(Hearts!), and even actual game demos! I downloaded the demo of Project Gotham Racing 3 and it was 2GB's! They also improved some of the existing things like the soundtrack feature from the first X-Box. Instead of letting some games access the soundfiles on the hard drive through the game, this acts more like a computer where the game is just the topmost application running. So you can play any music you want with any game because it doesn't rely on the game to access it like before. I tell ya, there was so much cool stuff it was two hours or so before I even put in a game. And which games did I get you ask? How about Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion, and Battlefield 2 Modern Combat. Which, by the way, I rock at. So there you go, just a little update from the world of Dan.

Star Clipper - Top Dating Spot?

Alive magazine named Star Clipper in the 11th best date in St. Louis.

It's fun to get name dropped and I couldn't agree with them more. Come date at Star Clipper - we'll treat you nice!

-Ben

Dan has Fun

Well, I tried a few others, and here are some of the results:

Your Monster Profile

Basilisk Terror You Feast On: Starbucks You Lurk Around In: Swamps You Especially Like to Torment: Crybabies

What's Your Monster Name?

You Are Cherry Pie

You're the perfect combo of innocent and sexy Those who like you enjoy a contradiction

What Kind of Pie Are You?

Your 1920's Name is:

Weston Ike

What's Your 1920's Name?

You Should Get a PhD in Science (like chemistry, math, or engineering)

You're both smart and innovative when it comes to ideas. Maybe you'll find a cure for cancer - or develop the latest underground drug.

What Advanced Degree Should You Get?

You Are Scooter

Brainy and knowledgable, you are the perfect sidekick. You're always willing to lend a helping hand. In any big event or party, you're the one who keeps things going. "15 seconds to showtime!"

The Muppet Personality Test

Not as Evil as I Thought

Well, not as good as I thought, but oh well.

-Dan

You Are 84% Evil

You're the most evil person you know. The devil is even a little scared of you!

How Evil Are You?

Justice League Figure Collection

Okay, so I don't how exciting this is for you people, but I have finally completed my Justice League figure collection.

Now I really don't get into the whole collectors market, but when I was younger I loved buying the different statues, t-shirts, posters - all of that stuff. Now I got out of that okay, and said I would never do it again, but several years went by and I heard they were releasing a Jack Knight Starman figure. Starman being my favorite comic of all time, and Jack my favorite hero, I just had to get one. Oh but this was only the beginning. After that came the Spider Jerusalem figure, then the three Planetary figs. After that came Jenny Sparks, John Constantine, a Kyle Rayner Green Lantern and a Kingdom Come Batman among others.

I quickly realized that I had just switched one type of collecting for another. But I was only buying my favorite characters from my favorite books, so that made it okay. Yeah right. So I put my foot down on myself, only the best of the best from then out. I made a list of characters I wanted really good models of, Superman, Batman, Nightwing, Robin, Adam Strange, Live Wire, Cosmic Boy and Saturn Girl from the mid-nineties.

So when I saw that there were going to be Ed McGuinness inspired versions of Superman and Batman from his Public Enemies run I knew I would have to get them when they came out. Soon afterwards I heard they were going to do a JLA: Classified line base off Ed's work as well. Now this put into motion a plan that has taken many months to bear fruit, but is now finally complete. I have at last collected a complete set of Grant Morrison's JLA, otherwise known as the "Magnificent Seven" - Superman, Batman, Green Lantern(Kyle Rayner), Wonder Woman, Flash, Aquaman, and the Martian Manhunter. I was so excited I had to go back and read some his great run on that book, when it hit me, "Crap, I'm not finished!" I now realize to really have Morrison's JLA I need to get the following characters, Big Barda, Orion, Steel, Huntress, Plastic Man, and Oracle. This must be why Supes calls it "the never ending battle".

Well, until then enjoy these pictures of my Justice League. The poster is an old Rand McNally one called One Planet, but I thought it looked very apropos given the Crisis of late.

Scott Pilgrim

I bought the first Scott Pilgrim book on Dec 7. By the time I finished reading it, the store was closed and I had to wait a whole torturous day to get the second book. I finished that and looked up when the 3rd would be out. The 14th! Less than a week. Sweet (coins) But no one had told me that the 2nd had been really late...

4 months later and Bryan Lee O'Malley's website insists it will be out 'soon'. Well, this long drought of canadian slackerness is over. No, the 3rd book isn't out. We just got in the Free Comic Book Day comics, and there was a little bit of blessed Pilgrim in there. A single issue-sized story that won't be in the books. I've read it and you can't...hehehe...until May 6th. come early. We only have 20 copies.

For anyone who hasn't read it, you're probably wondering why I suddenly turned all fanboy. Go buy it. Don't pick it up and flip through it thinking "Whats so great about this shitty american manga looking book?", as I did several times before someone convinced me. It really is great. Or maybe I'm just the target audience.

-Nick