Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Fanime 2012

Holy Cow was this a great FanimeCon.
Even though I had to ride the Line Ride TWICE, we did'nt have a hotel room, my "cosplay" on Friday was no where near as complete as I want it,  and I was asked to make sure Phish was peace tied twice, I had a blast and none of it bothered me.

It all began Day 0 while I was running around trying to find a few cheap pieces for my Kot-"eh"-tsu Cosplay. (that's where all of the pieces are not heavily moded or finished. the idea is that it's everyday wear and closet cosplay items so I can wear it on first day and last day and not be in an "uncomfortable" costume) and I was planning to head home and put a few touches on it and call it a night when some friends asked where I was in the pre-reg line. So I decide to go down and hang out with them. It was at that point I discovered there had been  a blown transformer and the power was out. Rumor has it that reg was DOING IT BY HAND ON PAPER. So, The line ride was on MANIAC difficulty, so after 5 hours of a sax who blessedly knew more songs than just the Epic Sax song and one rousing sing along of the Pokemon Opening theme, to celebrate a successful badge acquisition, there was delicious fancy food afterwards.
Oh yeah, the vest I found with white paneling on the front, I BOUGHT THE LAST ONE IN SANTA CLARA COUNTY! RLY though, I asked them to find me one in a larger size and they checked if they had ANY in four other stores and theirs was the only one. Good thing I know how to take this thing apart and put it back together, GO THEATRE SKILLS! Kudos to me though, I had two people call it and even one OTHER Kotetsu, whose cosplay was WAY better than mine, give me props, so, success!
CHECK THE SOURCE!

Day 1 started early since I wanted to snag my badge voucher and badge ASAP and check in on The Dojo to say high to the Knights. Kicked off the Con with some of the FIRST programming of the weekend watching some AMV Hell, always a great start. Bounced around seeing people, meeting up with people, wandering the halls. And then I had to get to rehearsal, to find out I wasn't called for rehearsal, so I ran back to wait in line to get a badge for my cousin who may or may not have gotten there before they closed Reg. Twice Line RIDE! Acheive Unlocked! We had some Pizza My Heart for dinner and watched some Midnight Madness, then called it a night. Dub of The Northstar FTW!

Day 2. "Is It Real?" 1 day, parking was balls since I got there AFTER 10 A M, so I got to lug my "weapon box", my backpack with prizes & netbook, my projector, and all while wearing my snazzy clothes. Always fun. Got there with time to spare, set up and found out that the reason attendance was so low MAY have had something to do with the fact that The Dojo was somehow left out of the Weekend pocket Schedule. Whatevs, the few people who showed for my Panel were chill and I educated like a boss.
Ducked our heads in to half of a panel. It wasn't exactly what we thought it would be so we ducked out. T1nk wanted to go to a few meet ups and see some anime, but was prepared to watch all the programming!
Summer Wars? That sounded familiar, lets go see that . . OH MY GOD WHAT AN AWESOME ANIME!!! A review to follw in the nearer future, no Lie, I ran out and bought it. Mostly because it's only one movie.
 ooh! Abridged Series . . DBZ!? Sweet, I have no real desire to ever watch any of the DBZ's so Abridged make sit so I have sort of watched it and can get the jokes.
(Watch from 5:50 to about 8:38, or just till 6:45. that part gets me every time, I think its the mostly the voice of Lord Guru. it makes me giggle.)


Then there was some snackage and I dug in for marathon mode of Gainax goodness. The first Gurren Movie followed by the First Eva Remake Movie, OH YEAH! welll..... after Gurren, one of our compatriots wanted some more light hearted fare than Shinji crying like a bitch so . . BEST OF ZERO PUNCTUATION!! Leave half way through for food at a local eatery which I need to remember to never go to again. (The food is fine, the service is fine, the prices are decent, the location is great, I just cant stand how busy it is all the time and the clientele.) Called it an early night as there was no AMV Hell or Midnight MAdness on the schedule. EARLY DAY TOMORROW THEN!

yeah right.
Day 3. T1nk & I went to visit some Gothic Lolita peeps who were having a meetup, we knew one or to and T1nk is ALWAYS looking to get further into the culture, made some new friends, all of them ADORABLE! Ohh Abridged again . . . AVATAR ABRIDGED? HELL YES! PLEASE! A few good episodes of that, then a couple episodes of Battle Ship Yamato 2199. At that point we decided to schlep to the car to get all my gear for my panel. had a late lunch/supper, then threw down for more Paneling. Great crew for that, lots of questions and they seemed interested. Gave out some prizes and packed it in to let the next crew get set up then packed everything back out of the con. It was well timed with having my cousin Lefty get picked up by his mom, so after that . . .  T1nk & I went to check out The Masquerade. It was better than usual, meaning, not terrible. It gives me hope for the future! Gee, maybe we should go to the B&W ball seeing as our outfits are fancy & the proper colors! Nope, met up with folks, hung out, called it a night and went home since T1nk had to open at balls o'clock.

Oh yeah, for a few years now I have been taking my stuffed Phish to cons and have had it peace tied as a gag. And this year it had the old Anime Expo tie on it so I actually had two separate rovers ask me to make sure I had this years peace tie. I'm fairly sure they were feeding the joke OR they had orders to make sure any old peace ties were up to date. Either way, when I got to Safety on Site the glad recognized my Phish and were happy to keep me up to date. I love Fanime!

Day 4. Slept in! Sort of, Did Laundry! Hit the con last day late, schmoozed in the Dealer Hall with friends who work there and same with Artist Alley. Decided to cap off the weekend with one last trip to Pizza My Heart. This year was a good one.
See yall at other Cons or next year!
Stay Classy H47ites!

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Double Move!

Standard Action. Season two began Filming a few weeks agoe!



I Finally Finished watching the end of Season One and cant wait for Two to start being put out!
First of all, how big of a blade nerd am I that I can recognize every sword used in the last three episodes and I know who designed them, manufactured them and how much they cost and whether or not they should have used them the way they did.
I will admit I kind of wish I could fly up there or live up there to do Stunt for them, because although i felt how they handled the combat was well thought out and executed, it told the story and kept me engaged, I feel it could have been more visceral. Especially had they been using two functional swords, not just one.
Character wise, I love the development and once more the characters lived and existed in the world and were invested in their universe. The tongue in cheek and meta jokes were well integrated and one was allowed to intuit them without having them hit you in the face. Bravo to the actors for doing the work and not sacrificing craft for camp or parody, but letting the script do it's job.

Who Needs Tanks & Heals. All you need is dps, support, support and a nuke!
Oh yeah, watch out, spoilers;
Oh My Gawd Edda is one hard ass bitch! She fuckin cut that foo!
Let me elaborate. I was thoroughly impressed by the choice to have Edda actually kill The Cleric as he was the obvious arch villain. My mind was blown. Bravo. this whole time you get this light-hearted, naive, almost "pretty dwarf" vibe from her and then BOOM, grim leadership from school of hard knocks call. Totally won MANY points with me.
An THEN, how they handle Fernando about it afterwards, priceless.
I'm sure there's more, but I unfortunately didn't get around to actually typing this up till a while after I watched it so some of it has faded from my memory.
Needless to say even if the quality is ONLY maintained in the future, I think Standard Action can stand Toe to Toe with other Web series greats like The Guild and Epic Meal Time.
And you can quote me on that, and I hope they will!
Go WATCH EVERYTHING ESPECIALLY . . . . . (something that I think might be good to condense and maybe make into a monologue. Maybe I should email the author and ask about permission and editing . . hrrrm . .)



Dense Post

Heavy wood! Oh yes, keeping the innuendos classy.
Thank you all for hanging in with my erratic update schedule the last couple weeks but I think I will have time next week to catch up and get us back on track.

First! Shameless Plug!!!!
Real







"IS IT REAL?"
Not Real
A blade info Panel to be presented at FANIME this weekend, Saturday at Noon and Sunday at 5 pm in The Dojo (Hilton side)
Come down, check it out, we got special offers for my shop and some prizes as well.


Next: If you like FPS's, Epic Meal Time, Shows about strange High Schools and crazy weaponized special effects . . . Then I just described:
Video Game High School
 Freddie Wong, Matt Arnold, Brandon Laatsch, & Desmond Dolly (yes, I can look at an "about" page WOO!) gather some of the world wide webs, webbest faces and do amazing nerdy things GO WATCH! ROCKET JUMP IS THE SIGHT CAUSE THEY MAKE OTHER THINGS TOO I MIGHT WATCH THEM!! HERE IS EPISODE 1 IF YOU WANT O WATCH IT BEFORE OR AFTER THE TRAILER BELOW! GO!


AAANNNDDD
I had a
STANDARD ACTION SEASON 1 REVIEW!!
but I felt it deserved its own post, so that's why it's above this post. Boo YA!


OVER 9000!! LIGHTSABRES!!!
Oh Yeah, I'm close to ordering a HALF A DOZEN LIGHTSABERS for my show later this summer, if you wish to purchase one and want a discount in exchange for letting me bash it about EMAIL ME ASAP! If we snap the blade it will be returned with a replacement and if the hilt is damaged I will offer you one of mine in recompense if the manufacturer doesn't warranty it. This is a tentative offer. email me for details.

Monday, May 14, 2012

Knapplesauce RPG Eve

A good pal of mine "Jubbles" is in town for a while so I'm hosting an RPG one shot. Since it's somewhat short notice and I don't even have an entire group confirmed I'm keeping it simple and posting the info here so that everyone involved can access it considering some don't use facebook and some don't use twitter.

Level one Pathfinder Society Characters!
(What the hell does that mean?) THIS!! HERE READ then DOWNLOAD THEN READ THIS
if you're like "Fuck you, H4773r! RPG's are about pretend not reading!" Then please build a level one pathfinder character, starting gold 150, point buy . . .
all stats start at 10, point values are
7, –4
8, –2
9, –1
10, 0
11, 1
12, 2
13, 3
14, 5
15, 7
16, 10
17, 13
18, 17
No scores below 7 or above 18, all before racial mods.
There are a few adjustments to item creation feats, siege engines and such. They will be addressed as necessary.
If you have no intent whatsoever to register your character for pathfinder play, these are merely suggestions.
If you already have a registered Society character, please feel free to bring it along, we will see if it is eligible for the module I will run.

I have the whole day off so if you want to show up before 3pm for help/to hang, contact me before midnight tomorrow (tuesday) So I can put clothes on in time.

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Grasp The Force

As some of you may know I have been given the the great opportunity to Fight Direct "Pericles," in a space opera/sci-fi homage setting, for Shady Shakespeare this summer. *Spoilers* There may be some swords with energy beams for blades. Also, there may be anywhere from 3-9 of these weapons on stage. Now, anyone who's played with the licensed "light sabers" from a certain franchise know that the $130 dollar types are nice and solid but can still break down with heavy repeated use, say . . . once a night 2-3 days a week for an entire month, ALSO, not to mention those are someone else's intellectual property and even though this would be a parody, I would like to bring some more unique and original designs to this production.

That being said, many of the places to get these crazy future swords will cost approx $200 on average (there are a few who go as low as $50 and some who go as high as $6-800 or more [GAWD I WANT! SO HARD] but 2-3 seems to be the dominant going price for most) and although a couple bills for one, maybe even two for someone who REALLY wants one seems like an okay, one-time purchase, I'm looking at upward of 3 thousand dollars. Without being specific about what my armory budget is, let me just say that I am not familiar with ANY production house that allows for that much of a budget for one single show, let alone 1 of 3 shows for the season with only one fight in it. Plus, I share the budget with props and there are some things in the show that I feel will be MUCH more pivotal to the performance than my one tussle and the raw materials alone for them will take a well deserved chunk of the allocated funds.
Yes, one solid piece of wood, a "laser sword bokken"
The reason I bring all this up, is one, my blog post for today is just a smattering of the research I've done looking at different production houses and shopping for props. And two, I'm blatantly going to ask you, my friends, family and assorted readers to either donate, purchase and contact me about acquiring lightsabres for this show. I am currently working on some ideas for fundraisers, I have fiddled with the idea for a Kickstarter/indie-gogo, but the magic idea would either be a straight donation (paypal button to the right ----> please feel free to put "for theatre lightsabres only" in the message, or even in person if you've ever met me) Or even purchase a lightsabre from any of the sources I provide and contact me to allow me and several other full grown adults (physically, not mentally) to bash it repeatedly for a few moths straight. Or even should you have one or a few already, any help would be appreciated. Please, if you are even the least bit inclined, email me at t3h (dot) h4773r (at) gmail (dot) com  and we can chat about ideas and needs of the production.

For those of you who came for the shineys, thank you for listening to my spiel, and just reading my blog is doing more than I'd ever expect, so on to the goodies!

Advanced-Light Weaponry
AWL. Main site, high-mid price
http://www.advanced-light.com/index.asp
Ebay store. Damn they're divers
 http://stores.ebay.com/ADVANCED-LIGHT-WEAPONRY
These are cool. Huge collection, I believe every blade is a custom item. Apparently there's a Texas troupe that has tried other sabers in the past and only his stand up to their abuse. I've talked to him over email, very swift to respond, sounds professional.




Ultra Sabers, low-mid price
http://www.ultrasabers.com/default.asp
I know a bunch of kids who got their sabers from here. They've been at it for some time and have a large selection as well as the most competitive prices I've seen. I attempted to contact them once or twice, but I believe I saw they had a booth at Wondercon around that time so I understand if they were a bit swamped, hope to hear from them soon.

Park Sabers, mid-high price
http://www.parksabers.com/
An old school "forge." The phase blades they use are SRZ BZNS and MAKE the eye see the blade trail. as well as using internal lamps so that the blade will "ignite" properly. I really like their double blader. I have only recently attempted to contact them, no word back yet, but they have one of those "on the site, enter your email & message" add ons and I'm not sure if my large message went through or even coded correctly, I guess I'll see.

Custom Saber Shop, low-high price.
 http://www.thecustomsabershop.com/Default.aspx
Another "old school forge" no single hilts & blades for sale BUT they have a custom builder interface I have played with a bit. I have not contacted them yet, and will try to in the near future.

FX Sabers  
http://www.fx-sabers.com/forum/index.php
More a resource hub & community than a one stop shop. A very active culture with a lot of info.

Saber Forge, price mid
http://saberforge.com/index.php
A newer guy to the field, met him at Anime Expo last year. He was quick to contact and nice enough. Many unique items there. My current favorite, mostly because of the items below . . .


Yes, Light-tonfa. Ah hahahaha!
Need some reach, how bout a pole-arm saber?

JQ sabers, High price
http://www.jqsabers.com/
Crazy High end, awesome sabers. clean pro site. UK crew. they do offer stunt sabers for about $200U.S. with a few customizable features.


Legacy Weaponry, mid-high price (
http://www.legacyweaponry.com/index.html
A student of AWL, started making his own when he moved. Not sure if he's still cracking them out, have not contacted. REALLY cool stuff though, You can definitely see the attention and, well, legacy, from the work with AWL.

I'm know I have missed/left out a few different lightsaber houses and maybe I will post on them later or even find a few more. I have even attempted to sift through numerous dead sites and un-informed reviews to try and gauge how "good" each company is and quite honestly I can't find enough to make a reliable assumption about any of them. Although, I think anyone who has time and energy to honestly crack these things out is a step above any sort of massed produced thing, so, I'd start with kudos to all of them and then go from there.

And, just to jazz you up, here's Ray Park being awesome, apparently something he does A LOT!

Thursday, May 3, 2012

3rd 4 T3h NRRD: May '12

Tribe One

Also, Tribe One Won, Dirty South Swamp Thing, Devil Rhymeosaur & Ol' Dirty Batroc. And I'm sure other awesome pseudonyms as well.
It's a shirt. I really want one. As much as I loathe those "pop-eye as a playa" or "pink panther as a pimp" Tees, this one is fresh, yo!
This particular artist was once part of a group called Remnant and has since guested on many Nerdcore tracks across the verse, some might be very familiar, and has laid down a couple albums, you can scope them NYAH. 
He has also toured with MC Chris & Adam Warrock for a stint on the Race Wars Tour.

I really hope this dude keeps producing and performing as I like his semi-spoken word style and his clean delivery. The beats he employs are usually solid with what I would call roots in more old school hip-hop but many that are unquestionably nerdy.
"That's right, I'm a grown ass man about to go out in public in a Spiderman Shirt" - a quote from his Facebook
He seems to be very in touch with the southern scene with a know-how and passion. There is a lot of heart in his music, and I like how clean that is. I like me some gimmicky/silly/obscene punchlines as much as the next angry nerd, but there's truth in his music that is refreshing and there needs to be more of it in the world in general.

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

SAUSAGE FEST!

As promised, this is the post about Sausage Fest.

It all began when RunningRyan, as he always does, was bemoaning the fact that we are not "Bert & Ernie" life mates, or if you ask him what he said, it would probably sound like "we need to hang out some time," and there might have also been mention of watching Season 4 of Venture Bros. To which I replied, "I guess, maybe for a bit, maybe Ti-Slut can come along and chaperone." *Thought* "Man, that would be a sausage fest . . . hey! that actually sounds delicious, lets get a bunch of tubed meat together and watch cartoons!" Then C.J. &  . . . (Spent way too long trying to come up with a clever pseudonym that properly conveyed the characters she plays and the type of person she is and could not adequately develop one at this time . . . woman) piped in asking if they could attend and would stuff if necessary. Encouraged by members of the fairer gender (one of my many follies, I'm sure) I declared the event to be a future thing!

We established a date & time, got coverage at work, so all could attend, and there may have even been a facebook event that read . . .

@ H47cave

BYO-Sausage and enough to share. We will be watching Venture Bros. Season 4. And otherwise BSing till a "decent" hour at night/in the morning. You can bring a friend or two, but no more than two.


Then, The Sausegening Began . . . .

Yes, Mini-Cheddarwursts & sausage wrapped in pancake-dogs. Savory & sweet



Some of "The Spread"





Another POV shot. Oh yeah, Pievuhg brought tacos to a sausage fest. typical.















 There were two not present for the Wide shot of the Orgy of Tubed Meat, but they gorged themselves as well as any you see there, guilty and debauched.




Many things were discussed . . .



And in the end, I suffered a great blow for my lust for sausage and company . . .




 And so was SAUSAGE FEST!!!!