As you may remember, I won a contest to design a T-Shirt for one of my musical heroes, Thomas Dolby, for a one off concert he just did March 28 in the UK.

Well, they produced the t-shirts with the design for the concert, but they also used my design on a huge video screen in the church where the concert took place, and hooked up a webcam on Dolby's piano so that when he was playing, his face showed up in the center of my design! How cool is that? Here's some photos of the actual t-shirt that people sent me, along with shots of the video screen.

Had to miss this show, but Mr. Dolby has assured me he'll make it worth my while when he tours the US for his upcoming album.

(Photo courtesy of some nice fan at the show, many thanks!)

Tons more photos here: THOMAS DOLBY'S FORUM

Wow, THIS is going to be an interesting week...
The pitch from Warren Ellis:
"So here's the deal:

You are an artist/designer. You have to put together the cover for a comic called SUPERMAN. It is issue 1 of this book.

You have been told that Superman is a man who dresses predominantly in a shade of blue, and wears a red S symbol. You know nothing else about the character.

The cover must include a logo and the text THE COMPLETE STORY OF THE DARING EXPLOITS OF THE ONE AND ONLY SUPERMAN.

And that's it.

It's up to you what kind of company you're at. What kind of comics you make. How you translate that description of Superman. What era you're in. Who you are, even. Go nuts with it.

You have one week. Go."

Decided to whip out the type-fu for this one, go all Swiss on it.
Worked really hard to keep it simple, and assume nothing more than exactly what was given.

Here's a bunch of recent stuff that's been posted on Warren Ellis' WHITECHAPEL forums in various places. Gotta be true to my commitment to keep making 2010 a year of MAKE.

After a short hiatus, the REMAKE/REMODEL thread is active at Whitechapel. Here's this week's challenge:

"Skyrocket Steele was a hero in the year X. He was assisted by Sari Marston and Invex the Invisible Man. His nemesis was Vance Roy.
Skyrocket Steele was the first character created by Bill Everett (the guy who created the Sub Mariner."

So here's my take on it:
"Skyrocket" Steele, the most highly decorated pilot of the French Negro Air Corps of 1923. His daughter Sari served as his mechanic, and the corps were funded by the "invisible" Invex Corporation, a secret group of investors.

MASSIVE ATTACK: HELIGOLAND (9 out of 10)
Review by Paul Sizer

Massive Attack won me over from the start by how they combined so many influences into a cohesive mix. Dub, reggae, electronics, dance/club influences, rap, hip hop, all things that, if combined badly, would result in a horrible sludge of fighting and dissonance. But what made Massive Attack really standout was their fearlessness at then, on top of all that, bringing in vocalists that actually had a different angle on all of it. Tricky, Horace Andy, Tracy Thorn, Sinead O'Connor, Liz Fraser. And they let these vocalists do what they do, and in some way, it all seemed like it belonged together. The mix is their strength. Always.

My vote for strongest album is "Protection", followed right on the heels by "Mezzanine". "100th Window" and "Danny The Dog" only suffered because they strayed from the vocalist in the mix quotient, and became more a solo project of Robert Del Naja. And while he is a brilliant producer of sounds, I think he realized that his true strength lies in working with great vocalists. Hence "Heligoland". 

I will venture to drop "Heligoland" in at #3 for me, only because of the slightly uneven nature of "Blue Lines", which I'll put at #4. Part of Massive Attack's earlier albums being so ahead of the curve were that NOBODY was doing what they do. Now, there's a whole generation of musicians who have had Massive Attack's albums as part of their learning process, so they don't stand apart as much as they once did. But they must know this, because while many bands sound like them, nobody really sounds as good as they do at it. 

My first comment on hearing Gil Scott-Heron's new stuff was "Man, THIS is what Massive Attack needs to sound like." But I'll take that back a bit; Gil's new music fits very nicely in the mold made by Massive Attack years ago. Dubstep owes it's genesis at least in part to what Massive Attack paved. I loved hearing Scott-Heron's new music because it reminded me of hearing Massive Attack's mixture. 

I'll give "Heligoland" a 9 out of 10, only because I want to hear more of the remixes that are sure to come from this album, and because they can always still surprise me, so I give them room to do so.

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I DID get a review of LITTLE WHITE MOUSE in a Russian gamer magazine.
Here I am reading the article, or at least looking at the pictures and pretending it's a glowing review. (My contact assures me that the review is kind).
My promo copy came in the mail today.

Been screwing around for a few days with some freeware called ALCHEMY. Very cool, randomized sketching software, more dedicated to the chaotic creation of forms rather than straight up representation. Not sure how it's best used, but it's a nice distraction and brain clearing exercise. Check out the website for download and sample work, along with the designers showing how it can be used. Very cool!

Here's a desktop design I did last night, again just messing around, but some cool directions may come from this.

Lots of stuff in the hopper right now, and lots of things on the horizon. Good stuff. Fun stuff. So here's a catch up on some art posted on the Ellis boards for some of the recent REMAKE threads:

My LITTLE WHITE MOUSE comic (which is currently running in its entirety on WEBCOMICS NATION) just got a review from a Russian magazine:

Pretty groovy, nyet?

My "remix" of the #1 issue of SPIDER-WOMAN from the late 70's was the featured entry on the "very cool and filled with amazing art" blog COVERED

I had a soft spot in my heart for this cover, in that it was one of the first #1 issues that I was able to buy as a kid collecting comics, along with MICRONAUTS, SHOGUN WARRIORS and GODZILLA, all from Marvel during their late 70's binge of licensed comic series.

Here's the cover on its own: