March 2018 – Page 2

Chris Ashley, Untitled, 20070805

3/29/20183/31/2018 by tom moody Comments Off

ashley_20070805

The HTML version of this piece was originally posted here in August 2007.
The CSS (or something) is shifting the yellow object to the far right, and adding some faint border lines. The original drawing from Ashley's blog is no longer online, so I emailed asking if he could send me the file.
The above is a screenshot (.png) made from the .htm opened in Firefox without any blog post middleman. If you click this link you can see the version altered by Word Press.

More on Ashley and the subject of making HTML drawings in an era of CSS, json, and overbearing web developers who stole publishing away from the People, man.

Chris Ashley, Concession, 2012

3/28/20183/29/2018 by tom moody Comments Off

chris_ashley_concession

Screenshot (.png) of HTML piece by Chris Ashley, from his blog. Posted on Jan. 16, 2012 and captioned as: "Concession, 20120116, HTML, 370 x 430 pixels." The caption is included in the screenshot to preserve some sense of the spacing. The white area around the colored rectangles shrinks and grows with the browser width; it was captured with the minimum padding allowed by the browser. My blog formatting adds more padding.

I have some older Ashley pieces posted where the HTML is no longer reading correctly; I've emailed Ashley to see if we can (or should) reconstitute those. HTML, the people's coding medium, is clearly on its way out the door in the current era of web developer dominance. HTML became shaky for "blog art" almost from the outset, because different browsers, PCs, and CSS design schemes seemed to render it differently. Ashley's pieces aren't hand-coded, in the sense of typing out table instructions for where the colors go. Originally he used Dreamweaver, a WYSWYG editor. Not sure what he's using now (he's still posting the drawings) or if it matters.

Update: Ashley notes via email that "the drawings are made with code and that despite using Dreamweaver [MX] these are not generated files ...but are mostly handmade, or hand-drawn."

hack movies and the composers who score for them

3/27/20183/31/2018 by tom moody Comments Off

Back in the day Cracked was a Mad clone but at some point it rebranded itself as a vehicle for feisty thinkpieces.
Here's one about the trials and tribulations of movie composers, written in the form of a "five reasons" listicle. (A format that's one of five causes of mass cognitive impairment and shallowness.)
The article isn't so much an example of the unreliable narrator as it is unreliable tone. Like the Wired piece about seniors in camper villages, it gushes and burbles in a humorous upbeat way about a grim subject: the state of movies and the hack mentality that infects every aspect of production. Hans Zimmer is held up as some kind of paragon, for a sh*tty Batman score that other composers imitate. The feeling you get is that if another Jerry Goldsmith or Ennio Morricone came along and wanted to do something offbeat today, he would be stifled by corporate toadies. Also celebrated is the virtual soundtrack, where the composer never leaves his or her computer but makes sweeping orchestral gestures that sound like recycled Max Steiner. Uggh, enough.

concentric sketch (inverted)

3/26/20183/28/2018 by tom moody Comments Off

concentric sketch (inverted)

Tommoody.us began its life as a blog that people could view on a PC. This meant long form writing and art that could be comfortably displayed up to 650 pixels in width.* Then suddenly instead of computers people spent all their time with a small device. This means shorter text and smaller pictures. One could say this is making everyone cognitively impaired and shallow but it's ultimately less work for me. I can make small art.

*without resizing, which mushes some bitmap-style art

nation held hostage by casino magnate

3/26/20183/26/2018 by tom moody Comments Off

No, not that one, the other one. Mondoweiss:

The simple truth about John Bolton’s appointment to national security adviser is that the Republicans need Sheldon Adelson’s money in order to be competitive in the coming midterms, and John Bolton is a tool of Sheldon Adelson.

The appointment of course is a complete reversal of Donald Trump’s declaration during the campaign that the Iraq war – which Bolton pushed and still thinks is a great idea – was the biggest mistake ever, and he was against it from jump.

But Adelson was Trump’s biggest donor during the 2016 campaign, and Trump needs Sheldon Adelson’s money to keep Congress from flipping and cutting his throat.

It’s little wonder that any Republican with political ambition was quick to extol John Bolton. Politico reported in February that many of those “desperate” Republicans were trekking to Las Vegas and “gushing” over Adelson because they need him “more than ever” to try and hold on to the House this year.

Also:

The only place you will hear about Trump’s placating Adelson with the Bolton pick are on Lobelog and the American Conservative and Democracy Now! [links added --tm]

... in other words, only the the Far Center is calling this correctly.