Archive for October, 2007
When the Zero-Gravity Avenger sets down on the dusky surface of Mars, you know you’re going to be seeing ACTION!
Driving around a bit east of our office, I cruised by a little clothing shop, obviously barely staying in business. In huge letters in their windows they were advertising:
CALZONES UNDERWEAR CALZONES
It is now easy to understand exactly what their highly successful business model is. Only in Downtown can you find such delights.
Drawn by the incredible Christie Hauck.
Rick’s post about the cancellation of Online Nation got me thinking.
From my days as a web designer/developer, I have a fantastic book called The Elements of User Experience by Jesse James Garnett, which is a big-picture look at the process of developing web sites that work the way the user expects them to.
The web is no longer my primary source of income, nor what I spend most of my time working on, but I still like to re-read this book every few years, because the principles within are intelligent, effective, and apply to all sorts of projects. In my most recent reading, I was struck by a few observations.
CW’s new program “Online Nation,” featuring “the best of user-generated web videos, was the first show of the year to get cancelled. One of our clips here at Psychic Bunny, “Frotuma” was on the final episode. Sigh, so sad.
Even more sad was that a video by my sketch comedy group, Six Finger Fist, was set to air later in the season. That video was “The Good, The Bad, and The Cuddly,” and now no one will ever get to see it. Well, unless they go online.
Which is the point of a few bloggers who have tried to figure out why the show has such dismal ratings. Steve Briant at ReelPop says that online “you’re in control. The you is the most important part, and Online Nation removed “you” entirely.” You can read the whole post here.
I watched the few episodes of the show that were on, though, and I thought they were a lot of fun. It reminded me a lot of “Robot Chicken,” in that they took the best parts of online video, cut out all the boring parts, and strung it along in a very frenetic crazy way. The hosts were very scripted and dull, and obviously weren’t allowed much freedom. But I think overall the concept worked.
This other blog says the whole concept of watching YouTube videos online has repeatedly failed. Why, though? People watch a lot of TV online– shouldn’t they want to watch internet videos on TV?
I personally just think they didn’t brand the show well enough. America’s Funniest Home Videos is basically the same kind of thing, but you know exactly what kind of videos you’re going to be watching– people getting kicked in the pants, pets being adorable, wedding mishaps, etc. And it’s been on the air for YEARS. Online Nation from the outside looked like it was going to be a completely sterile show.
But then when you actually watch it, it’s this CRAZY mixed up mash of totally random videos. It’s a lot more like Robot Chicken, and if the hosts had been as crazy as the videos, and the advertising just as crazy, I think the show would have been more successful. The craziness, from my POV, should have been the selling point of the show.
Please yes. Yes, yes, a thousand times yes.
Newsarama reports that the writers of “Superman Returns” are out, Warner Bros might pull a “Hulk” and make a sequel that has nothing to do with “Superman Returns,” and Mark Millar has offerred to write the script for the new Superman movie for free. This is ALL great news.
If there’s one thing Mark Millar does well, it is have people hit things.
Here, lean back and relax to the utter pleasantry of HunterGatherer’s intro for the Swerve Festival…
Especially in the indie film world, this seems to be the never-ending debate, especially with the release of RED and the spread of 35mm adapters for virtually every camera out there. Somehow, even though I hate it, I got in another one of these debates yesterday, and I realized something:
People who are asking this question almost never mention specifically What they are shooting, or Why they want the camera in the first place!
I’ll see Asa’s xkcd, and Doug’s Dead the Whole Time and raise you a Questionable Content (pops).
Some of my favorites of this comic are below:
Critical Error (pops)
And Now You Will Too (pops)
Assimilation (pops)
Admittedly its a longer storyish based comic, but they have some really nice zingers.
Enjoy!
Craig
Riffing off Asa’s last past, I figure I could throw some love to Dead the Whole Time, the web comic our friend Mike puts up. If you like movies and bitter sarcasm, you’ll like this!