Nevsky

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Posts posted by Nevsky

  1. Posted

    Wow, Scott McCloud! Great work, Kingzjester!

    The second episode of Behind The Bytes is up now. This time we're looking at the Zelda franchise. Or at least our absurd approximation of it.

    KQGWc8Mmsw4

    A few tweaks after last time: a shorter script, generally pacier editing, and a different location for one of the talking heads. Hopefully it's better overall. The last episode was featured on Kotaku, so I'm hoping lightning strikes twice...

  3. Posted

    Sleepdance, Miffy, glad you both liked it! Now, Thunderpeel...

    Very good indeed! :tup:

    It's very close to being brilliant, in fact. Well done.

    Um. Ways to improve it? The graphical stuff is good, the acting... not great. Not terrible, but could be improved.

    The story is what made it interesting, and made me keep watching. I'd say do more of that. Nothing massively convoluted, though. Just more drama. You could have added stuff about Sonic feeling guilty about leaving his old partner behind, and that's how Tails got involved in Sonic 2, for example. (I'm a sucker for characters and story.)

    Technically the SEGA guy's backdrop could have been less bland, and the audio quality wasn't great (echo-ey rooms).

    Funny stuff. Would definitely like more :tup:

    Thanks for the comments, and I'm glad you liked it overall. And, yeah, all the points are valid, and ones that occurred to us when we were shooting/editing:

    Acting: The straightforward answer here is that we're not actors, apart from Samantha (who I think is noticeably better). We aimed to keep the team tight, so the three guys are all hyphenates. Also, we were still feeling out the characters as we went through the day-long shoot.

    Location: We shot it all in one day at a friend's flat, so were limited in terms of space. For the Jeff Tozai segments, we were going for 'corporate void', and instead got a slightly reverb-tinged man-in-an-empty room effect. If there's a next time we'll try something different.

    Thanks again, guys. We're trying to get it out there, and get some eyeballs on it, just to see if there's actually an audience for a series like that. So far, traffic has been slow, but I'm hoping it picks it up soon.

  4. Posted · Edited by Nevsky

    Straight up: here's a pilot for a webseries I've been developing with a couple of friends. Just some dudes with some equipment and a sense of humour.

    We've called it Behind The Bytes, based on Behind The Music (and, more importantly, the Simpsons episode 'Behind The Laughter'). It will peddle completely fictitious short documentaries, looking at the scandalous lives of video game characters. The pilot is about Tails, from Sonic the Hedgehog: it is a tragic tale of companionship, obsession, and sprinting.

    Have a look.

    0OV2ZRm3o44

    Comments, pointers, feedback? We're going to see if there's an actual audience for this kind of thing, before proceeding.

  9. Posted · Edited by Nevsky

    Like it!

    [amazing image, with some good books and some bad books that apparently we all should read]

    Around 27 for me. Surprising list, really. I guess that's consensus for you. Interesting to chart the shift from 'classics' (the wodge of Dickens) to 'cultural touchstones' (Lolita, Crash, Androids, Foundation, Hitchhikers, Dune!) and then the absolute split between popular and critically-lauded fiction in the late 20th century.

    And, wow, two books by the author of The Kite Runner?

  18. Posted

    Big fan of Kon's work, Perfect Blue in particular. Still need to see Paranoia Agent, though.

    I'm sending in my Masters' thesis proposal today, and I'm writing about fansubbing, so I guess I need to watch a lot more anime, and call it research.

  19. Posted

    Without having seen True Grit, you're missing what I personally would call the best movie of the year, so you should probably get on that.

    Yep, they've been screening it for critics over here since before Christmas, so I've had colleagues and friends going on about it a lot. But then, when it came to the actual review, another guy covered it (same with The Fighter), so I have to wait.

    Fuck Rabbit Hole mostly because I'm sick of white suburban problems being what draws all the nominations. Everything I've seen of Rabbit Hole looks like the kind of thing I already saw from Little Children which, while a fantastic movie, kind of filled my quota of suburban white movies for the next several years after. There's just so much more that's interesting out there that I can't be bothered to see those things as much.

    You're missing out. I liked it a lot. Sure, I guess the characters are middle class, but I don't think loss is a 'white suburban problem'. And it's not really drawing 'all the nominations' at all, which I think is a shame, because I think it - and Blue Valentine - deserves a lot more recognition. They're both similarly complex, sincere, and powerful.

  20. Posted

    Only best picture nominee that I still need to see (besides Rabbit Hole, because fuck Rabbit Hole) is now Blue Valentine. Hopefully will be going tomorrow. Whoo, movies!

    Neither of those films are nominated for Best Picture. Why 'fuck Rabbit Hole'?

    I still have to see The Fighter and True Grit, because they've not been released here yet. Oh, and Winter's Bone, as I missed it at the time.

  22. Posted · Edited by Nevsky

    It looks like there haven't been a lot of comic books mentioned in this thread, so I'm going to solicit some recommendations. I've recently been pretty wrapped up reading DC stuff, like Tornado's Path and Batman: Year One. My experience with comics is pretty damn limited, so essentially anything is on the table.

    I've already got The Dark Knight Returns, Identity Crisis, Earth 2, Batman: Hush, Green Lantern: Rebirth, and Kingdom Come on my radar, for what it's worth.

    All-Star Superman is essential, I'd say, but you've got a good list there to work through.

    In kinda-books news, I got the new 'issue' of McSweeney's Quarterly Concern today. It's a box, that looks a little like a pink Clark Gable, full of literary goodies. Here's a pic of it on my shelf:

    mcsweeneys36.jpg

    And a video going through the contents:

    sAkURFRqu_8

  23. Posted

    I completed Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light today. Fun game! I enjoyed it a lot more than I expected, and it was a steal for [cheap price on Steam].

    I'm surprised that no one on my friends list seems to have gone further than the first couple of levels. And, judging by the leaderboards, a startling 75% dropped off before getting to the final level. Deserves a little more attention, because I think the puzzle-adventure design is top-notch.

  24. Posted

    I'd second a few up that have already been mentioned, such as Kate Beaton. I read quite a few webcomics, but here's one I'll recommend:

    My Cardboard Life - The art style might look like a gimmick at first, but the very distinctive sense of humour (a mixture of dry wit, groan-inducing puns, silliness and passive-aggression) is what brings me back. Plus, there are some great ideas, such as this recent strip, where one of the characters attempted to escape from the comic.