Important If True 49: You Don't Just Eat 'Em

[Jake]

Important If True 49:

You Don't Just Eat 'Em
Send us your problems, your conundrums, your mysteries, no matter how important, and we'll do our absolute best to figure it all out. This week: What is the loneliest food? Is it a sandwich? If "you don't just eat" Pringles, what DO you do with them? And, why do birds suddenly appear, every time you are near? In this case it may be because the bird is an immobile cement statue you have mistaken for your wife. But don't worry, we're on it! Join us.

Discussed: Dodgson (nobody cares), calling people on the phone, The Coldblum, Nigel "No Mates" the Lonely Gannet, radicalized Men's Rights Birds, dorky-looking Night Herons (god what nerds), bird catfishing, The Lake Merritt Center for Thirsty Birds, Pringles: You Don't Just Eat 'Em, a name like Smuckers, Fuddruckers, The Nigel Experiment, A scientist's thoughts on the Crow Box, the loneliest food, sandwiches, the Red Vines waxy pound, The Guardian's history of the British packaged sandwich industry, [ASMR] ~British Packaged Sandwich Industry~ podcast crisp mouthfeel.mpeg, Orson Welles' frozen peas commercial outtakes, street pizza, bird self-recognition, bird-on-human political gaslighting



Send us your questions at questions@importantiftrue.com. If you enjoyed this and would like to subscribe to an ad-free feed, please consider supporting Idle Thumbs by backing our Patreon. Jake's Endorsement: Jordan Eldredge's full-featured Winamp 2 running in your web browser

Nick's Endorsement: Teaching yourself to draw, even if you do it badly

Jake's Chained-On Endorsement: Taking a community college introduction to studio art or drawing class

Chris' Corrective Endorsement: The Android version of New York Times Crossword, which exists, contrary to previous claims

Chris' Endorsement: MP Matt Hancock's inexplicable personal social network "Matt Hancock MP" for iOS and Android

 

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[Salacious Snake]

I like the new podcast slogan: Just Butt Stuff. 

[RubixsQube]

[Nappi]

Orson Welles' commercials are fascinating: 

 

 

[thenexus6]

Anyone got a link to that bit where Chris and jake stayed silent and just let Nick talk? I can't quite remember when that happened and would like to relisten to the clip!

[ke51n]

8 hours ago, thenexus6 said:

Anyone got a link to that bit where Chris and jake stayed silent and just let Nick talk? I can't quite remember when that happened and would like to relisten to the clip!

around the 9 minute mark.

 

[chummer]

let's keep the horny bird talk going: http://metro.co.uk/2018/02/08/blind-bisexual-goose-stuck-love-triangle-two-swans-dies-aged-40-7296814/

 

[WealthyAardvark]

A children's anime came out last year titled Kemono Friends about anthropomorphic animals from around the globe. It was huge, unexpected success, and as part of a cross promotion a zoo in Japan took cardboard cutouts of the various Friends and put them in their matching enclosures in the zoo. This is the story of Grape-kun, a Humboldt Penguin who fell in love with the standee in his enclosure.
https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interest/2017-05-01/soap-opera-of-grape-the-zoo-penguin-in-love-with-kemono-friends-character/.115566
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/grape-kun

http://www.knowyourmeme.com/photos/1248563-grape-kun

[Alastair]

What a wonderful spectrum covered in this episode: from the harrowing loneliness of Nigel to the giddy delight of realising Important If True could follow through on their silly domain joke, turn commentary into action, and - in a small but genuinely meaningful way - save social media.

[root]

I know you guys were goofing when you were talking about creating a special-interest Important If True social network but if there was an idle thumbs hosted Mastodon instance I would be there like, now.

[plasticflesh]

I am compelled to assert the most pedantic bird related correction that is a sort of curse laid upon me by hanging out with bird watchers.

 

Technically there is no such thing as a "sea gull," it is just "gull."

 

There are many types of gulls, but there is no distinction between sea gulls and land gulls, as there is no sort of land gull, all gulls are of the sea.

🕊️

[plasticflesh]

I'm also compelled to share this Animaniacs bit that faithfully reenacts the entire Frozen Peas bit, just cleaning up a bit of the blue bits. It's pretty verbatim. It's good. I'm not sure why there's a bit of The Critic at the front of this youtube. The Critic also does a lot of Welles jokes so there's that.

[Flay]

Since there seems to be a lot of love for speedrunning here, I'm going to point out that the European Speedrunner Assembly is about to start its winter marathon on the 17th. It's very similar to Games Done Quick - better, in a few ways.

 

Also, I know you guys were talking about learning to draw casually, but I've been trying to learn to draw for a few years, I thought I'd share a bunch of resources that I've discovered that might be useful for anyone looking to try

 

Websites:

www.drawabox.com

www.proko.com

www.schoolism.com (in particular 'Fundamentals of Lighting' by Sam Nielson)

 

Books:

Everything by Andrew Loomis

'How to Draw' by Scott Robertson

'How to Render' by Scott Robertson

'Colour and Light' by James Gurney

'Artistic Anatomy' by Paul Richer

'Animator's Survival Kit' by Richard E. Williams

'The Charle's Bargue Drawing Course' by Charles Bargue

 

There's a lot more that I could suggest but those are the best that I've found so far

[Brannigan]

8 hours ago, plasticflesh said:

I'm also compelled to share this Animaniacs bit that faithfully reenacts the entire Frozen Peas bit, just cleaning up a bit of the blue bits. It's pretty verbatim. It's good. I'm not sure why there's a bit of The Critic at the front of this youtube. The Critic also does a lot of Welles jokes so there's that.

Maurice Lamarche voices both orsen welles and the brain...I think the brain's voice is actually based on Welles?  Anyway this is my excuse to share the critic clips!

 

 

[Problem Machine]

A book I found very useful starting out as an artist was Anatomy: A Complete Guide for Artists by Joseph Sheppard. It goes into detail with how the tendon and muscles are laid onto the skeleton and how they change position when each body part moves, which was incredibly useful. I also reinforced some of this information with watching a video dissection of a cadaver but that experience is a bit more difficult to broadly recommend.

 

A super important lesson when it comes to drawing, I think, is that a lot of the time you're doing two jobs in one: You're designing an idea of a picture in your mind and you're making careful marks on paper to represent that idea. This is important to remember because you don't always have to do both of these at once, and it can be much easier and more pleasurable to focus on one or the other sometimes. I found, myself, that having a hard time coming up with an Idea and being frustrated when the Idea I did come up with didn't pan out was initially a huge impediment to improvement and productivity for me -- focusing on just making marks on paper and eventually shaping those towards some expressive goal can be much more approachable. Conversely, sometimes it's fine to just study technique and anatomy without worrying about immediately applying it, and just let it sink down into the mind for later use.

[Flay]

Hm, never heard of that book before, I'll have to check it out.

 

Also I've never thought of separating it like that before, but that makes a lot of sense

[plasticflesh]

Re: drawing

 

Recently I've been giving identical advice to beginners as what @Problem Machine mentioned above, but I phrase it differently: as expression versus technique. The expression of representing the idea comes first and in my opinion is more important. The technique of perfecting the representation is something that comes with practice and time.
 

I think about it in terms of music, too. Punk rock is always notorious for musicians using very simple techniques, 3 chord songs if even that, but are also celebrated for their enthusiasm and charisma in early works.

 

This is why I don't like to decry stick figures. I think it is a miracle that smiley faces and stick figures exist, and that humans can so easily glob onto their semiotic meaning. XKCD for one is brilliant and conveying the versatility of a stick figure.

 

Anyway I found for me personally that I enjoy art instructors who focus more on expression and idea rather than technique. Of course an art instructor is meant to teach technique, but also to be supportive in celebrating ideas and charisma and enthusiasm. So my suggestion is if a person goes to an art class and is over whelmed or feels bullied out of it, in my opinion that is the fault of the professor. But people are also all different, and some desire the boot camp mean professor approach, so finding a good art class is like finding a therapist, it often is about a relationship between the tutor and tutee.

 

 

[plasticflesh]

"The Art Spirit by Robert Henrii" is one of my favorite drawing instruction books, because it's basically all expression and no technique, and therefore it's sort of a useless book, but I find it so amusing for it's pretentious inspiration quality.

 

I was also really inspired by Giorgio Morandi, an abstract painter who ended up drawing the same still life for decades. This article has some good quotes, such as: "One can travel the world and see nothing," he said, "To achieve understanding it is necessary not to see many things, but to look hard at what you do see."

 

In terms of actually helpful books I became a sort of perspective nerd at one point. I can't think of actually helpful books besides the totally cheesy but I think not bad "Drawing on the Right side of the Brain", and the terribly religious, new age, self help trollop "The Artists Way", but it might have some interesting exercises buried in there.

[plasticflesh]

Since I'm an animation nut, and if you're intersting in drawing cartoon style, it's also interesting to look at animation bibles to see what they prescribe for their shows. King of the Hill Animation Pointers, Story Boarding the Simpsons Way PDF

[root]

On 2/12/2018 at 7:40 AM, root said:

I know you guys were goofing when you were talking about creating a special-interest Important If True social network but if there was an idle thumbs hosted Mastodon instance I would be there like, now.

 

Update: Looks like there is now an idle thumbs mastodon instance.