There was one week a month or so ago when I churned out a crap ton of art. Then I stopped. Not sure why, but here are some of the fruits of that (and other) endeavors.

There you have it. Enjoy!

As some of you who follow me on Twitter may have noticed, I recently crafted a small bit for inclusion in the write in portion of Anime News Network's Hey, Answerman! column. Unfortunately, I was snubbed there and didn't have my writings brought to a larger than usual mass, but as I was planning on ranting about that topic on my blog anyways, I shall put it here regardless. (Damn you, Answerman!!!)

The question put forth was thus:

How open are you about your anime love with friends, family, and colleagues? Do you wear anime cloting, or read manga on your break? Be honest, damn it!

His incorrect spelling of "dammit" notwithstanding, here was my response:

When it comes to sharing my feelings of the various Japanese related media that I ingest on a day-to-day basis, I'm really very open. After all, why is it that just because a person likes media from a different country, they should be ashamed? For that matter, why are they persecuted? People who really enjoy sports or cars or anything "normal" don't have to face this problem, but they're doing the exact same thing we "otaku" do; follow, enjoy and obsess over their particular subject of interest. I suppose it's the "die hards" that taint the perception of the anime crowd, but aren't we all annoyed by that one person who won't shut up about his obsession (whatever it may be)? But, now I'm delving into another topic all together.

I enjoy my anime, my manga, and Japanese culture in general and I'm not afraid to share that enjoyment with those I'm with. But, at the same time, I try to keep in mind that they may not enjoy the subject as much as I do and adjust my level of enthusiasm accordingly.

One thing I did not mention, but was actually a driving force for me writing something in the first place, is a nerd's treatment of another type of nerd. To rant about somebody else's fanboyish obsessions while you yourself are guilty of the same crime, though it may be in a different field, should be punishable by damnation. Granted, I myself am guilty of this, but there it is.

/rant

So, after my epic battles with Premiere and then three times uploading to YouTube, I've finally finished the video that completes my series of reviews. If you can excuse the rather poor writing and me tripping up over my words, you may find enjoyment in it. Either way, it's been fun writing these reviews and I look forward to the good stuff to come in 2010!

Due to many codec and such type issues, progress on the third and final installment has not progressed as quickly or smoothly as I hoped, so I'll give you a quick sneak peak at what's coming down the turnpike.

Here we are at part 2 of the Matt's Grand Anime Review. Today I focus mainly on shounen/action genres.

Dragon Ball Z

Without Dragon Ball Z the American anime market may very well not exist (certainly not the way it does today). DBZ is certainly an entertaining show, what with all the rediculous battles and "power up" sequences, but it's not without its faults. Cheesy and reptitive animation dampen the action sequences and there really isn't a whole lot of character development. In fact, I consider DBZ to be almost like a "bro show". And, toss on the fact that no character can ever really die and a lot of the suspense has just been killed. But, at that, it does make for some excellent entertainment if you're willing to overlook the formulaic plots and the aforementioned other problems. 6/10

As a kind of quick Merry Christmas to anybody reading this blog, I bring to you some of my latest art pieces. I'm thinking perhaps that an art section on the gallery page might be a good idea, but in the mean time you can enjoy it right here or on my deviantArt page. But, I digress.

I hope everybody had a Merry Christmas and will have an awesome New Year!

Here begins three articles of anime reviews. Yes, I know I said two in the previous post, but after creating the list I realized it would be more prudent to split this into three. This also allows me to kind of categorize things and I'll kick the list off with cute and romantic comedies. Another thing to note is that my criteria have changed. The movies and video games were all things released in 2008-2009. These are all things I watched in those years. So, without further ado, here is part one of my anime reviews.

Midori Days

Midori Days falls into the latter of the aforementioned categories. The premise is absolutely rediculous opening with protagonist Sawamura Seiji waking up one day to find that a tiny girl, Kasugano Midori, has replaced his right hand. Oddly enough, even though the show indulges in more fan service than any other I've watched, there was never a raunchy moment, something I thought odd considering the premise. The overall story follows these two as Midori tries to win over Seiji who is otherwise distracted by just about every other woman within eyesight... except the ones that actually like him. The show is full of plenty of laughs and feel good moments and I'd certainly recommend watching it if you are interested in the genre. 7/10

In the downtime during my ever continuing quest for employment, I've taken up a few extra hobbies to keep from going completely bored. Some are more relevent to my future line of work, while others are simply for my enjoyment.

One thing that I've attempted to take up again is drawing. My skills currently sit somewhere between mediocre and decent, a stat I'd certainly like to level up. So, my brother Chris and I have periodically enjoyed an evening of drawing while watching the nerdy sitcom, Big Bang Theory. Unfortunately, we've finished the first two seasons and now are forced to wait a week for new episodes, as the third season just began. For the off days, BBT has been summarily replaced with Pinky and the Brain.

In keeping with my new found - and probably unhealthy - fascination with the land of the rising sun, I've been taking cues from the manga/anime style (much of which is fan art). So, for those who enjoy that sort of thing, here's a gallery of some of the artwork I've created over the lest month and a half.

So, there it is. You probably noticed that there's a bit of a common theme to the above pictures (beyond the manga/anime thing). If you didn't, you lose five points and get no cookie.

It's been quite some time since I last graced the interwebs with my esoteric writings. Much has happened since then and, on the flip side, much hasn't happened since then. Hell I don't even remember what the last thing I wrote was. But, no matter. That's why God invented tabbed browsing.

Going back over some of my more recent posts, it seems that I made some sort of attempt to be more... professional. That is, I attempted to be a help to the community at large, injecting into it my insights and examples. However, after some recent soul searching over break, I realize that this is not who I am, nor is it who I wish to be. I simply wish to be myself and for my blog to continue on much the way it has for so many years. That is to say, contain the trials, tribulations, and joys of my life. So, with so much time to catch up on, where does one begin? I suppose it's best to find out where one left off...

I suppose the last meaningful post was about the anime festival I attended in August. Now, back then I felt like an outcast amidst a lot of freaks (in a good way, however). But, since then, I too have fallen victim to the Japanese and tantalizing animations. I suppose the beginning of my downfall was when I picked up and was subsequently sucked into the Phoenix Wright games. It didn't help that I was prodded along the way by a buddy of mine (who will be called Ryan for lack of a made up name). He showed to me Hellsing, an anime about some vampire killing organization, the Catholic Church, and nazis. As crazy awesome as this combination may sound, vampires and the occult really aren't my forte. So, he pushed me towards Dragon Ball Z, which, I must admit, is not only awesome, but totally over nine thousand. From there I ventured out on my own checking out anime on Netflix's instant watch (Project A-ko and Best Student Council). My biggest pitfall was when Hulu picked up Naruto. Everybody and their chibis seemed to be completely enamoured with this show and, even though I'd previously shunned it as I had all anime, I watched an episode. And another. Two weeks later and not only had I watch one hundred twenty episodes, but I'd also read all the manga after the point I'd left off. I've also watched and completed Lucky Star (all the dubbed versions, at least) and the Meloncholoy of Haruhi Suzumiya. So, I can no longer consider myself the portent of anime's destruction (as I once wanted to be). Instead, I am a lowly otaku. Damn.

School-wise, nothing terribly interesting has happened. I've completed all my film courses, made a level for UT3, created a magazine and TV packaging, and now I'm back to web design. How I hate you, web design. Web programming, that's okay. I enjoy programming, However, I'm beginning to realize how much I don't enjoy actual design. The process of coming up with some idea out of nothing is one I find very difficult (though, I usually execute it fairly well). However, with programming I know what I'm trying to achieve and the steps to get there a fairly linear and even allow for a good bit of problem solving which I do love. That said, I still enjoy film making and motion graphics.

The good news about school is that I've got less than half a year left until graduation. I'm not entirely certain what I'll do after that. One thing I do know is that I'll be heading back home for a couple months to simply do nothing. Full Sail, while it hasn't been terribly difficult has left me drained of nearly every creative juice in my body as well as killed off almost all of my motivation. That can be attributed to the fast pace of the scheduling where every month I have to design my way out of another two classes. I've enjoyed my time here, but I'll also be glad when it ends. It means I get to go on and do something awesome (hopefully VFX, programming, or motion graphics).

Other than that nothing very exciting has happened to me. It's all school and what play there is generally involves me sitting on my ass in front of this computer monitor surfing the nets or whatever recent project has caught my fancy. I promise that I won't let another agonizing two months go by before I update again, but with nothing happening it's hard to find something to write about. Perhaps you should follow me on Twitter for all the little random things and thoughts of mine. Until next time, be cool and stay in school.

Yesterday, we (Ryan, Tyler, and I) had the pleasure of finally attending my very first convention (outside of the local county fair). Sadly, it wasn't a sci-fi convention as I would have liked, but an anime convention. I don't consider myself to be an anime nerd, and even border on disliking the genre entirely, but I did have a pretty good time none the less. The convention itself was fairly small in comparison to others, but there was still a goodly amount of things going on and plenty of dealers peddling their anime related wares.

The atmosphere or the con was... nerdy. Even so, I felt strangely out of place as I was one of the few attendees that wasn't cosplaying. Most of the costumes I didn't recognize, but there were the likes of Phoenix Wright, Yuna, Link and, surprisingly, several Snakes from Metal Gear:

It still surprised me just how many girls were there. In fact, I'd say the males were outnumbered by quite a bit which, for me, is an unusual situation to be in seeing as I go to school overflowing with testosterone. Just being around all these people was probably the most entertaining part of the day.

One of the areas we spent the most time in was the dealers floor. Just about anything anime related was being sold. Mangas, DVDs, T-shirts, action figures, plushies, costumes, weapons. And that's barely scratching the surface. As you can see in the picture above, I broke down and bought a Godot shirt. I wubs it!

There were some video games, including an NES championship tournament, but it was a side to everything else going on. There were rooms showing animes, people talking about how to improve your AMV/drawings, all sorts of crazy stuff. We wound up the night by sitting in on the "Weakest Geek" game show. It was kind of like Double Dare (sans the mess) and a quiz show with the Who Wants to be a Millionaire music playing in the background the entire time. The biggest part of this game was the "Box" game wherein a picture of an action figure would be shown and the player would then proceed to try to find said action figure in a fish tank filled with more action figures and packing peanuts. It was all rather entertaining to watch and the crew running the show was pretty cool.

I'm going to wrap this post up with a video I took while I was there (and later added music to).