elipses

Brooklyn Nine-Nine Hiatus Creations:

week five → captain raymond holt

T’Challa, Shuri’s 36 year old brother who is trying to be hip with the kids: fucking superb you funky little lesbian.

I will face God and walk backwards into Hell

“I’ll do whatever you want” “then perish”

I have been through hell and come out singing

Do I look like the kind of man who dies

God’s dead and soon we will be too

This is hell’s territory and I am beholden to no gods

Rachel: uh, and- and it’s something that I’ve noticed like, when I saw these three things about like- empathy, positivity, and strong emotional connections, it kinda helped me highlight… which components were missing from my previous relationships and kind of-

Griffin: you scared the living- the ever living fucking- mother fucking-

Rachel: *laughing*

Griffin: -fucking shit out of me and I shit my pants and almost died.

Rachel: *still laughing*

Griffin: are you kidding me? Doing a sentence like that? On a podcast? I almost shit my fucking butt off- are you kidding me? “It helped me realize something-“ this is our last episode of Wonderful!- are you kidding me?

Rachel: *laughing* I’m sorry

Griffin: Jesus Christ-

Rachel: *still laughing* helped me realize what was missing from my previous relationships-

Griffin: okay, but you understand that you sent shockwaves through the whole- like people were writing Facebook posts like, “WHAT THE FU- oh.”

Rachel: why would I bring you to this podcast to tear you-

Griffin: i don’t know! Last week you brought our sexual relations- our sexual conquest into the thing, I thought that “maybe Rachel is doing a bold new style of podcasting”

Rachel: *laughing* Griffin, I’m taking this opportunity…

Griffin: yeah, wowzers

Rachel: no, I was gonna say that it makes me realize why ours works so well

Griffin: oh, thank God

Rachel: ‘cause we are very empathetic with each other, we do compliment each other often-

Griffin: yeah

Rachel: and-

Griffin: sex power is off the charts

Rachel: -we’re positive

Griffin: yeah, we can’t even quantify our sex power

Rachel: yeahh, sex power

Griffin: blew up the bedroom yesterday

Rachel: ah, jeez

Griffin: a wave of super sonic force shot out of my body like I was-

Rachel: well you don’t have to tell out listeners, they probably felt it

Griffin: oh, no, apparently that’s what we do on this show, is tell them about my super sonic sex energy like Blanka from Street Fighter- shooting out of my body like electricity, tearing off the wall paper

Rachel: i don’t know who Blanka is

Griffin: that’s okay, he’s a big green monster from Street Fighter. He’s cool. He does this power where he crouches down and shoots electricity out of his body and like, y’know, E. Honda tries to punch him but gets a big shock

Rachel: you with your sex power, you’re more like Sheet Fighter

Griffin: ….. *starts laughing*

Rachel: pretty good, right?

Griffin: *still laughing* yeah

Beautiful big almond eye, realistic and full of expression as she gazes gently at you. Elbowed antennae and delicately segmented legs and body. Gorgeous pearlescent sheen like she is glowing. This ant moisturizes. This ant is round and huggable. This ant is a star. 11/10.

Beautifully detailed, lifelike pose but with an unexpected neck and odd antennae, perhaps scared straight. Her eyes suggest she has seen things. Her expression confirms she has seen too much. She is haunted and I want to know more. 7/10.

Floppy antenna, pointy muppet face, oddly posed legs. What is she? She has no waist. May be she is some kind of bee in disguise? I find her unsettling. 3/10.

This ant has an unexplained, double-jointed thorax, and no evidence of a waist. Her four-footed pose suggests that she a centaur rather than an ant. Centaur ants would be cool. I’m not sure what was intended here. 2/10.

Good first impression, kind of bland in the details. This ant has no particular waist to speak of, floppy rather than elbowed antennae, and an inexpressive face. Her color scheme is soft and hazy. I like the sharp angles of her stylishly sophisticated legs. This ant may not know quite were she is going, but she knows how she is getting there. 6/10.

Were you even trying. 0/10

Gasp! This ant is elegant. This ant has a beautiful tapered thorax, a segmented abdomen, alert, elbowed antennae, and a light-footed pose. This ant’s face suggests curiosity and a desire to explore the world. This ant inspires me. I want to be like her. 10/10

3-legged, waistless centaur-ant with strange, limp antennae and a beak. I don’t know what this is? It kind of reminds me of a Hork-Bajir. 1/10, not an ant.

This ant… makes me sad. All of her legs are broken. The MS Paint art style and gradient abuse convey distress. She has a duck beak. Despite this, her expression suggests perseverance and determined cheerfulness. I want this ant to have a better life. I am rooting for her. 3/10

This ant is a bold and challenging mixture of photorealism and caricature. She is broad and low-built and seems very sturdy. She looks like she would help you move. This ant is a dependable friend. 9/10

A picture of an ant from a children’s book.  She is wearing little boots.  This ant is wrong in every way, and yet I can’t stay mad at her.  7/10

An interesting, top-down view of an ant; her legs are positioned with slightly jarring symmetry.  Nevertheless, her overall impression is that of a graceful, stylized design, like a pictograph.  She is suitable for adorning fine garments and jewelry or perhaps gracing the walls of a tiny ant church.  I like this minimalist ant.  8/10.

Stop-Motion Moana

“We can rebuild her… We have the technology… We know the way!”

A few months ago I ripped apart a Moana doll and made it into a stop-motion puppet using a kinetic armature kit.  

The walk cycle above was the first thing I animated with this puppet, and was just a throw-away practice test with no green screen. I had never done a walk cycle in stop-motion before and soon discovered how difficult animating a straight-ahead cycle within a localized space with no retakes could be.

I showed the cycle to my dad while he was holding my Moana puppet in his hand and he seemed more impressed with this crappy test than the actual animation I did on the movie! I think the combination of him holding the puppet, and then seeing it come to life on the video before him was what blew him away. I guess that’s the appeal and magic of stop-motion. :)

Here’s a second test I animated for fun:

I read that it’s best to have the foot joints nice and tight to hold the weight of the puppet, and have the arms looser.  It’s amazing how much weight those toe and foot ball-joints could hold for the falling poses:

So Amethyst is like “but that’s my favourite word, when will be stop being young & impressionable so I can say it again??”

And Greg is like “uhh I don’t know, 15 I guess? 15 is probably old enough” 

“Got it”

flash forward to Steven’s fifteenth birthday and he is woken at dawn by Amethyst yelling “wake the FUCK up Steven it’s FUCKING TIME”

Garnet: *deadpan* Amethyst just got her favourite word back

Amethyst: you said once Steven was 15 I could say fuck again

Greg, who only hazily recalls the conversation in question: ……i DID?

Steven: I know what fuck means Pearl

Steven: um… Lars and Sadie… *mumbling* five years ago…

Amethyst: I’ve been denying myself my favourite word for FIVE YEARS for NOTHING??

Greg: uh even if he knows what it means it’s still not really appropriate for you t-

Amethyst: *running outside* FFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCK

Steven: …

Greg: …

Pearl: …

Garnet: …*quietly* fuck

Everyone else: O_O

Steven: Amethyst is allowed to say fuck now

Connie: oh! are we all allowed to say fuck now??

Greg & Pearl in unison: NO!!

— -. . / - .– — / - .– — / ..-. .. ..-. - -.–

Unfortunately for you, you aren’t very well versed in translating Morse code, merely recognizing it. You reach into your purse to grab your phone, but after a moment of searching, you realize you had left it at home before you left for work. “God damnit,” you mutter. You’re more than halfway to your office, and you’re already running late due to the fact that that you decided to follow some whim and jot down some cryptic message from a provocative rapper. Concluding that it would probably be best for you to mosey to work, you pull back onto the expressway and try to make it to work on time.

Upon arriving at work, you ask any coworker in sight if they know Morse code. Nobody seems to, and some don’t even know what Morse code is. You slump your shoulders in disappointment and head over to your desk, when suddenly, the quiet, mouse-like secretary clears her throat and says, “Excuse me, I know Morse code!”

You turn around with the same wide eyes as before. “You do!?” you ask vigorous excitement, which seems to startle the young woman.

“Yes,” she says, “when I was younger, I planned on joining the navy, so I taught it to myself.” You feel a bit sorry for her, that she wound up as a mere secretary instead of a naval officer, but that feeling of pity didn’t stop you from being grateful for the lucky coincidence of her knowing Morse code. You show her the pattern.

— -. . / - .– — / - .– — / ..-. .. ..-. - -.–

“That’s all there is?” she asks, furrowing her brow.

“Yeah,” you shrugged, “it just kept repeating that over and over again. What does it say?”

“One, two, two, fifty.”

Your heart sinks a little. “What is that? What does that mean, is it like a phone number or house address or something?”

The secretary shrugs. “I’m really sorry, I don’t know. It’s too short to be a phone number, but beyond deciphering it, I’m afraid I can’t help you.”

You nod slowly, and though you understand, you are still not at all satisfied. You go to sit at your desk. 1 2 2 50. The sequence plays over and over in your head all day, and needless to say, your curiosity an wonderment got the best of you. It was not a very productive work day.

You head home, and the same damned song plays on the radio. You shake your head as if that would make the song stop, then decide to plug 12250 into your GPS to see if there are any autofill results. None. You become increasingly frustrated.

When you get home, your daughter is sitting at the kitchen table, working on homework. She runs up to you and gives you a big hug, and asks about your day at work. You put on a fake smile and sigh. “Interesting,” you say— no doubt sugarcoating the intense excitement, disappointment, and confusion.

“Will you help me with my homework? I have to memorize something for my history class tomorrow.”

“Of course, doll! What are you memorizing?”

She hands you a laminated sheet of paper. “Roman numerals!”

You glance over the page, your eyes quickly darting from one, to two, to fifty.

It dawns on you. You’d recognize this pattern anywhere.

“Maybe you should marry that thing since you love it so much. Do you want to marry it. WELL I WONT LET YOU. how does that feel?”

“Nice job breaking it, hero”

“Look at you. sailing through the air majestically. Like an eagle…piloting a blimp”

“Well done. Here come the test results: You are a horrible person. I’m serious, that’s what it says: A horrible person. We weren’t even testing for that.”

“Wait. This next test DOES require some explanation. Let me give you the fast version- [unintelligible] There. If you have any questions, just remember what I said in slow motion. Test on your own recognizance, I’ll be right back.”

“This next test involves turrets. You remember them, right? They’re the pale spherical things that are full of bullets. Oh wait. That’s you in five seconds. Good luck.”

“That jumpsuit you’re wearing looks stupid. That’s not me talking, it’s right here in your file. On other people it looks fine, but right here a scientist has noted that on you it looks stupid. Well, what does a neck-bearded old engineer know about fashion? He probably - Oh, wait. It’s a she. Still, what does she know? Oh wait, it says she has a medical degree. In fashion! From France!”

“Oh, hi. How are you holding up? Because I’m a POTATO.”