It’s been a slow-motion roller-coaster ride these past couple of years, but I’ve finally been extended an offer for full-time employment with Rick’s Computers in Danbury, Iowa.

In one of those moments that seemed like providence I left Dallas to head back to Anthon to see my boys and I was asked by Scott Yockey to interview at Rick’s Computers.  It was a great interview; very relaxed and open. I was blunt and honest about my abilities and short-comings, and they seemed to appreciate what I had to say.

After a week in Anthon soaking up the time with my boys, I left on Friday to head back to Dallas. In the middle of Kansas I got a call from Bob where he extended me the offer and told me to think it over this weekend. Not much to think about. I’m excited to get back to some honest work and get my life going again. It’ll be nice to get my own place to make my own and enjoy the days I get my boys.

I start on July 6th, which will be a Tuesday. Huzzah!

I uploaded a couple of new fashion photos that I took here in Dallas. …That’s all.

Back in the days of in-store video rentals I remember encountering a movie that looked so horrible that I consistently steered clear of it. First off, the cover art looked cheesy beyond belief. Secondly, the name implied it was a sequel, to which I’d never seen the original anyway. No way, not a chance.

A few days ago that all changed when I finally saw Troll 2. …And now my life is forever altered.

Troll 2 is a movie released in 1990 that was so bad it’s great. I became re-aware of this movie from the trailer to the documentary Best Worst Movie. It was filmed by the starring young boy from Troll 2 who discovered that there was a cult following exploding in America. It recounts his strange time filming Troll 2 in which the actors would sit around trying to decipher the script and understand the meaning of the movie. It didn’t help that it was crewed by an all Italian production company with hardly anyone speaking English.

I saw the movie at a midnight showing at the old-fashioned Inwood Theater in Dallas, Texas. Troll 2 was screened in a room that had sofa seats instead of regular theater chairs. Each sofa seat had a couple of pillows, and half of them had ottomans to kick your feet up on. It was the perfect venue to watch a movie you’d normally only see at home. One of the main actors from Troll 2, George Hardy, was there to kick things off. He even acted-out some quotes from the movie. Everyone was in a great mood and George Hardy was one of the nicest people I’ve met. Below are a couple of pictures of us at the theater. The first shows Gary and his friend Tracy sitting in the oh-so-comfortable seats, and the second shows Gary and me with George Hardy.

After taking the picture with George Hardy I told him I’d never seen the film. He put a hand on my shoulder and in a serious tone said, “Your life will never be the same.” Then he smiled and was gone.

I must worn you that to enjoy this movie you need to watch it with friends who also like making fun of bad movies. You can’t take it seriously, and you need to watch it with the mindset, “What the hell were they thinking!”

There’s a couple a strange points to make note of concerning Troll 2. First, there’s absolutely no trolls in the movie, and secondly it’s not technically a sequel. Yeah, go figure.

1 out of 5 for Troll 2 as a movie, but 5 out of 5 as an experience.

Since seeing Troll 2 I went back and watched the documentary Best Worst Movie. A line from the documentary helps sum-up Troll 2, “It’s like aliens watched our movies and thought they could make one too.”

4 our of 5 for Best Worst Movie

Today was one of those days I just couldn’t keep my butt in a chair in front of my computer screen. So… I hopped in my car and went to a movie theater where I sat my butt down in front of a much bigger screen. Proved to be a wise move.

I use the excuse that since I’m into 3D animation, going to 3D animated movies is research. Truth is I just love animated movies. Always have. To date a few of my favorites are The Incredibles, Flushed Away, Kung Fu Panda, Monsters, Inc., and Cars. As of today How to Train Your Dragon has joined those ranks.

I spent most my time either laughing or wowing at the quality. Technically the movie had great animation, superb texturing, and wonderful character design. I felt the story was well written and helped you get to know the main characters enough to care about their individual points-of-view. The effects such as fire, clouds and water were extremely realistic. In all, a top-notch film.

I rate movies by my desire to own them and how often I think I’ll re-watch them, this is why How to Train Your Dragon ranks so highly.

5 out of 5

Oh yeah! Kids will love this movie, too.

I absolutely love Napoleon Dynamite. I adore Nacho Libre. Alas, I loathe Gentlemen Broncos. You’ve let me down, Jared Hess.

I downloaded the HD video onto my PS3 for the boys and I to watch this weekend. We had great expectations thanks to Jared Hess’s other movies. Heck! We even plan on taking a pilgrimage someday to Preston, Idaho to see where Napoleon Dynamite was filmed. When Gentlemen Broncos ended I didn’t hesitate to delete it.

This movie was’nt just strange, but horribly weird in a way that isn’t grounded enough in reality. This film had a strange fascination with boobs and testicles. …Don’t ask. The real problem—besides the lack of realistic characters—was that the protagonist rarely spoke. We hardly got a chance to know him by the end, which in my opinion came way too late.

I didn’t give this movie a 1 (which it deserves) only because of my fondness for strange films.

2 out of 5

This weekend I took my two boys to the movie Diary of a Wimpy Kid. This movie is for anyone who was an awkward adolescent boy that suffered his way through middle-school. My 12 year old Caleb was the main influence in going to this film. He loves the books and says he relates to the main character. Thankfully his older brother, who’s now in high-school, can still enjoy shows like this one.

I thought going into this movie that it’d be more silly than entertaining, but thankfully I was wrong. It brought back some painfully funny memories.  For anyone with boys close to middle-school age I highly recommend taking them to this film. Father’s might do better at relating to this film more then Mother’s; that’s just a hint toward who should take the kids.

The overall story is hilarious and the character’s are each distinct. The only issue I have is that the main character is quite self-serving and quick to blame others. In the end it’s a given that he’s learned his lesson by the smidge of selflessness that he shows, but it’s a very unbalanced moral lesson. Other than that, it’s a fun film that’s well worth taking the kids to see.

3 out of 5

No! The title has nothing to do with my personal life; it may be accurate, but we’re talking about the movie here. My friend Mike and I hit the Stimulus Tuesday movie at the mall. After grabbing our diet Cokes and wasting enough time to miss the Fandango commercial, we sat down with the expectation to see a sometimes funny, sometimes gross movie. Surprisingly it was more of the first and not a lot of the latter.

She’s Out of My League had Mike and I chortling like idiots most of the time. And rest of the time was spent whispering, “Wow she’s hot” to each other. After having seen a number of horrid gross-out comedies, this film was a great change. It was intelligently written, if that can be said about these type of movies. Many times the reactions of people seemed realistic instead of cartoonish. What I thought was best was when they had a moment you’d seen a hundred times before in other movies, they put a twist on it to make it new.

The movie is laced extensively with foul-language and sexual references, but surprisingly there’s no real nudity. Well, I guess there’s one scene that shows the main character’s buttocks, but at first glance I thought it was a baby’s bottom.

4 out of 5

Bob and his girls took the boys and I out golfing today. It was the first time for my boys, and I just took pictures. Bob gave the boys some great instructions which helped them a lot. Gage is like me and over-thought the whole process—I have no doubt he’ll eventually golf great if his mind and body can come together. Caleb on the other hand was a natural; great form, and even dressed right for the occasion. This is wonderful for Caleb since he finally found a passion for a mainstream sport.

Ever since my late teens I’ve wanted to create a comic based on the many odd situations my friends and I had playing D&D. Yes. …I played D&D. The real problem was that I had no real medium that I was talented in enough to create the comic. My only real skill artistically was in photography, but that wouldn’t work.

Eventually I learned CG animation using Lightwave 3D and later got the idea to do the comic with it called Hack-N-Slash. It’s about a warrior named Thadian Hackmar—nicknamed Hack—and his rogue companion Slash. In 2005 I began creating a journal of ideas for the comic and started modeling some of the characters. What at first was just a bunch of funny stand-alone panels quickly grew into ideas for a full-fledged comic book series. However, I soon realized this wasn’t as easy as I assumed.

I began searching for books on webcomics. Early on they were all pretty lame and only addressed the artistic side, not the business side. Then one day while in Texas I came across How to Make a Webcomic by four well-know artists; Scott Kurtz, Kris Straub, Dave Kellett, and Brad Guigar. This book gave the most pointers and insight of any book of any type I’ve ever come across. It details everything from ballooning, to setting up a booth at a convention, to dealing with fans, and much more. I highlight useful pointers in any book I read, and this book was highlighted extensively.

Anyone interested in creating a comic, not just webcomic, should seriously think about this book.

5 out of 5

I finally updated my WordPress to the latest version which allowed me to easily add some much needed features to the site.

I’ve added an ‘Animation‘ and ‘Videos‘ category to the site. The ‘Animation‘ category shows some of the work I’ve done while at Animation Factory. I’ve added a demo reel plus some of my favorite ecards I made.

Also, a while back I made a music video from a collection of clips taken while playing Half-Life 2 multiplayer. It took a long time to make since I only worked on it a bit here and a bit there over a few months. That video is in the new ‘Videos‘ category.