It came from Chook…

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I was going through the Chook page and I found Cliff Woodman’s bio.

My name is Cliff Woodman. My current occupation is as a web designer and technology coordinator for Chook Industries. I also do a lot of web design and graphic design on the side. I graduated from University of Maryland, College Park in 1991. I met up with Larry Snow in the mid 90’s, and he offered me a job with his new company. As I was bored of my job at the time, a computer programming job, I decided to take a chance. It turned out to be one of the best moves I had ever taken.

My interests include reading science fiction, especially old school science fiction. My favorite author is A.E. van Vogt. I also enjoy watching a good anime every now and again. Other hobbies of mine include playing guitar and drawing. I do enjoy a few computer games, mainly the old classics. My all-time favorite game is Wasteland.

I am currently unmarried and live with my dog, Herbert von Wilhelm.

Digital Rull

A Postcard for Fred and a Stamp

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Here’s another short film shot on the Jazz DV151. It is about sending Fred a postcard. My shaky camera work aside, the film gives a better sense of the camera’s capabilities, especially in low light where the gain gets cranked up. I noticed at times that the camera has a mild sound sync loss. I would also note that about an hour into recording the footage, I finally had to switch the batteries (and I’d been using it a couple days prior also). The camera runs off of double A’s.

For interested parties, Megan will be posting the video on Melodic Insomniac also. She’ll probably have some different comments on it than I.

Howard the Duck

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Howard the Duck is on Hulu. Check it out.

Howard the Duck

Update: Robot Holocaust is also on Hulu. Somewhere I’m not surprised that Howard the Duck made it on, which I actually really like. I watched it on VHS last night, and if I had of known it was on Hulu then, I would have watched it there. Robot Holocaust, however, is horrific, which means that if one were to factor the movie into those same pedestrian standards of poor which frequently rank Howard the Duck as atrocious, it could cause one’s head to explode or at least bring about the Robot Holocaust. It does have a nice title though and I like to pretend it was filmed at Sandy Hook even though it was filmed elsewhere.

Robot Holocaust

Jazz DV151

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I bought the Jazz DV151 camera from Walmart for $20.00 yesterday. The camera has a flip out viewscreen and records AVI files onto SD cards (it can handle up to 2GB cards) at a 320 x 240 resolution. The image is pretty much what you would expect from a $20.00 camera, but I haven’t been able to stop playing with it. Check out the short movie below to see and hear the quality of the recording. I’m still trying to figure out if I can hook the camera up to my computer so I can double it as a web cam (when you connect the camera to a computer with the USB, it switches automatically to download mode). I posted a picture of the camera at the bottom of this post so interested parties can see what it looks like.

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WATCHMEN: There must be some kind of way out of here

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Watchmen

Marshall McLuhan said, “The medium is the message.” If that’s true, in the case of Watchmen the message should be, “stick to your medium.” Because if you haven’t read the book, don’t waste your time. If you’re reading this I’m not going to belabor the backstories of the graphic novel and the movie directed by Zack Snyder. In the event of an emergency the oxygen masks will deploy from the overhead compartments. And Awaaay We Go!

First the good. The visual effects are probably the best literal translation of the comic book panel since the “ZOK!” superimposed over the fight scenes in the 1966 Batman TV series.

Second the bad. The acting is atrocious. Defendant number one, Malin Akerman. I’ve seen particleboard with more emotive ability. There is a scene of coitus superherois between Akerman and Owl Man (Patrick Wilson) in the Owlmobile that I think is the sole reason Akerman was hired. And Wilson displays all the depth and range of paint drying. Mathew Goode, the anti-hero hero is right up there with gypsum board. The rest of the cast is burdened by makeup that they cannot overcome with their limited abilities (acting, not superhero).

Next the ugly. The absolutely gratuitous, pointless violence with compound fractures and blood squirting captured in glorious slow-mo close-ups a la The Matrix to inspire the next generation of Gary Ridgeways whose parents are too lazy or too damn dumb to know that an R rated movie like this is inappropriate for kids under 18. (It really should have been rated NC-17, not R). And did we REALLY have to see multiple shots of Dr. Manhattan’s MIRV?

Now the blasphemous. They changed the ending – and it was better!

Finally the point. Watchmen was a originally drawn and written as a graphic novel and is a master of that medium known as “panel art” to the Upper West Side (Dr.) Manhattan crowd and “comic book” to the Great Unwashed. While individual scenes and sequences may have been translated literally (or as best as possible) to the moving image, it is simply impossible to take an art form which is a stationary medium and translate ALL of it literally to the moving screen without the result resembling Rorshach’s ever-changing blobular mask. – in other words a confused, incoherent mess.

The bottom line. Contrary to the fanboys, film students, and critics, Watchmen is NOT another Battleship Potemkin (let alone Star Wars). However it is NOT League of Extraordinary Gentlemen either. It is an interesting failure. Should you spend your hard earned $7.50? Only if you can see it in a theater with five other people like I did. Wait for the dvd. The theatrical version, not the “special director’s nine millionth edit” release they are planning. Cuz crap with a cherry on top is still crap. But it’s not TOTAL diarrhea. Confused? So am I. Said the joker to the thief.

Haystack Rock

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Buff’s brother and his family are moving to Maryland from Astoria, Oregon. Buff and I agreed to help out by flying there and then driving one of their cars the 3000 miles back, which we did last week. One of the perks of the trip was to get to see the Astoria area for the first time.

Sloth Love Chunk

As someone who grew up fantasizing of having a grand adventure like The Goonies had, visiting Haystack Rock was probably the closest thing I’ve had to having a religious experience.

EDIT: Oh, and here is the photo gallery of our road trip.

ding dong

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ding dong

Brian and Buff got me this for my birthday. I assume that Brian was the driving force here. Thanks. It looks good in front of my door.

It doesn’t show up great in the picture, but it’s sparkly. That’s what the white dots are around the “ding dong.”

Turkey Breasts

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Turkey Breasts was shot over the winter holiday. In addition to featuring Thom, Tim, Brian, Megan, a turkey and other stuff, the film features the dirt road out by my parent’s place in Salisbury, MD. Over the years, the dirt road has appeared in a number of movies I’ve been involved with in one way or another. In the ones on Protozoic alone, it crops up in Operation: Red Chicken Disco Jesus (Redux)</a href>, The Cave of Trouble in: Search for the Chupacabra, Spontaneous Combustion and The Bridge. For me, getting to return to the dirt road was one of my favorite parts about making this movie. It’s pretty cool to get old with your buddies and the places you grew up.

For interested parties, Tim has some production stills from the shoot that can be viewed here.

Hope you enjoy the film.

Saucy Visions of Dangerous Jack

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Dangerous Visions

Recently I read three short stories. Although written by two different authors more than twenty years apart, they shared one common theme: Jack the Ripper. Unlike David Berkowitz, Eileen Wuornos, and Gary Ridgeway, Jack the Ripper was never caught and so he did not lose his infamous moniker like the others. Which is probably why the man who brutally murdered women in London over a century ago remains so fascinating for us. Gary Ridgeway’s crimes were more horrific, at least in numbers of victims, but does anyone believe that 120 years from now, he will be the subject of a horror fiction story? Jack the Ripper’s anonymity allows writers a canvas upon which to paint suspense, fear, and nauseating horror.

And that’s exactly what writers Robert Bloch and Harlan Ellison have done with their trio of stories, “Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper”, “A Toy for Juliette”, and “The Prowler in the City at the Edge of the World.” Bloch wrote the first story for Weird Tales in 1943 and adapted it for the TV series Thriller and Star Trek. He wrote the second for Ellison’s 1967 anthology Dangerous Visions.

At the time, Dangerous Visions was heralded as revolutionary and in retrospect, it was. Written at the height of the “new wave” movement in speculative fiction that sought to move the genre from space opera and the stigma of second rate offal to mainstream literary art, Dangerous Visions contained stories from established masters like Bloch and Philip K. Dick to then-beginners Roger Zelanzy and Samuel R. Delaney. In fact, Ellison encouraged his contributors to break their own rules and submit stories that could not be printed in the science fiction magazines of the day.
As for the stories themselves, Bloch’s are the first two acts in this three-act play. They are well written and original and the basis for Ellison’s which is the best. But be warned, “Prowler” is NOT for the faint of heart. There are passages that can literally be stomach-churning although they are probably tame to a generation raised on CSI.

You can find “Yours Truly, Jack the Ripper” in The Dark Descent edited by David G. Hartwell. Dangerous Visions can usually be found for a reasonable price on eBay or in a good used bookstore. The last two stories can also be found in the July, 1968 issue of Adam magazine.
One other note: Ellison recommends reading “Toy” and “Prowler” as one continuous bloc with their introductions and afterwards. Elias recommends reading all three stories seriatim sans intros and afterwards. Read them first, then go back and read them per Ellison and you’ll see why.