Monsters, no ink...

I was encouraged (a.k.a told) I should post more drawings.

To appease the (sparse) crowd I shall, but with a slight twist since I don't like to always do exactly what I'm told. Besides, sculpture has always been one of my favorite forms of art.


I sculpted this guy while living abroad, teaching English in Japan (he was even exhibited in a big art show in Sendai). To give you some idea of what that involved, this sculpture in particular was completely almost entire during working hours (that's how much they cared about learning English... I kid, I kid).


The experience did garner one of my more interesting altercation with a Japanese co-worker about how an artist's mind works. He didn't understand that the design for this creature came from 'my imagination'. He kept asking me where it was from. When that proved to frustrating, he moved on to ask if it was a whale or a camel. I finally told him it was a kind of kaiju like Godzilla and Gamera. You think he would have understood that.


Good thing he never saw this guy... it would have blown his mind.

Mee-sa love Anni!

Comiket is primarily a comic convention for people who are so obsessed with characters such as Anakin Skywalker, Harry Potter and even that masked chap from V For Vendetta that they create and sell their own fan-fic of said characters.

If I had known Comiket was going to be a fan-fic convention, I probably wouldn't have gone. I was expecting Spiderman, just not in this format. In the end, I'm glad I went for two reasons: One, I didn't spend nearly as much money as I thought I would. Two, apparently when someone is as obsessed with Obiwan Kenobi as these people are, they are mostly concerned with writing about whether or not he's going to get Anakin in bed. That's right. Comiket seems to be filled with nothing but yaoi.


There was a LOT of Harry Potter yaoi. A LOT. This proved a bit of a challenge because I wanted to find one that I wouldn't feel ashamed to show my librarian mother when she inevitably asked to see it. All I could manage to find was this PG-rated one (mostly due to a penis joke involving the Weasel twins).


Spidey was also really big that year. This particular comic is the first half of a two part story involving Peter and Harry's growing and ultimately awkward love for one another. Unfortunately, my friend got his hands on the last copy of the second half in which Peter has Venom's love-child. He actually had a hard time convincing the girl who created it to sell him the copy (boys aren't suppose to like this stuff!).


I did get this sexy postcard, though!


This one is probably one of the nicest. It's got a simple but fun story while keeping the art and characters true to the American cartoon it was obviously based off of. In case you can't read the fine print, the story involves:

Girls-Bash-Night
Harley and Ivy are best pal. Merry making of girls's night. Love and the talk of sex are indispensable at a girlfriend's night!



Basically, Harley and Ivy talk about which hero/villain they'd like to 'do'. There's even a clever, if obvious joke about the Flash. All in all, it's cute and the characters remain true to the originals.


This, however, is perhaps my favorite. I can only guess that the Replicator is malfunctioning or something...

Whatever the case may be, it's certainly upsetting Number One.

Kudos to anyone that knows who this is or can guess what the story might entail...

Gomenasai...

Between some work with They Might Be Giants wrapping up, looking for a new apartment, a wicked cold that seems to come and go every other week and the upcoming move to said new apartment this poor ol' blog has fallen into disrepute. Once the move is complete, I promise interesting and exciting pictures of my new neighborhood and feline roommates.

For now though, I shall hope to amuse you with an exciting two part blog all about my adventures at Comiket back in 2006 (today's post) and some of the strange fan fiction I collected there (later post). Shall we begin?

Comiket is a HUGE comic fair held annually in Odaiba, just south of Tokyo that focuses primarily on fan-fic. The group of us headed down by shinkansen which some how was always more exciting to prepare for than to actually ride.


Bill's REALLY happy about Comiket.


I can't really see why... looks like a bunch of otakus milling about a warehouse.


Oh, now I know why he was excited... I had no idea 'The Boy Who Lived' was such a big fan of yaoi.

In all honesty, I think I spent a grand total of three hours actually at Comiket. The rest of the time, I wondered around Odaiba which had way more to offer.


Like Japan's very own Statue of Liberty!


And the giant ferris wheel... I don't think it's the biggest in the world but I'm sure some local swore to me that it was.


In fact, the best part of the trip down south was the giant mall (yes, mall) nearby. Inside, you can find Sega Joypolis.


It's basically an indoor amusement park complete with rollercoasters, simulation rides and other such goodies that I don't actually know the proper names for.

The coolest floor, though, was one made up to look like a matsuri (festival) straight out of the 1960s with a haunted house, boweling alley (well, really just one lane) and lots of vintage pinball machines and arcade games. Hmm... maybe this will be a three part post...