Batturtle

2009-07-10T16:28:00.001-04:00

The Mayfair opened in 1932. In 2009 I became a co-owner.

2009-07-01T12:29:00.002-04:00

Hope everyone has an Alpha Flight-tastic Canada Day. I will be crewing at some concert festivities like a chump. Or at least stuck there, hiding from the rain and not working because it looks like thunderstorms. No BBQ themed day off for me.

2009-06-25T12:24:00.003-04:00

I'm working on a couple projects at the moment. Neither of which can I really talk about. Which makes blog updates a bit uneventful and difficult. I can at least say that one is a web-series and one is a comic book, and progress is happening on both.

The artist sent in the thumbnail layouts for issue three of the comic mini-series (it's five issues total). And even just at that stage it has me really excited. Can't wait to see it all penciled and inked.

Looking into getting an short bit of animation done for my mascot Batty there. Something quick and short for the opening titles of the web-series. Been meaning to get something like that done for an age, will be cool to see Batty in motion. Now if only I could get an action figure made in his likeness.

2009-05-26T10:51:00.003-04:00

This upcoming Friday (May 29th) the Mayfair Theatre will be screening 'Young People Fucking' as their late late show (11PM). The movie is being shown as part of Canterbury High School's 40th anniversary, as it was directed by Canterbury alum Martin Gero.

Glenn Cockburn (one of the film's producers) will be in attendance to introduce the movie.

Tickets available at the theatre ($5 for members, $9 for non-members).

2009-05-19T13:53:00.002-04:00

A movie that I worked on a lil' while back will have it's premiere this upcoming Friday night (May 22nd) at 7PM at the Nepean Creative Arts Centre (35 Stafford Road, Nepean...aka...Ottawa). Admission is $5.00.

Attack of the Giant Leeches is director Brett Kelly's re-make of the Roger Corman produced 1959 drive-in cult classic. A film which also got the MST3K treatment in 1992:

Dr. Forrester: Ah! Robinson, Servo, Mr. T. Robot! Our invention this week is inspired by this week's experiment, "Attack of the Giant Leeches". In ye olden times, alchemists believed that leeches served medicinal purposes.

TV's Frank: So do we!

Dr. Forrester: Uh, yes um, we found that the common fresh water leech uh, can serve the same purpose as a nicotine patch, and being neither food nor drug, there's no pesky FDA regulation to impede your progress and I can experiment at will. Frank?

TV's Frank: At your service.

Dr. Forrester: Our subject, Frank, has been trying to quit smoking for quite some time. He's a three pack-a-day man.

TV's Frank: No I'm not!

Dr. Forrester: Yes you are, shut up. Now this leech, we'll call him Patches...

TV's Frank: Yah!

Dr. Forrester: When applied to the neck or head area, will suck any desire to smoke out of Frank.

TV's Frank: No, no, no, no! No! No! No, I'm the sum of my vices! I have my pain, my happiness, my losses, my love! My struggles, my hobbies, my lent! I want to live! I want to live! I want to live! And love! And learn! And live!

Dr. Forrester: But this won't hurt a bit.

TV's Frank: Oh, Ok.

Dr. Forrester: Uh, there you go. Now, Patches, I'm depending on you, ya slug!

TV's Frank: Say, this is the most action I've ever got.

2009-05-02T01:15:00.001-04:00

Yay for Free Comic Book Day!!!

2009-04-06T02:25:00.002-04:00

This picture by Eric Talbot has nothing to do with me or Batturtle Productions. Except for if I had thought of it, I totally would have gotten him to draw me something like this one of the couple of times that I met him.

2009-03-31T00:34:00.005-04:00

As I've stated on here in an earlier post, I prefer to add some form of picture along with my little blog updates. Alas, I don't have any photographic or art related stuff from the past month or so. Not that I haven't been busy. Work plows along on a couple projects that I can't really talk about just yet. Believe me, I wish I could gush about them but have been sworn to secrecy.

One (which I think I'm allowed to say is a comic book) is painfully close to hitting some form of maybe finding a publisher. It's such an insane uphill battle though. And I can't even say "but I can't complain"...'cause oh boy, could I ever complain about a couple of things that have happened to us in regards to finding a home for this thing and having it become an actual for real on paper comic book.

A couple posts ago I said I wanted to do something a bit more long form this year (like a feature length film). Which I would. But, out of nowhere (as good ideas have a tendency to often come from) a project that would be in a definite non-feature type format is on it's way to becoming a reality. As with that other project that's mentioned above, this too also involves comic books. Except they're more involved in the characters workplace location. I usually am extremely hard on my own writing...and I wrote something for this project that I think is my favorite thing that I've ever done. And that's a lot for me to fess up to considering my normal state of self deprecation.

2009-02-17T23:57:00.004-05:00

On the weekend, crewed for a lil' bit on a comic book based shoot titled 'The Scarab'. Would've liked to have worked on it more, but had to ditch out 'cause I was already booked elsewhere. Anyhow, will contribute more work towards it in upcoming weeks.

Above is a shot of one of the costumed characters from the picture, The Woman in Red.

2009-01-28T18:01:00.002-05:00

I guess this image could count as Blast From the Past #3 (I don't have drawers full of cool sketches like the TMNT blog has at it's disposal). That's me with a clipboard holding the lined shooting script, looking at a video assist monitor. This was taken during the shooting of one of the Villains shorts, which if I remember correctly was somewhere around 1950. Seems that long ago anyhow.

In more current news, am busy trying to get a few projects going:
I just wrote an 8 page back-up story for a friends comic book mini-series. The series that I co-wrote with Howard Wong is in the limbo of being shopped out to publisher's. In other writing related news, trying to figure out what to do with a trio of finished feature length scripts I have. Using them to sell out in some way would be just grand.

Also possibly re-tooling the ole' Comic Book Connection idea after having been inspired by a couple feature length doc's. Might be easier (well...easier is probably the wrong word) to focus the idea into a documentary with a beginning, middle, and end instead of a series straight away.

Basically, in 2009 I hope to do a longer project in some form. Fiction or doc... maybe both. If I can fit ambition and productivity in-between time spent at the Mayfair watching movies that is.

2008-12-31T14:16:00.001-05:00

Will 2009 be awesome?
Magic Eight Ball says..."YES"
The Magic Eight Ball never lies!!!

2008-12-23T00:08:00.003-05:00

From our home town of Ottawa...Kodos, Kang and I hope that all of you Quantum Presbyterians out there have an excellent Holiday season.

2008-12-20T23:15:00.004-05:00

My good deed of the day (or week...or month...possibly longer) was to walk around my neighbourhood for a bit today, getting the new Mayfair schedules into some places of business and into people's hands. When I first saw the schedule a couple days ago, I became a little spellbound. On this one month of movies alone, the first of many schedules to come, the Mayfair has I think become one of the best movie theatres not just in Canada, but anywhere.

Check out the Mayfair website for more details on the screenings. And be sure to come out on January 2nd for the grand re-opening, featuring a free screening of some local shorts and the classic film 'Metropolis'.

2008-11-14T01:03:00.000-05:00

The Killer63 screening is tomorrow. Go see it!

2008-10-31T00:02:00.002-04:00

I have three things that I love about Halloween nowadays:
1) There's the eating of all the candy leftover from my friends house 'cause there's hardly any trick-or-treaters.
2) All the great old horror movies on TCM.
3) Girls in skimpy super hero costumes.
Happy Halloween!

2008-10-30T11:40:00.002-04:00

In association with the comic strip PVP , there's a Flickr site about Skull the Troll and his travels around the globe. Where-in fans of the comic and owners a of Skull (doll? stuffed animal?...not sure the proper term) send in pictures of their toys travels.

A friend of mine recently made a trip to St Petersburg, Russia. And seeing as she is a fan of PVP as well, she was cool enough to drag along my Skull with her on her voyage. I submitted the picture to the Flickr site ages ago, bit seeing as it hasn't been updated in a couple months, thought I'd post it here.

2008-10-29T00:16:00.002-04:00

Been horribly busy the past six weeks working at Cirque du Soleil here in Ottawa. Which was great, but very time consuming and distracting from other stuff that I should've been working on. So, now I'm back to work on various projects, mainly getting the Killer63 Fest, and my short film contribution for it all done and ready.

And, another important endeavor, is an attempt that I'm undertaking to bribe a friend of mine into naming his soon to arrive new baby son 'Optimus'. It began with me jokingly saying I'd give him $20 bucks to do so...word spread, more folks chipped in, and now I'm suddenly up to $400 big bribery dollars. Now that my time has slightly freed up a bit, I'm going to try to raise that number to as big a dollar amount as I can manage. If you'd like to contribute to the cause, lemme know. There's no better bribe you could possibly donate to.

2008-09-03T00:09:00.002-04:00

Mayfair marquee for Killer63 year one

It looks like the Mayfair Theatre is closing in November. I spoke today with someone doing an article about the theatre (since I've shot movie stuff there and screened Killer63 events there). The news saddens me to no end. Especially so if it's destined to be replaced by another Starbucks or set of condos.

I have endless Mayfair stories I could tell. The first time that I went to the Mayfair, my uncle brought me, and introduced me to Monty Python. And since then, I've seen hundreds of movies there, double bills for the most part. I've happily wasted the day there watching a Star Trek marathon, shot cap guns at the screen of John Woo films, experienced horribly offensive Japanimation and classics the likes of Wizard of Oz.

It's awful that repertory theatres nation wide are destined for extinction it seems. The Mayfair is one of my favorite places on earth, and I will miss watching movies there very much.

2008-08-27T15:45:00.002-04:00

Catwoman (Darwyn Cooke style) at the Fan Expo

My friends, this image above is prime example number one why comic con's are awesome. This was the view from behind Howard Wong's table on Sunday afternoon at the Fan Expo. If you can pry your eyes away from Catwoman for a moment, you'll notice his 'After the Cape' comics there at the bottom of the picture (both trades currently available from Image Comics...go buy 'em now!) .

A fun weekend was had by all. I got to see a bunch of comic con friends and acquaintances, got a bit of schmoozing in, got to chat with some geeky heroes of mine the likes of (Commander) Rick Green, Keith Giffen, and the folks from Mirage Studios amongst others. And went see 'Evil Dead the Musical', which I'm pretty sure was the greatest thing ever produced by human beings in the history of the planet.

I filled up my second sketch book (well, exept for two pages that are on reserve for friends that I have to get in there). So, I'll get around to a scanner sooner or later and show off some of the new highlights of my collection soon.

2008-07-25T13:02:00.003-04:00

This is rather old news I'm afraid...the old complaint of being horribly busy and not having enough hours in the day (plus my internet connection was down for a week...horrible stuff). But I wanted to put up a little bit of a comment on the most awesome of film festivals in all of the land anyhow. Lat week I hit Montreal for 5 days of an overdose of genre bent movie watching madness. If you're a movie fan, if you love obscure martial arts movies, horror, bizarre documentaries, and the like, then this be the fest for you.

Seeing as the thing runs for a staggering 19 days, and I was there for 5...there's plenty (dozens) of movies that I didn't get to see. Without even making a stop over to drop off luggage or anything, headed straight to the theatre to meet up with friends and watch 'Akanbo Shojo'. An evil twin tale featuring a cleverly demonic little baby monster. The most fascinating of a documentary I saw, featuring train-wreck human beings as subject matter was 'I Think We're Alone Now', which was about Tiffany stalkers (yes...former teen pop star Tiffany). The best thing I was was a Thai horror anthology called '4bia' (which if I remember correctly translates to 'Crossroads'). I thought all 4 chapters were just great. It's so new though that it doesn't even seem to be on imdb as of yet. The worst thing I saw was not so shockingly enough, the new Uwe Boll opus, 'Tunnel Rats'. Within the first 3 or 4 minutes, I was in a haze of denial, thinking "Hey...this isn't bad, maybe the bastard's finally done it! Maybe this is gonna' be ok!". Things quickly went downhill from there from average to terrible to horrendous.

So, the festival has come and gone. Do go and check out the website for the 2008 Fantasia Film Festival though for a long list of movies well worth tracking down.

2008-06-23T18:38:00.003-04:00

Starting to get plans going for this years Killer63 mini-fest of doom. There's a Facebook thing and a blog where one can look for updates and post questions or comments. Currently...nothing really on the blog about this years event...but soon...soon...

2008-05-27T00:57:00.002-04:00

My friend Howard, who is also my current writing partner (on that thing that I can't tell you about) has gotten himself nominated for a Shuster Award. That magnificent bastard! The nomination is all fine and good for him, and as an added bonus it helps me out since now our pitch can have "from the Shuster nominated writer" in it. There's an online vote that can be checked out right here. If he doesn't win I'm flipping over a table.

2008-05-03T00:22:00.002-04:00

Happy Free Comic Book Day! Oh man...how I do love FCBD. It's my favorite holiday of the year. If you're not familiar with this wonderful annual event held by the comic book industry, go and find yourself a comic book store and check it out. Free comics! What do you have to lose?

2008-04-15T00:20:00.002-04:00

Raphael by Kevin Eastman

Last batch of sketches for now. Hope to have more worthy additions to show off post NYCC. Above is a sketch of Raphael by TMNT co-creator Kevin Eastman. I love the Ninja Turtles. Especially those characters as published in their original Mirage Comics incarnations. Now I've met pretty much everyone ever majorly involved in that run past and present. Kevin isn't involved in TMNT anymore, but you can tell that he still has a real love of the characters. And I got to give him my card and explain to him the origins of Batturtle Productions. He complimented the Batty design, really liked it a lot.

Lobo by Simon Bizley

The other star attraction at the Heavy Metal booth was Simon Bizley. Biz is one of my comic book hero's. His run on 'Lobo' is one of the defining memories of my high school geekyness. He wasn't about, just an empty seat behind the table, with a bunch of doodles on the table-cloth in front of it. I asked the nice lady in charge of the booth if she knew when he'd be back. She said he was just out having a smoke, and should be back soon. Right then he appeared. If you're familiar with the character Lobo, well...that's EXACTLY what Biz looks like. Well, except for the pale white skin and the things over his eyes. Besides for that though, mirror image.

I went over and said hi. He was surprisingly pleasant for a big scary monster of a drunk-ish British fella. I asked if I might be able to get a sketch from him. He said sure, paused, then asked if I wanted to go out for a smoke (except, where Biz comes from, they call them 'fags'...yeah yeah, very mature, stop snickering). I don't smoke. I've never smoked. I've never had the desire to smoke. Right then, for the first time ever, I really wished that I smoked. I told him I didn't smoke, he said join him anyhow. So I followed him outside. He's a giant lumbering Frankenstein's monster of a man. He basically walked in a quick straight line, and people dove out of his way. We bumped into an old lady who gave him cookies, which he politely accepted (not sure who she was, but they knew each other).

After his smoke...he said he wanted a drink. We headed for a nearby hotel bar. He asked me what I wanted to drink. And once again, having never drank or had any desire to drink...now I wished that I did drink. He commended me for not drinking, and bought me a Coke. We sat and chatted about everything from Canada to history to politics to comics to the Ramones. An hour later, we left the bar. He said he needed more cigarettes. And at the nearby hotel store they had those, and they also had beer (they sell beer all over the damn place in the States). I had my backpack on (which Biz called a rucksack), Biz noticed this and asked if I would mind smuggling in some beer for him back into the Con. I can neither confirm nor deny that I did this for Biz.

Two hours after having initially asked Biz for a sketch...I finally got my sketch. I can also neither confirm or deny that Biz gave me some free books.

Later, my friend asked why I missed the George Romero panel. This was why. My friend Tom claims that this was the greatest Con story he has ever heard.

2008-04-12T22:27:00.009-04:00

Tick by Gabe Crate

More sketches! Oh what an age of wonders we live in! Above, I'm sure that you will recognize the mighty blue force of justice himself, The Tick. In my first Year visiting San Diego, I was lucky enough to meet and get a sketch from Tick creator Ben Edlund (he also directed maybe my favorite 'Angel' ever). Year two, I got another sketch of the character from another fine Tick artist, Gabe Crate. He also gave me a copy of his comic, 'The Flickers'. Which I highly recommend you track down. It's funny and evil and actually made me laugh aloud while reading it.

Deadpool by Rob Liefeld

Ok...I know that hate is a strong word, but I hate Rob Liefeld's artwork. As should any other rational comic book reader with anything close to the smallest amount of good taste and reason. With all those teeth, scratchy ink lines, awful anatomy on everyone, panel to panel continuity thrown out the window. BUT, I would feel really bad if by some fluke he stumbled on this lil' blog, read that, and that my statement hurt his feelings. 'Cause he is likely the nicest comic book guy that you'll ever meet. It has been my goal to acquire a sketch from him for quite some time. Not sure why. Some kind of ironic, humorous take on my enjoyment of the world of comics. Like a fan of Elvis getting one of those velvet Elvis paintings. Or I'm just a jerk. Or a bit of both. I'm sure that Rob's millions of dollars and mega success keep him unworried about critics though.

Batman by Grant Morrison (!)

I showed off this Batman sketch to my friend Tom (who draws comics for a living), and he was unimpressed. Then I said "Grant Morrison drew it!", and he thought it was much cooler. I had gone to a DC panel solely to see Grant. As per usual, he has a tendency to blow yer mind with his stories. If he ever starts up a crazy cult, I'll be first in line to sign up. Later in the day, I was at Dark Horse Comics land, and my friend ran up yelling that Grant was signing at the DC area! I immediately sprinted my way over. I had nothing for him to autograph, so I was just going to get him to sign my sketchbook. Then, next thing you know, he's drawing me Batman. How did he know I liked Batman!?! THEN, he drew my friend Al an Animal Man. Which is Al's favorite Grant Morrison related character! He truly has magical powers greater than we average humans can understand.