HAPPY BIRTHDAY JULIA!!

Today is Julia's Birthday...

Doodley doo

Last night, I happened to draw this lovely lady

Extray! Extray! Mild-mannered cubicle employee releases graphic novel!

While "My Three Bosses" gradually catches up with speedy reality, let Big Time Attic introduce you to another kind of comic I care about: the actual comic book.

After three long years of gestation, it has finally been birthed, and boy is it healthy! 100% recycled process chlorine-free paper with vegetable-based inks delivered yesterday right on the loading bay of the warehouse! Weighing in at a scant 800 pounds, it will need your precious love and care to grow to its full potential. My baby is called "Commune" and its first words are prophetic and dear. About three children (assuredly unrelated to known bosses) who survive a disaster on a distant spaceship, it is equal parts memoir and fable. It's not funny, but it has pretty pictures and, I'm told, a "nice package" for its age.

That's why I've decided to put my baby up for auction! That's right, ladies and gentlemen, you may now own the fruits of my labor in exchange for a minor investment of digital moneys, here: Preview it! So check it out, let me know what you think, and next week the first installment of "My Four Bosses" will debut.

Meet Junior Slam!

Recently brought home from Target's Juvenile Recreation aisle, we're proud to publicly announce the latest member of the BTA family: Junior Slam. He's definitely made the working environment around here a special, special place.


Still, for all his merit, the one knock on Junior Slam is that he didn't come with easy mounting instructions or equipment. While we're resorting to standing on an upturned wastebasket for regulation height, that's no obstacle for Tim...

Candy-shelled acknowledgement

This little My Three Bosses is brought to you by many things that keep our great society flourishing! Thanks, those things!

Ladder Meeting

Well, as with most Tuesdays, we had another meeting about the ladder. I guess in the end it was productive, but I really don't see why it needs to come up so often.

Zander calls the meeting to order by approaching the company ladder.


Zander reviews the minutes from the last meeting, and asks for any new issues.


Max and Julia seem optimistic about the ladder's 2007 prospects.


Brit and Tim seem skeptical about the ladder's features. Steve places a ladder-related call.


I made a pretty awkward suggestion about the ladder, and received a disappointed reaction from all three bosses.

Big Time Attic at Flash MN TONIGHT / WEDNESDAY

UPDATE:: FREE PIZZA AND BEER!!

Big Time Attic has been invited to give an animation presentation at Flash MN tonight. This is our first public animation presentation, so here's a great opportunity to see how good Flash animation works and ask some questions. They're also giving away Adobe's Studio 8, the $1000 software package that includes full versions of Flash, Dreamweaver, and Fireworks.

It's free, tell your friends! We want lots and lots of people there please.

Where: Easel Training
Time: 6:30 social and 7:00 presentations

Flash MN presentation rehearsal

Max and I are set to have a dynamite presentation tonight at Flash MN (see previous post for details). Here are some shots of us rehearsing:

At first, Max doesn't seem interested and tells me he hates me


I try to win him over him with my enthusiasm and it seems to work


Oh no, now he's too passionate!


And then we lived happily ever after


Come see us talk tonight ! It'll be fun, fun fun!

ZZZZzzzzz....

I've decided M3B contains too many in-jokes, and entirely too much craziness. As a celebration of my new forray into the Strip Seeking Syndication, here is a less esoteric, more accessable My Three Bosses.

Birthday Pondering

Typically on my own birthday (Jan. 30), I spend a few moments trying to deduce whether I've got something in common with the past notables who share that day. Lately, I've feared it's impossible. I have neither the the tenacity of Franklin Roosevelt, the stern focus of Gene Hackman, nor the artistic vision of Phil Collins. But on the birthday of BTA, I've taken up the challenge again. I know there's something that can be threaded together between our fellow August-eleventhers, and that can shed light on our own destiny and traits as a company.

I'll keep working at it, but I'm sure we share something with Chadian independence, Hulk, the Ramones' third drummer, and Jim Lee. I think I'm close.

Our second Birthday!

Half the studio celebrated by taking the day off and the other half celebrated by being blissfully unaware of the occasion. Either way, we're two years old today and love everyone.

What you'll need to draw a comic, or possibly a large black and white picture

I made this helpful diagram so you all understand what you need to make comics, or pictures, or whatever it is you kids want to draw now days.

"Conor, no," he said.

Lunch

Double sized M3B for lateness! Today's story is about the SECRET to Big Time Attic's success.

Odometer milestone...

Two apologies up-front: [a] this is entirely personal and non-BTA-related, and [b] depending on your own experiences, this may be so trivial as to be disappointing. But, for me, I've never had a car that actually survived to 200K, so I'm feeling pumped right about now. Here's photographic evidence as of five minutes ago that, despite its faults (and brush-ins with thievery), I love what this li'l fourteen-year-old econo-box can do.

As Neil Young sang to his '53 Pontiac: With your chrome heart shining / In the sun / Long may you run.

BATTLESHIP FUN TIME

Wizard World 2006 - Donn Ha's Pancake-a-thon and Day01

Well, here we are at Wizard World Chicago, in the year of 2006. We had a grande ole' time last night staying at BTA's friend, Donn Ha's, house. We had pancakes and watched V for Vendetta and it was all pretty neat. The drive down wasn't too bad either, and traffic was mild, and spirits were high as evident in these pictures.

Kevin Drives with a purpose, but without caution.


Zander shows how pumped he is for Wizard World. Whoa Z, save that excitement for carrying boxes to the convention table!


Donn Ha's cat, the most adorable little muffin face in the whoooooooooole world!


I manned the table for a while at the convention, and drew a bit, but not anything below the shoulders, since I never made it that far in my 'It's Fun To Draw People!' book.

Some dudes who walked by.


I WISH this dude was at the con.


I asked Zander for a sketch, then he said it would be 5 dollars or fisticuffs. Then I asked if it could be of a unicorn, and he got this dewy-eyed look and broke down and did it. But then it was just captain America, so I think he forgot about the unicorn....or did he?!? Is that a horn?!



More pics this weekend!

Downstairs space DONE! (mostly)

It took us longer than we thought but we're ready to move the electronic stuff into the new space tomorrow. YAY!


Here's Tim fixing the rough and stained spots.


The new entrance.


Here's the new raw audio studio space, that door is going to be a sound booth.

BEFORE

BEFORE

AFTER

Zander, Kevin, and Britt go to Wizard World Chicago!

That's right! Tomorrow, Kevin, Zander, and Britt will cram themselves into Kevin's Saturn and head on down ol' highway 94 to the Windy City (or, rather, the Boring Tech Center in the Nondescript Suburb of the Windy City) to peddle their wares at Wizard World Chicago '06! And what better fuel on the night before the show than eating pancakes and watching V for Vendetta with Gene and Donn Ha? None, I tell you.

I'll now dispense with the third person and mention that we are getting an early start tomorrow, because driving to Chicago from Minneapolis has two halves: the half that involves 6 hours, give or take, of driving across Wisconsin, and the half that involves 2 hours, give or take, of driving the last 2 miles in horrendous Chicago traffic and finding a parking space. Dear God, it's awful.

And there is no way in the world that I'm missing episode 2 of Who Wants To Be A Superhero? This show is the freaking best. The main reason I'm watching it is that Feedback is my friend from college, but the truth of it is-- the show is really fun to watch. I mean, they get mauled by dogs in this episode! If you think I am going to miss people dressed in superhero suits who are then dressed in attack-dog protective gear trying to get across a backyard to supposedly help an old lady while being bitten, scratched, and dragged around by two attack dogs, you must be out of your mind.

So, also, if you're keeping track, this Wizard World show is a scant two weeks after San Diego. Two huge comics shows in three weekends. Although I love seeing all my comics homies, my general sentiment is this: no thank you very much. There used to be a nice comfy month between these shows and you could catch your breath. Now my wife Joolie has to hang out with the other comic-book widows.

San Diego was fun, as usual, although this was the first time that I was at the Preview Night on Wednesday night. And by Preview Night, I mean the first day of the show. Four days is a long enough time to be out on the floor, shaking hands and being awesome, without adding a fifth day at the beginning so that you can get that feeling of desperation before the thing even gets going. I was doing a sketch on the first night, and my back was getting a little sore from leaning over the sketchbook, and I had that sort-of sense memory from years past that said, "this show's starting to wear me down" when I suddenly realized that the show hadn't even started! I had four full days left. So I blew off the sketch (for a little while), got up and bought some comics and action figures and felt a whole lot better.

So come on over to Artist's Alley at Wizard World Chicago and hang with us cool guys. I don't know what booth we're at, but they're all in the same room, so this year we don't have to worry about people being stuck in the annex for the elderly and the infirm.

See you there!

The Meaning Behind "I Love You With My Ford"

We here at BTA have received ones and ones of emails from fans saying, "Hey, I loved I Love You With My Ford -- but what does it mean?" ILYWMF is based on a 1961 James Rosenquist painting of the same name. This has been my favorite painting since I first saw it in a college art textbook, and I even tried to see it live at its current home in Stockholm, but it was not on display at the time. Anyway, I have no idea what the painting means, so I thought I'd infuse a little story into the three disparate panels by making a modern America retelling of the classic Pygmalion & Galatea story. The idea for the setting of the comic came from the specific Ford car that Rosenquist used in his painting -- a 1949 model that literally saved the company from ruin. At the time we wrote the script, present-day Ford Motor Company was going through similar financial trouble.

The role of Richard Caleal, the clay model designer, is completely fictionalized. However, Henry Ford II (nicknamed "The Deuce") really did hire ten ex-air force officers to help keep things running smoothly (details below).

From saudiaramcoworld.com: "Born in 1912 in Lansing, Michigan to Lebanese immigrant parents, Richard Caleal began drawing pictures of automobiles at the age of seven. Self-taught and passionate about design, Caleal worked at Hudson, reo, Cadillac and Packard before going to Studebaker to become a member of the famed Raymond Loewy design team. In 1946 he began working as a free- lance designer for George Walker, who had been awarded the contract from Henry Ford ii for the design of the 1949 Ford. Working on the kitchen table in his small bungalow in Mishawaka, Indiana, Caleal designed and completed his prototype quarter-scale model, which was personally selected by Henry Ford ii to become the 1949 Ford. Referred to as “the car that saved an empire,” the 1949 Ford helped save Ford Motor Company from financial trouble, and earned Ford an astounding $177 million profit that year. Moreover, Caleal’s hyper-smooth, slab-sided design set the trend for the future of automobile styling."

And from www.hfmgv.org: "The 1949 Ford was revolutionary when it was introduced in the spring of that year. After the second World War, Ford Motor Company had been producing only remodeled designs of their 1942 automobile. Sleek and slab-sided with the trademark circle in the front grille, the 1949 Ford broke from previous ideas of design and engineering. By the late 1940s, the dominance of the Big Three was more apparent than ever. The 1949 Ford symbolized the company's revitalization under Henry Ford II, who had taken over for his grandfather in 1945. Modern management methods and dramatically new products returned Ford to second place in sales. Finding the company in total disarray, Henry Ford II lured Ernest R. Breech from the presidency of Bendix Aviation Corporation to be his executive vice-president and implement the recovery of Ford. Henry Ford II also lured in a dynamic management team to overhaul the company, including ten Harvard-trained ex-Air Force officers dubbed the Whiz Kids."

Artist note: James Rosenquist studied art at the Minneapolis Insitute of Arts and the University of Minnesota in the early 1950's. So... we've got that sweet Minneapolis connection.

San Diego Video: Cosplayers : What's your real life day job?

Mandatory Post Day!

It has recently come to my attention that posts are now mandatory nation-wide. In protest of these recent events, I hereby announce my refusal to post on a blog. Viva la revolution!