mababang langit

so there's this online flash game where you get to play the classic super mario game, but using other nintendo characters like mega man, link from the legend of zelda , samus from metroid , castlevania 's simon belmont, and one of the guys from contra (spread gun!). newgrounds user exploding rabbit spent over a year putting this together. no word yet on whether the thirty lives cheat works. play it here via

made these watercolor paintings of google image search results. more via

haven't posted any animal stuff in ages, so here's einstein , a three-day old pinto stallion from new hampshire that just claimed the title of world's lightest foal. he weighs 6 pounds and stands 14 inches high. makes me think of hammond's tiny elephant from the jurassic park novel. seriously.

via

so after baking the clay parts and painting the whole thing white ( here ), it's time to start painting in the details. at this point it dawns on me that i have absolutely no idea what i'm doing . i don't know how to mix paint or stroke the brush properly to avoid streaking or anything. i was literally reading the labels on the acrylic paint for instructions. not that being ignorant and unfit for the task has ever stopped me before... i temporarily took over the kids' work table so i could work in front of the TV. watching TV while painting is my official excuse. anyways, after a final coat of matte varnish this is what we have:

just dropped off copies of taal volcano monster vs. evil space paru-paro and school run #1 at sputnik comics in cubao.

previously i cut-and-pasted various parts to and from the munny, and my wrists hurt so bad from rubbing and molding sculpey that i decided to take a day off... which lasted several weeks. and so to continue... next step is baking the clay. but the head doesn't fit inside the toaster oven. so we make do. quote of the day: "is it supposed to smoke?" apparently not. after i die i want to get cremated. just to let you know. sanding the sculpey parts after they've hardened. spraying on some primer. and then a coat of white paint. drying them out. and this is what we have so far. as you can see the lumpy clay parts are still lumpy. sorry sputnik folks. tomorrow we paint in the other colors.

wallpaper version here . via oh, and while we're talking about the iceland volcano:

i'll be going through my indie stack slowly over the next few days, but here are some of the ones i've really liked so far: skin art - a strong debut from kay aranzanso , where she adapts a short story by angela pasion into a wordless comic. it's bittersweet, touching and very well-told visually. plague - writer fidelis tan headlines this mini-anthology about the human toll of a mysterious plague that turns people into brittle shells (it's not a zombie plague). especially loved sunday morning and the title story plague for their succinct, lyrical storytelling. bellboy and the hotel universe: pie in the sky - the little prince meets classic hanna-barbera cartoons in this wonderfully-drawn comic about an outer-space bellhop and his t-rex pal. some storytelling wrinkles could use some ironing out, but i'm definitely watching out for the next issue. kubori kikiam 7 - a contender for best kubori kikiam story ever. it's the kikiams vs. survival re

found this on the robo rock radio show's facebook feed , but can't seem to find any additional information about it. s.p. nats with kangkong juice, that kills me.

so here's the thing: when i started working on school run, i had it in mind to keep with zombie flick tradition. that is, to start with a group (in this case, of grade-school kids) and then kill them off one by one in horrible and entertaining ways until the sun sets on (or a rescue chopper comes for, whatever) a lone survivor at the end. and i specifically wanted the protagonists to be kids, because kids vs. zombies is something i haven't seen before. but when i told people about my plans i'd get these shocked reactions--i couldn't possibly do that. how could i do that? apparently you just don't feed kids to bloodthirsty mutant hordes, not even fictional cartoon kids that don't exist. and so i am putting things to a vote. if enough people vote to save the kids they get a reprieve. you won't get to vote for or against individual characters, just how many survive. the poll will be on the sidebar of this blog until the end of june. vote now people, the lives

thank you all you beautiful people who dropped by the indie tiangge and bought my stuff at yesterday's summerkon. school run #1 sold out, both the "DVD copy" (inkjet print) and "kuha sa sinehan" (photocopy) versions. you guys are awesome. look out for the second chapter at metrocon in august. i didn't have time to buy all the titles i wanted, but at least i got free stuff from chapel and josel nicolas . also did tradesies with mel casipit ( baboy 2 ), hazel manzano ( callwork 2: proud callboy ), lady storykeeper ( dragon kid 2 ) and michael david ( kubori kikiam 7 ): pop culture maven adam david remarked on the quality and variety of this year's indie releases. it's an exciting time! my setup, with the school run cover going camo against the red tablecloth. the indie tables were arranged in a circle and situated in a corner this year, so anyone who got there late had to face the wall, just like in kindergarten. i lucked out because gio paredes g

summerkon is next week! here's an updated list of indes coming out, mostly with pictures (this is not intended to be all-inclusive) - punnx 2 by jp cuison & dennis nierra - callwork: proud callboy by hazel manzano - love story from omeng estanistlao - kalayaan 9 by gio paredes (kaya mo yan gio!) - riddle of nowhere , a book of poems by ej galang illustrated by apol sta. maria - umlauts and atom bombs , by gerry alanguilan & marivi hilos-nepomuceno - philippine adventure & romance stories 1 , ed. by art de guzman & nestor malgapo - pasig: epilogue by taga-ilog shorts by david sysing sanduguan 6 by ner perdrina no parking comics ed. by amos villar kapitan tog/ kulas by freely abrigo insomnior by rhiver digmaang salinlahi: suleiman by jon zamar bayan knights 4 by gilbert monsanto et al baboy 2 by mel casipit hand-drawn, quartered and other tell-tales by ariel atienza laban: a love story by jose gamboa kubori kikiam 7 by michael david zombies in manila