Warren Ellis's Blog, page 81
January 20, 2012
January 19, 2012
January 18, 2012
SOPA
The Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act, two laws currently working their way through the American legislative system, will do untold damage to the structure of the internet if passed. Neither law is fit for its spoken purpose. I am not American, nor do I live in America. But the internet is an interdependent creature, and unilateral SOPA or PIPA actions will affect the entire animal. One country, even a country I love and admire, should not wield that power, especially in service of a cause both confused and mendacious.
As Charlie says, meddling in another country's politics is rarely wise. But I support the blackout.
I'll see you on the 19th.
January 17, 2012
TIMELESS
Some ideas in our new video #timeless http://t.co/lwV0rwzX were inspired by @warrenellis keynote at @cocities http://t.co/Zmrw4TcLTue Jan 17 19:24:48 via HootSuite Reply Retweet Favorite[image error]KS12
ks12
The digital settles in as background. We remember less and query more. Our identity play would be considered schizophrenic in the last century. We have more friends than ever before yet know new frontiers of isolation. The quantification of our experience haunts us in the form of a persistent history. And we are distracted more than we ever knew possible. These circumstances are paradoxically a description of the near future and a diagnosis of the current state of affairs. The truly timeless is redefined – it has transcended that which is classic; it has become that which is never finished.
Bookmarks for 2012-01-17
"A recent McClatchy report revealed that it takes nearly 170 people to keep a single Predator drone in the air for 24 hours."
(tags:war tech )
January 16, 2012
Routing Around Urban Damage: The Ghetto Escalator
In Comuna 13 of Medellin, Colombia's largest city, a recently built 1,260-foot long escalator snakes across the hillside shantytown in six separate divisions. As part of the neighborhood's larger urban regeneration project, this massive outdoor escalator cuts down the time to traverse Comuna 13, reportedly one of Medellin's poorest and most violent neighborhoods, from 35 minutes to six minutes on foot.
Velocity applied to every traveller. Every pedestrian given escape-pod momentum and jettisoned clear of shantytown. In someone's conception. I look at this and see a launchpad for all the feared criminals of Comuna 13 to speed up into all the nice places where the quality live. Saves having to nick a car.
The State Of South Ossetia
You remember South Ossetia? Declared independence from Georgia in 1990 in the chaotic hangover from the breakup of the Soviet Union. Got the shit blasted out of it a couple of times since then. After the last time, in 2008, all kinds of people promised to put money and resources into South Ossetia, even though (I think) Georgia still doesn't recognise it as a state.
So let's see how that's worked out.
The railway line out of Tskhinvali looks good, right?
The housing's in fine condition.
And a rotting tank turret that no bugger's bothered to move in three or four years makes an excellent piece of public art.
What A Comics Script Is For
This may seem obvious, but give me a minute. I think it's often misunderstood.
A script is a set of instructions to the artist(s), letterer, editor, colourist if applicable, and designer if applicable. This set of instructions is intended to present the mechanics of your story with the greatest possible clarity. Adhering to a precise format, as in screenwriting, is not necessary. Presenting a script whose operation is clear to everybody is the requirement.
This set of instructions must surround your story to the extent that you feel necessary and comfortable. Some writers produce reams of panel description because they require fine control of the artist, letterer and colourist to meet their vision of the story. Some writers boil their description down to a telegram because they require only that the most basic requirements of the panel be met in order to achieve their goals.
Both methods, however, and everything in between, are about manipulation of the artist. That sounds grim, doesn't it?
Even if you and the artist have previously agreed on content and scenes and set-pieces, clear and specific notation of the mechanics of the comic is down to you. You are telling the artist what to do. The trick is to get the artist to like it.
When you're starting out, you may well find yourself writing "blind": not knowing who the artist will be. This is why people like Alan Moore evolved that hyper-descriptive style — so he could get the end result he was looking for regardless of who was drawing it. You may prefer to do that. I would prefer that you took some art classes, and talk to some illustrators (this may involve sign language and grunting sounds). Investigate art, even if your drawing hand, like mine, behaves more like a flipper. Understanding what is joyful about illustration is important. It's important to create a thing that will delight an artist. (And even a letterer, although that's going to be harder as many of them have the demeanour of a demented gravedigger.)
You are, in many ways, writing a love letter intended to woo the artist into giving their best possible work to the job. A bored or unengaged artist will show up on the page like a fibrous stool in the toilet bowl, and that's not their fault — it's yours.
(Unless the artist is crazy. Which they all are. But you take my point, yes?)
Related articles
GUEST INFORMANT: Brandon Graham (warrenellis.com)
The First Comic I Ever Loved (warrenellis.com)
PREVIEW: Antony Johnston's WASTELAND #33 (warrenellis.com)
January 15, 2012
Bookmarks for 2012-01-15
"Paddy Ashdown claims that we are living in a moment in history where power is changing in ways it never has before. In a spellbinding talk at TEDxBrussels he outlines the three major global shifts that he sees coming." Also, a quote: "Mao described (WW1 and WW2) as 'the European Civil Wars.'"
(tags:pol war )
Alexei Navalny: Russia's new rebel who has Vladimir Putin in his sights | From the Guardian | The Guardian
"Navalny's more nationalist views are troubling. Last year he spoke at the Russky Marsh, where some protesters made Nazi salutes. He has also endorsed a movement called Enough of Feeding the Caucasus, which protests against the theft of state funding but which critics see as xenophobic. And a video that Navalny recorded for Narod several years ago called for arming the population to shoot Chechen bandits."
(tags:pol )
Christoph Adami: Finding life we can't imagine | Video on TED.com
"How do we search for alien life if it's nothing like the life that we know? At TEDxUIUC Christoph Adami shows how he uses his research into artificial life — self-replicating computer programs — to find a signature, a 'biomarker,' that is free of our preconceptions of what life is."
(tags:xeno )
Five-eyed intelligence « Ultraphyte
"Is our binocular vision the reason we tend to divide the world into two parts, yes or no, on or off, right or wrong? Would a (five-eyed) alien life form, like an intelligent Opabinid, see the world as pentameral? What would it be like for us to attempt communication with a pentameral being?"
(tags:bio xeno )
On Cyclonopedia: Not everything we read is to our liking « After the Dinner Party
In looking for a new copy of the book (lost mine), I turned up this wonderful phrase in a comments thread: "a certain necrocratic regime of thought."
(tags:quote )
Fogou – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"A fogou or fougou (pronounced "foo-goo") is an underground, dry-stone structure found on Iron Age or Romano-British defended settlement sites in Cornwall." (Also ref. Cope's "The Modern Antiquarian" tv docu, available on YouTube) (I'm always forgetting this word.)
(tags:history architecture )
Patience (After Sebald)
James Leyland Kirby, in his guise of The Caretaker, created a soundtrack to Grant Gee's documentary about the magnificent writer WG Sebald. Currently on vinyl only – I'm a direct subscriber to Kirby's work, and so received the download early. It'll be out on CD and download next month.
It's of a piece with other Caretaker work, and Kirby's other output outside the "Intrigue & Stuff" collections: deeply haunted early 20th Century recordings summoned through dusty electronic seance. I've seen a few people comment that it's Kirby-as-usual and the trick's getting thin. I think it's a perfect response to Sebald's work.
It did, in fact, send me running for my shattered old first-printing paperback copy of Sebald's sublime THE RINGS OF SATURN. Which promptly crumbled and disintegrated in my hands, a shower of papery dust and brittle yellowed sheets. No more apt way to strew the way for the recording, I suppose.
PATIENCE (AFTER SEBALD) is, at a long stroll's pace, meditative and deeply involved with memory. Exactly like Sebald's own work. I haven't yet seem the film, but it's hard to imagine a more fitting accompaniment to the man's themes. It is also, like Sebald's prose, very stately and beautiful.
You can hear samples at Boomkat. If you've never heard Kirby's work before and have further interest, there's a fine selection for full free streaming at his Bandcamp page.
(I can't believe there's not an ebook edition of RINGS OF SATURN.)
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