Advice From A Dude For Bands

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NoirJNL-01Dear bands everywhere,

If you have to introduce a cover song by name and artist because people aren’t going to recognize it, just don’t do that cover song. Don’t waste a “what’s this” moment with your audience on someone else’s obscure crap. Do an original instead.

If the audience isn’t going to recognize it, they’re not going to be impressed, and you’re basically doing someone else’s promotion for them. Promote your own band’s sound by doing your own songs and your own takes on well-known songs.

Category: Advice From A Dude

Just a little advice from a fan

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DEXTER-BATISTA

Category: Advice From A Dude

Paper Fetishists Can Calm Down – Codex Sales Are Climbing, Too

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An interesting thing happened on the way to the long-anticipated Funeral of the Codex…

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Category: Advice From A Dude

Duality of Storytelling

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hollywoodIt has often been noted that big summer movies come in thematic twos, the classic example being 1998’s Deep Impact and Armageddon asteroid catastrophe duo.

Beyond the simple coincidence of themes, however, I started to notice that these twin flicks often have a strange, yin-yang duality, with one film being more realistic (or attempting to be) and one being more iconic or even cartoonish. The question it raised in my head was this:

Why was this odd cinematic dualism happening?

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Another Set of Bulgy Eyes

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BETTA READER

Category: Uncategorized

Injustice to Enjustice – Moral Conflict as Writing Strategy

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DumasWritingLet’s face it: justice is boring.

Do you remember, in the Matrix trilogy, how the first attempt at trapping humanity in virtual reality was described as a perfect world without conflict? Humans withered and died. The machines had to inject conflict, suffering, and injustice into the program for their battery-slaves to thrive.

What I’m about to say might sound like a misanthropic observation, but human beings love conflict and injustice.

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Category: Advice From A Dude

Inventing Fictional Aliens

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The difficult thing about creating a fictional alien species is that if they are too familiar, they seem inauthentic. Slap some bumps on the forehead and voilà : every Star Trek alien ever. And, the Star Trek franchise eventually had to explain this phenotypical homogeneity (ask a fan, but it’s in a Next Generation episode) to keep the credibility of the milieu intact.

On the other hand, to seem scientifically authentic aliens have to be … unfamiliar? Unrelatable? What’s a better word?

Alien.

However, if you take the creative process step-by-step, you can work outward from simple premises to alien species that are both inhuman yet believable and understandable. Continue reading

How I think the next Star Wars movie will go (based on how Abrams did the last Star Trek movie)

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hollywoodNow that director J. J. Abrams has moved on from his quasi-reboot of the Star Trek franchise to quasi-reboot the Star Wars franchise, I am inspired to speculate what his handling of the former presages for the latter.

The egregious fanservicing! The clever character role reversals! The not-so-clever race reversals! And Abrams’ signature cinematographicalistic stylings!  Are you breathless yet?

So, here’s my take on what we might expect from Episode VII. (Note: If you haven’t seen the original Star Wars trilogy or Star Trek : Into Darkness, you’re probably not going to get any of this…)

INTO THE DARK SIDE

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Archaic Definition of the Week – Parbuckle

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ADOTWPARBUCKLE, a contrivance used by sailors to lower a cask or bale from any heighth [sic], as the top of a wharf or key, into a boat or lighter, which lies along-side, being chiefly employed where there is no crane or tackle.

It is formed by fastening the bight of a rope to a post, or ring, upon the wharf, and thence pulling the two parts of the rope under the two quarters of the cast, and bringing them back again over it; so that when the two lower parts remain firmly attached to the post, the two upper parts are gradually slackened together, and the barrel, or bale, suffered to roll easily downward Parbuckleto that place where it is received below. This method is also frequently used used by masons, in lifting up or letting down large stones, when they are employed in building; and from them it has probably been adopted by seamen.

– Wm. Falconer’s Dictionary of the Marine (1780).

Category: ADOTW

Neologism of the Week – Legitprop

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Writinglegitprop [n.] /LĒ-jit-prop/ in contrast to agitprop, which is propagandistic elements in art or literature intended to agitate, legitprop is propagandistic elements in art or literature intended to legitimize some potentially controversial cause or idea.

EX: “The climax of the film Iron Man 3 could be seen as legitprop for the use of robot drones.”

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