Magazine Recommendation - International Artist

While browsing through the magazine section of a local bookstore during lunch time a couple of weeks ago, I stumbled onto this magazine. The artwork on the cover caught my attention, and I picked it up and flip through the pages.

The quality of the art featured in the magazine was astounding, and best of all, it offered a step-by-step look at an evolution of a painting from various artists. It also features artists and their works, explaining their inspiration and style. It was a bit difficult to follow as they assumed the reader has some level of proficency in the arts. But nevertheless, the art works featured in the magazine itself is good enough to pick it up.

Bi-monthly, at a cover price of S$14.50. I bought my copy at Times the Bookshop.

Haul of the Day - 18 Dec 2006

Finally, Kinokuniya Singapore announced its public 20% storewide discount on Sunday, but only for a limited 2 day period. I was scanning through the Sunday papers, and did not notice until I saw it in the Chinese edition. It was then already too late for me to go on Sunday, so I had to make another trip on Monday (which is the last day) to the Orchard branch to get the books I had been holding out for so long.



From the top left, HyperHobby December 2006 edition, Graphic Novel The Fountain and trade paperback Essential X-men Volume 1.

I bought HH for a coupon for a magazine exclusive mailaway Medicom RAH DX Kamen Rider No.2 (old version), which TFH will help process for its members.

The Fountain is a movie adaptation of the same name, starring Huge Jackman (this guy is everywhere), about the fountain of youth. It is illustrated by Kent Williams, one of my favourite comic artists (reason why I picked it up).

Essential X-men vol.1 collects some Uncanny X-men story which I read in some UK comic magazines I bought ages ago. The story arc was illustrated by John Bryne, and I was simply amazed by the black and white artwork then. So I had to pick it up for the complete story. But I think John Bryne's artwork now is not as good as what he had done during those days.

I was also contemplating to get Frank Cho's Women, Halo GN (hardcover which I did not really fancy), IDW's Popbot Vol2 or Popbot Collection (a tpb of Vol1 and 2), but my wallet said "Woah, buddy. That's enough for today. Any more and I'll self combust."

DVD - The Batman Complete Third Season

The box art has been released by Warner Bros, and the DVD will hit the streets on April 10, 2007. The collection consists of 2 discs and all 13 epsiodes.

Anime Review - Naruto Movie 2

The show starts off with a battle between the Village of Sand and a mysterious band of warriors from a unique looking ship. As the battle reaches its climax, we move on to see Naruto, Sakura and Shikamaru on a mission to retrieve a ferrat. In the mist, they come into contact with the mysterious warriors and a boy in armour with special skills.

During the battle, Naruto and the armoured boy, Temujin, falls off a cliff and is saved by a caravan.

Shikamaru and Sakura, on the other hand, find themselves standing in front of a huge moving fortress. Shikamaru decides to embark on an inflitration mission to find out more.

As the story advances, it will be revealed that all the elements of Temujin, the fortress, the caravan people, and the man behind the whole scheme of things are all related, and the story cumulates in a secret ruins, and the power it kept.

The animation, compared to the first movie, is much better, and the action sequences are great as usual. The background is more detailed, and adds depth to the movie.
The animation sequence involving Sakura's battle in the ruins seemed to be animated differently.

The introduction of Garaa and Kankurou is a nice touch, and it was great to see them in action. Not much was revealed about the powers of the 3 ladies, but it has some resemblance to Dracula and the 3 witches. And surprsingly, none of the senior Shinobi from Konoha were featured, even for a brief moment.

The story was nothing much to get excited about. It still revolved around the theme of blind faith and ambition, exploitation and redemption, much like in the anime.

Overall, it was an enjoyable movie. Personally, I would rank it as a B-.

Anime - Blocker Gundan (Corps) IV Machine Blasters

I remember when I was a kid, I used to catch this anime religiously, over the Malaysia channel. It was dubbed in Malay, so I did not understand anything. But I still liked the show due to the mecha. They were so cool then, and till todate, I still think they are cool.

I used to draw the robots, and I still have a pencil sketch of Bosuparuda that my uncle did.

By the way, I was able to sing the opening and ending themes, in Japanese, then, even though I had no idea what I was singing.

With the advances in technology, I am able to relive my childhood memories, courtesy of youtube. :)

Opening theme


Closing theme


Now my only wish is to have toys of these mecha remade, along the lines of Bandai's Soul of Chogokin. (And hopefully Japan would release this show on DVD, like that it is currently doing for some of the more popular anime from the 70s and 80s.)

Video - Faithful

This is the short version of the Merc commerical that was aired locally quite sometime ago. It has a very nice background score, and personally the whole commerical was done very nicely. Enjoy.



PS. I do not know the title of the score. I think it was specially commissioned for this commerical. Also, I am just sharing the commerical, and in no way affiliated to the car manufacturing company in any way or form.

Figure Stands

I am not sure why the local toy shops do not stock up on figure stands. The only stands I see readily available are 12" figure stands - those with the adjustable waist/chest grip or Y-shaped crotch supports, not those for the common 6" to 8" action figures. No demand ? I am not sure.

Though, nowadays some toy company are packing in a stand with the figures - Toybiz's Marvel Legends, Takara's MicroAction series, Kaiyodo's Revoltech, and so on, there are still lots of figures that do not come with a stand and it makes posing them a tad difficult.

After searching through the net, I finally found something that was close to a perfect stand: Hasegawa's Flexible Stand Robot type A. It could fit most figures and I see a quite a number of Japanese toy purchasers use it in their toy galleries.

I bought this from a model kit shop, and when I wanted to get a couple more, they were sold out. Effort to source for more from a local toy shop is still in progress.

While searching through the net, I also came across some interesting stands from Hobby Base:

The last one is a mini MS stand which comes with a nice storage compartment to keep those little loose parts you might have.

I actually have the first 2 stands - the first one which I had bought much earlier via a mass order by Shaun from TFH; the second one when I made a trip to Hong Kong in the middle of the year, in anticipation of the BandaixMedicom 1/6 Project Kamen Rider The First 12" figure.

Digging through my stuff, I also found another stand which I was my first stand purchase - a flight base from Kotobukiya.

Haul of the Day - Oct 18

Another eventful and painful haul for today from The Falcon's Hangar - The latest Transformers Classics series from Hasbro.
Top row, left to right: Wave 1 Deluxe series Starscream, Bumblebee, Astrotrain and Rodimus.
Middle row: Wave 1 Voyager series Megatron and Optimus Prime.
Last row: An unexpected purchase. World's Smallest Transformers Dinobots Slag, Snarl and Grimlock from Justitoys.

Haul of the Day - Oct 16

From left to right:
Kaiyodo Revoltech 013 EVA-04 (Silver), World's Smallest Transformers (WST) Sunstorm, Kayiyodo Revoltech 012 Levi from Black Lagoon, Fewture Getter-2, and lastly Sideshow Star Wars 12" Qui-gon Jin for Shaun (again).

This is a killer 2 months due to big items arriving one after another. First MP-3 and MP-4. Then came Fewture Getter-2. Later this week will be all the Transformers Classics Voyager and Deluxe figures, and sometime this week or next will be Hottoys ED-209 from Robocop.

Haze of the Day

Since everyone's posting pictures, and this is the current talk of the town, I thought I also join in the bandwagon. Taken from office window.

Haul of the Day - Oct 14

Well, not exactly my haul, but for Shaun.
Only one on a pile of series 4 Brainiac and Superman, the 2-pack rehash.
Still looking for the elusive Darkseid.


Was on my way to a friend's house to take a look at her new house before all the renovations are completed. Decided to take a detour, and sometimes you just need to take that extra effort to score.

DVD - The Batman: The Complete Second Season

The Complete Season 2 DVD has hit the streets in the USA on Sep 19, 2006.

The 2-disc set collects all the 13 episodes, and has only a disappointing primary extra "Catching Up with...The Batman," a montage of clips -- with episode titles attached -- from the first season.

It's SRP is US19.98, with the appropriate discounts available at the online stores.

Other DVD features like subtitles: English, Spanish, French and audio tracks: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround), French (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround), Spanish (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround) are not something to go wild about as well.

Well, it's still a cartoon, and cannot expect much from Warner Brothers. Now will just wait for that 20% promotion at www.deepdiscountdvd.com.

Haul of the Day - Oct 04

1.
2. Masterpiece MP-4 Perfect Edition Convoy
3. Pinky:st rmp001 Nazuna (quite a bland packaging for a Japanese product)
4. Pinky:st Pinky with Rabbit Scooter Ver.2

Haul of the Day

- Ultra Cryo Scourge (repaint Cybertron Scourge)
- Deluxe Smokescreen (repaint Cybertron Crosswise)
- Deluxe Optimus Prime (repaint Beast Wars 10th Anniversary Optimus Primal)
- Deluxe Megatron (repaint Beast Wars 10th Anniversary Megatron)






Power Girl (yes, I got this figure mainly because of the *ahem*) But seriously, this figure is a good sculpt, among the DC Direct figures released so far.




EX Weapon Set MMS Type Rabbit Waffebunny






- Keroro Head Series 3 Trading figure
- Random gashaphon figure from a pile of gashapons

Google Box - Miami Ink

Miami Ink is both the name of a tattoo shop on Miami Beach, and the title of a reality show on TLC which films the events that take place there. The shop is co-owned by artists Ami James (2nd from left) and Chris Nuñez (3rd from left), and also features artists Kat Von D, Chris Garver (last), Darren Brass (4th from left) and Yoji Harada (first). The show exhibits the process and finished work of these entrepreneurial tattoo artists by featuring a number of customers along with their backstory and motivations for their tattoos.

Ami James incidentally was Chris Garver's apprentice, and Yoji Harada is now Ami's apprentice.

Season one is currently being re-run on Starhub channel 16 Discovery Travel and Living, every Sunday 11:00pm.

Have a look, and it will change your perception on the world of tattoo.

Artist - Daniel Dociu

I like this artist's style. It reminds me of Roger Dean (though the style is somewhat different), and the arcade game Darius.

www.tinfoilgames.com

Anime - BLEACH TV Series

Bleach the TV series is currenting screening on the local cable channel (CH 56). Having heard so much rave reviews about the show, which has over taken the ratings from Naruto to be the number one anime in Japan, I decided to have a look. Before that, it has not impressed me much based on the story and animation (after watching one episode sometime ago).

The current show time is 6:30pm, and a repeat on an ungodly hour of 00:30am, 5 days a week, Mondays to Fridays. By now, I have watched about 9 episodes, and frankly, it has not impressed me as much as the first time I watched Naruto.

Maybe this is just a slow beginning, so I will keep watching, as long as I can keep my eyes open. These late night repeats are a killer. I doze off half the time.

The animation is not as good as Naruto, and it is also not as hillarious as Naruto as well. But on the plus side, the animation is consistent. Naruto sometimes tend to have some bad animation. But when an epic battle ensues, the animation is superb.

The opening an closing themes as nice, but again, not as nice as Naruto, in terms of the songs and animation. The only 2 I liked so far is the 4th Opening "Tonight Tonight Tonight" by the Beat Crusaders and the 6th Ending "My Pace" by Sunset Swish. Both are catch tunes and the animation is great !

4th Opening Theme


6th Closing Theme

Music Recommendations - Jay Chou's Latest Release

Wow, it's been so long since I updated this site. I need to get off my lazy arse.

Anyway, Jay Chou has just released his latest album 依然范特西, and the first single is a collaboration with 费玉清 called 千里之外.












A friend's sister actually bought this new album for S$10 ! It's an authorised China version. But I guess you could have gotten it even cheaper if you were in China.

Here's the track list:
1.夜的第七章
2.听妈妈的话
3.千里之外
4.本草纲目
5.退后
6.红模仿
7.心雨
8.白色风车
9.迷迭香
10.菊花台

I managed to listen to a few songs, and frankly, there is not much difference from his previous ablum. Still the fast rap, R&B and slow song mixes.

Takara Cool Girl CATWOMAN

On July 06, 2006, Takara, or rather, TakaraTomy will release a Cool Girl version of Catwoman. I am not too sure which version is this based on, but it looks like the recent Jim Lee Hush version.
Suggested retail price is 6,999yen.




On a side note, a first for CG series, a male figure from Batman Begins, the Batz himself. Same date, SRP is a whopping 12,999yen.

Happy Chinese New Year 2006

A few more hours, and it's goodbye Year of the Chicken, and welcome Year of the Dog. I hope the coming year will be better for everyone.
Just got a brand new haircut yesterday, and against what I have previously thought I would never do, I changed my hair colour. (",) Anyways, hopefully with this new style comes a new attitude. :P

Oh, and the stylist would did the job is a friend I met while hanging out at Falcon's Hangar. After seeing my hair style (I kept it long and combed it in a geeky way), he was so eager to change it. I guess it was really that bad.
So here's a plug for him. Thanks pal ! I really like the new look.

Lawrence, at
It's Hairy
Far East Plaza
#04-100 (just across Falcon)
(+65) 6733 0976

Takara BEST OF COOL GIRLS EX 科學忍者隊

Takara is releasing a line of reissues of its Cool Girl 12inch doll series. They are not just straight reissue, but with some changes in the colours. It's been announced that G3 Jun from the Gatchaman series will be part of this release. And along with this release, a DARK version will also be introduced. Now, I am not too sure if Jun was ever in this costume, but it sure looks cool. Scheduled release date is Mar 2006, with a suggested retail price of 9975yen.

Here's a rundown of the releases:
Vol 1: CG-12 Ruby
Vol 2: CG-07 Harley
Vol 3: CG-EX3 Ash
Vol 4: Cutie Honey
Vol 5: G3

AVATAR The Last Airbender

I accidentally stumbled onto this animated series when I visited a website looking for some anime information. The information listed indicated that it was already half way through the series. So I did a search for more information on the net and found that it was not an anime. I decided not to pursue the series further.

Then while channel surfing on a fine weekend some months ago, I saw the show being broadcast on Nickelodeon (which is where the show was created for in the first place). I decided to give it a try, and to my surprise, it was very good.

The story is simple: This kid called Aang, destined to be the next Avatar, master of air, water, earth and fire bending (which means controlling), gets trapped in a block of ice, and released some 100 years later (ala Captain America), by 2 kids from the water tribe. During his absence, the Fire nation started a war to rule the 4 nations (world was divided then into Fire, Water, Earth, Air, all skilled in the art of their respective element bending). Now back to the present, he must master all the elements, defeat the Fire nation and being peace to the world. Quite a hugh undertaking for a 12 year old, who has only knolwdge in air bending.

What captivated me to this series are the animation and style. It is sometimes wacky, and the animation is smooth and consistent throughout. On one episode, a sequence of animation was done similar to the style of the Japanese anime DeadLeaves. But I do find the used of a singular colour tone and anime influence too dull. But that does not make the show any much less enjoyable.

The DVD will be out in Jan 2006. Sadly, when I heard the news, I thought it was for the complete 1st season. It turns out that it is only Vol 1 of the first season, comprising of 4 episodes only. At this rate, I am not sure when the whole 1st season will be completely released, before a boxset (hopefully) will be released.

Anyway, Happy New Year !