That Doom Buggy better come along soon...

This design is a mashup of The Haunted Mansion and The Haunted Mansion.

There's two fun images from The Haunted Mansion. One is the Hitchhiking Ghosts that attempt to accompany you home at the end of the ride. One of these three ghosts then appear in your Doombuggy as you approach the exit of the ride.

The other image comes from the other end of the attraction. When you first enter the spooky colonial facade, you come to stand in The Stretching Room, which contains four portraits that, while seemingly bland on entry, unroll with the stretching walls, to display more somewhat morbid fare.

The Quicksand Three are second from the right.

The stretching portraits are some of my favourite little touches in The Haunted Mansion, along with the moving busts and the creepy scary wallpaper.

This design is available on redbubble, for tshirts, prints, cards and stickers.

Logo Fail...

I understand that it's a serious topic, but maybe a less serious logo might be a nice idea?

And in addition to being an ugly, scary, creepy logo, I can't help but think that's an umbilical cord trailing out of the Ethiopian kid and into Robot Mother Nutrients Unit 3000.

Or is it just me?

And Now... Top Tips for Designers!

A Big Bucket of Win

Something for the fans of Hollywood Babble-On...



Anyone who hasn't had a chance to listen, Hollywood Babble-On is a podcast with Kevin Smith and Ralph Garman, and it is piss-funny.

If you like Hollywood Babble-On, Kevin Smith, Ralph Garman, KFC, or even just a big fan of archetypal Southern Grandfatherly Multinational Figureheads, grab a shirt or sticker from redbubble.



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Wrap yer laughing gear round one...

New to redbubble...

A chance encounter with an Urban Dictionary led to this design. I wanted to have a bit of fun with some typography, and this was a perfect opportunity.

If you like it, and who wouldn't :) feel free to buy one at redbubble.

Huzzah!

Tales of (Spanking) the Gold Monkey

I've been a recent convert to the Kevin Smith range of podcasts: "Jay and Silent Bob Get Old", "Hollywood Babble-On" and the original "Smodcast".

I've worked my way through the back catalogue of "Jay and Silent Bob Get Old", which began as a place to tell the history of Jason Mewes' addiction to drugs, and eventually as a public intervention, a way to keep him accountable for his actions in front of a weekly live audience, as well as a podcast audience of thousands. Jay's story boggles the mind: he goes through highs and lows (oddly enough, usually while high) and is extremely un-self-conscious about it all.

Throughout his years of addiction, one thing has kept him alive: Kevin Smith.

If it wasn't for Kevin Smith, Jay would probably be dead. I'd like to say "dead or eventually cleaned himself up", but the truth of the matter is without Smith's help, Jay would have continued to spiral down. Throughout the stories that Kevin and Jay tell, Jay is never the instigator of his salvation. Usually, he is the unwilling participant. It's up to Smith, Smith and Mewes' wives and their friends to intervene, drag Jay back from the edge, coerce him into rehab and generally straighten up and fly right. Which he does. For a while.

Alternatively, Smith muses that possibly he is the cause of the problem. By giving Mewes his break in "Clerks", then following up with roles in other movies, making Mewes a genuine paid actor, Smith wonders aloud that maybe he is at fault for giving Jay a career in acting and not allowing Mewes to mature and find himself actual employment. The idea has some merit, that Kevin Smith is an "enabler" to all of Jason Mewes' drug woes. No matter what happens in Jay's life, Kevin is always ready and available to pick up the pieces, set Mewes up in rehab, or just in Smith's own home, and try to straighten him out.

The question must be asked: when will he learn? The other question is: which one am I talking about?

Nevertheless, the podcast is enlightening, brave, honest and laugh-out-loud funny. Well recommended.

I've gotten a little behind on "Jay and Silent Get Old" because I've found my new favourite SModcast, "Hollywood Babble-On". Hosted by Kevin Smith and Ralph Garman, it's about Hollywood news and gossip generally - movie openings, celebrity deaths, charitable celebrities ("Hollywood Helpers, when you need a helping... ham...") and the sort. Interspersed with their various celebrity anecdotes are impersonations by Garman, who works for KROK in LA, and stories about smoking weed and masturbating by Smith. It's a happy balance.

The funniest thing about "Hollywood Babble-On" (or "HBO" as they abbreviate it... for now...) is that so many of the references are of my time, and would probably fly over the head of people under 30 years old. 80s TV shows, movies from 30 years ago, 1960s music icons. The impersonations in particular focus around the late 70s to early 90s, which is perfect for me.

An interesting point about this podcast is that Smith and Garman don't have any concerns about some of the litigious statements they make about celebrities, which is surprising considering the neighbourhood they're working in. For example, saying Arnold Schwarzenegger is a massive stoner or Chelsea Handler is a talentless c*nt is usually the kind of thing that has "allegedly" or "insiders say..." pasted onto the front, but Smith and Garman don't seem concerned about setting themselves to be sued. Maybe it's a case of "If it's a lie, prove it!"

Indeed, like "Jay and Silent Get Old", this podcast is also extremely honest about aspects of Smith and Garman's lives. Smith is quite open about being a huge stoner, morbidly obese, and a chronic masturbator (even if he balances it out by saying he does the latter to naked pictures of his own wife, which of course goes with my own sensibilities). Garman is pretty open about his absolute disgust at people who have succeeded more than he has, for example the fore-mentioned Chelsea Handler.

Considering he's got at least three podcasts to record a week, plus his daily regime of masturbation and smoking weed, I question how Kevin Smith gets anything done. But he does: he's got a new movie in the can, his first horror movie, "Red State". I'm looking forward to seeing it, considering I've enjoyed most of his output over the years.

And I'm certainly enjoying his current projects.

The "Birth. School. Kevin Smith. Credits." T-shirt design is a parody of the famous Metallica Gig shirt. If you don't get the joke about credits, I suggest you listen to the podcast. After you've bought a shirt, of course.

What does Disability look like to you?

Here's another thing gewgaw from the recent catalogues…

Yooralla hosted a design comp asking for design based on the concept "What does disability look like".

My thought was: If you were disabled, who would you look up to as a role model, someone who hasn't been hindered by their disability, but instead has used it to their advantage?

The answer: A pirate. Sure, there are some negative connotations, what with the death and the dismemberment and the cursed Aztec gold, but pirates are still in vogue at the moment, and with Pirates of the Caribbean 4 currently in production, they probably will be for a few years more.

And surely someone who is feeling marginalised by society from being disabled would feel a kinship with someone who skirts around the edges of society with finesse and zeal.

Zeal! There's a word I never get to use enough! Say it with me: "Zzzzzzzzeal!"

Long story short, I didn't win. I got beaten by "Bufferman", amongst others.

Superheroes beat pirates. Who knew?

Disabilities with Attitude: Now available from Redbubble.

Pirates of the Caribbean get shirty.

I had a ridiculously positive response to the Haunted Mansion shirts I loaded to redbubble.

One buyer commented: "I bought this shirt and love it. As a die hard Haunted Mansion fan it was perfect for me and their’s really nothing else like it on the market. You should consider more Disney themed shirts because they will definitely sell. Thanks again and keep up the good work."

Which made me think: he's right. While the Haunted Mansion would have to be one of my favourite ridesof all time, there are others that I enjoy as well: Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Forbidden Eye rocks mightily, The Jungle Cruise has a certain classic chic about it, Peter Pan has magical ships and the Tower of Terror has the classiest entrance and queue area.

But in terms of disney classics, there's really only one name: Pirates of the Caribbean.

Before there were the movies, the ride was already legendary, and like the Haunted Mansion,it has a slew of catchphrases and set pieces, some of which turn up in the movies for the eagle-eyed viewer.

So I decided to branch out from the Mansion and try out a little Pirates design.

With earlier version of the design, I had tried to shoe-horn a pirate ship or skull and cross bones motif, but it just wasn't working for me, so instead, I used the lines from the theme song of the ride as points of interest.

I like it so much, I bought one myself.

If you're a Pirates fan, go get it, and for a limited time (possibly up to Christmas 2010?), you can get 15% off by quoting The Code...

The 15% discount code is: actualchad_is_on_sale_8079

And if you're not a fan, well the code works for any other designs I have on redbubble as well. That can't be all bad, can it?

I originally designed a shirt based on the Haunted Mansion called "Foolish Mortal", which said exactly that, in a purple design on a grey background, which was designed to work differently between light and dark environments.

I decided, as an aside, that I would create a plain white version of the design, just in case people liked the design, but didn't trust the purple/grey colour scheme.

Sure, they've been enjoyed, but sales were cool.

But I really liked the idea of the purple and grey together, so I designed a new shirt. This time I added the Hatbox factor.

This shirt is a collage of quotes from the famous Haunted Mansion spiel, with the added bonus of having a "hidden" face which will only appear in the lowest light situations, supposedly.

Once again, interest was there, but it really didn't convert into sales.

I was more interested in the Hatbox effect than the typography, but after looking at the working files, I decided that it would be worthwhile to post up a version of just the text, one black and one white, as a design on its own.

All of a sudden, there's great interest in the design, and the shirt below went on to be one of the most popular shirt on redbubble for September. It also renewed some interest in the original design.

Now I'm looking forward to seeing photos of people at a Disney park wearing the shirts. That would be brilliant.

It just goes to show, sometimes you can't see the typography for the disembodied ghost head...

In celebration of "Star Wars: a New Hope"

A series of images I designed based on the very first Star Wars movie, "A New Hope".

Now on sale at redbubble.

The Best of Men

My brother-in-law recently got married to his new wife (now, but earlier, fiancee). From all reports everyone had a marvellous time. Unfortunately due to monetary constraints, we couldn't flight to the US to see the event LIVE, so we'll have to wait for the direct-to-DVD movie, or possibly the photo album.

As a memento of the event, Adam wanted to have a shirt designed for his groom's party, a thank you that was a little more personal than a pair of cuff links or ceremonial dagger. Being as I am a shirt designer, he asked me to provide a design that suited this most romantic and heartfelt of occasions.

Instead, I designed a shirt with boobs, sharks and gunplay.

We were both pretty happy with it.

Congratulations Adam and Rebekah!

The fortunate thing about the design is that it didn't take much to make it a design that could be used by any groom to thank his groom's party. All the important wedding-day elements are still there: boobs, sharks and gunplay. And part from Adam's initials, all I had to change was his red tie.

And now, huzzah, presenting… The Best Men.

It's a little bit wedding and a little bit Chuck Norris. And let's face it, isn't every wedding a little like Chuck Norris?

No. Probably not.

Come and get some of this!!!

Welcome to the meantime.

Hello, eventually.

Much is on in life, so in the interim between decent posts, I present "The Shatner", available here.

Carry on...

Mummy Smash Time

I have a lot of time for mothers, obviously. And I understand that there is a tipping point where they go from caring, loving, nurturing ladies to crazed, wild-eyed bunny-boilers.

It's usually about four minutes before Happy Hour.

And about two minutes after an offspring has decided, for the fifth time today, that taking their nappy off and/or spitting unwanted food is a form of communicating love.

At our house, we're not Jewish, but we do celebrate the Passover. It's the moment when I arrive home at night and Steph meets me at the door, we exchange brief pleasantries, and she passes over whichever child is causing her to Sea Red.


At some point, all mothers need to release the pressure valve. What better time than "Mummy Smash Time", when time is put aside for that quiet, leisurely glass of wine. Or six. Dozen.

Because nothing says "Don't bother me, it's Mummy Smash Time", than the official "Mummy Smash Time" t-shirt.

Except, of course, shaking the bottle and aiming the cork at the little bugger's head.

Also available in:

Available here.

From the Folio

A little while ago, I entered a competition at 99designs.com to create a logo for an art gallery called "Twenty First Century Art Ltd" As part of their brief, they mentioned that they were thinking about something like the 20th Century Fox logo, which I thought was a bad idea, because they'd just end up being sued or publicly attached to a movie studio.

In my mind, as an art gallery, being thought of as a subsiduary of a major motion picture company would reduce your ability to promote truly ground-breaking work to the public, because people would probably expect your gallery space to be filled with framed copies of movie posters.

It would be hard to sell works from the next up and coming Damien Hirst if they've only come in to buy the poster from "The Notebook".

So instead I went for zombies. Of course.

I really liked this design for a couple of reasons.

Firstly I like the subtitle "Art for Brains".

Secondly, the 21 works as a zombie head.

Thirdly, it would work on a business card as well as the side of a building.

Fourthly, I like the eyes, because they can work in an art gallery setting.

Of course I didn't win the comp. The winner as a knock-off of the 20th Century Fox logo. Who would've guessed?

But I liked the design, and I would hold on to it for a future job, but when am I gonna get asked to design a zombie head for an art gallery using the number 21?

Commissions like that are rarer than you think...

It could go either way...

I've set a ball in motion that could go one or more of many ways, if that makes sense.

Maybe it's a ball of water, which can split into different smaller balls of water which go into different directions, although a ball of water is kind of hard to launch.

Maybe it's a ball of mercury, which is sort of cooler, although the surface tension doesn't tend to let it split regularly.
If I could get a ball which had the splitability of water with the metallic finish of mercury, it would not only be perfect for this analogy, but also look damn cool...

...

...anyway...
...
Let's go back a bit...

A while ago, back when Steph and I were young and carefree and only had the one little pumpkin in the patch (oh those were the days, when we... slept) we discussed the idea of having another kid. I always said two was good, because one is officially the loneliest number, although 3 is also a particularly lonely number, since there will generally be a "ganging-up" of two against the remaining one, who would feel even more lonely when confronted with the chummy camaraderie of the other two.

And that's why people don't like mathematics. Because it's all about socio-political affectations of the individual components, rather than just counting. Maths is like communism: Good in theory, but once you get people involved, it falls over on its ear.
For example: 88 - Two fat ladies. Isn't that a little fattist? Sexist?
And if you think 13 is unlucky, spare a thought for "22 divided by 7".
How would you feel if everyone thought you were "easy as"?

We decided we wanted to have two children, so they would have someone to play with, protect each other and on the odd chance, supply an organ.
Fast forward a year (mainly so I don't have to explain the conception, pregnancy or birth) and we now have two kids, Honey and now Lilybelle, who are both beautiful and good-natured (pending), and we're happy with our decision to stop at two. For a start, they can never out-vote us, because in a split decision, we get the power of veto. Plus they're not old enough to vote, so that helps.
Plus, if we go out somewhere, there's one parent for each kid, so it is much easily to assert blame.
Also, how often do you see a family deal that states "2 adults, 3 children"? Never. OK, once, but that was a typo. "2 adults, 2 kids" is the goto ratio for Family Deals, the optimum, the golden rule, and I'd like to get in on some of that "Family Deal" action.

So what to do? Well if we didn't want any more kids, we could always do what my parents did and never have sex ever again (and if anyone thinks I'm being naive - SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP I'M NOT LISTENING!).
So instead, I decided to get a vasectomy.
Some people might think that's a little severe, but frankly it's the best option. Let's face it: If I was a superhero, whose power was the ability to get women pregnant, I could now say "My work here is done!" and fly off to my Fortress of Solitude (which is conveniently located in my shed).

Why not enjoy my progenitorial retirement?
Unfortunately, this superhero (I like the name THE IM-PREG-NA-TOR! myself. It's catchy) hit a brick wall.

Turns out a vasectomy costs over a thousand bucks!

Double ouch.That's a pain in the pocket, in more ways than one.
We don't have a thousand bucks to throw at my groin, so to speak. If we were gonna go ahead with this, I was gonna have to find a way to "make bank".

Fortunately, I came up with an idea, a plan so brilliant it verges on the dumb, a scheme so eye-googlingly stupendous, it could almost be considered idiotically stupid. And also a little embarassing.
Or it could just fail. There's always a chance.

It just so happened that I designed a shirt recently that would come in handy in just such an occasion.

The "MARRIED TO THE MILF" t-shirt was originally just a "love" letter to my wife. After all, she is the MILF for me. But I'm not the only man in the world who wants to have sex with his wife, am I?
So here's the idea: I sell the shirt, and the profits go towards me getting a vasectomy. What could possibly go wrong?

As I said, it could go one or more of many ways:

Possibly it could work, I sell enough shirts to pay for the snip, everybody wins.
Or it gets publicity, but don't doesn't transfer to sales, and I'm forever known as "Vasectomy Boy".

Or it gets publicity, does transfer to sales, but I'm still forever known as "Vasectomy Boy".
Or it doesn't work, and I still need to find a way to pay for a vasectomy.

But, as they say "You can't make an omelette without breaking eggs", although in this case, the eggs aren't my eggs per se, but my reputation, and the omelette is... the vasectomy? Is that right?

Which means the omelette is a vasectomy, which is the act of "breaking my eggs", so in this case, they should say "You can't break eggs without breaking eggs".

Very zen.

I guess we'll see how sales go. In the meantime, if you know someone who likes having sex with their wife (or even a wife who would like sex to be done with them), send them this PDF. Or just send them here.

Yours Sincerely,

V.B.

The Master says Relax... I mean Obey.

There have now been plenty of Masters on Doctor Who, but by far, the best Master of all would have to be Roger Delgado.
I have a soft spot for the Jon Pertwee era, considering it was when I first saw the show. ABC in Australia replayed Pertwee and Tom Baker episodes for what seemed like decades while I was growing up.
Roger Delgado's Master was the nemesis of Pertwee's Doctor, and the character was, even back then, a bit of a moustache-twirler, but Delgado gave it such style.
Delgado had a back catalogue of movie and TV roles, playing a range of swathy types and probably the odd vicar. He could play suave and sophisticated in his sleep. Narcolepsy aside, he had the chops.Delgado's Master had the same issues as the other Masters: a deep, seething hatred of the Doctor's ability to win both the day and the affections of everyone around him without resorting to underhanded dealings.

Oh, and wanting to rule the universe. Natch.
He also had the complete inability to kill off his nemesis with a simple bomb or gun, preferring the more intricate, ornate, sophisticated and ultimately escapable trap. Consider "Terror of the Autons" - the Master's first story. After cleverly disguising himself as a phone technician to infiltrate the UNIT base, the Master could just whip out a gun, add some witty quip, and blow his fellow Time Lord away.
But instead, he installs a phone.

Sure, it's a bit of a killy phone, what with the remote-controlled strangling cord and all, but still...

since Delgado's tragic death in a car accident while shooting a movie in Turkey, the character has been resurrected in both the classic and new versions of the show, plus appearances in the McGann movie of 1996 and online stories. But as each new version of the character appeared, the subtleties of the character diminished, from Anthony Ainsley's 80's appearances resembling Dick Dastardly, to John Simm's wildly grimacing portrayal in the new series.

None have suitably matched the gravitas that Delgado brought the role. For me, he was the original and the best.

To misquote Time Crash: "He was my Master."

This t-shirt design harks back to the bad old days of 2003. I travelled to Whovention in Sydney. To subsidise my expenses, I decided to try selling some merchandise, including keyrings with the Gallifrey symbol, posters and some t-shirts. One design was a dalek design that has since disappeared on one of my hard drives. the other was this design, a mash-up of Doctor Who and Shepard Fairey.

Considering the Master was a skilled hypnotist, I thought it was a perfect match.

The sale, by the way, was a disaster, and on top of that, I successfully (though accidentally) insulted one of the visiting celebrities in front of a room of fans. So all in all, the weekend was not a huge success.

But I was always happy with the finished version of this design. So I've made it available for purchase again through redbubble.

So, if Roger Delgado was your Master, you know what... you... must... do...

(I'm fiercely staring at you through the screen right now, btw)

Welcome, Foolish Mortals...

So begins the tour of The Haunted Mansion, a mainstay of Disney theme parks around the world, and one of my favourite attractions in any theme park.
Why? The Haunted Mansion epitomises the drawcard of attractions such as roller coasters, flume rides and dark rides: scares without danger.

While a roller coaster provides the scares of high speed and sudden turns (and if you're lucky, loops), it also provides safety from danger, in the form of seat belts, harnesses and safety brake systems. Thus, you can be hurtling to your death in a rocket car, but in the back of your mind, you know everything is going to be alright.

In comparison, hurtling to your death in an actual rocket car wouldn't have the same widespread appeal.

With The Haunted Mansion, you are dealing with all manner of scary spook, gruesome ghoul and a bridezilla, but the scares are balanced out by black humour and Charles Addams-style visual gags.

Alternatively, if you were just stuck in a creepy house where the rooms changed size, objects floated around your head and the paintings distorted into ghoulish patiches of their former beauty, you'd probably not enjoy it so much.


The "Foolish Mortal" tshirt above is in honour of one of my favourite all-time rides. The design resembles some of the motifs found within the attraction, most notably the unsettling wallpaper from sections of the ride.

What I really like about this design is the way the colours work. While there is a white version for other shirt colours, the purple design on the grey shirt is almost subliminal in low light, just the barest of glossy hints. However, when you step out into the sunlight, the design almost glows against the grey background.

If you're a fan of The Haunted Mansion, you could do worst than pick up a shirt and declare yourself a Foolish Mortal.

Sure you may have 999 t-shirts in your cupboard...

...but there's always room for one more....