Harry Potter Cover + Wolf's Rain Poster = Love

Ack! I haven't posted in forever! But I hope this makes up for it...






Yup! We finally have a new Harry Potter cover! Several, in fact, if you include the UK, but I love Mary Grandpre's illustrations a lot. (The German covers come a close second in being stylistically gorgeous and fun, IMO.)

Image courtesy of The Leaky Cauldron, and found via Digg.

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This is old news to everyone but myself, but I still love it. We were at Tokyo's Anime House the other day (where I bought the bestest Death Note, accompanied with CD and feather, squee!), when a stunning wall scroll caught my eye. Now, don't get me wrong, I get why people collect and love wall scrolls, but in general they are not for me. I'm very picky about what can go up on my walls, and about poster design and what I will be subjecting my poor eyes to for years to come. Hence no scrolls. But this scroll was gorgeous, very Art Nouveau and well designed in spite of having to include a multitude of text and a logo title for a series. Yup, it was the Wolf's Rain poster! I didn't buy it, but was sorely tempted to. (Yeesh, another series I haven't watched yet and sorely need to. The list never ends.)

Anyway, poster is below. See the prettiness?

My Work :: Part 23: Swirly Fish Cake

I had been sitting on this t-shirt idea since around October of last year, but never got it up from lack of satisfaction about its implementation. But in order to have it ready for next week's com, so Leeshee could order it, we finally got it up. Woot!

I'm lazy, so have not posted it up on DeviantArt yet, but will soon. In the meantime, you can check it out on the tees. The dark tee looks fabulous, particularly the blue one. Am very happy about that. The white one is great as well.

Our next week is looking busy; making buttons, plushies, costumes, etc. But am excited. I finally asked for the time off too; see how my laziness leeches out to all aspects of my life? On the plus side, we found good transfers for tees, FINALLY, so the plushies will be fab.

Anyway, a little about the design. The idea was Elicia's, a play on words with "naruto." I like it, because it's definitely an in-joke thing without being too obviously anime; those who get it can feel uber-special, and the rest, well, at least they have something attractive to look at. =) If they get it, cool, if not, hopefully they will ask you about it and you can have a discussion about Naruto and/or Japanese cuisine. So a win all around. The biggest challenges was finding an appropriate font and design for the naruto, to give nice visual weight and be interesting to look at. So basically the same challenges as always. =)

Go Team Venture! Season 3, Creator Blogs, DVD and More

Scientastic!!!! Some great Venture Brothers-related news and blogs to feast on.

First, the good news: I'm super happy that Season 3 is definitely on, with a likely season 4. No word in the article whether we will be getting a full 13 eps a season or what, but for now I don't care. I'm a content woman. Bad news: we won't be getting season 3 until next spring. Sad, as I was planning on it returning this year, but oh well; it just means that 2008 has something great in store. I'm also super happy that the DVD will be released next month, at a reasonable price, and that the extras will feature a tour of the Venture compound.

Now, onto the blogs. Publick Nuisance is Jackson Publick's personal LiveJournal, and he posts fabulous things Venture-related. Even if you don't watch or like the show, it's worth checking out and getting a peek at what it is like to do a cartoon series. He has unused DVD packaging, character designs, news, and much more. Besides, where else can you find and download the Venture Brothers' Christmas tunes?

Doc Hammer is one more person to add to the list of legit artists/creators who actually have a DeviantArt account. No joke. Go and check out his paintings and posts. Two Deviations of note: a poster he did in Illustrator featuring Doctor Girlfriend, and Triana's character specs to make the best Halloween costume ever.

Lastly, the fun things. I may have posted this link before, but here is an excellent interview with the two "masterminds" (go there just to save the awesome pic of all the characters; does anyone have a larger res pic of that?) There is also a podcast that interviewed Publick; very fun. (Golden nugget of advice he gives: in writing characters, avoid pop culture references for references' sake.) And everyone's probably gone here already, but some lovely wallpapers and freebies are available at Adult Swim's Site.

There's been a tribute poster for Venture Brothers rattling around in my head for quite some time; because of the long hiatus until next season, next month will be the perfect time to buckle down and make it at last. I will have to go through every ep and take copious notes, but that is no great torture. =) Heh, I'm actually looking forward to it.