Just People

Once upon a time, about twenty years ago, I was a great big stupid fanboy.  I did what just about every fanboy did: I took the creators of the content I liked, and put them on pedestals.  I made them into demigods and worshiped them for bringing me The Happy.

I try not to look down on fanboys nowadays, since it's just part of being an introverted youth in the era of the internet.  It's a phase a lot of kids in Western culture go through these days.  But in the intervening decades, a whole lot of life happened to me.  A whole lot of life happened to a lot of my idols, as well.

And I gradually realized something which should have been obvious.  For them, it's just a job.  A job with unique perks, sometimes, but mostly just a job.  If they're lucky, it's profitable.  If they're luckier, it's fun.  If they're really spectacularly lucky, it's both.  But even when that's the case, it doesn't always last.

I also discovered that very few creators really want to be worshiped.  Some of them do, sure.  But the majority respond much better to an honest, genuine attempt at a human connection.  Because, lo and behold, they're not demigods; they're just human.  Not founts of knowledge, not suggestion boxes, not paragons, not heroes, not even celebrities.  They're just people.

Escapism is fun and entertaining, but humanity is infinitely more interesting and beautiful in the end.  And what I've gotten back from those connections has infinitely surpassed the transient glee I got from shaking hands with my heroes at conventions.

If you happen across this entry, and you're one of the animators, artists, designers, voice actors, musicians, writers, photographers, or other creative types I've befriended, thank you.  Thank you for your inspiration, your friendship, and your humanity. :)

From the Age of Analog

I love analog, lo-fi sounds. The soundtrack to my childhood was made of Little Thinker tapes, squarewaves and sawtooth tones from the NES, scratchy crackling old vinyl, the Peter Howell version of the Doctor Who theme, Wendy Carlo's compositions for Tron, et cetera. I suppose some of my fondness for that era of electronic music is due to seeing it through nostalgia goggles, but I'm definitely not the only one out there who feels that way.

There are a handful of artists out there who deconstructed this stuff, took apart the basic components and used them like found objects. The samples themselves, or the looping structure, or the recurrent themes, or the sound quality. I love this music because to me it clearly conveys the subjective nature of some of these memories in a way that words can't. Childhood memories are unique because kids don't get everything (and don't feel a need to), and that's kind of how this genre of music is -- it doesn't have a "point" to make, it just kind of wanders around the backyard with a tape recorder in hand, studying the curious world around it.

Here's a few tidbits. Pretty much everyone knows the first one, but I can't make a post about this sort of thing without including Boards of Canada.

Boards Of Canada - Skyliner by parse

Baths - Maximalist by ericstein

Tycho - Coastal Brake by Tycho

isan - 64 fire damage by Katahati

Oneirist by Ochre

Thank you to Soundcloud (and its users) for hosting this stuff.

Fear of Tigers

While my blog's definitely about stuff I create, I've decided I'm also occasionally going to post plugs for things my friends are doing, short reviews of stuff I think is cool, and so on.

Anyway. If you love '80s-style synth and nostalgic electronic music, check out Fear of Tigers. This guy gets it.

Fear of Tigers - The Remixes Part 1 by fearoftigers

What to expect here

For the most part, this blog's probably going to be a showcase for the stuff I create. This might include any of the following: sketches, finished art, designs, photography, animations, color jobs I did on someone else's art, and so on. I might occasionally post my opinions and reviews of stuff, but that isn't really the main focus. (Plus there are far more articulate critics and pundits out there than me.) I may also occasionally post links to stuff I think is cool and/or events I might be attending.

That's basically it. I'll try to keep it fun.

Inaugural Post

Hi, internets. I'm Ben, and this is my blog.