How can we make our site better for you? Leave feedback.
View Grid Expanded
Ian
Released 2010-09-01 21:14:29 -0500
let's make an epic about the American Apollo program!!

this is inspired...by the Apollo program. duh. I have some recorded songs to start us off, but somebody with video skills could find some stock footage of the various missions and edit it with music, some musicians could record the rest of the apollo missions (i have songs for each mission through to Apollo 5...Apollo 11 will be the crazy climax piece, and Apollo 13 would be the start of "falling action" where it turns darker and a bit more… Read More
Image_icon
N5514552_37697997_2822
In the far corner of the dark, smoky room was the bed. Karla’s breasts were exposed over the ruffled red sheets, bending the shadow of the midday light coming through the venetian blinds. The ceiling fan was slowly sucking the smoke of Wilhelm’s cigarette towards its lazy blades. He had lived in this cluttered room for 3 years. He hadn’t had a steady job in as much time, and the girl currently sprawled across his twin bed was the first lay he had had since dropping out of college, where he had always managed to land a willing co-ed whenever the desire grabbed him. Which was fairly often. He had grown so lonely without his nocturnal companions that he decided to buy one: a ferret. The relationship was strictly plutonic, but Fiddlewinks still helped to fill a void that had always been sucking at Wilhelm’s empty chest. On the floor at Wilhelm’s feet was a pile of bones from the wings of chickens he and Karla had mercilessly devoured the night before as an antidote to the poison in their many 12oz twist-off bottles. Fiddlewinks was making sure that none of those aviary morsels went to waste when suddenly Wilhelm heard someone declare softly, “Ptheh...too salty!” Fiddlewinks? Did you say that? A quick glance around the room, his kingdom, was insufficient to locate the source of the culinary critique. There’s no way. Fiddlewinks can’t fucking talk. Or taste salt. It was at this thought that Fiddlewinks spontaneously caught fire and a loud alarm started sounding. There was an air raid outside. Wilhelm ran to the window to see Allied bombers flying low overhead dropping huge iron kazoos on the city. These kazoos made exactly the noise you’d think they would while they fell, and when they exploded they left a rich tapioca smell that was almost unbearable. Almost. When he went to escape his apartment, he tripped over a hungry hippopotamus he could swear he didn’t leave lying around like that and upon hitting the ground...

Shit. He had been dreaming. That morning eleven years ago had been haunting his dreams ever since the “incident.” The first hungover morning he spent with Karla had sealed his fatally festive fate. As he was gaining consciousness, he realized his alarm-clock was beeping shrilly, almost concealing his party-favor breaths. That explains the fucking air raid. After pounding the alarm with his angry morning fist, he got out of bed, already dressed and ready for another day. Vengeance doesn’t wear pajamas at night; it wears a mauve tie and keeps one vigilant eye open. That bastard Dolfhankton had narrowly escaped that depressing day four months ago in the Arancaho, but he wouldn’t continue going about his life unharassed for long. Wilhelm had little trouble tracking him down to this sleepy town in the south of France, or “sud-de-France” in the tongue of the natives. Wilhelm’s French was bad enough without the constant motor in his throat going 100mph in a squeaky second gear, obscuring whatever intelligible tidbits might otherwise have found themselves neatly inside French ears. So it was a good thing he wasn’t here to chat. He was here to kill, and kill he would. In due time. But first, breakfast.

Being dead tired of éclairs, he decided to go hunting for some kill croissants with death marmalade and a side of bastard-skin bacon. Then he would wash it all down with the liquefied pulpy flesh of a blood orange. They say you shouldn’t get even on an empty stomach, and Wilhelm was willing to believe them. Having satiated his appetite for food, he set about quenching his thirst for revenge, a drink best served slowly so one can appreciate all of its subtle flavors. The draught on tap for today was going to be a bitter brew with tragic overtones and notes of despair with a strong, acidic finish leaving a gratifying aftertaste that lingers until glorious death. Two knocks on the ancient wooden door down the street, number 136, and Wilhelm’s mouth would be watering; he could taste the sweet justice about to be served.

From his seat on the train Dolfhankton could see the countryside blurring past him. He could see hay bales, cows, hedgerows, even a small farm house a few hundred yards away and receding fast. He wished he could live here forever photographing French farm girls and their frolicking feline friends. But he knew that death had found him. He heard death’s humming breath a couple days ago while eating lunch at a cafe. Roast beef au jus was his favorite, but he would have to get it somewhere else from now on. The last couple of days had been the most terrifying of his life, but he couldn’t leave immediately. He had to make arrangements for his departure so that he would leave no trail. He also had to set the trap. Ever since the boathouse, Dolfhankton had been simply trying to run away. But now he was tired of running. Now he would fight. When Wilhelm knocks on the door of number 136 looking to make one final sale, he will find himself out of luck, and hopefully, without a head.
2010-08-14 16:58:24 -0500
471 Hits
5 Recommends
Image_icon
N5514552_38035228_303
It was a hot day in the Arancaho jungle. And muggy. The frogs were chirping, the brooks were bubbling and any hope of a cooling breeze was swallowed by the dense and suffocating underbrush. Kaylee couldn’t remember how he got to be in this unforgiving jungle alone. All he could remember before passing out was having a vague sense that something wasn’t right. His veiny muscles were bulging with exhaustion. How long was it since he ate anything? How long since he last savored the refreshing splash of water on his pouty lips? His entire life he only knew one thing: bodybuilding. Picking it up, putting it back down. Picking it up, putting it back down. His life had always had a reassuring and relentless rhythm. But the staccato of insect noises and the loud dissonant shrieks of birds were putting him into a syncopated funk that was at odds with his military-march sensibilities.

Between the “KAW!!” of the toucan and the “oohahAHAHAHAH!!!” of the bonobo, Kaylee thought he heard a strangely familiar wheezy “bhvvvvvv.” He heard it again. And again. And each time it got louder, as if approaching. Being unsure of what to do with himself, he looked nervously for something heavy to pick up. And then put back down. But before he could, an enigmatic creature appeared through the dense, green groundcover. It was an angry-looking man, vaguely familiar, of about six feet wearing an impeccably tailored but messily ruffled grey pinstripe suit. His fedora matched his suit, and the solid mauve tie that completed the ensemble was currently being held in his hands. Tied into a noose. There was a menace in this creature’s eyes and neckware that upset Kaylee. This was an unstable creature, not to be trusted. And what’s more, every time he breathed in, or out, a wheezy high pitched hum accompanied the hot air. Or was it a squeaky wheeze? Before he could react, the creature charged and leapt on Kaylee, immediately finding his thick neck with the makeshift noose. Kaylee flung his arms around to strike his assailant, but after years of building strength, he had neglected flexibility, rendering him completely unable to touch the well-dressed attacker currently standing on his shoulders, quickly tightening the suffocating formal-wear around his neck. The volume and intensity of the squeaky wheeze became deafening and before long, Kaylee began to turn purple and succumb to a confusion even more deep and profound than usual. He ceased to know which way was up and which way was “that way.” The frantic wheezing in his ears penetrated so deep into his brain that he could not even think those simple thoughts that had kept him occupied most of his life, a life which was quickly coming to an end at the hands of a fashionable frenzied foe.

Wilhelm waited until all of the bulging, veiny muscles relaxed completely, freed from the weight of a life spent lifting. He had gotten his revenge here in the Arancaho. And for now, he could relax. He didn’t know the name of the lifeless mass of muted strength heaped under him. All he knew was that this monster was the midwife to his sufferings; the accomplice to the crime that left Wilhelm forever squeaky, uncurably wheezy...comically miserable. All he ever wanted to do was sell musical plastic happiness to others. But now that cheap happiness was irrevocably lodged in his own throat, an integral part of his newly noisy respiratory system, reminding him with every breath of what he used to be...and can never be again. The extra business cards in his inside breast pocket used to mock him with taunts of “Wilhelm Gravy – kazoo specialist.” He could have thrown them away, fed them to the snakes and the alligators. But no. He adopted a more poetic distribution strategy: he would leave one on every body he left lifeless. He left one on every person who had done this to him. He left one on Karla, his first wife who had gotten him into sales. He left one on his old boss Guido. He left one on his high school music teacher, Mrs. Happy. She used to adore the kazoo; now she’s dead. There was only one card left. He was saving that one for the person who had the most blame resting on his shoulders. The man most directly responsible for Wilhelm’s squeaky agony, his wheezy torment.

Dolfhankton was quietly working in his lab in a boathouse when he heard a knock at the door. “Why, that’s impossible,” he muttered to himself. He thought it was strange that someone would be here. In the Arancaho jungle. Miles away from anything at all. After hearing a second knock, he figured that stranger things have happened, and decided to open the door. On the way to the door, he could feel his leg acting up again. It had been fussy ever since that photoshoot in the Hellagata swamp for the Jellyfish Mania calendar. One sting too many, apparently. As he opened the door ever so slightly to avoid ruining the pictures for the Muscley Men of Might calendar, the man on the outside burst through screaming, “My name is Wilhelm! Would you like to buy some kazoos?!” This man was dressed in grey, holding a mauve noose and sporting a sadistic grin. Dolfhankton could not believe it. It had been so long since “the incident” that he had almost completely forgotten about it. Almost. And now those memories were back. For blood. Or at least choking. Dolfhankton knew that Wilhelm would have no mercy. And he was right; Wilhelm had special plans for this victim. Dolfhankton was special and he was going to get special treatment; a good old-fashioned neck-tie strangling was nowhere near formal enough. After easily pinning him down, Wilhelm pulled out a kazoo. Unlike most kazoos, this one was covered with sharp metal barbs and filled with broken glass and hydrochloric acid.

But Wilhelm could not perform his revenge in the dim red light of Dolfhankton’s darkroom. He had to see every tortured contour of this bastard’s dying face. He had to find the lights. Distracted by this thought, he barely noticed the twitching in Dolfhankton’s legs. Suddenly, one of his legs violently spasmed right into Wilhelm’s low-hung testicles. The pain was excruciating. He let out a shriek of agony accompanied by a dehumanizingly festive party noise. Dolfhankton couldn’t help but laugh maniacally while pushing himself free of his musically mutated captor. He then bolted out of the door towards the other end of the boathouse, where he had tied up his metal fishing boat with the name “Dolf’s Plankton” painted in a bold red nautical font on the forward starboard. As he tried to start the engine, the battery would not spark. Would he be stranded in a piranha-infested river waiting to die at the hands of either unforgiving nature or kazooey revenge? He looked around desperately for salvation and in the bottom of the boat he found it: a piece of tinfoil he had used to cook fish the night before! He quickly wound it into a makeshift wire and used it to patch the frayed contacts of the battery just in time to putter off watching Wilhelm stumble up to the pier, wheezing (as always) and holding his crotch.

Dolfhankton had escaped justice, Wilhelm thought. For now.
2010-08-05 19:02:08 -0500
964 Hits
16 Recommends
Image_icon
Herrinbone_hat_poster_jpg_small
just building off of Jake Leggett's collage of others' artwork for this popular poem/story. added some color, some text, a bit of reformatting and some graphic tweaks.

could be a promo poster, cover for a print edition, title page, etc.

if anyone's interested i can get you the PSD file. just ask. and if you just want to add some text, the font is copperplate gothic bold. comes standard with adobe cs, i believe.

enjoy!
2010-08-09 12:05:22 -0500
1392 Hits
36 Recommends
Image_icon
Herrinbone_hat_poster_jpg_2c
just another take on the poster/book cover design
2010-08-10 11:43:59 -0500
459 Hits
3 Recommends