Ruthermore Heidigens and the Fifth Planet is the first of David Leyman’s Ruthermore Heidigens science fiction novellas. It features the most powerful wizard in the known universe, simply because he’s the only wizard in the universe. His powers are real, but are they really of a magical source? Here’s the cover for the book I painted recently in watercolour:
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Cover for Meevo
Meevo is the ebook novella by David Leyman. It is a suitably eerie horror-flavoured science-fiction tale involving an escaped prisoner, the prisoner’s hunters and – as we see in the opening scenes – a mutant, in a post-apocalyptic future. To view the full cover image, click on the thumbnail below. Meevo is available for purchase on Amazon.com here.
Continue readingCover for Three’s Company
Ebb n Folks’s latest short story soon to be published on Amazon as a Kindle download is Three’s Company. The publisher called for a lined artwork with clean colours on it. So here it is. “Three” in the story title is the catlike lady seen below. But why has she been with the protagonist all these decades? Watch for it on Amazon.com soon. [[image:ebb-n-folks-threes-company-cover.jpg:What’s with the picture in the middle?:center:0]]
Continue readingPoster for Horizon
Horizon is a short film written and directed by Emma Coats, set in the wilds of a post-apocalyptic near future. I’ve seen a rough cut of the film. It looks spectacular and is very ambitious project. Also, it has a zeppelin! I was invited to contibute a movie poster to be displayed in a gallery released with the DVD and here’s what I came up with. Watch this space for details of its upcoming release! [[image:horizon-poster.jpg:80s comic adapation movie poster at its cheesiest?:center:0]] Click here to see more photos and posters for Horizon. Click here to see a bigger version of my poster on DeviantArt.
Continue readingCover for Crater
Ebb & Folks has again given me the assignment to come up with another cover for one of their books. This time it’s the novella Crater by David Leyman, now on sale on Amazon.com as an ebook. [[image:ebb-n-folks-crater-cover.jpg:That star is Aldebaran, by the way.:center:0]] It’s a star and time spanning tale of humans versus a ruthless alien civilisation at war. Check it out at the link above to buy and download it.
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Darth Bill Adama?
A weird moment for Admiral William Adama of the Battlestar Galactica (complete with ominous shadow outline) when he suddenly spouts lines from The Empire Strikes Back at his son Lee. What does he say, and how does Lee reply? Click here to find out and to view a larger version of the artwork.
Continue readingLegacy of Tron: A Tron Legacy Review
[[image:tron-legacy01.jpg::center:0]] After 28 years, the sequel to Disney’s Tron is finally upon us. Tron Legacy, produced by the original movie’s director Steven Lisberger and directed by newcomer Joseph Kosinski, had a unique problem. Tron had a connection to the computer and gaming lore of the late 70s and early 80s, with its simple vector graphics and sounds. The home computer for the consumer was still rare. The general public had very little clue on how computers work. The World Wide Web is still almost a decade away. How can one create a modern sequel to a movie based on anachronistic world view of technology? Very simple. Just build upon the even more fantastic elements of the first movie and move on from there. SPOILERS BEYOND! SPOILERS! The first movie appeared to visually be the inner workings of a computer. But if you think about it, how can you make actuarial […]
Continue readingThe Many Green Lanterns of the Trailer
The official trailer for next year’s Green Lantern movie starring Deadpool is out. There are quite a number of Green Lanterns in the trailer. [[image:green-lantern-trailer01.jpg:WHAT YA LOOKIN AT, POOZER!:center:0]] Kilowog! [[image:green-lantern-trailer02.jpg:Amon Sur, you’re a jackass:center:0]] Abin Sur! [[image:green-lantern-trailer03.jpg:But where’s Qward?:center:0]] Tomar-Re and the Oan central power battery! [[image:green-lantern-trailer04.jpg:Green Lantern of Space Sector 1417:center:0]] Sinestro! [[image:green-lantern-trailer05.jpg:Highball:center:0]] and of course, Hal Jordan. Yeah, I just wanted to post pictures of the live-action corpsmen on the blog, is all. Too bad there’s no Mogo and Bzzd.
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Gamera Tears Up The Living Room
… or at the very least, it wishes it could. As previously mentioned Irfan seems to have taken a shine to Gamera, the giant monster turtle with awesome powers! I was looking at papercraft material online when I came across a Gamera papercraft, which was only a two-page downloadable pdf. Irfan and I spent the part of the afternoon cutting, folding and gluing the pieces together. Finally this was what we ended up with:
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Cody vs. Cody
In the early 1950s, Republic Pictures produced a black and white film serial featuring the character named Commando Cody. Cody was featured in two serials, namely Radar Men from the Moon and Commando Cody: Sky Marshal of the Universe. His costume included a helmet and a rocket pack, which allows him to fly. During this time, a young man watched these serials at the cinema. More than fifty years later, as part of a movie serial he himself created, that man developed a supporting character named Commander Cody who wears a helmet and sometimes a rocket pack, obviously inspired by and a homage to the former character. Here’s what happens when the heavens open up and they meet. Click here to view a larger version of the image.
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Dare Sensei – The Fourth Sensei
Dare Sensei is a webcomic illustrated in manga form, which is an unofficial adaptation of BBC’s Doctor Who, where all the doctors are female. I’ve been commissioned by the writer of Dare Sensei to create any incarnation of the Senseis, and I’ve opted to illustrate the fourth, which is easily identified in the following image by her long coat, scarf and a sonic screwdriver. However, Irfan insists that this is River Song.
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Lord Morpheus Will Want To Have Words – An Inception Review
Inception is by far one of the most enjoyable science fiction movies in recent memory. I went in cold, save for information gleaned from the trailers. I knew it was a heist movie where characters try to steal information from their marks via shared dreams. What I got was a story that was surprisingly not convoluted, where exposition – all the “if / then explanation” – was delivered in advance and easily understood. What was explained was still pretty fantastic, and when the fantastic occurs onscreen it takes your breath away. Spoilers to follow! SPOILERS! Inception, written and directed by Christopher Nolan, tells of a group of people that are paid big money to illegally infiltrate a target’s subconscious and coax (read: steal) information from them through their dreams. The opening scenes illustrated how it is done, what dangers are involved, and what happens if they fail – which they […]
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Do They Sell This Suitcase Anywhere?
This nifty suitcase appears to be pretty cool, and seem to be good to have with you all the time. When you need to use it, all you have to do is activate it at your feet, like so: Then you wait for it to quickly unfold and show a pair of handgrips. You grab on to the handgrips and twist them, like so: Then you bring it up to your chest, like so: Then you stretch your arms outwards still holding the handgrips, exposing the arc reactor and automatically causing all the other parts to glide and snap into position all around your body, like so: Then you wait for the headpiece to pivot and slide over your head and form a helmet, like so: Finally, profit! Coming soon May 7, 2010.
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Prawn-flavoured Keropok: A District 9 review
A gigantic spaceship appears in the skies above Johannesburg 28 years ago. A million starving insectoid sapients are found in the ship, and ferried ground-side. Now, a guarded slum area called District 9 exists in Johannesburg that tries to keep these alien “prawns” away from humans, while the Multinational United (MNU) administrates District 9 as it attempts to pry secrets of alien technology from the dumb prawns for profit. The movie District 9 doesn’t have a particularly original storyline. In fact its premise is largely based on and a commentary on the apartheid in South Africa. It’s not really very hard sci-fi, with a lot of the science relegated to background. We see and marvel at alien technology and its effect but we don’t go into details. Its hand-held shakycam effects are not as motion sickness-inducing as say The Blair Witch Project or Cloverfield, but it does have some jitter […]
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Walking Through A-Deh-Deh-Deh Like That – A Terminator Salvation Review
In the first Terminator movie, if time travel convention is to be adhered to, just before John Connor’s troops stormed Skynet and was on the verge of destroying it in Timeline A, the human resistance is screwed the moment the T-800 Model 101 went back in time moments before Kyle Reese did. What actually did happen? Was that Skynet destroyed in Timeline A even as the T-800 terminated Sarah Connor in a new divergent timeline (Timeline B) in which case John Connor never existed and Skynet was triumphant? From Timeline A, Kyle Reese went back and stopped the Terminator creating Timeline C. Do all these three timelines exist simultaneously? If you didn’t stop to think about it all however, thanks to the superb direction, story and visual effects – if you are sufficiently entertained – then Terminator was a flawless movie. Similarly with Terminator 2: Judgment Day, the movie was […]
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I’m Just Gonna Title This Entry “A Star Trek Review” Okay?
Doctor Who. Yes. You always have at least one scene (and usually more) in every episode of the show. You know the kind of scene they have: “Run!” “Doctor?” “I said, run!” “Did you say…” “RUN!!!” And then present company goes tearing down a corridor or a hallway or an alien cave at top speed being chased by a monster or an alien or both, usually lethal. That’s the kind of energy I found in almost every other scene in the new Star Trek movie which is entitled, uh… Star Trek. When I heard this project being announced I didn’t feel any apprehension or outrage or elation over it. I was all Star Trekked out. Younger actors portraying the Original Series’ characters. Young Kirk, Spock and McCoy. Trek 90210. Yeah, whatever. But closer I got to the release, the closer I got excited about information that leaked out of the […]
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