What Can Be Better Than A Guy In A Rubber Suit?

Behind the scenes Godzilla photo dump...

This has got to be one of my favorites!

The Ultimate Mega-dungeon -- If You're An Ant!

Retired entomologist Walter Tschinkel casts live ant colonies in aluminum to reveal the most amazing and alien underground structures.  A pretty incredible mega-dungeon if you ask me with all the best elements to confuse the most veteran of explorer.

So, who has the lifetime to key this out?

More info here. Be sure to check out the video too!

Look to the ants, my fellow DMs, look to the ants

Poor ol' Hank Pym.  You better start work on that cybernetic helmet!

The Warlock Is Now Into Leather

A number of years ago I got into Archery. 

Not for hunting but just for target shooting (okay maybe hunting orcs!).  It's something I've always wanted to do and so I finally got a nice traditional recurve bow and occasionally went out for some target practice.

Ever since I got the bow, I've wanted to create my own accessories ('cause that's what we do over here at the Homebrew!) and it turns out that would be in leather.

So this year I set out learning how to work with leather, tooling it, stitching it, dying it.  There's always a learning curve with a new medium and I struggled through that making plenty of mistakes - which I'm still making but learning from.  So I finally felt confident enough to work on my first custom project.  That turned out to be an archery armguard.

Here's the finished item:

And here it is on my skinny arm.

I was very happy with the way it turned out. A few rough spots in the tooling which I think I've worked through.  I'm working on a new design with straps and buckles as the ties are a little to hard to work with. 

As an aside, it's quite fun wearing this heavy leather.  It's surprisingly strong. Makes me want to move on to making some type of stylized leather armor.  Not that I'm influenced by D&D or anything!

The Riddle of Steel

Even The 'King' Swiped From Time To Time

Playboy Jack Kirby

I've always been a big fan of Jack Kirby so this post is by no means any type of put down.  On the contrary, it shows that even the greatest, most influential comic artist lifted or swiped a reference image from time to time.

Before the internet where any reference image can be brought up in seconds, back in the day, artists had to collect files of reference images from books, magazines, photos and store them in filing cabinets called -- swipe files.  I'm sure Jack was no exception.  Case in point; Sue Storm.

In the early to mid-sixties, Kirby always portrayed Susan Storm of the Fantastic Four as a glamorous public hero always seeking the current fashion trends.  When she wasn't getting herself captured (at least in the early issues) she was out shopping for the trendiest wardrobes or the newest hairstyles.  So it is no surprise that Jack Kirby would reference Sue Storm with only the glamorous of imagery (when his characters weren't exploding off the pages)

Click to embiggen this NSFW picture.

Above on the left you will see the splash page from Fantastic Four issue 22 (late 1963) while on the right you will see an image from the artist Vargas published in Playboy (1963).  Kirby's perfect swipe from Playboy to give Sue Storm that extra glamor including the kookie hat (customized by Reed Richards).

Even the King swipes from time to time.

That's not saying he couldn't draw circles around these swipe happy artists of today, he can.  In fact, there is no one before or since that can blow the borders off of a comic page as Jack Kirby.  So when he slips in a little swipe from time to time to give Sue Storm a bit of glamor, cut the King some slack, will'ya?

This ain't a swipe, it's pure Kirby!