Happy New Year

Its a new year again 2012 and so far its looking ok, we didn’t do too much this time around mostly because Fanny has been working very hard and I had just finished a few commercials, Hulu for Superbowl and a spot for a lemon flavored malt beverage out of Japan. I was able to finish the New Years Card in time this year thankfully. 2012 is the year of the dragon in Chinese Zodiac so I figured would use that in my design. I chose a baby Chinese Dragon with the five fingers which represents the Emperor and the Red BG for good luck which we all can use… Fanny has asked me to make one using Chinese Characters to send to her family and friends for Chinese New Year which will be in late Jan and is based on the Lunar cycle.

Fun facts did you know that all chinese dragons are male? yep its true they represent the male or yang as opposed to the female yin which is represented by the phoenix.

The Chinese are very funny about western holidays, obviously Christmas, Easter and our New Years do not coincide with anything in their culture. They are adopting them anyway just adding it on to all of their own special days and events. At this stage it is mostly just an excuse to have some time off and of course sell stuff. Christmas I think is really quite funny as their interpretation of the traditional Christmas themes Santa, gift giving, Nativity etc… is interesting to say the least. You could say slightly surrealistic. I have taken a few pics of things we have seen to illustrate my point. The theme here seems to be Santa flying his Wright Brothers style sleigh while his ” reindeer / antelopes ” hang out by the tree.

Photo Op Santa

The scary Santa below is a favorite of mine I especially enjoy the squinty eyes and nightmarish squishy mouth…

Hmmm...

Here we have the traditional Santa enjoying a relaxing smoke and hang gliding session. Its all in the details folks. We have snowmen with small shingle roofs for hats and what I suppose must be a mutant snowman / elf creature with Tim Burton inspired headgear held safely in his steel cage…

Smoking Santa hang glider

This was a nice one we found standing at the entrance to our favorite place to buy bread. 85c is a Taiwanese company that is quite successful here and in the states as well. I can’t say the quality is as good as what you would get in Taiwan but they do seem to be keeping the quality up in comparison to the local brands. We buy bread for toasting and specialty buns with all kinds of interesting ingredients such as pork flavored shavings, meats and even squid ink. This may not sound appetizing but it is actually quite yummy… Will have to post some on that later.

85c

Christmas and New Years are behind us once again, 2011 was a strange one but there were some nice highlights. Fanny and I are now married after 5, 6 or 7 years. I have been accepted into the New York film union Local 829 which should be a great thing. We went on a cruise which was the first really relaxing thing we have done in many years and we bought our first large format printer which I am hoping we can use to produce some great work in 2012.

Two Hooligans by the sea, Fanny went snorkling out at sea for the first time no small thing that…

Snorkle B

The new printer is going to allow me to try out some of my ideas for ” Fine Art ” and if possible branch out into some other areas of work, not totally dependent on being produced by me.

Thas a big printer

As my own camera is still in need of repair after its unfortunate rendezvous with the deck of our cruise ship in Sept. I have been taking these pics with Fanny’s cell phone. Some are quite good actually. some not so much I am hoping we can get the camera fixed soon.

I was planning on spending Chinese New Year in Taiwan with Fanny’s family but it turn out I will most likely be returning early to work on a Themed Entertainment project in Jan. Good for the career but I was looking forward to the Taiwan trip.

So farewell to the old year and welcome the new, lets hope things improve all around, unless of course the Mayan thing turns out to be true in which case watch out for John Cusak…