If you are a fan of books, quality bookstores, writing, or are currently being, or hoping to be published, then I urge you to join the ABA in its fight against the big box stores who are now perpetrating a totally immoral, and possibly illegal pricing war on new hardcover books. You may think that buying new books at far below the retail price is a good thing for yourself as a consumer, but you need to understand that big box store bargains are detrimental to the economy and to jobs. Your miniscule savings (five to ten dollars per purchase, in most cases) is putting small businesses out of business every day.

The ABA has asked the Department of Justice to investigate the stores involved, and here are some choice quotes from the request I have pulled out:

"While on the surface it may seem that these lower prices will encourage more reading and a greater sharing of ideas in the culture, the reality is quite the opposite. Consider this quote from Mr. Grisham's agent, David Gernert, that appeared in the New York Times:

"If readers come to believe that the value of a new book is $10, publishing as we know it is over. If you can buy Stephen King's new novel or John Grisham's 'Ford County' for $10, why would you buy a brilliant first novel for $25? I think we underestimate the effect to which extremely discounted best sellers take the consumer's attention away from emerging writers."

For our members -- locally owned, independent bookstores -- the effect will be devastating. There is simply no way for ABA members to compete. The net result will be the closing of many independent bookstores, and a concentration of power in the book industry in very few hands. Bill Petrocelli, owner of Book Passage in Corte Madera, California, an ABA member, was also quoted in the New York Times:

"You have a choke point where millions of writers are trying to reach millions of readers. But if it all has to go through a narrow funnel where there are only four or five buyers deciding what's going to get published, the business is in trouble."

We would find these practices questionable were they taking place in the market for widgets. That they are taking place in the market for books is catastrophic. If left unchecked, these predatory pricing policies will devastate not only the book industry, but our collective ability to maintain a society where the widest range of ideas are always made available to the public, and will allow the few remaining mega booksellers to raise prices to consumers unchecked."

The entire request is below in the lj-cut.
 

( ABA Asks Department of Justice to Investigate Bestseller Price Wars )

I would urge you to also write to the Department of Justice, as well as your local newspapers and on your own blogs about this incredible threat to the printing industry.

This is not just a danger to store owners, such as my wife and sister in law, but to any authors or artist interested in making a viable living in print. If the big box stores control pricing and selections, what will happen to your small boutique publishers? Who's going to publish your journal comic or pet project when they're all out of business? How many illustration jobs will any of us get for book covers and art inserts when only a select few best selling authors are getting their work out there?

There is an emerging culture here that demands entertainment for cheaper and cheaper (read: pirated and or free), and though we can all appreciate the allure of not having to pay for television, movies, music, and books, our actions undercut the value of the artists and creatives who are working to produce these works. This means that if you are an artist or writer your value is being diminished by the actions of your peers, and possibly by yourself.

So, I know the entire internet is at SPX right now, or whatever, so this should go about as noticed as the majority of my posts.

As some of you may have speed-read past on your way to comics about cute bears and historical figures, I worked on a little flash show for MTV that has started airing last month. They were airing it Mon-Thurs at 6:30 EST, but now they're running it like, every day at 11pm. It's called Popzilla and it's kind of like a SouthPark / Jib Jab satire thing that makes fun of various celebrities. Think SNL, but not Live. Or on Saturdays. MTV has also started compiling highlights of all the episodes shown during a week. Here are three clips I did that were highlighted from the first two weeks. (That's pretty good, since I only did 12 clips total)


So, I did a couple clips with this celebrity. I really didn't have any idea who this guy was, in fact, I still don't really. Hopefully MTV viewers do.


I really liked doing this one. I also made the cd cover graphics at the end, which was fun, because I had to do multiple versions.


And here, is the big one. Of all the 12 clip I did, this one is the one I really hope gets passed around. I'll get yelled at like David Letterman! Please pass it around!

I'm really hoping to work on some children's programming again soon. I don't want to get pigeonholed into this kind of blue stuff exclusively. Though this show has been interesting to work on.

So, once again I'm credited on television. Did any of you guys catch Popzilla tonight on MTV?

It's all right. You can catch it every Monday through Thursday at 6:30pm PST for the next month or so. If you did catch it, I did the scene where Leonardo Dicaprio jerks off a tree.

Yeah, that's where my professional path has taken me.

Popzilla, the show I've been working on for the past couple of months (and am still working on, unexpectedly, two weeks after being initially laid off) will finally premiere on MTV on Sept. 28th (Monday) at 6:30pm ET / PT, and then it'll continue to run Mondays through Thursdays for a few weeks till they run out of the 12 episodes they've bought, or, if we're lucky, they buy some more.

Anyway, if you happen to get MTV, please try to watch, and get your friends to, and you know, maybe tell the ratings people you watched with a bunch of people in the room.



You can check out a few clips there at the website, none of them were done by me, but if they do put up any by me, I'll be sure to highlight them here.

Oh yeah, baby and Laura are doing great.

8lbs 11.25 ounces. 7:49pm, 09/09/09. My wife is incredible. Find out more.

Well, my video didn't win, but that's okay! We got a very respectable 2nd place (over 30% of the votes cast!), and so I want to thank anyone and everyone who voted for me!

Thanks a lot!

All right, I promise this is the very very last time I mention this, mainly because it's over at 2pm EST today. (A few hours.) We were misinformed that it was ending yesterday (thanks Mtv!), but the actual deadline is today. (I actually figured that out by reading the website the voting is on.) The band that is in the lead is an already established group (they've performed on TRL, I think that should instantly disqualifty them from a "freshmen video contest", but whatever) with a large following of dedicated young girls who are really pounding the votes, please help us defeat them!

The music video I directed is now in 2nd place, and that is a huge deal, but we're still like, 20% behind the leader! PLEASE:

Go here and vote: VOTE FOR BRICK, THE ANIMATED VIDEO, ON THE RIGHT HAND COLUMN

AND PLEASE, REPOST THIS LINK AND INSTRUCTIONS ON YOUR LJ'S AND FACEBOOKS AND TWITTERS AND WHATEVER. PEOPLE LIKE YOU, AND WILL LISTEN TO YOU, AND IT WOULD REALLY MAKE MY DAY. THANKS.

REMEMBER, YOU CAN VOTE MULTIPLE TIMES, SO BE SURE TO TELL PEOPLE THEY CAN VOTE OVER AND OVER AGAIN!

VOTING ENDS AT 2PM TODAY, SO I DON'T HAVE A LOT OF TIME TO BEG YOU.

The music video I directed is now in 2nd place, and that is a huge deal, but we're still like, 20% behind the leader! PLEASE:

Go here and vote: VOTE FOR BRICK, THE ANIMATED VIDEO, ON THE RIGHT HAND COLUMN

AND PLEASE, REPOST THIS LINK AND INSTRUCTIONS ON YOUR LJ'S AND FACEBOOKS AND TWITTERS AND WHATEVER. PEOPLE LIKE YOU, AND WILL LISTEN TO YOU, AND IT WOULD REALLY MAKE MY DAY. THANKS.

REMEMBER, YOU CAN VOTE MULTIPLE TIMES, SO BE SURE TO TELL PEOPLE THEY CAN VOTE OVER AND OVER AGAIN!

VOTING ENDS AT 2PM TODAY, SO I DON'T HAVE A LOT OF TIME TO BEG YOU.

LJ Friends, I always go and vote for your t shirts. I generally read all your journal comics. I am asking, for once, that you follow this simple request and help me out!

The music video I directed and animated has been running all week on mtvU, which is the MTV station they air on the campus's of a lot of universities across the nation. It is part of this thing where they pick five videos, and the one that gets the most votes gets picked up for rotation on all the MTV's.

Go here and vote: VOTE FOR BRICK, THE ANIMATED VIDEO, ON THE RIGHT HAND COLUMN

AND PLEASE, REPOST THIS LINK AND INSTRUCTIONS ON YOUR LJ'S AND FACEBOOKS AND TWITTERS AND WHATEVER. PEOPLE LIKE YOU AND WILL LISTEN TO YOU, AND IT WOULD REALLY MAKE MY DAY. THANKS.

VOTING ENDS AT 2PM TODAY, SO I DON'T HAVE A LOT OF TIME TO BEG YOU.

I finished the mural, Laura finished the quilt, and we started arranging the nursery!. We just need to finish organizing things and buy some appopriate lighting and lamps and we're set. Only about four weeks left!


You can see more pics and updates over at the blogand the photostream! This is a finished detail before I put the wall coverings and shelves back up.

"John Hill, professional music video director".

That's right, MTV has picked up the video I did for Scripts and Screwz. It's online now, I'm waiting to hear if it'll be on the television box or not.

I think the version up on Vimeo is still of a better quality, but whatever.

I've started working on my son's mural:

I'm pretty excited about it.


This is the show I am currently working on. I did not work on this skit at all though. It's being covered over on the Cold.Hard.Flash.

That's kind of like "I'm" being covered over there. But not. Not since I didn't work on that skit, and the last two things I submitted to CHF got generally panned and not covered. Oh well.

I sure do love making money though. MMMMmmmmm. Money.

Enough to fix the roof on the bookstore? No. Never enough.

More available at the website

They finally decided to finish editing and put up the latest episode of Colonel Deese. I finished it months ago. I'm pretty pleased with how the card game sequence turned out. Vote funny and all that shit.

Did several sketches of students as they worked. Turns out, drawing people in profile isn't very fun, also, seveal students I drew turned out good, but are just unattractive people. Don't want to put them up, because, heaven forbid, they find this, and realize I have drawn them all ugly.

So I drew celebrities after that.

Have you guys noticed how long Paris Hilton's neck is? She's like those water planet clone engineeers in that one Star Wars prequel. Seriously. And her chin? I sware she's like the Mummy's curse with Bruce Campbell's chin.


From the cover of wired magazine. Don't know what issue. Did I ever tell you the story where I saw him at Disneyland? I did. I saw him at Disneyland. We shared a wave. (A friendly hand gesture to one another, not an ocean wave, which would have been cooler.)

Enjoy.

Listen to President Pullman, it's a day for us to ALL CELEBRATE!


Have a safe weekend ever'body!

I was super proud of this thing, like, four days ago. Now I can't really stand it. I want to learn to sketch with water colors, but everyone said I should learn to sketch with an ink brush first. Well, I suck at that. Shakiest hand ever. I want to learn to use oil paints, but I thought I should try to master acrylics first. Well. I don't know anymore.

I've got several canvas's sitting around the house. Not to mention canvas paper and watercolor paper, but I never really paint anything. I go through these spells where I really want to be some kind of a painter or traditional illustrator, I feel like I should know how to do this stuff. But it only lasts a few weeks, and then I'm perfectly content to go back to dicking around on the computer. I do secretly wish I had quality stuff to hang in galleries somewhere.

This is up right now in our gallery, with copies of my digital prints, but that doesn't really count. I mean. I own the building. It's cheating right?


These are for the mural I'm going to attempt to paint on the walls in the nursery for Jack. He'll be here in September, so I really have to get started ASAP. I've nailed down these character illustrations though, so now I just need to project them on the wall, trace, and then paint. I'm going to keep them as flat colors (to better match the original reference pieces) primarily, so I shouldn't muck it up too much with the painting.



These are some background characters for the latest episode of "Colonel Deese" I finished about a month ago. It's still not up on the internet, but I hope it will be soon.


Don't forget about my prints for sale.

I'll have a couple copies of these (and two different versions of the old Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein thing I did months [years?] ago.) for sale at the bookstore next month, on display with some original sketches / photographs / painting, and accompanied by a lot of art from some rockin' local artist.

You however, can buy them online now, get it printed on canvas, framed, whatever.

Even if you aren't buying (and hey, I know, economy) please let your friends list know about them.