Author Archives: Cimaxion

Film: Metropolis Part 1

by Cimaxion

Having realized in a blinding flash of insight this week that the geek/tech outlook has essentially taken over most of the web world like some sort of a skin cancer and is absolute death to art, I offer an artist’s messy and incoherent view of urban life.  It is very uncool and not technically proficient.  But it is an artist speaking directly, without falsehood intervening.  This piece is by Marvin Tiberious who lives in Italy.

I’m having a huge vomit reaction to these blogs run by little gangs of cool-cats who spread themselves thinly across all domains and offer a smug smirk when photographed.  We’ve turned too much of the web over to the ugly little nerd group that wants everything to be just a tad retro.  If I see something that looks steampunk I’m going to smash it.  Steampunk is the white-supremacist version of cyberpunk which is simply a reference to any book you have read but cannot remember.

Boing Boing, Censorship, and Hypocrisy: Commenters, Watch Your Language!

by Cimaxion | 23 Comments

This article incorporates adult themes and language.

This is a flat-out attack on the hypocrisy and thin-skinned holiness of a major blog that purports to stand for freedom of expression and open ideas.  The blog is BoingBoing.net.  I’ve had my problems with the site before, having made comments that their moderators found to be excessive or too foul-mouthed for their rather puritanical tastes.  I say puritanical and I mean exactly that.

Boing Boing has a problem with genitalia.  You’ll see why in a few moments.

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Yellow Plastic Raygun Wins Best Experimental Film Award at Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles

by Cimaxion | 1 Comment

Well I’m just very pleased about this.  The Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles has given my film, Yellow Plastic Raygun, the award for Best Experimental Film.  I was having quite a nice week attending various parties and screenings at the festival.  Its use of multiple locations in the heart of downtown Los Angeles gives one a real sense of taking part in the life of the city and being involved with something that’s helping to foster the exploding art and film scene in downtown.  Most of the short films were screened in the new Civic Center Theater at the intersection of First and Main Streets, in the shadow of the famous City Hall tower that has appeared in so many crime shows and film noir classics.  I attended the screening of my own film this past Saturday evening and was amazed at seeing it large since I had put so much work into it on small monitors.  What’s great about the Downtown Film Festival is that it shows a wide range of filmmaking styles, crew sizes and budgets.  They show films made with lots of production resources right alongside films made by individual artists working with inexpensive HD cameras and even cell phone cameras.  I am very proud to have won this and I look forward to more great festivals in downtown Los Angeles from the people who put this together.

Audio Podcast Novel: Robinson Crusoe (Part 17 – Conclusion)

by Cimaxion

DOWNLOAD ROBINSON CRUSOE – PART 17

Robinson Crusoe and Friday finally have a ship and a way off the island. Crusoe relates his journey home and how he resolves the outstanding issues he left behind in his life. He meets with one final harrowing adventure on his journey home and uses it to lead into the final thoughts of his great tale. So ends one of the greatest adventures ever written and so began the great art of the English novel. Daniel Defoe created a character that has influenced every writer and every reader’s imagination since he wrote this incredible book.

It has been an uncommon pleasure to read this difficult book and to make my way through the unusual language of Mr. Defoe. Perhaps by reading him, one can learn to think a bit like him. With great language comes great subtlety of thought.

By the way, Defoe did write a sequel to this book. It’s called ‘The Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe.’ Perhaps a podcast of that book should be…

Subscribe to audio podcast

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Read by Alessandro Cima

Illustration is by NC Wyeth (1920)
Crusoe is grateful to the ship’s captain for his opportunity of rescue

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved. Do not distribute copies of our MP3 audio or video stories. They are for your personal use. If you choose to burn our MP3 stories onto a personal CD, do not make copies of the CD or distribute them to other people. Also, do not sell CDs containing our audio stories. All audio stories are copyrighted by Candlelight Stories, Inc.

Audio Podcast Novel: Robinson Crusoe (Part 16)

by Cimaxion

DOWNLOAD ROBINSON CRUSOE – PART 16

Crusoe and Friday see what looks like an English ship. But what does this ship bring? This is an action-packed section of the book. Crusoe uses every bit of his cunning and skill to defend himself and Friday while never ceasing to maintain his hope of rescue.

Get all the previous parts here

Subscribe to audio podcast

Subscribe to audio with iTunes

Read by Alessandro Cima

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved. Do not distribute copies of our MP3 audio or video stories. They are for your personal use. If you choose to burn our MP3 stories onto a personal CD, do not make copies of the CD or distribute them to other people. Also, do not sell CDs containing our audio stories. All audio stories are copyrighted by Candlelight Stories, Inc.

Audio Podcast Novel: Robinson Crusoe (Part 15)

by Cimaxion

DOWNLOAD ROBINSON CRUSOE – PART 15

Robinson Crusoe and Friday get many surprises as they battle cannibals. The action explodes as they are forced to think and act quickly to save lives. Crusoe continues to be amazed at the strength of Friday’s character and his incredible loyalty.

Subscribe to audio podcast

Subscribe to audio with iTunes

Read by Alessandro Cima

Illustration is by NC Wyeth (1920)
Crusoe battles the cannibals on the beach

All audio stories are Copyright © Candlelight Stories, Inc., All Rights Reserved. Do not distribute copies of our MP3 audio or video stories. They are for your personal use. If you choose to burn our MP3 stories onto a personal CD, do not make copies of the CD or distribute them to other people. Also, do not sell CDs containing our audio stories. All audio stories are copyrighted by Candlelight Stories, Inc.

Film: Spaceman

by Cimaxion

Jono Schaferkotter wrote and directed this short sci-fi film that places a spaceship crew in love and peril during a mission to find more resources for Earth. But the spaceship is an apartment. It’s a clever mix of perspectives and imaginary circumstances that play out over the course of a short romance. The film was made with no budget but it features some lovely special effects and a very convincing space walk.

The Books of Anselm Kiefer

by Cimaxion | 3 Comments

The Art of Memory, a blog that specializes in minimal film, music, literature, poetry and art, has posted a series of images from a rare book called The Books of Anselm Kiefer, 1969-1990.  Kiefer has worked on books since the sixties and incorporates many different materials in them, including photography, painting, sand, straw, cloth, and metal.  The books are one of a kind artworks and are seldom seen.

There is always something fascinating about a book made by the hand of an artist.  The problem with seeing books in museums is always the same though: you can only see two pages of any given book.  But since most people have no experience with turning a book’s pages, you simply would not want to trust patrons with this responsibility.

One of Kiefer’s main instincts has always been to try to look directly at the horrific history of Germany in the twentieth century.  These book pages contain some of his attempts to do so.

Children’s Verse: Brooke and the Ramshackle Ship

by Cimaxion | 2 Comments

By Steve Bynghall

Steve Bynghall lives in London, England. Other poems about Brooke and her useless Dad appear on Smories.com.  Visit http://www.smories.com/author/steve-bynghall/ for more details.  If you want to be notified when a new Brooke story will be appearing please email [email protected].

Brooke and the Ramshackle Ship

Brooke’s Dad was the captain
Of the world’s most hopeless boat
It was ramshackle and rotten
It could hardly stay afloat!

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Animation: The Black Dog’s Progress

by Cimaxion | 1 Comment

Vimeo user Quirky Pictures pointed me to this strange and dark little film about a dog losing its home and wandering through a rather horrible and tragic life. The film uses multiple flip book frames to tell its story in a series of loops. It was made by Stephen Irwin at small time inc. as an Animate Projects Commission for England’s Channel 4.

Another film from the Candlelight Stories Short Films group on Vimeo.

Yellow Plastic Raygun Selected for Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles

by Cimaxion

The Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles has made my latest short film, Yellow Plastic Raygun, part of their official selection!  So if you are in Los Angeles on Saturday, September 11, 2010 and you want to see an evening of short films, come by the Civic Center Theater at First and Main Street right across from the City Hall building.  The shorts program starts at 10:00 pm.  Here’s a link to the festival schedule.

I am very happy about this.  I like the idea of a film festival right here at home where I can go and hang around with some other insane filmmakers.  It should be an interesting Saturday night.

August 28 is International Read a Comic in Public Day!

by Cimaxion

Hey, tomorrow, Saturday August 28, 2010, is International Read a Comic in Public Day!

That means that all you unattractive, bedroom-bound, nerdish, geekster, loser, babeless nobodies can actually get up a little nonexistent courage and emerge from your domiciles to take your first tentative steps across the street with a real live honest-to-god paper-printed comic book in your hands!  Woooooo!  Get it on, baby!  Jivesteppin’ along the street with my ink pages!

Flavorwire has a nice little post about what comics to read for certain locations if you want to fit in and look cool.  I don’t happen to suffer from the decease of timidity or humble nerdishness.  I’m a real bastard who likes to walk up and push ballpoints into people’s throats if I think they aren’t showing proper respect.  So whatever your problem with reading comics in public might be I’m probably not going to understand it or be very sympathetic.  In fact, I might just chase your ass through the park to have a good laugh at your expense.

So, go for it.  Read your stupid comic in public tomorrow.  I dare you.

Children’s Story: The Ketchup Bottle Genie

by Cimaxion | 11 Comments

By Mark L. Glosser

The Ketchup Bottle Genie

“Hey,” Eric yelped as he watched his younger brother Ian shake a huge glob of ketchup onto his sandwich. “You emptied the bottle. What am I supposed to put on my hot dog?”

“Mom got another bottle,” Ian mumbled as he stuffed half the sandwich in his mouth, Go look in the refrigerator.”

Eric stomped to the refrigerator and pulled out a weird shaped-bottle. “Genie Ketchup Company? I never heard of this brand,” said Eric as he unscrewed the lid.

A moment after the lid came off; all the ketchup in the bottle squirted to the ceiling, and started to spin like a tornado.Eric and Ian dove under the table.

A flash of light momentarily blinded them.  When their vision cleared they saw a man with long, black hair floating in mid-air. His red pants barely fit over his bulging belly, and his white shirt was splattered with ketchup.

Peeking out from under the table Eric asked in a trembling voice, “Who are you?”

The strange visitor floated down from the ceiling and looked under the table. “I’m the Ketchup Bottle Genie. Haven’t you heard of me?”

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