Jean wants another kitten. I vote: this one.

I think 20th Century Fox must have been shooting a movie in Harlem over the weekend. When I was walking to the UPS store I saw a black SUV drive by at full speed. It’s windows were all smashed in and the right rear tire was shooting sparks where it was rubbing the bent frame. Three helicopters were flying low overhead and seemed to be chasing the SUV. I stopped to watch, because even though it’s NYC this stuff doesn’t really happen every day. As the SUV passed by I saw two guys in costume running along the adjacent buildings like they were chasing the SUV too. The guy in front was dressed like the Predator from the movie “Predator” and the guys in the back were dressed like the aliens from “Aliens”. There was one in a weird thicker Alien costume with long arms, a bit reminiscent of the Kenner toy Gorilla. I couldn’t get my camera out of my bag fast enough to get any good shots and since I was so pumped to see the action I forgot to adjust the settings so all my pictures were blown out (I had the camera adjusted for a low light situation earlier…). The helicopter in the back was firing fake chain gun rounds at the Alien guys and I saw a couple green squibs go off indicating the “kill”. Then some guy in military uniform (go Marines!) jumped out of the second helicopter rappelling down a rope and landing on the roof with the guy in the predator costume. I couldn’t see the action, but the helicopter with the round camera thing underneath (it looked like the one on the BBC’s series “Planet Earth”) kept swooping around the roof until a giant ball of flame, like a gasoline bomb, exploded into the air in a mushroom cloud. The helicopter landed on the roof out of my site. I waited around for a bit but had to get to the UPS store before it closed. The guy at the UPS counter said he didn’t know if they were shooting a film, but that there had been a lot of big white trucks up around that area all day. If this was what I think it was, I can’t wait to see the movie. AVP3?! Sweet as!

There’s no way this really happened… If anyone knows of a sci-fi movie or show being shot it the greater Manhattan area let me know. I saw some stuff on the street last night that had movie special effects written all over it. I was trying to figure out where the cameras were because I’m sure this was some sort of gorilla style film making or something. I was walking up the hill from my subway stop and as I passed a whole group of people hanging out on the street corner there was a big commotion from the street on my right. I looked up there just in time to see a car come sliding around the corner and head up the street the wrong way. It looked like it was dragging something behind it and a grayish green smoke came off the ground as it drove away. These crazy people had some sort of special effect creature thing tied to the car and were dragging it around. I couldn’t really see the string so at first glance it looked like the animal was chasing the car but it was going too fast. Everyone else around me was making a big deal of it and freaking out, but I’m pretty sure it was a low budget movie or something. Anyone know? No one in my neighborhood has a clue.

Just sharing the wealth. I was constantly using images of old maps and re-purposing them for the steampunk pictures or wallpapers, so I took and hour and converted a whole slew of my favorite old maps into super high res Photoshop brushes. The *.abr file is large (55.9MB) but it’s totally worth it if you need some good aged looking backdrops. In the list is a brush made from a high res picture of the back of one of the older maps. I’ve used it as a basis for several images. Let me know what you think. Maps Photoshop Brush Pack (2212)

Maps Photoshop Brush Pack (2212)

I can’t believe what I saw! This is going to totally freak you out, but… I was wandering around town after work because I’ve been spending too much time in my room and needed to feel like I had gotten out and about without spending money I don’t have. Anyhow, I went to the little park just down the road from my apartment building. Jean, you know the one with the huge stone wall. I was walking on one of the upper paths and I smelled something horrible, like death. I couldn’t figure out where the smell was coming from, but when I rounded a bend in the path I saw it. There was a huge hole in the wall that was coated in this grayish-black stuff that looked like melted plastic. For a second I thought it was a service entrance for the subway lines beneath the street above, but it wasn’t. The smell was coming out of the hole so strong. I haven’t smelled death like that since I lived in Michigan and ran across a bloated dead deer on the road while biking. This was worse though. I had to get away, but as I was backing up and before I turned around, I swear I saw something or someone moving inside the hole. Just a quick glimpse of something shiny moving in the dark, but it freaked me out. I ran down the path away from the smell and called the police, but after 15 minutes and no one showing up, it was getting dark. I did not want to be there in the dark, so I left. Apparently, no one cares about bad smells in the park. I don’t know what it was, but curiosity isn’t going to overcome the nausea I felt there, so I’m not going back. I suggest you don’t either.