School for my district has been in session for two weeks now, and man was it awesome! I've got friends in each of my classes except one, which is weird since I walk with one of the girls to it, and she's in the same room, and then we're on opposite sides of the room and so don't talk. Weird, huh? But, I've got at least two in each class, and in a couple, there's so many that I've already gotten the evil eye for 'being distracted.' Wasn't a major problem, and I resolved it in time, so I'm still good.
The classes I'm most excited about are Writer's Workshop and Drawing 1. I'm already fairly rounded in each of those areas, which I love to do, and we do nothing but write and draw all day. Sweet, sweet freedom. And to top it all off, I'm not a freshman anymore, so my status is increased, and my friends and I can pretty much sit wherever we want in the big gym(really big) and in the cafeteria, including the coveted stage! It's like the whole place fades away, and there's plenty of rooms. It's luxurious indeed.
Though, I did finish reading the next installment of the Nicholas Flamel series: The Sorceress.



This was a book that explored a lot of different perspectives, which is a refreshing and interesting take on keeping up with the activities and emotions of all the main characters. There were individual adventures that I really liked, since they all fully explore the personalities of the characters and the element of fantasy involved in this storyline.
I am in the midst of reading The Necromancer currently, and, dismissing all review-related thoughts concerning that installment, this is the best book of the series so far. so much hinges on individual characters fighting for whatever motives that are carefully developed. A great selection of the series!

Inception Review :-)

I'm not very creative when it comes to blog posts, as shown by the title above. But, I know I've not posted for a while, and there really isn't an excuse this time. *shrug* But, as I promised, here's the new movie review:



Yes, Leonardo DiCaprio's newest blockbuster is out, and this movie rocked! In a LOT of different areas too. Makes sense though, since this movie deals with lots of different areas, specifically dreams. The movie is essentially dealing with the human subconscious and dreams, or specifically, layers and layers of them. This is a very tricky subject in any forms of storytelling, but the movie pulled it off very well.
The acting fully brought out the characteristics of the characters in this story, which was very important so that you could understand the gravity of the events. There was a wide range of situations that forced the actors to put on their game faces, everything from tragedy to comedy to action. It all fit nicely into the story and the acting made it believable.
This story is one I'll remember for quite a while. Everything is always shifting, sometimes depending on how the characters feel, sometimes depending on how they want their dreams to look. It's a story you can just loose yourself in and let the imagination run wild. Fertile ground for further story ideas too! Though, I'm not saying you should copy it.
Bottom line is that you should go see it right now!
So, school starts tomorrow, and I've got my schedule already, I keep hearing things about how its gonna be tough, but I already knew that. So, if I'm prepared, what could go wrong? Huh, that's what I thought last year with math, and that grade was on a roller coaster.
Plus, My IQ test results should be coming back soon, and the person in charge said that its already pretty high. Woo-hoo!

IT'S BACK!

Check out this website if you want to learn more, but here I was, minding my own business, when all of a sudden I notice an update on the Avatar wiki. It mentions something called Avatar: Legend of Kora, and all of a sudden I'm thrust into an Avatar wonderland!
Premiering next year(not sure what month, people), is a brand new series that follows the events of our favorite Nick show: Avatar. A new Avatar, new cities, and of course new people(the gang isn't in this one)! Mike and Bryan are working on it as well, so rest assured that it's going to be a hit. I'm excited now!
So here's the big part of this post that I promised yesterday!



Yep, it's Sorcerer's Apprentice. This won't take long, because I don't want to spoil this for those people hoping to see it.
I highly recommend seeing this movie if you're a fan of fantasy. There's great use of magical instruction, artifacts, and mythology. The characters could use a bit more development, but they're so caught up in the story that you seem to ignore those tiny flaws. The affects are spectacular, and the story flows at a logical pace, doing some unexpected stuff. There's something for everyone here too: romance, action, magic... You know, all the good stuff! Bottom line: go see it!

New Stuff!

Not all of the two pics are going to be of the new stuff, but I can still talk about them. First up is a new composition, one that isn't quite finished just yet.



There is only a slight outline of the tree found in this pic, so sorry if you can't see it right but this is a hand holding a tree on its side. I just thought of this off the top of my head.
I've been drawing trees a lot lately. Refining my technique, drawing gesture sketches, figuring out how to make the leaves with the pencil, etc. Great fun! plus, I've got a new book about drawing techniques and media. Most of the techniques are shown individually in the composition, so it's a bit simple compared to what I'm aiming for, but the book makes use of them fairly well.
Gesture sketches are explored a lot in the book too. And those little things are pretty interesting. You can use a combination of either crude lines or shapes to map out a figure, or you can leave it aloen and imagine the possibilities!
Anyways, here comes a new book review!



So, I've reviewed the first book in this series, The Alchemyst, and so with the completion of this one I wanted to contribute my thoughts to my blog.
Nicholas Flamel and the Newman twins arrive in Paris, and the action picks up from there. This book moved along so fast that I was thinking the author had split in the first one in two. In some cases, that's a bad thing, but for the most part, I loved it. The author, Michael Scott, provides such details that makes every turn of these stories enjoyable. He switches perspectives and locations fast enough that you never know what's going to come next. It also makes it somewhat easy to peer into various characters' personalities.
The fantasy aspects of this installment were broadened, introducing various characters from history, fierce creatures, and an all new form of magic. It's a must-read for fans of fantasy, and quickly brought the series to become one of my favorites!
Speaking of fantasy, my next post(tomorrow) will feature my review of The Sorcerer's Apprentice. But on to other matters. The new Leonardo DiCaprio movie, Inception, knocked Sorcerer flat on its back. I hate that statistic, but Inception DOES look pretty freakin' cool! You can add that to my list of movies I want to see, I guess.

I Have Returned!!!

It's definitely been a while since I've posted, but not as big as that fallout last winter. I can't even remember why I was so out of touch. Anyways, one of this summer's biggest movies, on my list, anyway, has finally made it to the review session. Yep, The Last Airbender was the movie I saw first thing on it's premier, though my friends weren't around so sadly they didn't share this horrendous experience with me.



Yeah, so if you suffer from chronic heartbreak, depression, anger issues, anxiety, or mood swings when it comes to mistakes dealing with your fave franchises, then I suggest you skip this entire section of the post. *REVIEW BEGINS HERE*
I had high hopes for this movie. I mean, you look at the promotional material, commercials, and the epic trailers and think that they're going to include the essential characters and storyline of the show's first season. WRONG! First off, many, many, MANY characters were missing. Sure, you could have gotten rid of Haru, The Fire Sages, and Chief Arnook if you wanted, but destroying the lives of many characters is heartbreaking.
Here's a list of characters that were eliminated that I feel should have stayed: Haru, Jet, Bato, Chief Arnook, Koh(Why did they write him off? WHY?!), Bumi(:0), Roku(insert anger issues), Suki(crying), and Jeong Jeong. It's awful. Some of these people come back and provide the backbones to the story. And the story IS demolished in the movie. There is ZERO character development. So remember the great personalities we all fell in love with? GONE! The Kyoshi Warriors were even planned to be in the movie, but then cut at the last minute. That's what I call pathetic. I'm still not sure whether I want to waste my money in buying the DVD.
*REVIEW ENDS HERE*
So, now that this traumatic experience is over, we can listen to the vast arsenal of art supplies I've got. You all know of my huge collections of colored pencils, which has grown by at least fifteen new colors and values by now. But now, thirty-six new variations of colors have joined the pack. I got them on my birthday(yay), so you may or may not know that. Also, a similar pack of pastel pencils, with a small assortment of plain pastels, are in the collection. Today I bought a twelve-pack of shades of graphite pencils, with one more hat was one degree over the pack I already have.
There's much more, including Newsprint(an accident, actually), Bristol Board(yay, again), charcoal pencils, kneaded and normal erasers, a mannequin, and an assortment of drawing books. Ahh, I'm in good shape now.

New Purchases

Today we picked up a familiar little contraption known as the Wit Balance Board. And what does that go with? That's right, Wit Fit. Well, in my family's case, the Wii Fit Plus game. I have never played the original, so I'll just start with this extended version of the game. There's strength training, aerobics, reflexes and balance tests, all sorts of games to help fitness.
But one of the things that I am DEFINITELY looking forward to trying is the Yoga. I've always been interested, but never really taken the time to research the poses and actually DO them. I can do the tree pose, and the one where you are like a bridge; that's probably called the bridge pose, but I don't know for sure.Martial arts have been a strong interest to me too, but again, commitment issues or something. Hopefully my uncle can help train me though, since he used to be a karate instructor. However, I don't know if I should do karate or kung fu. Kung Fu is more circular, and I love directing my arms like that. I'll just have to find out!
And, I finished the Alchemyst. That is one of the best fantasy books I've read in a LONG time. Warrior Heir was good, but it's a slightly less standard of a novel than this one. Anyways, Alchemyst starts off faster than many books I've read, and ends just as quick. There's tons of great storyline, magic, characters, and battles in between, and the description of the tale and everything thing relating to magic is SUPERB! I highly recommend it. Now, I'm looking for the sequels, The Magician, The Sorceress, and The Necromancer, and buy them. And did I mention that I need to buy another bookshelf? Well, I do.
Stay flamin'' hotmen!

Here Comes A New Review

Once again, I have a very large poster to mark the name of the movie, so this is the I-stop-talking-and-I-get-straight-to-the-review part of the blog!



The legend lives... literally. This was a flat-out epic, awesome, amazing, fantastic movie. I laughed, I nearly cried(a BIG deal here, people), stared in awe, and held my fist in victory.
There certainly has been a lot of great movies this summer, but I would say only Iron Man 2 comes close to topping this one, and it's still number two in my book. So, first thing I have to say is to get over the hype about this being just a remake of the first. That is very true, but it is fresh, funny, all-around great to watch. This movie has elements of action, drama, adventure, romance(little), tragedy(I guess that's drama), and even tiny hints of fantasy!
The acting is good, though in some situations you would question it. It works for the individual roles in the movie however, and so comes along smoothly. The story is the same, amazing one, and there are great shots and locations to contribute to the scale of the movie. It is very inspirational, as always with the karate kid, and made me feel like I could pick off a few baddies myself.
A few instances in the movie are a bit unclear, such as seeing a photo or the characters doing something without much explanation, and so force the imagination to work. It works in this movie though. It deserves every amount of praise it gets!
I just wanted to end rather dramatically there, sorry about that. But check this out!



I haven't posted anything Lego that I've searched for in a LONG time, but this was so, so beautiful I, I had to continue!(notice the incredibles pun?) And if anyone is out there paying attention to this blog, I need some suggestions on some drawings. I have a few in mind, but nothing's really struck gold yet.
Plus there was a new Last Airbender TV spot playing on the TV behind me a few seconds ago, and Katara speaks, Appa shows his face, and Sokka gives his trademark WOO-HOO! Man... this is going to be SUCH an epic movie.
I'm out(woohoo!)

Indy shoots...and I score!

Everyone remembers the most witty scene in the Indy movies: the epic showdown between our hero and the Cairo Swordsman. Well Lego has released a neat little set that captures that scene pretty well.

The minifigs in this set are fantastic, except for the fact that the swordsman's face looks cartoony. Anyways, TLG could have done a few buildings though.




This photo shows the instructional manuals from all the Indy sets I've purchased. Well this isn't entirely accurate. I've purchased two copies of Motorcycle Chase, Jungle Cutter, and received two extra copies of Shanghai Chase, but everything else is only one copy.