September 30, 2005
The Music Man
By DEANNA DAHLSAD
Chris Leap thinks having a verb for a surname is a nightmare. I think
it's perfectly descriptive for one who jumps so enthusiastically into
things...
Thirty-two years ago Englishman Chris Leap was born, but it took
receiving a gift to make Chris spring to life.
"As a kid, the first birthday present I remember was a tape recorder.
Recording burps hehe. Since then, it's been all music, technology,
synths and PCs." says Chris.
After discovering sound with his tape recorder, Chris was bound for
performing arts school. He dove into the lifestyle, studying music, and
recording. He loved it so much that after graduating he hopped to
another art school to get another degree in music technology. But then
it was time to soar - Chris began touring with bands.
Touring he experienced "depravity, mindless abandon, rock n roll" which
likely set the stage for his working on the internet...
Chris posted music samples to the web, including work under the user
name of "Dog." In December, 2003, Dog received an email from Kat. Kat
was Kat Caverly, who wanted to know who the composer of one of the music
samples was. Dog wrote back, and Chris eventually made a leap of faith,
coming to work for No Evil Productions. Now, Dog & Kat make more than
beautiful burp noises together.
It seems to me, Leap is a rather good name for the head of the No Evil
Productions music department, for he leaps into action - and hasn't
missed yet.
(Unless you count one fall off a pier trying to impress a girl in
Portugal, but we don't dwell on that unless it's a slow day at the
office...)
Chris' favorite projects:
Posted by photocartoonist at 12:45 AM
September 29, 2005
Leap-ing to Conclusions
Folks hear our professional music - sophisticated, full orchestrations,
quality stuff - and what do they conclude? It must be either licensed
or used without permission. Ahh, bless their little hearts for such
a compliment!
In truth, all the music is like the animation, photography, & other
artwork: original.
Kat Caverly says "It is time for the world to know that the team is not
just freelancers, but artists who are brilliant, who are devoted, who
are on staff." So here we are, telling you all about it.
The main reason the music is so fabulous is the No Evil Productions
music department. This department is headed by Sound Designer Chris Leap,
who is composer, arranger, musician, sound FX designer, foley
artist (matching environmental effects), voiceover artist, lyricist, and
songwriter.
(Is that all, Chris, you slacker? :snort:)
Err, no. There's more.
Not only does Chris have multiple talents, but he's flexible in his part
in the process of production: He literally can join in anywhere in the
process.
Says Chris "Each project is different. They come at different stages,
some with finished animations, some in script form, some with voice
tracks, some with a title or feeling and some a mixture of these.
Working this way opens up lots of ways of writing and composing. There's
a lot of freedom. Pushing the limits of software and hardware and
breaking the rules is encouraged."
(No wonder his last name is an action word!)
Kat says this about Chris, "He has this passion for music; he has to
make music or he feels physically ill. I can come up with a never ending
stream of ideas and projects and this makes Chris very very happy and
his music just flourishes and grows. He is such a blessing."
Chris in turn feels blessed, "I get to do what I love, creating music
and sound and recording and mixing and breaking rules (including
grammatical ones)."
(Hey, back off on the grammar errors, Chris. Leave a little something
for the rest of us!)
So no, dear fans, the music doesn't arrive here via licensing. As they
say, music comes from the soul. And that's the way it's all done here
at No Evil Productions: All original, all the time.
By DEANNA DAHLSAD
Posted by photocartoonist at 12:02 AM
September 28, 2005
"I am over 30, love cats and any kind of design jobs."
By DEANNA DAHLSAD
No, that's not Kat Caverly herself speaking, it's No Evil Productions
Dream Team member Sai Ming Yiu. He could be saying this to flatter his
boss, but after nearly 5 years and over 100 brochures, print ads,
catalogues, and greeting cards (including roughly 30 animations), we
don't think Sai Ming's in any danger of losing his job.
Sai Ming Yiu is from Hong Kong. He's studied 3d animation and graphic
design at the School of Visual Arts in New York and British Arts College
and has worked as a graphic designer in Hong Kong. He met Kat Caverly in
October 2000 after graduating with a degree in computer arts.
When asked to discuss his coming to work for Katakismet, Sai Ming said
"I was looking for some graphic design job and we talked on the phone
for over 15 minutes."
(I know he must be lying about the length of time – people who
accidentally make 'wrong number' calls to Kat Caverly are on the phone
longer than that!)
Sai Ming continued "We have a lot in common; we both love cats and Hong
Kong actor Jackie Chan."
It's no wonder then, that Sai Ming is behind the development of Smuggly
the duck and his cousin Quacki.
Along with Smuggly and Quacki, Pearl the Puffer Fish is one of his favorite projects.
Posted by photocartoonist at 10:42 PM
September 23, 2005
You Have to Kiss Alotta Frogs...
It's been a few years since I've been single, but I don't forget, nor do
I take for granted, the difficult process of finding my mate.
I've tried to forget, but I can't. It's seared into my mind... And then
there are all the single folks I know who keep reminding me what it's
like out there... For example, that coworker who has been standing
'round that water cooler all day, whining about her love life (or lack
thereof). :sigh:
Like momma said, you've got to kiss a lot of frogs to find your prince.
If you've got a friend, a sister, coworker - who ever it is – that
suffers from frog kissing frustrations here's a cute way to cheer them up.
This cute ecard is one little pick-me-up that won't try to take them home.
And maybe then we can all return to laughing at the water cooler. :wink:
By DEANNA DAHLSAD
Posted by photocartoonist at 9:50 PM
September 21, 2005
Creativity: A River Runs To It
A look at Nayan Soni, one of the members of No Evil Productions Dream Team
By DEANNA DAHLSAD
Nayan was born on 18th July 1974 in an Jabalpur, India, a town famous
for it's river, the Narmada. He credits the river for much of his
inspiration, saying “(It's) free-flowing water taught me how to be
spontaneous in my life and my work.”
Like a river, Nayan has a physical source as well. He was blessed to be
born into a family of artists and musicians. His grandfather was a music
professor teaching the sitar. Both his grandfather and father we painters.
Young Nayan used to accompany his father on trips where his father would
paint landscapes in watercolors and Nayan remembers “that is where I got
my first "taste" of colors.”
Nayan graduated with a degree in Fine arts, with a specialization in
Painting. His post graduate work was in Visual Communication with
Animation Film Making as a specialization.
He believes destiny and humor are what led him to Kat Caverly's website,
The Photocartoonist, and credits the free-flowing spontaneity of his
river for inspiring him to contact her. He sent her an email with
samples of his work and on January 2, 2003, he officially joined the
team with this first assignment from Kat Caverly:
“I am working on a script that will feature a purple stegosaurus. I
loved dinosaurs when I was a kid and I want to create unusual
characters. This stegosaurus is a hopeless romantic and HE is purple."
On Jan. 23, 2003 Steggie was born.
Since then it's been smooth sailing for Nayan. As a member of No Evil
Productions he has done 150 animations. While Nayan cannot name any
favorites, saying all of them have the same amount of labor & love put
into them, users have made the following Nayan's most popular designs:
Feliz Cumpleaños
Happy Burp Day
Birthday Blast
Posted by photocartoonist at 9:28 PM
September 7, 2005
The Story of Bodega Boy
Bodega Boy got his name because he was promised to the local deli on the corner. These delis are called Bodegas here in New York City, in this neighborhood, which was very Spanish in the Westside Story era. Bodega is the Spanish name for, well, deli but that's Jewish, also very New York. Bodega is Spanish for little grocery store or at least that's what I believe.
Anyway when BB was 6 months old he went to his new home. the next day I went to see how he was and the counter guy said "Please take that kitten back home." He has been crying all day and night, so they had to put his cage down in the basement.
When he saw me, he started screaming and my heart just broke, so I didn't even take the 5 minutes to go get a carrier. I took little BB and put him in my jacket and held him close because the streets are busy here and my heart was just pounding and so was his.
When I got him back to the studio where his mommy was, you never saw such a happy kitten. He literally leaped for joy! Boing, boing!
When he got full grown, he was twice his mommy's size and still the mommy's boy but Delila wanted nothing to do with this goofy son of hers so he used to have to chase her to try to get affection.
But alas poor BB never got enough affection from his mommy. So we make up for that with ice cream and homages, to our great goofy gentleman; full of love and paranoia!
His mommy, Delila, well that is another story; very sad but with the joy of 5 beautiful little kittens. Delila was such a good mommy. I was always impressed by her devotion and dedication to taking care of this motley crew.
She had been left in an apartment, only 150 square feet small, with 8 other cats. I brought her to my studio and had to hide and re-hide for the next two weeks. She wouldn't eat and I begged her to come out.
Finally I discovered that she was probably pregnant and yes a month later she had 5 little rat cats! I found them all great homes, including Delila. I wanted to keep her too. She was so special but in a cruel twist of fate, Delila did NOT like BB and because of that BB use to chase her around and it made Delila a nervous wreck.
So I found Delila a special home, where she could live just by herself with TWO humans to wait on her hand and foot. She got fat and content and is finally living the life she has always deserved.
I truly love my kitty buddies but I have had to stop the rescue efforts. I found out the hard way that they don't like to live in large groups with each other and as long as I keep them to 3 to an apartment, the animosity is kept to a minimum! They have such opinions!
Posted by photocartoonist at 2:12 PM
September 2, 2005
When a Robot breaks down...
Ah the robots.txt file...at the center of controversy in a landmark copyright infringement case.
Reading about this reminds me of the old opt-in, opt-out controversy. The Internet community claims that a website owner can OPT-OUT of search engine indexing via the robots.txt file, well folks like so much else in this day and age, that doesn't really work 100%.
This is the root of the lawsuit, and the first of its kind against an indexing of images, cached pages, without the expressed permission of the copyright holder. Many have opined about when/if this would happen to say Google. I have read that there is case law already allowing for thumbnails to be fair use and of course we all can see the usefulness and the legitimate fair use of an archive of the history of the Internet.
Libraries, the brick & mortar versions, get the publishers expressed permission. The Library of Congress has emassed its collection since deposit is a requirement of copyright registration. That again is with the copyright holders expressed permission.
Posted by photocartoonist at 1:55 PM