Awesome =P

Thanks! Woof!

Once again, great tag line. ^^

And Cheeto predicted he was the truth, too. So it fits.

I had drawn the picture of Korber a couple months ago. When I drew it, I had really, REALLY hoped it would be Mayors/Typhoons in the first round. Aw, well-- it's still a good poster.

Yes, yes, but... this way, it's even more dramatic. If the 'Phoons make it and if the Mayors make it...

Let's just say the Battle For The East is going to be epic.

That famous point to a father = epic win. :)

I'm so glad you recognized the pose!! Yes! This is supposed to be a photo of Klaus Korber pointing to his father after hitting the buzzer-beating triple to win the game against the Mayors and end their undefeated streak.

And the moment just before the rest of his team TACKLEHUGGED him.

hehe, That's what I thought. The look you can't miss.

Great one here. That is true.

Thanks!!

Sure thing.

You... drew art?! WOOOOO!!! :D

I love it! LOVE IT! Korber's one cold puppy with a bone to settle... hoping the 'Phoons can get to the Mayors in the playoffs! ^^

I did! Yay!!

I actually drew the sketch for this months ago. And had it digitally inked back in May, I think. I had the idea for this poster for a long time and was planning on releasing it for the playoffs in anticipation for a Mayors/Typhoons matchup in the first round. Sadly, that didn't happen. But I still liked the art and figured I should finish the piece.

Though that choke chain necklace took FOREVER.

Chains do take forever, I know! But it looks great! :)

I think everyone would have preferred a Mayors/Typhoons matchup, but hey, this is the FBA, not some predetermined storyline, heh. If it were David Stern in your shoes he would have set that up in a heartbeat. I'd like to think Sterne Davids is a little more respectable, right? ;)

Heehee! I think so! Sterne Davids certainly does a good job of letting the athletes do their thing. He's never imposed any 'no headbands' or 'business casual dress' rules on the players. It's part of why FBA players are free to wear chain necklaces and earrings and all the silly stuff they put on.

However, I do believe that the Mayors intentionally lost their last game against the Typhoons specifically so that the 'Phoons would get the #7 seed-- and miss them in the first round of the playoffs. Rolf Korber is that sneaky of a coach, and if the Mayors had won that game, the 'Phoons would have made #8.

Yep, Korber is that sneaky, but also, it's a pretty good move strategy wise. He knows his matchups... but more than anything he probably just doesn't want to see his son in that kind of competitive environment, knowing the kinds of things he's already done this year to motivate him.

Davids can be a bit... boring (not really, he's endlessly entertaining to me, but I know he is supposed to sound bored. ;) ) but he does do a great job of letting the players be themselves. Part of the draw of the FBA is the uniqueness of the characters, not the marketability. ^^

oh word up Buck! awesome work. the poise. the determination. It's playoff time!

WOO!! A playoff win in 2010!! Go 'Phoons!!

I promise you, 2K is going to be watching game tape from the Taproots ALL NIGHT. He's going to have their playbook memorized by Monday.

How are you?

I'm doing ok Train thank you.

I've been really busy lately (moved to a new city and started grad school) so I really haven't had much time for anything.

How've you been my friend?

I'm pretty good. Looking to moving into my own apartment in a few months.

Personally, I hope 2K and the Typhoons stomp the Mayors into the ground!

I hope the Typhoons meet the Mayors! If it were a Typhoons/Mayors matchup, I'd feel really good about Tallahassee's chances. Sadly, the Taproots are a different deal! But let's hope for the young club.

But don't tell  christaphorac.

The Korber Story was really interesting and deep, man.

I love that point.

Thanks, Rainwhisker! That podcast is still one of my favorites. I do love all the drama in it.

And I think there's something magnificent about Klaus Korber making the final last-second shot, hitting the big 3-ball to steal the win, and responding not by jumping and cheering and pumping at the air-- but just by looking across the court and pointing at his dad.

Old rivalries will reignite, and a thirst will for vengeance will be unleashed, oh watch for fireworks if the Typhoons and the Mayors meet up during the playoffs.

And we all get the rare treat of your drawings! Whoot! It's like Pepsi in my house: a rare treat that everyone savours. The difference being my mum doesn't pour this artpiece down the sink when she finds it in the fridge!

Hah!! Thanks, Big Z! As everyone knows, I'm much more of a video/audio guy that an illustrator-- but it's still fun for me to draw now and then. What I really love is the digital mastering of the pictures-- coloring it and highlighting it and arranging stuff. And I learn new things all the time.

This was the first time that I really made hard, aggressive highlights and shadows in my picture. Usually I dim them down to very low opacity and blur them a whole lot, trying not to make them too much. This time I just drew them and let them shine-- and I think it works!

Yup, you are the A/V guy, but we still love it when you get a pencil to paper ^_^

Digital art really is am amazing medium, it can really save time with artpieces because like for comics if you have two frames which are only very minorly different, you can copy, paste and adjust. Plus, if in your sketch you notice one of the characters is drawn a bit too small you can just blow him up in Photoshop!

Hey, I've used this tool in CS4 called the "blob brush" or something like that? I have CS3 so I'm curious to know, what is that? Is it something that makes inking a lot easier?

Yup, it definitely worked! Hard, aggressive, just like the subject!

Yeah, I've used the blob brush, too. It's a tool in Illustrator CS4, not Photoshop, though. The blob brush allows you to draw freehand style and converts your drawing into vectors. I used the blob brush on many of my earlier pieces to trace out my scanned pencil sketches. The nice thing is that because it converts your drawing into vectors, it smoothes out the linework a little bit-- which is a big help to a guy like me with a pretty darn shaky drawing hand. XD

The last couple of pics I've put up (the Rouge and Korber pieces), I traced out the scanned pencil work using SketchBook Pro instead, then imported that into Photoshop. I don't get the benefit of the vectors or the blob brush's smoothing, but I found I liked how easy it made the process of coloring the picture in Photoshop, much easier than when I imported an EPS from Illustrator. Still, I may go back to using Illustrator. What I really need to do is get good at drawing out the vectors and making my linework really smooth!

Hmm, so you get around the shaky hand problem with Vectors, interesting. My hands aren't that shaky, but they still do so the way I get around that is that I scan and trace at very high resolution (like 6000 pixels by 4000 pixels) and then shrink it down to 1280 pixels when I upload it.

It is really difficult making lineart smooth. I can try drawing the same line five times before I get it smooth enough to my liking!

Ah yes... the point and stare!

The lens flare is a nice effect, too. Really adds in the drama from the original pose, even to those who might not recognize this from an earlier podcast. I like it! ^.=.^

Thanks, DFTP! I know the photography-minded out there will tell me I should have put the lens flare in FRONT of Korber instead of behind him-- but somehow the effect with it behind just looked really good to me.