An Excerpt From My Lies-about-Doctor-Who Book.

Leaked Doctor Who production material reveals plans for the Doctor’s hairstyle.

I’d recently come to the conclusion that I needed to do more regular artwork to keep the brain juices going, even if only one quick doodle per day.  To this end, I began privately doodling some of my friends’ Twitter userpics.

I’d done a few and realized that the best thing to do with my growing collection of userpic doodles would be to start posting them on their own dedicated Twitter account, and throw the general Twitter public into the mix.  Hence, twitter.com/RobDrawsYourPic.

Now friends, acquaintances, luminaries, and total strangers are all finding themselves receiving my unsolicited mutations of their avatars, and I’ve even fulfilled some requests.  It’s a good excuse to not only get some sort of drawing done every day, but to try out some different styles.

So far folks on the tweetybirds seem to be digging it, or at least taking it in stride.  A couple of people have even changed their userpic to my version, which is entirely wild.  I’m sure I’ll creep someone out eventually, though.

Images are scaled down here; hit twitter.com/RobDrawsYourPic and the subjects’ Twitter accounts for the bigger versions.  Original userpics remain the property of their owners.

This is the December 12, 2018 edition of Off the Hook, the hacker-produced weekly FM talk-radio show I’ve been part of for a decade.  I was the head producer on this episode, and in it we talk about a few different news stories, but beginning at 20:55 in the file we talk about the Tumblr purge which goes into effect today.  Special guest Dr. Kit Stubbs, educator and hacker, joins the panel (this week consisting of XioNYC, myself, and Gila) to discuss the cultural shift, not just on Tumblr but elsewhere, and its effect on the LGBTQIA+ communities as well as people in all lines of work and of life.

This is the final thing I’ll be posting to Tumblr, as I’m leaving this site in protest of the change.  This has been a fun place to doodle and keep up with cool folks and their work, but I don’t feel right sticking around anymore given Tumblr’s part in making things worse for everyone.

You can find me elsewhere on Twitter, Mastodon, Reddit, and all sorts of other places and email me here.  You can keep up with my artwork and projects via my website and my blog, which I’ll have to begin using regularly again.

Best wishes!

Stromberg-Carlson upright phone 1894

When Alexander Graham Bell’s patent on the telephone expired in 1894, American Bell Telephone Company employees Alfred Stromberg and Androv Carlson went into the telephone-manufacturing business for themselves.

The telephone shown here is Stromberg-Carlson’s first upright desk phone, nicknamed "the Coffee Grinder" by enthusiasts due to its unusual shape and side-mounted hand crank.  Few of these unique members of the "candlestick phone" family survive today.

Acrylic on canvas, 5x7″.  From my series of paintings of historical telephones.

More The Wicker Man nonsense.  My extra-derpy Nicholas Cage from my earlier piece is now a brand mascot, paying tribute to another memorable line from that cinematic bee-sting.  Would you buy your next bottle of God Damn Honey from this man?

Inspired by the ending of this rather brilliant Wicker Man YouTube Poop.

Original photo by Flickr user TheTruthAbout (cc by-sa)

The Mystery Science Theater 3000 seats, the most minimalist ASCII art I've ever done.  Thanks, ISO-8859-1!

fuckyeahmst3k:

ooòôõ

Filmed in letterrama

Daily doodle number four is a quick sketch of the main character from La Linea (”The Line”), an Italian cartoon which as a child I thought was the greatest thing ever.  Now, as an adult, I still think it’s the greatest thing ever; this little long-suffering gibberish-spouting cartoonist-pestering guy is just as wonderful to watch today as he was when I was a toddler.

Search for “La Linea” on your video site of choice to watch any of his excellent shorts.

Edward Barnett

In 1971, Purdue University undergraduate student Edward Barnett co-founded the Purdue University Black Society of Engineers to encourage his fellow black students to pursue engineering in a dedicated and supportive environment. The organization succeeded and grew, and continues its work today as the National Society of Black Engineers.

Acrylic on canvas, 5x7″.  From my September 2015 set Luminaries of the Hacker World.

Motorola DynaTAC 8000x 1983

The Motorola DynaTAC series was the first commercially-available, completely-handheld cellular phone.  A full charge of the brick-style phone's battery took ten hours, and offered half an hour of talk time.

The phone has since become iconic to the 1980s in general, and Yuppies in particular.  DynaTACs are used by characters of privilege in productions such as Wall Street, Saved By the Bell, and American Psycho.

Acrylic on canvas, 5x7″.  From my series of paintings of historical telephones.

The logo of the fictional Union Broadcasting System (UBS) television network, from the brilliant Sidney Lumet film Network.  Recreated using screenshots from the film.  I thought I might someday use this to make a microphone flag, or maybe some novelty press credentials.

If you haven't seen Network yet watch it ASAP, preferably without looking up any plot points or spoilers beforehand.  It's a requirement for membership in the human race.