Today my life changed forever.

What waited for me in my spam folder this afternoon was not yet another offer to augment my manhood, or Nigerian royalty offering to share their inheritance with me… what I found today can only be described as transcendent.

These are either the words of a visionary, or a madman.

You decide.

/Chris

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If you missed the first time we threw a BeerPONG event, well, here’s your chance to fix your mistake.  On Thursday June 18th, we are bringing it back for you.  BeerPONG is a custom version of the classic arcade game PONG, built as a competitive drinking game.  The first tournament last November was incredibly fun, with a nailbiting 9-9 final round that was more exciting than you can imagine.  If you want to play, register your 2 man team here.  If you want to come watch, just get the address and other info from here.  If you want to see what you can expect, check out the pics from the first tournament here.  If you want to practice, you can play the full game here.  If you missed it in November, shame on you.  If you miss it in June, shame on you also!

Sam and I are in agreement, this video makes us want to go see “Wolverine” more than anything else has.  And not in a good way.  In a “man, I want to go see that movie, just so that I may appreciate this joke even more than I already do” kind of way.  That movie looks like so much ass.

STEALTHY NINJA SAM-EDIT: Considering our latest rant on spammy web video people, it’s important to note that when people are genuinely awesome, we should give credit where credit’s due. Most of the stuff from You Said Your Damn Ninja Would Take Care of Robocop Productions is pretty damn funny, and I hope he actually gains some fans from this video, rather than just becoming known as that 30-sec Asian Wolverine Guy.

We get a lot of random links and messages and hellos and “hey, we’re making shows like you, let’s help each other out!”.  This is an example of how not to do it: Read the rest of this entry »

Brian Rothe wrote a nice quick review of the new AV Club series “Striker and Swat” over on Eguiders:

Striker and Swat is a new series from The AV Club about two roommates who struggle to get along with their neighbors and try to find meaning in the world. With very clever writing and fun story lines, I’m predicting a bright future for this show. Do I smell a Streamy in 2010?

Well, a Streamy would certainly be an honor, but honestly it is more important to us that everyone is enjoying the series as much as we are enjoying making it, so thank you to everyone who has helped us spread the word about the show! Stay tuned for episode three next Tuesday, and please, pass the vids along to everyone you know.

In just a little over one week I will hopefully be wrapped on doing VFX for Terminator: Salvation. When I do finish, I will be quitting. Not just quitting my job at the company I work for, I’m quitting VFX entirely. I have spent the past 7 years of working long days (and often long nights) doing CG for films and commercials, and then spending my ‘free time’ at night and on weekends making short films and videos for this site and others. It is almost impossible to write, plan, film, edit, and distribute something while sitting in an office for 8 to 16 hours per day, 5 to 7 days per week. I’ve done it over and over, and every single time it was hell on wheels. I have finally reached the point where I must stop one or the other, at least for a little while- or else I will go insane!

I listen to NPR on the drive to and from work every single day. I read the news. I know how incredibly unsound a decision it is to quit a well-paid, stable job in the face of the worst economic collapse in decades (if not ever). But I have been saving money for years, and have recently decided to use that money to support my dream instead of putting it as a down payment on a house as I had always planned. I came to Los Angeles in 1998 to go to film school. I went to film school to make movies. I graduated and have been working on other people’s movies ever since, with my own projects crammed into the spare hours left over. So now, despite the economy, I have decided to make a run at this ‘Directing’ thing full time, while I still can. The plan is to take at least 6 months (if not several years) off from working a day job to focus on doing what I came here to do.

Everyone whom I have talked to about this has been surprisingly supportive- not a single person has tried to caution me or otherwise convince me to change my mind. In fact, this decision has almost been more nerve-wracking given how little opposition I’ve heard. I am mildly terrified, but also more excited about it than anything I’ve done in a long time. My VFX skills are not going to disappear, and I have an open door at my current company to return, should I burn through all my savings and need to come crawling back for more.

What does this mean for The AV Club? First up is the completion of Team Apocalypse, a new pilot we have been working on for quite a while now. And then more Psycho Bob episodes. And after that, more web series, music videos, short films, spec commercials… anything that seems worth making! So stay tuned to this site- there will be plenty of new content, news and updates as this exciting chapter begins!

-Andy Cochrane

Monday April 6th, 10pm on Discovery HD: “Twist The Throttle”

The Discovery series about motorcycles that I went to Japan and Europe to film in 2007 (2 years ago- wow!) is now an 8 episode series on Discovery HD, premiering on April 6th.  We are on at 10pm right after American Chopper, and I for one can’t wait.  So if you want to see all the amazing B camera footage shot by yours truly, or the so-so A camera work of DP Andrew Waruszewski (kidding; he’s an artist with a camera), tune in and see what we managed to film with a small crew in just 6 grueling and incredible weeks.  I cannot wait to get out on the next shoot for Dylan and Milt, hopefully there will be one I can get on this year.  Again, the important details:

Monday April 6th, 10pm on Discovery HD: “Twist The Throttle”

IM IN UR HOUSE!!!! WIGGING UR PETS!!!

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