The 26th seal of the Roboplastic Apocalypse bursts into a mighty explosion of flames and burnt pepperoni like a 5 dollar pizza being sliced by Voltron's blazing sword! It's a Voltronian MegaConocalypse as the Nostrodomatron descends upon Orlando, Florida during MegaCon 2011 to record interviews with artists Jayson Kretzer, Juan Antonio Fontanez Jr., Danielle Soloud and Luis Diaz! They all had art in either the Voltron sketch card set or the Voltron: United and Drawn book released last year by 5finity Productions. Be amazed by how much you have in common with these Voltronian artist people! Did you ever think the Voltron Force pilots should carpool? If you could draw would you let people pay you in toy robots? Did you feel Power Rangers was really just Voltron with dinosaurs? Does seeing Voltron combine make you worry about your prostate? If the answer to any of these was yes then you're gonna love this IT'S ALL FUN AND GAMES UNTIL BLACK LION TRIES TO PUT HIS LEG UP YOUR BUTT edition of the Podcastalypse!
Or download it directly
HE LIKES THE BIG CATS
Jayson Kretzer of the webcomic WannbeHeroes did a couple Voltron cards where Voltron was spewing fire out of his lion hands, which if you think about it is the only imagery even more terrifying than a giant robot with lion hands in the first place. Did Voltron ever really do that anywhere other than in the nightmares of marshmallow robeasts? I had to ask him about it! He's also the only artist I've met this long after the Voltron card set's release that still had one of his Voltron cards for sale right there on his table. Dang I should have bought it. In the meantime I can always check out his DeviantArt for examples of his other Voltron cards and the piece he did for Voltron United and Drawn.
WILL DRAW FOR ROBOTS
Juan Antonio Fontanez Jr. knows the horrors of toy robot addiction and he is happy to let you be his supplier. I was happy to buy Voltron United and Drawn from him and get a great shot of him working alongside Optimus Prime. You can see the blazing sword card we talked about over on his Deviant Art page. Also over there are the rough pencils and finished version of the initial submission he did that got him hired on the Voltron card set. He told me to come back after I got my other interviews and he'd do a sketch in my book, but before I knew it the con was over. I will definitely hit him up again when he comes down south this July for Florida Supercon.
QUEEN OF THE PRINCESS!
Danielle Soloud's got a webcomic called Life with Death and one of the characters is an undead dog named Rotty who has a detached eyeball hanging out of his skull. I have a feeling if I asked her to draw Rotty chasing one of the Voltron mice she would totally do it. I will totally get the chance when she comes down to Miami this Fourth of July weekend for Florida Supercon! Until then, check out her DeviantArt page for that great rendering she did of Princess Allura on a really REALLY familiar blue rug. Did I mention she's fluent in sarcasm?
THE DAZE OF LION AND ROBOTS
Luis Diaz! The name strikes fear into the hearts of Cabbage Patch Kid lovers everywhere. It also kinda makes the yellow lion a bit uncomfortable, too! Better blogs than mine have interviewed Luis before on subjects ranging from his work on the Terminator Salvation cards to his run on Garbage Pail Kids but I think the Roboplastic Podcastalypse is the only place he's ever talked about his art being inspired by prostate exams. Check him out at LuisDiazArt.com and also on his Facebook.
SHOW NOTES OF THE PODCASTALYPSE
- Chun Li ruins the intro!
- It's MegaCon Sunday!
- Kinda like Botcon but with Pokemononians
- Does this robot costume make me look fat?
- No convention for old GoBotronians
- Shogun Warrior Voltrons abound
- Pretenders hide the five dollars inside
- Interview with Jayson Kretzer [5:42 mark]
- Old Shogun Warriors standing around
- R2-D2 people are good people
- The many flavors of R2-D2
- Overwhelming show for MegaVirgins
- Interview with Juan Antonio Fontanez Jr. [13:50 mark]
- Voltron United & Drawn is a good united book about drawn Voltrons
- The haul: a Super Robot Chogokin Mazinger Z I bought
- Running into Chuck Rozanski
- Interview with Danielle Soloud [24:30 mark]
- 5finity's giant lion of a task combining artists to draw a giant combining lion of a robot
- Going to the Super Robot Scramble and How to Draw Star Wars panels
- Interview with Luis Diaz [31:46 mark]
- ProsTATE!
- Leaving MegaCon
- Break-MegaCon 2011 commercial
- Post-show wrapup
- Treating people wearing 80s cartoon shirts like cosplay superstars
- My decades long failure in acquiring Voltronian souvenirs
- Thanks to all the artists!
- Thanks to 5finity Productions
- Thanks to Zack
- The SupermanFan podcast has MegaCon panel audio
- Don't rocket punch your friends!
6 comments:
Fantastic interviews. However, you should have put in a special no thank you to Mr. O'Neil.
WTF, man?? One day for one hour?? Really??? XD
Well we don't know the whole story so we can't really judge the guy. I know he at least showed up for the panel he was scheduled to do. But it was a big disappointment to not get to even briefly talk to him off the record about the early days of Transformers.
Agreed. A shame about Dennis O'Neil.
Your podcast is so seemless between where you nip away and return that, if you didn't say you'd done so, I'd never even notice you'd left.
So what is the story with the Botcon audio clips? Why do you fear the lord of FunPub? :)
Initially FunPub's rule regarding photography or other recording of panels was that just the Hasbro panel was prohibited from being videotaped, then by 2008 that grew into no panel could be videotaped. Ever since 2009 both audio and video recording were outlawed. You'd have to ask Brian Savage why no audio or video recording is allowed at any Botcon panels for the official explanation. Second hand I can tell you we were told at the Orci/Kurtzman panel in '09 that it's because the guests are representatives of different agencies or corporations and any reproduction of their appearances would violate their (the artists and companies they represent) rights. I don't know how true that is from a legal perspective but that's what I heard. Yet Stan Lee's panel at last month's MegaCon is up for people to watch and I don't see that being pulled down for artist infringement.
What irks me is that no recording of any kind is now the across the board policy for every BotCon panel no matter who or what the panel's about. I can understand why video or photos of the Hasbro panels are prohibited but the voice actor and cartoon writer stuff? No recording of any kind at all? In this age of YouTube and podcasting I think that's a bit archaic. The policy didn't stop fans from posting crappy video of Weird Al in '09 or any other panel for that matter. If these YouTube videos of Weird Al and Peter Cullen aren't in direct violation of some sort of artists' performance rights law then why haven't they been taken down? I think it's because the BotCon recording policy is a sham and they real reason they don't want recordings is they fear attendance will be negatively impacted somehow by amateur broadcasting of their events.
[continued in next comment]
[continued from previous comment]
If people can stay at home and watch Botcon panels on YouTube would they really not go? I don't think so and mostly because amateur recordings are of poor quality. I see a charm to that poor quality, though. They are that viral kind of word of mouth advertising at the ground roots level. But how do you keep just the amateur YouTubers doing their thing? I say modify the policy to let anyone record whatever they want but require anyone with a tripod to apply for a press pass. This ensures the amateur YouTubers continue. Serious media is less likely to post entire panels anyways.
Speaking of serious reporters, for FunPub to not allow non-traditional media like bloggers or podcasters access to their guests is also backwards. Getting my proposed interview with Bob Prupis shot down was why I didn't go to JoeCon this year. All these anti-blogger/podcaster policies may change in a couple of years once they realize they're preventing some truly positive, fan driven publicity and guest interaction from being done at their shows but I'm not going to wait. As with a lot of BotCon issues over the last few years, I chalk it up to FunPub being out of touch with convention culture, technology and the new media. In the meantime all we're going to get are the crappy bootleg quality illegal YouTube video snippets and Tom Croom style coverage under the current system.
It would be nice to do podcast shows that incorporate segments from the BotCon panels but that's just not legal under FunPub. Listening to SupermanFan's audio recordings of the MegaCon comic creator panels makes me wish I could do something like that for BotCon, but with my own commentary on what Budiansky or the G1 writers or whoever said. Hell, Brian Kilby's audio of the voice actor panel at Botcon 2001 was one of my favorite Radio Free Cybertrons ever! Things are different now under the new management so podcasts like that just can't exist for Botcon in the current era. It's their policy and I respect it (insofar as I'll never do any BotCon podcast coverage despite having made "illegal" audio recordings of some of the panels from the past few years).
I think you hit the nail on the head with respect to FunPub being out of touch. Different generation running things. But there are great podcasts at TFCon, and I think it helps sell tickets. Anyway. Good that you have the audio files though. Someday I'll get you to make me a copy of the Flint Dille panel.
Post a Comment