tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-47877233401665866452011-07-07T16:25:46.245-07:00A Blog by a Newspaper Art Worker, Tattoo Apprentice, DIY Hardcore Gig Putter On-er, Sci-Fi Geek, Comic Collector, Political Cynic, Wrestling Fan, Media Critic, Grumpy Bastard, Music Lover, Sometimes Bass Player, Wannabe Photographer, General Dabbler, who finds most things interesting. As long as it isn't Sport. Particularly Football.Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comBlogger241100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-79649862734556898902010-03-24T09:12:00.000-07:002010-03-24T09:12:21.932-07:00

So my time with Johnston Press' Pre-press department draws to a close. My compromise agreement is with the solicitor. I have a finishing date of 2nd of April, but I don't work Thursday/Fridays so my last day is a week today. If I'm looking for positives, I could say at the very least this has been the catalyst to doing something more interesting with my professional life. I had an interview

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-82465511751612546022010-03-09T09:22:00.000-08:002010-03-09T09:22:58.682-08:00

I think I'm going to have to make a serious assault on reducing my coffee consumption. I keep getting headaches which I presume are caffeine related more and more frequently. I've always been quite prone to headaches. But recently I've started waking up with a sore head which can stay with me all day. No amount of pain killers shifts it. Seems to be on days when I get up later, i.e. days where

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-6904152440094128402010-03-02T09:13:00.000-08:002010-03-02T14:50:32.063-08:00

Have you heard the news? The Doors are reforming. Jim Morrison's Corpse has been disinterred at Père Lachaise. Right this minute the highly skilled Team at Jim Henson's Creature Workshop are rigging what remains of his corpse with a whole array of animatronics gizmos, so that the Lizard King can perform once again. Ray Manzarek informed the assembled press that technology will even enable

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-69584873024379904482010-02-22T09:23:00.000-08:002010-03-02T09:15:46.448-08:00

Last Wednesday at work we got dragged into the conference room and given the news none of us was particularly surprised to finally hear. Johnston Press are closing my dept (ad make up) and transferring the work we do down South. I'm effectively redundant. Although for nonsense legal reasons its not quite as straight forward, but the end result will be the same. On one level this is a real pain.

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-89448006147803558302010-02-09T02:06:00.000-08:002010-02-09T02:06:10.567-08:00

I have a habit of tearing pages out of my sketchbook because their ineptitude angers me. This is probably a self defeating action. I love looking through other people's sketch books. I'm never offended by the roughness of anyone else's ideas. I love to see inside their thought process, their doodles, their roughs, I don't judge the content. But I seem to have trouble looking at my own work in the

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-75813307913509620212010-02-08T08:31:00.000-08:002010-02-08T08:33:02.692-08:00

I'm having a "JESUS SUFFERING FUCK" Monday. I'm beset by idiocy at every turn. Its making me want to drive my head into my monitor and end it all in a shower of sparks. Started this morning with Ben Sheppard musing; "its amazing the public appetite for the John Terry Saga". What appetite you snivelling little shiterag? The retarded mess that poses for the media in this country chooses to force

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-21036699712657892212010-02-02T15:48:00.000-08:002010-02-02T15:48:39.865-08:00

Excited is an understatement.

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-79457528183560917922010-02-01T15:55:00.000-08:002010-02-01T15:55:25.258-08:00

This gig is nothing to do with me, but you've got four of Scotland's best young hardcore bands playing together for three quid. The Plight were meant to play, but they cancelled. Who cares though? We got a sniffy email off their manager once about a gig we were putting on they wanted to play at and proper hardcore bands DO NOT have managers, so fuck them. Plus, they're on the same label as those

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-57610642857120789092010-02-01T09:02:00.000-08:002010-02-01T09:02:05.875-08:00

So today I got up at 5am (instead of the usual 5.45am) to give me time to meditate before I went to work. Although it's brutally early I've been getting to bed a bit earlier of late so its not quite as punishing as it could be. I'm going to try to fit my evening one in on my break at about 5.15pm. I guess I'll have to be doing it a couple weeks before I can really say how its going, but I

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-83590826046262792202010-01-31T08:01:00.000-08:002010-01-31T08:03:46.172-08:00

I've been working on a record sleeve for a Global Thrash Complilation Roderick Thor Neithercut is putting out with some other guy from Europe. This is a quick snap of it, I'll have to go get a proper scan done and then sort out exactly what text is going onto the cover too. It's some sort of Skull shaped Thrash Meteor, streaking to Earth. Pretty goofy, but that's kind of the idea. There is a

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-32567221646489633412010-01-29T15:10:00.000-08:002010-01-30T14:38:00.915-08:00

Tomorrow I'm off to start learning Transcendental Meditation. I'll let the late Yogi Maharishi Mahesh explain. First one to call me a hippy gets glassed.

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-41626025323222952372010-01-26T09:29:00.000-08:002010-01-26T09:34:00.906-08:00

The sore throat I developed from shouting like a dafty at the Wrestling has progressed into some sort of lurgy. I feel pish. Work was so slow I took a half day to come home and get on with some drawing projects. Then I got a phone call from Leith Academy, the Watercolour class I'd signed up for on Thursday nights has been cancelled due to lack of numbers. The eedjit on the phone asked if I wanted

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-58000899210256941572010-01-25T08:52:00.000-08:002010-01-25T09:00:36.453-08:00

Monday-Wedensday is Pre-Press. Three 12 Hour shifts setting a never ending slew of small adverts for free sheet newspapers for every toilet town in Scotland. There are a LOT of toilet towns in Scotland. The worst part is having to (attempt to) communicate with Epsilon Minus "Sales Executives" all day long. I might as well smash myself in the face with a brick for twelve hours. It'd be less

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-48069774841279260952010-01-24T13:49:00.000-08:002010-01-24T14:35:46.387-08:00

I got tickets to go and see TNA Wrestling in Glasgow for my birthday way back in June last year. I've loved the Wrestling for as long as I can remember. When I was really small I remember watching Kendo Nagasaki and the other British Wrestling stars on TV on a Saturday lunchtime. Later on me and my brother were both big WWF fans (so he was the natrual choice to accompany me to this). But I'd

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-89046311151114313422010-01-24T13:22:00.000-08:002010-01-24T13:49:00.659-08:00

This is my upper inner left arm as it currently stands. If you're wondering, it's an origami frog, which is also the blueprint for a Time Machine. The pink/red circle behind it is Barbelith. I allready have Ganesha on my outer upper arm and Kali on my lower inner arm. I have plans for the outer inner arm, but I'll keep that under wraps for now. It probably all seems like a very random collection

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-91572952243012758872010-01-22T14:31:00.000-08:002010-01-22T15:49:30.725-08:00

This afternoon/evening was a Scotsman graphic shift. People give me a blank look when I say I work on the graphics desk. It really is just that. I make graphics for the newspaper. Graphs, Maps, Timelines, general Photo-shoppery. For example, tonight I made the above map (among other things). Its pretty straight forward, using Illustrator to trace off from various sources. Compared to the

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-19279367637923867162010-01-21T14:08:00.000-08:002010-01-23T01:26:34.252-08:00

This is Charlotte's current window display at Venus Flytrap (where I'm apprenticing). Being so into all things Japanese, she themes the window display to go with the seasons. Geisha are kind of her signature if you like. This one is particularly awesome, I think the tattoo version is for a girl who's really into Snowboarding if I remember right.One of the things I've been working on for

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-9955894218814977442010-01-21T00:41:00.000-08:002010-01-21T00:43:52.566-08:00

We Want Tables! etc etc.

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-39481453621785075532010-01-19T13:07:00.000-08:002010-01-19T13:10:08.187-08:00

New turns of phrase I have come across in the past week, which have tickled me, and thus will be added to my personal lexicon:"Bang Tidy" (thanks Becca)"Mook" (thanks to Crazy Titch)"a face like a fire damaged box of Lego" (thanks to Jamieserpents, although he credits his mate)Isn't language a wonderful thing?

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-78421490730471366722010-01-19T12:12:00.000-08:002010-01-19T12:24:55.352-08:00

Forward momentum! I don't think I've been this busy in a long time. It's tiring, but good. Feel like I'm actually going somewhere for a change. Just had a cheeky halfday from PrePress to get a quick haircut (courtesy of the quiff sculptor Norrie at York Barbers). I also trawled Jessops and Curries snootching at the Cameras.Saturday/Sunday I was doing an introduction to d-slr photography course,

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-36313011599683896022010-01-11T06:18:00.000-08:002010-01-11T06:33:13.614-08:00

I started my apprenticeship at Venus Flytrap Tattoo on Thursday. The first three days were all interesting and rewarding and I feel 100% positive about this. For me that's a big deal. At best I can usually muster around 30% positivity. Anymore just seems like you're asking for shit to go very badly wrong.To start off I'm in Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays. I'll still be in Pre-Press Mon-Wed and

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-28818068188500866492010-01-11T01:43:00.001-08:002010-01-11T01:53:37.751-08:00

I passed this, fixed to an empty shop front at Greenside on the Way to work on Thursday. The Edinburgh Autonomous Center is based in Leith, so you see political street art quite a lot in the area, It's one of the reasons I like the area so much. The Belgrade Six where arrested in relation to a petrol bomb attack on the Greek Embassy in Serbia. Although no real damage was done and despite another

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-14816343279349950822010-01-01T06:51:00.000-08:002010-01-01T07:12:32.979-08:00

Now, I was several miles further away than this picture, watching from Dougie's Kitchen Window, but this was how we saw in the bells. The Nuke everything for ten minutes approach is a much more satisfying fireworks experience than the Festival closing Fireworks concert don't you think? Pre- Midnight, me and Kay watched Zoolander and Anchorman, yeah, highbrow stuff. Stay classy in 2010 World.

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4787723340166586645.post-64624100028686538902009-12-30T04:04:00.000-08:002009-12-30T04:06:12.969-08:00

Major Blogging FAIL.The few posts I had got around to making via this here method of electronic communication seemed to serve only to taunt me like a photograph of a bad haircut from my adolescence. So I have expunged them all.If you're going to do something, there is NO point being half arsed about it. So in the traditional spirit of fourthcoming newyear optimism and in anticipation of several

Sly Baconhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04122534931274059849noreply@blogger.com