Tony vs. Paul

The flying and moving-through-fences effects are so friggin’ cool, and the fact that you know exactly how they were achieved makes it perhaps more so.

Stop-motion is often used to show the construction of a project or artwork from beginning to end, which can appear as a growth effect, especially if the artist himself doesn’t appear in the images. The graffiti artist Blu has mastered the medium, though, by turning the process he captures into the artwork itself rather than only achieving completion at the end of the video. Blu works on public walls, and videos like this beg the question of how much time, energy, and paint he expends over the course of a single project. This probably would have gotten a lot of strange looks from passersby:

MUTO by Blu

Here, Blu collaborated with painter David Ellis in an old courtyard:

COMBO by Blu and David Ellis

It turns out that Ellis, too, is a a prolific stop-motion artist. Never has watching paint dry been so fascinating:

Daily by David Ellis

Truck by David Ellis

Stella:
Below is one choice episode of Stella, the tv series. All 10 episodes are available on Hulu, which is where you get your TV. Kill some time, why don’t you.

A Stella Short:
featuring Bradley Cooper

The Michael Showalter Showalter, an original internet series on Collegehumor.com:

Michael Ian Black on VH1’s “I love the 90s”:
Doing his thing.

Showalter’s Parody Ad for the 92YTribeca:

One round of ASG voting just wasn’t enough, apparently. Bill Pulte and Mike McGee ran closely enough to force a run-off vote, scheduled for this Friday. If you were one of the record 4,455 voters who cast a ballot, I’m sure you already have your mind made up (except for the Luke Adams crowd and the 18 of you who voted for Dickie Humps; find a new outlet for your expression). But for everyone else who forgot to vote or could care less about ASG elections (here!) and who suddenly feel spurred to participate in student democracy, who should you vote for? Sure, you could focus on the issues or which candidate’s platform would benefit you most, but BORRRRRRRRRRRRRRRING.

Thankfully, the two candidates remaining both have faux-rap videos online devoted to them. Forget matters of substance. Which candidate can spit the hottest fire? Well, in this case, neither candidate actually drops any verses, so it comes down to who has the best MC repping them. First up, the rap about Mike McGee:

The “Fresh Prince” beat seems played out at first, but whoever put this together mixed it up, adding a new twist to an old classic. The lyrics focus on positive change, casting McGee as the conscious candidate. Some of the rhymes are whack (”We got a new president, his name is Schapiro / that means change, there’s nothing to fear-o”), but it’s overall a very upbeat number about making Northwestern a better place. But not stupid upbeat, like that will.i.am Obama song. How about the Pulte rap?

OK, you probably figured out Bill Pulte in no way endorses this, especially since it explicitly tells you not to vote for Bill Pulte. Plus, it’s loaded with spelling errors. And that’s probably good, because if he seriously made a parody of the already-a-parody “I’m On A Boat,” he’d lose the valuable Netplay demographic (hey all six of you!). However, this Pulte diss does raise a valid point: was Bill Pulte in anyway involved with the Pike atrocity “Fratstar?” Did he contribute vocals? Did he give it his approval? Did he not just say “seriously guys, cut it out?” If it is revealed that Mr. Pulte is anyway associated with or not physically repulsed by “Fratstar,” he should pull out of this run-off election and record a heartfelt apology rap.

Obviously, deciding who to cast your presidential ballot for based on rap videos is stupid. But as a senior who has absolutely no stake in this election, I encourage you to follow your heart and vote for the candidate with the better song.

(And since Bill Pulte didn’t actually get a positive video featured in this post, I’ll give him a plug here. Well, sort of, because this pro-Pulte ad features all the hallmarks of a “The More You Know” spot.)

Clarification, 2:37 a.m.: This story has been clarified to reflect the fact that 4,455 students cast ballots, and 4,421 of those ballots were eligible. Thanks to Election Commissioner Paul David Shrader for the clarification.

If you’ve viewed any YouTube videos at all today, you may have noticed a large banner across the top announcing the YouTube Symphony project. The banner, placed in the same high-profile yet highly-ignorable area that usually houses the “Stay cool, we are performing site maintenance, everything will be 100% in a bit” message, represents a long-term and innovative project coming to fruition.

YouTube hosted auditions for musicians of all types and then built the symphony by mashing videos contributions from selected musicians around the world. Very Web-2.0 indeed.

The music itself? YouTube quality, at best. The project may be bold, but there are certainly advantages to having your symphony players in the same room.

More details available here.

But if you want to see something far cooler…go here instead.

This year, the stage belongs to one particular politician, Sarah Palin. It all started when Jon Stewart compared Palin to Tina Fey on The Daily Show, an observation that the everyone in this world has since claimed as their own (yes, you’re all guilty). Naturally, it wasn’t long before Fey herself caught on and wrote herself into this Saturday Night Live skit.

Things heated up in the next few weeks on SNL, as Sarah Palin herself appeared on the show alongside Tina Fey:

On the same Daily Show, Stewart also likened Palin to the subject of a late-night Cinemax movie. The good folks at Hustler have made that a reality with their soon-to-be-released film, “Who’s Nailin’ Paylin? Adventures of a Hockey MILF.”

Nice. At first glance, the video is just another silly Palin spoof, but the Hustler watermark in the bottom right corner says it all.

Clips from the production have already popped up on the web, along with the full script*. Do indulge on this small sampling of “Nailin’ Paylin.” Trust me, it’s all safe for work (as in no nudity).

*Note: The original version I saw, which was a little longer and more hysterical, had a special ending. Here it is, for posterity’s sake.

Now, Netplay can step aside and focus on everything else the Internet has to offer. But that doesn’t mean we can’t look back at some of the cutest videos featured on Netplay previously. So enjoy this navel gazing, and check out some awesome furry friends from yesteryear.

Corgi!

The dog that started it all. Netplay’s first great cute animal post, and still my personal favorite. The cutest puppy I’ve ever seen.

Shopping Penguin

What makes this video is the penguin’s backpack – another penguin. That’s a level of adorable detail you can’t beat.

Piano Cat

Hate this video. I dare you, hate it. You would be a soulless monster.

Penguins Modeling Clothes

The Japanese sure love penguins. Weird. Worth it for the head bonking.

Dog Popping Balloons

One of the few cute animal videos to get me out of a bad mood. And now the future begins….

I have two questions for you to answer. One, have you seen the dancer? Two, which way is she turning, clockwise or counter-clockwise? (If you have trouble figuring it out, imagine the clock laying on the ground).

You are probably wondering whether or not this is an elaborate hoax, a flash animation set to spin both ways but trick you into thinking that it is all in your head, but I did a little bit of investigating: I saved the GIF to my desktop and looked at it frame-by-frame in Adobe Flash. Yes, it only depicted one rotation, and yes, I was able to run the animation both forward and backward and it still appeared to be going the same direction. For me, it was consistently clockwise, despite the article claiming that “most” people see it going counter-clockwise.

The only unsubstantiated claim then is whether or not the spinning corresponds to right brain vs. left brain. Judging by the difficulties I’ve been having in math class lately, I would not be surprised to learn that I am, indeed, entirely right-brained.

Which are you?

Despite desperate pleas to my extended family to STOP sending me those annoying forwards (most specifically e-mails threatening death if I don’t forward them on to some ridiculous amount of people), my dearest kinfolk still manage to spam my inbox almost every day.

So I’ve decided that if I’m going to have to waste my time reading them, then why not waste yours by posting them?

FORWARD #1
DATE RECEIVED – 12.09.06
OFFENDER – My supposedly “Texan” step-mother. Let’s admit it, this e-mail speaks otherwise.
E-MAIL -

I find this interesting…

1. Open Google
2. Type in the word failure
3. Click the “I’m feeling lucky” button…….see what happens

MY USELESS COMMENTARY – Even though Bush-Bashing is way overplayed these days, this little trick is actually kind of funny…

FORWARD #2
DATE RECEIVED – 11.01.06
OFFENDER – My “I love anything that reminds me of Precious Moments” mother.
E-MAIL -
Sorry, a word that every
one uses all the time.
Did you ever wonder what
“Sorry” looks like?

MY USELESS COMMENTARY – I’ll admit it, this is a cute puppy…but it’s really bothering me that it looks like it’s about to have a seizure.

FORWARD #3
DATE RECEIVED – 10.27.06
OFFENDER – Every middle-aged hippie that has access to a computer.
E-MAIL -

Fun stuff….

NEED ART THERAPY?
EVERY TIME YOU CLICK ON IT YOUR MOUSE CHANGES COLOR.

http://www.jacksonpollock.org

MY USELESS COMMENTARY – Almost as cool as the site where you can carve your own pumpkin. Or the time my mom sent me this picture for Halloween.