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Smart Neta

हाजिर जवाबी में हमारे नेताओं का कोई जवाब नही. हर बात का उत्तर तैयार रहता है उनके पास… प्रश्न पूछ्ने वाले को ही चुप करवा देतें हैं हमारे नेता … Smart Neta

The post Smart Neta appeared first on Monica Gupta.

Dolphins are famous not only for their playful personalities, but also their striking level of intelligence. After half a century studying their minds, scientists have learned a lot about how dolphins think, and the nature of their intelligence. You’ve probably heard a lot about dolphins over the years, but how much do you know about the latest scientific research into dolphin cognition? Take the quiz and find out!

The post Are you as smart as a dolphin? [quiz] appeared first on OUPblog.

I think I'm getting back into the swing of things with drawing. A morning monster cuddle is almost as good as staying under the duvet.



They're having a privet moment. This comes with a big nod to Jontofski's monster drawings; if you haven't seen his work, check out what he and Felt Mistress get up to.

And check out Jamie Smart, he's been making lots of Whubble comics. You can read more at whubble.net. (And you can follow him on Twitter as @jamiesmart.)

Today's a big day, for today is the launch of the MOOSE KID COMICS, 36 pages of free online family-friendly goodness from 40 of Britain's top comics creators!



With all this publicity that highbrow literary comics for grownups have been getting, it can be easy to forget how vitally important children's comics are. Moose Kid Comic is the brainchild of the amazing Jamie Smart (think the Find Chaffy books, Bunny vs Monkey in The Phoenix Comic, Desperate Dan in The Dandy, a squillion other things), and he wanted to set up a showcase of what British talent can do. Jamie's a great editor, it was fun working with him to polish up a rough strip I had in my drawer that I was hoping would see the light of day. Find out more about Moose Kid Comics in this interview with Jamie by Off Life.



And, of course, READ THE COMIC HERE!! Find out the origins of Tank Girl! And so much more! Be sure to let Jamie (and all of us!) know what you think by tweeting at @mooseheadcomics or leaving a note on its Facebook page. You can also follow Jamie at @jamiesmart.

This one's for the super-talented Jamie Smart and his little white fluff ball named Chaffy. Jamie's had an amazing year of producing enormous amounts of amazing comics (including for the Phoenix Comic), picture books and a few other things besides, so much that it's almost frightening, and I hope he gets some time to rest over the holidays.



And you still have two days to enter the Win a Chaffy for Christmas competition! Friday's your deadline, go with Chaffy a very happy Christmas.



I got these great picture this afternoon from Nicole and Charlotte, who followed the step-by-step How to Draw Captain Waffle guide. Fabulous!! Thanks, ladies! :D

A ThrillerFest panel last week tackled this question: “Can a thriller be both exciting and smart?” Participants included authors Linwood Barclay, Joseph Finder, Kathleen George, Andrew Gross, Andrew Pyper and Matt Richtel. David Liss moderated the panel.

During the discussion, the participants picked Dennis LeHane‘s Shutter Island, Joseph Conrad‘s Heart of Darkness, and William Landay‘s upcoming Defending Jacob as their favorite smart thrillers.

Below, we’ve included five tips for writing smart thrillers from the discussion.

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Some sketches from the weekend. It's usually more fun to draw people's faces than the backs of their heads, but at least when I'm drawing them from behind, they can't spot me staring at them.



There's some good discussion going on over on the Forbidden Planet International blog about choosing child-friendly comics for libraries. Richard Bruton's been stocking his school library, recommends some books and asks for more recommendations. Have a look in the comments to see what people are suggesting and perhaps add your own suggestions!



Don't forget, tonight, just off Brick Lane, is Laydeez Do Comics! Darryl Cunningham (author of Psychiatric Tales) is coming all the way down from Yorkshire just to be in the audience, so I promised I'd be there. It'll be great, I love hearing from Myriad Editions' Corinne Pearlmann, Ed Hillyer (Ilya) always does a good talk, and there are a couple new people booked that I have yet to hear speak, including Erica Smith and Dr Julia Round.

And I'll leave you with a little video of DFC colleague Jamie Smart showing us how he draws Desperate Dan for The Dandy:


Jamie Smart How-to-draw-Desperate-Dan YouTube link
If you're looking for more step-by-step how-to-draw videos, children's book creator Shoo Raynor has a huge stockpile of them over on Shoo-Tube.

Oh my goodness, you have to see what Lorenzo Etherington has been getting up to, over on the DFC team's blog, the Super Comics Adventure Squad. Lorenzo, you rock!

It's fan art for our DFC colleague Jamie Smart (foo5), who's Find Chaffy book comes out THIS THURSDAY! Find out more about it here! And keep an eye on the Super Comics Adventure Squad, there's a whole heap load of things happening with these people.
(Oh, and here's Chaffy and me in Chinese.)

Here is an illustration I've just finished for a project for Smart Car - could that be Iceland's volcano? ;)

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Today's very sloppy morning sketch features Lumpy the dinosaur, carefully crafted by Gary Northfield and lurking on one of the studio bookshelves. Lumpy is very famous, he starred in a film at the National Theatre for about four seconds and got a great laugh. He also has a nasty smoking habit.



Got to see some grand folk last night after Jamie Smart's book signing at Forbidden Planet (including Steve Marchant, above, looking his most winsome.)

Here are Mark Stafford and Paul Gravett, and Jamie in his new Chaffy scarf. I bought a copy of Jamie's Ubu-Bubu book and I'm about halfway through, but I can say that not only are his characters full of kawaii cuteness, but he has pushed the concept of 'not suitable for young children' to staggering new levels.

I know the anthology's in black and white, but I thought I'd paint it in sepia tones so the originals would look nice. (Thanks to my friend and website designer Dan Fone for catching the misspelling on the previous page I posted. Half the reason I post these things, I think! Better to catch 'em now...) Here's the second of four pages. The story's a bit quiet and reflective on the first two pages, but things change on the third page.



Three people have told me so far that she looks like a grown-up Marcie from Peanuts. I didn't try to make her to look that way, but it makes me kind of happy that she does.

Another Chaffy sighting! This time you have to work very hard to spot him in a white stone quarry. If you liked Fish-Head Steve and The DFC Olympics in the DFC, you can see their creator, Jamie Smart, signing copies of his book Ubu Bubu at Forbidden Planet in London this Thursday, 6-7pm. I'm sure I will go along because Jamie has been the most elusive DFC person to meet so far, and I am very determined to HUNT HIM DOWN. (Heh heh, if he's a no-show, you will now know why.)

Edit: Okay, I went back and fixed my spelling of 'Thursday' ... thanks, Gary!

Edit 2: Other publishing news... The Bologna Book Fair, the biggest annual event in children's publishing, has suddenly cut the Monday off the fair, making it three days instead of four... massive scandal insues! (details)
And WingedChariot Press have brought out the first iPhone picture book app, Surprise by Sylvia Van Ommen, details on the Write Away website.

Edit 3: Gah, Gary and I are on a bad run of misspelling this week... I caught one of his and he caught another one of mine on a Birdsong page (thier vs their). Why can't I spell this week? I even spent a year working as a friggin' copy editor... Grr!

Just did a bit more inking for the Birdsong anthology entry. I think I'm going to steer clear of digital and use some watercolour washes over it. Might actually save me time!

And hey, what is this about? The postman came with a little parcel from foo5, the DFC's Jamie Smart...