Over the last two years, I have picked up a pretty interesting hobby. I have always had an appreciation for toys, and the vinyl toy scene has gotten huge over the last 5 years or so. I have always been curious about everything, but never really had that urge to purchase anything, save for pieces done by some of my favorite painters, in a collaboration with a toy company. I have always had a pretty strong love for Transformers, but that never quite materialized into much of a collection. And then I found 3A toys by Ashley Wood and everything clicked. Giant, weathered, dirty robots with awesome graphic design elements, and complex storylines in an alternate reality where Earth and Mars are at war. Pretty much the nerd in me's ultimate fantasy. Ashley Wood is an extremely talented fine artist, and has done a lot of work for comic books and graphic novels, which is yet another hobby that has piqued my interest but I just don't even have the time for.

Two years later, and I have a pretty ridiculous collection that occupies a large amount of our home office. I even was a winner of a design contest judged by Ashley Wood himself, and won a really rare figure that is one of the gems of my collection. But what has been even cooler is the community. Just about everyone involved is insanely talented and creative, and strangely just really nice. And this weekend was a custom show put on by someone who is just a fan of the toys. He kept pushing harder and harder, and the show turned into a huge event, with some big name artists contributing pieces in addition to fans who were customizing their own 3A toys. Artists were given a blank robot head to do whatever they wanted with it, and it was awesome seeing the wild variety of ideas, and how different they all ended up being. And it was great to meet up with a bunch of people I've chatted with but never met. Someone even flew in from Singapore just for 2 days!

For more information on the show and all the artists involved, visit www.1amsf.com

And in other totally unrelated news, my friend and I were able to get tickets for the American Nightmare/Give Up The Ghost reunion show in Los Angeles on New Years Eve. I don't know if I ever have been this excited for a concert, and I was not expecting to be able to get tickets for it. It sold out while the website was crashing, but somehow he managed to get some as I failed. I haven't been able to take or edit many photos lately, but I really would like to, so hopefully I can share some soon.