Wednesday, February 22, 2017

Getting Tangled Up In Vogue Knitting


Getting Entangled with Tangled The Movie

Disney Princess movies, they've been around since the 1937 release of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and have been a prominent franchise in Disney's arsenal ever since, bringing movies such as Cinderella, Aladdin, Beauty and the Beast, Sleeping Beauty, Frozen and the best Disney Princess movie of all time, the Emperors New Groove. I'm kidding that wasn't a Disney princess movie, or was it? Disney Emperor movie? One of a kind.

Anyway these movies for the most part are based on fairy tales by authors such as Brothers Grimm. One famous Fairy Tale written by Brothers Grimm is none other then Rapunzel. Rapunzel was the "loose" base for Disney's 50th animated featured film and very first CGI animated princess movie, Tangled. 


Remember when I discussed Frozen (Made by the same production team.) back during Christmas time last year? I praised Tangled quite a bit and rightfully so. I revisited this movie last night with my family and it's still holding up as one of my favorite Disney animated movies. a lot of development went into this movie and it was in the pre-production and production phase for 14 straight years with an original 2007 release date under the name Rapunzel Unbraided. After tons of delays the movie finally released in 2014 as Tangled, Disney's first CGI animated Princess movie. with a mixture of CGI animation, traditional animation and rendered using non-photorealistic settings to give it the impression of being painted.


CGI animation (or 3D animation as younger me always called it.) has become dominant over hand drawn animation over the past 20 years and while I love hand drawn animation and have always been on the edge regarding this transition, Pixar and Disney have proven they can do CGI right. Despite doubts this movie is absolutely gorgeous and takes place in the Kingdom of Corona. Like mentioned earlier this movie is LOOSELY based on the original Rapunzel Fairy Tail, very loosely. It's basically Rapunzel with a twist and a tangle. 

Rapunzel (Voiced by Mandy Moore) is an 18 year old lady, (With super long golden hair that can magically heal and de-age people, take that Olay.) becoming independent over the years of being practically trapped in a secluded tower by her "mother" she has a desire to see the outside world and discover the truth about the lanterns she sees fly through the sky on her Birthday every year. This movie also features Flynn Rider (Voiced by Zachary Levi), a self absorbed thief on the run from the Kingdom (Because, you know, he stole something pretty precious from them.) on his fugitive escape he winds up finding the Tower that Rapunzel resides in. Sneaking his way in an attempt to hide from the kingdom Flynn and Rapunzel have a Face to Frying Pan talk. The young blonde convinces Flynn to take her to see the flying lanterns in exchange for the sachet (Which she cleverly hid after another frying pan whack.) and they sneak out, against her Mother's wishes. 


This movie will satisfy you knitters out there as this flick has quite a few subtle but cool knitting references. It's also a fantastic movie to knit to, which obviously I was doing, I'll go more into detail on that later in the blog. Maximus the Horse (Yes, horse.) also plays a big part in this movie as one of the main characters, joining the ranks of coolest movie horses of all time. Ever seen a horse sword fight before? I thought not!


Tangled is one of Disney's best animations if not their best Princess (Rapunzel being a pretty kick butt Princess herself, long hair and Frying Pans are the best options for your arsenal) movie of all time with some good songs, awesome fleshed out characters, gorgeous art and animation, a thrilling tale and lots of Frying Pans. This'll make a great family movie and while kids will love it I find myself (I'm a 21 year old kid, forgive me.) loving it just as much. It's not just one of those distract your kids kind of movies it's got a lot packed into it that can be appreciated by many demographics, especially knitters. One day Disney will make a movie specifically based on knitting, maybe.



Tangled is making a big return in the form of a brand new animated series on Disney Channel premiering on March 24th this year. It takes place after the movie and before the Tangled Ever After short film. Unlike the movie though it's going to be 2D animation but no worries they're keeping the art style from the movie and it seems to transition well. To give you a taste check out this sneak peek! Though this will hold spoilers for the original movie, you've probably already seen the movie, right?


As much as I love the movie Tangled I really do not like untangling knitting yarn, which seems to be a reoccurring event when it comes to me. I've been knitting for almost 5 months now and with tons of finished objects already under my belt I've been doing pretty good. I'm still a beginner but with the help of Mum and people online I'm getting there. Books have become a big source of help for me as well, with Mum having quite a collection of knitting books and magazines. This one book I'm about to discuss might just be the perfect book for beginners like myself.

The Vogue Knitting Ultimate Knitting Book; A Knitting Almanac

Vogue Knitting, as all of us knitters know, is a Knitting magazine that's been around since 1932 and has grown quite substantially since. From the editors of the Vogue Knitting magazine comes The Ultimate Knitting Book.

Cover Provided by Amazon

Mum has had this book for a while now and it's been a big help to me as a beginner. The editors of this book worked on it for 3 years, researching hundreds of knitting books (Some long out of print), during this journey they learned that no one had actually managed to fit everything into one book, that a knitter had to jump from book to book to learn everything. The Ultimate Knitting Book solves that issue as it has EVERYTHING you need to know about knitting, from Basic Techniques, correcting errors, yarn and tools, blocking and finishing to more advance stuff like designing. The Ultimate Knitting Book even has 9 pages on the history of knitting. If knitting was a religion (Is it?) this would be its bible.


It doesn't just have written words this book's tutorials also have picture graphs demonstrating the hand movements. Want to learn every cast on imaginable? This has just that. This book has also been a god send in correcting errors. No more bugging Mum with helping me correct errors I just dive into this knitting knowledge bank and it shows me step by step on how to pick up a stitch, Knit wise and purl wise. When it comes to the time when I'm working on my future sweater this book should help with assembling and grafting. It'll help when it comes to blocking my in progress shawl. (Though I'll probably bug mum on that one.) Similar to the edging book I talked about a while ago this encyclopedia actually has a stitch dictionary with stitch types and stitches in here (With graphs along with.) for adding into your own patterns.

Speaking of patterns, as a cherry on top in the back there are a few full patterns for you to knit. All of them are tops but they're really nice patterns that I'm going to try myself in the future. So yeah that's the Vogue Knitting Ultimate Knitting Book. While this book did come out in 2002 it's still viable in this day and age, because in the knitting world you don't fix what's not broken. I've barely scratched the surface of this book. Of course I wouldn't talk about this book without giving you a way of checking it out for yourself. You can buy it at Amazon for $28.60.


Also check out Vogue Knitting themselves at http://www.vogueknitting.com/. They have online learning, a shop, their digital magazine and free patterns!

A ZAK Afterthought Heel Sock Update

February 22, 2017 

Enough about Vogue Knitting let's talk about ZAK Knitting. I can't wrap without giving you all an update on my afterthought self striping socks.


Yes, I'm still on the first sock but I'm just about to start the toe. I was knitting this throughout Tangled and The Flash, which is getting REALLY good lately, Gorilla Grodd is back boys. Anyway this sock is coming to a close and I got to pick out a solid color to go into my toe and heel sooner rather then later. I'll figure that out.

Remember that knitting pattern I was working on? I'm still working on it! Yes I haven't given up, I'm just a little nervous when working on this, it's my first pattern. I will get it finished and up for you guys as soon as I can.

Before we wrap I want to do a little teasing. This upcoming Monday is officially Pokemon day! Yes The Pokemon Company is celebrating the 21st birthday (20th birthday of the Show) all over the world at different events. They're also celebrating online with the hashtag #PokemonDay on social media such as Instagram and Twitter. You can post photos of your Pokemon memories/merchandise and you could possibly get featured on their website http://www.pokemon.com/us/pokemon-day/. So yeah the Pokemon celebrating spirit is in the air and it's filling ZAK Entertainment. Check out my Instagram because I'll be posting photos of my Pokemon gear in anticipation for Monday. Monday's blog post is going to be pretty big. I'll be posting a blog discussing my Pokemon life, the history of Pokemon and everything Generation 1. This will be the first entry in a year spanning series going through all 7 generations of Pokemon and I'm really excited to write and publish these for you all to read.  

#PokemonDay

That's a wrap folks! Don't forget to check out my newest video I've uploaded to my youtube! It's a short film featuring some American Coots and a beautiful lake with some awesome cinematic shots I took on our recent trip out there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXvy27Gz8zs

Keep your lifes entertaining!

No comments:

Post a Comment