08.26.2008 | 8:26 am
Last week’s “Design Kenny’s Tattoo” Photoshop contest turned out great. Of course, the original intent — to help Kenny find a tattoo that he’d really like to have — went almost entirely ignored, but what do you expect when you ask for peoples’ opinions on a overweight cycling comedy blog?
So, here are some of my favorites.
Tyler: Helmet Tattoo
The award for best Photoshopping using MSPaint goes to Tyler, as does the award for most amazingly ridiculous idea. Tyler gets a tube of DZNuts as thanks for this inspired silliness.
Spiff: Cleat Tattoo
Spiff either didn’t have a photo editing program or just couldn’t be bothered, but he still had a terrific idea:
How ’bout Kenny gets the bottom of his feet tattooed with the image of eggbeater/candy cleats?
This tattoo’s great, because hardly anyone would ever see it. Which, now that I think of it, kind of defeats the whole purpose of getting a tattoo. I’m still gonna give Spiff a tube of DZNuts for his idea.
Kanyon Kris: Permanent Dog Tag
Kanyon Kris gets the award for most practical and useful idea, as well as for the nerdiest. Why not tattoo on your contact information, allergies, and other important medical info? ‘Course, you’ve got to go get some new work done anytime you change your address or phone number, but that shouldn’t be a problem. Kris, swing by my house and pick up your free box of Jelly Belly Sports Beans anytime (see how I just cleverly avoided having to pay postage on the heaviest prize in the list? I’m clever, aren’t I?).
Bitter (formerly known as Lissee): Saggy Baggy Kenny With a Chainring
Bitter gets the prize for taking me very literally. I posited that it would be funny to have a Photoshop of Kenny as an overweight old guy, and Bitter delivered, tossing in the now-ovalized chainring tattoo as a bonus.
I think there’s an important lesson to be learned here by any tattoo-getters: remember to account for droopage.
Bitter gets a DZNuts “Lube ‘em Or Lose ‘Em” t-shirt as his prize. You know, to cover up with.
NCCyclist4Fun: This Space for Rent
I think the idea of using your tattoos as a billboard is pure genius, and I hereby offer $100 to the first person who actually gets the Fat Cyclist Clydesdale logo as a tattoo. Feel free to use the original orange, or I’ll throw in an extra $50 if you go with pink.
Kudos to NCCyclist4Fun for thinking like a capitalist. You get a tube of DZNuts as your reward.
KeepYerBag: The Recumbent
As the undisputed winner of the “No way would Kenny ever actually get this tattoo, even at gunpoint” award, KeepYerBag gets the Men’s White Stitch Flexit Cap. I only wish I had a bag I could offer him.
Clay: General Brilliance
So there we all were, happily trying to Photoshop rudimentary tattoos onto Kenny, and then Clay swaggered in and mopped the place up with us.
I hardly ever actually laugh out loud when I’m sitting at the computer. But I did when I saw Clay’s “Bikini Sunburn Kenny” Photoshop work.
The whale tail is priceless.
And then, showing a flare for in-jokes, Clay gave Kenny a nice new pair of bibshorts and a Rock Racing tattoo.
Clay gets both a tube of DZNuts and a Lube ‘em or Lose ‘Em t-shirt. I don’t think anyone’s going to dispute that he deserves them.
Winners: email me with your address, and I’ll send your prizes out.
The Grand Prize: Unclaimed
Of course, Kenny was looking for a tattoo he would actually want, so nobody won the grand prize of $25 in photo processing and an autographed 8 x 10 glossy of Kenny sporting his tattoo.
I, however, came pretty darned close. I believe my entry was one of very few semi-serious ones entered.
Kenny likes my idea of a tire tread tattoo, but is thinking of it going up the back of both arms. He submits the following mockup:
Kenny says that if someone wants to come up with a more “tribal” tire tread (the pattern Kenny and I used in our images is from a scan of an old Continental Pro 1) pattern he likes, the grand prize offer still stands.
Congrats to the winners, and a big thanks to DZNuts and Jelly Belly Sports Beans for providing the prizes!
Comments (46)
08.21.2008 | 9:17 am
Kenny’s wanted a tattoo for a long time. Like, since he was seven. And now he’s finally worn down his wife; she’s given him the go-ahead.
But important questions remain. What should the tattoo be of? And where should it go?
And that, dear reader, is where you come in.
The First-Ever Fat Cyclist Photoshop Contest
Kenny knows for sure he wants a cycling-related tattoo — what a surprise! — but he honestly doesn’t know what it ought to be, or where it ought to go.
Which seems like a perfect opportunity to do a Photoshop contest.
Here’s how it works. I’ve taken several photos of Kenny, below. Click any of them to go to the high-res original. Then, take it into Photoshop and give Kenny the tattoo you think he ought to have.
Then, after you’ve uploaded your work of art to your online photo-hosting site of choice (not a huge image, please), embed the image in the comments section to this post. The tag should look like this:
[img]url for your image goes here[/img]
Easy, no?
OK, so here are the photos you have to work with. First, the front view:
I’m not entirely certain, but I believe that may have been Kenny’s “Blue Steel” look.
And here’s one if you think he ought to have something on his back:
I’m guessing his legs will be a popular choice:
Or maybe you’ll want to go with a full-body tattoo. In which case, here’s your canvas:
Now, before we get to the part about what you can win, I have a few observations I’d like to make.
- The photo shoot was awkward. As I was getting out my camera and Kenny was removing his jersey, a riding buddy — Riley — rolled up. Neither Kenny nor I could imagine ourselves satisfactorily explaining what was going on, so we didn’t. Riley, now you know.
- I expect a lot of traffic from this post. It’s always interesting to see what posts generate a lot of traffic. (Last week, for example, was my second-highest week ever, traffic-wise.) I think this post is going to generate a lot of traffic and a lot of downloads and a lot of linkbacks. And I think very little of that traffic is going to have to do with my sparkling prose.
- I don’t think Kenny’s wife is going to like this post very much. Sorry, Natalie.
OK. On with the prizes!
Tell ‘Em What They Can Win, Johnny
I like the prizes I’m giving away almost as much as I like the contest itself. Remember how, a couple weeks ago, I did a review of DZNuts? Well, I was a little worried that I’d get an angry letter back from them.
Well, I got a letter back, all right. The scientist who formulated DZNuts emailed me, saying that he got a good laugh out of the post, told me that Masterwort is the real deal (and sent some complex studies to back him up), and asked if I’d like to give away some tubes of DZNuts, along with some t-shirts, to my readers.
Well, of course I would. So, here’s what they sent me, all of which I’ll be giving away as prizes for great entries in the “Tattoo Kenny” Photoshop contest:
But That’s Not All!
Back in July, I talked about how much I like Jelly Belly Sports Beans — they’re like eating candy while you’re riding.
OK, let’s be honest — they are eating candy while you ride. But it’s hard to argue with the results: I ate Sports Beans throughout the entirety of the Leadville 100 a couple weeks ago, and had good power the whole day.
Anyway, Jelly Belly sent me a bunch of Sport Beans, most of which I have eaten myself. Sorry, I lack willpower.
However, I have held one box of Sport Beans — containing 24 packets of the Fruit Punch flavor beans. Pink of course: I really like the way Jelly Belly is donating some of the proceeds from this flavor to fight cancer.
So that’s another $24 (retail value) prize. For a total of $182 worth of prizes, so far. I tell you what: they don’t give away prizes like this when you win a Fark Photoshop contest.
Wait! There’s More!
I will for sure give away all of the prizes mentioned above, mainly by inventing categories on the spot for entries I really like — such as a “Best Photoshop of how Kenny will look with his tattoo when he’s 75 years old and has gained 180 pounds” — but there’s one prize that will only be given away under a certain condition.
If you come up with a tattoo Kenny likes enough that he actually decides to get that tattoo (or a tattoo based on your idea), Kenny’s going to give you the following:
- $25 of free processing at Kenny’s Photo
- A glossy 8 x 10 image of himself, showing off his new tattoo. Autographed.
Kenny isn’t aware that I added that second item to the grand prize, but I figure he’ll go along. What choice does he have?
By the way, I am not excluding myself from this contest, because I think I have a winner of an idea for his tattoo. However, I am excluding myself from any of the prizes.
What If You Don’t Have Photoshop Skillz?
Don’t have or use Photoshop? Use MS Paint. I’m more interested in the idea than the execution. Though I also plan to give away prizes when I see a really well-executed Photoshop.
And if you just don’t want to edit an image but have a great tattoo idea, go ahead and describe it with text in the comments section. You can still win that way, too.
How Long Do You Have?
This contest will run through Monday, at which point the judging begins.
I gotta say, I’m really looking forward to your entries. Get Photoshopping!
Comments (170)
03.13.2007 | 4:01 am
I’ve been on the road now for nine days, more or less (I was back home for the weekend). Here are some interesting statistics about my trip:
- Number of days during which I have stuck to my eating plan on this trip: 0
- Number of times I have exercised during this trip: 3
- Number of times I have weighed myself since beginning this trip: 0
- Number of belt notches I have had to let out since beginning this trip: 1
So here’s a story problem:
“If a Fat Cyclist goes on a two-week-long business trip where he eats every meal at a restaurant, doesn’t have time (nor facilities) to exercise, spends several hours of each day snacking to keep himself awake while driving (a sedentary position), and occasionally goes on evening eating binges to drive away the boredom of being alone in yet another hotel room, and if, furthermore, that Fat Cyclist weighed 162 pounds before leaving on that trip, what will the Fat Cyclist weigh at the end of this trip (i.e., this Friday)?”
The three closest-to-correct answers get a cool Fat Cyclist-labeled item currently under development (value: $15), the item being something which I have not announced yet but am definitely excited about.
In case of ties, earlier entries win.
PS: I am going to be having very little time to post during the remainder of this week and next week. So if you’ve ever thought to yourself, “I have a story/observation/witty piece of fake news that should go in Fat Cyclist,” now’s your chance. E-mail me your story. If I think it feels like something I would write, I’ll post it. If I don’t post it, however, just remember: it’s not you. It’s me.
Comments (119)
03.3.2007 | 10:41 pm
Picture yourself in this situation. You’ve picked out an incredibly difficult event to race in — something so difficult the race itself will take close to a month to ride. You’ve spent most of a year gathering gear, training, saving money, and arranging your life so that you can be away for a month.
That race totally becomes your life. When it finally begins, you can hardly believe it. You’re about to start the adventure of a lifetime.
And then, just a few days into it, someone steals your bike.
Your race is over.
And that, my friends, is exactly what happened to Dave Nice last year at the Great Divide Race (GDR).
Try, Try Again
A lot of people have already banded together and helped get Dave a new bike. That’s very cool. Now Dave is getting ready to try doing the Great Divide Race again this year. He’s doing the training, he’s getting the gear, and now he needs money for food, bike maintenance, and the occasional hotel room. Basically, he needs about $2500.
And I think we should help him out.
Oh, and you can win some very cool prizes if you do.
What You Can Win
Here’s how it works. Buy a virtual raffle ticket for $5.00, and you get one chance at winning one of the prizes listed below. Buy two raffle tickets, you win two chances at winning a prize. Buy three tickets, you get three chances. Get the idea? The more raffle tickets you buy, the better the chances are you’ll win something — and there’s no rule that you can’t win more than one prize.
Sooooo, tell ‘em what they can win, Johnny.
- Banjo Brothers Commuter Backpack and $50 Gift Certificate to Penn Cycle: A while back, I wrote a review of this backpack. I loved it. I still love it. And now you can have one and love it, too. And, because the Banjo Brothers are cooler than they have any right to be, they’re throwing in a $50.00 gift certificate to Penn Cycles, where you can get pretty much any bike-related item you want. These two items are worth $130.00 togehter and will be treated as a single awesome prize for some lucky winner. Sweet!
- Twin Six Jersey: Any style, any size. Which Twin Six jersey design is your favorite? The Argyle? The Speedy? The Deluxe? They’re all so cool that it’s hard to choose, isn’t it. Well, if you win this prize, you’re going to have to make that choice. You may lose some sleep over it, but it’ll be worth it.
- 5 Boxes of Trailblaze Bake-at-Home Energy Bars: Not one but two lucky winners will get five boxes of what I consider to be the most delicious energy food on the market today. If I won this prize, I’d definitely go with three boxes of the chocolate chip flavor and two boxes of the Cranberry Walnut (and then mix in a handful of chocolate chips of my own). Warning: Trailblaze Bake-at-Home Energy bars are highly addictive. Eat at your own risk.
- Free Coaching: Lofgran coaching will give away a month’s free coaching and a free set up consultation if you’re interested in long-term term coaching, or a set up consultation with a one month training schedule free. Either way, that’s worth more than $100.
- Twin Six T-Shirt: Any style, any size. What? I thought Twin Six had another prize up higher in the list. Well, it turns out they just can’t help themselves. They give and they give and they give.
- Vicious Cycles Two-Day Socks: Day one: wear the gray half on the outside. Day two, switch left and right feet and the black half is on the outside. Kind of like two pairs for the price of one! Two winners will proudly sport the Vicious Cycles logo around their ankles.
- Ergon grips: I just got a set of the R1 grips for the Weapon of Choice; now three lucky winners will get a set of these high-zoot grips for their MTB. Actually, these are too advanced to be called “grips.” They should be called “handlebar management systems” or something. You’re going to dig them.
Bonus Gift for Entering
Every single person who buys a raffle ticket will get a fatcyclist.com email address of their choosing and a 2Gb email account as a “thank you” for helping out. You know what I’d ask for as my email address if someone gave me a free fatcyclist.com email account? Something like one of these:
- sweaty@fatcyclist.com
- bigandbloated@fatcyclist.com
- cholesterolphreak@fatcyclist.com
‘Course, that’s just me. You get to pick whatever you want. As long as I don’t think it’s obscene or something.
OK, Time To Buy Raffle Tickets
How easy is it to buy raffle tickets to support Dave on his GDR this year?
Real easy, that’s how easy.
Below, just enter how many tickets you want and click Buy to go to the checkout page, where you can pay with Paypal (which lets you pay either with your own account or with a credit card). It’s all secure and stuff.
The raffle will go on ’til the Saturday, the 17th of March, at which point I’ll let the winners know how what they’ve won and how much money we pulled together for Dave.
Some Fine Print
All the prizes are donated (thanks, Ads-for-Schwag partners!), so there’s no cost-of-prize overhead. Every penny I collect from this raffle will go to Dave.
Note to all my non-U.S. readers: The Ads-for-Schwag advertisers are generous, but none of them are super rich. Which means that while they’re cool with donating nice prizes, they aren’t cool with paying for shipping all over the world. Which means that prizes — with the exception of Lofgran Coaching, which is available to anyone, anywhere — are only available inside the U.S. Which means that if you’re not in the U.S., you can still donate, but you aren’t going to win anything. (If this bothers you, you can rectify the situation by finding me an Ad-for-Schwag partner in your country.) Of course, you’ll still get a fatcyclist.com email account, and that’s something, right?
PS to All B7 Challengers: It’s March now. Time to do your monthly weigh in and time trial. Speaking of which, I just did mine Saturday, and here’s where I stand:
MY SCORE: 75
Weight Loss Score: 59
Time Trial Score: 16
DETAILS
Starting Weight: 179.8
Weight Loss Goal: 31.8
Current Weight: 161
First Time Trial: 19:15
Current Time Trial: 16:14
The thing is, while these are good numbers, there are people who are doing even better — looks like I’m going to have to give away a few jerseys! Read more about how the Banjo Brothers’ Big Bad Bulky Biker Bodfyat (B7) challenge is going over at the forum.
Comments (39)
01.31.2007 | 12:01 am
A Very, Very Frazzled Note from Fatty: When I started this photo contest, I thought it would be cool to host the photos on my own site. It turns out that was sheer foolishness. I used a software packaged called Gallery, which evidently used so much server power as to set off all kinds of alarms at my web hosting service.
They shut me down.
So I spent a few minutes hyperventilating, then I begged to be put back online (see how useful begging is?). They agreed, providing I get my server usage under control.
So I uninstalled Gallery (Stupid Gallery) and created a new group on Flickr (a free photo hosting site owned by Yahoo), called — cleverly enough — Fat Cyclist.
And now I’ve edited today’s post so that the instructions work with this new gallery. For those of you who posted with the old gallery, I’ve already uploaded your photos into the new gallery.
Kenny’s Dilemma
Kenny Jones is one of my best friends, and is without question the hard-coriest cyclist I have ever met. He was one of the four cyclists in The Jack Mormon Militia, the first singlespeed team to ever win the 24 Hours of Moab.
Kenny is also the owner of Kenny’s Photo, a great photo lab that develops prints for both Internet customers and for locals.
Kenny’s had an ad up on my site for some time, and recently I started pestering him that it’s time to give up some schwag. I proposed he sponsor a contest based around one of the following ideas:
- Choose Kenny’s Tattoo: Readers send in their ideas for Kenny’s first tattoo — what it should look like and where it should go. Kenny’s wife, having read the Very Helpful Comments this blog tends to attract, wasn’t super-keen on this notion.
- Get a Pull From Kenny: A random contest entrant gets to attach a bungee cord to Kenny’s bike for the duration of this year’s Leadville 100. The thing is, I would have totally rigged this race so that I win. I suspect there would have been questions about how that happened.
- A Photo Contest: How about if we had the first-ever Fat Cyclist Photo contest, where readers can upload their best bike-related photo, and the winner gets a big ol’ enlargement of their photo and $100 in credit at Kenny’s store? That wouldn’t be as cool as knowing that because of me, Kenny will always have a Fat Cyclist logo tattooed on each of his kneecaps (cuz I would have rigged the tattoo contest), but we can live with it.
And so it was settled. Today, we’re kicking off the first-ever Fat Cyclist Photo contest.
What You Can Win
The winner of the contest (you, natch)Â – selected not at random this time, but by Kenny — will get a massive print, professionally-enlarged (16″ x 20″ or 16Â x 24″, whatever makes sense), mounted on black foam board, Â and sprayed with a texture spray that also protects it from UV rays. Shipped to your door, as long as you live in the US.
The winner also gets $100 credit at Kenny’s store, good toward Internet print orders.
So this prize is worth more than $150.Â
Nice.
Whatcha Gotta Do To See (or Submit) Photos in the Contest
Whether you’re going to submit a photo or just want to see what others are entering, you’re going to need to register with Flickr. Also, to see all the photos, you’ve got to join the Fat Cyclist Group. Luckily, that’s relatively painless. Just do this:
- First, to www.flickr.com/signup and follow the standard signup rigamarole to get registered. Luckily, it’s free.
- This step is important. If you don’t do this, you won’t be able to see all the photos: Once you’ve registered with Flickr, you need to join the Fat Cyclist group. That’s easy: Just go to www.flickr.com/groups/fatcyclist/Â and click Join this Group. Now you can see the photos for the photo contest at www.flickr.com/groups/fatcyclist/pool/.
How it Works
If you know how to use Flickr, you can skip this part. If, like me, you’re still totally novice to Flickr, here’s how you upload a picture.
- Go to the Flickr Upload page: www.flickr.com/photos/upload.
- Browse for your photo(s) –Â you can enter up to three photos in this contest. Photos are automatically resized, so don’t stress about having it be a particular size before you upload it.
- Click the Upload button at the bottom of the screen.
- Enter captions for each of your photos. Be interesting and descriptive. If you can’t be both, be one or the other.
- Click the Save button at the bottom of the page.
- Now you’ve got to make your photo part of the Fat Cyclist group. To do that, from your “Your Photos” page (you should be there already) click your picture. You should see options of what you can do with that photo above the picture now.
- Click “Send to Group” to make a menu drop down. From that menu, choose Fat Cyclist.
- OK, that’s it.
Your photos should be added to the gallery pretty much immediately.
Kenny will choose a winner this Sunday, and I’ll announce it on my blog on Monday. So you have a few days to enter.
A Plug For Kenny (and For Me, Too)
Whether you enter the contest or not, check out Kenny’s ad toward the top of the sidebar (right below the ad where I obnoxiously beg for  your Bloggies vote). He’ll give you $10 off your first order if you’re willing to admit you read my blog. Is it worth $10 to make that admission? You’ll have to make that choice yourself.
You know what? I’m excited to see what photos you submit.
Though I plan to continue to push Kenny to do the Tattoo contest next time.
PS: Today’s weight: 169.8, which is a loss of 3.2 pounds in one day. This tells me one thing: I must’ve gone to bed dehydrated.
Comments (24)
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