Neil and Korra

So... I've been in a huge literary kick this year.  

I've not only run into Brian Selznik at my bakery job, or got to see Audrey Niffenegger at a reading at the Museum of Contemporary Art, but yesterday... I got to meet NEIL GAIMAN!

The man who wrote Coraline, Neverwhere, and the award-winning The Graveyard Book.  He's also written for television (Doctor Who) and for films (Hayao Miyazaki's English adaptation of Princess Mononoke!) and I just can't believe how humble of a guy he is in real life.

He talked about how his ideas for children's books aren't systematic, how they're basically taken from his own childhood experiences and "what if" situations.  Coraline, for example, came from a question he asked himself when he was 12: "what if I came home one day and realized my parents had moved away without telling me?  And what if they replaced themselves with two people who looked exactly like them?"  He talked about the goal of wanting to frighten children with story ideas, but not overwhelm them in the scary plots that they wouldn't want to read more.  He wrote Coraline while using his literary agent's daughter as a guinea pig to see if it was too scary for children, and it was because of her intrigue that the book got published... except that the girl admitted years later that she was terrified the whole time she'd read the book, but still wanted to know how it ended!

Neil also mentioned how it took him 10 years from conception to publishing Coraline!

It's one of the things I admire about writing: you never know how long it'll take for an idea to be fulfilled on paper... or how long it will take others to realize its potential... and yet you strive to get your voice heard.

I've been in a creative-limbo lately, in terms of writing my childrens' novel and getting my stuff out there, but I'm really glad that these ongoing moments of inspiration keep coming my way.  I'm off to a great start, though, with my main characters all fleshed out (except the ages) and putting them in a Chicago 1930s setting.  Yay!

In other news... THIS PREMIERED!

It's been a surprising good few episodes thus far, and it's killing me how Mike & Bryan make all these references to the old Gaang.  Katara's the elderly and wise figure now!  This new series has taken a much more mature and darker direction than the original, with the characters being teenagers and having a little romantic tension behind all the political oppression that's going on in Republic City.  The style of the setting is very much the 1920s with steampunk, and I love the art backgrounds and the outfits and awww, everything.

Korra is the polar opposite of what Aang used to be.  To me, she's a combination of what Katara and Toph would've been as a 16 year old, not to mention a bigger prodigy than Aang since she can bend three elements naturally at the age of 4!  She acts violently and passionately through her emotions, and she needs to learn to be calm and reflective (which is why she needs Airbending so badly!)  It's... different.... overall.

Romance-wise, I'm rooting for Korra and Mako - partly because they remind so much of what Katara and Zuko could've been - but what's bugging me is that Bolin is clearly the one who makes Korra laugh and encourage fun out of her.  Bolin's the kid at heart, and Mako's the sullen teenager taking responsibilities.  Ugh... I have a feeling Mike & Bryan will be prolonging this love triangle throughout the series, and it'll be awkward since Mako and Bolin are orphaned brothers!  Oy.

In other news...  I'm officially a half-marathon runner!  2 hours, 11minutes, running nonstop.  It's a part of who I am now.  ^^

What happened to March?

(So excited for this film, and the Japanese poster is inspiring me to learn the language)

Seriously, this month is just flying by, which means that a fourth of the year is already over!

I don't know how I feel about this, but I do feel like my life in Chicago has been jumping from good moments to not so great moments. Financially, I'm doing okay (breaking even for the first time in 6 months!) and I have two part-time jobs that are getting me by. I already know that I don't want to live off of minimum wage, and I want to make myself proud as much as everyone else.

Sadly, I haven't been able to do much creative stuff this month, but the ideas keep rolling. I suppose that's the tricky part to being an artist - you can't just wait for the ideas to be fully fleshed-out before taking the time to write them or draw them. I'm excited for April because I'll be participating in "Script Frenzy" where I'll be drawing 100 pages of a graphic novel in the span of 30 days. With a 39-hour work week, learning Japanese, volunteering at a Literacy Center, and training for a half-marathon at the end of April, and my birthday plans (!)... this is not going to be easy.

Things to do for April:
-celebrate the anniversary of my quitting art school by drawing every day for "Script Frenzy."
-turn 28. Bake my own cake.
-run my first half-marathon.
-successfully translate the BRAVE poster in Japanese.
-write a comedy script.
-get back into Yoga and Dancing.
-use my tax refund for something fun. Maybe a vacation. Or a MacBook Pro.

In other news, The Hunger Games film rocked! =)

my Twilight moment

Gotta love Miyazaki

This is Hayao Miyazaki's latest film project, "The Secret World of Arrietty," and once again I'm impressed and taken aback by the emotional layering he can bring to a simple relationship between a little person (aka "a borrower") and a sickly young boy, Arrietty and Shawn.

The film overall is not my favorite of his works, but I just wanted to commend Miyazaki for some beautiful sequences he does, such as the beginning with Arrietty's first "borrowing" expedition at night. You can see the obstacles that a little person has to go through, how the simple task of getting sugar in the kitchen involves spelunking, rock-climbing, and being quick on your feet with unfriendly bugs.

There isn't much action in the film, as it mostly takes place inside a house, but the artwork and intricate details that Miyazaki places inside the walls of that house makes things intriguing to the viewer. You see things from the little persons' perspective, similar to that 90s film "Honey I Shrunk the Kids" but in animation. I also loved the slow, delicate moments between Arrietty and Shawn as they slowly begin to understand each others' place in that simple world. Shawn begins to see Arrietty and the Borrowers as people rather than just secretive little creatures, and it's an amazing transformation to watch onscreen.

Overall, a great film to watch for the sake of storytelling.

Figure Drawing

Once a week, I go to this art academy downtown for some Open Studio time, where the objective is to draw a human figure in whatever medium you'd like. I'm trying to get back into the comic-drawing mode to work on a graphic novel, and in a way, I'm also re-learning the basics of animation.

The thing about Open Studio is that you don't really have a teacher critiquing you on what you should improve on. It's the artist who needs to fix their own mistakes and trust their individual skills. I like this method, but I've noticed that it takes a lot of energy and motivation for me to actually open a sketchbook and draw outside of class.

I did the above motion sequence during a break I had at work, and I can already tell I need massive improvement. Nevertheless, I felt really proud that I had successfully drawn something in sequence!

My next goal is to start writing this graphic novel to get a good idea of what I should draw. Lots to do!