bugs!

This is a side-project I've been working on for my school's Family Reading Night.  The theme this year is "bugs" so I decided to go all out and give a nice botanical touch to the posters.  Here's one of my ideas:

Office Antics

This is something I did a little while ago to show how much I love my coworkers. I'm pushing myself to do one work-comic per week this year, as a way to practice my cartooning skillzzz. The girls also enjoy reading them in the office, and it's so great to hear them commenting and anticipating the next one! =)

I'm taking Storyboarding this semester, which I've easily fallen in love with. It sounds silly, but quick-drawing is actually one the toughest things I've had to do artistically, putting so much detail with minimal value in the drawings. I just got my third assignment back (storyboarding all camera shots for a commercial) and I got an A! =) Not too shabby, considering our professor assertively mentioned that he rarely gives out A's. Here's page 1:


I feel like I overdid the value, but I'm off to a really good start!

stop-motion attempt

I was supposed to be studying for Art History, but instead I did this. =P

You can guess by the sloppy lighting and camera movements that it didn't take much time for me to do this, and you're right. I wanted to focus on building a life-like relationship with inanimate objects... since I will eventually need to master this craft anyway, as a character animator! I used a digital camera and a tripod to campure about 40 individual frames. The editing could've been better, but meh. Next time!

The Illusionist

Just a quick post before work takes over my life again...

My first summer of art school kind of ended on an anti-climactic note, partially because it was online and I felt like I wasn't getting much out of it. Of course everyone says that it's up to you how much you want to get out of the class, but knowing myself, it takes a lot of self motivation and "Big Brother is Watching You!" pressure for me to understand something, much less feel accomplished from it. My biggest example is the drawing class, waiting for grades every two weeks from the professor, only to realize that my technique is completely wrong. It didn't help that I had to turn in multiple projects every 3 days. So at some point I just stopped trying my hardest and just worried about making deadlines. Is that supposed to be conducive to great art? I feel like I'm missing something. I noticed that my inspiration for artwork was shrinking over the summer because I felt paranoid and stupid about the art I was making. Do all art students feel this way when they first start out?

Hah. Well I know I can't just sit on my butt and wait for inspiration to come along. And I definitely cannot afford another C+, especially if I want to make brilliant things like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHVG1JmbU30

Moving on

It's been almost a month and I think I've finally recovered from the epic horrendousness that was M.Night Shyamalan's The Last Airbender... especially now that Nickelodeon has officially announced a new spinoff series: "Avatar: the Legend of Korra!"

“The Legend of Korra takes place 70 years after the events of ‘Avatar: The Last Airbender’ and follows the adventures of the Avatar after Aang - a passionate, rebellious, and fearless teenaged girl from the Southern Water Tribe named Korra.”

Korra’s quest eventually leads her to Republic City - the epicenter of the world of “Avatar.” A metropolis powered by steampunk-type technology, the city is inhabited by people from all nations. Korra finds that Republic City suffers from rampant crime and is also dealing with an anti-bender revolt. Korra is tutored by Aang’s son, Tenzin, is the ways of airbending."

It's only going to be a mini-series (which means less filler, more intense storylines!) and according to Mike and Bryan, it's set to be released sometime in 2011. I'm really excited for this, and I'm just glad that those two are still keeping their amazing universe alive and kicking.

But seriously... what happened to Zuko's mom? =/

Anyway, enough Avatar-related goodness. Going into art school... I have to say that if you don't take criticism with a grain of salt in this world, people drop out of it like flies. I never thought I'd get a D in a drawing assignment, but then you realize, "wait, there's technique involved" and "dammit, I need to stop holding the pencil as if I were writing a letter!" My knowledge about figure drawing technique seems to fluctuate with every work I do; one day you might be asked to do five-minute quick drawings, but then the next unit involves drawing for 45 minutes a full figure to establish the anatomy. Contour lines are key in this class, which has made me grunt uncontrollably because I love to be "messy" in my drawings. It's all about defining the figure with minimal lines first, and then adding the value (which we haven't gotten to yet).

Here's an example of what I worked this past week, using charcoal:


(I think I overdid the shading, but I'm actually proud with my use of charcoal. It's scary! You can't erase or take back what you already did. =S)

The semester's almost over, and by then I'll be finished with my History of Character Animation class, turned in my paper on Don Bluth's style of animation, and mastered the art of drawing in charcoal and graphite. Wish me luck!

And... if you haven't seen Despicable Me, go see it just to see the yellow Minions:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5fKfWMcD48