Manifest ending has left me in DESPAIR!!!

Zetsuboushita!

Yes another Manifest has come and gone. This time I managed to garner the courage to get a costume together of the best male anime character ever: Zetsubou Sensei / Nozomu Itoshiki. Total people who recognised me: 6 (out of 4800), total photos taken by other people: 2 (thahks!). At least it made approaching other cosplayers for photographs a little easier.

While the screenings were rather lackluster (there's a limit to how much live Death Note one can take) and the attendance on Friday was a bit slow... the other events definitely made up for it. There was a brilliant Iron Chef AMV that was dealt the dreaded 'Rickroll' yet managed to drown the theatre with laughter. There were some really talented artists during the Oztaku Iron Artists as well considering the themes were 'prison', 'suicide' and 'restrained (or something like that)'. My particular favourite was the one 'shitting blood' as it were.

It was good to meet my friend there who was a volunteer. Also managed to show off a bit in the drawing rooms (although I had not been practicing my drawing in over a few months). Took part in the Oztaku 4-panel comic competition and I was supposed to have won a hoodie. Got heaps of manga and another wooden sword too.

I'd say I still enjoyed the event thoroughly and would definitely make it a point to go again next year, preferrably with more people.

Anyway, here's a picture dump for you: some random sketches, partially inspired by Force Unleashed, partially inspired by Negima and some best left unmentioned.

Because someone's birthday is coming up, I should extend my warmest regards while I can remember to. It's been a VERY busy week at work (lots and lots of overtime) and I have forgotten a lot of things so... I hope I'll remember to send the gift early.

RIP Baroncrovax

Ah, it's been so long hasn't it? I can't even remember what I was talking about the last time.

And now it's time for Manifest 08 again... and I'm utterly unprepared. I haven't been drawing anything in the past... 3 months? Something like that.

Why? There's too many things. Work has kept me perpetually busy and depressed. Add to that the fact that my housemate and good friend had to go b ack to his home country and now new stranger(s) have moved in. It's all quite confronting.

But the biggest thing is that I've just not had any inspiration or motivation. I just lost it all.

So I'm doing a cop-out and uploading some old junk that I was going to upload a few months ago. Among which were sketches from Soul Eater (very fond of Rangarok and Chrona) and a picture of Maka and Soul that I wanted to colour but just couldn't find the time. Ghost girl is partially inspired by something I read in Negima.

Well, I'll try to get some new stuff up. Been hooked onto Final Fantasy Tactics A2 and Force Unleashed more recently. Will see if I can get some good ol' Jedi sketches up.

Post-Japan Crunch Madness

Greetings to the two or three people who still bother to read this blog! Howya doing? Sorry I've been so remiss with my blog or my sketching. I'm rather afraid to say that I still owe 1 person a birthday greeting an another an overdue commission!

However there's fairly good reasons for my absence. Since my last post, I've been attending 3 (non-anime) training sessions (some VERY far away), travelled to Japan, celebrated my birthday, finished a TON of assignments, finished a TON(ner?) of work and generally lost all drive or ability to draw. Oh, and I'm currently hooked on Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness on the PSP as well as hurting from playing Guitar Hero: On Tour on the DS.

Yeah, that's what happens. However, I must at least highlight the fact that I managed to finally set foot in Japan to visit my mother (no, we're NOT Japanese), not to mention drop by to say 'Hi' to me old and forgotten mate VagaryLoc.

Ah the things in Japan. I still have vivid dreams of being so close to it I could just pop over for the weekend. I have to say that there's great seafood to be had there and I managed to fit in (my stomach) nearly everything I've heard or read about. Truly, it was a food extravaganza.

I did manage to buy numerous figurines (including Eureka from Eureka 7.... SQUEAL! I should have gotten Talho and Haruno Sakura too!), Taiko no Tetsujin (a DS game based on an arcade game my friend likes) and several manga including my beloved Zetsubou Sensei! I was presented with a hakama (Arigato Gozaimasu!) which hopefully will help me come September. I have to say that I was truly surprised at the lack of anime ON PUBLIC TV... or at least at my mum's place. She swears that it's her TV's fault, though. Nevertheless I did manage to catch some promotions on the trip to Akihabara.

Ahhh, Akihabara. There's a million and one references to Lucky Star (and Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuutsu) there. There ought to be cosplayers of Konata walking around all day long (we only managed to get there in the late evening). Seriously, that place is kinda like Heaven for me (luckily I missed the crazed stabber, otherwise it WOULD be Heaven for me... literally). I swear that there's just wasn't enough time spent there (although it was great shopping at Hobby Off in Shibata and the food and service in Niigata was exquisite). I should note that I managed to get into the gallery showing the works of Vagabond in Ueno, too. Popped into Animate in Sunshine City.... You know, for a holiday lasting just over a week I have to say I really really enjoyed it. I got a good wakeup on how bad my Japanese was too!

Anyway, today's postings are all just some random sketches. Practice so that I can do better next time. Also, many thanks to XY for sending over that nifty pen. Can you tell which pictures were drawn with it?

Animaniamania!

Wowzers, I just managed to crawl out of stupor and put something up!

Work is piling up and I have been on the go for the past few days. I'm barely at home as it is, seeing as there's social obligations. Never really got the time to sit down and nut out some sketches. Really don't have time for colouring at present!

Anyway, asides from being swamped, things aren't too bad. Went to see Superhero movie... kinda funny but not award winning material.

Animania's tomorrow! I have to get some sketches out to practice but I was tired out today. Nevertheless, there are some older ones I did involving Zetsubou Sensei (still loving it) characters. I reckon it'll be my goal to finish them all. I reckon that shouldn't be too many provided they don't keep introducing more (well, no complaints really).

Pic (1) is a random drawing of a girl with a wooden sword, based on mine. Pic (2) is heavily influenced by the Caramelldansen craze (even VG Cats got hit with it) and all the Youtube madness. Pictured are the insane Kafuka (I wanted to use her in a more sadistic way.. but Caramelldansen is pretty sadistic) and Maria (wanted to get her out of the way). Pic (3)... Kobushi in her 50-50 semi-nude pose. Thank goodness for Chiri's fan service! I really wanted to colour this in to get the differentiation between bandage and skin. Pic (4) is my trial design for the Animania sketch theme this year: Fire and Water. Hopefully not tired out by tomorrow to think about it.

Alright, need to recuperate. Hopefully can get some coloured stuff out eventually.

Monster Reborn

Alright, besides the cheap anime reference... I'm back! Yes, on April Fool's day too... what with all of Australia reeling from computers not being able to update themselves to extended Daylight Savings.

But yes... I'm back. With ADSL 2+. Apprently, the downloads are so fast I can finish up my quota in a few days. Shocking. Still, there's much to love about it. Work is pretty good. I've never appreciated the numerous holidays around Easter quite as much as I have this year. However, the lack of internet during a few of them was a bit of a downer. Anyway, had some big pow-wow as well and managed to fit 10 people into the new apartment (yes, that's right... I've moved). Now I just got to manage in a schedule of regular maintenance and so on into my daily schedule.

Events? Just recently visited Supanova. To be honest as an anime fan it was a bit dull because it didn't really cater to us. I did see Greg Horn (really realistic digital artist) and Arthur Suydam (does Marvel Zombies! Fantastic artist!). It was nice to see them go about explaining their work... but generally it wasn't in depth enough. I bought me a nice wooden sword and a few other comics.

Oh, I did buy 'Hollow Fields' by Madeleine Rosca. I was utterly surprised to find out that she won one of the International Manga awards and is recognised among the Japanese mangaka. Even more surprising was the fact that she shares this honour only 3 others and one of them is Malaysia's very own Benny Wong aka Ben who drew Le Gardenie. I was and am seriously infatuated with his work and his bio is interesting to read.

I did try to enter the art competition in Supanova, though. I came up with drawing (2). At first the characters didn't look too ugly and I did refer to '50 Robots to Draw and Paint' by Keith Thompson to get the guns right. Then I added the background. Things went downhill there. I remembered seeing coloured pictures (as in digitally coloured ones) and I thought I'd get mine coloured to stand a chance. I dug out an old set of cheap colour pencils. THAT was my biggest mistake. After a few seconds I realised I had made a horrible mistake but it was too late to go back and at the end of it the picture looked like the most grotesque thing you've ever seen vomitted. Needless to say, I did not win. Nevertheless, I'll try to pick myself up for Animania next on 16th April. The theme is 'Fire and Water' and since it's just pencils I think I'll be able to get a bit of a homeground advantage.

Other drawings: (1) is an early (and very risque... I know) drawing I made trying to see if I could get the 'wet' look to it. (3) is influenced by the robot book I mentioned and watching 'Dukes of Hazzard' (whoo... Daisy Duke). I was thinking how cool if instead of using the General Lee, we had one of those hot pants'd girls in a mecha of some sort. (4) is just anothed random doodle that popped up one of these days.

Anyway that's all I have to say for my return. Will need to bunker down for Animania!

Happy New Year of the Rat

Gong Xi Fa Chai to you all! Happy and prosperous wishes. Longevity... yeah, you know the drill. It's Chinese New Year again! I only wish I could have spent it with my family back home, but I'll just have to settle for working overtime.

It shouldn't be a surprse to you all that it's not a holiday in Australia. However, this is the first year where I'm actually working (and not bumming) and putting in many many unpaid overtime hours. No time for lion dance hunts. Also busy shifting into the new apartment, or making arrangements to do so.

Anyway it's not all busy. Last week had soem fun playing laser wars with the most dishonourable group of 11-year olds. Incredibly fun (and sweat inducing), though. And this weekend I've got a few sizable dinners and lunches to attend.

In brief: (1) is a drawing of a Liz Lieu, apparently quite an attractive poker player. This was a first draft which I will work on when time is available. (2) is yet another one of my scantily clad warrior girls... somewhat loli in this case. (3) is inspired by one of the fanarts in the recent Naruto Shippuuden ending. The original is 'OVER 9000!!!' times cuter. (4) is darling Ogiue from Genshiken 2 (and the OVA after Genshiken 1). I have waxed about her in my prior post.

Have a great new year, all!

Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei

AAAH! It's back! Zetsubou Sensei 2nd Season!! YEAH!

• Now, it just has to compete with the numerous other 2nd season shows I'm watching: Genshiken 2 (Ogiue is my new favourite!), Dokuro chan 2 and hopefully Zero no Tsukaima 2. Oh, man what's a guy to do?

• But work HAS been piling up and I am slowly sinking. Not to mention that I intend to move house soon, and haven't found a housemate. Ahhh... it's all overwhelming. At least the recent days have been cold although it has been pretty unbearable prior to that.

• So quick descriptions: (1) is my rendition of Jenny from Zombie Hunters, which I recommended last post. (2) is something I picked up recently based on a recent comment made by Belkar in Order of the Stick (Giant in the Playground Games). Trust me... the pose is meant to be like that. (3) is in celebration of ep1 of Zoku Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei. Love the new opening and ending sequences, love the creepy bits in the first episode (staying in the school after classes are over reminded me of my old days in high school and those star gazing sessions). (4) is something I randomly drew a while back. (5) is an experiment on colouring without lines that I was to give to my poker pal for his use. Need to refine it a bit further. Not too happy with it overall. (6) is something that Genshiken 2 inspired, but it really didn't come out well. I'll never be able to draw ero-doujinshis! (7) Something random I did... a girl playing Warhammer.

• Sore back today, so I can't be sitting up very much. Alright, peace out. Need to watch that Zetsubou Sensei episode again.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Hiya everyone! Sorry it's been more than a month. Things just kept piling up, really. Work rush, Christmas shopping and all the usual things just kept me utterly busy. Plus the PSP is working again so there was some major tinkering there. To be honest, I'm slowly rethinking my previous stance on the PSP vs Nintendo thing... but only to the point of balance. Slowly, though.

Also just came back from Adelaide. Had to pop back midway to get some work done and then head back to meet up with family and grandmother. Very nice, I have to say, seeing as asides from paying for a dinner treat or two, I didn't really have to do anything at all. Reading Dawkin's God Delusion, playing PSP and DS games, watching Foxtel in a surprisingly cold Adelaide climate... bliss. Definitely worth it to meet them all too, as it's been a while since I saw the rest of my family. I collected my ton of anime figurines from mum as well.

Mum's had a little health concern for us, though, what with her internal lump. Just had surgery and we hear it's all clear and benign. Hopefully it remains all clear and recovery is quick.

Anyway, at least one person noted my absence and demanded an update (in return for ONE measely photo?) and I guess I needed to get back on the horse. The first pic is something I was mulling over throughout my trip and finally tried to put to paper. That tree is supposed to be a willow, by the way. I used the airbrush style of painting and let me tell you... that took me at least 4 hours. My fingers were sore from the pressure used to colour some of those bits. I'm not doing that again anytime soon. I have to say it didn't turn out TOO bad.

Speaking of hard to do... the 2nd pic took me hours as well to draw (because I used my tablet) and colour. This was mainly because I wanted it to look like one of the figurines mum sent over. Japanese craftmanship has me in awe, although I wonder if that robe is removable. I've read about some other figurines that have different 'layers'. Thanks, mum. It's a lovely figurine.

The last 2 were sort of warm-up pics. The first is a tribute to Kiwi in Le Gardenie by the Malaysian artist Ben. Brilliant artist, and definitely something to aspire to. The last pic is just something I mucked up to prove that I could draw with just a pen (that means no erasing). Not too good as I was still stretching after a long period of no drawing.

Alright, I've got to see what else needs to be done pre-New Years. Hopefully I'll have time during my break to do more sketches (asides from studying for tests immediately after the break).

Enjoy the heat, Australians. It's going to get worse.

Did you get that thing I sentcha?

Asides from the sudden update, you would probably be wondering about the title. Well, that's Harvey Birdman for you... a somewhat strange cartoon not as funny as Yugioh the Abridged series (that you MUST see) but is not without its charm. But why the long absence?

Well, things have been busy and slow at the same time. My PSP suffered a fatal crash in my quest to tinker with it and now there is but one slim chance of redeeming it at the risk of my friend's unit. That sort of kept me down for a few weeks. That and preparations for my office's dinner function last week. Not to mention that it's hot, muggy... and I'm irritable from lack of sleep. And vague work objectives.

But I had to get something out, I was sitting on a few drawings. One was a carry-on from the last update, using a similar style (pic 2). Inspired, once again, by the currently-stalled Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei. It features my little zashiki warashi (oh, she's REAL hot...) with her little friends. I wonder if I should consider doing another one of Chiri-chan. As if that pic wasn't enough, I just had to do one of the stalker girl, Matoi-chan (pic 1). What does it take to get a chick that hot to stalk you (besides an Enya-kit of sorts)?

I blather on... I should also mention that Star Wars: The Force Unleashed has caught my attention even though it won't be out this year... and will only have a very slim chance on being on a console I own (fingers crossed, my darling DS who hasn't ever failed me once unlike my red-headed-stepchild PSP). Jedis are incredibly impressive. Meantime, I have FFXII: Revenant Wings. Now that is a very interesting game, although it could be better.

Alright, I'll leave you to your jibblies now.

Halloween 07's a'comin

oooOOOOOooooo.... Spookytime's almost here. Sigh. Unfortunately I couldn't complete a decent Beanie Man vs Chainsaw Dave pic in time. I have been a bit distracted by a few things: my new PSP and the awesome anime 'Sayonara Zetsubou Sensei'. Well that and the fact that I just couldn't get a decent thought on paper that had that chilling Halloween feel about it. I even borrowed a heap of Mignola's Hellboy comics to inspire me, but it was just too hard.

Thank god for Zetsubou Sensei (if only I was a woman...). I mean seriously, that guy is totally cool in an emotionally depressed gothic sort of way. Well, as a guy, I can say I love every one of his twisted students, from the stalker, to the recluse to the anal retentive demon. So deliciously flawed and yet so perfect. Anyway, that anime had splices of chilling scenes and one of the ending theme ones really got me inspired to do Pic 2 (rough sketch) to Pic 3 (final version). Oh, that absolute look about her. I only wish I could capture it as it was in the anime. Tell you guys what. Go look it up in Youtube. Worth the watch, especially the 2nd OP (from ep 4 onwards).

Asides from that, I've also been enchanted with some of the ARIA soundtracks. Brings memories of a scene I saw during Minifest this year with the entire Venice-like town flooded, but in a serene way (not like the floods disasters). It was a very pristine and calm scene, that accompanied with the angelic music really heightens the mood. Anyway, I tried to do something similar and work a bit on my shadows. Spent ages on her hair. I do realise the background's a bit weird.

Alright, hope you guys have a safe but spooky Halloween. Especially those of you living alone at the moment. If you want, I can try to come up with some chilling tales to get you into the mood.

The Return

Alright, settle down, men. Geez, don't get all excited.

Yeah, it's been a while hasn't it? Busy busy busy. I had to go do site visits: a military base. That was pretty damn cool, if I do say so myself. It's a pity I didn't really SEE any shooting going on. Just heard them, although I caught a peek at some mortar training.

Well, at least work's toned down recently. I haven't had to ship off to Sydney yet for my training so I'm a bit happy. I got myself Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, which is a barrel-full of fun if you have a LONG stylus. I wish I had a DS Lite... but then again I also long for the sinful (but oh-so-not-gamer-oriented) PSP. Ah, decisions.

Alright, I've abandoned that colouring style I mentioned last week. I just can't keep up with it and I'm way too messy. I prefer the cell-shaded style anyway. So a week or so back, I popped up pic 1 to compare the difference. That's not to say I haven't learned anything from that other style. I realise that sketching using an airbrush stroke is a lot closer to what I would get using a pencil, which is close to what I'm looking for. Therefore, the method is pretty idea for that purpose which I used to cough out pic 2 and 3. Add some cell-shading and highlighs for pic 2 and there you have it. But I'm still working up to some horror-themed works come Halloween.

Side note: I actually gave a company presentation on my Masters thesis and did some sketches to spice it up. Fortunately it gave the result I wanted: I got a fair amount of laughs on a dreary Friday morning and became a centerpiece of conversation. I'll also note that this isn't the first presentation that has employed my 'handicrafts'.

Oh yes, Ying2. I must insist I receive a mailing address. Otherwise I will be forced to take drastic actions. How drastic? You don't want to know. Happy Birthday, by the way.