Look In The Mirror

As promised i will post the final piece for the Good vs Evil pic for the contest here.

Here was when i was 50% through it

Almost done....

Final Product in wallpaper size for non wide screen if you interested.

Anyways, i also promised to post my rationale for it. I'll just copy paste it from my deviantart account.

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Look in the mirror...

...and you will see your other self. Evil lies naked within all of us, we just have to pay attention to it. Many a times we are quick to point out the flaws of others, but remain ignorant of our own actions. More often than not we choose to neglect reflecting upon ourselves.

So is evil really that far off?

If we do not keep it in check it will eventually taint and consume us whole. Thus it is a constant battle of good vs evil.

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I'm bad at expressing things figuratively, so i went for the straight ball.

- Angelic and demonic side, well you get the drift. Straight forward enough.
- Almost naked demonic side, represents that evil lies naked within ourselves.
- Closed eyes for the angel side to represent ignorance.
- Tendril like things swirling around the connected palms represents the taint creeping in.

cliche....but i hope i get my message across clear enough ^^ ;;

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Well, i don't expect anything from the competition. I wasn't really joining it with the motive to win anything (although winning is a bonus, which i doubt of course). More importantly i wanted to try doing something based on a contest theme. I just gave it my best shot so that i won't regret later for not participating at all. Thanx a lot to Jun who was always encouraging me to take part. I truly hope he comes up with something better than mine and get a win :D

I always tried ways to cg like what i have done for this pic. I think i am fairly satisfied with the results this time. I tried to use greater contrast by using more black. I know, in college the lecturers do not encourage the use of this color because it is a color-killer. But ImagineFX has taught me otherwise. Mastering the use of black brings out a greater sense of depth and contrast to your works, making it very stable and solid if controlled properly (and epic-ness in my own opinion). I wanted to challenge myself to be able to achieve that.

I guess that itself was already a victory for me. I am quite proud of what i have achieved for myself here. It took me longer than usual to finish this piece but it brought back the nostalgic feeling i had when i took onto a personal project seriously. I was already wondering if i could still have the determination to go through that again. I have proven to be still passionate about it.

Although not many will like it for its stereotypical-branding i am still very, very happy with the outcome of this pic. I tried thinking out of the box and doing something different for this theme. I came out with many ideas much better than this, but then in the end i asked myself, "What is it that i enjoy doing the most?" So i decided to go with this pic. I have always tried to avoid drawing angelic and demonic representations because it is too overused. But i cannot deny that i still enjoy it no matter how recycled these sort of depictions are.

I shall continue to refrain myself further or what you will be seeing from me will all be of the angelic-demonic sort.

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Oh i also wanted to share some things i learnt from ImagineFX. For those majoring in IL and is greatly interested in digital painting or CG, i recommend getting this book. I know it is not cheap, but it is worth every dollar you pay because they even include a resource CD which has brushes for photoshop to works from featured artists of that particular issue. If you really cant afford it then get a glimpse of it in the TOA library.

There's a very good tip i used in this work by one of the artists featured in IFX. He works in grayscale first to get the sense of '3d'-ness right before he adds in color tones. So from there i picked up turning my colored works into grayscale. While you are working on it, save up often and constantly convert it into grayscale to check. It truly makes your colored works less flat and brings it another level.

And a personal advice from me before truly ending this post. Save often and make LOTS of backup copies whenever you can. It really stinks to have to redo a work because you saved in a single file and it gets corrupted (e.g. power blackout while saving). I have not experienced it myself before because on day 1 i picked up CG, i made countless copies all over every single available space and hard disk i have. I fear losing my precious works so much that i even burn mutliple copies of them into DVDs. Please, please heed this simple but very very useful advice.

Sheet!!

Please forgive this poor soul Gan... orzlll
Shaun...i'm gonna join you in not doing the figures holidays assignment. I actually did something. 1 piece of coloured figures and another incomplete piece which i was too ambitious with lmao.

There are 2 more days before Friday but i'm currently working on the DA contest entry Good vs Evil theme. Here are the WIPs.

the initial rough idea. complete mirror images except the facial expression

editted the reflection because i improved on my rationale

cliche....totally cliche....i'll put up the complete version later with my rationale. By then it will turn out even more cheezier because of the rationale.

Anyhow so far so good to the classes i've been attending. I'm wondering why we have Typography....hopefully it is more bearable than calligraphy this time around.

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oh i forgot to mention, quote of the day,

"Tatsun is out of proportion" ~Lip Wei

MAY DAY!

It seems i lack content for my blog during the holidays. That is a good thing. Means that i am more occupied to be spending time contemplating about things that contradict myself sometimes. But anyhow, sem is starting in about a couple of days more and i'm not too keen about it as usual :P

Anyways, just yesterday i went to get my results, timetable and meet up with Andy, Racist D, Jun, Phee Chien and not to forget Ah Beng who was cheated into coming because he thought there was a dota game on, courtesy of PC.

Timetable is pretty awesome with no Saturday classes this time!!!! HO YEA!!! 1 subject per day totaling 5, excluding moral. Now i just can't resist rubbing it onto those who has to take it. BOHAHAHAHAHA~~!!!!

To answer some ppl asking why i never draw guys, i do, but i do not post them up my DA gallery because, well, i prefer to post my voluptous beauties rather than plain old boring guys. And to imagine it was the guys asking WHY I ONLY DRAW GIRLS. Common sense doods, where is it? You have a joystick (literally a 'joy' ' stick'), so do i. Stop wanting to see more sticks drawn by some other guys. This shows how unhealthy you bunch are.

here is one incase your tastes are skewed. I am in no position to bend you back to the light side.

So anyways, i met up with the guys because Racist D wanted to know how i worked with my cgs, and so i was about to start from scratch outlining a fresh piece for usage. But the tedious work of it turned him off and i worked on an existing old lineart i had.

Results, after maybe about an hour plus i was done with my little 'demo'....

...and when i got home i decided to repair, flip, and finish up the pic.

Later Jun asked about the method i used when coloring in greyscale. So i chose my waifu for an example this time.

I started off by sketching the rough and doing a quick outline on a diff layer. Then i started filling in the base grey scale shadings on another layer.

I proceeded in using another layer to fill in the colors with layer settings set to 'Overlay'. I stopped here and we all went for lunch. I continued back at home later that night.

From here on i merged all the layers together and started painting over the outlines and touching up some parts.

More touching up and added some depth into it with higher contrast shadows.

Added some reflective highlight from her purplish headgear lights as well as a blue-ish top light. Made some simple 'Rhythms' to the background so as to make it more interesting. It can be considered to be finished here but i wanted to add more impact with the colors...

...and so I dodged tool some highlighted areas, created another layer with 'Overlay' settings again and started making the reflection more prominent and bring out the eyes with blue-ish glow. Also i darkened the bottom part to make the image less flat.

The stuff i did above was mostly done with Paint Tool SAI, using photoshop only at the very end to touch up and save up.

After my initial 'demo' i had Jun teach me how to use color pencils for figures drawing. Goddam he's really good. Oooooh the patience. How i wish i had that when i did my figures. Well at least thanx to him i have an idea on how to work on my remaining holiday assignments. I might not achieve his standards but i must at least try not to disappoint him :P

I need to get working on it soon. Been slacking off purely on my own works that i haven't done anything for my assignments. I think Gan won't bite but lets not misuse that advantage. I try not to disappoint such a great lecturer like him.

My Joy and my Bane

Sigh... i have just finished watching the anime Shuffle!
(yes i know i am super outdated on animes and only watch those many many years back)

And after each conclusion of an anime, i always feel a melancholic tinge of aftertaste. It happened to me too when i finished Mahoromatic, Shingetsutan Tsukihime, Kanon and even my all time favourite Vandread. I tend to get too attached to an anime i like that i am virtually submerged into it. So much so that i always have a reluctance to finish watching it. It is a sad excuse, but i don't want it to end.

Maybe that is why i am very reluctant to watch them in the first place. It takes months just to finish an anime, and Shuffle alone took me over 4 months. By that alone you can do the maths to calculate how much i actually watch per year. There are exceptions though like Tsukihime which caught me in suspence until i spent a marathon of 6 hours to clear it and felt really down in the pits after that.

Dwelling onto the topic of being too attached to anime, i think i am slightly abnormal. The word 'otaku' might or might not apply to me. When i watch a series, take for example Kanon, i shed bucketfull of tears to the extent i really 'FEEL' the anime. Eversince young when i watch any show, no matter how i told myself that it is all just fabrication, i still tend to feel deep emotions that are conveyed in them. As if it was a very real thing and i was a character in there, feeling everything myself.

Which is another possible explanation as well as to why i watch so little anime. I will drink in every single detail possible and rewind the show over and over again. I want to know every single meaning of the words said, every action taken and etc. I have a criteria as well when watching, which is to have no external disturbances if possible so i can concentrate. This is like a meditative state i enter. Thus this dooms myself to usually wanting to watch animes alone.

Exceptions are for those comedic ones like Lucky Star and Seto no Hanayome to name a few. THAT i can watch non-stop and with other audiences because i feel less of that emotional thingy compared to the other genres. Still, the end of a comedy series brings slight of whatever i mentioned above about that melancholic tinge. No escape.

So why torture myself and watch in the first place if i were to always feel sad about a series ending? - because i just love watching it too much to completely ignore it. I try to watch as little as i can to lessen that problem but that just gives me another problem. I am superbly outdated and i feel that in the field i am dwelling in, i can't let this go on forever as i constantly need to update myself.

Joy and sadness. Both in one bundle. What more could i ask for.

The Contemplations of Kai

Each time i stumble upon a great contribution to the world, i tell myself, when will it be my turn. When will i contribute something which can bring winds of change to the era i am living in.

Who am i in the first place to create such changes. i am but a small dust speck clinging to an ancient picture frame.

It aches me to think that way but i guess the 'greats' have gone through such periods as well. There might have been those not lucky enough but with world changing inspirations which never managed to see light. It is all a game of luck, of chance, doing the right thing at the right time and at the right place. Whether fate has it that i will chance upon such an opportunity, well i can't say for certain.

I have no idea what changes i might bring to the world in time to come. But i always imagine myself being a major contributer in future (No, i'm not trying to be cocky or arrogant here, just a gut feeling that it was hardwired into my DNA). I don't know what my calling for that is yet, be it on the spiritual or physical level. I have always harbored this uncontrollable desire within myself to want to make positive differences to the world. Maybe, subconsciously my taint has already touched somethings out there and is slowly bringing about the changes i have so spoken. But who knows? i just hope that i can find out what it is throughout the process of living my life.

Though i might never see myself reaching that state of greatness in this lifetime, i live contented to know that i tried every second i could. It might turn out to be just a beautiful dream, or with (lotsa) luck it might turn out to be something given form. Life is too short and there is too much to achieve. The drive in me just grows stronger each moment i know that time is running short for me. (*note* no i am not inflicted with fatal diseases whatsoever)

Some might think that i am too young to harbor such thoughts right now, that i still have a long way ahead of me to work things through. But that is not the case, since time passes by with each blink of an eye and waits for no man. Don't you realise that each time you look back, you find that it just passes by so quickly. When you are living it out, it feels like a never-ending drag at that moment.

I cannot stress enough that time is such a precious commodity to me that i feel that i just don't have enough of it. There are so many things i want to do, so many things i want to master in this lifetime. But knowing the restrains of time, and how untalented or ungifted i am, there is a maximum limit to how much i can garner. Knowledge is power, and i crave knowledge no matter how trivial or minute it is. It saddens me to know that i have to choose only certain pathways to take and not all.

"Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference."

~The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost

To conclude, maybe i'll just stay as that small little dust speck. Well, in a way it still contributes, though it is together with the collective mass of other dust specks. seldom things work on it's own alone and i guess i would then have to stay contented to know that i contributed as a mass. It ain't so bad then...

MY PANTIES GOT STOLEN *GASP*

....no, not mine exactly. I'm actually quoting the person who did the works below lmao. It was on his msn personal message and i couldn't resist XDDDD

fuuuuu~~~~naise view ladies~~~!!

I guess many of you will be familiar with these (in)famous works you saw at the main block of TOA, positioned at just the perfect spot below the staircase. You might be wondering what it was for and why was it there in the 1st place. Remember History of Art? where we had to exhibit our works. Difference was this was for History of Art 2. He chose dada-ism and some other stuff which i can recall and his idea was all about voyeurism and porn. Stephen likes his idea but says the execution is lacking to back it up.

So, after his presentation and stuff, when he wanted to retrieve it.....

IT GOT STOLEN!!!
LOLLERSKATES *GASP* ROFLCOPTER XDDDD

I think many people have already been eye-ing to steal it and might already be hanging it on their room ceilings now. Well since he still has the digital files it wouldn't hurt him much but still he spent money printing it and mounting it lol. Curses to whoever who stole it quicker than i did opps.

So anyway, this post is dedicated to him, so i'll provide a brief introduction of the said artist of these magnificent pieces of gems. He goes by the name of Daniel (no not the racist Daniel of class CD85) or better known as Nekonya as his pen name for the doujin group i'm in. He is my partner in crim.....arms who used to compete with each other in producing godly CGs (godly only applies to him). Currently he's taking the degree programme and entered TOA at the same intake as me.

He is the first fella whom i shared my lousy cg knowledge with yearssss back when i was starting out as well. It was funny how it all started. I saw his sketches in forums and i saw great potential within him. I was like "Wow, if this fella were to cg, the world will bow to him". Then i went and CG his sketches to prove that point and somehow we clicked after that.

Today, he proves me correct and is really a case of student surpassing a lousy master. So let this be motivational advice to any of you reading this. Do not be easily discouraged by the greatness of your masters (yes Xiao Qing, I'm referring to you), instead work hard and you are bound to surpass or be equals to them one day. But make sure after you have surpassed them, help to pull them up too and vice versa ya.

Anyhow, if you are reading this Neko, get that lazy ass off gaming and produce more gems like the ones you did for HOA2 pls. I miss my cg partner....

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unrelated piece of work which i just finished for my commissioner.


What is this tinging pain i feel within myself when i look at the work i have just done.
I think i hear the winds whispering *ronery....ronery...so ronery*
hmmm.....might be my imagination.

IT HAS ARRIVED!!!!

APRIL HAS ARRIVED!!!

SEM BREAK HAS ARRIVED!!!

KEI'S GALLERY ARTBOOK HAS ARRIVED!!!

YESSSSS!!!!! KEI ;A; FOREVER!!!

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Anyways i almost dieded this last week working on

for figures 3 final due on Thursday

and for perspective due on Saturday

I just love purple don't i? both versions look so purplish orzll
Bigger versions here and here

oh mai gawd working nonstop on 2 full scale cgs within a span of a couple of days is tiring and crazy. After figures class on Thursday i went home straight, kaputted, woke up for dinner and kaputted again till the next day. I woke up on Friday cursing myself for the work not done for Saturday.

From 10 am till 6 am on Friday, i sat in front of my computer working the piece for perspective, halfway almost giving up and just submitting the bare minimal requirement of an outline (at 10 pm). But something inside me wouldn't let that happen. It is the "Xiao Qing" effect part within me which tugged at me. Something flared, telling me that i should not shame my religion and God (Xiao Qing) and thus i pushed on. Coincidentally at 1 am i got words of wisdom and encouragement from the GOD XIAO QING and thus i persevered.

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If paid off.....though i wasn't really satisfied with both the works i did, but still i felt proud of the achievement.

I felt liberated after handing it in on Saturday 10.45 am...

I had wanted to head home to rest then but i made a tradition promise of a dota match at the end of each sem with my gang. (the one and only time i will play) And so headed off for lunch and later the CC. Game ended at around 4.30 pm. I got home at 5.30 pm.....

KO-ed straight on my bed. I vaguely remember my mum trying to wake me up for dinner but i swatted her off and continued my slumber. I woke up at 8.30 am the next morning...took breakfast.....kaputted again at 10 am till 1.30 pm.

Headed off to town with my parents and bro for lunch, and later picking up Kei's artbook at Kinokuniya. Got myself some damned expensive ImagineFX mags and another Warhammer 40k omnibus of the Blood Angels.

Signing off now, stay tune to more kai-ism posts later this week.