Whitewater rafting!

I guess I never post about anything related to physical activity.  So this might look pretty out of place here.

Michael and I went whitewater rafting with a big group of friends this weekend up at the American River.  Here's an animated gif of us going down one of the rapids.

I'm feeling pretty sore this morning, but it was an amazing time.  The scenery down on the river was gorgeous and the whole trip really gave me a good kick of inspiration for creative elements I can add to my comics and stories.

It really is important to go outside one's comfort zone every now and then and get some new stimulation.

Brick by Brick - Sustainable Creativity

Shared this with some friends a while ago, but definitely wanted to log it here.

Brick by Brick, by Stephen McCranie, is an excellent series of visual essays reflecting on sustainable creativity.  Gives very good practical advice about making plans, setting goals, and being creative continually with the goal to grow.  Love it!  It's very encouraging and inspiring.

Updates and Inspirations

I have not had much to post lately even though I've been keeping busy with projects.  Here are some updates.

"What's New in SAND 1.5" comic
So I can't actually post it here, but I essentially completed my very first comic.  We completed version 1.5 of SAND at work and were asked to give a presentation of it to the TD sup's and leads.  We put together an outline of the material we wanted to cover and then I decided to put it into a comic form!  It took a few late nights at home, but it turned out really well!  (It was received really well at the meeting and word spread about it.)  I'm quite proud of it and it works really well as a proof of concept for communicating very technical things in a visual, accessible way.  I've been wanting to do that for a while and have some other ideas on where to go next :)

Avatar: The Last Airbender - thumbnailing
I finished up thumbnailing episode 2, but since I started in the middle of it, I decided I should thumbnail the first part too.  So I wrapped back around and still have about a third of the episode to thumbnail.  Oyy... still learning a lot, but some days it's pretty monotonous.  Will scan them up soon.


20th Century Boys - thumbnailing
In case I haven't mentioned it before,  I've also been thumbnailing the pages of 20th Century Boys, currently my favorite manga.  I'm also learning a lot here and getting a better sense of pacing in the comic form and how much dialogue you can get away with and how to keep it interesting.  Progress has been slower on this though because I'm working much smaller and it feels even more tedious.  Will scan some up soon.

Project Apricot
I haven't made much more progress on thumbnailing and have spent more time working on the two studies above.  Though honestly I've probably been using the two studies above as excuses to not work on my own stuff some days.  I need to readjust my goals and motivate myself to just do it.  New goal:  thumbnail for an hour for Project Apricot every week; outline for an hour for Project Apricot every week.

Concept Art 
Haven't done much in that regard lately, but following the posts of my talented friend Patrick Jensen, I found and joined a great facebook group where an amazing collection of super talented concept artists from the industry post 30 minute paintings inspired by topics of the day.  Daily Spitpaint is simultaneously inspiring and makes me want to pick up my tablet, and also intimidating because I have so far to go and no time lately to follow down this new path.  New goal:  Do at least one daily spitpaint challenge a week.

Artists to watch
Since my last post, I've gone to APE (Alternative Press Expo) again and though we were rushed this year because of time constraints and other engagements, we saw a lot of amazing artists, and I've compiled a list of links to blogs and websites that I will frequent for inspiration.  Here's the list:

artist blogs

e t e l o i s

Rad's blog

d3capmode

gheehappy

Greg Peltz

Brittney Lee

Francis Vallejo | blog

Josh Kao's blog

Nathan Fowkes Art

LIBRA BEAR

Charicreatures.com :: The Art of Genevieve Tsai

Charicreatures Blog :: Genevieve Tsai

The Art of Eunjung June Kim

Tuna Bora

Scribbles For Sweetpea

cake-o

Keiko Murayama - Online Portfolio

Everyday Love – the art of Nidhi Chanani – Home

Everyday Love

LITTLE BITS

Nhu Q Diep - Home

Waffles the Cat | Home | Online Store Powered by Storenvy

Pickle - The little bird who doesn't Tweet!

Hediun's Atelier by hediun on Etsy

Thousand Skies

tonybuifanclub

♥Cindy Chen♥

Pin Illustration

Hula Bunny - Cute Animation - Dress Up Games - Sketches - Art

Berkeley Mews -

Animated Shorts
I've also been playing with the idea of making some shorts out of the Prairie Rabbits universe.  This has gotten me researching shorts and digging up my favorites again.  Here are a few:

Mirage (which I've shared before)

Mirage from Iker & Dana on Vimeo.

Oktapodi (Octopus love)
 

Paperman (currently not available online because it's being considered for an Oscar)

Carn (visually striking and haunting)

The Wedding (perfectly neurotic and just a bit poignant and just a bit profound)

I found some of these from a site called shortoftheweek.com.  Great collections of animated shorts.  I'm still making my way through.  A lot of good stuff here.
http://www.shortoftheweek.com/category/style/animation/
http://www.shortoftheweek.com/category/style/3d-animation/

Wow.  That's enough for now I guess.  Not much to show, but there's definitely a lot happening.

Concept Sketch Practice

I attended another art dev class at work, this time taught by the amazing concept artist Jason Sheier (see his blog here http://d3capmode.blogspot.com/).  And it was really incredible to both see his process and get his thoughts on constructing a compelling scene.  I am continually inspired and blown away by the amazing talent in our company.

So with some of his lessons still fresh in mind, I forced myself to sit down and try it out.  It's not great, but it's a start.  I'm practicing the thumbnailing technique he demonstrated.

And I painted it using the very first photoshop brush that I made!  It looks like this:

The next step is to work on varying the value.  Right now, the values are too similar and most of the image blends together.  Another thing to do is to add more elements so that there are more entry points into the image and also creating more paths for you eye.

On the topic of blogs of artists from work (in case I haven't posted it before), here are blogs from two very cool artists from work:
Rad Sechrist (who taught the outstanding comic class) - http://radfordsechrist.blogspot.com/
Priscilla Wong - http://etelois.blogspot.com/

Inspirations

I'm pretty behind posting inspirational things here, though I've continually been collecting them.

Here's an amazing trailer for Kairos (a French comic).

KAIROS Trailer from Studio La Cachette on Vimeo.
Here's a fantastic student animated short called Mirage.

Mirage from Iker & Dana on Vimeo.

And intricate laser-cut paper, layered together.

See more images of this here.

Calligraphy and Ting Tongs

It's another new year and we started it off with a trip to the Asian Art Museum to see their Chinese calligraphy exhibit.  It was just the momentum I needed as I'm deep in my planning for Project Apricot!  I'm super excited about Chinese calligraphy again and will soon bust out my supplies to start practicing again.  It'll be great.  Really.

I really like Chinese as a written art form.  The above is standard script, but I especially love the semi-cursive and cursive writing.

I also recently made some home-made Ding Dongs (which I named Ting Tongs) for a friend who was lamenting the demise of the Hostess company.  I followed this recipe and it came out pretty tasty (and no shady chemicals or preservatives).  It was definitely messy, but yummy and won thumbs up from everyone who tried one.

Tea cups

I have a great fondness for tea.  I love the history of it in Chinese culture, the richness of the tradition of proper brewing technique, (sometimes) the convenience of bagged tea, the warmth and the flavors.  It invokes thoughts of sitting by the window on a rainy day or early Saturday mornings of working on my latest projects.

Now and then I notice some pretty adorable tea cups as well.  Here I've collected images/links of some fun, modern teacups.

These are tea cups designs such that over time and repeated use, the stains from the tea would bring forth the hidden pattern in the tea cups, adding beauty and reversing the idea of wearing down a item's value.  (By Bethan Laura Wood.)

These mugs have hidden floral stamps on the bottom, and turns those pesky stain rings into lovely prints.  With just two different types of stamps, you can already do some pretty interesting things.  How fun!  (By Valeria Miglioli & Barnaby Barford)  You can order them here, but they are pricey!

In a similar vein, there's this maze-like saucer to trap coffee drips.

Here is a very modern and interesting take on the tea cup called The Skase.  (By Steve Watson) 

Here are some adorable hidden animal tea cups, which you can find on amazon.

I'll end this post with a modern, minimalistic cup by Molo Design.

Sanjay Patel's Fun Indian Exhibit at Asian Art Museum

I just had a really lovely birthday :)  I was jokingly told that I was past my prime this year, but it doesn't feel so bad so far.

Michael took me to the Asian Art Museum which still turns me into a giddy kid.  Aside from their usual exhibits, they had the Maharaja exhibit.  The highlight for me was the work by Sanjay Patel that was being displayed all over the museum.

Sanjay's extensive work illustrated many Hindu dieties as well as a Maharaja's parade, and more.  The works are visually fun, intricate, and exciting.  They are a bold, fun modern take on classical material, which he lovingly handles.

His work also reminds me of the visual storytelling of the Samurai Jack series.

Love it!

"Wallace and Gromit - Curse of the Were-Rabbit" notes

Just watched "Wallace and Gromit - Curse of the Were-Rabbit" and here are my notes after the page break.

I'm specifically looking at how each scene is organized and how it abides by the HIP structure (provided courtesy of Shawn).


Hook - start with an implicit question; the more energetic or primal (survival) the question is, the better
Intensity - ramp up the activity in the scene, drive it forward, bring the people to the edge of their seat
Prompt - end the scene with at least one question left unanswered; have the bad guy closing in with your hero backed into a corner; this drives people to read/watch more

packaging design blog - lovelypackage

I like all the eye candy on this blog.  It's nice to get some inspiration from here every once in a while :)

Lovely Package

cool animated gifs

These are some truly artistic animated gifs that quietly capture a moment.  (Editted because the blog where I first found the images, doesn't have them anymore.)

Animated Gifs That Savor a Passing Moment

macaron update

I made another batch of macarons this weekend with great success!

It took half a day to make a batch on my own.  I did half a batch of mango ganache filling and half batch of red bean paste filling.

The mango ones turned out perfect, but the red bean paste ganache didn't chill long enough and was runny at first.  The red bean ones were also on parchment paper instead of the silpat and also came out mis-shapened.

I had no problems with oven bake times.  I put the oven on 300 degrees and baked the biscuits in the top-middle rack about 16 minutes total.

The macarons were good but still a bit too sweet.  I think next time we can cut back on the powered sugar and compensate for the same amount of almond meal so the dry mass stays the same.

Oh and here's a recipe I found from a blog and it has pink bunny macarons.  Cute.  I will try to do some fun shapes again soon, but a bit differently.


Easter Bunny Macarons

Great article of an artist's perspective

How to steal like an artist and 9 other things nobody told me

Despite the title, it's not about stealing, but a reflection on what it means to create, and an analysis how an artist or a person is influenced to create.

I love this article because it solidifies a lot of what I've realized over the years.

• I don't have to forbid myself from creating art until "I'm good enough"
• I need to create stuff that I enjoy.  Only then can I make my own decisions and only then can I fully love the results.
• I can love and mimic another artist's style and work, but ultimately I need to find my own style and process.
• Be brave.  If I want to learn something, I will go learn it and try to do it.  Practice even if I'm disappointed with the results.  Especially when I'm disappointed with the results.
• Edit.  Each technique and tool I accumulate should just be something available to be used judiciously.  I should not apply every tool at every possible time.

I was glad to read that side hobbies and projects are important considering I have so many.  I love working and exploring.  It has really helped me learn more about myself over the years.

Victorian Star Wars and other coolness

This artist has some pretty interesting things in his gallery including, but not limited to, Victorian-style drawn Star Wars characters :)  Fun.

http://gregpeltz.blogspot.com/

Self-imposed screen writing homework

In an effort to understand how my favorite animated movies construct interesting scenes and plotting, I'm going to rewatch some of my favorite animated movies this weekend and write out how they're plotted.

Here's what's on my list of candidates so far:

• Lion King
• Castle in the Sky 
• Paprika
• Howl's Moving Castle
• Wallace and Gromit - Curse of the Wererabbit
• Wallace and Gromit - The Wrong Trousers
• Coraline

I'll post my findings when as I go through this list :)

elbooga's art and plushies

Found her on musthavecute.com.  She makes some really charming plushies and portaits, that's a much more refined version of some of the doodles I do.  So cute!  She's currently not taking anymore commissions, but may again in the future.

elbooga's deviantart site

Dan Meyer on math education

I watched this talk last year and instantly got absorbed into what he was saying about match education and the problems with it.  I love this talk.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/dan_meyer_math_curriculum_makeover.html

I finally emailed him today to thank him for this talk and he teaching work.  It really inspires me to get moving on the educational comic idea I've been brewing, but I don't know where to start!!

APE and inspiration

I went to the Alternative Press Expo of 2010 and it was great!  So many talented artists this year!


I got 2 prints.  One called "Cat Tetris" (I forget the artist, but I'll find his name) and another by Britney Lee.

I really love all of Britney's stuff, but Michael said this one reminded him of me, so I had to have it.  I find her work really inspiring (see more at her blog and her etsy site).  I would love to progress to her level with the way she uses colors, shapes and the way she tells stories using one single frames in time.

Some artist blogs for inspiration

http://francisvallejo.blogspot.com/
Has a video on inking techniques and some really nice gesture drawings.

http://josh-kao.blogspot.com/
Pretty cool sci-fi concept art.

http://nathanfowkes.blogspot.com/
Concept art and locational drawings.  Great drawings of rocky areas.

http://librabear.blogspot.com/
Love his character sketches.

inspiration for plushies

http://monsterfactory.net/monsters

I just added a new project under "sewing" and it's to make my own plushies.  Monster Factory has some cute, quirky and fun designs and totally great for inspiration.