Clothes: 040213

When I went back to the family home in the weekend, I forgot to bring any non-work clothes so I was pretty much stuck with super frilly ones that I only wear occasionally these days. I forgot how much fun it is to dress in lolita-inspired attire since I started to dress more conservatively. I feel like a child again~ haha. Apparently the 2nd of February was Twin Tail Day in Japan so I decided to celebrate a day late.

Headband: $3.50 from Japan store

Blouse: $15 from Paper Bag Princess

Skirt: $10 from Trademe (IT WAS A STEAL!)

And today, I decided to keep going with the girly co-ordinates. I don't think the low twin tail hairstyle is too bad either. Might use it more often ^-^ Oh youth~! uhoo.

Sailor Jacket: Aliexpress

Frilly Shorts: Wholesale-dress.net

Blouse: Kmart

Bow: Japan store

I drew pictures today. I wanna get faster~

Drawing is more fun now that the pressure is off! I knew it was more a hobby thing for me. Sometimes I wish I has realised this sooner xD Of course I still enjoy it, but if I had to do it all the time for both work purpose and hobby purpose I would probably tire of it. Whereas more logical stuff like web design seems to drive me more in terms of productivity.

Yeah, I did the Graphic Design degree. But after some thought, I am truly more of a left brain thinker as opposed to the right brain thinker a designer is assumed to be. I like being creative and designing stuff, but I also like rules and I like knowing exactly how things are supposed to work. 

If only it was so easy with other things that I struggle with... the rule thing anyways;; Some aspects of life don't have a very defined set of rules to follow, because its too complicated and varied. Well, ganbarimasu! Will keep trying ^-^

Also read Death Note again, and damn I can't get over how evil Light becomes as series progresses. SO EVIL! It's interesting to read from a villain's standpoint though haha. I think that was what drew me to the series the first time I read it. There was no other story like it before~

If you like my artwork, check out my art blog too over here!

Japan: Kingdom of Characters Exhibition

Went to the Japan: Kingdom of Characters Exhibition at the Gus Fisher Gallery on Shortland St, Auckland.  The exhibition is a showcase of the impact of characters, as they are integrated into Japanese society.  It is not uncommon for both children and adults to own something that pertains to the appreciation of characters.  It seems that this big boom for the love of characters began at the end of World War II, just when comic and animation also became increasingly popular in the Western world as well.  They say that the group that has been hit with most of this impact is the Japanese high school girl, and in the exhibition an example of a girl's room is presented.  Hmm, well it has a lot of pink and kitties that's for sure ^^

I want to make my room super cute too!  Started a few weeks ago with a bunch of posters that I acquired from the years of purchases from Doujin Overload and Armageddon.  Just some more renovation and can be done ohoho.

They also have spotlighted ordinary people of different dynamics and their experiences with this character culture.  I found it very cute that this middle aged man always dreamed of having a Kamen Rider belt when he was a young boy so when he could afford to buy it for himself as a man, he took the opportunity haha.  And there's the high school girls with accessories dangled excessively on their cellphones.  Haha, I think I have seen those around.  I have also had the temptation to do this myself, but then again its a bit impractical. All for sake of super cuteness! >u<

Go check out Japan: Kingdom of Characters in the Gus Fisher Gallery at 74 Shortland Street!

It runs from the 9th January to the 1st of February 2013~  More details about opening times here.

The grand opening will be this Friday at 5.30pm!

Also had an art jam with Keito this afternoon.  It's been a while since I drew pictures, and even better to draw with a friend.

Well, time for dinner now!  

Pasta salad tonight >u<

Virtual Learning

I am so glad I subscribed to Lynda.com!  It took me a while to decide whether or not to fork out US$25 for a month of this online service, because there are a lot of free resources out there.  The main reason I was finally seriously considering the purchase was cos we finally had an ample amount of bandwidth to be able to withstand the streaming usage of the site.  I watched a few of the free videos they had available every now and then, including the story of how the whole business started up, as well as the beginning of the Simone Legno documentary and they were really good.  It looks like the people at Lynda.com really work hard on bringing quality, comprehensive content to its users.  Each course is also split into categories and sub-categories, so you don't have to watch the whole course at once.

(Applying Legno's workflow to my own sketch)

Gesture Drawing

Started working through Glen Vilppu's Drawing Manual last week!  I've only read the first two exercises so far, but I can already see some results.  He warned us in his written word that people may be tempted to skip all those basic steps that he teaches because it looks so easy and pointless, but it honestly helps.  If only I had been patient earlier instead of flipping through the pages, and go "pshh that seems easy enough".  It was good to finally sit down and go through the book.  I find when I rewrite notes from books into shorter form, I tend to grasp the information better and am discouraged to just skim through parts that might be important.

The first exercise was the jot down the overall gesture line of the body, arms and legs.  Not necessarily copying the outer shape of the body but feeling the movement and letting your pencil capture that shape.

The second exercise was to play around with spheres, and how different the lines can communicate to the person looking at an image depending on how its drawn.  Just the way you place a line can determine whether the shape is in front, behind or twisted in relation to another shape.  I like how I can get a more logical take on drawing.

I guess I would usually depend on my artistic instinct (whatever I have anyways), but I feel that starting to learn the fundamentals properly is allowing me to make sense of it all.  Part of me thinks that I should have focussed on this earlier, but better late than never right?

Okies, gotta keep trucking with these gestures from posemaniacs everyday!