the moth bar

Early in the morning, Cliff wipes off the dust on a mug.

He probably keeps the cleanest down-town bar in the city. It looks kind of classy at this hour, but at night it's just like any other bar with the darkness, the loudness, and the neon and colored lights. Cliff doesn't own the place, but the owner highly prizes him as one of the best bartenders he's got.

The boss is a lepidopterist (biologist specializing in moths and butterflies) which is where the bar name comes from.

spiral bound pad

These are some of the first sketches during the development of Moth and Vaitea. Moth hasn't changed around much although his facial features waver too much for my liking between drawings (not counting different expressions which call for variation). Vaitea was a tough one for me because I really liked the first sketch I ever made of her (not shown here). I tried to replicate that look in later drawings without having a reference but it didn't look right... usually I'm pretty good with remembering my characters' designs but she eluded me. I finally pulled that first sketch out and made a good enough copy of it in my sketch book... the full body drawing of her next to the heads is that sketch. The heads there are me experimenting with different looks.

I want to stay true to the idea that Vaitea doesn't have a stereo-typical comic-book female body... but she is still pretty. I have to try hard to keep her proportions together in every pose... its tough because its so easy to draw the generic and proportional female when sketching quickly. She has larger hips and legs, but they are short not long and thin. She doesn't have a large chest. She has to have just the right head size- otherwise she'll look like a kid. I'm still getting a feel for her eyes and nose, on how large or small to make them.


Hope you guys liked the drawings. I feel pretty good about their designs but their "souls" need to develop!

MOTH

This is Moth, the lead character of some amorphous story I'm slowly creating. His real name is Cliff. He constantly carries around a notepad, a pencil, and a pen. He was a bartender but now he's wrapped up in other things... like adventures and stuff.

I believe it's really important to get a personal project going even though my job may encompass most of my weekday hours. Even though I may get less sleep each night... I think it's that important. I talked to an awesome co-worker today, Mike, who has been in the comic industry for years and has also worked in 2d animation, and other graphic design work. He confirmed today my feelings on this so that's really encouraging... my feelings that I really need to just get my work out on the web, a project- I gotta tell my own story. It's amazing how fast business can move through the net, but first I have to create the art for my business which is a slow process. My dear friend Christine has been a big inspiration on this already, as she has made her way creating her own projects, seeing them through to completion. I am truly in the infant stages of my own first story I'm planning to put entirely online, but I will do it! Here on this blog as well as on my deviantart, I'll gradually build it up. Please wish me the best.


In other news, for those of you who are thinking, "We never saw your thesis- where is it?!"

I have a website now! It's very... very... VERY simple and just starting off but you may view my thesis there in the "story" section. Check it out- lemme know what you think!

REDCHIMPANZEE.com <--my website

I finished putting together a 2d character design portfolio so I'm pretty happy about that, and now on to all the other things I have to do... oh boy. The Earthworm Jim I drew was for one of my instructors who has been super kind and supportive of me. I still think its not much in showing my thanks but I hope he likes it! The other two are just cropped from larger pages with more characters for my portfolio.

I would like to say that Gurihiru is still inspiring and influencing me so much. I don't know where I would be without their great artworks. So, these works were inspired by them as well as others... I have been using blue and red color pencils because of Sasaki, the pencil and ink artist. I know traditional animators have been doing that for a long time, but it's new for me and I love it. Thank you Gurihiru~!

NY Comic Con

OK- so my super late NY comic con report! Time to sound geeky. It was super awesome!!! I enjoyed it a lot and want to go again next year. I definitely got worn out by the second day but everything I did on the first made it more than worth it to me. I got to see a number of artists I admire, for instance I got to meet "Cheeks" in person and even get a Robin head sketch! He is a really friendly guy, it helped me feel less nervous meeting one of my big art-role models, haha.

I also could've gotten an autograph from Jim Lee but I wanted to try getting a sketch and the time I saw him it was autographs only... so I tried for the next day but didn't see him again. :( I even brought my Hush book to sign- ah man!

I bought two artbooks and many cool comic books; some I knew of and others I am new to like "Atomic Robo"! With all the stuff I have to do I haven't gotten to read them yet (for shame!) but I know they will all be great. I want to sit back and enjoy them once all my work is done.

The creators of Avatar were there too! I saw special concept art, preview trailers, and clips of the upcoming episodes, it was crazy... fangirls were screaming there heads off. I now have an Avatar poster on my wall signed by Bryan and Mike!

Next time I would like to have more energy to do more things, like spend more time in the artist alley~ and to get more autographs I missed! I look forward to next year.

spag het ti

Today was my first time to the Central Park Zoo. It's pretty neat and I find it very beautiful. It's small but after all it's a zoo within a park, within Manhattan, so it's a fine size. I saw most of the animals and especially liked the tamarin monkeys and polar bears, although no snow monkeys were showing (they were cleaning the area). I also finally saw red pandas in person- finally! The only thing was... they were sleeping. They are mostly nocturnal so its understandable, and they were still super cute... got two sketches of them.

After that, I tossed a frisbee around with Will (the frisbee sensei!) in the park itself. The weather was so awesome.

Then my roomate and I spontaneously made lasagna! Yummeh!

Yesterday, I got "Professor Layton" for DS. The art direction is really charming, and totally my kind of game. I like the little animated cut scenes and the puzzles are fun... I just wish I was smarter.

It's great to be at this stage in senior year... not much time left... I make it sound like summer vacation has broken loose but don't get me wrong, I'm totally anxious about a ton of different things and got a large bundle of work I have to finish which is unsettling (demo reels, polished finalized thesis, gallery exhibit preparations, small concept art stuff... planning my future...).

That term, "THE FUTURE" has never felt closer... truly like a door a few paces ahead waiting to be opened. I gotta get myself in order.

The image above is a random doodle. I wanted to try using a western theme but amping the colors... the result is a spaghetti sauce looking piece.

check point save

Thesis was outputted to DV tape on Monday and that went well all things considered- a huge hurdle has been made! For those of you who are saying, "outputDVwha?", basically a finished version was handed in that is to be shown to faculty, classmates, and industry reps at the first screening. This is for successful graduation. In the meantime, a second more polished version of thesis will be worked on and then I hope to once and for all really feel done, posting it online and all that jazz. Wooo! I feel bad for not showing you guys any little animation previews or render previews along the way, but I needed to focus 100% on getting done without much distraction... and it worked! Now I can sorta get back to all those internety things- yay! Plus, I just felt I wouldn't do justice to the short film unless I could show it in it's entirety (didn't wanna give anything away ;P ). So, gotta wait a bit longer, and work just that extra bit... then everything will be dandy!

Oh, and the picture above is a doodle I just made since I feel awkward posting only text here. Even robots make art...?!

Have fun!

This is mainly for you guys who don't know about my personal art. Plus, I thought I would mix it up a bit and post something other than thesis work (but I am still working on that of course, you better believe it!). Here are some artworks I've done in 2007 and some now in 2008. You can find these artworks and others I've done on my deviantart page here: gingashi.deviantart.com













Lemme know what you think~ I hope you guys like it!