Wrapping up 2011

 

2011 was a very challenging year for me. A lot of things happened that forced me somewhat out of my comfort zone. Somehow I think I responded to the challenge positively and sometimes a bit negatively. But I never bitched about it and somehow that made me proud. I handled things the way a real man should!

Fast forward today and I'm quite content at where I stand now. And if ever I have a time machine, I won't change a thing. And if ever alternate timelines exist, I won't wonder what happened to all those other timelines.

And at that note, I bit farewell to you 2011. We had a good run and though you always managed to get a jump at me and kick me in the ass, we had fun.

Cheers to you 2011! You made me change my perspective to a lot of things!

Hello to you 2012!

Happy Holidays!

Some of the things I got this December. I think I got mostly what was on my imaginary lists and some more.
I got most of the things here as gifts from family and friends. A great addition to my ever growing mini-Library of sorts.

Now, the biggest surprise here is the whole set of A Song of Ice and Fire. I wasn't really expecting to receive this. And the Annotated Brothers Grimm is really quite fancy too. Just look at that cover.
Now if only I could find the time to actually read through all this.

Anyway, Happy Holidays folks. I hope you had a lovely holiday as much as I did.
Heres to 2012!
Cheers!

Technoteapot

Almost a month ago, we got invited to a goth/steampunk-inspired tea party hosted by Spidersilk Productions. Sensing an opportunity to promote ourselves, we gave it a go. It was held December 8-10 at LRI Design Plaza. The place was really good, quite fancy, I should say. The perfect place for those artsy people who want an intimate setting to their galleries.

Here are some of the photos from the event. To see more just click here.

This is the first art exhibit, in which we got invited to participate. It actually felt nice that we are somehow getting recognized, slowly but surely, I guess. Here's hoping that we get to participate to more art exhibit in the future. In the mean time, here is the piece I made just for the event.

It was supposed to be somewhat a steampunk-inspired Astroboy fanart, but people didn't recognize it and some actually thought it was more like a lone-ranger-inspired piece. So, yea I failed there.

I actually thought about posting images of the progress of how I made this piece, but nobody actually read this blog anyway, so meh. Maybe some other time. When I actually have people that really follows this blog.

Komikon

was awesome.




I sold my remaining copies of my previous indie comics.

 

I also met some awesome artists. Everything turned out fine.

See you again on summer, I guess.

Tintiiin!

I haven't read a lot of the published comic books of this guy. But I did watch the tv series when I was a kid. So, a little introduction to the folks who don't know who this guy is.

The Adventures of Tintin (Les Aventures de Tintin) is a series of classic comic books created by the French-Belgian artist Georges Rémi (1907–1983), who wrote under the pen name of Hergé. The series is one of the most popular European comics of the 20th century, with translations published in more than 80 languages and more than 350 million copies of the books sold to date. Its popularity around the world has been attributed to its "universal appeal" and its ability to transcend "time, language and culture."

Tintin is a young reporter, and Hergé uses this to present the character in a number of adventures which were contemporary with the period in which he was working, most notably, the Bolshevik uprising in Russia and World War II, and sometimes even prescient, as in the case of the moon landings.

I got that from Wikipedia, for more info on Tintin just read it here

Now that we're done with introductions, so here's my take on Tintin for our artjam this week. Yea I know that there are a lot of things wrong here, especially the running pose that is basically out of whack, but hey the important thing is the idea, right?
My idea for my Tintin is to mix the 60's spy era with Japan's giant robot era. Yea sorry for the crappy robot, but you folks get it, right? Plus throw in a funky soundtrack like Redline's Lynchman theme and you have a funky version of Tintin with giant robots and sci-fi gadgets.


TINTIIIIIN!

“Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

~Rest in peace Mr. Jobs

Oh wait.. I take that back. 2011, you suck!

So far..

Ber-months are in. That means only a quarter of the year left before I'll be needing a new calendar.
Judging from the artworks I produced over the course of nine months, I think its safe to say that this year produced some of my most uninspired works. Maybe it was the change of pace or the change in interests that brought this, but I think the focus is still there and the change in art style is a breathe of fresh air. Also the year is starting to get a little more interesting, particularly September brought a couple of awesome stuffs on the table that made the first six grueling months bearable, and judging from experience over the past few years I think its safe to say that something good always happens in September. So far, I'm seeing the results of the change in interests and influences. I'm currently preparing for something for the summer and I'm feeling particularly confident about it. I do hope that all goes well.


 ~Quarter year review

Tumblr!

I made a tumblr account so I can have a site where I can post photos I found that I felt I like.

tumblr

Megaman Tribute

 

My book copy just arrived, and it looks great. My artwork looks waaay better printed than my digital file.

I also noticed that my blog site is listed on the book. Looks like I need to pimp this place up better, this is where the people who got the book would be going.

Brick!

Just rewatched Brick. Brendan is really badass. JGL gave a really awesome performance.
So heres a fanart of Brendan.

 

I'll try and ink this after I reconfigure some of the settings I lost. I lost my HD from overheat last month and I just recently replaced it.

To those who don't know what Brick is, here is what wikipedia has to say: Brick (film)

Tree Planting

Just some photos from our tree planting activity last July 30. Just for the sake of updating this blog.
Some more shots here.

Rock it like yesterday

My piece for Udon's Megaman tribute book.

MEGA MAN TRIBUTE LIMITED EDITION HARDCOVER

-the book is premiering at the San Diego Comic-con at the UDON booth (#5037), July 20-24

-for fans not attending the show, you can preorder the book at UDONstore.com (http://www.udonstore.com/Mega-Man-Tribute-HC-Udon-Store-Exclusive-p/mega-man-tribute-exclusive-hc.htm )

 

MEGA MAN TRIBUTE SOFTCOVER

-          The standard softcover edition is also available for preorder on amazon.com (http://www.amazon.com/dp/1926778308?tag=udoent-20&camp=14573&creative=327641&linkCode=as1&creativeASIN=1926778308&adid=0DS0GBZB0YWZK4H62YZM& )

Pico de Loro Expedition

Pico de Loro expedition last saturday.

more pics here

Challenge Accepted: Scooby gang redesign

 

I got challenged by a friend to redesign the Scooby-Doo show characters.

So, here's my version of the Scooby gang. In my version, Shag is somewhat a brilliant but lazy kind of character. Street-smart but still a coward and an expert at hiding. Velma is the bookwork/techie character. Fred is the leader. The suave, buff character. Daphne is somewhat a femme-fatale. And Scooby is Scooby.

If this was a show I want it to be funky and retro. Like a Lupin/PCP-esque, sci-fi, mystery-solving kind of show.

The Fear that came from Mars

 

Finally done with this one. I'm lagging behind on our weekly artjams.

Here is my piece for our sci-fi jam. I tried to give it a retro sci-fi movie poster kind of flavor, somewhat The Thing-film poster inspired, with the scientist exploring the arctic and discovering a horror hidden in the treacherous place. Yea something like that.

I just noticed that I haven't really drawn females in a very long time. So, here is a quick study.

 

This was supposed to be my piece for this week's sci-fi artjam. But halfway through, I got tired of it, it sort of looks crappy for me. So, yeah, maybe I'll finish this someday or permanently scrap it. But either way, I guess this is better than nothing for this week.

The Magnificent Steampunked Chair

 

Finally done with this one. This is my Mignola-inspired steampunk piece.

Carl Sullivan

 

This week's artjam was supposed to be a sci-fi/noir themed one, I failed on the sci-fi part. Nothing sci-fi can be seen in this work, but I still had lots of fun in this piece. This is the first time I've done a full-colored work in a very long time. Wanted to try something different this time and just went all out with it.

Monkey King

Our artjam for the week. Monkey king from the journey to the west. For my version of the monkey king I decided to give it a little twist and focus on the journey part and make it MadMax-barren-wasteland-dystopian-future style kind of genre with the dragon steed being a fast retro-dystopian-future kind of ride. So here you go, this is my monkey king, in my version he's called the king of the highroad.

 

 

Just an update on the steampunk englishman earlier. Still a work in progress. Playing with mr. Mignola's style. What to ink and what to leave out is giving me headaches. Arrgh.

Koi Tiger

 

One piece has a lot of awesome fishman characters.

My buddies and I decided to do an artjam of our very own fishman character.

Heres mine. He's Koi Tiger. A fishman based on a koi fish. A former slave, a master marksman, and an awesome mechanic. He loves the high seas and adventures to the unknown.

I had a lot of fun with this guy. Played a lot with his tattoo patterns.

Manila!

 

 Venturing the streets of Manila. Excerpts from my venture log for another time.

More shots here.

Care for a drink, chap?

 

Work in progress. I'll stop for now. Can't figure out what to do with the effin' chair.

 

 

Artjam with Borg.

 

A little something for my blog.

Rock it like yesterday

 

I got selected for the Udon's Megaman Tribute artbook. Here is a preview for my entry for the book.

 

 

more random randomness from work.

 

Something quick from work. Used mouse. Heisenberg; the awesome man from Breaking Bad.

@ Majayjay, Laguna

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A work in progress

Warming up

 

Some warm up sketches for the day. The second one got a little wild. And I'm liking it. Guess I'll color it. It's gonna be fun.

Redesigning and Renaming

I've been contemplating of renaming and redesigning my blog. I want to rename it with something more appropriate. "the Fishpond" was what I came up with. I think it's appropriate because I, most of the time, go by the name Koi. And since this is the place where I would like to pool my ideas, I think it really is appropriate.

 

I'm going to consider this my first project. I want to make a really cool illustration for my blog. And since I'm going to take things slow this time, I'm going to document my progress here. 

Captain’s Log:

2nd of April 7, 2011, 0500
Our navigator, Bubba, has located a suitable land formation for provisioning. We will land immediately and trek the land formation, despite the weather.

2nd of April 7, 2011, 0537
At the base of the land formation, we were greeted by its guardian. An old woman, she asked for some donations, as she called it, before we could proceed with our journey. We each gave her 50 pieces of eights. She asked if we would like to take a horse along our journey for 300 pieces of gold. We refused her offer. It would later prove to be a fatal mistake.

2nd of April 7, 2011, 0723   
One of my crew mates is down; our first officer Euls said he’s exhibiting symptoms of an unknown parasitic infection, from the plants or from the insects. That old lady, she tricked us.

2nd of April 7, 2011, 0753
We met a native boy along the way atop the mountain. He offered us help by carrying our bags on his horse. We accepted his offer. I don’t know if I could trust him, but our heavy bags are killing our backs.

2nd of April 7, 2011, 0920
Hours of walking through the treacherous jungle, we were covered with sweat, filth and dirt. We managed to reach the camp site, where we were greeted by an old man. He was smiling. I don’t like the look of his smile. He may be plotting something. Better watch out.

2nd of April 7, 2011, 0955
After setting up camp, we decided to explore the place some more. I took our first officer, Euls, along with our navigator, Bubba, and our two marksmen, Junpo and Je. Going down camp, we hold onto roots from the large trees that covers the whole place.  Our descend was slow, one false step would make us lose our balance; one false step could mean agony for the body, a fall this high would render us incapacitated.

2nd of April 7, 2011, 1028
The land is filled with unknown plant species, animal life that have yet been laid eyes upon; we took data of our discoveries.  I can guarantee it will be a valuable resource for our future generations.

2nd of April 7, 2011, 1839
Temperature is dropping steadily as the night draws near. We decided to make fire out of the woods we collected along the way.  As the darkness crept we heard something amongst the bushes. A sound that could take the life of a sissy man lost in the jungle. Something was circling our camp. I decided to go track it myself, even if it means accidentally shooting one of my crew mate named Berting.

3rd of April 7, 2011, 0708
We left camp with fewer provisions than expected. The old man who earlier greeted us when we first arrived was waving goodbye while still smiling and making a faint sound; I could only make out the faint hee-heeee-heeeeeey.  We haven’t found any treasure, but found something more meaningful than any treasure, discovery or provision we could find. We found peace, for the weary soul.

 

Journals from our trek. Of course, heavily fictionalized to quench my exploration thirst.

Into the wild

 

@Mt. Famy; Siniloan, Laguna

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What's the story, Morning Glory?

 

There are many things that I would like to say to you, I don't know how 

-Wonderwall; Oasis

Fun under the sun

@ UP Diliman. Lots of folks go there early in the morning to jog and have fun.
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