Betty Kwong's Art Blog

Best Friends

2012-02-18T13:28:00.000-08:00

A fun little speed paint! I used this lovely photo as a background reference.

Reviving With a Cherry on Top

2012-02-12T01:30:00.000-08:00

I am reviving my webcomic "With a Cherry on Top" after a long hiatus due to my grad film, work and portfolio. I'm drawing the pages in digital format now and doing character profile revisions (and still going!). Top two pages are the first digital pages that I experimented with (page 28 and 29). This year, I plan to make a website for the comic and continue drawing and creating new content for it when I can. I'm excited!

Campfire Tales

2012-01-10T00:07:00.000-08:00

I had been working at Rival Schools's team on a flash game and part of it has been released (yes there is more to come)! Check it out on Knowledge Kid's website! The game we worked on are Campfire Tales and Forest Melodies. Under directions from the Creative Director, Executive Director and Senior Interactive Developer, I was responsible for illustrating, animating and designing graphic assets for the game along side with another contractor, Jerry, who also had the same role as I did. He has more experience so he taught me a lot of new flash techniques which was pretty awesome! I'm looking forward to learning more flash!

This project was my first experience in a studio setting and I really enjoyed it! Rival Schools is always positive and passionate about the work they do. I look forward to creating and working on more challenging projects in a team environment. :)

Layout Change

2011-12-11T02:25:00.000-08:00

I wanted to change my layout for my blog and drew a new header for fun! The style and colouring is inspired by Sam Miller's work. I love his vibrant colours and shapes!

Edit (Feb 11, 2012) Another new header!

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword!

2011-11-21T23:11:00.000-08:00

Illustrator Doodles

2011-11-17T22:06:00.000-08:00

Rana! My friend Nemuri's character!

Drawing for my friend Jenny's Birthday!

Updated self-portrait done in illustrator for fun!

Pokemon/Digimon Inspired Designs

2011-11-14T22:42:00.000-08:00

These are some test concepts (sketched in October) that was done for a project that wanted to use a pokemon/digimon style. I had to design an electric wolf, fire dragon and a water serpent.

A Cake for Cherry (My First Short Film) + OST Released!

2011-11-08T14:00:00.000-08:00

I decided to release my graduation film online! I'm really excited for its release. If you can spare a couple of minutes watching it, please do! I hope you will enjoy! Thank you so much!

Along with the release of my film is it's original soundtrack! If you enjoyed the music from my film, you can download tracks composed by flashygoodness! (psss, it also includes amazing 8-bit remixes of all the songs).

Thank you everyone for your support! It truly means a lot. I hope to make more short films in the future!

Late Night Doodling

2011-10-04T01:00:00.000-07:00

Been wanting to change my blog header for a while now. Working on rendering this image!

I also randomly ended up doing some super quick sketches of cats tonight hahaa!

Nostalgic Sketches

2011-09-25T23:15:00.000-07:00

My brother got Star Fox 64 on the 3DS and playing it makes me want to draw the characters ;-;

I use to play this game all the time, hahaa!

Same with this game! I use to play it non-stop when I was little (and drew the characters all the time XD) It was fun revisiting these characters. I had not drawn them since I was in elementary school.

Character Heads

2011-09-24T17:05:00.000-07:00

Some fun doodling on the weekend!

I'm alive!!!

2011-09-24T11:15:00.000-07:00

Some character doodles that I did in my free time.

This is a birthday present I drew for my friend Jenna in August. Now that I look back at it, her arms is really long! LOL! Need to watch out for that next time. It's fun drawing caricatures. Wish I had more time to work on the drawing. Spent a couple hours on this one.

This was drawn for my friend Jenny's Birthday. It was drawn in June (a super belated birthday present because of grad film!)

I'm thinking of doing some silhouettes of character heads, backgrounds and robot designs this weekend! Looking forward to learning more! :D

Also, I've been really busy working at Rival Schools's studio for the month. I've been designing characters, backgrounds, props and storyboarding and even animated a little in flash. I learned A LOT and it was a great experience. My co-workers are all super fun and I always look forward to going to work! My contract is ending (last day is on Monday) so I'm trying to find work at local studios (I'm gonna miss Rival Schools :( ). I spent a couple months after school just building a portfolio to apply to studios. I hope for the best!

BANG BANG BANG

2011-09-07T22:49:00.001-07:00

Some gun designs :D

Fire, Water, Earth Animals/Monsters

2011-08-27T22:51:00.000-07:00

Life Drawing Practice

2011-07-24T14:38:00.000-07:00

With a Cherry on Top: Elf House Designs

2011-07-21T22:47:00.000-07:00

Various small houses and brainstorming/process :) They were fun to design!

Cups and Pots

2011-07-19T23:23:00.000-07:00

Simple and fun! Lots of shapes to play with :)

2011-07-17T15:51:00.000-07:00

I am le tired @____@

A Cake for Cherry Concepts

2011-07-13T20:05:00.000-07:00

Vancouver Opera 2011 Manga: Romeo et Juliette

2011-07-12T14:20:00.000-07:00

Roughs

Rough Colours

Coloured

Final with Text! Text added in by Jerry Cai and Rival Schools' Creative Director, Roy Husada!

It is also up on the Vancouver Opera Website. Go check out the other VanOpera comics! :)

Layout Speedpaint02

2011-07-05T14:57:00.000-07:00

Another background speedpaint I did this afternoon! It is related to the background in the previous post. These are fun! :) Spent around 2-3 hours on this one. Need to practice practice practice!

edit (July 14, 2011) Another one! :)

Layout Speedpaint

2011-07-04T22:20:00.000-07:00

I've never actually done a speed paint of a background before, so this was quite an experience. I think I designed it too complicated, but it's okay, I learned a lot. Gotta draw more backgrounds!

Here are the earlier stages of this background.

It's July!

2011-07-03T10:44:00.000-07:00

Fun character designs based on birds! Can you guess what birds their designs are inspired by?

Sketch of designs above

Design wip for DeeDee!

A Dragon I designed and sketched a while ago in my sketchbook and I decided to clean it up and experiment with different colour combinations!

Some life drawing and caricatures I drew when me and my friends went to hang out at Kafka's! I only ended up drawing one page 'cause I drank coffee and was dizzy the whole day x_x

Having fun with Character Designs!

2011-06-27T22:37:00.000-07:00

Character Design process! It's a Sheep Herder. The design is inspired by a photo I saw a while ago on tumblr. But I never did save it.. but I sketched it out in my sketchbook. I mixed elements and played around with the design and this was the result!

Bird Designs

2011-06-26T23:07:00.001-07:00

This weekend I did some bird designs! It was loads of fun and I learned a lot! :D

June Update!

2011-06-22T01:08:00.000-07:00

Hey guys! It's been a while. I finally finished my Vancouver Opera comic (will post it up when it is up on the Vancouver Opera website!). After, I took a couple days of break and doodled a lot!

Here is a sketchdump!

I was browsing through my photobucket account tonight, giggling at my old art and I found this!:

I totally forgot about the existence of this concept art I drew for fun in Advance Animation class. Kinda glad I came across it on my photobucket!

Been working on drawings lately (all WIP!):

Some Revisions on character sheets for my film!

I noticed I don't have any dynamic backgrounds and I don't draw many backgrounds so I decided to draw a well polished one to practice. Still need to render it!

I'm also currently designing a small set of characters. Here's a little preview.

I'm having so much fun. I love drawing!

Demo Reel 2011

2011-05-31T00:02:00.000-07:00

I finally made a demo reel! I wish it was better, but this is what I have so far. I had a lot of my grad film on there originally, but I cut it down a lot. I wish I could include more of it 'cause some of my best animation is in my film. Ah well :( I still have lots and lots to learn!

Thanks to Daryl-Lynn and Sitji for giving me feedback! And thanks to erikochan for suggesting the song (The Bicycles - Oh no, it's love!) to go along with my reel!

Any other suggestions and comments are welcomed as well!

My Display at Emily Carr Degree Exhibition 2011!

2011-05-13T11:20:00.000-07:00

My Display Shelf! -Photo taken by my dad! :)

My progress book, guestbook, business cards and little mini cake cards!

My poster framed up!

Close up of my progress book and guestbook!

Close up of my Business Cards and Cake Cards!

From May 8-May 22, 2011 The Emily Carr University Degree Exhibition is going on! Celebrating the class of 2011! Animation Grads displays are located in room 241! I encourage you guys to take a look :D

Also, next Saturday is our External Grad Show! I highly recommend you guys to come if you live in the Vancouver Area! There is food, you can meet all the Emily Carr Animation Graduates and watch our films in a super nice theatre! :)

I handed in my film and got a new domain!

2011-04-30T02:00:00.000-07:00

Congrats to everyone who finished their film! I handed in my film this afternoon (well technically yesterday afternoon). The feeling of finishing up a film is really weird. I feel accomplished and empty, but at the same time, I still feel like there are many things that I can do to improve the film. But what is done is done. I have to move on to new projects. I guess what matters is that I tried my best--though it still can be better! I will be looking forward to making more films in the future. Making this film was defiantly an eye-opening experience, especially since this is my very first. I am planning to submit it to a few film festivals--why miss this opportunity?! Thank you to all my friends and everyone for the support and encouragement. I don't think I would've made it without you guys. :)

Now I'm looking forward to helping out at the Internal Grad show and the External Grad show! Come visit us if you can!

Finally, I have time to design a portfolio website! I bought a new domain name

http://www.bettykwong.com

Site is new and under construction. I have a layout in mind, but I need to figure out how to do CSS/html and all that jazz. I have some basic experience in website building (and would love to learn more!) so hopefully it will go okay. Special thanks to Cari for hosting my site and helping me!

I also made some changes to my blogspot url:
Instead of using my chinese name: yuen-kwong.blogspot.com
I switched my blogspot to betty-kwong.blogspot.com because that is the name that everyone calls me or knows me by. I should have done it sooner! Ah-well.

Poster and Trailer!

2011-04-08T01:12:00.000-07:00

I finally finished my poster! It took me several days to polish it. I just need to figure out where to put my title card and my name. I think I can make use of the perspective with the title and name. Title (on the top left) and Name (bottom right).

aannnddd what everyone has been waiting for, the trailer! Special thanks to my composer (flashygoodness) and sound designer (Trevor Shultz) for helping me with the music and sound!! And of course my voice actor (Salem "Samuel" Saif) for voicing Bendi! :)

A Cake for Cherry: The First Slice from Betty Kwong on Vimeo.

Right now, I'm working on compositing a time-lock reel this weekend, working on my presskit and then worrying about minor animation revisions -colours, shadows, bgs, etc- and finishing off the sound mix for the film. POST PRODUCTION MADNESS!!!!

and yesterday, I totally freaked out when I found out we had to render our film at 23.976fps while I've been working and rendering at 24fps =^=;; I'm just afraid it will unsync the music when I render it. Good thing it is an insignificant difference... hopefully it'll work out in the end! Sometimes, I think I worry way too much. Gah!!

3 more weeks left!! :(

Awesome Week and Credits Brainstorm

2011-03-26T15:34:00.000-07:00

This week was a blast! I fixed my freezing computer problem, flashygoodness finished the draft of the sad music for my film (now there is only the ending music left!!), I composite an updated reel with all my animation in it for my sound designer (aftereffects didn't crash at all which made me very happy), and it gets even better:

Miki drew a super cute picture of Bendi TvT aaaa Thank you Miki!!

And before that... this comes in the post!! It is from Korune aaaaaaaaa ;A; ahhh such a surprise!!! Thank you soooo much I've been eyeing on this sc arf for a while during Christmas Break. Totally made my day ;v; Thank you sooo much! I'm so grateful!

Yesterday night I did a doodling livestream and two of my friends happen to visit me in the stream and I drew both of their characters!

Miki's character Alyssia and Judy's characters Rel and Fugue! I had so much fun drawing them!

As for the credits of my film, I decided to do more to it and have a mini narrative (images) of the aftermath of the main story. I thought it would be a cute idea because credits are an important part of the film and I don't want to rush it! I'm thinking of doing something like the credits from Out of Sight (if you had not seen the short film, I recommend you to check it out!!) So, I did some brainstorming (using 3-4 images). I will probably include it in my next reel on Wednesday! I hope it all goes well! =)

Let's buy another cake!

Business Card + Poster brainstorm -post Grad Film

2011-03-23T00:16:00.000-07:00

I finished all my animation and now it's on to revisions! So I started that this week. Need to get a reel sometime this week! >:(

PressKit stuff is coming up soon.. so here are some of my brainstorm and ideas:

My Business Card that I designed for Professional Practice Class last semester. I like it and I think I'll keep it! I love the rounded edges and double sided..it is more expensive to print, but presentation looks so much better. I think I'll do a little editing on some minor things that are bugging me. Feedback are welcomed!

I also did a little brainstorm a couple months ago and I got the most votes on number 2!
I am not sure what to do with the background.... I took the 2nd picture a little further and made it more dynamic. Instead of Cherry in the background, I added the steamclock. What do you guys think?

Almost there!

2011-03-11T15:30:00.000-08:00

I'm almost at the end! Just need to animate 2 more shots (+animated background and a still shot) and I will be on to revisions, finishing up sound, final timing and compositing. Final renders are going to take a long time so I hope to have a full month to do it. There are delays with the music because my composer has been busy lately. I really really hope he can finish up to the sad music this weekend, so my sound designer can do his first pass.

My workstation at home! I have crap all over the table. I'm currently trying to finish up my 2nd last shot. I am frame by framing all the words and photo in this scene.... kinda regretting it, but I am almost done!!!

Also, this has been my distraction for this week. It's horrible. I've been playing it during breaks, on my commute to school and when my reel is rendering. I need to stop playing it because I need to finish my film. Damn you pokemon for being so addicting!!! I also give my pokemon the stupidest names 8I

Yesterday night I didn't sleep too well because I was panicking about the earthquake and tsunami news. Woke up several times from earthquake nightmares x___x. I hope everyone around the world will be okay. Everyone deserves cake ;-; Rainbow cake will make everyone feel better!

Oh yes, before I forget, here are 3 screenshots from my film that I submitted to the Grad Catalogue! A trailer will be coming out in the mid of April!:

Stay tuned!

just an update + hairy fishnets

2011-03-04T01:50:00.000-08:00

Today (er yesterday), I finished all my character animation for Bendi! To celebrate I drew more of him.... man I'm a little crazy.. considering I probably drew him over 9000 times, I never get sick of it..I have problems hahaa.

I have 4 more shots left to animate + revisions on all the scenes! Then I'll have to time it together with the music and send it off to sound designer! I really hope that AfterEffects will coopoerate with me because recently, it has been crashing a lot. :( I don't know why. So I'm going to have to find a solution soon. My composer had some delays so he finished the music up to where Bendi gets pissed ahhaaa. Hopefully, he can finish up the main music and up to the sad music by the end of this week!

Today, er yesterday night, I decided to take a break and did a doodling livestream. This was the result:

I don't remember who started the suggestion of ... hairy fishnets. It started with domokun and then everything had fishnets 8I LMAO. Well, that was defiantly a stress reliever! Well, I will get back to animating tomorrow.

2 Months Left- oh my gawd

2011-02-23T14:20:00.000-08:00

2 MONTHS TILL GRAD FILM DEATH

Time is ticking and I need to be a lot more productive. I find it kinda funny how my film totally describes how I feel right now- or what everyone in 4th year animation feels like.... Well I've got some major deadlines coming up and I cannot screw up. I need to stay on schedule and keep on going!

This week I hope to have the music composed up to the sad music and some sound design mixed in. I also need to finish up some animation because they take longer than I expect them to... *sob*

Some major deadlines for my film:

March 12 Finish Animation
March 18 Finish ALL ANIMATION- no exceptions and then send it off to Composer and then Sound Designer
April 4 Rough Press Kits and Promotional Package Design (Poster and Business Cards)
April 11 Final Press Kit
April 11 SOUND IN FINAL MIX
April 12-15 Final Review Panel
April 25 Finish Film
April 29 12pm GRAD FILM DEADLINE (NO EXCEPTIONS)

Oh my gawd.

.. on a less stressful topic..a few days ago, I went on posemaniacs to practice some 30 sec poses (the last time I went on there was 2 years ago.. hahaha). Man, I'm so rusty because it's been so long since I've done life drawing. I need some real life drawing sessions 'cause it is quite different from drawing what is on screen/paper. Some of the poses they have on there are so weird hahaa XD

But yes, I need to be animating at full force now. I need to remember to take breaks but also keep on going!

Let's do this! I will finish on time!

The Legend of Zelda 25th Anniversary Collaboration!

2011-02-21T13:38:00.001-08:00

It is finally revealed! The Legend of Zelda 25th Anniversary Collaboration Project hosted by Kichisu! (click on the link for the list of artist and download!)

I participated in it and drew Spirit Tracks Link (second last one)! It is so cool to see so many different styles. Everyone did an amazing job and Kichisu did a wonderful job putting it all together! :) YAY! You can see all the high-resolution of each Link here!

Happy Valentines Day + Doodling Grad Film Characters (part 3)!

2011-02-14T15:08:00.000-08:00

Happy Valentines Day!

A little doodle I drew yesterday night for fun! I've been doodling a lot lately because I need a break from my film. Starting tomorrow I'm going full force again!

Here is the 3rd Set of Grad Film Characters and will be the last set for now (until I finish my film) because I really need to focus. It was a fun week of doodling other characters!

From left to right, top to bottom, Daryl-Lynn, Kim, Eduardo, Nic, Alexie and Sarah's characters!

I drew this background for my film yesterday while doodling other things.. so I don't feel too bad about taking a break.. Man, I can't draw buildings. I need to study backgrounds more!

Oh yes! Before I forget, here's my Link from Zelda Spirit Tracks for Kichisu's Zelda Collaboration Project!

Lots of doodling this week! :)

Doodling Grad Film Characters (part 2)!

2011-02-10T13:32:00.001-08:00

This time I compiled them together because some of the links didn't work properly in the last update.. xD From left to right, top to bottom: Ceci, Sunny, Melanie, Carolyn, Julie and Jenny's characters!

Also, I'm having a lot of trouble animating the scene. I've been animating it for more than a week now. Hopefully I can finish it today so I can move on.. X____X

Doodling Grad Film Characters (part 1)!

2011-02-07T15:16:00.000-08:00

Recently, I've been having a difficult time trying to get myself to animate. I think it’s because I had not drawn anything other than my film for along time. I decided yesterday that I want to draw everyone’s grad film characters! I think sketching them will help me get my artistic flow going again. I think I'm going to try doing 1 to 2 a day.. let's see how it goes. I will be uploading the characters individually on tumblr!

Here are the ones I've done so far:

Sitji!

Paige!

Kendra!

and Kristen!

Now, back to animating because these past few days, all I've been doing is timing and editing my leica reel, working with my composer and writing a revise script for my sound designer. My sound designer is working on his first pass this week and I'm excittteeed! :D

Introducing the Composer of my Grad Film, Flashygoodness!

2011-01-07T00:20:00.000-08:00

I needed a quick break today since I had not painted anything in months. All I've been doing is animating and sketching. I wanted to paint something really quick and simple to relieve my stress so I picked Flashygoodness's characters! :D I guess you can say this is a gift for him!

Please take a look at his DeviantArt Gallery and Website! :) He composes amazingly catchy music and draws cute cute pictures!

FLASHY IS COMPOSING FOR MY FILM! Stay tuned for May 2011!

Grad Film Poster Brainstorm

2010-12-30T14:36:00.001-08:00

I thumb-nailed some quick sketch ideas of what my film poster may look like… which ones do you guys like? Any ideas/suggestions?

Frame Colouring Instructions (ignore this post if you're not helping me colour for my grad film)

2010-12-24T02:59:00.000-08:00

BASE COLOURING INSTRUCTIONS

For my Graduation Film -“A Cake for Cherry”

PLEASE READ THROUGHLY- It will save both our time- and if you have any questions please let me know. My email is chibi.rinku@gmail.com or you can comment on this entry for questions.

I will give you my personal contact information if you're working with me!

Program Requirements:

You need Adobe Photoshop CS3 EXTENDED (not the regular version, but the extended version) and UP to colour (I recommend Adobe Photoshop CS5 EXTENDED)

Brush Settings
-make sure your brush's Hardness is set to 100%
-use regular brush. A brush that is completely solid--- no airbrush or soft brushes

1. Open the File

You will see something like so… *Ignore all locked layers!

2. Go to Window>Animation

And you will see a timeline at the bottom appear:

-On the Animation window-Scroll down and you will see my first few frames ^

The animation layer interface of photoshop can be confusing at first. So I will explain it step by step.

The Line Art + Colour that I marked in red is the first drawing in the animation. -Each frame is one layer. I make an extra layer underneath the lineart layer to colour. Okay, yeah, it is confusing LOL, so I will explain further:

3) Scroll your timeline to the 2^nd Frame:

When you scroll right (to the second block) you will go to the 2^nd Frame of my animation.

--MAKE SURE YOU SELECT THE 2^ND FRAME LAYER (by clicking on it or you can click on the layers on the side) and your SCROLLER must be on that layer OR ELSE YOU CANNOT ALTER/EDIT/DO ANYTHING with that layer.
-sorry, I don’t name my layers as it is very time consuming. Use the blocks in the timeline as your guide. :( To give you an idea, you can scroll through the timeline.

4) Now that you’re on the 2^nd Frame- Your layer window on the right side will also highlight the layer the 2^nd frame is drawn on.

Go to the highlighted layer (right side) and Right Click>Duplicate Layer

And a little block (another layer) underneath 2^nd Frame will appear!

5) Select the layer underneath

1. Choose the Eraser to Erase the duplicated lineart -the colour layered one, not the original lineart (I do this to avoid jittery outlines)

2.-Then start colouring! –You can scroll back to the first frame and use the eyedropper (shortcut to eyedropper is by holding alt when paintbrush is selected) to pick out the colours.

-Scroll back to the layer you’re working on. Make sure you’re on the colouring layer.

*You can either paintbucket it or use the brush to colour manually. IF YOU ARE PAINTBUCKETING MAKE SURE TO GO OVER THE LINES WITH THE BRUSH TOOL TO FILL IN UNCOLOURED AREAS. I DO NOT WANT JITTERING AND UNCOLOURED SPOTS. I know my outlines are messy, but do your best to make sure the colours are inside the main outlines.

You can Zoom In to double check if you missed any colouring spots. You can navigate by going to Window>Navigator if it’s not already in your photoshop window.

And Repeat by doing Frame 3 and on!!

-I coloured the first 2 Frames as examples

When you’re done, send scenes to my e-mail chibi.rinku@gmail.com or upload them on mediafire or some kind of storage website like dropbox and then send the link to me.

THANK YOU! :D

------------

Multiple Layer Animation

Similar to the one layer of animation above, this scene has multiple layers, meaning there are multiple animation playing at the same time. For example, I animated Cherry's hair separately from her body so it is easier for me to animate.

You colour the same way, it's just that you'll have to select the correct layer in order to colour the specific animation.

For example, if I want to colour Cherry

I start colouring her body animation layer first. Then I switch to her hair layer animation to colour her hair.

For Bendi it's the same, except he's on one animation layer so you don't have to colour his hair and body separately (in this scene anyway).

If you're confused of which layer you're on you can check with the layer visibility (the eye icon on your layer window on the right)

If you have any questions please let me know!

Winter Break!

2010-12-20T01:14:00.000-08:00

I'm finally on Winter Break! I am taking a couple days off but I am also planning to work on my Grad Film. I needed to doodle something simple to relieve my stress and I drew fox because I was playing Star Fox with a couple of friends yesterday afternoon .. and felt like drawing him LOL.

To do List:
-Cast Cherry's Voice + Voice Script (probably do it after Dec 26! Really busy right now. Sorry!! :( )
-Script for Composer + Sound Designer
-Base Colouring Instructions + prepare scenes to send off to colourists (I keep delaying this-NEED TO DO IT BEFORE BREAK ENDS!)
-ANIMATEEEEE some run cycles!

Auditions for Bendi's Voice

2010-12-08T02:27:00.000-08:00

Dec 11, 2010! Confirmed voice actor for Bendi!

If you want to audition for Cherry MORE INFO HERE!!!

So um.. yeah, I need to find a voice for Bendi. I think I'm going to start posting on forums such as Voice Acting Club and Voice Acting Alliance soon. Bendi's voice is going to be hard to find x_x.. I imagine him between young and a male adolescent. But leaning towards adolescent (not too young and not too old).... maybe like Young Link from Ocarina of Time but a little deeper. Bendi's age is around his teens.

Film making is so much work.. gaaaaahhh

To do list:
-composer agreement
-script for composer, sound designer and possible voice actors
-need to talk to composer more about music requirements
-update production schedule
-instructions for colourists
-ANIMATE ANIMATE ANIMATE AAAAAAAAAA

line colour + film update

2010-11-12T15:26:00.001-08:00

I made my background line colours the same colour as my animation lines and it looks a lot better. It took me the whole morning/afternoon just to adjust and change the line colours for some scenes that I've done already. I don't know.. I hope it works out in the end...

I've done some small easy animation in the past couple of weeks. This week I'm going to try out some fast paced animation. I really need to pick up the pace X___X

Good news is I found a sound designer and a composer. Just need to talk to them and work out the details. I'm kinda scared and excited at the same time! aaaaaa

What I need to do this week:
-write composer/sound designer agreement
-make colouring instructions for helpers
-KEEP ON WORKING ON FILM AAHHHHHHHH (屮ಠДಠ)屮彡 ┻━┻

Bendi's Birthday + Evolution

2010-11-07T11:30:00.000-08:00

Today is Bendi's Birthday! The day I created him hehee :) I am celebrating it by writing a blog entry about him!

I first created him in my 2nd year animation class (Nov 7, 2008). He is my very first walkcycle character. He started out with pie on his head. I got rid of the pie 'cause it was annoying and added a cowlick on his head.

I'm surprised my teacher didn't catch that I forgot to flip his arms hahaha!!! XD

I started to love this character when I was doing my class Anijam. The Anijam created life and personality in the character as well as in relation to other characters.

And yes.. that is Cherry (my friend Azucena's walkcycle character-I named her because Bendi likes cherries) that he groped OTL; He use to be such a pervert AHAHAA!! And that is why he likes Cherry!

He didn't have a name and I tried to come up with a bunch of names with my friends (they kept ending up to be perverted... LOL). We thought he is kinda flexible and my friend Jenny suggested Bendi and that is his name ever since XDDD

I was so happy about Bendi I drew pictures and little comics :I lol. I drew him a lot in my sketchbook and he ended up becoming shorter and shorter because I kept drawing him chibi.

I've done various little projects using Bendi including a small animation in 2nd Year (which is kinda like the early prototype/idea for my graduation film LOL). I also made him in 3D:

Then I took webcomic + narrative images class in the past summers and started a webcomic series with him as the main character. I plan to keep it going, but it is on hiatus right now because I am doing my graduation film (WITH BENDI!!! :D). I promise to continue it after my film!!!

I draw him a lot during my school years and even sometimes on desks.. haha and he makes new friends!!!

YEAAAHHH!!!!!! Kurt is my friend Emily's character that I knew through doodling on desks.. XD

I have connected to and became friends with many different animators/artists from my school and even on the internet just because of Bendi. I am actually really happy and grateful that I had created him and kept him alive for these past two years.

I even receive fanart ;-; Here are some of my favorites:

By Nemuri!

By Judy!

By JohnSu!

By Endling!

and MORE !!

Thank you so much everyone for all your support for me, my art and Bendi all these years!! They mean a lot to me. :) I am blessed to have such fantastic people in my life and I am grateful. Thank you!

stressless doodling

2010-11-05T16:47:00.000-07:00

Some doodles in my sketchbook when I'm bored in class... :< They are nice breaks and stress relievers, I think!

Updated Reel and Animation Tests

2010-11-03T00:21:00.000-07:00

I think right now I have my story down (I can't satisfy everyone tbh)..

Anyways, I'm going at this full force now :P As I animate, there will be new ideas and changes that will pop up so.. I better start now..

Here is my recent leica reel with scratch sound (some sounds/music are missing :( ). My scratch sounds are HORRENDOUS and I want to claw my ears out 'cause they are NOT how I imagine them at all. I got most of my scratch sound from various sources on the internet-all free. This is why I need a sound designer/composer D: Any recommendations/feedback for sound and music + anything are welcomed because I am a retard blah.

Also, I did some Animation Tests! Here are some:

October Doodles

2010-10-25T14:25:00.001-07:00

I am excited for Halloween!!

6 Months left to do Grad Film 8(

I draw.. a lot of Bendi 8I LOLL

Self-portrait XD...

wip ad for composers + sound designers

2010-10-20T12:56:00.000-07:00

Bendi has sausage hands... lol
Anyways, I've never hired or worked with a sound designer/composer before so I'm really worried. I'm trying to find one as early as possible. I'm making posters to post around universities like vfs, sfu, ubc, capliano etc. ... or should I use craigslist? :( I want to find someone who is local, reliable and does really good pro sound work... Any ideas/recommendations?

For My Love

2010-10-17T14:46:00.000-07:00

What should I name my film? For now my working title is "A Cake for Cherry". My friends keep joking about naming it For My Love (My friend Jenna came up with it 'cause we were talking about FML) XD.. but I don't know..... I think it's too internet-y and meme related. And the message behind it isn't really "fml" and I don't want people to get the wrong idea, even though it's a joke. I'm going to avoid that. Anyone else have any other ideas and opinions? Does my working title work? I guess it will come up to me once I almost finish my film XD

Some expression sketches for fun!

If you guys want to see my first leica reel draft and give me feedback please let me know! E-mail me chibi.rinku@gmail.com. I made it "private" to protect myself ('cause I forgot to put my name on it :( )

update + I need to do more life drawing!!!

2010-10-16T12:52:00.000-07:00

Cherry Doodle

Some more little concept sketches in my sketchbook

My class suggested that I don't actually really need the last montage for my film-but if I have time, I would like to add one more! Let's see what happens. I can actually start animating now. I still need a composer + sound designer... that is what I am most worried about.

They also suggested that Bendi should be trying to fix the cake when it drops out of the box in the end. I actually like that idea. It's cute. I want to do it. :) hehe.

Thank you for all the feedback guys!!

I was going through life drawings I did in first year of University because I needed some for my demoreel (for Prof Practices class). It reminds me I really need to get back to doing life drawings. It's been so long since I've drawn models x__x (Should start going to the Friday night ones!)

Life drawingsss I miss youuu :( It's nice to look back at what you did in the previous years and seeing mistakes on them because you know that you've improved and want to do better!

refresh

2010-10-11T01:06:00.000-07:00

It's been 5 months since I've done an actual animation. I was looking up runcycles this afternoon and found a really interesting one and felt like animating the movement. I've never done a profile runcycle (or run cycles in general) before so I decided to give it a try.

I'm glad I did because now I kinda know how I can animate Bendi holding the cake box while running (I had a hard time stopping it from boiling all over the place x__x It's a lot better now). I think I need to make a model of it and record some videos for reference.

That was very refreshing! Now I just need to figure out how I'm going to colour the frames, add a shadow in AfterFX and "clean up". I'm such a messy animator D:

(I'm not actually going to use this animation for my film-It's just a refresher/test. I think I'm going to do the coloured animation test on one of the coloured backgrounds that I had done..).. okay, back to my leica reel tomorrow..er.. today.

edit: I need to draw a frame with him up in the air +make it faster LOL

Leica Reel Draft #1

2010-10-06T02:57:00.000-07:00

I finally have my very first draft of my leica reel put together!:

Things I need to consider and need help with:

-KEEP THE FILM AS SIMPLE AS POSSIBLE.
-KEEP IT UNDER 4 MINUTES -best if under 3:50 Minutes

-More obstacle ideas. When you're in a hurry, what drives you crazy?
-Sound (I need a music/sound composer)-I contacted one, but I need to get back to him soon with my proposal (with revised budget and agreements).
-I need to get helpers for base colouring! Will be doing that soon when I start animating

Constructive and Helpful feedback/suggestions are welcomed and appreciated! Thanks guys! :)

EDIT: Making film private to protect myself lol D:-'cause I didn't have my name on the reel. Thanks to those who saw it and gave me wonderful feedback!!

2010-09-28T22:12:00.000-07:00

I love bringing traditional colouring medias to school so I can colour/experiment! :D

Felt like drawing Futurama because my brother showed me a new episode XD

backgrounds

2010-09-26T22:54:00.000-07:00

omg this background took me forever (2 days)... and made me really hungry.

Time to brainstorm my story since I still have not figured out the middle of it. Also need to revise my character reference sheet. I'm excited!

brainfart

2010-09-24T14:14:00.000-07:00

I always draw people facing the left :( (and draw lots of Bendi lol)

Kurt (Emily's character) and Bendi XD

Judy's character, Rel! I plan to colour it when I find ref for her colours XD

BrainFart

I need to get cracking on my film again. LETS DO THISSSSSSSSSSSSS YEAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!!!

procrastination

2010-09-22T17:54:00.000-07:00

Even with the internet off at school I still find some way to procrastinate... :I
It's an original character that I occasionally draw in my sketchbook. His name is Pero (my friends Kendra and Jenna named him LOL-it was a while ago) 'cause we were talking about Perogies XD

BLARGH

2010-09-20T18:17:00.000-07:00

I was gonna go to school today to work on my homework but I felt like crap (have a flu.. :( ) so I decided to stay home.

I spent all day designing my business card for professional practice class (of course, I end up using Bendi in it..). Illustrator crashed when I was working on it and I died a little inside, but I manage to redo it in photoshop. It is a draft (the final version is due in a couple of weeks I think..), suggestions/feedback/critiques are welcomed :)

I still have time to work on my storyboard for my grad film so I'm going to work on that after. I am so behind because I've been sick since Friday >__<

and have a team rocket! LOL orz;; I am so unprepared (for trouble)..

btw, thanks for all the comments on my last post guys! Really appreciate it! :D

Brief Grad Film Intro

2010-09-19T22:44:00.000-07:00

My graduation film's two main characters are Be ndi and Cherry. They are from my webcomic With a Cherry on Top (which is on hiatus until I finish my graduation film).

Cherry and Bendi

I kinda "chibified" Cherry so she would fit more in the style of the film.

I still don't know what to call my film.. so for now, the working title is "A Cake for Cherry".

The story of my film is simple: Bendi goes buy a present (a cake) for Cherry, whom is waiting for him at a restaurant. Bendi's main goal is to get there on time. He struggles and faces numerous obstacles in the city. And in the end..... it's going to be a surprise :D

The film's setting is Rainy Vancouver, so there will be several landmarks that will be recognized by Vancouverites :> I hope to make the film funny, entertaining and be fast-paced, with comical timing.

I have the beginning of the story, climax and ending of the story figured out (I have my story critique on Tuesday), but I am still brainstorming the middle. It can be almost anything since it would just be random obstacles that Bendi will encounter.
I brainstormed some but I have to pick 2-3 situations (something that is doable (and funny) for the time that I have (7 months)). Any suggestions/ideas are welcomed :D So what gets in your way when you're in a rush/trying to get somewhere on time?

stuff in my sketchbook

2010-09-19T11:52:00.000-07:00

I selected and scanned some random sketches that I did over this year from my sketchbook XD They were fun to look through.

Drew this last night to relax. It's suppose to be characters that I draw all the time when I was young haha! I had so many obsessions XD I used zero references too! Prooves that I drew them a lot rofl. (Bendi does not count LOL)

Me and my friend, Jenny, always makes fun of Medic and Heavy from TF2 LOL!
I noticed I draw a lot of quick, dumb, crazy cartoony stuff in my sketchbook... XD I need to do more environments and life drawing. I use to do so many in my first year of uni but it kinda died after. :(

Reviving my Blogspot

2010-09-18T17:03:00.001-07:00

Hello everyone! I decided that I want to revive my blogspot. :) I quickly doodled a temporary image for my header so my blogspot kinda represents me and my work. (I just love header images OTL;) I decided that I'm going to use this blog as a doodle dump. I will be posting my experimentation, stuff from my graduation film and just my art in general. Thanks for dropping by! XD

Well, to start off, I guess I can post some of my grad film experimentation.

After several critiques from friends.. this is what I hope my film style would look like :D

I also did some quick drawings of what other objects may look like in the film

I'm really excited! I am working on more drawings, my storyboard and other crap, so look forward to future posts! :D