Sora @ Work

Getting Ready For A Fight

Posted by: Polar on: April 14, 2009

Ryu: Getting ready for a fight

Ryu: Getting ready for a fight

This is a fan art digital painting of Ryu, a character from Street Fighter. Ryu is my favourite character from Street Fighter even though I’m lousy at the game.

Since it’s a fan art and not my own creation, I tend to view it as a practice piece. When I started drawing this picture, I set out to accomplish a few things:

  • Do everything digitally
  • Get used to using the Wacom tablet
  • Practice and find my own style in colouring
  • Draw my own version of Ryu from memory

I did everything using Gimp and my Wacom graphire 3 tablet, from sketching to the colouring. I think I’m getting more used to using a tablet even though I still find it easier to draw on paper. When I sketched out Ryu, I decided not to give him any facial features such as eyes, nose and mouth because these are the hardest to draw and I don’t want to spend too much time on them. I’m still not very used to drawing on a tablet and I don’t know whether I’m proficient enough to do such detailed work. So in the end I put his face in shadows.

I wanted to give Ryu a more interesting pose than just standing there. Since he is from a fighting game, the logical conclusion is to put him in a fighting pose but it felt kind of boring to me. I wanted something that was not commonly used but at the same time, not too hard to draw and had a bit of movement. After playing with a few ideas, I decided to do a pose of Ryu getting ready for a fight. I used his clothes to add a feeling of movement to the picture. Since there were so many versions of Ryu, I used his clothes to identify him. I drew him mostly from memory, only checking to make sure that I had his clothing correct.

I’m a drawer, not a painter and I don’t really like colouring but in this piece, I tried to do everything in colour, shades and tones, even forgoing the black outline that I am used to. I think the result was not bad. It was only after I finished colouring Ryu, then I chose the background colour. It took me a while to decide. I can’t pick white as Ryu is dressed in white; black is too black and grey is dull. In the end I settled on dark red and I used some grunge brushes to make the background more interesting.

I started this painting in January and I only just completed it. Even though the painting was only just finished, I could already see some mistakes.

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Random Sketch

Posted by: Polar on: March 8, 2009

sketch01

Did a random sketch of a person (probably a boy) while trying out a Wacom intuos tablet. The tablet is easy to use but I can’t afford it. So I will just have to be contented with my Wacom graphire 3.

Hello, 2009

Posted by: Rixou on: January 4, 2009

First post of the year! I hope it’ll be one with many good things worth looking forward to.

2008 closed with me getting hold of some neat pieces of design, thought they’ll be worth sharing here.

First, there’s my i Dog from my office gift exchange.

pluged in puppy

plugged in puppy

A speaker that doubles as a robotic pet. Barks and whines for attention, grooves to the music being played, and comes with volume controls too! The ‘mood matrix’ piqued my interest the most. The emotions of the iDog are shown through moving colored LED lights on it’s face, like so.

jammin' puppy

jammin' puppy

There’s a whole range light movement patterns and color sets  which reflect emotions from ‘Ecstatic’ to ‘Bored’ or ‘Lonely’ or even ’sick’. Part of the fun of getting to know this little critter is thumbing through the manual (ok maybe I’m strange that way) and getting to know what means what. It’s like learning a new language, and there’s a germ of a story there I think- perhaps it’ll incubate and surface with time :)

Also on the topic of Christmas Presents, FSc had a lovely range this year.

I’ve always adored FSc’s art, and discovering her equally creative and quirky range of products this year just made me an even bigger fan.

Here’s one of my favorites. It came ready packaged for a friend, and I couldn’t bring myself to unwrap it. So the photos really don’t do it justice.

"Cynthia's Mocha Mix"

"Cynthia's Mocha Mix"

When I requested FSc to add in my greetings in the design, I didn’t expect her to offer to personalise the artwork to add in the recipient’s name! It was a lovely touch on her part. Like her other works too, the can label was full of her signature quaint and off-beat doodles. Like the ingredients list below.

hm.. wonder what it tastes like?

hm.. wonder what it tastes like?

As someone dabbling with products packaging and design myself, I am impressed (and somewhat humbled) by all the levels of detail which goes into her work. Having a ‘Gold Standard’ like her in front of me keeps me motivated!

And lastly, I’ve finally made a move to add to my digital arsenal.

black, shiny and new!

black, shiny and new!

I’m still getting my head around the controls and I suspect I wouldn’t be fully comfortable with the settings until I’m done with my first 2 or 3 tablet colored pieces. So there’s one of my first new personal challenges this year.

Look forward to seeing how things turn out!

Red Cliff is online!

Posted by: Rixou on: July 31, 2008

Slightly over one month after Red Cliff was first previewed at the Singapore Toy and Comic Convention, The first official web entry is up! It’s just a modest 4 frame comic at the moment, but more is in the works.

To mark the occasion, here’s the very first Red Cliff art trade I made (at STCC!): featuring Zhou Yu, and Zhuge Liang, of course J. Drawing on the spot really isn’t my forte- I get major deer- in-headlights syndrome. I’m rather pleased with the overall results this time round though (although the proportions could still use more work..eheh)

 

 

3 kingdoms

 

Joichi very obligingly responded with a lovely piece of her own pair of rivals from her original story, Warlock’s Emblem.

 

copyright of Joichi! 

One of the best things that came out of STCC for me, was getting to touch base with other artists like Joichi, Gilamon etc. etc. To see such outstanding work so close to home is at the same time humbling and exciting- if this is an indication of things to come, future events are going to be something to watch out for!