A lil straight forward gag... with a few randomness.
Just watched the Rocketeer again.. The same director directed the new Captain America flick, and it has a old school pulpy feel , whic you definitely see similarities between the two from what I've partially seen.
No idea why i started doodling mma fighter chris leben... and er.. other random people... not so random on the right :P
and then at the end you use sharper and sharper brushes for detail..
oh rite..
Amazing artist. worked on a few feature films
great layout artist, great sense of color and form...
scratching on paper is therapeutic.
I love analyzing how various comic artists ink their work. I've tried
brush but don't prefer it as my main tool. It's almost too graceful?
There's a scratchy shake in the nib that I appreciate.
Akita toriyama has fun pen work as do many manga artists. Old school
line artists like albrecht durer is azing to look at, how they only
use thickness of line to describe volume without shading.
>
>
well, sorta,
My face will be plastered on a wall for a photo art show at the Fashion Arts at 99 sudbury
st. in toronto on the 29th of April.
A year ago I met the wonderful photographer Stef Kloibhofer (I love saying her full name :P)
who was finishing her Masters in Photography and for her thesis took pictures of dual identities of Canadians of different heritage.
http://fashionarttoronto.wordpress.com/2011/04/08/meet-the-photographer-stephanie-kloibhofer/
Apparently my black and white short film , Jolly Melancholies
is going to be screening in the lobby during the theatre run
of Brown Balls at Factory Theatre in Toronto.
here's Fu-Gen's Brown Balls site: http://fu-gen.org/current-season/brown-balls/
and Factor Theatre: http://www.factorytheatre.ca/
This is a double honour for me since I screened the film at Reel Asian two years ago and my old high school friend Byron Abalos (who has been finding great success in theatre and acting) is the creator of the play.
here's a little exerpt from the fu- GEN website on what his film is about:
FU-GEN WEBSITE BROWN BALLS
"I’ve been working on this play for about 5 years now and I’ve had some wonderful help on the way from the Ontario Arts Council, Cahoots Theatre Company, Carlos Bulosan Theatre and, of course, fu-GEN. In that time, it has completely transformed. Originally, it was a play for my ‘peeps.’ It was about friendship, nostalgia and old school R & B music. It was about my feelings growing up Filipino in Toronto. I wanted to write a feel good play because there’s so much crap in the world that some times you just want to laugh. But now, with the help of some friends, a special fiancé, gifted actors, and some of the best dramaturges I know, it’s become something I couldn’t have expected. My vision for Brown Balls has expanded. Now, it’s about the experience of Asian-Canadian men - not just Filipinos - in North America. It’s about gender, race, power and hegemony – not just about sex.
My goal is to take the audience for a ride. At first, I want them to laugh their asses off. But in the end, I hope that they can look at their selves and the people around them in a very different way. "
It's been all Bunny on the brain.
This year's theme for the Toronto Animated Image Societyj's Animation Jam is Bunnies.
My mom just gave away our bunny, Amber, just last week.
Been looking through old photos to see if I have any pictures of Amber to remember her by.
I'm also looking for references for an idea I have for the Bunny Jam this year.
It's gonn be gross, and offensive. But hopefully funny. Funny Bunny.
here's a warm up sketch o' Amber. I'll miss her. (But thanks to my buddy Phong for picking her up and now taking care of her. I should drop by soon to see how she's doing.)
I was just browsing through my old images I have from my pretentious years back in university (has it changed?) Saw this comic strip of an old man. I was exploring the ideas of sentiment and sentimentality (OooOooO) through mundane moments at the twilight of the old man's life. I guess it was a complimentary piece to the old man exploration I was doing.
Here's a few boards for ideas of things an old man would do.
Here's a lil diddy in 3d: Jolly Melancholies (Original)
and the 'old man on the can' (actual title)
Apart from my obsession with old men (don't ask why...:P)I was pretty obsessed with Chris Ware at the time in 2006, as well as Robert Crumb.
And I really gravitated toward their way of presenting relatively appealing characters in dark comedic scenarios (even borderline perverse)
Here was my take on exploring a story of an old man and a dog.
This time i really wanted to juxtapose the framing devices of comic books and framing in film. The genius that is Chris Ware and his exploration and innovation of page frame layout has intrigued me.
Scott Mcloud's Making Comics has always been an essential read that I go back from time to time... Evidently the read has found a broader reference outside comic books, and into video game designers short list.
I'll post more soon.
Stumbled upon this amazing website quotevadis.com that presents inspiring quotes from great people from history.
The quote from Stanley Kubrick really stuck out to me since it really sits will with some ideas we are trying to portray in our film, Traces of Joy.
KUBRICK: “Yes, for those of us who manage somehow to cope with our mortality. The very meaninglessness of life forces man to create his own meaning. Children, of course, begin life with an untarnished sense of wonder, a capacity to experience total joy at something as simple as the greenness of a leaf; but as they grow older, the awareness of death and decay begins to impinge on their consciousness and subtly erode their joie de vivre, their Idealism—and their assumption of Immortality. As a child matures, he sees death and pain everywhere about him, and begins to lose faith in the ultimate goodness of man. But if he’s reasonably strong—and lucky—he can emerge from this twilight of the soul into a rebirth of life’s élan. Both because of and in spite of his awareness of the meaninglessness of life, he can forge a fresh sense of purpose and affirmation. He may not recapture the same pure sense of wonder he was born with, but he can shape something far more enduring and sustaining. The most terrifying fact about the universe is not that it is hostile but that it is indifferent; but if we can come to terms with this indifference and accept the challenges of life within the boundaries of death—however mutable man may be able to make them—our existence as a species can have genuine meaning and fulfilment. However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light.”
http://quotevadis.com/post/3050164604/however-vast-the-darkness-we-must-supply-our-own-light
I'm going to read this over from time to time.
So today is my first day off from my contract at March Entertainment. It was a great experience there doing Layout on Yok..er Yuke..er. Mia and Me.
So what am I doing now? I'm going full time on my short film I'm working on with Louis Yeum. It's time well valued as we'll need all the time we're going to get.
We're crazy fortunate to receive some funding from various art councils and Bravo!FACT and the deadline is coming real soon.
Today I'm going to warm up on reviewing all of the various story issues we've addressed so I can make a new cut for the leica. (With temp tracks as well) so that we can show some people for feedback. We've showed our old cut to various people and we've received the same sort of concerns with our 2nd scene... So I think with the things we've talked about we've now addressed that.
Other positives this past month is our recent discussions with Animation Producer Michael Fukushima from NFB and our application for a Filmmaker's Assistance program grant. So cross our fingers and see if we get that!
Seems like there's a lot riding on this, and there's even now more pressure than ever to get this film executed to the best of our ability.
Other things our our agenda this week:
Meet with potential post production distribution strategist, and other opportunity for sales and exposure. We'll see what happens with that.
Also, a specific website catered directly for our film as some people have been curious about it.
Be back soon!
Read more
So what am I doing now? I'm going full time on my short film I'm working on with Louis Yeum. It's time well valued as we'll need all the time we're going to get.
We're crazy fortunate to receive some funding from various art councils and Bravo!FACT and the deadline is coming real soon.
Today I'm going to warm up on reviewing all of the various story issues we've addressed so I can make a new cut for the leica. (With temp tracks as well) so that we can show some people for feedback. We've showed our old cut to various people and we've received the same sort of concerns with our 2nd scene... So I think with the things we've talked about we've now addressed that.
Other positives this past month is our recent discussions with Animation Producer Michael Fukushima from NFB and our application for a Filmmaker's Assistance program grant. So cross our fingers and see if we get that!
Seems like there's a lot riding on this, and there's even now more pressure than ever to get this film executed to the best of our ability.
Other things our our agenda this week:
Meet with potential post production distribution strategist, and other opportunity for sales and exposure. We'll see what happens with that.
Also, a specific website catered directly for our film as some people have been curious about it.
Be back soon!
It was an honour to be part of Reel Asian this year.
Last year I attended as a filmmaker but this year Louis and I attended as Pitch Finalistts for our short film, Traces of Joy.
The days leading up to the Competition was extremely stressful! Ups and downs of confidence and then sheer fear! Lol. But The hours and hours of practice paid off. And by the time we came on stage we were pretty calm on how to deliver.
The judges were rather positive in their responses but definitely address things that we will keep note on.
Unfortunately we lost! (sob!) but we're very happy for Shahrzad Nakhai and Tricia Lee
and all of the pitches were of great ambition and quality and we were extremely honored to compete with them.
Thank you again to Siya Chen, and Sonia Sakamoto-Jog and the rest of Reel Asian for their on going support of my work and hopefully we'll see you again soon in the future!
Click here for a facebook gallery part 1 of the experience.
REEL ASIAN 2010
I've been working on a few commercials over the past 2 years with Billie Mintz
and he's working on a shot for a lottery commercial. Hopefully it brings
great things as I always have fun working with him.
Here's the link to the boards:
http://www.billiemintz.com/blog/?p=86
uess who?
Clue, he's a director.
Been watchin' interviews for his upcoming film. Quick sketch in ball point.
Aye, lookee ere! Robin Hood ... well my first try. his eyes aren't droopy enough.. prolly a bit too big as well..
some random hobo missin' his pants.. and yet can find himself a hat to wear and a bottle o' beer.
Read more
Clue, he's a director.
Aye, lookee ere! Robin Hood ... well my first try. his eyes aren't droopy enough.. prolly a bit too big as well..
This is probably as close as I'm going to get to the Vietnam War.
(Kim Phuc standing next to a painting Daniel and I made for her during her visit to our high school)
Just stumbled on this link. Thanks Digg! The first war to be as documented as it was...(Kim Phuc standing next to a painting Daniel and I made for her during her visit to our high school)
http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2010/05/vietnam_35_years_later.html
ironically I haven't seen much as I feel as I should, what with me being Vietnamese and all. My father was in the navy for the anti-communist forces as a missile loader on a war ship. It wasn't a long period yet, I don't really know much about his life during the that time... I suppose it was something my family wanted to leave in the past and start a new life. Now that I'm older, and more mature, I slowly have a growing interest in learning more about the war that definitely caused me to be the Canadian I am today. It reminded me of the time my high school was visited by Kim Phuc, the famous girl immortalized in the war picture (see above).
My dad around the same age as I was when I made that painting.
Would you say he looks like me? WTF happened to his neck??:P
Would you say he looks like me? WTF happened to his neck??:P
I can't say I knew much about her aside from the photo. She was invited as a guest speaker by our school to commemorate her anniversary of the photograph and the war. My buddy Steve and I (since we were viets and all) were in charge of gathering our vietnamese friends (from the catholic community) to attend the event and sing the national anthem (which I didn't know until the day before!... Was it the communist or southern anthem... oh politics!) So she told her story of what had happened before she was napalmed and her rescue. All I remember was that she would repeat that she 'cry, and cry and cry' a lot. In the end, she moved to Canada and became Catholic. *applause* There lies the connection to her invitation to our school.
My father attended that day as well, and had a chance to chat with her along with the faculty afterwards, which I remember felt cool that my dad was getting V.I.P. with the staff. Yeah... cooool. Not too sure she had much to say, aside her happenstance being a symbol of anti-war sentiment and propaganda.(well she didn't say that exactly) But she was affected by the war nonetheless. Even after this experience what do I really know?
The weird thing about all this is, with my personal distancing towards the war and my parent's life in Vietnam, is that I'm crazy fascinated with other historical wars. I recently studied the Japanese -American War during World War II! I loved Letters from Iwo Jima. And I can't wait to see The Pacific! But Vietnam War? Good Gawd!
So much I am fascinated with it in fact, I dedicated a short film (see a few images in the short film section) regarding it. Reading from 'Embracing Defeat' among other sources, I got into things such as the Nanking, The Bomb, American Occupation, Economical recovery, and its influence on manga and art (which probably has to do with the origins of my curiosity of the topic).
And all I did from the Vietnam War was a painting I did for Kim Phuc'n Phuc (with respects).
I'm sure it's a maturation of personal discovery. Steven Spielberg himself (can't even compare!) didn't do anything regarding the holocaust until he was in in 40's. He had his ideas on the Holocaust, but felt he wasn't ready until much later.
I visited my mom on mother's day and asked her about an old war photo of my dad in the navy. Then out from nowhere she whips out a whole new photo album with a bunch of 'new' photos of my dad I never seen before! Apparently they grabbed them on their last visit to Vietnam a few years ago... I ask them how come thye never showed me, in something similar she said.. "we never thought to show you". Wowzers... No wonder I know so little about that time in their lives. I don't know what it is about old photos, but I can't stop looking at them... something about it being bittersweet... being able to peer a glimpse into the past, at the same time existing in the present, and never able to go back. It's unbelievable to see my dad so young and almost 40 years ago.
A few friends of mine took a history course back in uni on the Vietnam War, which of course I had no particular interest in. Especially which shed the Viet Cong in any light other than negative. Blasphemous! From what my parents have told me, South : Good. North : Bad! Star? Yechh.. Stripes: Woo hoo!! I'm going to have to ask my fried to lend me his book from the course. It's crazy how complex it really is, and you can't help but grow up with bias from those who have been affected by the other side... and I hear Vietnam is actually really thriving now, and the War is becoming more of a distant memory. Well never entirely....
I better go see my Grandma in the motherland before it's too late...
So you can see the image from the catalogue in color here: AKIMBO
My how times flies. I recently received my catalogue copy of the video themed commission I was part of, "Icon, Villain, Antihero". It looks pretty snazzy. I love the glossy text finish on matte cover.
And the nifty 'ntsc' like style of odd and even fields of what appears to be an image of Tim Curry from the Rocky Horror Picture Show.
My film ' Construct a Nation of Couture and Peace!" was part of the first series titled ICON. My film discussed the idea of film/media icons and how it pertains to American/Japanese relations during the postwar occupation. I appropriated footage and images from various sources, Tetsuwan Atom, Astro Boy, Gene Kelly films, World War II photographs, and propaganda films and combined it in After Effects, and 3d. The other artists part of my series was Aram Siu Wai Collier (a hilarious film edited together of Lou Diamond Phillips from his various roles) , Maria Legault (a music video with a fabricated celebrity, Marie-Minou) , Kathleen Smith (an homage to Werner Herzog's work with her walk to the Toronto Zoo) , and Jenn E Norton (A kaleidoscopic visual representation of the creation of a star).
Here's what writer MARUSYA BOCIURKIW summarized about my film:
Things get even more dreamlike, perhaps even a little nightmarish, in Jeffrey Tran's 'Construct a Nation of Couture and Peace!' The title evokes Communist slogans and implies a sinister tone to fashion's dictates. ... These images represent the collision of Japanese and American culture in postwar Japan, but they also speak to the globalized and hybridized nature of popular culture itself..."
....and so on and so forth. They get it! Woo hoo! Then again, it wasn't cryptic ... It's crazy that it's been 3 seasons ago now that I made this,
and to have my first commissioned work with Trinity Square Video was a great experience and opportunity for me. Congrads to Trinity Square Video and all the artists involved on the completion of this series.
Will Wright, Genius
I actually had written this in the previous post to further explain my thoughts on 3d glitches and mistakes but decided to give it it's own post:
Anyway here's a photo of me with Will Wright, the Creator of massively successful and innovative games such as Sim City, The Sims, and Spore.
I had a chance to hear his talk at Siggraph 09, and my word was in inspiring.
I wanted to talk about the current status of computer graphics and its amazing future. I'm not talking about Avatar, and oo ahh 3d! (Which is pretty impressive) But i'm still waiting for the standard screen w/o glasses part.
I'm talking about the state of which we're at where art is reverting back and exploring new aesthetics that isn't just about hyper-realism.
With new eye capture tech, The uncanny valley is appearing less and less noticeable.
With 3d graphics pretty much achieving the realism it was striving for, I notice that the industry is actually pulling back, in film and video games. And you are slowly seeing it like in Borderlands on xbox 360 cell shading.. or course Jet set Radio did that first, but was always a niche market game at best) Or even with Horton Hears a Who and the more recent Cloudy with a chance of meatballs.
But what I don't see as frequent is the minimalist, abract and raw animation, playblasted, and edgy, and rough work as accepted in the mainstream.. but it will eventually.. Have a look at low res pixel animation, it's exploding everywhere now.
low res graphic games are booming in the industry through xbox live downloads.
That's why David O'Reilly (I refer to him often b/c he's the first I've seen to receive accolades for his short film work in playblast, low res aestetics.
have a look:
Compression Reel from David OReilly on Vimeo.
And no, all the glitches just crappy compressed work or a mistake.. i'm sure it began as a glitch, but then by refining the technique, was able to harness it.
In history a lot of great things in science have been discovered by chance, like x rays, penicillin.. and viagra. And when I mean discovered, I mean in a sense of using it in a practical sense.
You ever work on your computer and the window freezes? And then you begin grabbing the window and dragging it around and around and making this cascading effect which is entrancing? I wouldn't be surprised if someone creates a performance piece out of that. (Kinda reminds me of sand art animation .. future post!!!)
As an artist, be it paint, pencil, chalk, or clay, the medium and how you use it is motivated by what you're trying to achieve in your art.
In art history, art began as cave drawings, then humans discovered perspective, pencils, paints, chiaroscuro, muscle anatomy, and arguably reached abilities to replicate realism. Then those crummy expressionists had to get involved.
Art began to push back and try to explore paint and ways of expression that wasn't so stringent to academia, and what came was an explosion (pardon me) of art possibilities.
Now in 3d graphics, those with the principle that it's all about hi res, with GI, displacement, normal maps, cloth, hair dynamics , that's fine. Now people are looking to push back and explore various ranges and trying to mix aspects of 3d together to create new techniques.... people are mixing 8 bit graphic paradigms with more realistic paradigms, or even them some.
It's funny how it seems that 3d graphics is related to limitless possibilties, but in a broader sense, we have gotten stuck in this 'realism' idea (among its umbrella of iterations), and it's the derivations that thrive from this.
Every art style has a confined (almost mechanical) set of rules (and exceptions)
to create a work of art.
But that can be discussed in another post!
When I was at Siggraph '09 last year, I attended Will Wright's talk about the evolution of computer graphics and gaming. He presented a slide show on the same parallel that I just said here (coincidence!) But I'm sure the thought isn't new, it just isn't in the forefront yet.
But the indies will eventually become the norm, (which i'm kinda afraid of it becoming over saturated and being seen in your next car commercial)
So if there ever was a stagnation in 3d art, it's opened up once again, and until 3d/3d holographic entertainment emerges, we'll be busy creating new and interesting aesthetics within this construct.
You know sometimes mistakes bring great surprises. There's one thing about motion graphics that I just am disappointed to not see in the field yet (well not entirely true: see the genius that is :David O'Reilly)
I was cleaning the mesh of a blendshape that was attached to a original bind pose, and since the the cleaned mesh had less vertices than the original it was connected to... this happened!
it kinda looks like what Two-Face from batman would look like in a modernized updated version in the future... wouldn't that be neat? as if Batman Beyond had a two face, where the new Harvey Dent was trying to stop a hacker of sorts (instead of the mob in a Chemical Plant) and was in some sort of tech firm, and half his body gets electronically digitized!
(next thing you know it happens.... )
No just a quick sketch i saw online of Thomas Edison the perfecter of the light bulb! (not creator, someone else did, i don`t know who) and practicing my crosshatching.
You definitely have to work in steps, and plan out highlights to shadows, because each layer of cross hatch you add should be uniform and consistent across your image, as well as quality of line, and length.
it`s fascinating the amount of thought goes into a certain style.
You need to maintain a consistent set of rules to stick to, otherwise the drawing will look flawed...
it`s almost computer like, in fact it pretty much is. There`s tons of computer techniques (like you see in photoshop) that can mimic artist techniques. Thought I don`t think we`re there just yet in perfecting it.
To me from the animated films I`ve seen (SUPER Street Fighter IV) for example uses `pencil`line filters, that still seem too perfect to be considered organic.
I really dig the watercolor simulations that have been applied lately though. In the video game Okami it`s another example of this...
Hopefully in our short film that we`re making this year we can try something that can loosen up some of this computerized automated look.
Maybe We`ll be able to improve on the computer 'organic' technique.
Busy working on a project for Bryan Belanger-Diaz, a 3d western of sorts, (with a twist)! It's always like that ain't it? I fixed the 3d model a bit and made his face a lil broader, his previous design seemed a bit gangly and more of a goon than a protagonist.
But yeah, the drawing is much more toonish than the project, but i decided to give it a try and draw a concept of them in this style.
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