cwfineart

Summer Vacation

2009-07-30T22:33:00.002+09:00

I should be finishing up the tone work on my 16 page manga right now, but after 6 straight hours of 3D modeling in Maya I can't seem to bring my brain to engage in any other work.

It's my summer vacation, and though that may sound like I would have some free time. The truth is... I don't.

In addition to constantly searching for a part time jobs to pay the bills I also have a huge load of homework.

Summer Vacation homework...

100 figure sketches.
10 background drawings.
12 3D modeling objects
3D model of a tea cup and plate
start a portfolio quality 3D model of a medievel helmet
two 16 page manga's
two names(a rough draft) for next manga's
watercolor background painting
written proposal for a manga series
Read 10 short stories and 50 mangas

Yeah, they like to keep us busy.

Lykanthropik Amphibian

2009-07-17T21:36:00.003+09:00

100 yen to anyone who can guess what the meaning of this title is.

I've spent over four months as a student in Japan now, and I'm really enjoying the experience. It's basically like I was given the chance to relive my college days, but now from a Japanese perspective.

It's really quite interesting to me, and I don't know if I can adequately explain the sensation, but it feels like I hacked life or something, and now I get to live twice. I get to keep all my experiences from age 20-27 and now go back and start back at 20 again, but this time in Japan, in a Japanese school, with Japanese friends, going out and doing all the things that Japanese 20 year old's do, and grow up one more time.

I think this will help my manga a lot, because It's helping me understand Japanese culture in a way that I could never get from the outside, and I'll be able to use my biculturalness as a way to create stories that can reach the world.

I have to say that you appreciate it more the second time through. Since I've already had the experience of growing up and entering society as it were I've had time to think about all the things I missed about being a kid. And now that I'm a kid again (or at least a college student) I get to take life in fully and make the best of every moment.

This is a great time in my life, but on the flip side it's also the most challenging. My philosophy is to work hard and play hard, but even with all the play, there still is a lot of work.

You've heard of burning from both ends of the candle? Well my candle's not burning from both ends, someone threw into a furnace and it's now melting from every square centimeter. Becoming a manga artist isn't easy, but catching your dreams never is.

Anyway, I'll go into more detail in another post. For now let me just say that life is good.

Polyphasic Sleep

2009-06-25T00:18:00.002+09:00

So I'm seriously enjoying my classes here in Tokyo and love being a student again, but doing a double major while working part time to pay the bills leaves me with no free time. In fact if I were to numerate the free hours I had I think it would have to be a negative number.

It got to the point where I began to considering dropping one of my majors, but after talking to a teacher it sounds like it's actually too late to drop classes for this semester so that option went out the window.

So what option did I have left? What I came up with was an alternative life style (sleeping pattern) that I had been considering trying before but lacked the push to actually put it into practice.

It's called the Uberman sleep cycle. It's a form of polyphasic sleep in which you throw out your nightly 7-8 hr block of sleep in exchange for six 20min naps spread out in about 4 hr increments throughout the 24 hour day.

It's rumored that people like Leonardo Da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and other great minds had implemented this sleep schedule. And now I'm giving it a go.

It's been about 5 days and I haven't experienced any adverse effects, which is surprising since other people who tried it tended to be hit really hard in the first week or so since the body needs to adjust to the new sleeping pattern.

Most people feel like a zombie in the first week, but I've only experienced this state on a few very rare occasions usually in the middle of the night when I couldn't think of anything to busy myself with.

I think the reason I haven't experienced any real drowsiness apart from that is that I chose to begin this transition during my regular busy schedule instead of during a break. Most people chose a break since they may have risks with driving to work and so forth, but I don't have any particularly strenuous or risky (like driving a car) activities in my regular schedule so for me keeping the regular schedule has allowed me to keep regular functionality almost as if seeing my normal surroundings somehow allows my brain to forget that it's not sleeping properly.

I should probably explain that the first week really isn't proper sleep, since you don't get REM sleep regularly from 20 minute naps, but after the adjustment period is over your body acually adapts to the new schedule and you receive your REM even in 20 min naps.

I've been dreaming in my naps lately (a result of REM sleep) which shows me that I may already be adapting.

I've recently decided to make a bit of a change in the traditional uberman schedule however, because I have one class once a week that's 7 hours long and doesn't give me a chance to get a nap. To fix this I'm going to attempt to allow for a 7 hour awake period during the day by condensing my nightly naps to every 3 hours instead of every 4.
As far as I can see this hasn't been done by anyone before, so I'm not sure how effective it will be, and if it doesn't pan out, I may switch back to the tradition schedule and just do my best to make up for missing the nap during my 7 hour class once a week.

I don't plan on doing this long term. From what I've read no ones ever done it for more than about 6 months (with the possible exception of historical figures like Davinci, but that's not easily verified), so I don't think I'd be comfortable doing it for any longer than that.

新入学式　Entrance Ceremony

2009-04-14T18:28:00.002+09:00

Tokugawa Ieyasu came to my School's Entrance Ceremony!!

徳川家康が私の入学式に来ました！

Ok, if you know your history than you'll know that that's impossible.
But the actor who played Tokugawa Ieyasu in an NHK Drama, Tsugawa Masahiko, did come and speak to us.

I had watched the drama and really liked his acting, so I was surprised and honored to see that he had come to the ceremony.

それはもちろん無理ですが、ＮＨＫの徳川三代というドラマに徳川家康の訳を演じた津川雅彦さんは実に入学式にお越しくださいました。実はそのドラマ、私も好きで、津川さんは尊敬している男優ですので、驚きました。

I wasn't expecting much coming into this ceremony, because in America I don't think I've ever had an entrance ceremony, so I didn't really get what the point was, and I have to say it was a little weird hearing Canon playing in the background despite the fact that it's not a graduation ceremony.

アメリカにはこういう入学式はないと思うんで、正直に言うと別にいらないじゃないかと自分思ったんですが、実は意外と感動しました。

But I have to say I'm thoroughly impressed. The ceremony started with introductions of the principal and teachers, and the principal gave an interesting speech which was followed by words of encouragement from a few other teachers as well as some famous graduates and people related to the school including Tsugawa Masahiko, who I mentioned earlier. And there was even a recorded message sent to us from the Principal of Columbia University Chicago (<-My home town).

最初に学校のスタフの紹介してから、校長からのスピーチがありました。そして、先述べた津川さんや他の有名な卒業生や学校と関係のある方からの一言を頂きました。

Then the second half started off with a graduate from the school talking about his recent work arranging the Resident Evil theme song. Which was promptly followed by a live concert style performance of the song.

そして、バイオハザードのティムソングをアレンジした卒業生からの一言が終わったら、ライブで演奏してくださいました。

I was sitting in the very front next to the left speakers and I could feel every beat course through my body. As the girls next to me cringed at the loudness of it, I just sat an took in the moment like a sip of high quality wine. As I heard and felt the guitar riffs and watched the singer bathed in lights on the stage I could to tell that this was definitely not your average school function. Realizing the possibilities that are being laid out ahead of me I almost cried. Maybe it was joy, maybe it was excitement. Anticipation maybe? Whatever it was I felt something deep within. Something like what I felt just before I made the decision to come to Japan as a study abroad student four years ago. It's the feeling of change, and the feeling of possibility. It's the feeling of purpose.

スピーカの隣に座っていたので、その音楽は聞いたと言うより、本当に全体で感じたと言った方がいいかもしれません。その瞬間をワインを飲んでいるようにゆっくりと身につけました。これは普通の学校ではない、今日は普通の日ではない　と感じました。
興奮か喜びか何の気持ちか分からないですが、今日何かを感じました。何か、深くに。
四年前最初に日本に来ようと思った、その少し前の時の気分と同じです。変化と可能性の気分です。　目標という気分です。

X Japan sent us flowers!!

Marked by Sakura 桜のしるし

2009-04-08T00:16:00.004+09:00

桜がきれいに咲いていますね。懐かしい。

The Cherry Blossoms are blooming. Their truly beautiful.

最初に日本に来た時にも桜が満開でした。

They were in full bloom when I first came to Japan as well.

今年の桜は私にとって、日本で過ごした三年間の印となります。

For me, this year's sakura represent a full 3 years spent in Japan.

日本に来るのは私の夢でした。そして叶いました。
去年、また新しい夢を追いかけようと決意して、漫画とイラストの専門学校を調べました

Coming to Japan was my dream, and now that dream is my reality.
A year ago, shortly after the sakura had bloomed I decided to chase another dream, and began researching art schools.

それから一年立って、今東京コミュニケーションアート専門学校を通うことになりました。
授業は来週から始まります。

A year later and now I'm set to start school at Tokyo Communication Art College next week.

教材は今日貰いました。

I picked up my supplies earlier today.

私の人生にはまた新しいチャプターが後もうすぐ開きます

A new chapter in my life is about to begin.

I'm excited and scared at the same time.
Luckily, that's a feeling I've gotten used to.

一番楽しい、一番苦しい時期になるかもしれません。興奮と恐怖を同時に感じるような不思議な気持ちですけど、望どおりです。

New Year

2009-01-21T11:08:00.003+09:00

First post of the New Year.

Sorry for being mia for the last month or so. I decided to take some time off for the holidays.

I haven't been posting many digital pieces lately (with the exception of some photography) and it's not that I'm being lazy or anything. It's just that right now I'm doing a lot of research for my comic and for some new stories I plan to start working.

(By the way; the third part of my comic is now up for view at [link])

So I've been doing a lot of sketches of various clothes and armor from various cultures and historical periods to give me an idea of what direction I want to go with the character designs for my stories and then I've been looking over a lot of my old material and thinking of ways to reinterpret it and translate it into Japanese and what not.

In summary I've been doing a lot of prep work but don't have a lot of finished products to post up at the moment. But don't worry I have a lot of pans for the new year and I'll have it ready soon.

Until then I hope you enjoy the rest of the photos from my summer photoshoot with Ashley.

four years from now.

2008-11-10T19:05:00.002+09:00

A few years back I did an exercise where I wrote up a number of possibilities of where I saw my life leading. If you have the time and want to read that post I'll put a link here

But now I find myself at another point of decision. I've already been accepted to Tokyo Communication Art College, but I'm finding it harder than I thought to determine exactly what major I want to choose and exactly what it is I'm shooting for.

What is it I want to be doing three or four years from now?

I've been thinking about doing a Pro Manga and Game Character Design double major, thinking that I'd work in a Game company to secure a stable income and provide myself with a visa while working toward getting my manga published on the side.

But I've been coming to some doubts lately as to where it is my heart lies, and what I want to be ultimately aiming for. A part of me always wants to shoot for the sky while standing on some sort of solid ground, but the more I keep living double (more like quadruple or sextuple) lives the more I see this burning of all ends of the candles as being an ongoing condition, and can I be a balanced person, can I meet a wife and raise a stable family, if 10 or so hours of my day are spent in a company job and the time I'm at home is spent working on my own freelance endeavors?

I think it's time I look more at what paths are before me so I can come to some decision about where it is I want to go and what it is that I really want to do.

GAME COMPANY
If your going to work for a company in Japan you have to be prepared to really eat drink and sleep your company work, because Japanese do not know the meaning of a 9 to 5 job.
I could be fine with that. That is if I'm doing something I enjoy. Ideally I'd like to work on fantasy based games and ideally I'd like to do the conceptual artwork and help establish the games image through 2D illustration.
But games are becoming more and more about 3D. And the most likely job I'd get would be that of a 3D modeler or animator. I really don't want to do animation.
I could do modeling, but I would still feel a need to pursue something more like illustration in my own free time.

Who I want to be like...
Yoshitaka Amano
Conceptual work for Final Fantasy, Vampire Hunter D, etc.

Ayami Kojima
Konami's Castevania, etc.

MANGA
One thing that makes me less than eager to just spend my days doing 3D modeling is the wealth of stories I have to tell. I really want these stories to come to life. I want to draw them out as a manga. Yet there are some issues with this as well. I can't get a visa as a manga artist. I thought I could just do some translation or something on the side to get my visa, but apparently the government here isn't keen on allowing you to get a visa with a field unrelated to what you studied in school. (Particularly with 専門学校) There are ways around this. One thing that I would absolutely love, would be if I could get hired with a company translating manga to English, but I still need to look more into what that would entail.

Another challenge is the fact that I am not a native Japanese speaker. I can definitely write the comic in Japanese, but there may be places where I'm not able to grasp the write nuance of a word or phrase. A writer you'd imagine should be of above average language proficiency. I am above average as a foreigner but if I'm competing with native writers, than that's a different story. However you cut it, I'm below average compared to a native Japanese speaker.

But this could be remedied by employing a Japanese assistant, and I could always market my comic in English to America or another English speaking market.

I would still meet some challenges in manga since my style is rather unique and in opposition to the popular akiba-kei wide eyed, cutsy, moe girls that publishing companies know will sell. But if someone's willing to take a chance on my unique style than hopefully I'll be able to stand out fro the crowd and become something great. Plus I can rest assured in the fact that manga is and will probably always be... 2D.

But the big knife hanging over this is the question... what happens if I can't secure a visa?

Of course I could come to the States, but will I fit in to the American comic industry? I could do some other work like translation and teaching and what not, but honestly, I don't know if I can stay away from Japan for very long. There are a few circumstances that could possibly change my mind, but I'm not going to go into those here.

Who I want to be like...

Inoue Tekehiko
Vagabond, Slam Dunk, etc.

I actually saw this exhibit in person

Samura Hiroaki
Blade of the Immortal, etc.

CONCLUSIONS
If I go for the Game world there's a small chance I can do exactly what I want, but odds are I'll have to compromise and there's also a chance I may end up doing something I didn't want to be doing.

If I go for manga there's a small chance I can create a successful series that I can live comfortably off of, but it's more likely that I'll be doing some other work to keep afloat. The other work may be something I enjoy, or it may not.

Financially the game world is more secure, but the comic illustration world gives more opportunity for 2D art.

Ultimately the determiner in whether I do what I want or conform is my skill.
It's fine to aspire to be like an Amano or Inoue, but the final challenge is this. I have to be good. I have to be really freakin good. Good enough to stand above everyone else.

And truth is....
I'm just not that good... ....yet.

Happy Halloween

2008-10-31T01:49:00.004+09:00

I've always loved Halloween. Maybe it's partially due to it's close proximity to another fav Holiday, namely my birthday, but I've always looked forward to the later half of the month of October when I could see that Halloween spirit coming out. The wonderful joy of letting yourself enjoy the darker side of our ego's for a season, where ghosts and ghouls, and my personal favorite, vampires, can come to life in our imaginations.

So the traditional way to celebrate Halloween I suppose would be to go trick or treating. Yet, this generally doesn't last into adulthood, and I despite being an avid fan of the Holiday, never really cared much for trick or treating. Yes I went a few times as a child, but I didn't care too much for candy and probably around 8th grade I found a much better way to celebrate the Holiday. I volunteered to scare the crap out of people in the annual Haunted Labyrinth.

For years since I looked forward to hiding in the shadows of that dark maze and pop out at the expecting yet unsuspecting victims (guests) who stumbled their way into my room. I was often able to scare the same group of people five times, popping out or dropping down and finally playing the dummy, before they moved on to the next room.

Yes those were good times. I hope one day I'll be in Chicago again for Halloween and I'll be able to volunteer again.

But now in Japan I've had to come up with new ways to celebrate my beloved All Hollow's Even. Last year I had a party at my apartment and also went out to eat at Lock Up, a restaurant where they put you in a cell and have monsters break lose in the middle of your dinner, with a few friends.

I dressed up and went to Harajuku last year too, thinking that maybe there would be some Japanese dressed up for Halloween, but all I saw were a few foreigners dressed up in Shibuya. Oh keep in mind when I say that I "dressed up" I don't mean I wore a costume. I just downed my Goth clothes and breathed in a little night air.
Even though they don't seem to do anything special for Halloween the atmosphere in Harajuku is always welcoming to interesting clothing styles and it feels good to go down there from time to time decked out in clothes a little less like what you casually wear. Although now that I am becoming a student again and won't have the binds of having to wear suits to work everyday I imagine those lines of what I usually wear and what I wear when I feel a bit expressive may become a bit blurred.

Anyway I digress...

I have another tradition I have taken up for the Halloween season, and that is the Halloween movie. I think two years ago I watched my favorite Disney movie, A Nightmare Before Christmas with the church youth group and then last year I bought a copy of Queen of the Damned which I watched for the second time as I had seen it before, and this year I have watched it again.

I projected it in my apartment for the last time as tomorrow I'll be moving. I began the movie with my two other roommates but one disappeared halfway through and the other watched to the end but was kinda squimish about some of the scenes. I didn't see what the big deal was. I mean it's not a horror movie or anything. Just a little blood sucking here and there, oh and then that part with the ripping out of the heart and biting it (my roommate hurried out of the room at that scene).

But yeah I enjoyed the film. Although compared to the book the story is really simplified, so of course I recommend the book over the film, but it was nice seeing the scenes I imagined in my head performed in the flesh. Aliyah did a really good job and I like this Lestat better than Tom Cruise from "Interview with a Vampire".
Plus I love the music from the film.

If you don't know about Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles or any of these movies I may be boring you right now, but I would recommend you look into them if you get the chance. Lestat is such an intriguing character. And the sort of dark mythology Anne Rice builds around him is simply enthralling.

So Halloween is actually tomorrow, but I may not be able to go out at all since I'm moving. But we'll see. At least I got my movie in and I did go to Lock Up again the other day for my Birthday.

Next year I'll probably watch the Underworld Movies, and if possible I think I'd like to go to a Visual Kei Concert or something. I just need to find someone to go with me, cause it sucks going out alone and my current friends seem a bit to squimish to join me.

So anyway no real point to this post, accept maybe to encourage people to enjoy the Holiday.

So to all I'll just say...

"Happy Halloween"

Japanese/Admission Test

2008-10-09T17:56:00.005+09:00

So the admission process is more or less complete.

Application for early admission... accepted
Interview... passed
Application for enrollment... accepted

Only thing left was a Japanese Language Test to show that I would be able to attend classes in Japanese, which I just took this Sunday.

I haven't spoken a lick of English any of the times I visited the schools, so the teacher's kept telling me that the test should be a breeze, but I still get a little nervous taking tests, especially when I don't know what they're going to test me on.

I wasn't really that worried, but I was a little worried that there might be a writing portion where I would have to write Kanji. See I can read most Kanji, but writing them is a different story. Since the computer pulls up Kanji for you when you're writing emails or what not it's easy (even for native Japanese speakers) to forget how to write kanji.

So anyway I came to the school in some comfortable jeans and casual clothes, and after arriving I was brought to a room filled with other applicants,
who were ALL WEARING SUITS!!!

I felt a little out of place, and I started to wonder if in Japan you're supposed to wear a suit to take a test, but then I realized (and later had it confirmed by a teacher) that all the other applicants hadn't done the early enrollment and still needed to have their interviews.
I already passed my interview so I was all right. But yeah was still a bit shocking at first.

So I received the test alone in a room with a teacher watching over me. The first part of the test was on proper use of Keigo (the super polite form that I don't use that often in my regular life).
Luckily I had read a copy of
"Chibi Maruko's Keigo Classroom"
about a year ago and new enough about keigo to work out the questions through a process of eliminating which answers I knew weren't right.

Next section was the kanji. This was what I knew would be on the test so I was ready to work out kanji backwards and forwards and even tried preparing just in case I had to write from scratch (no multiple choice), but actually this section was quite easy. None of the kanji were higher than the second level JLPT and it was just multiple choice "How do you read this kanji?" type of questions. Much more straight forward and less tricky than the 1st level JLPT kanji section.

Next I think it was reading comprehension. These weren't too hard but there were a few questions that were a little tricky. I really wonder what the answer for the last question was. It was this article on the Japanese dependency on foreign imports and the last question was asking what the author felt would happen if trends continued as they are. The first two choices were way off so I eliminating those and then had to choose between...

1. Japan will lose it's ability to farm it's own resources.
2. Japan's economy will collapse.

Now the author mentions both of these things but he doesn't say it in exactly those words. If I remember correctly it was something like...

"...this will effect Japan's ability to produce it's own resources, and the Japanese economy may be in danger of collapsing."

So they don't actually say the economy WILL collapse, or the ability to produce resources WILL be lost. It just says there will be an EFFECT, and there may be a DANGER. So neither one's really correct, so I have to try to guess which one's closest. This is what I don't like about some multiple choice tests.

Anyway, I went with the last one.

After the test I stayed around for the Open House and took part in a sample class for Maya 3D software. 3D feels so strange to me, but they say the more you do it the easier it gets.

After class my supervisor congratulated me on my test. He said, "I can't tell you what score you got, but you don't have to worry. Good job."

I guess that means I pass.

Now I just have to wait for the card in the mail, and keep working on my portfolio.

If I have a good enough portfolio they said I may be able to skip the first year and start as a second year student. That translates into me saving a lot of money and having a better chance to get into a company (they like hiring people under 30), so I think that's what I want to do.

Oh and in other news, I have to move by the end of the month.
If I renew the lease here it'll be for two years, and since I'm going to school next year it wouldn't make sense. I'll probably move in with a friend for the time being, so no big, but packing is taking more of my precious time that I need to be using working on my portfolio and stuff.

World's End Cafe

2008-09-18T15:56:00.003+09:00

In case you haven't already heard, I went to Singapore to see Jingna's exhibition.

It was an amazing experience. The exhibition was simply beautiful.
Seeing her works fully realized and on display was really inspiring.

I had a lot of good conversations at the opening party. Jingna has a really good social circle, and I felt really honored by the way she enthusiastically introduced me to them.

In honesty I've been to a lot of parties where I enjoyed conversations with people that were basically just a means of keeping entertained during the duration of the party but not really people I'd feel particularly compelled to keep in contact with afterward.
But I think I can honestly say that the people I met in Singapore are people I'd love to hang out with again if I should ever get the chance.

I don't think Singapore was ever on my list of places to go before I die, but now having been there, I think I might be putting it on my places to go again before I die.

It was unexpectedly comfortable. I mean I really don't recall any particular culture shock.
The closest thing would have to be the surprise I felt when I came off the plane and went through customs, where I was greeted in very polite English.
It wasn't that I was surprised they spoke English. What surprised me was how pleasant they were. I mean I'm used to leaving the super polite atmosphere of Japan to step out of a plane in Chicago where I'm jerked into reality by the flippant attitudes of U.S. customs and security and what not, that basically treat you like a big herd of cattle.

Ok sorry for the rant. I still love America... Really.

Anyway back to Singapore. I think the best way to describe it would be to use the metaphore I heard while at Jingna's Opening.

Ren, one of the great people I met, said that Singapore is basically like "the World's End Cafe" from the "Sandman" comics.
Now I haven't read Sandman (although now I think I kinda want to), but I could more or less visualize what he was describing, because I remembered a similar place that came up in the old Chrono Trigger RPG.

It's like a place outside of time (at least in Chrono Trigger it was) where people from all sorts of worlds would stop in the midst of their travels and sit and share their stories before heading on to somewhere else.

You may be wondering what in the world that could have to do with Singapore, but in the short time I was there it felt to me like that was an adequate metaphore.

I felt like Singapore was a amalgamation of all the different places I'd been before.
It was like a wider more spacious Tokyo,
a safer more laid back Chicago,
a cleaner more organized Manila,
and probably numerous other places all rolled together into one neat package.

Maybe that's why it felt so homely (did I just say homely. There's probably a better word that could go there. meh whatever).

So yeah I think I'd be down with another visit sometime. Maybe when I need a break from all the busy-ness that is Tokyo.

The food was great. I wanted to take a picture of it, but I was too busy eating.
Here's a picture of the aftermath.

It was mostly spicy food. uberly delicious spicy food.

And then there were a lot of fruit drinks, shakes, sherberts, ice cream, and what not. Here's something called halu halu.

there wasn't any picture on the menue, but I figured, "it sounds like halo halo (the Filipino desert) so it's probably good."

...it was.

Oh I also had a gigantuan sized mug of sugar cane drink.

This is Zeng, posing as a size reference.

More photos...

Gothic Loli in Singapore

A hecka large stairway we went up on our way to a movie screening

Night Safari

K well I'm getting tired of writing. I have a detailed account of my trip written in my Japanese journal. But for the time being that'll only be seen by myself and my Japanese tutor.

Sorry for the long post. I'll have to start writing regular bite sized posts instead of the occasional short novel.