Friday is always a good day. And Good Friday all the better.

It is a good Friday to sit down and finish this piece I left over a few months ago. 3 months ago, to be exact.

Ever take a look at a piece of drawing that is nearing its finished state, and felt something is so wrong that the whole thing just look like shit?

This is what happened to this 3 months ago. I was so close to complete it, but the whole thing just seem so bad and ugly. It is like a itchy part of your body you are trying to scratch but you just couldn't find that spot. I tried to figure out what went wrong for a few days. In the end, I decided to chuck it aside.

Over the months I wanted to redo the whole thing a few times changing the pose, composition, lighting etc. I even considered remaking the whole thing as 3D render.

Few days ago after not seeing it for months, I reopened this file and shifted a few things here and there. Suddenly the whole thing just cured itself. It doesn't look so bad anymore, and I actually want to finish it.

So here it is. I spent most of my Good Friday finishing up the rest, mainly the piano. Ahh....the piano. What a friggin nightmare .___________.



The strokes at the piano area are very rough. It is the toughest part of the drawing. I gotta admit, after leaving this drawing aside for so long, a part of me want to rush through it as well.

I am quite happy with the results. As usual, might make a few tweaks here and there for the next few days. But this is about it.

This is the last WIP update for rhapsody. I should be able to post the final image in the next entry. Basically everything is finalised except the piano keys which was the problem I was stuck with for quite some time and of course her left hand.

I spent quite abit of time today to touchup her face. It was quite abit of overhaul in fact.



But I am happy with the final result.
The image above is 50% of paint size. The canvas is 6000 x 3750. It is pretty huge but the painting lacks detail. More than half the time I was painting at 25% zoom with soft brushes, making the painting look very soft on such huge size espcially with such lighting. I did not cast any hard shadow here. In fact, I barely cast any shadow here.

In the meantime, I feel like taking a short break off this and paint something else. Something fast.

An update on Project Rhapsody.



This gotta be the last time I paint something this bright. I cannot work on this without taking an eye break every 10 min. Nonetheless I am quite happy how it is turning out so far. There are many parts I am unsure of, like how to make those flames and white feathers look nice on such bright setting. I've left the toughest part to the last, and am still totally clueless how to even get to it.

Tonight is the last night of 2011. It is a lovely night, except I got slapped with some bad news. Not a pleasant thing to expect on the eve of New Year. Nonetheless I am sure it will turn out fine.

Like a friend of mine always say, "It is always fine in the end. If it is not fine, then it is not the end."

Enjoy your New Year Eve!
To those people partying out there, HAVE FUN! I'll be staying home tonight :)

Finally its the holiday season break again :)

I've been working on this.



Rhapsody was one of the many ideas I had for a long time, but I was very bent on doing it. I started one out earlier this year but I ditched it 'cos it was too ugly. I restarted last month and had hoped to finish it before the year ends but it might prove harder than I think. Extremely bright lighting isn't what I do often, and there are things I need to explore first.

In the meantime, I might plan another fast paint to keep my momentum going.

How did you spent your Christmas? Mine was not bad, though I wished Santa had given me this:




It is a tablet that runs Windows 7 with 256 levels of pressure sensitivity. For artists, it blows the other tablets and the stupid IPad out of the water. I sold my android tablet to prepare for this and despite my drool bowl getting full, it is still not available in Singapore. I doubt even Santa can give it international warranty.

The other cool stuff in my wishlist:




Wacom, instead of coming up with a Cintiq-style tablet like the one above, came up with this cute little gadget. I am curious as how it would work. Afterall it is always easier to draw on paper with pencil. So if this thing can capture pencil sketches so sharply it is sure another good investment. What is the harm in carrying this tiny gadget around to make sure anything I doodle goes digital?
Not available in Singapore either, though for this I am sure its a matter of time. Can't say the same for the slate.

Anyway, happy holidays!

We had a little free time at work, so some of the guys decided we could draw something.

We were to choose a character from Final Fantasy IX and depict him or her in realistic style.

I chose Vivi.

Did you make a wish?
I did :)

There are two 11:11:11 today. What were you doing?
Morning I was talking excitedly to my colleagues about the release of Skyrim, which no doubt would take up the majority of my weekend.
Evening, I was doing this:


One of the many WIPs I have for this year but I intend to finish this before the year ends.

I would paint something for 111111, but Skyrim took me first :p

Looking forward to the release of this book :)



P.S My terrible lack of updates are mainly due to busy work and heavy procrastination. I have quite a few WIPs but none I intend to post as yet.

Woohoo, its the year of the rabbit~! It has been a REALLY busy holiday for me, but lovely!

Love your life~!
Break the rules~!
Strive for your goal~!
Cherish your love~!

And most of all...



...eat healthy~!

May everyone have a good year ahead.
Happy Lunar New Year~!

I have added a new section "365", wierd name I know.

It is for the ImagineFX 365 Days Sketch Challenge. Basically, the challenge is to post a sketch everyday and aim to post for 365 consecutive days. If a day is skipped, the count resets to zero. Given my lifestyle, there is no way I can post everyday as I almost never go home early after work. I might need some backdating every now and then. I'm giving myself a 7 day limit unless I go overseas. Any backdating more than 7 days will reset my count.

Even so, I know my discipline is as solid as jello. So my aim is to hit as high a score as possible. If I were to reset I'll try to aim for higher score next time. I'm guessing my average score to be around 20. Who knows the section might be abandoned next week lol...

I fixed something on the site too. Some users have claimed that the site displays wierd on their browsers. I realised it happens on Firefox and Safari. I've fixed it anyway. Kudos to my CSS skills.

As usual, mistakes never appear obvious to your eyes until you stop looking at them for a while.

I did some edits to the face. It was fugly and I wondered how I got it so wrong in the first place.

Did some level adjustments too.

More updates 19 Jan:

Made changes to anatomy. It was horribly off. It is still off a little but there is no fast fix for that.