AV_IDersWatz

Today's Card: Water.

Fun Facts: Japanese people canNOT handle it when I insist I prefer water to any other drink. And make no mistake, tea is not water. Get that filth away from me. Right now. Yesterday.

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AV_IDersRokz

Today's card: Rock.

Fun Facts: Rock is so great, it makes rap listenable.

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AV_IDersKaonashiz

Today's card: Black.

Fun Facts: I used this gag already, but hey.

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AV_IDersIcez

Today's card: Ice cream.

These are edited, by the way, so it's just the image, not the text that goes with it.

I should note I rarely eat ice cream in scoops like this since coming to Japan, it's all just tiny single-serving cup things mostly cuz Japan's big on tiny foods. And yes, ice cream is foods.

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AV_IDersJpz

Today's card: Japan.

I love Japan. I like the US. But I love Japan.

This was sorta designed to be a whammy prize in the card exchange activity...plus this was one of the last ones and I'll admit I was getting exhausted (I drew this whole series in about two marathon sessions).

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AV_IDersLuffz

Today's card: Luffy.
Fun Facts: I draw Luffy and Chopper a lot, so to make this one more interesting, I tried to give it a realistic take. When giving these away, I tried to match the card to whatever the jKid giving me a card talked about. This card's recipient liked this one and the class was abuzz, too, so that was pretty neat!

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AV_IDersDrawz

It's days shy of April as I write this.

My gosh.
Let's post some drawings...First a series I had to do--introduction cards for some jKids, kinda like last summer's cards. These were simpler for elementary jKids, so it's just Name and What You Like. The cards were roughly palm sized.

First up: drawing

Fun Facts: I've had the pictured pencil since college, maybe high school, but have recently lost it and am stuck on my awful, awful back up copy. Maybe I'm due for an upgrade since it was starting to stink anyway--my fingers have even worn down the rubber grip to nothing and turned the metal to yellow!

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AV_InfiniteSadness_Preview

Quite behind on updating this site, but deadlines are just about beat, after which we'll marathon some posts up. For now, here's a quick preview of an upcoming January poster featuring a composition inspired by the Norman Rockwell.
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Design_RedAtNight

This is some fan art for the Adrian Simon. Most of the music I use in my youchoob videos belongs to him (used with permission, of course!), and since I didn't get to do fan art of him last time, I thought now would be a great time to draw a token of my thanks. 

So the art "order" was for a "cute graphic" t-shirt with some kind of redhead-based saying. I couldn't think of any sweet sayings myself and research left me with nothing sumptuous, so I stretched a line a little to fit using innuendo (gingerly).

The expression I heard when I was young was "Red at night, sailor's delight; red in the morning, sailors take warning," apparently a nautical saying seafarers used to ballpark the day's weather before casting off to go fight the forces of the Negaverse or whatever it is people do in the Naaaaaavy. The phrase synched up pretty neatly with the AO, particularly when you factor in Adrian Simon's more recent work kinda gets a touch blue, so there was more to munch on there if you choose to take it up that way. Not that there's anything outrageous here that would make you turn your head, but it can go as coughy as you want it to.

Fun Facts: As we were driving up to LA for my interview to get the very job I currently enjoy here in Japan, we listened (appropriately) to Adrian Simon's Ivy League albums for the occasion, complete with his BUAD cover. 

The only one in the car who hadn't heard the song before, like I did way back when, squinted suspiciously after a couple repeats' worth of plays granted the lyrics lucidity.  It's like getting tricked into loving that song. But it's so great!  Ok, not the song, just his cover. I normally can't stand rap, but this dude killllls it.  Every single time.  I would be all over it if he did a rap covers album. He can make the most horrific stuff beautiful. Gosh.

ANYWAY. So I sketched this one mostly in my head, but early versions had him in a full-on Sailor Scoutfit but I thought that was a little much since it might inadvertently dishonor rather than laud the guy. So we just settled with a regular sailor's uniform but with Serena's pose. Clever right? Yeah I am.

But the trickiest thing was it had to be cute (I really wanna draw him cool, though, you know? I so badly wanna draw a cool picture of a redhead some day). I wouldn't normally do the extra-chibi-riffic thing but it was to sell the Sailor Moon angle, and because chibi has become a shorthand for cute, even if the SD figure isn't even actually cute (and who knows if mine is!).

As for making it feel like a t-shirt design, I tried to keep the colors simple, though if this were an actual t-shirt, I'd prolly just make it all flat.  Additionally, while I knew this would be destined for a red shirt, I thought it's be neat to make the frame riff on of the Heinz ketchup labeling.  Google it.

So, final score--redhead expression: check-ish. Cute: check-ish.  T-shirt graphic: check-ish.  Pretty close, right?

There was super short notice on this piece and I was neck-dope in a different production, but it was a fun project to undertake for the experience points.  I would love to make real t-shirts down the road someday.  I want to make them by hand, though; I'm not crazy about this 100% digital art business, ya know?

Oh! Also, if you've never listened to the Adrian Simon, you gotta chuckim oot.

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Fun_Snowmz

Here's another Christmas card I made for a jKid who mailed me a Christmas card of her own. I didn't know what to draw so I went with a US-style snowman. In Japan snowmen are only made of two snowballs, two buttons for eyes and a bucket for a hat. They get a thrill out of how we deck ours out.

Speaking of decking things out for Christmas but not really but kinda anyway...

It's our Christmas Special for youchoob. It's only about a third Duel Masters-related, but there's plenty of other content including some looks at obscure manga. A lot of art in this video, too, including stuff we hadn't even debuted on this site yet.

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Fun_GuyWhoseNameIsDaniel

This is a sequel Christmas present I drew for my pizza man. I was floored he still has last year's card!

Still waiting for Japan to get that stuffed-crust technology, tho, son!

But it's all good.

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AV_anp.MySpanta_MO

Here's the Making Of that one piece we did a while ago. Dang I love coloring snowmens.

Here's the pencils if you're into that kind of thing.

Statistically you are not.

By the way, this piece is called MySpanta because of this. Boy, that link was worth clicking, wasn't it? Are you proud of yourself?

Ugh.

That last "ugh" wasn't directed at you.

I just can't get the taste of stealthed wasabi out of my mouth. Why don't they ever warn you?

Ugh.

That one was for you. My disdain for your disinterest in just exactly the things I'm interested in.

Speaking of feeling special for clicking things, if you click anything in this post, make it this picture. It'll zoom in so you can see our coloring proh-sess. We're using Copic Ciaos of course, and this time I got a bit more daring and used purple to bitter up the eye sockets. This is terribly exciting to me and only me. But now you know that.

That's it.

Ugh.

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Fun_Presents

Drawing Christmas cards and such for people. This is a riff on a card I received in the mail.

Actual mail.

Gosh, I'm lonely.

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AV_anp.MySpanta

Here's our proper December ALT poster, fresh in oh-twelve, right? Right.  We've got a special section on Christmas rock tunes including selections from My Chemical Romance, and The Matches, Something Corporate, Fall Out Boy, and Those Guys.  This one was kind of a rusher towards the end, but pretty happy with that Santa!

This is a close up of the reindeer I have named Doofy.

Trying desperately to draw a cute reindeer that doesn't look like a Chopper rip-off is not easy. But fortunately I failed miserably. I am the fool. Pity me.

I've started using my lightest skin tones for wood and stuff so I tried it out on the antlers and was pleasantly surpised with how it turned out.  Neat, said nobody but me.

This is a close up of our section on how to Secret Santa. Because that's a verb. Sentence fragment.

I would tell you more, but it's a secret.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH get it?

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AV_INGLook

Here's the third and final ING illustration. Can you guess the verb? Tough luck, the answer is "looking."

I was really happy with the character design here. I think I finally landed the perfect leader of the crew. I want to call her Jinjin.

I was so happy with the postcardy version that I did a run of her for my chardesign practice exercise. So this was the version of her that conformed to our challenge's rules. That session went so effortlessly and it was so fun. I would love to tell a story with her. But it's about assembling a team, you know? Who is good enough to hang with her? That's tricky.

As for her powers, she has a compass that gives her different abilities and techniques based on the direction of the compass rose. So for example, she'd get cold-based powers from the north, heat-based powers from the south. She also has basically an auto-shield against suckerpunches in her compass. So no cheap shots. And she always looks out for her crew more than they will ever know. But who is looking out for her, when even she can't?

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AV_SnakeOne

I had to make some Holiday cards for the jKids. I normally loathe the term "Holiday" since that usually is just code for Christmas, but we were in actuality covering multiple holidays, so it was a tolerable usage this time around. The two holidays here are Christmas and New Years' (the year of the snake). I wanted to try going inkless, just pencils and Copics, but I still don't know how I feel about noinks. But I do know I love the word "noinks."

Gonna give this away to someone...but who?

Noinks. Away,

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Fun_VanIceCory

This is a char from the chardesign sketch sesh. This is Cory. Her full name is Van Ice Cory, but she rarely uses her first two names. Cory isn't her last name, it's just the last name of hers.

She can use peeps like walking globs of C4. She can use cold and ice through her hands and her breath. She can use heat and fire through her feet.

They say her "real" name is Corey...there are also some filthy rumors floating around...that she's Canadian.

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AV_INGeat

Here's another selection from our ING practice. Can you guess the verb?

I'll give you a hint: eating.

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Fun_BilltedStilted

Billted is from our chardesign exercise. I want very much not to have a boy be the leader. So this guy started out as a girl but then as he became more evidently a boy, it became a struggle to make him not feel like the leader. So he aspires to be the leader. Or maybe he just leads a rival, but lesser or minor crew?

Anyway, he's hooked on placebos. And he knows it. But he can't function without them. He's looking for the legendary Panacebo, which will cure all his placebo-related issues. But for now, he remains functional thanks only the the thin shred of functionality granted by his placebraces.

Will he ever find the Panacebo? Or will he learn to overcome his crippling, entirely constructed dependency himself? One thing's for sure, he will never remember to zip up his pants.

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AV_anp.HAWsanta

Here's a QUICK poster I did for an elemenary visit. They popped this request on me the day of (I'm beginning to suspect a doggone pattern). But I'm pretty happy with how this one turned out. I even finished BEFORE (just before, let's be honest) closing time! Really happy with how the early reviews went from the jCrew, but woulda loved to see the little jDudes lose their little jMinds!

Here's the process shots. Not as detailed as usual since time is terribly precious on these one-dayers.

Anyway, I got the common mark of success--people wanted to rub the drawing...guys, you gotta stop doing that...especially on the pencils(!).

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AV_INGcheer

I did three little postcardy things for the jKids to demonstrate ING verbs.

We'd slow reveal the picture to have them guess the verb.

This one is cheering. Go Oakland.

I took the opportunity to practice more char design, hoping to finally unlock the new lead design I've been looking for. This one isn't it (not too happy with it, but the jKids enjoyed). Two more chances...

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Fun_Skiddish

Skiddish tries so hard to make everyone happy. He hates himself because he blames himself for his ancestors' planetary destruction. So though he has the power to demolish entire celestial orbs, he has locked those centruries' etched programs and applications away in his memory. He can't actually delete them, though, so they're always there. But if they're permalocked, they can't ever be accessed again...right?

Short of recovering and unlocking his Critical Error files, he will stop at nothing to please and make things right with reals. Maybe he will redeem his kind and become a real himself. Maybe he will fall into the wrong hands and destroy us all.

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Fun_BeauxRoundOne

More from the chardesign exercise. I wanna call this guy Beaux (or Beauox) Piœίpe or something.

He's rich and fancy and looks like a girl if you squint a little cuz when I was drawing him I thought I was originally drawing a girl.

But this exercise was about being kinda spontaneous and following the sketch. So maybe it's a girl...we'd need to see some development.

Anyway, if you can manage to land a hit, just don't touch the face. I can't stress that enough.

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Fun_KanonKero

Another one from the CharDesign exercise. This one started with the froggy hoody which lead to the froggie poncho.

She has literary-based powers. The only spelling she always has cast is "Dunbar's Mask."

I want to name a character Kanon, one of the coolest names I've encountered here in Japan.

This one is exciting to me.

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Fun_AnnieWho

More from the Moleskine character design exercise. I think her name is Annie Who. She has comedy-based powers.

Although I didn't really like Annie Hall. It was so surprisingly sad, it hit me outta nowhere. I had to watch it for a comedy class.

I severely want to have a character wear one of those bucket hats. And suspenders. Not necessarily together.

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Fun_KumaTheKid_One

I've been doing a character design exercise recently. It started with this little sketch. The rules are: draw it in my moleskine with my janky writing pen, but draw it as cleanly and quickly as you can, make it fun, and make it evoke a story, as if I'm assembling my own Straw Hats.

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Fun_hws.MegaRad

It's time for more Homework Sketches. We've got a Megaman for a Rockman fan, authenticish pizza from New York for a US-Pizza-eating-wisher, and a clarification illustration for the difference between "cloth" and "clothes" for a confused kid.

Clockwise spiraling, we've got a rare Naruto draw for a Narufan and an even rarer (debut, right?) Bleach sketch.  While waiting for my snow tires to get swapped in at the car shop, I perused the body shop's Bleach collection, and I have to say, it didn't live up to the hype.  I've even seen a few minutes of the show and found it painfully boring and aesthetically off-putting.  I hate the half skeleton masks and stuff, but included it for the Bleach fan because he loved the series so much, I didn't want to let him down.  He even drew a study of my pic for his report on anime!  How cool! I would post it up, but I hear that's illegal. So.

Anyway, we keep the rarities flowing with some Animorphs fan art for a fellow book-enthusiast.  And to mix it up, a rare upshot of pizza.  Yum.

Winding up/down, we've got a trio of Radwimps fan arts.  We've got a chibi Yojiro Noda. and a sketch of their best album's cover. And then a nice close up of the charismatic, mysterious leader of the 味噌汁'S.

And that's that!

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AV_anp.JuneDoggle

Wow! I thought I lost this! But here it is! It's my very first mini-ALT news.

I was showing some of my regular posters to elemKids during an elemVisit, and they elemAsked me to make a poster for them.

On the spot with time ticking, I had to think quick, so I just went with the old, look out the window and go plan.

So it was raining, and I like dem Boston Terriers, so we were off to the races for pic and text.

I just finished the illustration by closing time, although I did have to hand off the last of the lettering to the regular staff to complete.

So there we go!

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Fun_hws.BirdMountainMission

Here are some more Homework Sketches.

The wolf is from a band I recently got into a little, Man With a Mission. Nice guitars but the lead vocalist kinda misses with me.  Great English for a jRock band, though.

Next is a man of iron.  And then a baseball boy for a boy baseballer, and a key chain for someone who knows someone who's name sounds like "keychain." 

We've got a sketch of two cards I enjoy, Mortivore (done totally from memory, to horrific results!) and this dude from Duel Masters.   And there's a snowman for a fellow fan of winter (we just had our first snowy day, though it was more like hale and it didn't last too long)

Here's where it gets wacky--the badominton sketch is for a badmintonista who they say is a strong candidate for the OLYMPICS!  WHA??  Yeah!  I even saw her on the cover of Badminton Magazine!!  I don't know what's cooler, that Badminton Magazine gave her the cover, or that Badminton Magazine exists.   

To bring it home we've got a big gulp for someone who says he wants to visit the US to partake in its giant foodery (wonder if he's ever heard of a Big Gulp?) and a bird mountain for the coolest of the bird mountains this side of Akira.

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Fun_MyLittleStereo

We're figuring out a new character in the old sketchbook, researching some short hair styles and jRock fashion.

Today's study: Stereopony.

I don't love all their music, but I would certainly put them under the "they pretty much rock" column.

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