Vitamin Dy

Doodle of the Day: Sushi Cat

2012-02-18T00:55:00.004+08:00

I haven't been posting on this blog for a while so I'm a little surprised to how my average pageviews per day has gone up since I last checked. Not that it's much, but it's nice to know people are still visiting the site. I've been busy, as usual, with work, but I thought it's about time I started drawing for myself again. Here's something I drew just for fun. It's based on my cat, Sushi, who wasn't exactly the best behaved model (he was biting my arm as I drew this). Hopefully this post will get the ball rolling and kick me back to drawing and posting more art.

Going Analog: Art Markers

2011-10-03T05:08:00.000+08:00

I've been struggling with a really bad cough for these past two weeks (among other problems) and I haven't had much time and energy to update this blog as much as I'd like. Something I really wanted to share, though, is how I recently fell in love with art markers. It was during the storm Pedring, when my whole neighborhood had a power outage that lasted the whole day. If I stayed in my apartment, I would have either died from heat (no power means no fans, and the rain was too strong to keep the windows open) or boredom.

Since all my tech was running out of battery life, I had to look for entertainment elsewhere. I remembered that Fully Booked downstairs (I live on top of a mall. Convenient, yes?) stocked some art markers, so I went to see how much they were. The marker sets that I really wanted were way too expensive for me at the time, but I did find a set of markers that was in my budget.

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Doodle of the Day: Clams look like...

2011-09-23T09:23:00.000+08:00

Here's a sketch I made that was inspired by my recent trip to Coron. It's based on a snorkeling trip where I saw some giant clams nested in rocks and surrounded by corals. IRL, though, I was wearing a life vest, had no flippers, and was safely swimming on the surface of the water.

I'm thinking of going back to this sketch and painting it if I have enough time in the future as I'd love to add in more detail and color to the corals and clam itself.

Trip to Coron

2011-09-23T06:34:00.000+08:00

I finally had a proper vacation recently in Coron, Palawan, which would explain the recent inactivity on this blog. Normally I'd be tempted to write a tl;dr post of the entire trip but it's way too early in the morning and my brain isn't functioning at optimum levels yet. So instead, here are the highlights of my trip in bullet form:
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Portraits: Marilyn

2011-09-16T09:52:00.001+08:00

I was going around my old DA account when it occurred to me that I haven't been painting portraits in a while, so I painted this one of Marilyn Monroe for practice. This went through several incarnations before I was satisfied with my initial sketch. Like I said on a previous post, I'm not really very good with likenesses, so excuse me if it doesn't look exactly like her. I was going for a vintage poster look, and I think I got that effect with the saturation of the skin tones.

P.S. I used a reference photo of Marilyn that I got from this site.

Doodle of the Day: Zuko

2011-09-15T10:05:00.000+08:00

Here's some fan art of Zuko from Avatar: The Last Airbender, for old time's sake. I used to do draw these guys a lot, and it's a little surprising to see one of my artworks in the first page of search results for images of Zuko. I wanted to draw a pose that was a little more dynamic, but I think I might have made some anatomical errors along the way.

I was going to try adding colors to this but I already spent too much time just inking this piece, and my initial test in laying down some colors didn't pan out well, so I just decided to ditch it.

Jungle Explorer 1 of 4

2011-09-14T10:02:00.000+08:00

This is the finished piece for the sketches I posted last week. The original intent for this piece was to have a fancy white border around the illustration to make it look like the background was fading into white, but I couldn't get the result I wanted, so I decided to just keep the full background and get rid of the white border.

My client allowed me to post this up and offer it for prints on Deviant Art in case anyone would be interested in owning his/her own copy. You can buy one here. :)

It's Magic, Charlie Brown

2011-09-13T10:06:00.001+08:00

Here's something a little different from my usual Doodle of the Day posts. This is the poster I made for Committee GeekFight's September game called It's Magic, Charlie Brown. I'm not really very used to designing posters for events, so this piece is kind of like "discovering new art forms" for me. To be very honest, this was done quite haphazardly, seeing as the mana icons look really shitty in the final poster.

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Doodle of the Day: Moving

2011-09-12T14:10:00.000+08:00

This is a doodle I made for posting at my old Deviant Art account to tell my watchers about my new one. It's been several years since I've last been active on DA, so I felt it was better to have a fresh start. There are only a few doodles and pieces posted in the new one, but I will, hopefully, be able to fill it up with more art and doodles soon.

I'm really getting fond of this style of doodling for me, it looks a bit like Copic marker art, but digital. It's inspiring me try out using real markers in the future; go traditional again. I think I'll stick to digital for now, though, since those markers are incredibly expensive.

Doodle of the Day: Doctor What

2011-09-11T13:58:00.000+08:00

Here's a doodle of my favorite Doctor. I'm not very good with likenesses, but I think it looks somewhat like David Tennant. Also, I have really horrible lettering skills. Thank god for fonts.

Doodle of the Day: Tinkerbell

2011-09-09T09:48:00.001+08:00

I was playing with some brush settings to see if I can get a more natural chalky brush and I drew this little piece to practice with the new brush I made. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out, though I didn't really spend too much time on this since I really wanted to make it look like a sketched artwork.

Things I Love Thursdays: I Like A Lot of Things!

2011-09-08T07:58:00.000+08:00

I first heard about Things I Love Thursdays (TILT) from my favorite blogger, Gala Darling. Although I liked the idea of writing my own TILT posts, I never really got around to doing so back when I first heard about it, which was... maybe 4 or 5 years ago? Now I've been seeing a lot of TILT posts from random blogs, and recently, from someone I've actually met, so I thought I'd give writing TILT posts another shot. So, here's my TILT of the week:

International Bacon Day I didn't really know that it was International Bacon Day last Saturday when I was celebrating my birthday with a helping of garlic rice, eggs, and lots of bacon for breakfast. I only found out when I read about Lifehacker's 8 Essential Bacon Hacks. I wish it was alright to eat bacon every day, because I want to make every day International Bacon Day.
The Sims Social I've always been a fan of The Sims games, so it's a little surprising that I didn't start playing this game as soon as it hit Facebook. I finally started playing last week and if you haven't heard yet, I'm totally addicted to it.

Doodle of the Day: Cel and Pixie

2011-09-06T23:11:00.000+08:00

A few years back, I had a webcomic that gained a bit or popularity on the internets called Draw Write Play. I'm not sure if I still have copies of it anywhere online (probably in my Multiply account, which is also dead), but I'm thinking of putting it up back again somewhere just as an archive of all my attempts at being a cartoonist.

I had the urge to draw my main characters again, and here's how it came out:

Maybe someday I'll attempt to make another webcomic. I actually have a few ideas already, but if I'm gonna do it again, I need to make sure I do it right this time. And by "right" I mean not stop making them.

The Frugal Gamer's Dilemma

2011-09-05T22:42:00.000+08:00

I'd like to think that with the exception of tech, that I've grown pretty frugal when it comes to everything else. When it comes to video games, it's very rare that I will buy a game as soon as it gets released, and I will tend to wait for it to go on sale on Steam or on iTunes before I buy it. I guess it's because I don't really have that much time to play all the games that I can buy anyway. Even the ones that I do buy during sales, I hardly ever get to play so much.
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Jungle Explorer #01 Sketches

2011-09-05T14:08:00.001+08:00

I got a bit inspired by my friend Ryan Sumo's new art blog, so I thought I'd try to share some of my art along with my process too. I don't really get to do a lot of personal work nowadays, so I asked my client Ray Hart, if I could post the WIPs of a commission I'm doing for him.

This is part one of a series of pinups revolving around a female jungle explorer. Below is the initial sketch I made for the first pinup:

I was in the middle of painting this piece when I decided that I wasn't happy with how the face turned out. So instead of finishing the colors then and there, I switched off all my colors layers and re-sketched the face. This is how it turned out:

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Game Love: Sims Social

2011-09-03T11:46:00.000+08:00

The last game I ever played seriously on Facebook was Pet Society, and back then, I was never really into it. I tried Sims Social because my friend Denice recommended it, and because I thought the graphics were pretty. Boy, was that a bad idea. Because now I'm addicted to it.

My Sim is so cute! Look at her! SHE'S SO FUCKING CUTE!

Doodle of the Day: Kitties

2011-09-02T16:02:00.003+08:00

It's my birthday today, and I took the day off because I've been having insomnia for the past few days, and I wanted to rest. After several failed attempts at getting some sleep, I decided to doodle something for myself instead. Hopefully I can get myself to do more personal art this year. I'm already feeling out of practice.

This piece is a cartoony self portrait of me and my cat. I didn't get his markings exactly right, but I think he still looks pretty cute here.

Hello, 27.

2011-09-01T23:00:00.000+08:00

So I'm officially turning 27 tomorrow; I say "officially" because I've been telling the staff at 7 Eleven that I was 27 for the past 6 months. I'm trying to remember what it was like at my last birthday, and this is what I can recall:

Me (a.k.a. Tomato Face) and Guia at last year's party. Photo by Luis.

I was sick, as I always am on my birthdays, and there was a party with a "nuns and school boys" theme that we threw at Yale with two other celebrants (Alice and Luna). I didn't know how to dress up as a nun, so I dressed up as a school girl instead. This year, I am not having a party. Instead, I will be spending the day working, and hanging out with my boyfriend and my family the weekend after.

Game Love: iAssociate 2

2011-08-18T05:23:00.000+08:00

iAssociate 2 is a word association game that my friend Aissa introduced to me. The first level (Tutorial) is pretty easy, but the later levels get more complex, and completing them becomes a matter of how much stock knowledge you have of the subjects present in the level -OR- how diligent you are at guessing by random punching of letters (if you guess the correct character in order, it reveals as a clue.)

I like this game because it shows just how much or how little I know about certain subjects. Forces of Nature, for example, made me realize that I don't know shit about science :P. Some words force me to do research before I can answer them, like the bonus word in Savor the Flavor.

Game Love: Tiny Tower

2011-08-05T23:44:00.000+08:00

Tiny Tower is far from being a new game in the app store, but I've resisted from trying it despite the recommendations from friends. One night laced with ennui, I decided I should finally give the game a try.

Now I understand why my friends would sometimes ignore me and check their iPods when they hear that hear that ping!

I guess my initial hesitation with playing Tiny Tower was brought by all the freemium social games that I've grown tired off since I started playing them in the first few months of owning an iPod Touch (Lil' Pirates, Hero Project, and Adventure Bay to name a few).