New Hiyaku Member

Earlier on I mentioned the possibility of another recruit for Hiyaku Studio. Well, he's here and ready to roll with the team. Introducing, Kouken.

If you've been to Doujin Overload, no doubt you would recognize this guy. His CG work ranks (in my opinion) among the top of the artist lineup. Being one of my personal favourites, I'm stoked to have such a talented artist in our ranks. He'll surely assist us in achieving greatness.

Here are a few examples of his art, but do check out his DeviantArt page at http://kouken.deviantart.com for more good stuff. He also has some very nifty 3D work as well, it's really worth a gander.

Bookworks - Term4 Studio Final

This here was my final project for the year. It's another artbook, except this time it features only my own art and it's heavily inspired by fashion illustration.

My instructor recommended I try a different approach from the manga stuff if I was going to do another book, and I'm quite glad I did. It was a very refreshing change, having to deal with a style which I'm totally unfamiliar with. At the same time, it was also quite a mission getting a handle of new techniques while while trying to produce something presentable and put it into book form in the given time period.

I decided to go with fashion illustrations because I was drawn to the simplicity and elegance. In some sense, it shares similar qualities to my design interests... maybe that's why I liked it. I dunno. Anyways, these artworks are based on real photographs of models. It was done via Sai, because I wanted to employ that slight watercolour effect which isn't so easily harnessed in Photoshop (maybe you can, but I'm a newb at this stuff).

The book itself is called 'Line'. It's a 32 page hardcover, perfect-bound artbook with a dust jacket. The bindery did a great job this time around. I think it's an improvement from my last book, but it's still not what I would call shelf-worthy. If possible I'd like to try out some materials which were made specifically for picture books. This is because the stuff they provide at uni is kind of multi-purpose. It looks pretty decent on the surface, but, if we were to be picky, it could be better. For instance, the dust jacket is too grippy... the semi-matte paper stock obviously wasn't made to be handled this way. Next time around, I'll try out some different printing alternatives who should provide more specific paper stocks. It'll probably do me good to get to know more print places anyway.

One thing that really threw me off was that the background colour in some of the images came out different to the same colour i underlayed it with (so that the picture spreads across two pages). It was strange because I used the paint bucket tool for the background and I didn't think that the eyedropper could pick up variations of that colour... In the end, the technician helped me fix it up much as it would allow, but it's still noticable in some areas.. which is a pain in the ass. Couldn't even detect it on the screen until I went to uni to get it printed, and by that time it was too late to fix completely. Well, shit happens I suppose, and I learn from it.

You can see some images of the book below.

- Cover
- Inside Cover
- Spread 1
- Spread 2
- Spread 3
- Spread 4
- Spread 5
- Spread 6
- Afterword
- Spread 7

Sketch Post 01

Alright, so here's the first of what might be a series of random sketches that I feel are too rough to post on DeviantArt. I know there's a scrap section there that I could use, I'm using it to bin my outdated stuff.

Bookworks - Term3 Studio Final

Since Hiyaku Studio was created, I've had held great interest in bookmaking. I think it's because it allows the use of both design and illustration to be combined without being strictly traditional or digital. The fact that the work is being presented in book form makes for many design options regardless of the content matter (be it still life drawings, or whatever else). With my hobby of drawing manga, and my ambition to become a designer, any process which utilized techniques from both worlds (like bookmaking) just seemed to appeal to me naturally.

The first book I designed was for a Hiyaku Studio doujinshi entitled 'Engage' in 2007. It was the first time hearing about bleed and things of that sort, so it was a bit of a wobbly start. Of course, the design itself wasn't too spectacular, but seeing as it was going to be presented at Doujin Overload, which is an event based on nonprofessional work, I wasn't too worried about heavy criticism. The second book I design was, again, for Hiyaku Studio. This time in 2008, it was an artbook entitled 'In A Few Words'. This is where I first began experimenting with minimalist techniques which I've since grown quite fond of. This year, Simon did the design work for our artbook, which turned out great. Only me and Simon have design knowledge, so it's either me or him that does this stuff for Hiyaku Studio. However, that's not to say I didn't make any books for 2009.

During the third term of my second semester at uni, I had the opportunity to learn more about bookmaking for my Studio class. I gained a lot more technical knowledge regarding the subject, and managed to make a book of much higher standard than what I've previously created for Hiyaku Studio; though, given the materials and binding which was used, it's little surprize. This book was perfect-bound with double sided matte paper for the pages. It's still not professional enough to be considered shelf-worthy in my opinion, but it's a nice step up from the staple-bound stuff in any case.

This book is a one-off, and will not be sold. However, I did get another copy made because the bindery kinda messed up the first one and my instructor unleashed almighty fury on their asses. Haha, well that's kinda exaggerated, but he was not impressed and personally raised the issue with the bindery, insisting that they pay for a reprint (it's awesome having instructors that genuinely care for your work). So I've got two copies now and I'm thinking about giving the good one away. Maybe Hiyaku Studio can hold a contest or draw.. something like that. I dunno. It features artwork from the five members of Hiyaku Studio, both old and new. You can see more images of it below. Sorry for some of the blurred images, I couldn't really notice on the camera LCD screen.
- Cover
- Back Cover
- Spread 1
- Spread 2
- Spread 3
- Spread 4
- Spread 5
- Spread 6
- Spread 7

Hiyaku Studio

Sooner or later, I'm gonna post about Hiyaku Studio's activities, so I figure I'd best explain what it's all about first and foremost.

Formed in 2006, Hiyaku Studio is an artist circle based in Auckland. Our style is heavily influenced by Japanese manga culture, always has been and always will. Although there are some remarkable talents within our group, for the moment Hiyaku Studio is strictly nonprofessional. All our projects thus far have been carried out with our own personal interests in mind.

What we do is we collaborate each year to create a body of works to present and sell at the annual pop culture event Doujin Overload. This may vary in the form of doujinshi (fan comics), prints, posters, bookmarks, etc. Our feature product is always an artbook, and it is this which makes up the bulk of our workload.

Regarding the members of Hiyaku Studio, we currently have five. We originally started with four when the group was formed in 2006, which was made up of myself, Simon (Ethird), Jeri and Kody. Our fifth member, Claire, joined up earlier this year in 2009; and we're expecting a sixth to be officially announced in the coming weeks.

On that note, we are still open for new members. We're not taking this too professionally since we're basically just a bunch of young, like-minded artists who collaborate for the joy of it; but we do expect applicants to at least specialize in manga (art-wise) and be around our level of skill (or above; that would be pretty sweet haha). If you're interested in taking part in our projects, feel free to contact me anytime. Being a resident in New Zealand is a plus, and a resident of Auckland is a plus plus.

New Blog, Descrap

So the holidays are finally here, and I actually have time to relax and do my own thing (ye-yer). With that time, one of the things I'm gonna try and do is keep record of my work using this blog.

Usually I use my DeviantArt page to host my art, but I feel as though it's unfit for stuff that differ from my usual style. I say this because watchers on my DeviantArt don't watch me for my works-in-progresses or different practices.. they generally keep to my manga work, which is understandable. When I watch someone on DeviantArt, I don't really pay much attention to their other activities either.

This blog is for me to have that freedom to post whatever I want without the concern of not meeting expectations. It may vary from manga sketches, stuff I've been working on during my study period at Auckland Uni, things that concern my artist circle, just anything in general. I might have video tutorials at some point as well (for the newbies at drawing).

Okay. Now, lets see if this blog thing lasts. I may get bored of it.