So…Where have I been?

Happy New Year 2018!!! I’ve been MIA for the last few months of 2017.

Let me explain where I’ve been for the past few months: I got into art college! As a result, I’ve been drawing and animating all semester, even during the 5-week-long, province-wide strike. Thanks to that strike, our semester ended in the middle of January, and we are now into the second semester. Goodbye, reading week, you will be missed… 😦

Here are some of my workings from these past semester.

Life drawings

Yes, they were real live nude models. Come now, we’re all adults here.

Remember the golden rule of life drawing etiquette: don’t chatter, take pictures, or laugh during life drawing. It’s distracting and disrespectful to the model, as well as to your fellow sketching artists.

 

After impromptu sketching a classmate, you really appreciate the skill and patience models have, to hold perfectly still.

I quite liked our female model. Her curves were soothing, and fun to draw. Although I didn’t like some of my classmates’ reactions to the models: “why can’t we draw hot people?” As animators, we will be required to draw people of various ages, genders, races, and body types. We shouldn’t limit ourselves to the chiseled Adonis, or the wide-eyed anime girl. I could probably write an entire post, about why teachers “don’t like Anime.”

Speaking of which, I’d like to think life drawing has encouraged me to break out of my limiting box. To aspiring artists out there, remember: even the best manga-ka have an understanding of human anatomy.

 

Character Sketches

A term you will learn about is silhouette. Indeed, all characters have distinct silhouettes. For example, even if I showed you this silhouette, you already know who this is:

Similarly, we studied silhouettes and designed characters. This is Frank McLauchlin, a “goofy” archetype character I designed for assignment purposes. Because of his design, Frank is capable of pulling humourous body language and poses. Here he is falling down, surprised, chilling, running, and hungry:

 

Modelling

Ah, modelling…I have a love/hate relationship with Maya, and the things it entails. I made a sword, though. And a Master Sword! (Click for the original concept art source)

Oh, and I made a house.

 

Animation

Unfortunately the playblasts refuse to cooperate with YouTube. But I did animate a bouncing ball, follow-through actions (tail wagging in response to the bouncing motion) and other neat things. You’ll just have to take honsest PiBaa’s word for it.

 

 

It’s really happening, guys. I’m finally on my way to make great artwork, and animation. Let’s keep making the world plush…and animated!

Pika, so happy~

Ice Cream – Amigurumi #39

I scream you scream, we all scream for… plushie 2/4 from the summer binge! Click here to view the first one.

Pictured with its friend, the Lolly

Greetings from my home, away from home! I have now completed the first semester in residence. I am very excited to finally be taking steps towards true independence.

Residence isn’t necessarily living on your own; you have a roommate. One of my prospective roommates was a girl called Maddie. I’m still not 100% sure why I chose Juefei over her. Don’t get me wrong, they’re both lovely girls, but for some reason I felt like Juefei would be a good choice. As fate should have it, Maddie ended up living right next door! Yay, wall mates! I gave her this ice cream cone as a first meeting present. (Juefei got the chocolate covered strawberry) Ice cream is now sitting with Doggy.

I lost the picture of Squirtle eating the ice cream. Oh well.

The original plan, was to make the ice cream scoops and cone all one piece. When that failed, I made the vanilla and strawberry scoops separately, and the chocolate attached to the cone. No more chocolate drips this way!

As much as I love ice cream, it was the food that taught me I’m lactose intolerant. Shoonie can attest, that that was the worst car ride ever. We had gone to PEI, and stopped at COWS Creamerey for…well, what else? COWS prides themselves on their 100% real dairy ice cream, and it was indeed delicious. But about an hour after consuming this delicious treat… ohhhh my poor tummy. And I had to sit in the car for an hour, feeling like I was gonna explode. Luckily Uncle Shoon was great and managed to pull over to a nearby gas station.

Oddly enough, store-bought ice cream from the grocery store rarely affects me. What the sheep on the farm is in that stuff? Or rather…isn’t in that stuff?!

 

 

 

What do you think 3/4 will be? Do you like ice cream? What is your favourite flavour? Comment below!

Pika, so happy~

In Response to the 2016 Capsule

It’s that time of year again, where I respond to my past self!

For those who are new to this blog, I have made a New Year’s tradition of summarizing the past year, and saving it to be opened at the end of the following year. You can read my past capsules here:

2015 Capsule
2014 Capsule

As you write this, you should be sleeping in time for Cassie Day in a few hours.

2016 has been strewn with both positivity and negativity. You began the year on a rocky note, with a fail new year’s date, followed by a broken heart a few days after Valentine’s Day. Fortunately, it was nothing a spontaneous change to your style couldn’t fix. And you made a new friend in the process!

The second half of the year was devoted to your mental and physical health. This has been beneficial so far, because it gave you a lot of breathing room to schedule other events, and work on crafty projects. Not to mention, you travelled further on your own, twice! Last year you went to Belleville, Ontairo. This year you went to Lyndhurst, Ontario – a town about an hour away from Kingston, which is even further than Belleville. This is the place where Top Hat, your first ever blog subscriber, evolved into the tall, dark, and handsome Mad Hatter.

And you’ve gotten back into drawing! As our Mad Hatter pointed out, you completed the 30 Day Drawing Challenge in October. You even finished the bonus challenge?! Like WOT?! I hope you have participated in a drawing challenge since, this was fun. ^_^

Here is one of your best pieces from the challenge. It symboilzes a lot to you. Now that you have surpassed the curtain of 2017, what do you have to say?

You have since returned to Lyndhurst several times. In fact, you’ve spent a lot of time away from home this year. You moved out on your own, went back to school to pursue your dream career, made new friends, and became closer with old friends.

And yes, you have participated in two more drawing challenges this year. Now that you officially attend the school that hosted it, you were eligible for a prize!

You may not have achieved last year’s goal of 1 plush/month, but you did learn a new skill: beading. Have you made anything since? Pics pls.

Oh yeah, how’s this blog look so far? Are you still posting? Even if you have to drop it down to a post every two weeks, please please PLEASE write something.

And holy sheep, PLEASE tell me the shop came back. Do you really want to work at The Fluff Club forever?!

Ehehehe…yeah, about these…

I think it would be better, to post a catch-up blog at the end of each month. And not just blogs about plushies, but drawings, beading, plushies, knits, treats, candy kits… anything that requires one to get creative.

The goal for this year is to make a plushie/craft sale. In 2017, I sold a baby Groot, and a pair of fingerless gloves/wrist warmers. Let’s see if I can make more in person sales, if not online sales.

By the time you read this, our wee baby Shoonie will have graduated high school, and gone off to college. How is she? Do you still have fans among her friends? XP

How are Ginger, Aburr, Kitty, Tabbs, Huggie Buddy, and Cassie?

Shoonie has grown up before our eyes. She is now studying to be a baker lee! She has made lots of delicious baked goodies, and has a cute uniform to wear during classes. And on New Year’s Eve, she pulled out all the plushies you’ve made over the years. It was humorous to see, how much you’ve improved over the years.

You haven’t spoken to Aburr in a bit, but everyone else is great as always. You should really make effort to see Cassie…

You’ve also made new friends this year: Aimz, Juefei, Isa, Toni, and An. Aimz is bubbly and snuggly, and thanks to her you went to your first concert: Fall Out Boy! The goal for this coming year, is to find a new place to live with Juefei and Isa.

Did you watch any good anime this year? As you type this, you were squeeing over Yuri!!! on Ice. Hey, you’re never too old to like pretty artwork and music.

Yes, you’ve watched a lot, thanks to your new roommate, Juefei. Some include Black Butler, Durarara!, Re:Zero, Jojo’s Bizzare Adventure, Angel Beats, One Punch Man, Baccano!, Gintama, and one of your new favorites, Another. I have considered making the other bears, to go along with the We Bare Bear’s Panda plushie Juefei gave us.

Of course, thanks to Aimz, you still squee over Yuri on Ice. Sadly, there’s still no season 2 of it.

How is school? Did you get in anywhere? If so, how is it? If not, what’s the plan?

School is great, you got into your first choice, and so far so good! You’ve learned more in a single 2 hour class, than you did in a single 3 hour lectures, and 90-minute tutorial! Unfortunately the province wide strike occurred this semester, leaving everyone in limbo for 5 weeks. Fortunately the Mad Hatter came to visit during that time, and you got to enjoy his visit uninterrupted.

Did you remember Anime North this year? Did you go? How was it?

You remembered! And it was great.

Did you take up NaNoWriMo again this year? Remember to write what’s in your heart. Let Sammi and friends tell their story through pictures; the book can be about something else.

NaNoWriMo came right after the 30 day drawing challenge, so you ignored it this year. Not to worry, because we happen to be taking a creative writing course, and the final assignment happens to include writing a script…

Did you get a chance to play Breath of the Wild? How is it?! Anything else interesting come out this year?

Yes, and it is FANTASTIC~ We definitely want to play it through again, and were devastated when the Champion tunic hoodie disappeared from Hot Topic. Also released this year: Super Mario Odyssy. It’s been a good year for Nintendo, at least. You haven’t had a chance to play a lot of games, especially over these past few months. Last we went home, we were playing Tales of Xillia 2, having finished Xillia (Jude’s Story) earlier this year.

Dare I ask… how is our Mad Hatter? You began the year seeing his silly face. Did you end it the same way? If so, he must truly be mad to have stayed this long.

❤ He certainly is mad. But we’re all a little mad around here. It’s been over a year later, and he still brags to his family about cool things we make. As you type this sentence, you should be sleeping for the secret Santa exchange tomorrow…. *honkshoo honkshoo*

If nothing else above was positive, at the very least, please tell me the “dab” died…

Weep for the future, Pika. Weep.

And that’s all I’ve got for the start of 2017. How did it go? Did we achieve anything cool? Comment in your response!

I’m making a more formal response. Go read that!

And so ends my response. Now, off to write a capsule of 2017!

Pika, happy new year~