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My Sketchbook Project

Reg — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 14:00:45 +0000

Some time last year, I ordered a blank sketchbook from The Sketchbook Project. The premise is that anyone can order a sketchbook, fill it out, and send it back by a certain date so that it can be part of a big, traveling sketchbook exhibition all over the world. Sounds good, right? Unfortunately, I never got to sending out mine. I never even got past filling out anything beyond the second page of my book. I’m not surprised– I have so many personal projects left unattended and this was just another one of them.

However, I did bust out the sketchbook recently to test out some new acrylic paints I bought. Some of my old paints have dried up, leaving me with this:

Tumor-like globs of acrylic paint that jiggle when you poke them.

I really was just looking to test out my new paints so I quickly sketched on the sketchbook cover and came up with this:

I love working with cardboard– it’s so “unfinished” and not as intimidating as
a blank piece of white paper. It screams out, “I’m brown and blank! Do something with me!”

It’s basically just a doodle with color, but I like how imperfect and loose the overall look is. Might have to consider working in this loose style for future paint work– it’s fast, spontaneous, and raw in this digital age where everything is clean and perfect and polished.

So maybe the sketchbook project isn’t a bust after all. At least I have a cute, personalized cat sketchbook to use when my current one is all filled up?

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iPhone retina wallpapers

Reg — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 17:03:26 +0000

I’ve updated my iPhone wallpapers for the iPhone 4/4S. I had a 3rd generation iPod Touch where I’m using one of my illustrations as a wallpaper for the lock screen. It looked fine, but when I got an iPhone 4S, the same wallpaper looked blurry and pixelated due to the upgrade to a retina screen. I then reworked the existing iPhone wallpapers I have for download to fit the new resolution of the iPhone 4/4S, and added some new designs for both iPhone and desktop.

The iPhone wallpapers work best when set for the lock screen; they are already sized to fit so you won’t need to scale or adjust. Check out the Downloads page to get these, as well as their desktop counterparts and other wallpaper designs. I’ll be adding more wallpapers from time to time!

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Quirky, illustrated Japan

Reg — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 15:59:13 +0000

One thing I’m interested in apart from illustration, design, paper crafts, cats, and Flaming Hot Cheetos (that’s my one-line bio right there) is travel. I’ve traveled for a leeetle bit when I was younger, before college and work got in the way. Now that I’m back on my own time with no desk job to tie me down, I’ve been open to indulging in wanderlust when the time and opportunity arises.

One such opportunity came up when my aunt invited me to go to Osaka, Japan with her family last month. Japan was not in my immediate/foreseeable travel plans, but they had already been to Japan numerous times and I wasn’t going to pass up a chance to tour a non-English speaking country with people who already knew how to get around the place and the language barrier.

My aunt wanted to go in mid-November to catch the autumn foliage. Being from a tropical country where the leaves are green all year round, I’ve never experienced fall in my life, but I was a bit more interested in all the quirks and cute stuff Japan had to offer. And Japan did not disappoint!

On our first full day, I was first alerted to how quirky Japan can be when I spotted this sign at the subway. After-work socials and drinking on Friday nights seem to be the norm for the average Japanese office worker, and drunk businessmen on the subway are not at all uncommon. This is one thing they need to watch out for– falling on the tracks while intoxicated! Hopefully the chances of that happening will be nil, thanks to this sign.

We went to Minoh, a nature park that led to a waterfall. You know it’s a family-friendly park as someone took the time to commission this illustration:

There were also monkeys around the park though we didn’t see any. But we knew they were there by their presence on signs all around.

Smile– boulders are falling down the mountain!

Scary-looking monkey

And their manhole covers– they’re not just “illustrated”, they’re also colored. Oh em gee. I dunno, am I making a big deal out of this? Where I’m from, manhole covers are plain and the color of rust… if they haven’t been carted off by some goon to sell off as scrap metal.

Manhole cover in Kobe

Colored manhole cover in Minoh Park, Osaka. This isn’t just a manhole anymore. It’s street art (literally)!

Everywhere you look, there’s something cute and quirky, whether it’s a print ad that’s not afraid to use every single color that exists on earth…

Jewel Pets, whatever those are

…an attention-grabbing storefront for an optical shop…

If you miss seeing this, you’re as blind as a bat and may need this shop’s services

…random pandas on vending machines…

So much cuteness… bordering on ridiculous!

…or a HUGE display of kawaii right on the subway station’s ceiling!

Sorry for the blurred photo, it was rush hour and I was trying to keep pace with everyone.

Even their food is illustrated.

Yep, I totally bought the apple juice just because it was cute.

Pig and panda-shaped steamed buns (a.k.a. siopao)

Chocolate panda cookies. These were good AND cheap.

I have to admire the Japanese for their penchant for the seemingly-trivial and inconsequential quirkiness. Take this ad, for example. We can tell they’re advertising sightseeing spots during the different seasons. The ad can stand on its own without the illustrations. However, they upped the ante (and budget) and really hired someone to add those little characters. And you have to admit, doing so is enough to warrant a second look for these ads (and in my case, an inclusion in this blog entry).

Japan is heaven for illustrators and designers. These are just a small sampling of the hundreds of cute, illustrated, and well-designed things that can be found all over the place. I’ve uploaded the photos here on this blog post plus twenty more of Japan’s quirks I saw on my trip on my Facebook page, just in case you need more cute in your life.

Oh, and the autumn foliage my aunt wanted to see? Fantastic.

Taken with my cameraphone.

These are some of the reasons I fell in love with Japan– enough to want to go back next year (with my family this time). I’ll just need to keep an eye out for CebuPac’s bagsak-presyo seat sales to Osaka. I also want to go back to stock up on more kawaii stationery supplies I bought there, but that’s another blog entry for another day :)

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