7/30/2019: Books I have been reading
It's been a long time since I have have posted on my blog. I have been so focused on producing content that I have fallen a bit behind on some of the other aspects of being an artist such as self marketing and maintaining my website. In addition, there have been a few books that I have been immersed in. I finished the Moribito series--at least the two books that Scholastic published of it recently. What I absolutely love about the book is the depth of the strong female protagonist Balsa, who is a bodyguard who has to take care of a boy who was chosen to host the egg of a water spirit, and the fact that the story centers on fictional governments that are based on the political tension between the Japanese empire and the native culture. Nahoko Uehashi is a fantastic writer, and she brings many elements to her story from her perspective as a professor of ethnology.
Right after I finished Moribito, I moved on to another book of a completely different genre. The Lean Startup by Eric Ries is much more related to business and a movement of people who believe in creating a startup company using smaller batch principles to verify whether a business venture requires perseverance or pivoting. Although this is much easier to implement in technical startups, I can imagine such a principle might look a bit different when it comes to art or media.
The current book that I'm reading is The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver. I am very interested in politics. I was not as fiery about politics as I used to be when I was in college and made political artwork and protest signs. Nonetheless, now I love to accumulate knowledge about the intricacies of our society, the data that we collect about people, and whether that data can be trusted. The Lean Startup and The Signal and the Noise both have something in common. They both argue that larger batch sizes may seem intuitively quicker and cheaper, but they are overrated. The Lean Startup asserts that larger batch sizes means more mistakes accumulate and become more expensive to correct. That's why product recalls from companies are done for thousands or more units, all caused by the same defect. Big data has the same flaws in that more data may intuitively sound more useful, but can confuse and delude statisticians into seeing patterns that aren't there. Although the number of data points is large and vast, the human brain can only hold about 3 TB of data, so we have to be wise about where we expend our talent and resources to avoid following false leads.
I never enjoyed reading as a child because of my eyesight, but after going through my surgery, I have a fresh, newly discovered love for it. Balsa's adventures in Moribito motivated me to network with more women artists and writers because women's perspectives are underrepresented and unpopular because they tend to break pervasive and comfortable story lines and cliches. The Lean Startup and The Signal and the Noise also gave me fresh perspectives about business and politics and are showing an increasing trend for people to embrace smaller batches to reduce a potential for waste in the long term.
It's been a long time since I have have posted on my blog. I have been so focused on producing content that I have fallen a bit behind on some of the other aspects of being an artist such as self marketing and maintaining my website. In addition, there have been a few books that I have been immersed in. I finished the Moribito series--at least the two books that Scholastic published of it recently. What I absolutely love about the book is the depth of the strong female protagonist Balsa, who is a bodyguard who has to take care of a boy who was chosen to host the egg of a water spirit, and the fact that the story centers on fictional governments that are based on the political tension between the Japanese empire and the native culture. Nahoko Uehashi is a fantastic writer, and she brings many elements to her story from her perspective as a professor of ethnology.
Right after I finished Moribito, I moved on to another book of a completely different genre. The Lean Startup by Eric Ries is much more related to business and a movement of people who believe in creating a startup company using smaller batch principles to verify whether a business venture requires perseverance or pivoting. Although this is much easier to implement in technical startups, I can imagine such a principle might look a bit different when it comes to art or media.
The current book that I'm reading is The Signal and the Noise by Nate Silver. I am very interested in politics. I was not as fiery about politics as I used to be when I was in college and made political artwork and protest signs. Nonetheless, now I love to accumulate knowledge about the intricacies of our society, the data that we collect about people, and whether that data can be trusted. The Lean Startup and The Signal and the Noise both have something in common. They both argue that larger batch sizes may seem intuitively quicker and cheaper, but they are overrated. The Lean Startup asserts that larger batch sizes means more mistakes accumulate and become more expensive to correct. That's why product recalls from companies are done for thousands or more units, all caused by the same defect. Big data has the same flaws in that more data may intuitively sound more useful, but can confuse and delude statisticians into seeing patterns that aren't there. Although the number of data points is large and vast, the human brain can only hold about 3 TB of data, so we have to be wise about where we expend our talent and resources to avoid following false leads.
I never enjoyed reading as a child because of my eyesight, but after going through my surgery, I have a fresh, newly discovered love for it. Balsa's adventures in Moribito motivated me to network with more women artists and writers because women's perspectives are underrepresented and unpopular because they tend to break pervasive and comfortable story lines and cliches. The Lean Startup and The Signal and the Noise also gave me fresh perspectives about business and politics and are showing an increasing trend for people to embrace smaller batches to reduce a potential for waste in the long term.
3/6/2019: Cosmogany, a superhero story of a girl who's not allowed to use her superpowers
I have finally completed one of my short stories Outcasts of Earth, which is a short slice-of-life comic for the Josei demographic that tells a story about a lesbian who gets herself entangled in someone else's relationship conflict. The story details the absurd choices women make to conform to a heteronormative society. While this classifies as realistic fiction, I promised earlier to create a story of a completely different genre, and the story Cosmogany was born.
Cosmogany is a superhero story about a girl with an immense amount of power that has such a big trade-off that it is not worth using in the first place. The concept is based on a nightmare combined with a lucid dream. I will aim to release a page per day. Stay tuned for more!
I have finally completed one of my short stories Outcasts of Earth, which is a short slice-of-life comic for the Josei demographic that tells a story about a lesbian who gets herself entangled in someone else's relationship conflict. The story details the absurd choices women make to conform to a heteronormative society. While this classifies as realistic fiction, I promised earlier to create a story of a completely different genre, and the story Cosmogany was born.
Cosmogany is a superhero story about a girl with an immense amount of power that has such a big trade-off that it is not worth using in the first place. The concept is based on a nightmare combined with a lucid dream. I will aim to release a page per day. Stay tuned for more!
2/14/2019: Kai the Akita
Happy Valentine's Day, everyone! I have been very busy, but I have tried to stay updated on posting artwork. These past two months have been on a figurative roller coaster. Art and comics are a great way for me to relax and de-stress so it's a bit easier to keep up on staying creative, but when it comes to keeping my blog updated, I have to be very emotionally involved and invested, and therefore need to have a clear head before I begin writing. The storm has finally dissipated, and I can finally talk about what has happened the past few months.
Last month, I had a good friend of mine who nearly died and had to go through surgery, and I had to be there for her. Here is a picture of her. Great news: she has been doing a lot better, and she is eating a lot of treats!
Happy Valentine's Day, everyone! I have been very busy, but I have tried to stay updated on posting artwork. These past two months have been on a figurative roller coaster. Art and comics are a great way for me to relax and de-stress so it's a bit easier to keep up on staying creative, but when it comes to keeping my blog updated, I have to be very emotionally involved and invested, and therefore need to have a clear head before I begin writing. The storm has finally dissipated, and I can finally talk about what has happened the past few months.
Last month, I had a good friend of mine who nearly died and had to go through surgery, and I had to be there for her. Here is a picture of her. Great news: she has been doing a lot better, and she is eating a lot of treats!
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I absolutely love her, and I have already posted some comics about our adventures already, and will continue to do so when I have the time. Stay tuned!
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12/2/2018: Choco and Sakura: A love story that could have been
Happy December to everyone. Wintertime means longer nights. Longer nights mean more sleeping. I usually sleep 6 or 10 hours, but rarely in between. 6 hours of sleep optimizes productivity and my ability to code, but 10 hours of sleep optimizes by creative and artistic abilities because it gives me sufficient time to dream. I slept for a very long time because I burned myself out, and I had a very interesting dream where I was rewriting a completely different version of Cherry Blossom Princess that took place in a universe when Sakura and Choco still belonged in the same world, and the dream reminded me that it's a good idea to share some history about the Cherry Blossom Princess series. When I was around 13, I first came up with the early concept of Cherry Blossom Princess. Choco and Sakura were supposed to be a couple.
Happy December to everyone. Wintertime means longer nights. Longer nights mean more sleeping. I usually sleep 6 or 10 hours, but rarely in between. 6 hours of sleep optimizes productivity and my ability to code, but 10 hours of sleep optimizes by creative and artistic abilities because it gives me sufficient time to dream. I slept for a very long time because I burned myself out, and I had a very interesting dream where I was rewriting a completely different version of Cherry Blossom Princess that took place in a universe when Sakura and Choco still belonged in the same world, and the dream reminded me that it's a good idea to share some history about the Cherry Blossom Princess series. When I was around 13, I first came up with the early concept of Cherry Blossom Princess. Choco and Sakura were supposed to be a couple.
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Choco is the tall girl to the left, and Sakura is the shorter girl to the right holding the flower. I used to print all text through a computer, and draw the images by hand afterwards--a technique that impressed my fellow middle schoolers quite a bit.
Sakura was an upper-middle class daughter to an alcoholic single father (her mother is deceased), and she is always trapped, and her only access to the outside world is a trash chute (you will see what this looks like in the second volume), which she uses to connect with Choco, an orphan that regularly hangs around the garbage dump to forage for food. It's an economic system that gives the orphans very little social mobility. However, as I kept developing on the story, Choco was eventually written out of the script, and the title The Devil's Cry went from The Devil's Tears, then finally, it was scrapped altogether to become Cherry Blossom Princess. |
Choco's role in the original story was replaced by Heiko (below left) and Rusty (below right). Heiko's role is a bit more obvious because she becomes Sakura's romantic interest, but Rusty's place in the story will become clearer as the story progresses.
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Choco and Sakura are two of my oldest characters that I still use today. Although Sakura's story is closest to the original manuscript The Devil's Cry, the title The Devil's Tears is reused for Choco's story. The two branch off to different stories. Choco in The Devil's Tears meets another group of orphans and vagrants, develops schizophrenia, and falls in love with another girl who takes care of her during the apocalypse (bottom right). Similarly, in Cherry Blossom Princess, Sakura falls in love with Heiko (bottom left).
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In the dream I had related to this history, Sakura was still in love with Choco and resented me for rewriting their history. There were so many entities--both human and inhuman--that tried to pry these two apart, including Sakura's mother and a wicked witch she hired to make sure Sakura wasn't keeping anyone in her room in secret.
My dreams always inspire me to create more stories for my characters, but this one was interesting in particular because I have never had one where my characters broke the forth wall. Although Choco has been away from Sakura for so many years, if they were real, I wonder if she and Sakura have moved on.
My dreams always inspire me to create more stories for my characters, but this one was interesting in particular because I have never had one where my characters broke the forth wall. Although Choco has been away from Sakura for so many years, if they were real, I wonder if she and Sakura have moved on.
11/29/2018: Update on current projects
Before I go to bed, here is a current update on projects, both to keep you all in the loop as well as to remind me of my progress. Stuff like this is almost therapeutic because it's like saving my progress when I have come far enough in a game. I am off work next week, so I will try to take advantage of the situation and pump out as much content as I can.
Before I go to bed, here is a current update on projects, both to keep you all in the loop as well as to remind me of my progress. Stuff like this is almost therapeutic because it's like saving my progress when I have come far enough in a game. I am off work next week, so I will try to take advantage of the situation and pump out as much content as I can.
| Project Name | Type | Priority | Description | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cherry Blossom Princess: Of the Eyes of Polar Bears | Traditional Comic | Important | A sequel to the already published graphic novel Cherry Blossom Princess, which needs some touch-ups and visual edits. | I am averaging 3/5 of a page per day. The story is completely written, but any continuity errors are getting fixed as I go along. |
| What Will We Tell Our Children | Animation | Medium | Animation about the destruction of our environment. | This is the most technical out of all my projects. Next action item is to put the media assets together using Java and Processing 3 to animate the stock exchange scene with text(). |
| Outcasts of Earth | Traditional comic | Medium | Webtoon about being surrounded by crappy people. | This is closer to a side project for now. Page 18 has been penciled but needs to get inked. |
| Cats of the Village | Animation | Important | An animation about a girl whose brother can transform into a tiger. | I am currently searching for any artists who are willing to participate by creating backdrops. Next action item for me is to create a wireframe animation for Scene 4. Stay tuned. Animation takes a while. |
In addition, I ran a poll on my Twitter about whether you guys would be interested in watching speedpaints of me working on my traditional comics, and it has encouraged me to stay productive and get a tripod since the dollar one I purchased broke after I bent it around too much. It has encouraged me to stay productive on both Cherry Blossom Princess and Outcasts of Earth, so I am definitely happy with publishing them!
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11/12/2018: New Animations
Although I have been into creating comics ever since I was in middle school, I'm fairly new when it comes to animating. My first time animating was when I created spritesheets in my game design class. Another student in the class liked my animations for my final project enough to commission me to create animation assets for an Android game he and his friend was working on called Curry Ninja. Later, I took a film and architecture class, and began to combine Java programming with my animations. After I published my graphic novel Cherry Blossom Princess, I worked on an additional project to create an animated trailer.
Recently, I have been desiring to take my animation skills to the next level, and I've become pretty ambitious with my projects. Although, I previously had a very impatient and rash style of delivering my projects, particularly when I was a teenager, I have been striving to break the habit and become more meticulous in also delivering finesse and quality in my work.
This is a preview of scene from my project What will we tell our children? a commentary about climate change, pollution, and the environment.
Although I have been into creating comics ever since I was in middle school, I'm fairly new when it comes to animating. My first time animating was when I created spritesheets in my game design class. Another student in the class liked my animations for my final project enough to commission me to create animation assets for an Android game he and his friend was working on called Curry Ninja. Later, I took a film and architecture class, and began to combine Java programming with my animations. After I published my graphic novel Cherry Blossom Princess, I worked on an additional project to create an animated trailer.
Recently, I have been desiring to take my animation skills to the next level, and I've become pretty ambitious with my projects. Although, I previously had a very impatient and rash style of delivering my projects, particularly when I was a teenager, I have been striving to break the habit and become more meticulous in also delivering finesse and quality in my work.
This is a preview of scene from my project What will we tell our children? a commentary about climate change, pollution, and the environment.
In addition, progress has been made on Cats of the Village, an animation that I'm working on that has a drawing style very different from my own because it has a much less Americanized appearance. It integrates styles from Korean and Japanese art.
I have received some requests to get commissioned for related animation scenes, but I am currently unable to take requests at this time. I may been a bit unreasonable and jacked up the price a bit mostly because I've also been studying for technical certifications. I'm averaging around six hours of sleep, and I've become an expert at time management. When I catch myself getting distracted on something for longer than five minutes, I immediately try to focus my attention to do something productive. In addition, before any wise guys tell me, "Then, why are you on Twitter, bub?" the time I spend on Twitter is also scheduled so I can connect with more artists and voice actors.
Overall, it's been a very challenging month, and I had the opportunity to meet plenty of amazing people. Thank you for all the support, and I will try to continue to deliver the best content I can for everyone.
10/29/2018: Trying to juggle five active projects
It's been a month since I last updated my blog. These past few weeks, I haven't had much of a social life, and have been trying to squeeze out as much productivity from every hour of the day, with the exception of getting distracted with Facebook occasionally for only fifteen minutes at a time. Currently, I have five projects that I'm actively working on. In order to make sure they reach their intended destination of completion, I organized folders, hung sticky notes around my office, and optimized my workspace for multi-tasking. Essentially, each project is treated like a college course--each requires meticulous attention to detail and solid, realistic deadlines.
Here are the updates for my current projects:
It's been a month since I last updated my blog. These past few weeks, I haven't had much of a social life, and have been trying to squeeze out as much productivity from every hour of the day, with the exception of getting distracted with Facebook occasionally for only fifteen minutes at a time. Currently, I have five projects that I'm actively working on. In order to make sure they reach their intended destination of completion, I organized folders, hung sticky notes around my office, and optimized my workspace for multi-tasking. Essentially, each project is treated like a college course--each requires meticulous attention to detail and solid, realistic deadlines.
Here are the updates for my current projects:
| Project Name | Description | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Cherry Blossom Princess: Of the Eyes of Polar Bears | A sequel to the already published graphic novel Cherry Blossom Princess, which needs some touch-ups and visual edits. | Currently redoing the ugly, sloppily done pages that I made while I was in high school. |
| What Will We Tell Our Children | Animation about the destruction of our environment. | In the process of animating. |
| Coding Tutorial: Processing 3 Basics | Coding tutorials for artists and front end developers for graphic applications. | In the process of writing a script. |
| Outcasts of Earth | Webtoon about being surrounded by crappy people. | Page 12 has just been completed. Page 13 has to be penciled. |
| Cats of the Village | An animation about a girl whose brother can transform into a tiger. | In the process of animating. |
I have met quite a few artists that prefer focusing on one for a multitude of reasons. For starters, it allows your followers to keep track of one thing that you're working on and remember your project because of your consistency. It's much harder to remember all the projects of an artist who is jumping around and changing topics frequently. In addition, if you invest all your time in one project, it increases the likelihood it will be finished completely and all in one piece. However, I also find that I sometimes cannot be productive. When I'm groveling in artistic hopelessness on one project, I feel my passion rekindle when I change my frame of mind by swapping to a different project. I can focus on one project for long periods of time without losing passion, so this will not be an issue.
9/11/2018: Start of a brand new project and Korean speaking voice actresses / voice actors needed!
Although I was born in Baltimore, Maryland, I often include elements of my Korean heritage into my work. For example, Cherry Blossom Princess has its setting taking place in a fictional city on the east coast of the United States. However, it also had some references to Korean history, specifically, Japanese imperialism and occupation of Korea in the 19th century. However, the heritage and history is mostly in the background of the story, and knowledge of the culture is not crucial to understand the plot. In addition, the art style of Cherry Blossom Princess is a mixture between Western and Asian influences instead of being exclusively "manhwa" in its style. My next project, Cats of the Village, on the other hand will be in a completely different style.
Korean American culture is vastly different from the culture of Korean-born Koreans. This new project will reflect a lot of new elements that I have not shown in previous projects. While Cherry Blossom Princess has an intentionally exaggerated drawing style--for example, characters are often drawn with big heads and tiny hands--Cats of the Village has a very neat, clean art style. The proportions of the characters are more realistic, and the background and landscape do not have a distorted perspective.
One of the themes that appear in Cats of the Village is the balance of conformity and individuality. Culture in the United States is very diverse and free, as reflected in in the distorted art style that takes place in the setting of Cherry Blossom Princess. However, the experience in Korea is said to be much more different because conformity is often considered important.
The story centers on an ordinary high school girl Mayumi and her older brother who is the only known inhabitant of the village with the seemingly supernatural ability to transform into a tiger. Although Mayumi loves her older brother, the way he chooses to use his power eventually begins to make her stand out in a negative way at her school.
This is an animated project that will be formatted similarly to a movie trailer. I am currently working on the animatic, but I am starting my search for fluent Korean voice actors ahead of time.
Although I was born in Baltimore, Maryland, I often include elements of my Korean heritage into my work. For example, Cherry Blossom Princess has its setting taking place in a fictional city on the east coast of the United States. However, it also had some references to Korean history, specifically, Japanese imperialism and occupation of Korea in the 19th century. However, the heritage and history is mostly in the background of the story, and knowledge of the culture is not crucial to understand the plot. In addition, the art style of Cherry Blossom Princess is a mixture between Western and Asian influences instead of being exclusively "manhwa" in its style. My next project, Cats of the Village, on the other hand will be in a completely different style.
Korean American culture is vastly different from the culture of Korean-born Koreans. This new project will reflect a lot of new elements that I have not shown in previous projects. While Cherry Blossom Princess has an intentionally exaggerated drawing style--for example, characters are often drawn with big heads and tiny hands--Cats of the Village has a very neat, clean art style. The proportions of the characters are more realistic, and the background and landscape do not have a distorted perspective.
One of the themes that appear in Cats of the Village is the balance of conformity and individuality. Culture in the United States is very diverse and free, as reflected in in the distorted art style that takes place in the setting of Cherry Blossom Princess. However, the experience in Korea is said to be much more different because conformity is often considered important.
The story centers on an ordinary high school girl Mayumi and her older brother who is the only known inhabitant of the village with the seemingly supernatural ability to transform into a tiger. Although Mayumi loves her older brother, the way he chooses to use his power eventually begins to make her stand out in a negative way at her school.
This is an animated project that will be formatted similarly to a movie trailer. I am currently working on the animatic, but I am starting my search for fluent Korean voice actors ahead of time.
9/29/2018: Cherry Blossom Princess paperback copies have arrived: My initial Impressions
My bulk order of Cherry Blossom Princess has arrived! My first impression is that the matte finish for the cover feels very nice to the touch, but it turned out slightly different from my initial expectations because the finish almost feels rubbery to the touch. I am very satisfied with the build quality, and the book looks beautiful. The formatting for my files was correct, so there is no text or images that are falling into the gutter, which was the initial worry of my reviewers.
I have noticed that there are small aliasing effects here and there that were not caught during my image editing process, and it showed in the print version, and I am well-aware of them. All images were traditionally drawn with pigment liner and scanned in, and although the "black" in the image appears to be actual black on the computer and when I edit images, when I view the images in physical print instead of on a computer screen, the color looks rather faded and grey. This is something that I will have to keep in mind when conducting visual editing for my second novel.
There have been several people that suggested that I scan the images in with a higher DPI to avoid having individual pixels be visible to the viewer in print, but this turned out not to be an issue because the images are not in full color. I tested this out for my printer at home and could not tell the difference between versions with a higher DPI or a lower DPI--something I strongly suggest for authors who intend to use traditionally drawn or painted images.
I expected that the book be a lot thicker, considering it's 232 pages, and I have seen a lot of books with fewer pages that appeared much bigger. The paper for this book is quite thin, especially compared to the fact that the original copy was drawn on cardstock and slipped into sheet protectors, hence making it immensely thick.
Overall, I am extremely happy that I have finally had the opportunity to hold my own published books in my own hands. Thank you to everyone who has supported me through this long journey! You have all been amazing!
My bulk order of Cherry Blossom Princess has arrived! My first impression is that the matte finish for the cover feels very nice to the touch, but it turned out slightly different from my initial expectations because the finish almost feels rubbery to the touch. I am very satisfied with the build quality, and the book looks beautiful. The formatting for my files was correct, so there is no text or images that are falling into the gutter, which was the initial worry of my reviewers.
I have noticed that there are small aliasing effects here and there that were not caught during my image editing process, and it showed in the print version, and I am well-aware of them. All images were traditionally drawn with pigment liner and scanned in, and although the "black" in the image appears to be actual black on the computer and when I edit images, when I view the images in physical print instead of on a computer screen, the color looks rather faded and grey. This is something that I will have to keep in mind when conducting visual editing for my second novel.
There have been several people that suggested that I scan the images in with a higher DPI to avoid having individual pixels be visible to the viewer in print, but this turned out not to be an issue because the images are not in full color. I tested this out for my printer at home and could not tell the difference between versions with a higher DPI or a lower DPI--something I strongly suggest for authors who intend to use traditionally drawn or painted images.
I expected that the book be a lot thicker, considering it's 232 pages, and I have seen a lot of books with fewer pages that appeared much bigger. The paper for this book is quite thin, especially compared to the fact that the original copy was drawn on cardstock and slipped into sheet protectors, hence making it immensely thick.
Overall, I am extremely happy that I have finally had the opportunity to hold my own published books in my own hands. Thank you to everyone who has supported me through this long journey! You have all been amazing!
8/25/2018: Cherry Blossom Princess out in Paperback on Amazon
After some work, editing, and consulting with formatting reviewers, I was finally able to get the paperback version of Cherry Blossom Princess out on Amazon sooner than I imagined, and it can be purchased here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1732611408/. I ordered a few copies in bulk for myself to sell at events because I notice that many of the new friends I have made were very kind and wanted to support me then and there. They sometimes ask if I have a hard copy on hand for them to purchase, and this time I will be prepared.
I have been very busy the past few days, so I haven't been as active on Instagram and Twitter. I have been meeting with different artists here and there and networking, and I have felt like I learned a lot of new things on my journey. Although I have always been confident in my line art, I struggled with color in the past, especially when I was an artist during my high school years. However, after learning about which colors go well together, I began to create my own sets of color palettes that portray the emotions that I wish to portray in my work. I had many fellow artists who have been with me through my artistic journey, and they told me there has been a significant improvement in that area since I first entered my first Studio Art class in high school.
I will continue honing my skills and remaining optimistic.
After some work, editing, and consulting with formatting reviewers, I was finally able to get the paperback version of Cherry Blossom Princess out on Amazon sooner than I imagined, and it can be purchased here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1732611408/. I ordered a few copies in bulk for myself to sell at events because I notice that many of the new friends I have made were very kind and wanted to support me then and there. They sometimes ask if I have a hard copy on hand for them to purchase, and this time I will be prepared.
I have been very busy the past few days, so I haven't been as active on Instagram and Twitter. I have been meeting with different artists here and there and networking, and I have felt like I learned a lot of new things on my journey. Although I have always been confident in my line art, I struggled with color in the past, especially when I was an artist during my high school years. However, after learning about which colors go well together, I began to create my own sets of color palettes that portray the emotions that I wish to portray in my work. I had many fellow artists who have been with me through my artistic journey, and they told me there has been a significant improvement in that area since I first entered my first Studio Art class in high school.
I will continue honing my skills and remaining optimistic.
8/18/2018: Cherry Blossom Princess out as an E-book on Amazon
After some struggles with getting the formatting correct for the physical paperback version, I decided to go ahead and publish the Kindle version of Cherry Blossom Princess this August, and I am super excited! You can purchase the graphic novel here. Cherry Blossom Princess is a genre bending story with romance, family drama, science fiction elements, aliens, pirates, and Nazis, and it was a ton of fun to draw and write, and will be an equally enjoyable read. It is free with Kindle Unlimited. If you are interested in supporting my work, please purchase a copy and leave a review!
After some struggles with getting the formatting correct for the physical paperback version, I decided to go ahead and publish the Kindle version of Cherry Blossom Princess this August, and I am super excited! You can purchase the graphic novel here. Cherry Blossom Princess is a genre bending story with romance, family drama, science fiction elements, aliens, pirates, and Nazis, and it was a ton of fun to draw and write, and will be an equally enjoyable read. It is free with Kindle Unlimited. If you are interested in supporting my work, please purchase a copy and leave a review!
A new novel that follows Cherry Blossom Princess will also be released. It's part of the same trilogy, but the name of this volume is called Of The Eyes of Polar Bears. Although in the timeline, this story takes place approximately 8 years after where Cherry Blossom Princess left off, I started working on this volume during my high school years so it is slightly older--even though there was some time overlap, and at some point, I actually worked on both volumes at the same time. However, I have yet to create an appropriate cover page, but I posted some ideas on my Instagram.
I know there have been some people who have been asking when the paperback format will be out, and I kept on giving out dates but pushing them back, and I am grateful to everyone for remaining patient! Formatting is a bit of a struggle because one of the criteria for paperbacks to be acceptable to be distributed in places like Amazon and Barnes and Noble is that the text has to be within the margins, but a lot of the text for Cherry Blossom Princess is very close to the edge, and so I may have to be cautious about editing my work to not lose some of its original storytelling.
Thanks to everyone for their support for my art! I will post more updates soon about the paperback release for Cherry Blossom Princess and the Kindle release for Of the Eyes Of Polar Bears.
Thanks to everyone for their support for my art! I will post more updates soon about the paperback release for Cherry Blossom Princess and the Kindle release for Of the Eyes Of Polar Bears.
7/30/18: Cryptobox Comics stickers have arrived!
5/24/2018: New Animation Project Preview Image
Stay tuned.
Subscribe to Cryptobox Comics YouTube channel here!
Stay tuned.
Subscribe to Cryptobox Comics YouTube channel here!
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5/9/2018: Beta Version of Cherry Blossom Princess out now!
This is a beta trailer for the first volume Cherry Blossom Princess, featuring animations made by me in both 2D and 3D space. Trailer song was also created by me as well. I'm still verifying with others to see if there is any room for improvement. |
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5/1/2018: Introduction to Cryptobox Tutorials
Today, I have finished the first video of my new YouTube series, Cryptobox Tutorials, which is intended to help artists get into coding. For a while, I have yearned pursuing a PhD in computer graphics and computer animation so I could become a college professor for art students, but this will take time. In addition, I don't need a PhD to inspire and hopefully teach other artists how to program now. Even if no one watches it, I'm still excited because I do have a passion for teaching. |
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4/26/18: My First Manuscript Submission
Today, I submitted my manuscript of Cherry Blossom Princess to a publishing agency for the first time. I felt a great deal of anxiety and excitement just like I felt when I submitted applications for college for the first time a few years ago. I remember my friends cheering me on, telling me to remain hopeful and believe in myself. Although I don't know if I will get accepted or not, it feels like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders, and I have passed a milestone. I used to be very timid about my art, but submitting my work makes it feel as if I have stepped out of my comfort zone and took initiative. |
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4/23/2018: The City of Neocerradia
The setting for Cherry Blossom Princess takes place in the fictional city of Neocerradia, which is loosely based off of my birthplace in Baltimore, Maryland. Chaos and ruin lurk in every corner, and privileged individuals are better equipped to stray far from danger. However, there is another element to the buildings where they almost seem to shape themselves based on the emotions and spirits of the city's residents.
I was born with very bad vision as a child that could not be measured with the traditional 20/20 scale. It had to be corrected with +17.50 diopter glasses or +24.00 diopter contact lenses. I drew in a very distinct style where the people and buildings looked much more exaggerated in their shapes to reflect the confusion that I had when trying to understand my warped urban surroundings. When the technology developed and my vision improved, I began to borrow the art styles of others. The characters looked much more consistent, and the buildings had a much straighter sense of perspective. However, I felt as if my drawings were not as honest. It didn't reflect a very large part of my life growing up confused and lost.
I returned to drawing my buildings in the way that I understood when growing up with that same sense of confusion that I had. I could vaguely make out the shapes, but oftentimes, I filled in what I couldn't see with my imagination, which is something that is limitless but also limited by my young, naive understanding of the world especially at that time.
Neocerradia is a manifestation of unconscious feelings, thoughts, and fears. As Sakuragi navigates this world, one can't help but wonder: how much of Neocerradia is a reflection of reality, and how much of Neocerradia is a reflection of herself?
The setting for Cherry Blossom Princess takes place in the fictional city of Neocerradia, which is loosely based off of my birthplace in Baltimore, Maryland. Chaos and ruin lurk in every corner, and privileged individuals are better equipped to stray far from danger. However, there is another element to the buildings where they almost seem to shape themselves based on the emotions and spirits of the city's residents.
I was born with very bad vision as a child that could not be measured with the traditional 20/20 scale. It had to be corrected with +17.50 diopter glasses or +24.00 diopter contact lenses. I drew in a very distinct style where the people and buildings looked much more exaggerated in their shapes to reflect the confusion that I had when trying to understand my warped urban surroundings. When the technology developed and my vision improved, I began to borrow the art styles of others. The characters looked much more consistent, and the buildings had a much straighter sense of perspective. However, I felt as if my drawings were not as honest. It didn't reflect a very large part of my life growing up confused and lost.
I returned to drawing my buildings in the way that I understood when growing up with that same sense of confusion that I had. I could vaguely make out the shapes, but oftentimes, I filled in what I couldn't see with my imagination, which is something that is limitless but also limited by my young, naive understanding of the world especially at that time.
Neocerradia is a manifestation of unconscious feelings, thoughts, and fears. As Sakuragi navigates this world, one can't help but wonder: how much of Neocerradia is a reflection of reality, and how much of Neocerradia is a reflection of herself?
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4/22/2018: Animation Preview
I am currently working on an animation project using Java, Flip-A-Clip, GIMP, and Autodesk Sketchbook. This will be used for the trailer for my upcoming graphic novel Cherry Blossom Princess. This video is an animation loop of Sakura, the series protagonist staring out at the city as the wind blows in her hair. |
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