Impending Doom of Midterms

Jeez, I can’t believe the last time I posted was nearly half a year ago - for any of you who try and keep up with me or my work, please know that I am so TERRIBLY sorry. So here, allow me to appease you with some eye w̶o̶r̶k̶o̶u̶t̶s̶ ah, I mean candy, immediately.

It’s Rob and the Orange Lightning!

I revisited the property for my midterm project in Justin Pichetrungsi’s Painting 3 class just this summer. That was the only studio I had then, so all of the work I did in the class will probably be put together with the section I’d be making for my current fall classes. I’ll try and upload more presentable things through the blog here occasionally, but that bulk upload? You can look forward to it around the winter holidays. :]

Here’s a peek at something I’m cooking up for Vehicles and Props this term with Brendan Krause!

Here’s a peek at something I’m cooking up for Vehicles and Props this term with Brendan Krause!

I haven’t taken a semester off since summer last year, so I’ve been especially worn down as 2020 continually throws out its curveballs. Regarding my working tools alone, my previous laptop took a huge dump in the middle of the spring. I requisitioned a brand spankin’ new Lenovo Yoga C940 with some nice specifications, but alas, my relationship with technology has been STRENUOUS. I just got it back a few weeks ago from a service repair, but the wifi connection shuts off all the time, and my Photoshop has been super temperamental. Guaranteed crashes when the laptop wakes, sometimes it becomes unresponsive, other times it crashes in mere minutes - so it’s been rare for me to get long and consistent sessions. But I’ll take it as a blessing in disguise - after all, it’s been forcing me to up my working speed.

And, a film study that doesn’t involve any actual drawing! From Originality in Design with Shannon Jeffries.

I dropped off my mail ballot earlier today - thankfully Jean did much of the homework, and I was glad to see my dad doing the same for his votes. I have to say though, the websites belonging to many of these candidates and sometimes lack of info left plenty to be desired. I’ll cross my fingers - I’m hoping everyone simply does their part in making the world better, because boy do we need that now.

Please send me your fortunes! I wish the same upon you - stay safe and be well!

Custom Build: MG Sazabi Ver. Ka

When I was 7, my dad introduced me to Mobile Suit Gundam through VHS tapes. Besides watching and drawing these giant machines for two decades, I’ve also dabbled in Gunpla, a portmanteau for Gundam plastic model, Bandai’s culmination of art and engineering compressed into a build-able model kit. Despite having handled a large variety of kits since the 90’s, I’ve seldom done more than a simple snap build. 2018 marks the year of my first custom build, wherein applied kitbashing, panel lining, detailing, and coating. What you'll see here are the results of my laborious craftsmanship and passion over the course of that summer season. At the bottom of the post you can also watch a short timelapse/montage of some of my working sessions with this absolute unit!

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The optional metal parts set was a first for me; I honestly expected a simple parts substitution, but as it turns out I needed to cut and drill a lot of parts of the original build - a scary prospect when working on a $90+ kit. I’ve also had really bad luck applying decals; my prior Master Grades have little to no markings present. I did build two Real Grades before this though and went through the builds diligently, giving me the practice I needed to complete the markings for the Sazabi. Along the way however, I had an accidental spill that ruined the decal sheet, and also lost the mouth visor to boot. I need to give a special shout-out to GUNDAM REPLACEMENT PARTS for getting me the replacements I needed. They secure these by requesting a warranty stub found inside every manual - I didn’t even know that was an actual thing you could do in Japan! If you ever need something in your Gundam model kit replaced, be sure to check these guys out!

All in all, this was a fantastic project to take on. With the exception of a few design/engineering choices on certain parts, the Master Grade Sazabi created by Katoki and the teams at Bandai is one of the best representations of peak mecha and toy design. I look at and get inspired by a lot of custom builds like those submitted to GWBC and am always looking to get closer to that level of craftsmanship. You can see some of my old builds to the right to catch a glimpse of the progress I made. I’m itching for a chance to finish another custom build like this by next year!

Anyways, I hope you guys enjoyed this deeper look - I put in a lot of extra effort for this one cause I have been over-baking its presentation for the last two years. Until next time everyone -

Cheers!

Cinematic Game Trailer Studies

Here are some cinematic trailer painting studies with minor breakdowns I did for homework in Painting 2 - the top is from Bungie’s Destiny 2 and below are from Ubisoft’s For Honor’s cinematic and gameplay trailers.

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Hope everyone had a fantastic weekend! My family has been relatively good about quarantine, so we had a small gathering for Mother’s Day with a lot of food and flowers. Summer term at ACCD also starts next week (ALREADY?!); I was on the fence about taking classes this time but thought I’m gonna have to do it sooner or later anyway. Looks like it’s going to be busy - I’ve picked up some other projects on the side, and I still have a lot of my personal projects for this site to complete.

Look forward to my future endeavors! Cheers and take care!

A SHOT BEYOND THE TIME

Hey all!

Here’s a personal piece I worked on over the past few days - an illustration depicting one of the most iconic scenes in giant robot anime. It’s no secret to those who know me personally that I’m a huge Gundam fanatic. The finale of Yoshiyuki Tomino’s 1979 Mobile Suit Gundam TV series sees the original v-fin hero machine make its final stand, firing a bright beam of energy into the air to strike at its nemesis above as the asteroid base falls apart around them.

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As you may infer from the progress spread above, this is actually a piece I’ve attempted 2 years ago. I never finished that (you’ll find the furthest I took it to the right), but after the amount of digital painting I’ve been practicing this spring I decided to give it another go from scratch. This time, I had a wider and more adaptable brush workflow, and I was a lot more flexible with the initial drawing as well. Initially I was trying to recreate the Katoki design - leading me to focus too much on itty-bitty details and over thinking/working the painting, and in both bases it caused me to get stuck. I overcame it by being a little more liberal with what design cues I wanted to take from different variations of the grandpa Gundam.

I’m slow with posting stuff on this blog section - I have a lot of content to share for those who won’t initially have access to the pickings on Coursework but at the same time I don’t want to just dump things without care or thought - though an art dump for quick daily doodles sounds good too. But this personal piece will make for a good segway into some of the stuff I did for Painting 2, as it was where I did a lot of brute force painting and learned a lot of lessons that helped me with the drastic makeover. That will be for the next post.

Till next time! Hope you all have a great night!

Post-Term Spring Update

Hey there!

Before I say anything else! I hope more than anything that you are well and safe! I think we can all agree 2020 can use a breather; moving furiously and quickly, it’s like life itself has been upset for the past four months.

If I haven’t lived it I wouldn’t have believed that four months have gone by so quick. Another semester at ArtCenter has come and gone, and I have the fruits of my recent labor to share!

If you mosey on over to the Coureworks section of the site you’ll find a the new row of content from each of the recent studio classes I’ve taken - below and to the right you can see at a glance at some of what’s added: like my completed presentation deck for Entertainment Graphics, and a page grab from Costume Design. The content’s password locked, but feel free to reach out to me for access - I want nothing more on this site than to share the work I create in my life, and if I could hear from you and your interest to see it that in itself would mean absolute the world to me!

Design for the Wolf from The Three Little Pigs

Design for the Wolf from The Three Little Pigs

Imaginary Landscape Painting “Picking Flowers”

I’m just really happy my loved ones are well and that we still have a roof overhead and food to consume. Quarantine hit right after the spring midterms at ArtCenter, and it really knocked me off my game. I think getting cut off from the outside world and being relegated to a digital screen cause me some mental duress, among other things. Casually broke my back from overworking. (lul what?!) I hit 29 last Tuesday during finals though. And I was really thankful to be able to celebrate it over hot pot with just my parents and girlfriend. She bought me an ice cream cake too. I haven’t had a slice of those since middle school! What I’d like to say is this - really be careful about how you want to approach life, so you can keep guarded, and also just really appreciate all the things you can be thankful for. Cause lawd knows shit can really hit the fan sometimes.

I’m rambling. Come back around sometime. Again, I hope you continue to stay well and safe.
Cheers!

Stylization 1 Showcase

I hope the new year is treating everyone well! Today I’ll be sharing with you one of the final projects I worked on for Kirsten Kawamura’s Stylization 1 class at ACCD this past fall semester. As the course name would suggest, the focus of the class was to learn and adapt different existing styles from life and from other artists, enabling us to begin developing our own unique styles for our work.

Rob in the Orange Lightning - Revamped Final Illustration

The final project that we took on after midterms involved visual development of a basic adventure story following a theme or tone. This included a line-up of characters, an environment to place them in, as well as a vehicle; as for the tone, I attempted to go for something more whimsical. I imagined it as a an animated television series, similar to shows like Phineas & Ferb or Adventure Time. The bones of the visual inspiration came from a blend of artist studio CreatureBox, known for its work on the Ratchet & Clank game franchise, as well as concept artist ‘Spudonkey’ Gareth Davies. For more on the development process, click on the gallery images contained in this post to zoom and enhance!

Overall the class, its exercises, and the final project were a lot of fun to go through. It’s akin to putting your own spin on a master copy/study, and I was happy to see how the aesthetic evolved over the 7 weeks. Of course, this is only representative of half of the work I did for the class; for more on Stylization 1, do check it out in its own section under my Coursework page, where you can find that as well as archives of work from my other classes throughout my college years!

Happy new year everyone! Thanks for dropping by, I’ll speak to you again soon!

Post-FA19: Happy Holidays!

Oh gosh I know, I know, I’m terrible at this! Before I knew it another semester has come and gone, and I haven’t given any word on the development on the site. ArtCenter’s curriculum put me through the wringer as usual, and by the time term came to a close my sleeping and eating schedule has never been more messed up! I ended up spending the last week recovering from sickness just well enough to make it through the holidays. But even though I was worse for wear, I spent a significant amount of time compiling much of the work I’ve done for work and for school throughout the decade, and I’m pleased to announce that a large majority of that is now up for viewing on this site! Those of you who were familiar with my site might remember a smaller body of work through my Personal and the Works page sections listed up top; I have since filled the latter’s content, and have also given the Coursework some much-needed love. Here below are some sample screengrabs of what pages you can peruse!

Courseworks and Stylization 1

Garage Life and Kado Vapor

Those of you with keen minds and active eyes may notice that I have intentionally locked most of the work I’ve done in classes, as it is a resource representative of ArtCenter’s collegiate entertainment and industrial design programs. As such, it is opened primarily to friends, family, professional contacts, and benefactors. It should go without saying that attending ACCD is both financially taxing and time-consuming. I’ve also had to upgrade my Squarespace membership to allow for the amount and fidelity of work that I want to share, and so I hope that you would be considerate in supporting what I can bring to the table!

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I’ll be speaking to you again very soon! In the meantime, much love, merry Christmas, and happy holidays to you all!

- Wilson