UH CathSoc now has a new logo!

This was suggested by Peter Murphy and illustrated by yours truly.

And here's the step-by-step process for it:

Now one of Britain's most prolific Catholic Socties gets an identity. You may see us with tees bearing this logo when we go to Woldingham School for the Faith Summer Conference!

Chaplaincy

Today is Sunday. And with term having begun, the first Student Mass for the academic year is today.

Oh, how I am looking forward to that. And how I am looking forward to meeting my closest friends again!

I must be in bed — a long day awaits me. But really, I am excited.

In truth, it isn’t the law school that has taken me places. The one affiliation that has indeed taken me places is the university’s Catholic chaplaincy (a.k.a. UH CathSoc). Had it not been for them, I wouldn’t have found myself. I wouldn’t have been able to go to Stonyhurst and Woldingham to discuss questions of faith openly. I wouldn’t have made the company I’ve made. Had it not been for them, I wouldn’t have known what World Youth Day is all about. I wouldn’t have had such a profound encounter and change of heart — that which resulted from an event which almost claimed my life. My dream of meeting the Holy Father face-to-face wouldn’t have been true. And every question for which the answer is, ‘God is love’, would not have been answered.

I’m now part of the committee (as secretary), along with Michael, Peter and Mark (Tanner). My other friends — Gonçalo, Sophia and loads of others — are there to help too. I must bear in mind that whatever I do, I must put God at the centre, and all things good will come out of it.

I’ve been going on and on about the chaplaincy without actually showing you the new CathSoc logotype, which I conjured about a week before the Faith Summer Conference:

It’s getting late, so I’m going to throw in a link to the description.

Alright. I’d better do my Lectio and head off to bed kthxbai.

Drawings.

One is a step-by-step explanation of a drawing, and the other is the final result of a work I just completed today.

I recently completed a drawing of Reyvateil sisters Luca and Leyka Trulyworth from Ar tonelico II — otherwise known as Luca Trulyworth and Cloche Leythal Pastalia respectively. This is one drawing I’m actually quite happy about, because of the thick outlines and vivid colours.

In case you’re wondering which one is Luca and which one is Cloche, Luca has blue hair.

Alright, time for a step-by-step explanation of how it was done:

On DeviantArt Muro, I began drawing Cloche. Light blue is my ideal skeleton colour, as you can tell — it’s easy on the eyes, and I can erase the blue parts on GIMP once the drawing is done.

Then, I flipped the image…

… and drew Luca. Now, I thought of the ending scene — there’s a song that the two of them sing together, and this drawing was heavily inspired by that. The song in question is EXEC_with.METHOD_METAFALICA/.

Removed the blue lines on GIMP, and rendered the image transparent.

Still on GIMP, I coloured the drawing in.

I copied the drawing on PowerPoint and passed it through the Cutout filter. Note that this is a later version of the drawing, because I only added the lighting marks on GIMP some time after filtering.

The original version of the filtered drawing. I added a crescent moon, which I drew from scratch on Paint, copied to PowerPoint and filtered. Ar tonelico II enthusiats would immediately think this refers to Viola Moon, but I didn’t even have that in mind.

The near-final version of the drawing. A background was added on a separate layer. The houses are arranged in a curved pattern, reminiscent of the actual layout of Ar Ciel, the fictional planet where Ar tonelico takes place.

Final result. The opening lines of EXEC_with.METHOD_METAFALICA/. were added to the drawing. The lines read, Was yea ra chs ieeya fhyu (I will gladly become the wind of hope) for Luca, and Wee ki ra chs wasara dor (I will honestly become the abundant earth) for Cloche.

 

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The other drawing I’d like to share with you guys is this:

This is the large version of an entry to a contest on DeviantArt. The group holding the contest is Happy Animé Art. Their tagline: “pictures that make us smile”.

This was pretty much my first try with magnified animé faces and…. well, this style of drawing. It isn’t too far from my actual style, but it isn’t one I’d have come up with overnight.

 

Like it? I’d be glad if you faved the drawings in their respective pages:

Hymme Trulyworth  /  Happy Animé Art Icon, Size L

Time of rejoicing

“I want to give myself to You, for You have provided for me with great friends.”

                                                                        — Aimée Duchemin

 

Another passion-fuelled sketch, set to the tone of a drum loop I had recently completed, drawn on DeviantArt Muro, touched up on GIMP and PowerPoint 2010.

 

Love it? Support me by purchasing the print here!

A new drawing is done!

I had thought of this wallpaper/background idea yesterday evening, and started doing it — it took me four to five hours in total, but it’s finally done…

Presenting… Terra’s, Aqua’s and Ventus’ Wayfinders from Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep! Well, it’s actually in the order of Terra’s, Ventus’ and Aqua’s.

And with the exception of the background colours, which were edited by Erry, I did not use Photoshop. The software at hand were PowerPoint, GIMP and Paint, and so I had to use those to the best of my ability.

This post is up because I told a few friends — notably Phil — that I’d let them see the finished drawing. I’m quite pleased with how it turned out, considering I’ve only recently begun to draw decently, though over time, I may experiment with more textures and make them more realistic than ever.

This drawing began on Friday, and ended either on Saturday night or Sunday morning — I forget. And since I took about four to five hours, there were breaks in between. Long breaks.

So here’s how it went, from start to end:

 

1. A Wayfinder fragment, drawn on Paint.

2. The Wayfinder base. This was done on PowerPoint — by making the white parts of the Wayfinder fragment transparent, and then copying, pasting and rotating.

3. A base with three Wayfinders. Still on PowerPoint, I copied/pasted the single Wayfinder base thrice, then used 3D Rotation to give different angles to each one.

4. I opened Microsoft Paint (I’m on Windows 7, in case you ask) and I coloured them in with an oil brush.

5. I salvaged some Mark of Mastery pictures I made on Paint some time ago (for archive images on Kingdom Hearts Wiki), made the white bits transparent for the Wayfinders on PowerPoint, edited the colours/contrast on the Marks of Mastery on Microsoft Office Picture Manager, superimposed them onto the Wayfinders, grouped them and saved them (on PowerPoint).

6. Still on PowerPoint, I added a Paint Brush effect to the coloured Wayfinders.

7. I smoothened out the colours on GIMP and began to bore holes in the metal parts, for the strings. The Wayfinders now look cartoony.

8. To make them less cartoony, I redid the Paint Brush effect on PowerPoint, and gave them a second edit over on GIMP.

9. Then, on GIMP, I made a background, with orange for the foreground and blue for the background, and I made it a HSV gradient, and I gave it a bit of texture —

but, as you can see, it's too bright.

10. Then I passed it to Erry, who darkened the background on Photoshop:

Just the timbre I needed! Thanks, Erry!

11. Added bokeh and minimal glitter on GIMP.

12. Copied/pasted the supposedly finished Wayfinders onto the BG. So on GIMP, this file had two layers. This was to be the wallpaper base.

13. Added glitter, softlighted some edges of the Wayfinders so that they’d glow (both on GIMP), and added strings on Paint. Reopened GIMP and gave the strings a bit more detail, so that at full download size it wouldn’t look unrealistic.

Before I added the strings I showed Unbirth the picture, and he noticed that the Wayfinders were opaque, although they were made of glass. So he advised me to make the glass a bit more translucent.

14. Erased a bit of colour from the glass parts of the Wayfinders, and there you have the finished picture:

Love it? Show your support by favouriting the artwork here!

The Wayfinders are from Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep © Disney and Square Enix.

Where did my Kirby BG come from, you ask?

Here’s how it all went:

A basic drawing on Paint

+

A basic background done on GIMP

+

a lot of further touching up and editing on GIMP and PowerPoint

=

I love how the final background turned out. This is the first time I’ve ever drawn a decent Kirby digitally.

 

Love it? Support me by favouriting the artwork here!

A new wallpaper is done : )

One of Didier Deschamps this time :

This is gonna be one of his last designs (chronologically) - this is what I intend him to look like by the end of the main series. I imagine the last episode in the series is Les Histoires Duchemin 7. The tattoo on his face is supposed to be the insignia of a warrior : I got inspired by Zell from Final Fantasy VIII, as well as the cultures of several ethnic groups in the Malaysian state of Sarawak which practice tattooing.

The fictional location of Point-Neuf, the place where Histoires begins (also, Deschamps' province of birth), is an amalgamation of many cultures, but predominantly Sarawakian and Breton. Imagine black, white and gold solidarity, tattooing, people who were once masters in head-hunting (read : about a millenium ago), national identity crises, community dance gatherings...... and anything Breton and Sarawakian which can logically be fused together.

Now, about Deschamps. In the first episode, Le Carnet du Service National (English : The National Service Journal), there are four companies in the conscription training camps : Alpha (red), Bravo (blue), Charlie (yellow) and Delta (green). Under the initial system, I placed Didier in Delta. Now it's Alpha (royal blue), Bravo (crimson), Charlie (chartreuse) and Delta (yellow), which makes Deschamps fall under Charlie - I did not want to change the colour associated with him.

I'll do main characters Aimée Duchemin, Erroll de Wardes and Sylvain Dieudonné soon... provided I can stuff them within the same picture size.

This is my first work where everything (yes, everything) was done on a touchpad, and although this work looks like nothing but a draft, I'm quite pleased with the touchpad thing. : )

Drawn on Paint

Colouring and effects done on GIMP

Love it ? Show some love by getting the print here !

Halloween wallpapers, Kingdom Hearts-style

Well, at the moment I only have two, and I'm using these at the moment. The motif here is Sora's face mask as seen in Kingdom Hearts Mobile.

Modifications to the face mask were done on PowerPoint. The mask itself was cropped out using GIMP. I wanted it to be subtle, though I'm not sure if it works...

A draft for the new Arts and Entertainment Society

I had this idea in mind when coming up for a logo for the Arts and Entertainment Society, back when I was in KL. I had planned not to use the general abbreviation of "AES", but rather, "HEARTS", which, as a backronym, can be read as "Hertfordshire Arts".

The name not only defines us as a society for everything which spells arts, but also as the ideal affiliate whenever we have people wanting to engage in projects with us. I happen to think way ahead of my time, which is a weakness in a way because I often overlook the reality that we're still small, and that we've only just taken off. Regardless. Have I got some really good ideas up my sleeves, and if it weren't for the Lord, I probably wouldn't even have received them !


Text done on Microsoft PowerPoint 2010.
Splat, scribbles and lighting effects done on GIMP.

Chapman Hall, in digital imprint.

Home of the Reyvateils and Vanguard.

Our team colours are finally DIGITAL !

Silhouette and glitter done on GIMP, text, stars and BG done on PowerPoint.

Ode to Lady Brittania

Remember that sketch of Lady Brittania's mugshot that I did the other day ? I finally finished my Lady Brittania sketch !

Well, it's because Lady Brittania has been treating me rather well. : )

The original finished product took less than 2 hours to finish in total, and I did it on Windows 7's Paint. I didn't know if I should colour her hair blonde or brown, so I ended up with a mix of both. Oh well. The entire thing was done on Brushes > Natural pencil.

The "cutout" version of Lady Brittania. I really like how this one turned out. All I did was copy/paste the earlier drawing on Microsoft PowerPoint (2010 version), and then I looked up the artistic effects and selected "Cutout". So in essence, the work is mine, the colour scheme is mine, but the final touches were quick ones. And I especially love how the hair and cape turned out at the end of it all. Oh and the dress too !

Kingdom Hearts Wiki’s Twitter is up !

Be sure to follow us here.

And whilst I’m at it, I even created provisory backgrounds to celebrate Kingdom Hearts Re:coded. That is to say, once it releases, of course. I used a template similar to that of the Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep background which is on the Twitter page.
 

Normal version.


Softglow version.

Thing is, I have another idea for the Re:coded BGs, but I’m not sure where to find translucent squares. Like the ones you see on the Re:coded wallpapers. If I use the squares, I’d fit with the theme a lot better. The circular bokeh bits remind me of Birth by Sleep’s introduction and this current BG needs to be distinct from the previous one, whilst still keeping to the theme. Anyone can tell me where to find them ?
Or perhaps I’ll scour DeviantArt tonight and see if there’s anything worth searching.

Will Kingdom Hearts Wiki get a Twitter page of its own ?

That's what we'd like to find out ! It all started when Bluerfn and I discussed this on Twitter. Imagine, I was so gung-ho about the whole idea that I practically pinged all of Kingdom Hearts Wiki ! The people at Kingdom Hearts Francophone Wiki are yet to know about this. Fine, so not many of us have Twitter pages. But it's a step forward, I believe, either way ! Users will start getting used to the tweets ; followers will come and edit on the wikis. That's what we want our ultimate result to be.


Meanwhile, whilst watching over the forums waiting for responses, I've started developing backgrounds, in case the occasion arises and we need to start a page.

Normal version.

Heavy softglow version.

I did both backgrounds whilst thinking of, and ultimately listening to, Precious Stars in the Sky from the first Kingdom Hearts.
I love etoillic ambiences. Another drawing I did some time back also featured sparkles and stuff like that ; I also listened to another starry Kingdom Hearts song.

Maybe I'll call for more ideas. But that depends on the feedback.

Meanwhile, Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep is released in stores today, and I'd like to see what the English version has to offer. Apparently there's an in-built French version for Canadian gamers, though I'd like to see if this really is the case.

The reasoning behind "Kingdom Herts"

1) It's a pun on Kingdom Hearts.
2) It's linked to the fact that I'll soon be entering the University of Hertfordshire. Which is in the UK. :P Don't ask silly questions.

Bind United Kingdom, Kingdom Hearts and Hertfordshire together and here's what you get :

Kingdom Herts, of course !

Now, these images have been used in the process of making the new BG.

The first image. Involved several handwriting and doodle brushes.

The second image. This was once the blog background, but I felt it was too bare. The transparent heart was ripped out from the Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep trailer. Yes, I even went so far as to remove the text and do something about the edges.

And here you have it - the final image !

As you can see, I kinda tweaked the first one a bit, and then placed the second one at 40% transparency, and then combined the two together.

There. My redesigning work is finally done.

Made myself a BG nice enough to celebrate my entry into Kingdom Herts. ;-)


On a totally side note, today does indeed feel like a day of mourning. Two years ago, on this day, I lost my mom. I realised that I had drained out all my tears last night and now, even when I'm sad, I just can't seem to cry. Mourning takes place in the weirdest of ways sometimes. But one thing's for sure : I want the people around me to see a fine young girl, God-fearing, loving, forgiving, diligent, passionate. I know then, that anyone would be proud of me. Mom would.





P.S. Remember my first ever cover ? It reached 700 views today !
Here's my promise - if I get a good mic I will at least attempt to rework it. <3

バルサミコ酢 やっぱ いらへん で (or, Kingdom Hearts character Caramelldansen)

バルサミコ酢 やっぱ いらへん で

barusamiko-su yappa irahen de

幼女 に 乗れた 仁王立ち の 先生

youjo ni noreta nioudachi no sensei

滅相もない ミサイル本店

messa mou nai misairu honten

滅多 に 会えぬ キャラメル 探偵

metta ni aenu kyarameru tantei

Yes, if you pass this on Google Translate, it'd be butchered to the max.
The chorus for the Japanese version of Caramelldansen is already in butchered Japanese.


So anyway, as the title suggests, I'm working on a Kingdom Hearts-themed Caramelldansen, and in the spotlight, I'll be featuring the characters picked by members of the Kingdom Hearts Francophone Wiki. Right now, I only have a test vid, featuring Roxas, which looks like this :




Yes, I worked on the entire thing myself. o.O

I downloaded the Caramelldansen base from DeviantArt, printed and traced on it, and tried to follow the moveset as closely as possible. Roxas hair and face are in my own style.

As for the background, it was done on GIMP. I did the stars first, then the hearts.

I did not assemble the frames on GIMP though ; I did it on PowerPoint. I started with the stars, then the hearts, then Roxas' moves.

Some frames will feature two or even three characters. And by request, I'll add in a bit of comic relief in the middle of the vid. Stay tuned !

MOAR in-exam-period news and goodies

Tomorrow's my Criminal Law paper, and after tomorrow, I can kick my shoes off and relax !
I'm not the least bit worried about Contract now, and I must admit that after the lecturers told me how students from the previous batches worried about Criminal Law, I must be on my guard now. I had an OH TEH NOES ! moment not very long ago but now, at least I know our lecturer's marking the papers before they get screened.


In the meantime, I've been doing a lot of things - emotes, photo-manipulation and whatnot. Since these works are on deviantArt already, I might as well put them up here for all of you to see.


Wallpapers/Emotes

In light of the upcoming FIFA World Cup 2010 (click on the link if you haven't any idea of what it is), my nails, at least, will be painted blue, white and red, and I'll do everything I can to don my favourite team colours during their matches. I'll be supporting Les Bleus, just as I did in the previous World Cup. Almost the whole thing was done on GIMP (for the scoop on how I made the emotes, you can find it here) while the text was added on PowerPoint.


And if you're seeking to download the emotes separately to show love for the French football team, you could always make use of these :

The emotes with the Tricolore as a backdrop. Note that I did the Tricolore freehand. I'm actually proud with the result, because it looks like it's been coloured in with a felt pen (when in actual fact, all I did was use the Fuzzy Circle brush on GIMP) ! And I'm especially proud because I only started using GIMP in mid-February this year, and now mid-May is approaching. Three months and I've managed to do this ! Praise the Lord ! ^_^

The three emotes themselves, without the flag.

And these are the separate emotes. I''m making them free, because I'm sure there'll be quite a number of France supporters (though I'm not sure how many would stumble upon this space). I haven't named these emotes yet, but if I ever do name them, they'd be called (from left to right) Liberté, Égalité and Fraternité (lit. Liberty, Equality and Fraternity).

MOAR emotes :

Pretty cute-looking thing, eh ? Yes, I know this one's pretty stereotypically coloured pink and yellow, but I somehow think this is one of my best. Ever.


Photomanipulations
Country First

This work, titled "Country First", is currently the display picture for Facebook group "Geng PLKN Sungai Rait, Miri", a group which unites all ex-trainees of Camp Miri in Sungai Rait. For the uninitiated, I was in Camp Miri, Sungai Rait for three months for compulsory conscription. Prior to having this picture, we only had a stylised National Service logo, and I didn't want us to stick with that.


Cikgu Hafiz took this image back when we were singing either Standing in the Eyes or some other patriotic song. I cropped it, added the tint, text and National Service logo on PowerPoint. Then I passed the image on GIMP and drew a Malaysian flag freehand, with almost full transparency. Again, I'm proud of the result.


The slogan "Country First. The rest is collateral damage" came from a Nike promotional poster for the Malaysian football team jersey, which is yellow with black stripes. I was taken in by the tagline, which had an underlying, depressing message. I wanted the people reading this to know that despite the happiness depicted in the photo, it wasn't entirely a bed of roses. Group 3 Series 6 was downright depressing.




Heroines in our own little way

The picture was taken by Monica, a Delta trainee, with my camera phone (Sony Ericsson K500i) towards the end of my National Service stint, and the entire process of tinting, adding text and scribbling is the same as for the previous photo.


There's me, Léa and Juliane in the picture - I was a Bravo trainee, Léa was from Alpha and Juliane was from Delta. I wanted to show that despite the odds, we managed to stick together till the end. Also, I wanted to do something special with the "trademark" of National Service, so to speak - the blue combat uniforms often depicted in the media.




Soirée du spectacle

The title literally means "Evening of performance, concert etc.". Manipulation methods are the same as for the above pictures.


It was actually one of the pictures taken during Patriots' Night, or Malam Penghayatan Kemerdekaan, where I was singing Jalur Gemilang. Imagine if those lights around us really appeared ! ^_^




Remember That Day

This was also taken during Patriots' Night, and manipulated the same way. I mean, shots of people lifting their fists into the air and shouting MERDEKA ! (lit. "Independence") can be rather poignant. I took a shot done by Cikgu Dzul and everything else was done freehand. I was watching from the sidelines at that moment, and when cries of MERDEKA ! were heard, our night was about to come to a close. I remember that moment, and the number of times it was captured on photo (at least thrice), so I put in a stark message for every Malaysian to see : 310857 - REMEMBER THAT DAY.

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On a side note, the French Arts and Film Festival starts this 13th May, which is also Ascension Thursday and the last day of my exams. I'd love to be there and check it out !