Roar

So I've been a bit quiet recently. Football has wound down for another season and I've been in a bit of a lull as I slowly apply for jobs and chilax for a bit. Gonna gear up a bit this weekend though as I head to Melbourne to watch the Victory play Roar on Sunday. Also gonna catch the Picasso exhibition, the Da Vinci Machines exhibit, meet up with Kenny and maybe see what the Melbourne Fringe Festival has to offer. Stay a bit with my rellies and also with Gof, before some window shopping on monday before coming home.

Last time this year it was my goal to get pro at DDR. I didn't quite hit the lofty heights I aimed for but I certainly improved to a happy amount. This year I want to be a pro breaking bboy! Gonna need to work a lot harder at this one, as over the last year or two my body has been getting smaller and smaller. Will have to change my sleeping, my eating and my training to get strong enough to do mad skillz movez, plus I have to get my leg as good as I can flexibility and strength wise.

It appears my right foot indeed broke before June and set wrong. I've got a little 'pain button' bump on my foot now which might require an operation at some point between now and next year. Looks like I'm in for another injury interrupted football season, oh well.

I bought the Street Fighter Ultimate Edition tradepaperback (bound comic book), and it roxors my soxors. It's oversize, full glossy, in a different order, great art, and loads of extras including full bleed art and some cute mini comics. Been doing some drawing from it but am slowly progressing to a bit of freehand original art, albeit inspired. Part of this reason is that although the Ultimate Edition is a feast to behold, it's also a beast to hold singlehandedly while I draw with the other! A feat that was more than achievable with the tiny digests.

Been listening to a bit of new music. I'm pretty disappointed in the new JT album, it's mostly wimpy boy luvs girl pop. One or two tracks are alright, mainly in the first half of the disc, my fave is prolly Love stoned, but even the first half of that I don't like - it's like 2 remixes in the one song. Snow Patrol is pretty cool, but I'm just listening to them as each single is released. Nelly Furtado was not too bad, but the album as a whole lacks bite. Now I'm on the Step Up album, and I'm gonna have to watch that movie soon! Not only for the mad breaking skillz but the soundtrack is pumpin fo real. Sean Paul ft. Keisha Cole - Give it Up is top of my pops.

Lazy Boi is dead, a new comic cometh

Lazy Boi has officially finished it's run.
It's a comic about a lazy person... OF COURSE I"M GOING TO GIVE UP!!
Still 5 comics is 5x more than my last comic! hehe - small steps.

3 issues per week... no one can say I don't have ambition. Discipline is another matter entirely...

Part of the reason Lazy Boi is gone is:

• I was drawing them at night, after issue 5 I was returned to waking up before noon like the rest of humanity.
• I'm not interested in drawing that style anymore since I've resumed sketching.
• I'm lazy!

So now I have plans vaguely in my mind to start drawing some comic book style pages as opposed to comic strip style. A lot more work is involved with that, so there is no chance they will be in colour although I also intend to practice inking and colouring with the tablet eventually. I'm thinking maybe some tight storylines on whatever story fills my head, so that they only need to run a few pages long so that when I do give up, something is complete or close to completion in a neat small package. That's the plan, or more accurately idea, at this stage.

Finally got Titan Quest working with a workaround I found on the net to stop the incessent crashing, and think I might 'borrow' the Titan Quest environment for my first 'mini comic' trial.

Comic Book Sketches

I've reintroduced myself to comic books and in particular comic book art.
I picked up Street Fighter Legends: Sakura issue 1 after checking out the comic store in the centre of the city bus interchange on my rare venture out of the house and into day time. The art is great, and the comic itself is full glossy and the story line is very amusing. I've always liked the Street Fighter storyline which is difficult to get a hold of as it's included in bit's and pieces over the series of games and occasionaly in merchandise and art books which are generally in japanese in Japan.

Since then I also found Street Fighter vol.2 trade paperback which collates the earlier successful series of Street Fighter comics. Unfortunately it's in reduced form (50%!) which sucks, because the art in some issues is great. The pages are still glossy fortunately, and only 1 image (a centre spread) is not fully visible because of the binding of the book.

I've switched to drawing on A4 sheets instead of in my art book. This happened cause I was between sketch books for a while but the move is a good one I think because the paper is whiter, smoother, and landscape format is good for spacing images. Here are the best of a heap of drawings I have been making over the last 2 weeks. Next to none of them are original pictures though. They are free drawn sketches from comic books - after I drew my fave images from the Street Fighter series I dug out a few old X-Men issues by my fave X-Men artist Joe Madureira.













My Artwork

End of Season

Football is over now. My mens team played very well and went down in the tightest game by the narrowest of margins 3-2 after surrenduring a 2-0 lead in the second half. But a host of chances at both ends by 2 very competetive teams in an exciting game. In the final analysis we were let down by tiring players with a handful of small injuries and lack of fitness.

Can't wait till next season to start assembling a new team to push on!

Also copped a huge double whack on the shin. The first tackle shifted the shin guard and the second whack was pretty solid! It came up a lovely bleeding red and swollen purple. RICER (Rest Ice Compression Elevation) actually works would you believe it! I threw some ice water on it for about 20 minutes after the game, then bound it lightly with a compression bandage and elevated it to pelvic height (put my feet up) for about 30 mins later. The day after all thats left is the skin scarring, no swelling and no significant bruising!

Optimized workspace

You know... just in case one day I do any work :S....

Finally got some overdue maintenance done on the comp. Sorted out the agp issue I was having. Blew out the bulk of the dust clogging the mainboard. Cleaned my desk which had become overflowing with crap. And neatly arranged my new wacom tablet.

Did I mention I added another monitor? :D SWEEET! :)

It is very cool.

Football
In other things. Womens finally ended. Not quite a relief and I wasn't waiting to escape. But this season has been a bit of a drain on my available resources. Men's might have snuck into finals which would be great coz I was pretty bummed I had to ref the entirety of our final league game. That sucked.

Father's Day
Had lunch with Dad and Jo and his chinese boy at Mt. Stromlo. It was a pretty nice salad - Prawn and Mango. Gale force winds was pretty crazy up there!

Comic
Still getting used to the tablet, and am not used to drawing in the day time. Wierd eh? My return to the land of the living coincided with no more work on Lazy Boi. Win some lose some.

Job Hunting
ugh... I dun wanna think about it

Great Day

Yesterday was a great day.
Woke up early (10.30am!!).
Perfect weather.
Clipped some job ads from the paper (It's a start!...).
Fridge was full, soon my tumm was full.
Was lookin GOOOooOOOoooddD! Had the urge to dress well and fulfilled said urge.
Joined Luke for errands and shopping.
First picked up Street Fighter Trade Paperback Comic Book Volume 2 - which rox!
Then Luke (who is AWESOME!) bought me a WACOM TABLET!!! :O (late b'day pressy)
Fo real. So I bought him lunch hehe. What a deal!
Then returned the nets and joined womens training were we had a leisurely run about. Training was unfortunately poor again, and I've made final my decision to not take women's next year.
Got home, ate pizza, watched a movie. Noice.

Here is my first doodle with the Wacom Table straight out of the box. I am going to need a bit of practice!!