Teo-Ology - Military, Technical & Natural Science Illustration

In Soviet Russia....

2012-01-26T21:34:00.003+08:00

Concept "Black Eagle" Tank. (Chyornyy Oryol) This was a cancelled project. The tank was based off the body of a lengthened T-80 chassis. It got cancelled due to the fact the T-80 performed poorly in the First Chechen war. The reliability issues of the T-80 design was apparent and it presumably got translated into the Black Eagle prototype. However its easy to blame the design of the tank when the tank platoons were sent into the capital Grozny with little training, no infantry support and lack of tactical knowledge of the area. For better or worse, this model is now consigned to model kits and the history books. Shoot over to wikipedia and read about it and the T-80.

Indian T-72 Ajeya variant with ERA armour. Ok its not Russian, but its of Russian make.

Wheels

2012-01-24T21:05:00.002+08:00

Concept Troop Transport

Rollin' on quad bikes.

Happy Lunar New Year!

2012-01-23T03:12:00.000+08:00

Big Cats

2012-01-22T18:24:00.003+08:00

Leopard 2A6 rolling through. Once again, pardon the inaccuracies. This is just a practice sketch and I try to work with watercolors directly. So there's really no planning.

I have a few 1/144 miniatures to take reference from. As well as photos on the internets.

Update. Leopard 2A4 with pen and watercolor.

Dirt

2012-01-22T00:16:00.002+08:00

Merkava IV, winged it to test out the Moleskine Watercolor Pad. The paper isn't too bad, not as bad as the really crap Moleskine Sketchbook but nowhere near the orgasmic feeling of an Arches Hotpress. Direct watercolor sketch, so pardon the inaccuracies and the non-sharpish angles.

Workdesk shot.

Concept Jeep on another cheaper sketchbook.

And a detail shot.

Momentum

2012-01-21T02:29:00.001+08:00

Yeah You Guys Know The Drill

2012-01-20T01:49:00.002+08:00

Fresh Sketches For Jan 012

2012-01-19T01:17:00.002+08:00

I'll paint these later.

I know the M4 for the 2nd piece is off (by miles). No excuses. Oh wait, I do have one....I work directly on ink and mistakes happen. Deal with it guys 8-D

Took Me Long Enough.

2012-01-15T02:16:00.004+08:00

Yep...took me till 15th of Jan to put in my first post of 2012. Busy with a startup. Not so busy that it killed me, but busy enough that I had to stop doing what I usually do. Went sketching with friends earlier today and I feel rusty.

Old School Warriors: Qin Dynasty Infantry.

2011-08-29T23:40:00.005+08:00

We visit ancient China in this post. I've had an interest in the Qin Dynasty warriors for some time but had never really gone and did more reading up on it.

At the Asian Civilizations Museum here in Singapore, there's a Terra-Cotta Warrior exhibit. Since I have an interest in really old military things, I took the opportunity to head on down to see the Terra-cotta statues in real life. I got more than what I bargained for. The setup wasn't terribly impressive given the size of the space - but they had one of each type of soldier, from the General standing out front, to the kneeling crossbowman. So it looked like a good opportunity to learn more. And it was.

As I walked around, the whole concept of having references for your artwork being there in front of you is reinforced deeper in me. You simply cannot beat having the real thing in front of you. I could walk around and get a 360 view of what I could never get off the internet search. I could see the leftover red pigments on the lanyard reinforcing the flexible parts of the soldier's armour (they were brightly painted in ceremonial colors as noted by archeologists). I could make out they had different footwear, the Cavalrymen wore something drastically different from the infantry. I could even make out how their tunic underneath the armour was layered. Though they may not be very accurate, I could get a genuine idea how the lamellar plates were layered and where the stiff and flexible areas of the body armour were.

I was gonna reach out and touch them (like I did years ago with a genuine Van Gogh :D) but I can't really be sure if I won't get kicked out - there were several security personnel around at all times.

Also I read on a history buff forum. I believe it was the China History Forum that the Qin army did have shields, and they probably looked very similar to the Han shields that came later. The theory made sense, technology went backwards after the Qin Dynasty collapse, not forward. So there wasn't any reason to believe something used effectively by the mighty Qin army previously would be discarded so soon after the fall of the dynasty.

It was a pretty good exhibit for its scale. I also got to test out the new fountain pen I bought for sketching pretty thoroughly. The exhibit is only 5 bucks, plus its not likely I'll head on down to Shaanxi anytime soon to see the actual dig itself and see the warriors in the thousands, so this will have to do.....for now.

More information on the exhibit at the Asian Civilizations Museum can be found >>HERE<<

Old School Warriors

2011-08-24T01:35:00.002+08:00

Couple of digital sketches for this update.

Medieval Saracen Warrior

One of my favourite units, the mercenary Landsknecht - this here is a Doppelsoldner in full armour.

That's all for this update. Not enough sleep....or caffeine.

Accuracy International AX 338

2011-08-03T03:12:00.001+08:00

Self explanatory. Took a while but here it is.

Balearic Slingers - And Off To The Army

2011-06-12T23:46:00.006+08:00

Balearic Slingers come from the Balearic Island chain off the coast of the Iberian Peninsular. After being absorbed into the Roman Empire, the Slingers were used as projectile troops in the Auxillaries.

More information on the Balearic Isles >>here<< Information on Sling can be found >>here<< **** Also, headed off to do my reserves training for a week. Yaaaayy conscription. **** update **** I'm back from my reserves training and here are a couple vids from Youtube of launching the sling in Balearic style. This guy davidmorningstar is pretty cool and has a channel on youtube >>here<<

Guns Collection 01

2011-06-02T21:09:00.002+08:00

All the nice and candy glossed firearms I've illustrated - up till now.

German Shepherd Update

2011-05-31T23:25:00.003+08:00

The whole world probably knows by now what went down in the wee hours of Abbottabad, Pakistan on May 7th 2011. If you don't.....then you might've been living in a cave (haha, get yourself upgraded coz even OBL lived in a decent house).

By now almost every nitty gritty detail that weren't classified has been let out on the wires. Even the classified ones were somewhat dissected and deciphered to some decent extent by real experts and armchair experts. There was even a dog in the raid!! The pooch was wearing one of these!

>>K9-Storm Intruder vest<<

Naturally we have to update our old German Shepherd K9 unit illustration.

New Firearms Illustration

2011-05-31T22:56:00.006+08:00

Something new for Euro-Optic Ltd.

Banner

Full Body

And a new one still to be completed.

May Update. Its Been A Loooong 2 Months.

2011-05-31T21:55:00.003+08:00

Busy 2 months. Nothing I can make public. But I'll leave with this sneak peek.

Not much more info >>here<<

New Art Direction

2011-04-01T22:13:00.002+08:00

I've been told I should try something new. Something different.

So this is my new direction in art.

I think it looks pretty good. Quick too.

Limited Work This Month

2011-03-30T00:45:00.004+08:00

I can't put up the stuff I'm working on. Wrapped in a new venture and there's really nothing to put up for now. Non-disclosure and all.

Here are some older work from 2009. This was created for Euro-Optic Ltd which is a firearms and optics retailer based out of North America.

In fact they were my very first client back in 09 when I started freelancing full time. Working with Alex on this series was a great experience - I can't say I've had a better client. Though I do still owe him a piece which I'm working on now....I'm hoping to wrap it up ASAP - I hope he's not getting impatient.

Hopefully there's more to show in April.

German Shepherd, K9 Progress.

2011-02-10T19:32:00.004+08:00

Progress work on the German Shepherd/K9 piece. I've previously mentioned there's a full dog underneath that K9 vest and here it is.

Here is a close up of the head.

PMC Dude - With K9!!

2011-02-09T02:12:00.006+08:00

Started work on the K9 German Shepherd today. Took a while to get the proportions right but I think this is pretty good for now.

There's a full dog underneath that K9 vest. It takes longer, but I usually prefer to work with a full body below whenever I want to overlap something. Also because this image is dual purpose, for the web-portfolio and for my collection of dog drawings.

Putting the 2 together:

I'm fairly happy with this update. These set of characters will be worked into the main web-portfolio interface at some point. There's an additional IRobot 510 Packbot to be added. Still in basic stages of line construction. At one point today I thought I lost the working file. Turns out its not in my usual working folders.

AKS-74U PMC Dude - Full Body

2011-02-08T03:47:00.004+08:00

I've posted a half body version before and I'm using it now as part of my printed marketing material. But I needed a full body version for my web portfolio revamp. Its a year overdue and it seriously needs some updating. Almost done, just a bit more to go.

Some parts of the webbing was reworked so I'll need to paint those over. Changed the pants around a little bit but the artwork is generally the same.

Updating Some Old, In-Progress Artwork

2011-02-06T05:30:00.009+08:00

There's a lull due to the holiday season here with the Chinese New Year celebrations. So I thought, I better dig up my older stuff and get them completed before moving back into the current stuff I'm working on.

This piece was last updated maybe 6 months back or more. To put it into context of how fast the world moves (or how slow I work depending on how you see it); When I started out doing this piece, I was looking at using the UCP camouflage for this guy's uniform. As of a few months back, the US Army in Afghanistan has swapped to the OCP - Operation Enduring Freedom Camouflage Pattern. Better known as MULTICAM.

(I checked, it was almost 9 months ago)

To get the details into the gun, I use Adobe Illustrator to path out the features in vector and try to separate out the overlapping areas. After the pathing is done, I can bring the vectors over onto Photoshop to paint digitally. With the pathing and overlapping areas planned, I can then use Photoshop layers to its fullest. This way I can make minor adjustments even after I've done the coloring for the weapon.

This is how it looks like pieced together.

I'm not looking at any real deadline for this. I'm currently concentrating on getting a Natural Science portfolio up to buff my capabilities and also on the lookout for incoming jobs so I'll see how it goes. Shouldn't be a problem.

On to something a bit fun. I got carried away while working on that Year of the Rabbit greeting card and just went nuts with the variety of guns. I just wanted to create one but ended up doing over a dozen and I'm adding new ones everyday. I intend to release them for free use soon - but not all at once. So here are a few to look at - I'll post the vector packs once I'm ready.

Year of the Rabbit

2011-01-31T23:43:00.006+08:00

In a few more days, we'll enter a new Lunar Year and the Chinese will celebrate the year of the Rabbit in their Zodiac. Now, the animal zodiacs as followed by the Chinese were used more for their values than their iconic imagery. That's why there's also a Rat in there (being first among the 12 signs). Rabbits are supposed to be lively, fun loving, popular, good company and so on. I should know - my dad's a rabbit and he's got all of those virtues. But of course he can be a bit thick at times :D

So here's to a prosperous and fulfilling Year of the Rabbit. May good fortune be with you. Here's a little something inspired by Cat Shit One:

For those of you with a little more explosive tendencies....

Also some progress on the European-esque town where the battle will take place:

And a couple of the combatants on one side:

This is an ongoing thing. I'm not even sure I will even start this project. But hopefully I get some spare time to do things here and there.

First Post 2011

2011-01-10T02:30:00.004+08:00

Here we go.

As per SOP - The smallest guy gets the biggest gun. This is the Machine Gunner. I haven't had the chance to add the A-Gunner sketch yet.

A couple of Armoured Vehicle concepts. A Troop Carrier and an armoured truck.

And finally....where it all takes place. This European-esque town is really an amalgamation of 3 river towns in Central France. It probably resembles Château-Thierry the most in terms of layout.

More details to come when I get the artwork done. Working on several things and so far its been a productive first week of the new year.

Happy New Year & New Content For 2011

2010-12-31T23:54:00.004+08:00

Here's wishing everyone a better year ahead than 2010.

For myself, I've had a pretty lazy year. Ill disciplined and lazy. So I resolve to post at least twice a month on this blog and work harder on my own content. And to kick that off, here are some sketches for new content coming in 2011.

Platoon Sgt

SAW Gunner

Sharpshooter

Happy Holidays!

2010-12-24T23:56:00.005+08:00

Transport Helo Concepts

2010-11-25T01:49:00.003+08:00

There we go again - an entire month almost gone. All thanks to the good folks at Obsidian and Bethesda Soft for bringing us Fallout New Vegas....my entire month of November almost got frakked.

There were however some work done and these here are some of the more interesting things from the month of November.

Transport helo concept based around co-axial contra-rotating rotors. Pretty much what the Russian helicopter manufacturer Kamov does. Started out trying it in a Gyrodyne configuration - which was curiously not popular in real life despite its speed and agility. Though its brought back into the spotlight recently with the X-49 Speedhawk Compound Helo testbed.

Subsequent tries were a bit more conventional.

Here's a light 2-3 man utility helicopter. Was kinda interested to see how I can cross the Bell-47 with a Kamov.

Also, a couple of portable UAV concepts.

This one's based on the MQ-8B Firescout. Instead of specialized outboard weapons, what if the UAV could be reloaded by simply mounting infantry carried AT rockets? That would probably greatly reduce the time needed to return for rearming.

That's all for this post folks. I'll be putting up another one before November ends - hopefully.

Disc-rotor Compound Helo - Concept

2010-10-31T23:53:00.007+08:00

October sure went by fast.

I follow a couple of tech and military blogs quite often. Recently I've read that the USAF had an eye on a new medium/light lifter to replace the ageing C-130 Herc. But they haven't quite figured out what they want. A few days later I read on another tech blog about DARPA's experimental Discrotor Compound Helicopter Program. This is actually old news of course - the brains at DARPA had announced this back in 2008 and now they're more or less ready to go into the prototype phase.

Now, seeing as how VTOL is one of those options the USAF are looking at for the C-130 replacement...and how the Discrotor may come into play, I decided to visually duct tape the ideas together to see how ugly it looks :D

Now there may be questions as to why not a tilt-rotor like the Osprey. I think the Osprey is a great machine. Personally, I feel the biggest shortcoming of the tilt-rotor is that when its landing, the 2 (or 4) massive engines are in the way - you can't mount guns on the side and shoot through them if you're being engaged in a hot landing zone from your 3 and 9. You can't mount a gun on top either - coz you don't want to shoot out the rotors too. The only other logical place is underneath where they did eventually fit a mounted gun, but being underneath, it can't really be used once the bird is on the ground dismounting troops. So a Disc-rotor makes more sense - even though its ugly as hell.

Now bear in mind I don't have the operational or budgetary constraints of real world engineers and researchers - its just my pen, my sketchbook and my imagination. I have no real responsibility so I don't have to make sense and the above paragraph wasn't a critique but more of an observation.

More Historical Stuff

2010-09-09T18:52:00.003+08:00

It feels great to be doing historical units with watercolors.

One more piece of Roman Auxillary Trooper

Norman Knights maile coif study - they put on a quilted padded cotton arming cap before wearing the coif.

Subsequently with better metallurgy technology the medieval armourers were able to fashion bigger plates and the Great Helm was born. Full faced protection comes at a price - no peripheral vision.

I've been doing some reading on the Terracotta Warriors too - what intruiged me was really their armour. Instead of simply being overlapped in sequence like Lamellar armour, the Qin era plates were arranged in a way that would have less of a weakness if struck directly from the front.

What's also interesting was the plated helmet that was found in a separate site. That goes to show the Qin soldiers did not go to war bare headed. The Terracotta Warriors in the mausoleum were posed in parade dress rather than full battle dress.

If you compare the Qin bodyarmour to the modern infantryman....

...the design seems timeless.

Of course our anatomy hasn't changed at all since modern humans came about, but bodyarmour has gone through a great amount of changes via available technology and a compromise between mobility and protection. So its kinda interesting we've come full circle. If you look at the internal plate structures of today's bodyarmour - with front and back plates + optional side plates, its very close in layout to the Persian Chahar-Ainé. Ideas remain the same - technology and materials change....but war....war never changes. (October can't come soon enough)

History Weekend - Medieval Military Update

2010-08-28T23:57:00.005+08:00

Trying out some watercolors. Getting back into it with a Daler Rowney pocket watercolor set. Also ran across several BBC documentaries on the Normans and the Norman invasion of the British Isles. And I dug around a bit on the earlier Anglo-Saxon invasion and I've been reading up on the Arthurian legends which were kinda placed in the short span of time after Roman withdrawal from Western Europe and before the Anglo-Saxon invasion/immigration. All very interesting.

Here are some sketches on those topics.

Late Roman Era Infantryman

Equipment of an Infantryman

Granted its not really accurate - The Pilum isn't really in use by the 4th to 5th century just before Roman withdrawal from Western Europe. The course of warfare has evolved by then with the Romans so effective and technologically superior - it makes no sense to train and equip expensive troops when the frontline brawlers could win the day.

On to the Normans - I was intrigued by the written description of their hairstyle. I've given it a modern spin here - when I first heard the description I thought they must've looked a lot like modern infantrymen with crew cuts.

Norman knight 1066AD

There's a lot more freedom when it comes to accuracy of the uniform in this 1500 year stretch. Most soldiers paid for their own equipment and each piece is customized to some extent. Gives room for creative freedom :D

Pretty cool exercise - I need more practice. The Holbien Waterbrush is great if you're working on a more intuitive level as it always stays wet as long as you have water in the well - but sometimes for detail work, I have to switch back to a normal brush for dry brushing. Still, its quite an interesting piece of equipment.

Time Flies

2010-08-01T23:54:00.003+08:00

Kinda busy all thru July. So here's a post.

Rework of older concepts. I've got several things I keep reworking on throughout the years. They're never quite complete so I don't toss em out much. I guess I'll start doing it more often from now - these were first thought up of way back in 2004 but of course only close friends have seen the older sketches.

Still Nothing Done...

2010-06-24T01:32:00.007+08:00

Listen...if you're not watching the World Cup....something is wrong.....WITH YOU!!

Sketches.

Also working on something new. Was pretty inspired by a >>friend<< who got back into drawing comics as a hobby. He claimed I inspired him...well I guess the positive vibes come back after all.

That's all for now. Nothing is getting done at all really. GO TEAMS!!! (I haven't adopted a country to support at this world cup).

Nothing is Getting Done

2010-06-19T22:04:00.003+08:00

WORLD CUP - that is all.

AKS-74U SOPMOD Progress and other ramblings..

2010-05-29T23:22:00.008+08:00

May is almost at its end and its nearly half of 2010 gone. There's this voice at the back of my head telling me "Dude, maybe you're not working hard enough."

Anyhow, the last couple days I put in several hours into the AKS-74U SOPMOD piece. This is part of a package of firearms art similar in presentation style to the title bar (and my business ID). Its not complete yet, there are a few more things to add like a rifle sling and a background, but generally its done.

I've actually got a couple more pieces done in this presentation style for a client. I'll have to talk to him about letting me put them up here. Typically I don't publish artwork(s) before a client uses them for their business.

Also working on a new piece.....as well as several others. Hope to finish the bunch of stuff by 2010 if time permits. Sure as hell don't want to drag it on till 2011.

Changing to another topic.

Quite recently an old friend and paintball buddy of mine messaged me to inquire about my Deviant Art post. Well I don't have a DA account then, so how the heck did my artwork get posted up? After some digging, we both found out that this dude posted my artwork claiming it as his own - its not even copyright infringement, its outright plagiarism. In fact 3 of the work-in-progress pieces of this AKS-74U SOPMOD piece was stolen and posted on his Deviant Art gallery along with 4 more of my sketches, all from this blog. Those pieces either had no watermark or had the watermark tampered with.

I had my friend message him regarding my artwork and he took down the 3 AK pieces, but kept the rest of the sketches up. After a few more failed attempts to communicate with him, I gave up and went to Deviant Art moderators to lodge a complaint. They suspended his account in less than a week of my complaint. Some friends joked that I've finally 'arrived' because someone feels my work is good enough to steal. Honestly I don't find it funny, but I accept that as the silver lining in this cloud.

So the lesson learned here kids - don't steal works from others. The kudos you gained parading the false trophy cannot outweigh the embarrassment of being found out. And its getting easier to be found out these days. Hard work and commitment always pays off.

Last but not least, super duper thanks to Marc for giving me the heads up on this situation. (When you come back I'll buy you coffee...the expensive ones).

Frank Frazetta 1928-2010

2010-05-11T02:43:00.001+08:00

Got this sad piece of news from friends. He will be sorely missed.

A Visit To Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research

2010-04-30T18:25:00.008+08:00

Took a sketch trip down to the Raffles Museum of Biodiversity Research today. Located within the campus of National University of Singapore and tucked away into one of the buildings. I've heard of them some time ago but never really found time to haul my ass there to take a look. So I made the conscious decision to go for a short trip today - and it was awesome.

Did 5 sketches in about 4 hours. Lighting in the Museum wasn't optimal for drawing, but a lot of the exhibits were ancient so I guess the lighting was softened in consideration of the condition of the exhibits - some were from the early part of the last century or late bits of 2 centuries ago!! Here they are:

Malayan Tapir Cub

Sunda Pangolin

Sumatran Rhino - smallest Rhinoceros Species, extremely threatened, one recently captured on film.

Malayan Water Monitor - these guys are awesome. This particular specimen was one of the biggest I've seen dead or alive.

Gaur

I'll definitely drop by again to visit and sketch. Hopefully I can interest more illustrators to join me. Entry is free and if today was a benchmark, then the place is peaceful and optimal for sketching - well like I mentioned, lighting could be better but you can't win them all.

I overheard some chatter when I was sketching away and I realized that a lot of the exhibits on display were once placed in the National Museum of Singapore, which had a natural science exhibit. It was done away after the declaration of independence to allow the museum to focus more on nation building aspects (and whatever). The current Biodiversity Museum had such limited floorspace only maybe 10% of the total collection was being shown at any time. I don't have an opinion on the politics that relegated natural science education to its current position over nation building or whether its right or wrong. But I think its high time we bring it back into view of the public. In the 40+ years of nation-building we've lost a lot of our natural environment to urbanization, if we don't educate this generation - it will be forever lost by the time today's children in Singapore become adults. Heck, I was born in 78 and I have NO CLUE about this awesome collection until I'm in my early 30s. I would hope future generations of Singaporeans don't have to wait till they are my age to experience this wonderful collection.

In fact the RMBR requires money to move to a bigger space (between 2000 to 7000 sqm). I've not received any deals or anything to make this appeal on their behalf. I do so only because as an illustrator, any resource is valuable to me and my work. Without these guys holding up the fort and educating our next generation of biologists in Singapore, I wouldn't have anything to draw. Check >>this link<< if you wish to donate.

UPDATE:
Good news for the museum. They have raised a total of SG$46M and will indeed move to a bigger hall in a new facility by 2014. It will still be within the National University of Singapore campus and it should - hopefully - be able to showcase bigger exhibits. I know my 50 bucks didn't help that much but still...every bit counts. I hope our youngsters here will get a better sense of our region's natural history from this.

News link >>here<<

The Routine Of Working From Home

2010-04-17T01:27:00.002+08:00

You get up, go to the kitchen, get coffee, come back, sit your ass down, work until lunch, remember you haven't brushed your teeth, brush teeth, work, tired, want to nap but cannot, finally gives up and took a nap, wake up, coffee, work till dinner, then slack off a bit, work, maybe do some workout, shower, more work, even more work....too tired to work...sleeep....repeat.....

IT'S MID APRIL!!

2010-04-17T01:06:00.004+08:00

AND I'VE DONE NOTHING SIGNIFICANT YET!!!

Almost all my personal projects are on hold due to picking up 2 jobs at the same time. The burned weekends aren't great but at least the paid work was enjoyable content-wise.

For the first time in over almost 2 months found time to work on my personal stuff.

Weapon Detail:

Figure Detail:

Its just a few extra hours of work put in today right after I shipped off the last article in the draft to one of the clients. Looks OK I hope.

Swiss Army Knife - Not an Original Idea.

2010-02-03T14:57:00.003+08:00

The Roman Army Knife! Predating the Victorinox by 1800 years. Original Article from Daily Mail UK HERE via the excellent blog Soldier Systems.

Sketches.

2010-01-31T20:09:00.008+08:00

Put some ink on paper yesterday - ink always feel better than pencils. Used a single 0.05 point Staedler Pigment Liner (the grey ones) for all of them. It may sound like I'm putting myself through pain with such a small point, but its the only point size I can use to put down light lines and not have to worry about them showing up too much as I pile on the ink. Plus the sketchbook is just A5 in size so its no biggie.

** updated

Couple concept sketches on a SMG design. Kind of a mash up between a pistol, MP7, Uzi and so on. Firearms pretty much work on the same principles anyway.

**Edit: Added another sketch just today.

AKS-74U SOPMOD update

2010-01-19T00:25:00.002+08:00

Tonal and detail work with bits of tweaks here and there.

AKS-74U SOPMOD update

2010-01-12T03:58:00.005+08:00

Linework update for the AKS-74U. The linework for the dude is pretty much done. There's that little bit more to go for the Glock and the Blackhawk Serpa Holster he's carrying, might need to tweak the scale a bit, the Glock 17 is sleek - not small. The linework for the AKS is still at a very basic stage. That would need a bit more work. To be honest I'm not even sure why I bother with the lower body. Chances are I'm cropping it off at the waist in the final product.

Busy with other work. I'll decide if I want to put them up. Its mostly because they're neither military or technical themed.

Small Update

2009-12-21T01:34:00.005+08:00

Long story short - Most of this month I'm on a new contract so I couldn't find time to update stuff. Most of LAST MONTH however - was taken up by Dragon Age Origins. Blame Bioware for making such an awesome RPG.

I've gone back to pencil sketching recently and found myself in need of practice. The problem with using software is the ability to experiment and make mistakes while in traditional work you can only change so often. I do miss pencil sketching though - even though you can't undo.

Here's something I've been working on - a contractor with an AKS74U with quality mods. Still researching the AK so please pardon any inaccuracies. This piece had already been touched up digitally - that explains the sharp linework but the underlying sketch was done in pencil. I haven't had the confidence to ink sketches for a long time now.

Happy Holidays!!

2009-12-15T15:27:00.002+08:00

Where Did The Month Go?!

2009-11-27T21:53:00.000+08:00

I'll be back with something soon. November sure went by quick.

M4 Carbine Progress

2009-10-21T02:03:00.003+08:00

Its almost done - just a few more small parts to go and then its all about testing out the phantom effect. Very likely wrapping this up by the end of this week or early next week.

M4 Carbine Progress

2009-10-16T02:42:00.004+08:00

Going a little slow this week. More tweaking the little parts than actually working the major parts in. There are little things here and there to add and change, so as the old saying goes, slow is smooth and smooth is fast. Placed in the remaining major components that aren't done yet to see how it looks like as a final:

Not too bad - should be able to get the piece done by end of October.

M4 Carbine Progress

2009-10-13T00:35:00.003+08:00

More work done on the M4. Integrated the EOTech holosight and added the entire buffer tube construct. Also added the forward assist key, but it looks off - may redo it. Added a retouched Timney trigger - the hammer spring is in the proper position now. Also retouched the Magpul MIAD grip, dunno if anyone can see the difference haw haw haw.

Just plugging away for now, hopefully will be able to get this up to scratch by the end of October.

M4 Carbine Progress

2009-10-09T05:22:00.005+08:00

Still testing the 'ghosting' - but I've rendered a few more components and tossed them in for a quick look see. They seem to fit fairly nicely and it shouldn't be too much hassle. At this point I'm not too sure if I can get away with a full phantom/ghosted view. Might have to rethink the strategy here - hopefully I don't have to do extra work by doing a cutaway for the rail panels.

Pretty rough last couple days - a rushed storyboarding job with a probability of more work if the pitch is successful. I better go sleep - don't want to fall asleep in class in front of my students haw haw haw haw.

Works on Exhibit - Anatomia @ Ontario Science Centre

2009-10-08T06:09:00.005+08:00

Several weeks back my Prof from school emailed me on whether I'd like to toss in some works for an upcoming Exhibition at the Ontario Science Centre. The exhibit is titled 'Anatomia: An Exhibition Exploring The Art And Science of Anatomy'.

Obviously I said yes and here it is:

It is an honour to have my artwork exhibited among my peers from my school days, and among other talented illustrators and artists of OCAD, UofT and ÉPFL. Much thanks to Ontario Science Centre, Sheridan College, Ms Ana Klasnja-curator of the !dea gallery where the exhibition is held. Last but not least a big THANK YOU to my Prof Kathryn Chorney for taking time out of her busy schedule to coordinate with everyone to make this possible. Couldn't have been easy especially with me being literally on the other side of the world.

Here's a better view of the pieces chosen for the exhibit:

For more information, go here to access the OSC website. If you're in Toronto, do drop by to check out this exhibit.

More M4 Carbine progress

2009-10-06T01:27:00.008+08:00

Pretty much slacked off all of last week - with the exception of my part time teaching and some progress work on several personal pieces - including this one. Here we go:

Timney drop-in trigger. Timney doesn't make a full auto trigger. What they have is highly accurate drop-in match grade triggers for the M4/M16/AR15, but I gave it some liberal creative license - with full technical knowledge just so you guys know its not BS - and made it a full auto trigger. The...errr...selector plate is still not done.

The hammer spring is also....in the wrong resting position haha.

Below here is one of the few files I've worked on. Basically I did the linework for each component and then paint them separately. Made some discoveries while rendering these. I'll be working with photoshop paths more from now on.....lesson learned.

Here we have a 'test'. I'm still tweaking the balance of the masking - since there are many lines, its hard to figure out what to sacrifice yet what detail to retain while masking the surface layer to reveal the internal components. More tedious than difficult.

Thats all for this update. I'll have another WIP up in a couple days.

Some Updates....WIP

2009-09-27T01:59:00.005+08:00

Its an eventful few days - couple weeks back just as I started work for this client, my computer died suddenly. After some figuring out I thought it was a motherboard issue. To keep the story short, the old motherboard 'exploded' right in my face. I saw a chip glow bright orange and fizzled into white smoke. Changed the mobo and I'm now back in business.

Been working away on the series of illustrations for the current client. I won't post those just yet, I want them to use it first.

But here are some progress work from personal pieces, the M4 carbine and a new piece that I don't believe I've put up here before.

Back to work - man the air smells stale today....

Illustrators Don't Work For Free

2009-09-15T17:01:00.006+08:00

This article was first posted on Craigslist and later flagged/removed. But not before someone caught sight of it and re-posted it on his blog. I don't agree with it all, but I do agree with most of it....like 98%. I'm doing the same by reposting here and I hope everyone spreads the word.

Special thanks to my teacher Kathryn Adams for bringing this to our attention.

Original Post on Position Relative

"Craig’s Pissed
January 23, 2007

I’m a self-employed graphic designer. In the old days, when I was greener than a leprechaun’s testicles, nothing would make me consider suicide quicker than a potential client who was, in fact, just some deluded jackass. The hook was usually, “If you do this job cheap, I’ve loads more work for you!” and I bought that line more times than anyone with an ounce of sense ought to have.

This morning, the following was posted on CraigsList. It’s been doing the rounds on design boards and blogs in a big community whoop because it captures and excoriates so perfectly the ignorance and arrogance inflicted on designers by design morons.

The post was quickly flagged and removed (i.e. censored) by CraigsList users, but not before it became the gift that keeps on giving. Who was that masked crusader? Designers everywhere owe him a hot coffee and a big hug.

Post from CraigsList

Every day, there are more and more Craigs List posts seeking “artists” for everything from auto graphics to comic books to corporate logo designs. More people are finding themselves in need of some form of illustrative service.

But what they’re NOT doing, unfortunately, is realizing how rare someone with these particular talents can be.

To those who are “seeking artists”, let me ask you; How many people do you know, personally, with the talent and skill to perform the services you need? A dozen? Five? One? …none?

More than likely, you don’t know any. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be posting on craigslist to find them.

And this is not really a surprise.

In this country, there are almost twice as many neurosurgeons as there are professional illustrators. There are eleven times as many certified mechanics. There are SEVENTY times as many people in the IT field.

So, given that they are less rare, and therefore less in demand, would it make sense to ask your mechanic to work on your car for free? Would you look him in the eye, with a straight face, and tell him that his compensation would be the ability to have his work shown to others as you drive down the street?

Would you offer a neurosurgeon the “opportunity” to add your name to his resume as payment for removing that pesky tumor? (Maybe you could offer him “a few bucks” for “materials”. What a deal!)

Would you be able to seriously even CONSIDER offering your web hosting service the chance to have people see their work, by viewing your website, as their payment for hosting you?

If you answered “yes” to ANY of the above, you’re obviously insane. If you answered “no”, then kudos to you for living in the real world.

But then tell me… why would you think it is okay to live out the same, delusional, ridiculous fantasy when seeking someone whose abilities are even less in supply than these folks?

Graphic artists, illustrators, painters, etc., are skilled tradesmen. As such, to consider them as, or deal with them as, anything less than professionals fully deserving of your respect is both insulting and a bad reflection on you as a sane, reasonable person. In short, it makes you look like a twit.

A few things you need to know;

1. It is not a “great opportunity” for an artist to have his work seen on your car/’zine/website/bedroom wall, etc. It IS a “great opportunity” for YOU to have their work there.

2. It is not clever to seek a “student” or “beginner” in an attempt to get work for free. It’s ignorant and insulting. They may be “students”, but that does not mean they don’t deserve to be paid for their hard work. You were a “student” once, too. Would you have taken that job at McDonalds with no pay, because you were learning essential job skills for the real world? Yes, your proposition it JUST as stupid.

3. The chance to have their name on something that is going to be seen by other people, whether it’s one or one million, is NOT a valid enticement. Neither is the right to add that work to their “portfolio”. They get to do those things ANYWAY, after being paid as they should. It’s not compensation. It’s their right, and it’s a given.

4. Stop thinking that you’re giving them some great chance to work. Once they skip over your silly ad, as they should, the next ad is usually for someone who lives in the real world, and as such, will pay them. There are far more jobs needing these skills than there are people who possess these skills.

5. Students DO need “experience”. But they do NOT need to get it by giving their work away. In fact, this does not even offer them the experience they need. Anyone who will not/can not pay them is obviously the type of person or business they should be ashamed to have on their resume anyway. Do you think professional contractors list the “experience” they got while nailing down a loose step at their grandmother’s house when they were seventeen?

If you your company or gig was worth listing as desired experience, it would be able to pay for the services it received. The only experience they will get doing free work for you is a lesson learned in what kinds of scrubs they should not lower themselves to deal with.

6. (This one is FOR the artists out there, please pay attention.) Some will ask you to “submit work for consideration”. They may even be posing as some sort of “contest”. These are almost always scams. They will take the work submitted by many artists seeking to win the “contest”, or be “chosen” for the gig, and find what they like most. They will then usually have someone who works for them, or someone who works incredibly cheap because they have no originality or talent of their own, reproduce that same work, or even just make slight modifications to it, and claim it as their own. You will NOT be paid, you will NOT win the contest. The only people who win, here, are the underhanded folks who run these ads. This is speculative, or “spec”, work. It’s risky at best, and a complete scam at worst. I urge you to avoid it, completely. For more information on this subject, please visit www.no-spec.com.

So to artists/designers/illustrators looking for work, do everyone a favor, ESPECIALLY yourselves, and avoid people who do not intend to pay you. Whether they are “spec” gigs, or just some guy who wants a free mural on his living room walls. They need you. You do NOT need them.

And for those who are looking for someone to do work for free… please wake up and join the real world. The only thing you’re accomplishing is to insult those with the skills you need. Get a clue."

090909 - DREAMCAST WOULD'VE BEEN 10!

2009-09-10T00:23:00.010+08:00

Was it the best ever console? Maybe not, but it has some of the best games on consoles ever!!! I had a wonderful time with my DC when it was alive. I still keep its carcass in my drawers, maybe I'll ship it out to get repaired one of these days.

I attributed the downfall of SEGA's console business to 3 points:

1. Piracy - c'mon we all had some 'cracked' Dreamcast games at some point.

2. Sony's marketing power - had us all fooled, PS2 wasn't more powerful than the DC - in fact it took them several years to iron out anti aliasing problems that were never an issue with the SEGA console right from the start.

3. Astronomical development costs of the Shenmue Saga. 70million dollars in USD sure sounds like about average for development costs now, but think back 10-12 years ago where the market isn't as vast as today and neither were videogames as accessible as now (and neither were the profits as readily accessible to the publishers and developers).

Shenmue had a lot of innovative features that were improved from older games - its so called 'quick time events' where you have to push a combination of buttons when the game requires you to - is now de facto standard for some of the biggest console titles (The Force Unleashed and God of War are some examples). Yet very few console games were able to replicate the sandbox feel of Shenmue - save GTA4, Fallout3 and the bigger budget games. It wasn't a profitable business since it was rumoured that every DC owner would have to buy Shenmue twice for SEGA to actually make money on both the console and Shenmue. Still when you look back at Shenmue maybe 8-9 years ago....the graphics looked on par, if not better than the Wii.

Anyway - I think its a shame SEGA got out of the console business - because it meant no exclusives, and the lack of a hardware department meant they weren't able to do things to what they want.

Here's to the good times!!

Video Games ScrewAttack Top 10 Dreamcast Games

XBox 360 Playstation 3 Nintendo Wii

Sorry for the cut off, I my blog can't take images more than 400px across.

Fresh Posts To Come

2009-09-06T23:15:00.000+08:00

I've recently started a series of commissioned artwork and will be slower in updating this blog. I'll toss up things as soon as they're okayed - I want to ensure the client uses them first before I post on the blog.

Till then...

Work In Progress - M4 Sneak Peek - LINEWORK COMPLETE!

2009-09-01T21:53:00.006+08:00

ALRIGHT! The linework is finally done. Took a bit longer than I expected. This represents maybe 95 hours of work. I hope to have it completed sooner but that's that. I have a new commission that might start this month so this will have to take the back seat. Though I hope to have it finished before October.

Here are some close ups.

The full linework setup for Phantomed View. Parts are ready to be painted in Photoshop.

The forward assist key is missing from this. Its already done but the line weights haven't been added at this moment. I'm not really too sure how its going to turn out, hopefully it won't suck - but I'll keep this spot updated so anyone who is interested can follow the progress.

Sooo....Disney Buys Marvel.....

2009-08-31T23:34:00.006+08:00

For 4 Billion dollars. Now the deal might not go thru eventually but board members on both sides have agreed in principle to the deal....

so.....

Just sayin it might look like this thats all :D

Here's one more....I'm having WAAY Too much fun with this.

Source: http://kotaku.com/5349341/disney-buys-marvel-for-4-billion://

PS. I've been offiically pimped by my friend Andy over at ToysReviL. http://toysrevil.blogspot.com/

Work In Progress - M4 Tactical Carbine (sneak preview)

2009-08-31T00:41:00.010+08:00

Can't figure out what's not working, but its not Blogger's problem - its my firefox browser.

Yeah, lots of things going on, I probably should've updated the blog more often.

This is still a WIP. I've placed it on a 30/10 axonometric grid to avoid distortions in perspective, but some bits are slightly tuned because it looks better on the eye. Tested out the EO-Tech styled holosight in colors to see what needs to be tweaked in the linework.

The linework itself took about 85 hours on Adobe Illustrator, and its still ongoing because there are some tweaks here and there with the lineweights and several smaller components like the full auto sear and small springs and catches are not fully included yet. This piece of work is set up for exploded style drawing or a phantomed view drawing which I am attempting - a lot of work up front, but I can get 2 versions of artwork from the same linework. Will be needing another 40 hours or so more for this. The mess you see here is really not that messy at all, its just the way I work - clutter.

More posts coming up this week. Keep watching this space.

New Posts Coming...

2009-08-29T00:43:00.003+08:00

The last time this happened it took me almost a year to start posting new stuff haha.

Gonna put something up over the weekend.

Post Update: Blogger seems to have some javascript problem and I can't upload anything. Once this problem is resolved I will put up new work.

15 Minute Portraits

2009-07-06T02:53:00.012+08:00

Some sketches from the July 09 OIC Portrait Day event at the Red Dot Museum - I really should go more often. All the portraits were of folks off the 'street' (we were indoors) who signed up to model for 15 minutes, so sometimes its a challenge for all artists because they weren't paid professional models. But that makes it more interesting because you gotta use a lot of short term memory. The models also could buy the portraits they liked (there were at least 40 artists there) at 8 bucks a piece - so thats' not too bad!

In case anyone was wondering about the size of the sketchpad, its an A3 (or 11x14 for you north american types)

The pooch (image below) presented a different challenge. Pooches being Pooches, can't sit still for too long - especially when its an 8 month old Italian Greyhound thats full of energy. Still it was a very rare opportunity to get to observe and draw dogs up close, the last time I got to draw critters up close was a few years back when the Prof had a couple of birds - a Great Horned Owl and a Peregrine Falcon - that were brought in for our ornithology illustration part of the program.

I was actually hammering away at this one because its only 15 minutes and you can only get so many details in. My previous experience with dogs helped a lot with the structure so a lot less time was spent on observing and more on actually drawing.

Pooch was awesome by the way, he's a real darling -

Environmental Concepts

2009-06-25T01:42:00.005+08:00

Here are a couple of images hot off the press. I'm bidding for a storyboarding job recently and while I'm not sure if I'll get it, I've taken the opportunity to explore environmental concept art again. Used to do it for a living a few years back - though I admit I'm not the best at it. These are some of the locations I'm looking at for a comic that I'm writing, they're coming along slowly, but nicely.

Hope y'all will like these.

I've also taken my own sweet time to recover from a virus. I swear I almost coughed up a lung.

New addition - just continuing the work - got some new references and hopefully I can put something up next week.

Work In Progress - Polish Winged Hussar, in color

2009-06-08T02:12:00.006+08:00

This is a work in progress. I was looking through my older sketches and I've been wanting to put some colors into my Polish Winged Hussar sketches as found in my earlier post. Its still kinda rough right now, I'm not really looking to finish this up really soon coz of the other work that are bringing in money and the fact I'm easily distracted by so many things.

I've had some difficulty doing research off google images - I don't know if its flattering or embarrassing, but I get results of my own sketches more than the actual images from museum pieces out there. Although I try to be as accurate as possible, there will always be some artistic freedom license (appreciated or not) involved when creating an image from scratch. Hence its sometimes quite frustrating to not find what I need to enable me to create more accurate renditions of this unit.

Further digging did yield several wonderful websites out there with fairly good detailed photographs of Winged Hussar gear and equipment and those sites are worth looking at. Here are a couple of them:
- http://www.jest.art.pl/index1.html <- I believe this one is in Polish - http://www.polishhussarsupply.com/index.html

New Personal Logo

2009-06-04T02:02:00.004+08:00

Been working on some ID/branding job recently. So I took some break time to scribble in my own stuff. And after just a few tries I came upon the idea that led to this:

Now I just gotta figure a way out to integrate this into my business ID. That's all for this week, not much time to hammer things out. Back to the job that pays.

Arctic Sniper + SAKO TRG 42

2009-05-24T01:31:00.005+08:00

The SAKO TRG is one of the finest sniper rifles built in recent times. This piece was created with the same profile style as the previous post, but because I'm not too keen on working the internals so it took a lot less time. SAKO provides a very detailed pdf manual online and it provided great information to work with. The touqe looks unfinished and I guess it is, but it'll do for now and I gotta turn my attention to other stuff.

Without Camo

With Camo

Title Bar Artwork

2009-05-15T03:13:00.004+08:00

The artwork on the title bar was actually specifically created for promo purposes. If y'all think it sucks then I'm in trouble. What's already up now is just part of the complete artwork.

The snubby M4 carbine the fella is peering thru will in fact be a cutaway drawing showing the internals of the rifle. Here's an idea how it'll look like:

This was a rather fun piece due to the research I had to do. I'm rather satisfied with it and its now being tossed up onto my business card, hopefully future promos will make further use of it.

More Dogs!

2009-05-15T02:47:00.004+08:00

Fawn Colored Great Dane
Work in progress of the Grey Wolf - Canis Lupus Lupus
Frakkin furry frak.....

Dogs....yes...dogs...

2009-05-04T18:58:00.003+08:00

Almost 8 months since the last post. After months of neglect, here's something at last.

Profile views of a Dobermann....
....and a Belgian Shepherd Malinois

More to come...

Fresh Posts To Come Soon

2008-09-02T09:07:00.002+08:00

Kinda busy over the last 3-4 weeks and didn't have time to get stuff done. Posts will come soon.

Singapore's National Day

2008-08-09T21:21:00.001+08:00

Uh, yeah. Just thought I'd note it in case I forgot - alright thats all, nothing to see, move along.

Historical Military Units - Polish Winged Hussars

2008-08-07T10:12:00.005+08:00

Cavalrymen are some of the most feared units on the medieval battlefield - all the way up to the 19th century where cavalry still charged against lines of enemy outfitted with firearms. One of the units I find extremely interesting are the Polish Winged Hussars. Known as Husaria where they are from, the Polish Hussars, like most hussar type units across Europe, were first conceived as light cavalry slowly evolving over the centuries into heavy cavalry. Hussars as light cavalry were particularly useful mopping up loose infantry units that were seperated and routed, as well as charging field artillery pieces to render them useless. The Polish-Lithuanian hussar units were reorganised in the 16th century and equipped with long lances and heavy plated armour. This evolutionary path was what made the Winged Hussars stand out over the rest of the Hussar units in Europe. The wings on their backs were a nod to their roots - the hussars originally have painted wings on their shields.

The wings on the hussars backs were either attached to a frame that goes over the cuirass, attached directly to the cuirass or fixed onto the saddle. There are several theories about the wings, like its used in battle to make them seem more intimidating, or it makes a whipping and whooping sound during a charge so it scares the bejeezus out of the enemy's horses, or it prevents lasso attacks and so on - it was even theorised that the wings were only bolted on during parades. So far none of the theories were proven conclusive, but it doesn't take away the fact they are DAAAAMNED COOOOOOL.

So here are the Winged Hussars...

If you want to read up more on the Polish Winged Hussars, check these links out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_Hussars
http://www.myarmoury.com/feature_hussars.html

More Concept Work for Smokinbuns

2008-08-07T09:34:00.005+08:00

Some sketches of ships - head on over to the Smokinbuns Developer Weblog for more information.

Linework For Ongoing Project

2008-08-05T14:31:00.005+08:00

Some line art of the proposed units for the flash based strategy game I'm working on with a friend of mine. Here's a link to the Smokinbuns Developer Weblog if anyone is interested to take a look. Anyway the concept part of the units are more or less confirmed so we went ahead to the linework stage. Here are the 9.

A brief introduction to the project - its a flash based strategy game where you're supposed to occupy bases on the map and slowly strangle the opponent before finishing it off. We've based it off an old Genesis game and hopefully it works out to how we planned it. So far it seems the coding part is gonna be the headache - glad I don't have to deal with that :P

That's all for this post. Will be up again tomorrow or Thursday to put up sketches of another historical unit.

Historical Military Units - Landsknecht

2008-07-31T05:41:00.002+08:00

Landsknechts are German mercenary pike units reknowned for their colourful costumes. I'm particularly drawn to them because they're mercs but they're considered professional mercs and they fight wars for feudal lords in Europe in the medieval periods. They are primarily pike and spear units - drawing their tactics from Swiss pikemen who were some of the best in Europe during their heyday.

The most amusing units in a Landsknecht formation are the Doppelsoldner, or Double Soldier. These are more experienced soldiers who take the frontlines, hence the riskier jobs. For that they are paid double - hence the name Double Soldier. Their primary armament is the extremely large, 5 to 8 feet long Zweihander - or Two Handers. The romanticized version recounting the use of the doppelsoldners were that they charge in with the zweihanders breaking spearheads of enemy pike formations so the rest of the Landsknechts can break through. Truthfully zweihanders were probably a pain to handle on the battlefield - tossed away after the initial contact and drawing their common use sword - the Katzbalger - for close combat when the enemy lines are broken.

Find out more about the Landsknechts here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landsknecht

For now, here are the sketches.

HOLY! Been a week!!

2008-07-25T13:42:00.003+08:00

I SERIOUSLY thought I'd be updating a lot more since there's a few stuff I already uploaded onto the server. Anyway. Here's the development of the Gray Wolf I was working on. It usually takes about 3-5 hours to finish a dog profile but I got sidetracked by some freelance stuff and a job application.

Here's something else I was working on for fun. I hardly, if ever, do fan art. But this is my version of Motoko Kusanagi from GITS - work in progress. So what does it prove? It just proves that I can still draw girls...I used to be pretty good at that.

That's all for this post. Should have something up again tomorrow.

Works in Progress

2008-07-19T03:51:00.006+08:00

A couple pieces of work in progress. Just laying down the linework and lighting tests for now. Actually I've got a few unfinished pieces lying around and just have to get around to finish them up.

I'll post the WIP stages bit by bit when I get them done.

Forgot to add this WIP piece. Canis Lupus - or Grey Wolf. Its part of the "dogs" collection of illustrations.

What can I say, I love canids - dogs, wolves, foxes - so expect to see more. Wolves are fascinating to me because of the way the pack works. Anyway there are a few things to fix on this piece. The muzzle needs to be longer and more tapered at the nose but otherwise the proportions of others seem fairly accurate with the reference pictures I got.

More Sketches

2008-07-17T11:39:00.002+08:00

Its basically the same batch of sketches, just going thru them bit by bit.

Some Sketches

2008-07-16T14:45:00.000+08:00

Some sketches here about the modern infantryman.

There's no specific unit referenced in this, its mostly a jumble of British and Canadian gear. Hope its adequate for a first post.

Hope y'all liked it.

First!!!

2008-07-16T11:27:00.000+08:00

Whooo here before everyone....