Rat in the House

Yeap, there was a rat in the house this early morning... Pronounced dead at 0415 on May 21... I think.



Haiz.. I was woken up by the sudden screams of my sis, who went 'RAT!!! RAT!!! RAT!!!" It was a very terrified tone, like those you see in movies and dramas when the female lead gets haunted down by a serial killer or something. It was still dark, so I couldn't see, until someone turned on the lights. It was dad. He was trying to comfort the girl a bit, denying there was a rat, although physically, he was already examining the scene. Then he started chasing a grey creature, which scurried off under the blankets nearby Yang's sleeping area. (The three of us slept in the same room, me on the bed, Ting and Yang on mattress laid on the floor cos it's cooler) That boy was still sitting there, kind of half awake. Dad quickly grabbed the creature along with the blanket, head and body. I could see it's hind legs and tail there, it didn't seem to move much. The elder man left the room with the rat together with mum, trying to find a way to keep the rat away.

As for that woman... that was the first time I saw her in a hysterical state. Crying, screaming (I doubt I can reach that loud a tone) and in fact, shivering, her arms hugging the knees kind of posture (didn't seemed very right to me...). No words seemed to go in, so I tried hugging, which calmed her down a bit. Mum came in again, giving her a cup of water, telling her to sleep on the bed with me for the night. Amid the weeps, Ting said she felt something biting her legs then, which led to the discovery (and drama).

Truthfully, she scared me more than the rat.... Going into the kitchen, Dad and Mum had caged the rat up in a mouse cage, but the rat was kind of lying motionless there. Dad had kind of accidentally suffocated it when he took the rat by the head. (or was it on purpose, I dunno...) They placed the rat outside the house, waiting for the morning sun to shine... I tried to get the kids to sleep, Ann was laughing at the entire situation.... Yang was moaning from pain (cos Mum accidentally stepped on his toes while moving in and out of the room). Ting was (for once) sleeping beside me on that king sized bed. She had a few layers of blankets covered over her (to the head), but I could still her sniffing away. She was still afraid, I think, cos I started to realise I had no space to turn my body with... A back to back situation...

Didn't quite want to wake up at 9am today, but still did. Ting was back to her old self, despite the drama. Mum was wondering what the girl had been using these days, since it wasn't the first time she was attacked by pests. Previously, I saw a cockroach running through her hair one night. Another incident was a bee hovering around her in the morning, and mum got stung while trying to get rid of it. Dad was laughing at how such a thing could happen, cos there wasn't a need to agitate the bee, but seeing last night's drama, guess no one could not help it but just go into the terminator mode... Guess her wailings proved to be a good auto-defense. I couldn't do that, given that situation on me, the rat have chance of living maybe.

Wonder why it would get into the room there... Inspection this morning has led to a floor mat with its corner bitten off. There was a hole in the covering under the door too, though I really wonder how could such a thing could squeeze in? Anyways, there I go again, clean up clean up... Hopefully dun need to face this situation again, it's pretty horrifying to see Ting in a teary, shivering mode.

Flight

(WARNING: Image heavy...)

Yeap, the comic done for 4D final project. Rushed out in 3 days... linework printed from an epson printer and watercolored. Many thanks to Prof Michael for hearing out my rants and pulling me back to the scene of now, that this comic is even done. Just recently, Ruby from maple was ranting in her DA journal, a similar situation that I faced earlier on that sparked off this comic idea. I guess that's what everyone who are to be graduating will face now and then. Strangely that it occured so fast to me... maybe cos it already strike me in poly year 3 and I couldn't really come to terms with this fear... So maybe this would be a gentle reminder to myself when it happens again, haha.

Hmm... there are no words in there, so might get a bit confusing there... My skills of storytelling ain't very good, and somehow felt the meaning of the story pretty ambiguous. Up to how one sees it ba... :)

Sorry about the overlay of words there =_= I was thinking of making it into a short animation clip next time, just an idea...

















































































The first page was colored digitally, cos it was the survivng piece of the first digital coloring tryout and I forgot all about it for the watercolroing (oh yea, so unpro~) Time was running ou and the brown colors was an instinct kind of treatment to the comic, since that way, I could just minimize the job to only tonal value change. The colors were splashed on towards the end as they seem to add to that wake-from-dream feel. Wonderful what watercolors can do..... T_T Just love 'em.

Haiz... coming back to look at it, I wonder what I should do with that question, since I'm a bit more clearer headed now... Somehow, I still dunno nia. It's like being pushed to the back of the head once again, a volcano that'll explode someday again. Maybe I just keep my eyes and head open this time? Michael asked me that day after I presented my work, that 'everything isn't lost, right?' I shrugged. It's just me ba...

The Start of Exams!

Yea... finally, the comic was done... or rather, 75% done... I was about 10 minutes late for class, and somehow, wasn't very frantic about the grade drop and not being able to present my work. Maybe just tired to be even anxious about all these things, but hey, I was given the chance to present, though the last one... But maybe cos I was the last one, no one figured out that the work was unfinished, since everyone kind of tuned out a bit due to the previous presentations dragging the class on for extra 2 hours.

The past three days right after the book was... haiz. The first two days was about orgainising everything, planning the sequence of the story, drawing out the panels. I was kind of tired out by the previous project that I didn't realise that the side effects of staying up late was coming until the head start to numb. Mum boiled some herbal drinks for me, which kind of kept me going too. (T_T) The panel drawing took quite long, and I had to frequently stop to check where the story was heading, since there wasn't any dialogue in the comic and there isn't a thumbnail outline or anything to guide me. All the panels done were final.

Didn't force myself there, the occasional blank outs were tormenting but I just wasn't coming out with anything, head over to the pc to maple abit. T_T Idiot lent me a wa 106 bow.... T_T Never touched an over wa 100 bow.... T_T Maybe after the 3D presentation on 27th, I'll start playing a bit with my new toy....

Anyways, I realised this shift in focus kind of helped a bit to look at the work with new ideas for the panels. Even tossed in an impromptu idea of a bird cage, though I wonder if it might end up confusing others, but it kind of added interest to the supposed monotonous panels of only head and expressions and more heads. (I'll be putting the comic together in flash once I had the time to go figure out that software...)

Was still inking the work on the last day, and by late night, I realised I'll have to get it colored in 10 hours. First try was a colored version, what I initially wanted. Took the color palette of NDS game 'Professor Layton' and tried slapping it there.



It was coming out fine, but took too long. Stopping to check the time, I realised it took me an hour to get to that, which kind of forced me to look for another style. Tried painting it sepia in digital, but accidentally overwrite the file I was working for the next half hour, and decided that I should just scrap digital and do it traditionally.



It was a bet, I doubt I could get everything done by 6am, then it was almost 1 in the morning. Printed one piece of the linework and tested to see it the epson ink was waterproof, and it is. Organised and cleaned up all the panels in photoshop, printed them out with a slight brown tone, and started painting. It was about 3am then, quite a mad race against time to get all about 40 pages done. Couldn't refine it and there were some important details that I couldn't do, since it was already nearing 7 and I have yet to cut the papers and bind them up. The next 45 minutes was just cutting and trimming, finding a nice cover from the bundles of paper on my table (where's the table in the mess...? lol..) Realised I haven't eat, didn't bathe for the day before (did I brush my teeth...), just drain a cup of milo, changed my clothes, grab my things and rush off to school (nope, no running there...)

On the way, I know I was late, Yin Huey and Siew Khim were sms-ing me to ask my location, cos the prof had started the lesson. I was dozing off on the bus when I read them, but was kind of giggling inside too.. the fact that they are more anxious than me... Yea, I quite gave up on even presenting the work (didn't even plan out how to do it too...) But hey, things turned out fine. Was pretty anxious before my presentation at the end, but just babbled on. Up till that point, I wasn't sure if my work had any major intention behind it... other than it being a journey of a girl through which she realises her problem and makes a decision.

Wonder if it was intentional, but the prof took the oppurtunity there to give us some boost for the next three years, a lesson about moving forward even if you go dry... Haha, learnt that for the price of a night's sleep. It was my first time not sleeping at all... The previous record in nyp was 1 hr sleep, and I end up feeling all floaty then. Funny how one can remain all awake and 'energised' for over 30 hours until you closed your eyes and dozed off a few minutes later.

Time to look back and think what to look out for next time... even with all the confidence lectures... ... shake head ar... Just one question mark to stop me from completing 3 projects, but still gotta move forward... Seeing that WSC 'settle and go, dun think twice' spirit there...

Yea, sleep. That was ten hours of it... enough for now, I guess.

Walking Contradiction...

Comic that I did after carving one spoon model out. (Short attention span, lol...) Had some nice time reminiscing the past, but heck, what's over is over, although must admit, some things are just not meant to be forgotten. You'll just keep going back to it, maybe cos that was something that played an important part in shaping you into the current self...? Whatever heh... that short comic wasn't finished. Inspired by my own contradictory self... talk about a firey-water horoscope... shocked me a while there, but at least I know I ain't alone XD. The style was something I wanted to try out eversince I saw Yina's concept arts for her 'Fishing' project few years back (check out the piccie here!) After sometime, I found myself staring into blank space for a couple of minutes and decided to leave the story there. A personal animation potential maybe, lol...

End up drawing this after that. Wanted to try the chinese sort of brush again, with some washes of paint after inking. Yea, anatomy problems are gonna haunt me... And when did I have a habit of putting a spot after a couple of brushstrokes? hmm.....

Oh! The miserable spoon.... XD

Flash-er in the making...

Hmmm.... a week and two days since i started working... and things are quite ok. Still trying to et used to macromedia flash tho. It's similar to illustrator in some ways, but the pen tool in flash is definitely unfriendly...



Did a short 3 page comic when i came back yesterday, about me and flash... or Flasher... haha. Lame-o. XD