Mindflyer for Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific / TLC WorldRiderZ

This is an animated titling work for Discovery Channel’s TLC program about ” WorldRiderZ ” together with Chris Leow from Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific and a production team from Frameworks.

WorldRiderZ is a production that rides around the world to raise awareness & prevention against children Chronic Kidney Disease and organ transplant. You can read the info here and like the FB page here ( https://www.facebook.com/worldriderz )

The brief required a very child-like look and feel to the character drawings with readable titles.

This is the completed title after final compositing work by the Discovery and Framework team. Click and view on youtube.

1) I started the project by understanding the brief and looking at the footage and understanding what is required.

2) Next I whip out some sketches and propose some design ideas on how simple the characters can be. While doing so- in the back of my mind, I am always thinking about how they can be animated.

3) I started sketching with markers on paper but when I got the gist of how to make it happen- I switch to Photoshop and tune a crayon brush to get the look I want.

4) After the sketches have been approved- I do some test animation and get some feed backs. All the test animations are small b/w files I output as animated gifs.

5) Once approved- I start started to render all the animation. All final files were delivered as layered Photoshop/ PSD format.

I hope to do more animation work in future especially those with my original character designs.

You can view more of Mindflyer’s work here: http://mindflyer.com/ or on.fb.me/mindflyer

Mindflyer’s “RUN, RUN” T-shirt illustration for Adidas’s All24

This is my new illustration to be printed on T-shirts for runners who are participating at the Adidas’s All24 event ( http://www.adidasall24.com/ )

Process

01 – My initial sketch to get approval for the composition. I was aiming for an Escher-ist kind of effect of an triple infinity loop filled with crazy runners.

02 – I have to make sure my key elements stay in the shaded area and make sure my illustration is not too busy under the headline

03-  Colour Test – the brief dictates that the illustration must have a dorminant red colour feel to it. To avoid over doing the red- I used some benday dots to supplement the effect.

Mindflyer’s “SCENT” at IDOLISM: OIC X A CURIOUS TEEPEE

Had the privilege to participate in IDOLISM and to work on some pieces to fill a big wall at Curious Teepee with Miun/ Noreen Loh (http://miun.sg/).

We set some base ideas and develop our own directions from there:

1. Same material to work on unprimed cotton or Calico

2. The theme is to draw inspiration from Iconic perfume bottles we love

3. Size of the art work is approx 1.2 m by 1.4 m

My concept –  Scent is just another form of “flight” packed, given a “shape” , a fashionably iconic bottle – so you know what you worship. ( material Acrylic on Calico )

Almost all artworks are for sale- do check it out! On till Sunday 22nd May at A Curious Teepee, 12pm to 9pm daily. ( Map is here )

Info on the IDOLISM exhibition –  http://bit.ly/lUUdT9

The Process – Love Is In The Air

Hi there everyone…I would like to share one of my painting’s processes with all of you.

So let’s start!

1. Concept: I was just thinking to draw something wild, adventurous…so came up with the idea of kissing lovers in the air, was laughing on my own idea so this is the first doodle I made.

2. Drawing & Composition: It’s time draw details…the dress code of the lovers, their vehicles & the city structure. If you are wondering about those sinister buildings then it’s intentional..yes, to show the bravery of the lover, I just wanted to add more drama in the whole composition, it also depicts that these two lovers are so passionate about each other that they don’t really care about the consequences of their Kiss.

Since I wanted to show something Futuristic yet ancient (sounds silly I know!) to make it more clear, I would like to say more about the culture I was looking for…

this city is somewhere above the sky and they are living there from ages… I tried to show more organic feel, like it’s made with natural stuff. Check out the overlay building’s roof.

As u can see, I’ve added few elements (Overlay) to add more depth. I wasn’t sure about the colour scheme till this moment.

3. Colour scheme: Since its going to be an ancient fantasy…I thought about Golden Yellow scheme.

So I created a new layer and filled Golden Yellow and tried the blending mode options. It’s a great option to achieve harmony in the artwork. Sometimes you can get lots of unexpected and beautiful effects

through this feature. I think most of the people are already aware about that. So as u can see here the look and feel is changed due to the blending mode adjustment. Now I started adding details in overall composition.

Sometimes I don’t follow the ideal process and work on different area at the same time. To show the depth of field, I made the foreground elements blurry

using Gaussian Blur filter. So I suggest working with lots of layers, so that we can tweak each layer separately without spoiling the whole artwork.

4. Background: Background was almost merging with the characters…so added light pink colour on a separate layer to add more depth in the background. So the character will come out.

5. I think we should take a break and see the same work once again after some period of time. After looking at this artwork after few days, I realized that the composition was too tight for the subject.

So I made few changes… minimized the character’s sizes and flipped entire canvas.

It was looking better than before…then started working on the details. I chose Calligraphic Brushes…these Brushes are great for painterly look & feel.

6. Final details and tweaks: I’ve used smooth edge brush around the character to avoid those sharp edges…added clouds and light in the sky. Hope u enjoyed the making. Click the last image to view the final bigger image.

Happy Painting!!

Process – Blueberry Cheesecake for BLU Shangri- La with TBWA Singapore

Alright guys, some analog stuff. Behind the scenes and process for a very interesting project with good friends which were from TBWA Singapore then, Pei Pei, Ng,  Merlin Kwan and David Chan. Another piece was crafted by our OiC darling, Sokkuan. An amazing illustrator in her own right.

1) Straight forward agency brief complete with idea and sketch.

2) Counter sketch from my side to enchance idea. Execution style is discussed and agreed upon with the creative team. In this case. Heavy body and soft body acrylic style.

3) Preliminary colour proposals done in photoshop.For analog or natural media work, this stage is very crucial because there is not much room for amendments when it gets to the real thing.

4) Final stages of colour, look and feel approved by agency creatives and  client. Canvas and paints are prepared and halfway through the completion of illustration, art director steps in for minimal final touch ups and amendments.

5) Voila! Final touch ups and off to the photographer to do his magic lighting. Crucial stage as well because photographing paintings need another set of skills.