The Toughest Day of the Week

Hey guys, I just wanted to share a quick story of how an ideal day should end. So the Packaging midterm was supposed to be due on Friday afternoon, complete with tight presentation and display boards to go along with the gazentas (that's what my professor refers to the items included in the packaging project). It's an individual project and everyone in the class had the freedom to choose what packaging or kit they wanted to make.
I decided I'd do something simple and relatable to Art Center community: making a finals week survival kit, mostly because I'm concerned by the fact that most Art Center students are often overwhelmed with their projects approaching the finals week that they neglect their hygiene and starve ourselves.

Band saw and Laid

Hey guys,

Guess what, it's a long weekend! I won't have class on Monday, which is good. What makes it even better, the homework load is not as crazy as I thought. But I know I will regret for saying this in the latter.

This term, I'm taking the last required class for integrated studies, and that is Materials of Art and Design. Honestly, I'm not really fond in building and making things. Cutting, sawing, and carving are just not my thing, which explains why I never had any pottery class. However, the first two projects seemed to be a fun thing to do! The first project involves carving a name out of a 0.5 inch MDF wood using the band saw. Frankly though, I hate the earsplitting sound of the blade cutting through the material. That machine doesn't seem so friendly.

But I'm pretty fond of how it turns out!

Ideas are everywhere, literally..except...

These past few weeks, my roommate and I have been working profusely on our Design 2 midterm, which includes 6 different abstract compositions made into different formats of artwork (print, painting, installation, sculpture, 3D work). Basically, we need to convey the 4x4" mockups that I posted previously on this blog into a real artwork.

It's pretty hard to find ideas on what to do for these 6 compositions in color, like what materials to choose from and how you are going to execute them. The class professor suggested that the students should go out and do some activities to draw inspiration. For example, my roommate and I went to Orchard Supply Hardware to look for materials. The variety of materials the store has suddenly showered both of us with some ideas of materials and format to work on for this project.

...which ironically barely happened on my campus, or at least in my class, since everyone became stressed out due to the hard critic almost all of us got in type class.

Dots, lines, and tricks

I still don't have a chance to continue my North Sumatra story. Things have been quite hectic, particularly for one class. Yep, Design 2 has been energy and idea drenching for the past four weeks, where we all had to come up with 30 4"x4" abstract compositions. The requirements for each compositions vary, and so are the concepts.

Compositions: Symmetry, Asymmetry, Figure on Ground, Figure and Ground, Depth Gestallt, Pattern based on a decade (I chose 1920s), Unity by Diversity 

Color/Temperatures: Emphasis by Hue, Emphasis by Tint/Shades/Tones,
Emphasis by Saturation 

Concepts: Anomaly, Technology, Dynamic, Luxury (I screwed this one)

home and jetlagged

Posting this at 1:26 am

Hey guys, sorry for being missing for quite some time.

Since the spring quarter ended, I've been busy packing and moving to Socal, not to mention apartment hunting with my future roommate (who's really one awesome person).

Anyway, I'm back here in Indonesia!

After a year being away in the States.

I didn't take a lot of pictures during my moving process, but I did take quite some pre-leaving Bay Area, farewell, as well as my short visit to Pasadena pictures.

Tribute to Ms. Theron

Hi guys, say hi to another post of the weekend! Woot woot!
I'm not going to talk much about my personal life - instead, I'd just like to show you some of the stuffs I've been working on.

Recently, I saw Snow White and the Huntsman. Appearance-wise, the prince was worth the look (although the guy who played in the prince in Mirror Mirror was much yummier). Acting-wise, Ms. Charlize Theron successfully blew my mind, which automatically makes her officially one of my most favorite actresses. As for Chris Hemsworth, it's no surprise that his axe-swinging moves resemble that of his Thor's signature hammer-swinging move.

Kristen Stewart? All I see is Bella Swan in a medieval costume -_-

v.1 Charlize Theron
Making this photo manip was such a pain, considering that I'm running out of battery for my mouse
Designing without a mouse = painting without a brush.

Quotation poster
One of my design weaknesses is always coming up with a crowded composition
This time, I tried to go a bit against my normal standards, hope I pulled it off.

I know, I should be more productive when it comes to designing, seeing that I'm counting down the days to enter an energy-sucking art school. I'm currently still on my steps to develop particularly my Illustrator skills - speaking of avoiding Photoshop for a while.

Next up, I'll be posting up the continuation of Orlando story and probably some good pictures from my New York trip on winter, with slight captions.

Have a great night guys!

3D stuff

You might be surprised to see me coming up with completely different design type. I'm not surprised if you ARE surprised, because 3D is something I have never approached before. Honestly, it takes up more effort than doing 2D (especially that'd be a plus point if you have a good 3D sense, which I'm lacking of, unfortunately). So taking a 3D class this quarter is definitely a challenge but I've liked it so far.

The following two pieces that I produced - you might think, "only two?", but seriously the work time took FOREVER - are the results of the last seven weeks of studio time.

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THE DEMENTED CAT AND ITS POOR PREY
(Wire project)
Medium: Black wire of 20 gauge and 24 gauge, white wire
Inspiration: Tom and Jerry
Highlight: The cat's face
Emphasis: movement
Note:
I wanted to emphasize movement and aggressiveness as portrayed by the cat's pose, hope that came out well. In addition to that, I also thought of making the two "sequels" of the piece, involving the cat lifting up the mouse in its claws, followed by the mouse - now dead - clutched in the cat's mouth. And yes, it's hard to crimp and twist the thick wire since you need a tool for it, whose name I forget. Wish I could have developed more details on to it though ><












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BIG BANG
(Geometric form)
Medium: cover papers of assorted colors and patterned paper contributed by Indri
Inspiration: Solar system????
Highlight: I just loveeee the two balls hanging on each sides of the wire. By the way they are movable.
Emphasis: Interpeneration, Interlocking, Juxtaposition, movement
Note:
According to my classmates and instructor in the critique today, the piece looks "fun, entertaining, and funky". I'm pleased that it received positive reviews. I didn't know where I got the inspiration from cos basically I didn't have the basic sketch for it. I instinctively started off making various kinds of unit (blocks, cubes, pyramids, and even the ball) then put them all together.



















Okay, I'll stop it right there. Don't worry, I'm not going to convert this blog into a complete design blog. I'll still be working on stories, but let's just wait for the right time.

Have a great President's Day long weekend holiday!

Some Digital Artworks

It's been a while since I haven't posted my recent designs on my blog. I'm considering to put these in my uni application portfolio. As you might have recalled, I once specialized in signature, banner, and avatar designs before I finally got to explore broader aspects in designing. So here are the results as of now. FYI, I taught myself Photoshop techniques and effects through video tutorials and I'll keep doing that to improve my skills!

Feedbacks are strongly encouraged!

Title: Sans Titre: A Wine Company
Type: Logo
Description:
I made this in response of my friend's request. She was making a fictional winery business for her business class project.

Title: Little Obama Screening Invitation
Type: Invitation
Description:
Indonesian Student Organization held a movie screening event to promote Indonesia to American society as well as International Student.

Title: Turning 25-Cho Kyuhyun
Type: Signature
Description:
I was kind of bored on February 4, a day after my Super Junior bias' birthday (it's no other than Cho Kyuhyun, the evil magnae). So I came up with the idea to make a tribute to him. I gotta say I love the lines in the background of the text!

Title: Happy Dragon is Happy (Happy Lunar New Year)
Type: Illustration
Description:
I haven't done coloring on Photoshop for two years. Last time, I took a coloring class in Machiko Manga School and how surprising that I still remembered how to apply the techniques they taught me.

Title: A Tribute to Alicia Keys
Type: Typography
Description:
Finally, a typography work! I have always wanted to make a typography but I never quite found out how. After seeing a video tutorial about a typography technique, I went on to make a piece, and this Alicia Keys was the result! Why Alicia Keys? Well, I just got back from New York when I made the piece, and New York somehow reminds me of her ;)

Title: A Tribute to Paul Klee
Type: Typography
Description:
Paul Klee was renowned for his painting and the colors just inspired me to make a typography piece dedicated to him (Well, typography isn't his kind of artwork but still...)

Title: When Life Gives you Melon...
Type: Typography Poster
Description:
It's a veryyyy simple typography work I did shortly after I finished the "Small Inspiration" one. I actually had fun experimenting on different types of typography and this "Lemon" piece is the result. Anyway, I didn't make the vector on my own. I found it on sweetclipart.com.

Title: A Small Inspiration can light up the Whole World
Type: Poster
Description:
It might look simple, but I'm trying to emphasize the lightbulb. Through this poster, I'd like to emphasize the message of the quote and relate it to the whole design.

Title: ISV Cover#1
Type: Slide Cover
Description:
My past covers were less creative because they normally took form of collages and blended images. So I was thinking to come up with something more creative. Later on, I decided to mess up around creating shapes with pen tool until they formed what now looked like little humans. The hands were purposely gestured to resemble the letter V for "Volunteer"

Title: ISV Cover#2
Type: Slide Cover
Description: My past covers were less creative because they normally took form of collages and blended images. So I was thinking to come up with something more creative. Later on, I decided to mess up around creating shapes with pen tool until they formed what now looked like little humans. The hands were purposely gestured to resemble the letter V for "Volunteer"

Title: Closing the Quarter
Type: Signature
Description: In celebrating the end of Winter Quarter, ISV took a trip to Global Winter Wonderland at Great America. The signature was to be displayed on the FB event page.

Title: Ice Breaker
Type: Illustration Slide
Description:
Okay, this one might not be that great or anything, but I just found it funny somehow. I created it within fifteen minutes (a short period of time to make a design). This utterly simple piece was to be placed as a slide in ISV meeting presentations. So when the slide in the presentation turns to this "Ice breaker" one, then everyone knows that it's time for games.

Title: ISV Flyer
Type: Flyer
Description:
This is a flyer I created to promote ISV in the club day. I didn't know what I had in mind when I made this. Probably I was possessed with the "Circle Syndrome" by the time I made it. There are just too many of them there!

BONUS!

Title: Dreams and Fantasies
Type: Self-Portrait
Description:
My second self-portrait! I made this in response of UCLA's portfolio requirement. I actually had a great time making it, although self-portrait is not really my specialization. Anyway, the stuff floating over me represents my favorites which are: music, dance, books, fun (depicted through carousel), art, books, and obviously Disneyland on the very top.

(My scanner kinda sucks. No matter how many times I tried to scan it to the computerthe entire frame, it kept getting slightly cropped on the edge).

New Look!

Hey all!
See something different here? Yeah, maybe you've seen it up for a while. But yeah, finally, it's good to announce that...

We have a new look!

Getting out of the pink area! Yay!

I like summer-y color these days and I think it would be great to use them for my new theme. It also kinda shows that I've been into a combination colors of pastel pink, blue, green, and yellow/cream. These days, I also fall in love with stripes, which might explain why I have that up for the background.

I finished messing up around with the banner. As you can see, I first used a not-so-good yet temporary banner, but I thought putting up just a typography for a banner would suit just fine.

Well, I hope you like the new theme.
Anyway, I've got something for you guys. Out of the blue.

It's just some discussion I had with four of my friends on Facebook. We talked about a particular picture (a dream room for four of us) but ended up having 1,013 comments!

Have a great day!

Sweets have never been so tempting

Apparently I don't have enough spirits to post any stories significant to my recent life. Right after spring quarter was done, I only had about four days to take a deep breath then another tense life waited after the weekend.

If you ask, I've been doing just fine. Good news is...

Picture by Martin Neuhof

summer is
h e r e ! !

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Say yay, beacheessss!!

So, hello sandals, shorts, T-shirts, tank tops, BIKINI (dude, I'm saying this as if I have one), and uh thin-layered outfit. I guess I've said this for zillionth time but if I have enough time, I'll definitely post some stories here. Hopefully that time will come pretty soon, cos writing stories indeed takes up a lot of time. So full dedication is strongly required.

In the mean time, I'd like to show you guys some of my latest artworks. I'm doing this cos I don't know what to post aside of stories. I simply want to keep you guys posted.

This is the final project I have for Web design class. I gotta say it took up a lot of time and hardwork on it but I'm satisfied about how it turns out to be! Well, the professor actually only allowed max 3 pages. But I ended up making 4 and had no idea which page I had to eliminate in order to meet the qualifications!

Homepage


Premade cake selection


Cake information


Customize cake

Anyway since the theme of the final project is making a fictional self-established company website, I came up with the idea of making a unique pastry/cake shop! Apparently there was someone else in the class who had a similar idea, so I decided to alter the concept a little bit. My cake business is a bit different since I allow visitors to customize their own cake and order it.

Even the professor said this to me:
"You should open up this shop. That's your next assignment."

Ha. Right on, sir. First I need investments and I'm gonna need a couple of people to help open this business. First and foremost, the most fundamental thing ever to do is: I might need to change my major to business or culinary arts haha.

Anyway, what a fun thing to do, right?

Back to spring-summer transition. I had a great time on the weekend. Okay, I know I said I wouldn't post stories but it wouldn't be such a big trouble for me to post one of them briefly. With spring's done, a lot of my friends are transferring, moving out, moving in to a new apartment, graduating, or going back for summer vacation. I attended like 4 farewells over the weekend.

One of the farewells I attended is Agnes'. Well, she's going back to Hong Kong for summer. My friends and I planned to hang out with her before she went back.

Right after finals, we went to have lunch at KFC (we were actually going to have lunch at Curry House but then it was packed with people so...), then we had karaoke.
While waiting for the bus, we took bunch of pics.

...even the bus wasn't able to stop our narcissism mode.





It took a while for us to get to Music Tunnel. We stopped by at KFC near the bus stop. Before choosing KFC, we were thinking to have late lunch at Curry House, but unfortunately, it was still closed. So, KFC is the alternative choice.

Afterwards, we went on to release our tension in Music Tunnel! We sang songs in various languages. Mostly Chinese, Cantonese, and English for sure, but other than that, we also tested our multilingual skills through Korean and Japanese songs







Guess what song we sang to below. It's pretty easy, so if you're a fan of music, you should know about it.



Get it?

We finished our karaoke quite later than expected, but that didn't stop us to continue hanging out. I remember that Agnes also wanted to see a movie. After all, it had been planned before Karaoke, so we decided to go to AMC to check what was on cinemas.

It was such a pain to wait for the bus. It took hella long time. We were quite in a rush because we were planning to catch a movie before 9pm, otherwise we'd have to walk our way home at around 12 (by the time the movie finished, cos there were no more buses operating at that time). We got there pronto. The line for the ticket box was quite long, considering it was Friday and Friday was always the premiere day of new movies.

It was Cars premiere screening day. As a fan of Pixar movies, it's one of the most anticipated movies for me. I was kinda sad at first since Terry already watched it, but we quickly found the solution: Super 8. We all haven't seen it and I checked the rating on internet and the movie received positive reviews (It even beat up Xmen in Box Office Chart!) So yeah, we went on with it.

Overall, the movie's quite interesting. At first I thought it was quite predictable, but seeing it was produced by Steven Spielberg, I gave it an excuse and changed my mind. We were practically entertained with it. I love the storyline and the acting, especially the grown up Elle Fanning really pulled it off.

After the movie, it turns out that I needed to walk all the way home since the bus was no longer operating (it was around 11pm that night, and I was only wearing shorts, slippers, and thin, 3/4-sleeved cardigan). Good heavens my apartment is located nearly two blocks away from the cinema, but with all the darkness surrounding me, it was quite a challenge.

The night was still seemingly young, as I crashed into a neighbor/friend's party and thankfully managed to stay myself sober. My neighbor was transferring to SoCal, so it was going to be her last weekend before moving out.

Anyway, I don't know why but I'm always having this identity-crisis. Nothing big or whatsoever but a lot of people have mistaken me as a Vietnamese, Thai, Filipino, Taiwanese, and Chinese. Never Indonesian, despite that's what I really am.

It really struck me when an international student I met in Anthropology class went on to me and said. "Are you a resident here?" I don't know why she could identify me as an American. Not just once, but I've encountered quite few people saying that. I feel flattered though, maybe it's a sign for me that my English has slightly improved (yay), but still, I'm proud of being an Indonesian!

Speaking of nationalism, I've got one story I really feel like sharing.
So stay tuned yo! XD